Could the New York Times have prevented 9/11 by publishing information and material it had?

That is what is alleged in an Alternet article referenced by Attywood.

Why didn't the information make the NY Times? because Judih Miller was too busy writing a book to report what could have been the biggest story of her career.

At the time I also had had a book coming out. Steve, Bill Broad and I were co-authors of a book about biological terrorism. So we were working flat out on that book trying to meet our deadline. I was desperately trying to get my arms around this series that we were trying to do on Al Qaida. I was having a lot of trouble because the information was very hard to come by. There was a lot going on. I was also doing biological weapons stories and homeland security stories. And in Washington, if you don't have a sense of immediacy about something, and if you sense that there is bureaucratic resistance to a story, you tend to focus on areas of less resistance.

While I don't agree with all the conclusions in the articles, i cannot help but agree with this.

So this is now the third time that the timing and flow of a news article with major impact on the electorate and the American political debate was affected by journalists working on a book, and the conflict that posed with their responsibility to newspaper readers. The others are Bob Woodward's withholding of information about the CIA-Valerie Plame case he uncovered during his book research, and James Risen's warrantless wiretapping scoop, which was finally published in the Times after he finished writing a book on the same subject.

There's got to be a better system here. In theory, we think that newspaper reporters writing books is a good thing, certainly for the career of the reporter and usually for the reading public. But must the public's right-to-know be a casualty, time and time again?

That said, I'd add this -- in the case of the Risen story -- must US national security be compromised to pump -up book sales for second-rate hack rporters at once great American newspapers?

Posted by: Greg at 10:41 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Close Gitmo, they tell us.

The United States should close its prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and avoid using secret detention facilities in its war on terror, a U.N. panel report released Friday said.

In an 11-page report on its review of U.S. adherence to the Treaty Against Torture, the committee said detainees should not be returned to any state where they could face a "real risk" of being tortured.

"The state party should cease to detain any person at Guantanamo Bay and close the detention facility," said the U.N. Committee Against Torture, a panel of 10 independent experts on adherence to the U.N. Convention Against Torture.

The United States should also ensure that no one is detained in secret detention facilities under its control and disclose the existence of any such places, the report said.

The committee said it was concerned that detainees were being held for protracted periods with insufficient legal safeguards and without judicial assessment of the justification for their detention.

The committee was also concerned about allegations that the United States has established secret prisons, where the international Red Cross does not have access to the detainees.

"The state party should ensure that no one is detained in any secret detention facility under its de facto effective control," the report said. "The state party should investigate and disclose the existence of any such facilities and the authority under which they have been established and the manner in which detainees are treated."

And we should give this matter precisely as much respect as Saddamite Iraq gave UN resolutions over the years.

Heck, we just need to repudiate the entire corrupt UN organization.

Posted by: Greg at 10:32 PM | Comments (31) | Add Comment
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And "cigarette" means "small cigar".

How, then, could anyone argue that "little cigars" are anything other than "cigarettes"?

Forty states have asked the U.S. Treasury Department to bar tobacco companies from marketing products they say are identical to cigarettes as "little cigars," a designation the states say lets the firms evade taxes and target younger consumers.

Attorneys general from the 40 states, including Maryland, want the department's Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau to reverse decades-old rules that permit products the size, shape and weight of cigarettes, but have brown rather than white wrappers, to be labeled as little cigars.

"If it looks like a cigarette, smokes like a cigarette and is being marketed like a cigarette, then the federal government should classify it as a cigarette," said Bill Roach, spokesman for Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller, co-chairman of the National Association of Attorneys General tobacco committee. The attorneys general also said the "little cigars" appeal to young smokers because they cost less than cigarettes and come with flavorings such as chocolate and raspberry.

The "little cigar" label allows the companies to pay lower federal and state taxes, and to avoid payments and advertising restrictions required for cigarettes under the 1998 master agreement between tobacco companies and all 50 states, according to the petition for rule changes.

Personally, I find the distinction to be ludicrous, and urge that the definitions be revised and the regulatory scheme made more sensible by placing all cigars in the same category as cigarettes.

Of course, I also think that the mandatory warning labels and advertising restrictions should be dropped as antithetical to notions of liberty and freedom of speech -- for both compelled and forbidden speech are examples of government censorship.

Posted by: Greg at 10:29 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Chris over at Texas Safety Forum notes these two open-to-the-public candidate events in Fort Bend County as we prepare for the June 9 resignation of Tom DeLay.

The first is on May 25.

Sugar Land - The Fort Bend Republican Club and the Spirit of Freedom Republican Women's Club are pleased to co-sponsor a forum for Fort Bend voters that will feature the candidates seeking the Republican Party nomination for the Congressional District 22 position in the November election.

Congressional District 22 voters who want to learn more about the individuals seeking to represent them as the Republican nominee for CD 22 will be able to hear the candidates discuss their reasons for seeking the nomination and can learn more about the candidates as they answer questions on issues in a moderated panel format.

The forum will be held on May 25th at the Comfort Suites Conference Center, located at 4820 Techniplex Drive in Stafford, Texas (South side of Hwy 59 in Stafford). A reception will be held from 6:30 - 7:00 PM prior to the event and the forum will last from 7:00- 8:30 PM.

For information, please contact Fort Bend Republican Club President, Dean Hrbacek, at 281-240-2424.

The second is on June 8.

Republican Party of Fort Bend County CandidateÂ’s Forum

Save the date! On June 8th the Republican Party of Fort Bend County will hold a CandidateÂ’s Forum for candidates to the 22nd Congressional District race. Because the list of candidates is fluid right now, please forward this notice to anyone interested in the race.

The forum will be open to any Precinct Chair from Brazoria, Fort Bend, Galveston and Harris County and will be open to the public. Candidates will be interviewed by local media representatives.

The location will be announced soon. Candidates are encouraged to contact Gary Gillen, Chairman of the Republican Party of Fort Bend County for further details. Contact Gary at chairman@fortbendgop.org

I echo Chris in wondering if David Wallace has been personally notified and invided, since he and his staff obviously are unfamiliar with the internet and the wealth of political resources -- including blogs -- that exist on the world wide web (and which include CD22 blogs like this one).

Interestingly enough, I got a big envelope from the Wallace campaign today -- containing the candidate survey from the Harris County event, signed and dated May 8. I'm betting the "prior committment" that kept him from coming to that event was a ruse, and the real problem is that he couldn't answer the questions in a timely fashion.

Posted by: Greg at 03:25 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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You wouldn't believe the cops this couple ran into trying to get to the freeway on the way home from an Orioles game in Baltimore.

Just call her Officer Psycho Bitch.

Baltimore City police arrested a Virginia couple over the weekend after they asked an officer for directions.

WBAL-TV 11 News I-Team reporter David Collins said Joshua Kelly and Llara Brook, of Chantilly, Va., got lost leaving an Orioles game on Saturday. Collins reported a city officer arrested them for trespassing on a public street while they were asking for directions .

"In jail for eight hours -- sleeping on a concrete floor next to a toilet," Kelly said.

"It was a nightmare," Brook said. "I was in there thinking I was just dreaming and waiting to wake up."

Collins reported it was a nightmare ending to a nearly perfect day. He said the couple went to a company picnic and watched the Orioles beat Kansas City. It was their first trip to Camden Yards and asked two people for directions to Interstate 95 South when they left.

Collins said somehow they ended up in the Cherry Hill section of south Baltimore. Hopelessly lost, relief melted away concerns after they spotted a police vehicle.

"I said, 'Thank goodness, could you please get us to 95?" Kelly said.

"The first thing that she said to us was no -- you just ran that stop sign, pull over," Brook said. "It wasn't a big deal. We'll pay the stop sign violation, but can we have directions?"

"What she said was 'You found your own way in here, you can find your own way out.'" Kelly said.

Collins said the couple spotted another police vehicle and flagged that officer down for directions. But Officer Natalie Preston, a six-year veteran of the force, intervened.

