Move over Hardee's ThickBurger -- this is the new heart attack on a bun.

A hundred bucks might buy you more than six dozen burgers from McDonald's, but the swanky Old Homestead Steakhouse will sell you one brawny beef sandwich for the same price.

Boca Raton Mayor Steven Abrams could barely speak between bites as he devoured the 20-ounce, $100 hamburger billed as the "beluga caviar of sandwiches."

"Heaven on a bun," restaurant owner Marc Sherry said.

The burger debuted Tuesday at the restaurant in the Boca Raton Resort and Club, where a membership costs $40,000 and an additional $3,600 a year.

"We've never had a hamburger on our menu here so we really wanted to go to the extreme," Sherry said, calling it "the most decadent burger in the world."

At about 5 1/2 inches across and 2 1/2 inches thick, the mound of meat is comprised of beef from three continents — American prime beef, Japanese Kobe and Argentine cattle.

The bill for one burger, with garnishing that includes organic greens, exotic mushrooms and tomatoes, comes out to $124.50 with tax and an 18 percent tip included. The restaurant will donate $10 from each sale to the Make-A-Wish Foundation.

And yes, I realize you can get bigger burgers elsewhere -- I was referring to the price-tag as the source of the cardiac arrest.

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Yeah, it still goes on -- and one ring got a bunch of cows from the ranch of baseball great Nolan Ryan.

Authorities said Tuesday they have cracked a cattle-rustling operation that stretched across eight counties and claimed 289 head, including 17 cows and 30 calves belonging to Hall of Fame pitcher Nolan Ryan.

The total value of the stolen livestock was estimated at up to $300,000.

Authorities recovered 83 head this week from the pastures of a Brazoria County cattle rancher who authorities say has confessed to the thefts.

"He comes from a ranching family, knows the business, knows cattle," said Brent Mast, Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers Association special ranger based in Willis. "He's knowledgeable enough about the business to know how to steal cattle, brand registration, and he knew the proper way to hide stolen cattle, if there's a proper way to hide stolen cattle."

The rancher, who has not been charged, faces 14 counts of cattle theft, a third-degree felony. The investigation remains ongoing, and authorities did not rule out that others could face charges.

Special Texas Ranger Tommy Johnson said police plodded through rain-soaked pastures in Angleton on Monday and expect to recover another 10 to 15 stolen animals at another pasture as soon as the fields dry.

He said the suspect is expected to surrender today.

When you consider how we used to deal with cattle-rustling in texas, it seems to me that this guy is getting off easy. It used to be a hanging offense -- and if the victims didn't wait for a trial before imposing the penalty, it was considered to be a justified homicide.

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I hope this guy goes away for a very long time -- and that there are some charges available for the "parent" who let him back behind the wheel.

A Chatham County man was charged with DWI twice in a span of about 20 minutes early Sunday morning, authorities said.

The incident started when a man was stopped in Siler City for speeding and driving left of center.

A Chatham County deputy found evidence that suggested the driver was intoxicated and the man was arrested.

The man's car, a 1991 Honda Civic, was left at the scene. The 18-year-old driver was released into the custody of his mother.

About 20 minutes later, the deputy went back to check on the Honda and to conduct a follow-up investigation.

When he arrived he saw the same man driving away in the car.

The deputy stopped the man and arrested him and impounded his car.

Alejandro Salas Sanchez, 18, of West 2nd Street, Siler City, was charged with two counts of DWI and one count of driving while license revoked, among other charges.

Sanchez was then jailed under a $1,000 secured bond and is scheduled to appear in Chatham County District Court in Siler City on July 11.

SOme folks simply do not need to be permitted in the same county as an automobile -- and this guy is one of them.

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Was "the perfect shot" really worth it?

A woman lost her footing after stepping over a retaining wall to take a photograph and went over a cliff, falling 500 feet to her death in a canyon, Yellowstone National Park officials said.

The 52-year-old woman was visiting the park with her husband and two children.

Her husband flagged down a passing motorist, who called 911 after the Saturday morning accident at an overlook along the Yellowstone River, park officials said.