"That really threw us for a loop when she stepped in between our cars," Kelly said. "(She) said my partner is not going to step in front of me and tell you directions if I'm not."

Collins reported the circumstances got worse. Kelly pulled 40 feet forward parking next to a curb and put his flashers on while Brook was on the phone to her father hoping he could help her with directions. Both her parents are police officers in the Harrisburg, Pa., area.

"(Brook's father) was in the middle of giving us directions when the officer screeched up behind us and got out of the car and asked me to step out. I obeyed," Kelly said. "I obeyed everything -- stepped out of the car, put my hands behind my back, and the next thing I know, I was getting arrested for trespassing."

"By this time, I was completely in tears," Brook said. "I said, 'Ma'am, you know, we just need your help. We are not trying to cause you any trouble. I'm not leaving him here.' What she did was walk over to my side of the car and said, 'Ok, we are taking you downtown, too.'"

Collins said the couple was released from jail without being charged with anything. Brook is now concerned the arrest may complicate a criminal background check she's going through in her job as a child care worker.

Collins said police left Kelly's car unlocked and the windows down at the impound lot. He reported a cell phone charger, pair of sunglasses and 20 CDs were stolen.

Baltimore City police said they are looking into the incident.

Sounds to me like someone was on quite a power trip -- and the arrests sound like an abuse of authority to me. That woman needs to lose her badge.

Wanna bet that litigation commences soon?

Posted by: Greg at 02:00 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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I wonder who this could be.

The US Senate is looking into allegations that a former US senator urged Baghdad to give a US company lucrative contracts under the much-criticised United Nations oil-for-food programme.

This is the first time that a leading US lawmaker has been linked to the controversial UN programme, whose shortcomings have been an important element of the Bush administration's critique of the UN.

No name, no party, no state. I wonder why the omission?

The investigation involves one of the most vivid figures in US east coast politics, former senator Robert Torricelli, a New Jersey Democrat who was forced to pull out of the 2002 election after being "severely admonished" by the Senate ethics committee for accepting expensive gifts from David Chang, a campaign contributor. Mr Chang, a Korean-American businessman, was found guilty in 2002 of conspiring to violate federal campaign laws and was jailed for 15 months.

Oh, that explains it -- a Democrat. Bury the pertinent details as deep as possible.

I just have to ask -- French Socialists, British ultra-Lefty Galloway, and now a liberal Dem. What is it about Saddam that drew the Left to him like moths to a flame?

Posted by: Greg at 01:35 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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I am utterly flabbergasted by this story.

A child custody battle between a former Strongsville High School substitute teacher and her former student lover is now over.

Christine Scarlett, 39, will share custody with the father of her 2-year-old son, former Strongsville football captain Steven Bradigan.

The two had an affair when Bradigan was still a 17-year-old high school student.

Scarlett's lawyer Eric Laubacher said the two put their differences aside and did what's best for their son. He said he doesn't believe criminal charges will be filed against Scarlett.

School officials fired Scarlett when they found out about the affair.

Two questions.

First, why is this child being left in the custody of a known sex offender when the father was willing to take custody? I see no reason the judge should have accepted the arrangement.

Second, why is this sex offender not in jail – and deemed unlikely ever to be charged?

Rest assured that if this wee a male teacher and a female student, the pervert in question would be doing hard time.

Posted by: Greg at 11:51 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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If these events do not happen, IÂ’d have to argue that Pat Robertson qualifies as a false prophet.

In another in a series of notable pronouncements, religious broadcaster Pat Robertson says God told him storms and possibly a tsunami will hit America's coastline this year.

Robertson has made the predictions at least four times in the past two weeks on his news-and-talk television show "The 700 Club" on the Christian Broadcasting Network, which he founded.

Robertson said the revelations about this year's weather came to him during his annual personal prayer retreat in January.

"If I heard the Lord right about 2006, the coasts of America will be lashed by storms," Robertson said May 8. On Wednesday, he added, "There well may be something as bad as a tsunami in the Pacific Northwest."

IÂ’ll be the fat guy with the granite concession outside the Robertson residence on January 1, 2007.

Posted by: Greg at 11:49 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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It is hard to argue against the premise that Thomas Jefferson was the greatest intellect to ever occupy the White House, as well as the author of one of the most important documents in world history. And it is equally beyond dispute that without John Adams, the need for that document would have been moot, for he was the firebrand that spurred his colleagues on to declare independence. As much as George Washington, they deserve recognition as fathers of our country. And if Adams is overshadowed by the great men whose presidencies surround his, one cannot argue that his was unimportant.

In less than a week, though, a record they set will be eclipsed by Jimmy Carter and Walter Mondale – that for longevity by a president and vice president from the same administration.

On Thursday, May 23rd, President Jimmy Carter and Vice President Walter Mondale will become the longest-living, post-administration President and Vice President in U.S. history. On that day, they will surpass President John Adams and Thomas Jefferson. Adams and Jefferson lived 25 years, 122 days after the end of their administration. Both Adams and Jefferson died on July 4th, 1826.

On Thursday, President Carter and Vice President Mondale will have lived 25 years, 123 days after leaving office.

"While breaking the Adams and Jefferson record is certainly a milestone, the important thing is how President Carter and Vice President Mondale have used that time," Carter Presidential Library Director Jay Hakes said.

Sorry, Jake – I’d have to argue that the holders of the longevity title remain mediocre and insignificant, especially when compared to their esteemed predecessors. One is an apologist for terrorists and dictators, while the other is a non-entity. Compared to Adams and Jefferson, the best they can hope for is to continue to fade deeper into murky mists of insignificance.

Posted by: Greg at 11:48 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Being married to a Democrat, I have to agree with George Will on this one.

An aggressively annoying new phrase in America's political lexicon is "values voters." It is used proudly by social conservatives, and carelessly by the media to denote such conservatives.

This phrase diminishes our understanding of politics. It also is arrogant on the part of social conservatives and insulting to everyone else because it implies that only social conservatives vote to advance their values and everyone else votes to . . . well, it is unclear what they supposedly think they are doing with their ballots.

My Darling Democrat has values – some of which I disagree with, others of which I simply prioritize differently. To imply that she doesn’t is condescending – and cuts off any chance of the GOP ever getting her and others who fall into the center-left to ever move our direction in terms of setting the direction of this country politically and socially. They are our family members, neighbors, co-workers and fellow church-members, and they often are not that far away from those of us in the conservative movement in terms of the values they hold dear.

After all –one’s position on civil rights is values based. So is one’s position on education. I cannot think of a single aspect of belief or ideology that is not, in the end, based upon the moral values one holds dear. The trick is often not to change the values that others hold, but to influence how they prioritize them and how they should be implemented.

Posted by: Greg at 11:47 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Oh – I guess it is a “fashionable” weird name, given that it has a celebrity cachet.

Chances are you don't have any friends named Nevaeh. Chances are today's toddlers will.

In 1999, there were only eight newborn American girls named Nevaeh. Last year, it was the 70th-most-popular name for baby girls, ahead of Sara, Vanessa and Amanda.

The spectacular rise of Nevaeh (commonly pronounced nah-VAY-uh) has little precedent, name experts say. They watched it break into the top 1,000 of girls' names in 2001 at No. 266, the third-highest debut ever. Four years later it cracked the top 100 with 4,457 newborn Nevaehs, having made the fastest climb among all names in more than a century, the entire period for which the Social Security Administration has such records.

Nevaeh is not in the Bible or any religious text. It is not from a foreign language. It is not the name of a celebrity, real or fictional.
Nevaeh is Heaven spelled backward.

After years of Sheniqua, Tannikka Roshaundra, Kevandrew, Keatrick, DÂ’John, and even a poor boy named Ducky, I donÂ’t even blink an eye any more when I get that roll sheet on the first day of school.

Posted by: Greg at 11:46 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Send this guy back to Honduras -- not only is he here illegally, but he clearly doesn't understand the American concept of freedom of speech.

An Honduran teenager arrested for stealing an anti-immigration protest sign is facing deportation after authorities discovered he was allegedly in the country illegally, authorities said.

Joel Martines, 19, was arrested last Thursday after he allegedly stole a sign being carried by an anti-immigration protester outside a 7-11 convenience store, Southampton police said.

The site is popular with day laborers, many of whom are suspected of being in the country illegally, and has lately been the scene of protests by those favoring strict enforcement of immigration laws.

In addition to being charged with the felony theft of the sign, Martines was also charged with a misdemeanor for allegedly giving police false information about his age and identity.

While in custody, officials from the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency then determined that Martines allegedly entered the country illegally on Feb. 21, 2005, through Eagle Pass, Texas.

A spokeswoman for the Suffolk County District Attorney's office could not immediately say whether Martines was still in the custody of local authorities, or whether he was being processed by ICE officials.

Let's keep him here just long enough to get him the felony conviction needed to permanently bar him from US under the new Senate immigration bill. He is not needed or wanted here.

Posted by: Greg at 02:02 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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My wife has been speculating on a secret marriage for the couple for several months – now it looks like we at least get an engagement out of the romance.

Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban will tie the knot, the country music star's publicist has confirmed.

"They are very happily engaged," said publicist Paul Freundlich. He declined to discuss details of their wedding plans, and Kidman's publicist did not immediately return a call for comment Wednesday.

The Oscar-winning actress broke the news to People magazine Monday after hosting a weekend gala event in New York.

"He's actually my fiance. I wouldn't be bringing my boyfriend," the magazine quoted her as saying in a story posted on its Web site.

No date yet, so I guess I will keep hearing about this one.

Posted by: Greg at 12:00 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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At least according to Muslims.

Dozens of academics, policy-makers and others are meeting in Malaysia this week to discuss "human rights in Islam" at a time when Muslims' tolerance levels have come under scrutiny as a result of the Mohammed cartoon ruckus.

Many Muslim scholars promote an "Islamic view" of human rights, even though their countries -- as U.N. member states -- are expected to support the objectives of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR).

In 1990, the world's Islamic countries signed a document called the Cairo Declaration of Human Rights in Islam, which asserts that all rights and freedoms must be subject to Islamic law (shari'a).

Since the furor over the satirical Mohammed cartoons erupted, the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), a grouping of more than 50 Muslim states, has led calls for defamation of religion and "prophets" to be outlawed.

The row has highlighted different perceptions of free speech, and human rights in general, in the Islamic and Western worlds.

Participants at the meeting in Kuala Lumpur have been discussing these issues, and some suggested that it was time Muslims were more open about the inconsistencies between the two worldviews on rights.

If [human rights] are contradictory with Islamic law, we have to say 'no,' " said Mohamed Nazri Abdul Aziz, a minister in the department of the Malaysian prime minister.

These are not my words, they are the words of Muslim leaders – human rights that conflict with Islamic law must be rejected.

Is there a place for such an ideology in the civilized world?

Posted by: Greg at 11:58 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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At least according to Muslims.

Dozens of academics, policy-makers and others are meeting in Malaysia this week to discuss "human rights in Islam" at a time when Muslims' tolerance levels have come under scrutiny as a result of the Mohammed cartoon ruckus.

Many Muslim scholars promote an "Islamic view" of human rights, even though their countries -- as U.N. member states -- are expected to support the objectives of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR).

In 1990, the world's Islamic countries signed a document called the Cairo Declaration of Human Rights in Islam, which asserts that all rights and freedoms must be subject to Islamic law (shari'a).

Since the furor over the satirical Mohammed cartoons erupted, the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), a grouping of more than 50 Muslim states, has led calls for defamation of religion and "prophets" to be outlawed.

The row has highlighted different perceptions of free speech, and human rights in general, in the Islamic and Western worlds.

Participants at the meeting in Kuala Lumpur have been discussing these issues, and some suggested that it was time Muslims were more open about the inconsistencies between the two worldviews on rights.

If [human rights] are contradictory with Islamic law, we have to say 'no,' " said Mohamed Nazri Abdul Aziz, a minister in the department of the Malaysian prime minister.

These are not my words, they are the words of Muslim leaders – human rights that conflict with Islamic law must be rejected.

Is there a place for such an ideology in the civilized world?

Posted by: Greg at 11:58 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Remember the goofball teacher who showed profane political rants to students? Well, he has been fired.

Steve White, a political candidate and eighth grade teacher, was dismissed from his position late Tuesday night after an investigation found he showed videos with sex acts, nudity and other obscene images to students.

“I think the evidence was clear,” said Dr. Barry Carroll, superintendent of Limestone County Schools, who recommended the Board of Education cancel White’s contract following the hearing.

During a two-week-long investigation in April, Carroll said pornographic material was found in WhiteÂ’s computer and administrators determined that White was showing videos rather than teaching science in his class at West Limestone High School.

White was placed on paid administrative leave April 7. Some of the students who were interviewed following the allegations on April 10 testified during Tuesday nightÂ’s hearing.

* * *
In a copy of the letter Carroll sent White on April 24 informing him of his intention to recommend canceling his contract, Carroll listed reasons for termination as “incompetency, insubordination, neglect of duty, immorality and failure to perform duties in a satisfactory manner or other good and just cause.”

Here is the list of reasons Carroll gave White in the letter:

1. Mr. White lets students watch videos and computer images in his classroom rather than engage in teaching;

2. Mr. White shows videos and computer images to his students which are inappropriate to be shown at school and inappropriate for the age of the students.

3. Mr. White has shown students in his class videos and computer images with sexual themes.

4. Mr. White has shown students in his class computer images purporting to show a former president and his wife engaged in sexual activity;

5. Mr. White has shown members of his class computer and video images showing an older lady answering questions relating to sex and other subjects using profanity. (EditorÂ’s note: According to a student, these were clips of The Fruitcake Lady, a character shown on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno.)

6. Mr. White has shown students in his class a computer image of a girl exposing her breast;

7. Rather than teach science, Mr. White shows students videos and computer images;

8. In violation of school board policy IFBG-A., Mr. White has used his computer to access Internet sites or programs which are offensive and otherwise not suitable or proper for use in the Limestone County School system;

9. Mr. White, in violation of school board policy, has pornographic images on his computer;

10. Mr. White has shown students computer images of a girl with a can of beer and a cigarette.

It is unclear to me precisely which charges wee determined to be true in the hearing, which White requested be closed to the public. His attorney indicates that there will be an appeal.

Posted by: Greg at 11:57 AM | Comments (43) | Add Comment
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It seems like some in the black community won’t be happy until white boys are punished for rape at Duke – guilty or not, and whether or not there really was a rape at all.

The worst thing said in the case involving rape charges against Duke University students was not said by either the prosecutor or the defense attorneys, or even by any of the accusers or the accused. It was said by a student at North Carolina Central University, a black institution attended by the stripper who made rape charges against Duke lacrosse players.

According to Newsweek, the young man at NCCU said that he wanted to see the Duke students prosecuted, "whether it happened or not. It would be justice for things that happened in the past."

Demanding that someone pay for a crime, regardless of actual guilt, is reprehensible. . If such attitudes are common sentiment in the black community, it appears there is a bigger issue than whether or not this woman was raped and who did it. Rather, there is the issue of our moving further and further away from the concept that individuals should be judged based on their character as demonstrated by their deeds.

Do we really want judgments made based upon skin color? Do we really want to bring back the bad old days?

Posted by: Greg at 11:47 AM | Comments (35) | Add Comment
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Want to bet this ever-so-significant detail changes nothing for those with Bush Derangement Syndrome?

Two judges on the secretive court that approves warrants for intelligence surveillance were told of the broad monitoring programs that have raised recent controversy, a Republican senator said Tuesday, connecting a court to knowledge of the collecting of millions of phone records for the first time.