A ranger rappelled down the canyon wall to reach the woman, but she was dead at the scene.

Condolences to the family of the deceased and all that -- but was there no consideration given to the idea that the wall was there for a reason?

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Based upon our experiences here in Houston, this does not even come as a surprise to me.

Five people ranging in age from 16 to 19 were killed in a street shooting early Saturday, the most violent crime reported in this slowly repopulating city since Hurricane Katrina hit last August.

All were believed to have been gunned down in a volley of bullets on a street in the Central City neighborhood just outside the central business district. Three of the victims were found in a sport utility vehicle rammed against a utility pole and two were found nearby on the street.

Authorities said they were looking for one or more suspects but did not elaborate.

Capt. John Bryson said police think the shootings were either drug-related or some type of retaliation attack. A semiautomatic weapon was used and "multiple, multiple rounds" were fired, he said.

"I think the motivation we're looking at is pretty obvious," he said. "Somebody wanted them dead."

Or crime rate -- especially our murder rate -- spiked following the arrival of the Katrina evacuees. Seems to me that some of the thugs have found their way back east. I hate to say it, but I'm just glad it happened in their town and not ours.

And I'm troubled by the learned helplessness of the residents of New Orleans.

Bryson said the recent spike in murders, which he said was connected to drugs, was not just a "police problem" or a "New Orleans problem."

"It's a Louisiana problem, it's a United States problem," he said. "We're begging the citizens to join with us to coordinate with watch groups."

No, Capt. Bryson -- it seems to be primarily a New Orleans problem. Deal with it yourself, and start by having your residents raise their children with some self-sufficiency, morality, and respect for the law and human life. Don't put it on the rest of us.

But unfortunately, there are those who will beat their breasts and blame the nation as a whole for the shortcomings of the residents 9and former residents) of New Orleans -- folks like the editors of the LA Times, who know where not to put the blame for the misuse of FEMA funds by Katrina evacuees.

But obsessing about the spending habits of refugees comes perilously close to blaming the victim.

I'm sure they will say the same of the criminality of New Orleanians as well.

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Liftoff will be in two weeks, if all goes according to plan.

NASA managers on Saturday picked July 1 to launch the first space shuttle in almost a year for a test-flight mission that will try out inspection methods and repairs that were devised following the Columbia disaster.

The launch of the seven crewmembers aboard Discovery in early July improved the chances that the 12-day mission would be extended by a day to add an important third spacewalk. The launch date was picked after two days of meetings by scores of NASA's top managers and engineers at the Kennedy Space Center.

The most contentious debate at the meeting focused on whether the shuttle's external tank should undergo further changes in 34 areas called ice-frost ramps. About 35 pounds of foam already have been removed from an area of the tank where a 1-pound piece of foam fell off during last July's launch of Discovery. NASA described it as the aerodynamic change ever made to the shuttle's launch system.

Some members of NASA's safety office said at the meeting that the shuttle shouldn't fly until more foam around the ice-frost ramps are removed. Top managers, however, countered that the shuttle should fly with only one major modification to the tank at a time.

"At the end of the day, some people had reservations and they expressed their reservations," said Wayne Hale, NASA's space shuttle program manager.

Flying foam off the external tank struck a wing of Columbia during its launch in 2003, allowing fiery gases to enter the shuttle and kill the seven-member crewmembers during descent.

Living just a few miles from Johnson Space Center, this is local news. I suspect the NASA hands (current and retired) will be buzzing at church tomorrow. I'm sure that the order for the "Good Luck, Discovery!" banners for the fences around JSC will be placed first thing Monday morning. One local church has already called forward one of the astronauts for a special blessing during the SUnday service, and more of those will be coming.

I guess what I am trying to say is that these are our people, members of our community. And as such, we down here around take a special pride in what is going to happen on July 1 and in the days that follow -- and that we will be holding our breath just a little bit deeper and praying a little bit harder than most of the rest of the world.

Not because we are better people or because we believe the astronauts are extraordinary people -- but because they and their families move among us every day, and we therefore know them to be ordinary men and women doing extraordinary things.

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We had a horrible incident here in Houston this week -- a little girl run down and killed just days before her birthday by a trio of carjackers stealing the family vehicle.

Well, the perps have been caught -- but will not face murder charges.

Harris County prosecutors decided to file aggravated robbery charges in a deadly carjacking because the evidence did not show the attackers intended to kill a girl, a key element for a murder charge, officials said.

"It doesn't sound like a serious enough charge — maybe that is what people's perception is," said Di Glaeser, chief of the major offender and special crimes unit of the Harris County District Attorney's Office. "I think, that if these people are guilty, they should receive the most serious punishment and that would be aggravated robbery."

I would have been really upset by this, except that i remembered something from my time on the jury for a capital murder case (which was pled down to aggravated robbery after a mistrial). And fortunately, the Chronicle points out exactly what i recalled.

Aggravated robbery, like murder, is a first-degree felony. They carry the same punishment.

And before you ask, the penalty is 25-to-life (except when the state seeks the death penalty in a murder case). These boys won't be getting out any time soon.

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The number is astounding -- $1.4 billion in fraud related to Hurricanes Katrina and Rita.

The government doled out as much as $1.4 billion in bogus assistance to victims of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, and was hoodwinked to pay for season football tickets, a tropical vacation and even a divorce lawyer, congressional investigators have found.

Prison inmates, a supposed victim who used a New Orleans cemetery for a home address, and a person who spent 70 days at a Hawaiian hotel were able to wrongly get taxpayer help, according to the Government Accountability Office.

Agents from the investigative arm of Congress went undercover to expose the ease of receiving disaster expense checks from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

The GAO concluded that as much as 16 percent of the billions of dollars in FEMA aid to individuals after the two hurricanes was unwarranted.

The findings are detailed in testimony that is scheduled to be delivered at a hearing today by the House Homeland Security subcommittee on investigations.

To dramatize the problem, the GAO provided lawmakers with a copy of a $2,358 U.S. Treasury check for rental assistance that an undercover agent got using a bogus address. The money was paid even after FEMA learned from its inspector that the undercover applicant did not live at the address.

"This is an assault on the American taxpayer," said Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Tex.), chairman of the subcommittee that will conduct the hearing. "Prosecutors from the federal level down should be looking at prosecuting these crimes and putting the criminals who committed them in jail for a long time."

It also pisses me off. Many folks impacted by the hurricanes who were insured and/or who applied for FEMA money following the hurricanes were denied compensation for damages that were considered to be not serious enough to meet the requirements for assistance, even if those expenses were in the $2000-3000 range. In the mean time, government debit cards for those amounts were being issued so that folks could go to strip clubs or buy designer clothes. It seems to me that such disaster programs need to be fixed.

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I'm disgusted that this suit has not been thrown out of court. After all, criminals don't deserve mercy at the hands of their intended victims.

A man who was beaten by employees of a store he was trying to rob is now suing.

Police say Dana Buckman entered the AutoZone in Rochester, New York, last July, brandished a semi-automatic pistol and demanded cash.

That's when employees Eli Crespo and Jerry Vega beat him with a pipe and held Buckman at bay with his own gun.

Buckman escaped when they retreated into the store to call 911, but he was arrested a week later. He pleaded guilty to first-degree robbery and was sentenced to 18 years in prison as a repeat violent felon.

Now Buckman is suing the auto parts store and the two employees who beat him, claiming they committed assault and battery and intentionally inflicted emotional distress.

So the moral of this story is don't stop beating a felon until he is dead -- that way he cannot sue you for taking all appropriate steps to stop his crime.

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IÂ’m glad to see that this guy has been indicted. What a piece of work!

Following a three-year investigation, the former president of Houston's largest Teamsters local was arrested Friday on charges of rigging a union election and accepting a $20,000 kickback from a union vendor.

Chuck Crawley, 56, who lost control of Local 988 in 2003 after an investigation into corruption allegations by the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, was released on a $100,000 bond after posting a $5,000 cash bail.

Crawley gained national attention that year when it was learned he used nonunion labor to build the local's $1.7 million union hall, causing international President James P. Hoffa to cancel his appearance at the opening.