President Bush, meanwhile, insisted the government does not listen in on domestic telephone conversations among ordinary Americans. But he declined to specifically discuss the compiling of phone records, or whether that would amount to an invasion of privacy.

USA Today reported last week that three of the four major telephone companies had provided information about millions of Americans' calls to the National Security Agency. However, Verizon Communications Inc. denied on Tuesday that it had been asked by the agency for customer information, one day after BellSouth said the same thing.

Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, said that at least two of the chief judges on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court had been informed since 2001 of White House-approved National Security Agency monitoring operations.

"None raised any objections, as far as I know," said Hatch, a member of a special Intelligence Committee panel appointed to oversee the NSA's work.

So the FISA court was in on this from the beginning. That should be enough to lay to rest the "illegal spying meme" -- if truth is a consideration for those propagating it.

But, as we have seen time and again, truth is not a factor for those seeking to undermine Bush by undermining the war against jihadi Muslims.

Posted by: Greg at 10:34 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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For those with doubts, they can be viewed here.

Video showing a plane crashing into the Pentagon on September 11, 2001, was released publicly for the first time Tuesday, a judicial watchdog group said.

The Justice Department has handed over tapes showing American Airlines Flight 77 striking the building outside Washington to Judicial Watch, a public interest group that requested the video, the group said.

The video is available on the group's Web site, according to a news release from Judicial Watch.

I won't watch them -- I have no doubts, and I know that inside one of those offices destroyed on the tape was a college classmate. I need not see his death.

Posted by: Greg at 10:28 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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What happens when you take a non-observant Jew writing for a liberal media outlet and you add a sudden insight that he doesn't know the holy book of his childhood nearly as well as he thought he did? You get a potentially interesting series of articles.

Like many lax but well-educated Jews (and Christians), I have long assumed I knew what was in the Bible—more or less. I read parts of the Torah as a child in Hebrew school, then attended a rigorous Christian high school where I had to study the Old and New Testaments. Many of the highlights stuck in my head—Adam and Eve, Cain vs., Abel, Jacob vs. Esau, Jonah vs. whale, 40 days and nights, 10 plagues and Commandments, 12 tribes and apostles, Red Sea walked under, Galilee Sea walked on, bush into fire, rock into water, water into wine. And, of course, I absorbed other bits of Bible everywhere—from stories I heard in churches and synagogues, movies and TV shows, tidbits my parents and teachers told me. All this left me with a general sense that I knew the Good Book well enough, and that it was a font of crackling stories, Jewish heroes, and moral lessons.

So, the tale of Dinah unsettled me, to say the least. If this story was strutting cheerfully through the back half of Genesis, what else had I forgotten or never learned? I decided I would, for the first time as an adult, read the Bible. And I would blog about it as I went along. For the millions of Jews and Christians who know the Bible intimately, this may seem obscene: Why should an ignoramus write about the stories and lessons that you know by heart and understand well? I don't intend any kind of insult. My goal is not to find contradictions, mock impossible events, or scoff at hypocrisy. Nor am I quite stupid enough to pretend that Judaism (or Christianity) is just the Bible. Jews are not only the People of the Book but the People of Many Books. There is the rest of the Hebrew Bible—the Prophets and Writings, the vast commentary of the Talmud, the stories of the midrashim, and thousands and thousands of years of other law and story and commentary. This 4,000years' worth of delving and discussion is totally unfamiliar to me—I can't hope to compete with its wisdom. Nor is there any shortage of modern advice on how to read the Bible. (Just look up "How to read the Bible" on Amazon.) There are experts to tell you why the Bible is literally true, others to advise you how to analyze it as history, and still others to help you read it as literature. You can learn how to approach it as a Jew, a Catholic, an evangelical Protestant, a feminist, a lawyer, a teenager.

So, what can I possibly do? My goal is pretty simple. I want to find out what happens when an ignorant person actually reads the book on which his religion is based. I think I'm in the same position as many other lazy but faithful people (Christians, Jews, Moslems, Hindus). I love Judaism; I love (most of) the lessons it has taught me about how to live in the world; and yet I realized I am fundamentally ignorant about its foundation, its essential document. So, what will happen if I approach my Bible empty, unmediated by teachers or rabbis or parents? What will delight and horrify me? How will the Bible relate to the religion I practice, and the lessons I thought I learned in synagogue and Hebrew School?

I'll spend the next few weeks (or months) finding out. I'll begin with "in the beginning" and see how far I get. My wife, struck by my new biblical obsession, gave me a wonderful Torah translation and commentary for Hannukah, the Etz Hayim, which was prepared by conservative Jewish scholars. I'll read that and dip into the King James and other translations on occasion. (But I'll avoid most commentary, since the whole point is to read the Bible fresh.) I'm sure I'll repeat obvious points made by thousands of biblical commentators before; I'll misunderstand some passages and distort others—hey, that'll be part of the fun. I hope you'll tell me how I've screwed up by e-mailing me at plotzd@slate.com.

I have to wish David Plotz good luck -- and point out to him that there are those who spend a lifetime studying scripture yet continue to find new aspects to it. It is sort of like any relationship -- if it does not remain fresh, the relationship dies. So it is with the most important of texts.

Plotz makes a good start with an examination of the Creation narratives.

Posted by: Greg at 10:21 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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You just step out the back, Jack;
Make a new Plan, Stan..."

Oh, I'm sorry -- that's 50 Ways To Leave Your Lover.

I guess I have just one way to kill a blog to talk about today -- and that is the course of action taken by Polipundit regarding co-blogger Lorie Byrd.

So far, IÂ’ve allowed the guest bloggers here to write pretty much what they pleased about all issues, including illegal immigration.

But on the illegal immigration issue, I now find myself having to contend with at least three out of four guest bloggers who will reflexively try to poke holes in any argument I make.

Suppose three out of four columnists at the Old York Times were pro-Republican. You can bet publisher “Pinch” Sulzberger would do something about that right quick.

Suppose a Bush administration official came out openly against amnesty. The Bushies would show him the door.

Similarly, the writers at PoliPundit.com need to respect the editorial position of PoliPundit.com on the most important issue to this blog, as the “publisher” sees it - illegal immigration.

We will discuss amongst ourselves what that means, and how we can best achieve it. Once we have come to a resolution, we will make it public.

Sounds to me like the resolution has been made -- conform or die, conscience be damned. Never mind that the very ideological conformity Polipundit has demanded is a part of what has taken the New York Times (his example) from the status of "paper of record" to bird-cage liner.

Demanding ideological conformity on a particular issue is a sure path to disaster -- unless you want to be regarded as a one-trick pony devoting a blog to a single issue.

I hope that Polipundit reconsiders this misguided course of action before he damages the viability of his blog -- if he has not done so already.

Posted by: Greg at 10:08 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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The winning entries in the Watcher's Council vote for this week are White House Rules by Done With Mirrors, and Republicans and the Flight of Opportunity by Cato Unbound. 

Here is where you can access the full results of the vote.

Posted by: Greg at 11:31 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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I do not believe that this could be written by any supposedly responsible member of the press, much less make it past one of the supposedly “racially sensitive” editors in our modern newswooms. I’ve bold-faced the slur, just to make the point.

Still, Powell rose higher than almost any black Republican by making the party faithful comfortable with his non-threatening and non-demanding presence on racial issues. Powell flamed out after his ego no longer allowed him to be an unquestioning spearchucker in Mr. Bush's war.

The use of the slur was intentional and done with malice aforethought. What is more, both the author and the ombudsman defend the use of such racist language directed at conservative and Republican African-Americans. I guess when you are black and writing for a second-rate waste of wood pulp, journalistic standards and basic civility are inapplicable.

Contrast this incident with the response to a slip-of-the-tongue incident in St. Louis recently.

A St. Louis radio station wasted no time firing a talk show host for using a racial epithet to describe Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on his morning show Wednesday.

KTRS president and general manager Tim Dorsey came on the air to announce the firing shortly after talk show host Dave Lenihan used the word "coon," a racial slur, instead of "coup" in describing her attributes for the post of NFL commissioner.