An indictment unsealed Friday accuses Crawley of using the mail to cast 362 phony ballots in the name of union members he thought would not be voting in a 2002 union election.

He also is accused of rigging the vote to get himself re-elected, using the union's computer system to generate fraudulent ballots, of accepting a $20,000 kickback from the company that installed the union's telephone system, and making false entries in union records about the telephone installation.

If convicted, he faces a maximum sentence of 20 years on one count of wire fraud, five years on each of two counts of embezzlement, and fines of $250,000 on each of the three counts.

This guy also used union money to sue two union members who went to the FBI to report his corruption.

It is cases like this that make me glad that I live in a right-to-work state, where I cannot be forced to give money to corrupt union bosses like Chuck Crawley. I hope he goes away for a long time – and that the members of his union realize that he is just the tip of the iceberg of corruption the historically corrupt Teamsters union.

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Some stories are just too weird to make up!

A woman angry that her new puppy had died pushed her way into a dog breeder's home and repeatedly hit her on the head with the dead Chihuahua, authorities said.

The 33-year-old woman told police she had taken the puppy to a veterinarian, who said it was only 4 weeks old and needed to be returned to its mother. But before she could return the puppy, it died.

Early Wednesday, the woman went to the breeder's home, pushed her way inside and began fighting with the breeder as she tried to make her way to the basement to get another puppy, police said.

The breeder wrestled the woman out of her house to the front porch, where the woman then hit the breeder over the head numerous times with the dead puppy, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported, citing police.

We could have teh basis of a new saying here -- "I'm gonna beat you with a dead Chihuahua." What do you think?

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Looks like my rocket-scientist friends will have some work to do over the next few years. And since JSC is only 10 minutes from this computer (depending on the traffic lights), I bet I know several of the leading figures in this new quest to return to the moon.

NASA handed out assignments for President Bush's lunar human exploration program on Monday, with much of the development work headed as expected for the Johnson Space Center in Houston and the Marshall Space Flight Center in Alabama.

All 10 of the space agency's installations in eight states will be involved in meeting the $104 billion Constellation program's goal of returning American explorers to the moon as early as 2018.

Johnson's responsibilities for directing the development of a new moon ship, called the Crew Exploration Vehicle, as well as for managing much of the work actually carried out at other agency installations, emerged in September as NASA unveiled the blueprint for its lunar transportation system.

The economy of this part of Harris County is driven by NASA and related corporate entities. Some of the older generation at my church still talk about the original Mercury astronauts on a first name basis. There is a couple that talks about some of the astronaut kids hiding out at their home to get away from the news crews in their front yards. One dear lady laments that the custom of NASA wives preparing meals for the families of those in space has fallen by the wayside since the end of the Apollo program.

This area is a company town -- and i'm glad it may stay that way for a little bit longer.

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Could you imagine the outrage if this were a report that a state-run health-care system were insisting that it would cover only radical mastectomies for all women, even if the less destructive lumpectomy were a better course of action for a woman with only a small, contained tumor who would be better served by a lumpectomy?

Well, that is comparable to what is hapening in England right now, where the NHS has decreed that it will not cover a less-invasive treatment for men with early-stage prostate cancer which radically cuts the likelihood of impotence.

HUNDREDS of men are being denied an alternative to radical surgery for prostate cancer because the National Health Service is refusing to pay for it, writes Sarah-Kate Templeton.

Hard-up primary care trusts across England have stopped funding brachytherapy, a new form of radiotherapy, although it has been approved by the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (Nice).

Doctors and patient groups have accused the NHS of discriminating against men. John Neate, chief executive of the Prostate Cancer Charity, said: “Nobody should have to battle bureaucracy when they need all their energy to come to terms with a diagnosis.”

Brachytherapy has fewer side effects than removing the prostate or giving radiotherapy for five days a week over seven weeks. Only 10%- 15% of men are left impotent after brachytherapy, compared with about 50% of men who undergo surgery.

The £9,000 treatment takes just one day. The patient has radioactive pellets implanted into the prostate gland. These target and kill the cancer.

Brachytherapy is not suitable for all prostate cancer sufferers but doctors believe that it is the best treatment for patients who have small tumours which have been caught at an early stage.