Dorsey and Lenihan both called the use of the word a "slip of the tongue," but Dorsey said the utterance was nonetheless "unacceptable, reprehensible and unforgivable."

Prior to the utterance, Lenihan was heaping praise on Rice, a big football fan, who has frequently said she aspires to run the league one day. But as recently as Wednesday, Rice ruled out applying for the job of NFL commissioner after Paul Tagliabue retires.

After taking several calls from listeners, Lenihan offered this on the air:
"She's been chancellor of Stanford. She's got the patent resume of somebody that has serious skill. She loves football. She's African-American, which would kind of be a big coon. A big coon. Oh my God. I am totally, totally, totally, totally, totally sorry for that.

I guess it is just another example of the double standards that inhabit American broadcast and print media today – only some have to be racially sensitive, and only some are entitled to racial sensitivity.

(H/T – Opinion Journal)

Posted by: Greg at 10:49 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Rather than allow this rogue regime to sell American-made fighters to the Iranians, we need a surgical strike to destroy the aircraft.

Venezuela's military is considering selling its fleet of U.S.-made F-16 fighter jets to another country, possibly Iran, in response to a U.S. ban on arms sales to President Hugo Chavez's government, an official said Tuesday.

Gen. Alberto Muller, a senior adviser to Chavez, told The Associated Press he had recommended to the defense minister that Venezuela consider selling the 21 jets to another country.

Muller said he thought it was worthwhile to consider "the feasibility of a negotiation with Iran for the sale of those planes."

Even before the United States announced the ban on arms sales Monday, Washington had stopped selling Venezuela sensitive upgrades for the F-16s.

Muller said officials have been considering options for replacing the F-16s for some time. He said the military was considering Russian Su-35 jet fighters, "which is the best jet fighter there is in the world right now."

Chavez has previously warned he could share the U.S.-made F-16s with Cuba and China _ and look into buying new jets from Russia or China _ because he said Washington was not supplying parts for the planes as agreed.

U.S. officials disputed that accusation, saying they were living up to their commitments under the deal. They said Venezuela is bound under the 1982 contract to consult with Washington before transferring any F-16s to another country.

"The recommendation that I'm making to the minister, and which I will make to the president at the appropriate time, is that the (F-16s) be sold to a third party because if they aren't complying with their part of the agreement, we don't have any obligation to comply with our part," Muller told the AP.

The sale of these planes to Iran on the eve of that country obtaining nuclear weapons is a risk we cannot and must not take.

Posted by: Greg at 10:46 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Ward Churchill has been unanimously determined to have engaged in serious academic misconduct.

Findings
The conclusions of the investigative committee that examined seven allegations of research misconduct against University of Colorado ethnic studies professor Ward Churchill:

Charge A: That Churchill misrepresented the General Allotment Act of 1887 in his writings by incorrectly writing that it created a "blood quantum" standard that allowed tribes to admit members only if they had at least half native blood.
Finding: Falsification, failure to comply with established standards regarding author names on publications.

Charge B: That Churchill misrepresented the Indian Arts and Crafts Act of 1990 by incorrectly writing that the act imposed a "blood quantum" requiring artists to prove they were one-quarter Indian by blood.
Finding: Falsification, failure to comply with established standards regarding author names on publications.

Charge C: That Churchill incorrectly claimed there was "some pretty strong circumstantial evidence" that Capt. John Smith introduced smallpox among the Wampanoag Indians between 1614-1618.
Finding: Falsification and fabrication.

Charge D: That in several writings Churchill falsely accused the U.S. Army of committing genocide by distributing blankets infested with smallpox to Mandan Indians in the Upper Missouri River Valley in 1837.
Finding: Falsification, fabrication, failure to comply with established standards regarding author names on publications, and serious deviation from accepted practices in reporting results from research. The committee also found that Churchill was "disrespectful of Indian oral tradition."

Charge E: That Churchill claimed as his own work a 1972 pamphlet about a water-diversion scheme in Canada titled "The Water Plot." The work actually was written by a now-defunct environmental group, "Dam the Dams."
Finding: Plagiarism.

Charge F: That Churchill plagiarized part of an essay written by Rebecca L. Robbins in a book he published in 1993.
Finding: No misconduct

Charge G: That Churchill plagiarized the writings of Canadian professor Fay G. Cohen in a 1992 essay.
Finding: Plagiarism.

While three of the panel members believe that the misconduct rises to the level at which termination might be justified, the panel offered a 4-1 recommendation in favor of a 5-year suspension. I would argue that such a suspension is insufficient, and that the higher penalty must be invoked in order to establish the seriousness of the misconduct and the importance of intellectual and academic honesty in the context of academic freedom.

I would also note that the charges in question have NOTHING to do with the inflammatory statements made regarding the victims of the 9/11 terrorist acts – they have to do with serious violations of scholarly standards and ethics. That is as it should be.

Posted by: Greg at 10:42 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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As noted over the weekend, human rights crusader Ayaan Hirsi Ali has been under harassment from her political opponents who would prefer to rid the Netherlands of an inconvenient opponent of Islamism rather than the jihadi Muslim scourge itself.

A Somali-born member of Parliament who became an internationally known opponent of some violent types of Islam said Tuesday she will resign and leave Holland after the government said she was improperly granted citizenship.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali has been under police protection since a film she wrote criticizing the treatment of women under Islam provoked the murder of its director, Theo van Gogh, by an Islamic radical.

Hirsi Ali said she had made the decision to resign Monday night, after Immigration Minister Rita Verdonk told her "she would strip me of my Dutch citizenship."

"I am therefore preparing to leave Holland," Hirsi Ali told reporters in The Hague.

Hirsi Ali has acknowledged that she lied on an asylum application in 1992. But after a television program again reported on the matter last week, Immigration Minister Rita Verdonk ruled Monday that her naturalization had been improperly granted.

Hirsi Ali was placed under guard after Van Gogh's murderer left a note threatening her was pinned on the filmmaker's corpse with a knife.

Hirsi Ali will likely be taking a position with the American Enterprise Institute, beginning in September. This could be an interesting mix.

Leon de Winter, an English-language blogger for the conservative German daily Die Welt, said, "She rocks the boat. As a member of the Dutch parliament for the liberal party she scares the insipid appeasers of the centre-left who'd like nothing better than to ignore what she has to say. What the racist right think of her is perhaps best left unsaid."

The report that Ali would join AEI was "premature," he added.

The Dutch media reaction to her prospective exile to America has been mixed, according to Expatica.com. Some political allies have expressed regret, while a spokesman for a Dutch Muslim group said her departure would contribute to religious understanding. An AEI spokesman cited a blanket policy of not commenting on personnel decisions.

In light of her loss of citizenship in the dhimmified Dutch nation, I again call upon American authorities to act to grant her immediate American citizenship in recognition of her activities on behalf of human rights.

UPDATE: The Washington Post has a later write-up that is none-too-friendly to Hirsi Ali.

Posted by: Greg at 09:32 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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As noted over the weekend, human rights crusader Ayaan Hirsi Ali has been under harassment from her political opponents who would prefer to rid the Netherlands of an inconvenient opponent of Islamism rather than the jihadi Muslim scourge itself.

A Somali-born member of Parliament who became an internationally known opponent of some violent types of Islam said Tuesday she will resign and leave Holland after the government said she was improperly granted citizenship.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali has been under police protection since a film she wrote criticizing the treatment of women under Islam provoked the murder of its director, Theo van Gogh, by an Islamic radical.

Hirsi Ali said she had made the decision to resign Monday night, after Immigration Minister Rita Verdonk told her "she would strip me of my Dutch citizenship."

"I am therefore preparing to leave Holland," Hirsi Ali told reporters in The Hague.

Hirsi Ali has acknowledged that she lied on an asylum application in 1992. But after a television program again reported on the matter last week, Immigration Minister Rita Verdonk ruled Monday that her naturalization had been improperly granted.

Hirsi Ali was placed under guard after Van Gogh's murderer left a note threatening her was pinned on the filmmaker's corpse with a knife.

Hirsi Ali will likely be taking a position with the American Enterprise Institute, beginning in September. This could be an interesting mix.

Leon de Winter, an English-language blogger for the conservative German daily Die Welt, said, "She rocks the boat. As a member of the Dutch parliament for the liberal party she scares the insipid appeasers of the centre-left who'd like nothing better than to ignore what she has to say. What the racist right think of her is perhaps best left unsaid."

The report that Ali would join AEI was "premature," he added.

The Dutch media reaction to her prospective exile to America has been mixed, according to Expatica.com. Some political allies have expressed regret, while a spokesman for a Dutch Muslim group said her departure would contribute to religious understanding. An AEI spokesman cited a blanket policy of not commenting on personnel decisions.

In light of her loss of citizenship in the dhimmified Dutch nation, I again call upon American authorities to act to grant her immediate American citizenship in recognition of her activities on behalf of human rights.

UPDATE: The Washington Post has a later write-up that is none-too-friendly to Hirsi Ali.

Posted by: Greg at 09:32 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Suffice it to say that virtually no one is happy with the proposal put forward in last night's speech by the President last night.

President Bush said last night that he will dispatch 6,000 National Guard troops starting next month to help secure the porous U.S.-Mexican border, calling on a divided Congress and country to find "a rational middle ground" on immigration that includes providing millions of illegal workers a new route to citizenship.

"We do not yet have full control of the border, and I am determined to change that," Bush said. He also called on Congress to end the U.S. practice of releasing into the country tens of thousands of people caught illegally crossing the southern border because officials lack the jail space or legal authority to detain them or send them home. He said every foreign worker should be required to hold a high-tech, tamper-proof identification card so U.S. companies could determine whether their employees are legal.

Unfortunately, this plan is flawed. The troops deployed to the border region are there for purposes of pushing paper, not stopping the flow of foreign invaders into the southwerstern part of the United States. Rather than stopping incursions by Mexican troops bringing illegal people and illegal drugs across the border, they will be filling out forms, processing paperwork, and answering phones.

In a rare prime-time speech from the Oval Office, Bush said the nation must move immediately to stanch the flow of illegal immigrants from its southern border by sending in the National Guard to free up U.S. Border Patrol agents in Arizona, California, New Mexico and Texas. The Guard troops will provide intelligence, surveillance and logistical assistance over the next two years -- not armed law enforcement.

It contains what amounts to an amnesty plan, in the form of a guest worker program and a "head of the line" citizenship program that puts the lawbreakers ahead of the law abiding.

We are a nation of laws, and we must enforce our laws. We are also a nation of immigrants, and we must uphold that tradition, which has strengthened our country in so many ways. These are not contradictory goals -- America can be a lawful society and a welcoming society at the same time. We will fix the problems created by illegal immigration, and we will deliver a system that is secure, orderly, and fair.

Unfortunately, what he is saying is that this "mation of laws" is going to allow those who broke the law to keep the major booty of their illegal activity -- life in the United States and eventual citizenship.

But let's face it -- there is no chance of the hard-line proposal of the House of Representatives being passed and signed. Doing nothing will result in more disaster at the border. Ands a plan that does impose meaningful border controls is better than the status quo. I therefore have to agree with Dafydd over at Big Lizards.

So that's it; if the anti-immigrant side of the GOP -- fair or not, that is the impression they leave -- persists in this folly, the idea that we can round up and deport eleven million people, and that we can just seal off the border and keep all the foreigners out, then bid adieu to the House, the Senate, and the White House, and gird yourself for twenty years of absolute hell on Earth. Because if we blow this, then that's how long the Republicans will have to wander in the wilderness until we're back in power.

Twenty years of socialist misery. Twenty years of staggering tax increases. Twenty years of racial preference poured down our throats with a gasoline funnel. Twenty years of imperialist judges nullifying elections and ruling by decree.

Twenty years of increasingly savage terrorist attacks; America will be Israel under Barak.

But at least, thank God, we will have stuck to our guns and refused to compromise in any way, shape, form, manner, style, jot, or tittle.

For the love of God, people... compromise means you must give a little. There is a middle ground. And if I'm wrong, if there is not, then we are all lost -- because John's side does not have the support of the American people and will never win.

Here are our choices:

1. We settle on a reasonable compromise bill that includes both border enforcement and also immigration reform, a guest-worker program, and some eventual normalization; and we try to make it the best bill we can, given those constraints; or...

2. We rend the party, the Democrats win, and then you'll find out what "amnesty" and "open borders" really mean. And minor things like the entire war on jihadi terrorism will trampled underfoot by the Democratic thugs who seize control of our country.

And all for the want of the simple art of giving a little to get a lot.

Think. Think. Think two times, three times... and don't throw away this magnificent opportunity -- just because you only get three-quarters of a loaf instead of the whole bloody thing on a golden plate.

I'd rather have a plan proposed by President Tancredo -- but if the best we can do is a plan by President Bush, I'll take it, because it is a damn site better than what we will eventually get from President Hillary Clinton, Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.

Posted by: Greg at 10:43 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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The President wants to use the military to help the border patrol.

How much longer until we see this sort of Left-Wing lunacy?

Oh -- the ACLU is already there, according to Stop the ACLU.

The following can be attributed to Anthony D. Romero, ACLU Executive Director:

“Turning immigration enforcement policy into another military operation is not the answer. The president’s proposed deployment of National Guard troops violates the spirit of the Posse Comitatus Act, which prohibits the military from getting into the business of civilian law enforcement.

US out of Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and California NOW!

Posted by: Greg at 10:15 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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I’d love to know how this was accomplished. Did Michale Jackson’s millions pay for some scientific breakthrough that has not been disclosed to the world?

As things stand today, Jackson is supposed to be in New York in one week to answer a wide range of questions about his parenthood.

You may recall that his two eldest children, Prince and Paris, were born to Rowe during their brief marriage. The children have been told by Jackson that they don’t have a mother, yet Rowe — as I revealed here last year — is their only biological parent.

Neat trick, if it is true.

Posted by: Greg at 09:38 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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IÂ’d love to know how this was accomplished. Did Michale JacksonÂ’s millions pay for some scientific breakthrough that has not been disclosed to the world?

As things stand today, Jackson is supposed to be in New York in one week to answer a wide range of questions about his parenthood.

You may recall that his two eldest children, Prince and Paris, were born to Rowe during their brief marriage. The children have been told by Jackson that they don’t have a mother, yet Rowe — as I revealed here last year — is their only biological parent.

Neat trick, if it is true.

Posted by: Greg at 09:38 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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I had the privilege of attending a lecture given by Jaroslav Pelikan on the early fathers of the Church many years ago, while I was a student in the seminary. I was fascinated by the breadth of his knowledge and the depth of his insight.

And then I got to fix drinks for him and the rest of the audience in my capacity as a bartender at the conference center at the seminary. Professor Pelikan was a delightful, friendly old man who made a point of asking the two of us tending bar how we had enjoyed the lecture – and tipped generously.

Yale professor Jaroslav Pelikan, one of the world's foremost scholars of the history of Christianity, has died of lung cancer, his son said Monday. He was 82.

Pelikan wrote more than 30 books, using sources in nine languages and dealing with literary and musical as well as doctrinal aspects of religion.

"For a man as talented and accomplished as he was, he was also exceptionally kind and genuinely humble," said his son, Michael. "The more he learned, the more amazed he was by how much he did not know."

Pelikan died Saturday at his home in Hamden, his son said.

A Lutheran convert to Eastern Orthodoxy, Pelikan was a former president of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and was appointed by President Clinton to serve on the President's Committee on the Arts and Humanities.

His works include the acclaimed five-volume text, "The Christian Tradition," which followed the story of Christianity from its origins to modern times.

Pelikan's "Whose Bible Is It?", published in 2005, explored how people of different faiths interpret the Bible. He said language and cultural differences led to varying interpretations of the Scripture.

His conclusion, he said in an interview with National Public Radio last year, was that, "Christians and Jews need each other in an effort to understand the sacred text they share."

It is sad to see such a great intellectual light has gone out – but I rejoice in the certainty that Pelikan stands in the presence of the God who he contemplated so deeply during his earthly life.

Posted by: Greg at 09:36 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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IÂ’m glad this malignant witch is being made an example of by the authorities.

Six Northern Kentucky University students could see charges of dismantling an anti-abortion display dismissed if they complete community service under a deal offered by prosecutors.

But prosecutors didn't offer that deal to Sally Jacobsen, the NKU literature professor involved in the April 12 incident.

Jacobsen is charged with criminal solicitation. Police said she encouraged students in one of her classes to destroy the display, which consisted of rows of about 400 white crosses. Jacobsen and the six students also were charged with criminal mischief and theft by unlawful taking.

A student Right to Life group put up the display, saying it represented aborted fetuses.

Jacobsen's attorney, Margo Grubbs, entered a plea of not guilty on her behalf Thursday in Campbell District Court, and a new court date was set for May 23.
The six students appeared before District Judge Karen Thomas but did not enter pleas. Thomas said charges would be dismissed if they completed a diversion program, which typically consists of community service.

Assistant County Attorney Rick Woeste said that based on the evidence so far, Jacobsen played a different role because she was the teacher.

Jacobsen abused her role as a teacher – she merits different treatment than her students.

Posted by: Greg at 09:35 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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You don't mean to tell me that the much-vaunted Democrat machine of my youth is still pulling the strings, taking kickbacks and giving out patronage jobs in the city run by Boss Daley's son, do you?

When Mary Jo Falcon started work as personnel director in the Chicago Sewers Department in 1994, she picked up some stern advice from her predecessor, who told Falcon that her real boss worked in a faraway office in City Hall.

The powerful man was Robert Sorich, and she could expect instructions from him on whom to hire, Falcon was told, according to court documents describing the scene. But his name was never to be penned on any documents. If questioned, she was to "deny everything. Deny, deny, deny."

Sorich, who worked in the Office of Intergovernmental Affairs, was Mayor Richard M. Daley's patronage chief until a federal grand jury indicted him last year on charges of rigging city hiring to favor campaign workers and others with notable political connections. In court this week, he will be fighting for his own reputation and, in a way, his boss's.

Prosecutors aim to persuade 12 jurors that Sorich and his associates made sure their favorites, whatever their qualifications, got secure jobs as building inspectors and bricklayers, tree trimmers and truck drivers, in a city heavily perfumed with government corruption.

That Sorich's office was right down the hall from the famously micromanaging mayor's is the tantalizing subtext of a case expected to open a window onto the way business is conducted in Daley's City Hall.

Prosecutors are not saying whether they think Daley is pulling levers behind the curtain. The five-term Democratic mayor has been questioned, but not implicated and not charged. His public response: "I don't play any role in hiring; no, I don't. I never have."

Not that Illinois politics have ever been clean -- rewarding political allies with public largesse is an old custom. And I'll be honest about it, my grandfather's connections to Democrat Senator Paul Douglas was the key to my grandmother scoring college scholarship for all four of her children back in the in the early 1950s. Those party ties also explain how my grandfather managed to score a plum job as a state policeman in the late 1930s, at a time when the department was noted as much for its patronage as for its professionalism.

Not, of course, that the GOP hasn't been involved in such shennanigans as well -- former Gov. George Ryan was recently convicted of using his office for personal gain.

This could be interesting -- showing once again that the more things change the more they stay the same.

Posted by: Greg at 10:44 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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There isn't enough DNA in supposed Seville remains to do research, and the Dominicans refuse to grant access to alleged remains in the New World. That means that we may never be able to figure out conclusively where the bones of Christopher Columbus really rest today.

But more than that, will we ever figure out who the "discoverer of America" really was? What were his roots, which have been clouded in mystery for centuries?

He gave new meaning to the phrase "world-class celebrity," but like Garbo, Christopher Columbus had little interest in talking about himself and dismissed queries about his origins with a rhetorical shrug: " Vine de nada" -- "I came from nothing."

It was never enough. For centuries, scholars have wondered about this enigmatic mariner whose compulsion to travel east by traveling west altered the course of Western civilization and effectively ended the Middle Ages.

He may have been born in Genoa, but he wrote in indifferent Latin or in good Spanish -- never in Italian. He had French connections, married a Portuguese woman, may have been Jewish, may have lived in Catalonia and died May 20, 500 years ago this week, in the Spanish city of Valladolid.

To commemorate this event, researchers led by Spanish forensic pathologist Jos� Antonio Lorente Acosta are comparing the DNA of Columbus's illegitimate son, Fernando, with DNA from hundreds of possible Columbus descendants in at least three countries.

The goal is to determine once and for all whether Columbus, as traditionalists hold, was the son of Genoese wool weaver Domenico Colombo, or was instead a Spaniard named Colon; or a Catalan Colom, from Barcelona; or a French Coulom or Colomb; or perhaps Corsican or Mallorcan.

"We'll get something, but it will be complicated," Lorente said in a telephone interview from his University of Granada office. "The trick is to differentiate between the Columbuses from different places -- and there's no guarantee."

The likely result? That is a good question, as there are plausible narratives to explain any of the above -- or some combination.

Or perhaps we will have to live with the mystery.

Posted by: Greg at 10:31 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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Looks like the Israel-bashers are at it again, holding Jews to a higher standard than that to which they hold Muslims.

Britain's biggest union for college and university teachers plans to ask its 67,000 members to consider boycotting Israeli lecturers who do not publicly dissociate themselves from what it called Israel's "apartheid policies."

The language is from a resolution to be put before the National Association of Teachers in Further and Higher Education at its annual conference in Blackpool from May 27 to 29.

The move has reopened a fiery debate that seized another college union, the Association of University Teachers, last year. In response to appeals from 60 Palestinian organizations, the Association of University Teachers voted in April 2005 to boycott two Israeli universities, saying it would bar faculty members from Haifa and Bar-Ilan Universities from taking part in academic conferences or research with British colleagues.

Less than a month later, the association voted to overturn the boycott when numerous advocates, including a group of Nobel laureates, argued that university campuses in Israel enjoyed vigorous political debate and were not the most appropriate institutions to boycott.

This year, however, the Association of University Teachers, with 40,000 members, plans to merge with the larger National Association of Teachers in Further and Higher Education, just after its conference in Blackpool. The contentious resolution is one of two relating directly to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

So if you are an Israeli Jew, these edu-Nazis want to make you submit to a political litmus test as a condition of allowing you to work or study in the UK. Such requirements are not imposed upon the citizens of the world's most oppressive dictatorships -- Red China, Cuba, North Korea -- but will be imposed upon the citizens of the only Western-style democracy in the Middle East.

Furthermore, this is only one of two resolutions being considered by the group.

The first, concerning Hamas's victory in Palestinian elections, enjoins British academics "to continue to help protect and support Palestinian colleges and universities in the face of the continual attacks by Israel's government" and to "contact the Palestinian Authority government to reaffirm that support."

That resolution accuses Britain of displaying "outrageous bias" against Hamas.

The European Union, the United States and Israel consider Hamas a terrorist organization with which they refuse to have dealings, especially so long as it declines to recognize Israel and renounce violence.

In other words, the group wants to go on record in support of Hamas and the Terrorstinians, who continue to conduct a campaign of murder against innocent civilians. Not only will there be no requirement that Muslims denounce Islamic terror around the globe, but the group willcondemn those who oppose the perpetrators of terror attacks! At the same time, though, any Israeli attempt to safeguard itself and its citizens is to be decried as illegitimate.

In the event this resolution passes, the United States needs to implement a policy of denying visas to all members of the National Association of Teachers in Further and Higher Education "who do not publicly dissociate themselves from" the group's anti-Semitic, pro-terrorist policies.

After all, what's good for the Israeli goose is good for the British gander.

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Now I am no advocate of censorship, but I do wonder what Australian censors would consider to be inciting violence if these books do not meet the criteria of that nation's anti-terrorism laws.

One of the books, Defence of the Muslim Lands, carried an endorsement from Osama bin Laden on its back cover and promoted "wiring up one's body" with explosives for "martyrdom or self-sacrifice operations".

The Criminal West, written by Australian Muslim Omar Hassan, claimed to be called Australian was something to be ashamed of and Western culture is the culture of wolves, injustice and racism.

It also claims Australian police are rapists who bash young boys and spoke of a conspiracy involving politicians to turn young Muslims into drug addicts.

The Ideological Attack claims there was a barbaric onslaught against Muslims by Jews, Christians and atheists.

Again, these are all books that the Australian government has said are just hunky-dory under its anti-terrorism law and other statutes which ban books promoting hatred and violence.

On the other hand, it is illegal in Australia to quote the Koran to prove that Islam is a religion which promotes hatred of Christians and Jews, and which is promotes violence against non-Muslims -- and Christians have been convicted for doing so.

Posted by: Greg at 05:11 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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Once again, the atheist Red Chinese choose confrontation over reconciliation with the legitimate authorities of the Catholic Church.

China's state-approved Catholic Church welcomed the installation Sunday of another bishop who was not approved by the pope, exacerbating the strain in Beijing's relations with the Vatican.

Bishop Zhan Silu, also known as Vincent Zhan, celebrated Mass for 500 Catholics and officials in a church in the southern city of Ningde to mark his formal appointment as head of the Mindong diocese. Hong Kong Cable TV showed Zhan holding a gold staff and wearing the pointed hat, or miter, used by bishops.

The welcoming ceremony compounded tensions in Vatican-China relations. Just a few months ago, Catholics had expressed hope that back-channel communications and concessions by the Vatican would end a rift between Rome and a separate Chinese church set up by the Communist government a half-century ago.

In recent weeks, China's state-approved Catholic hierarchy ordained two other bishops without papal assent, drawing a threat of excommunication from the Vatican and aggravating the split.

"They had to know that this would cause a serious reaction, a breakdown in the efforts to normalization," Richard Madsen, an expert on China-Vatican ties at the University of California at San Diego, said of the ordinations. "This shows at some level, they just didn't want relations to go forward."

In the fallout, the Vatican put on hold a review of Zhan's appointment that could have led to his approval by Pope Benedict XVI, a church official in Hong Kong said on condition of anonymity because of his involvement in the Rome-China dialogue.

Seems to me that the butchers in Beijing don't want to be seen as allowing too much religious freedom to the ever growing Christian population of China, so they are intentionally weakening relations with the Vatican -- relations that had been leading to Vatican acceptance of many officially sponsored episopal candidates.

For more on the status of Chinese Catholics loyal to the Vatican, click here.

UPDATE: More on this story here.

Posted by: Greg at 04:41 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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I doubt we'll be hearing the name Abramoff prominently from the Democrats this year. That is because any attempt to accuse the GOP of systemic corruption will only lead back to the ethical cess-pool that is the Democrat Party. Take this senior Democrat.

Starting in the 1990s, Rep. Alan B. Mollohan (D-W.Va.) chose an unusual way to funnel federal funds into his poverty-ridden district. He set up a network of nonprofit organizations to administer the millions of dollars he directed to such public endeavors as high-tech research and historic preservation.

Over the same period, Mollohan's personal fortunes soared. From 2000 to 2004, his assets grew from no more than $565,000 to at least $6.3 million. The partners in his rapidly expanding real estate empire included the head of one of these nonprofit groups and the owner of a local company for which he arranged substantial federal aid.

Mollohan used his seat on the House Appropriations Committee to secure more than $150 million for five nonprofit groups. One of the groups is headed by a former aide with whom Mollohan bought $2 million worth of property on Bald Head Island, N.C.

Controversy over this blending of commerce and legislation has triggered a federal probe, cost Mollohan his position on the House ethics committee and undermined the Democrats' effort to portray the GOP as the party of corruption because of the Jack Abramoff scandal. As early as today, the 12-term congressman will admit that he misstated some transactions in his congressional filings, according to Mollohan staffers.

"Mollohan has earmarked tens of millions of dollars to groups associated with his own business partners. That immediately raises the question whether these funds were allocated to promote the public good or to promote his interests and the interests of his partners," said Ken Boehm, chairman of the National Legal and Policy Center, a conservative watchdog group. "He also got very rich very quick, and that suggests a relationship that is suspect if not corrupt."

How bad is it? Take a look at this little tidbit.

Mollohan, 63, faces a widening federal investigation. The FBI has notified his nonprofit organizations that they will be subpoenaed soon and, according to Mollohan, a subpoena has already been served on a D.C. real estate company in which he has invested. In addition, Mollohan plans to divulge that he misstated on House financial disclosure forms the amount of loans and income from some of his real estate holdings.

I love that term, "misstated". Could you imagine the Democrats allowing a senior GOP congressman get by with that? The entire situation reeks of corruption -- yet the Democrats were more than willing to let him sit on the Ethics COmmittee and pass judgement on Tom DeLay, whose alleged lapses have everything to do with politics and not personal enrichment.

Now maybe there is some reasonable explanation for all this, but remember what the Democrats kept telling us -- the appearance of impropriety is itself an impropriety.

Posted by: Greg at 04:26 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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You know -- it must really suck to live in Massachusetts. Why else do you think a quarter of a million folks escaped between 2000 and 2005? And why else do you think that the state saw a population decrease of over 19,000 just in the period from 2003 to 2005, even with new arrivals and births?

A majority of people who moved out of Massachusetts last year report they are very satisfied with life in their new state and would not move back, a Boston Globe poll has found.

Seventy-three percent of those surveyed said they live in a home that is bigger than their home in Massachusetts was. Fifty-four percent said their standard of living is higher now.

The top reason people gave for leaving Massachusetts was a better job, followed by the cost of housing, family ties, and the weather. In a separate set of questions, 50 percent of those surveyed said the cost of housing was a ''major factor," and a better job was cited as a ''major factor" by 39 percent.

The findings underscored the difficulties of living, raising children, and earning enough money in Massachusetts, and suggested that these fundamental aspirations of the American middle-class are often easier for people to achieve outside the state.

The wide-ranging poll was the first of its kind to measure the motivations of people who have left Massachusetts, whose population of 6.39 million dropped by nearly 19,000 between 2003 and 2005, according to Census data.

The reasons are about what you would expect, and all relate to quality of life.

The survey also sought to measure what was a major factor in prompting people to move. Housing and jobs were cited by 50 percent and 39 percent, respectively. Taxes were cited by 30 percent; a better place to raise kids, by 25 percent; the weather by 24 percent; and the traffic by 20 percent.

Other issues were less important, the poll showed. Only 8 percent of respondents indicated crime as a major factor for their move, while 9 percent cited the public schools, 12 percent cited Massachusetts' liberal bent, and 13 percent its political leadership.

The problem is, though, that many of the reasons cited do, in fact, relate back to political leadership and the liberal politics of the state government. I'd argue that the first four points (housing costs, jobs, taxes, and "better place to raise kids" ) all relate back to the policies coming out of liberal government. This is especially true when you look where folks are going.

The results showed New Hampshire was the top destination for people who left Massachusetts. Florida was the second most popular state, followed by Texas. Regionally, the Southeast was the most popular destination, drawing 19 percent of those polled, followed by 18 percent who now live in the Midwest and West.

Do you notice anything?

By and large, the Massachusetts ex-pats are headed for red states.

Is this a harbinger of decreasing political influence for the People's Republic of Taxachusetts?

Posted by: Greg at 04:03 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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