The number of men who die of prostate cancer each year in Great Britain (and, I believe, in the United States and worldwide) is similar to the number of women who die of breast cancer. Funding for the latter, however, is significantly higher -- as is the politicization of the disease.

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Project Gutenberg will be giving away e-books for a month this summer -- some of the great classics of world literature.

For much of the past decade, the publishing world has been trying to figure out how to make money selling books in electronic form. Now a private project wants to give e-books away for free.

Project Gutenberg, a 35-year-old nonprofit based in Urbana, Ill., announced yesterday it is putting as many as 300,000 books online, where they will be available for free download. Called the World eBook Fair (worldbookfair.com), the program will last a month -- July 4 to Aug. 4 -- and will be repeated annually.

The catalog of available works will include fiction, nonfiction, and reference books, mostly those that are no longer protected by copyright. ``It will include the oldest books in the world, including every author you have heard of in your life, other than current ones," said Michael Hart, Project Gutenberg's founder. The fair also will offer classical music files, both scores and recordings, as well as films.

About 95 percent of the books are in the public domain and not subject to copyright law, Hart said. The copyright holders of the remaining 5 percent have given permission for use of their works. Copyright law generally protects a work for 70 years beyond the death of its creator.

Roughly 20,000 of the books have been scanned by thousands of Gutenberg volunteers -- and are already available at gutenberg.org -- but the majority will be loaned to Gutenberg for the month by more than 100 e-book libraries, including the World eBook Library, which normally charges a fee for temporary access. As many as 100,000 of the 300,000 books will remain available permanently. Gutenberg plans to offer 500,000 books in next year's fair, 750,000 in 2008, and 1 million in 2009. Still, even these numbers are a fraction of the tens of millions of books that have been published throughout history.

``Our stuff is all free," Hart said. ``We want people to take these books and use them, to keep them in their PDAs. Our mission is to help break down the walls of ignorance and illiteracy."

A bibliophile's dream, and a scholar's fantasy!

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Well, it looks like the report I saw the other day was bogus.

A free fuel plan for hurricane evacuees that was
unveiled to the public by a state official this week was incorrect
and not approved by top emergency leaders, officials said
Wednesday.

The plan was outlined Tuesday for about 500 people -- mostly
Harris County residents -- at the Houston/Galveston Hurricane
Workshop. But state officials said a day later that they were
unfamiliar with the free fuel system described during the public
presentation by Jenniffier Hawes, a regional liaison officer with
the Texas Department of Public Safety.

"The information she presented was incorrect," said Rachael
Novier, a spokeswoman for Gov. Rick Perry. "The situation is being
dealt with within the division of emergency management."

* * *

The revelation of a non-existent free fuel plan surprised -- and
scared -- many state agencies and industry officials who would be
directly involved in such a situation.

If motorists showed up to stations expecting free gas during an
evacuation, "we could end up with riots in our driveways," said
Scott Fisher, spokesman for the Texas Petroleum Marketers and
Convenience Store Association.

* * *

According to the state's new evacuation plan, officials will
work closely with gas companies to ensure that stations along
evacuation routes are adequately filled before an evacuation is
called. Officials have said that they will assess the gas supply
and send out tankers 120 hours before tropical storm force winds
make landfall.

On the heels of the erroneous plan going public, Texas
Department of Transportation spokesman Mike Cox said Wednesday that
if stalled drivers are spotted by courtesy patrol trucks, they'll
be given enough gas to get to the nearest station.

"But there will be no free fill-ups," he said.

Well, i hope this works. I'm just curious how they will deal with the traffic gridlock that we saw last September, and how those "courtesy patrol trucks" will get to vehicles that have run out of gass when the roads are moving at under 5 miles per hour.

(H/T Unite Later)

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You know, the last time I checked, this was well before the existence of homo sapiens sapiens, or any of our early ape-man/man-ape ancestors. Could it be that global warming is a transitory, natural phenomenon – followed by equally natural global cooling back to the norm?

The new analysis confirms that the Arctic Ocean warmed remarkably 55 million years ago, which is when many scientists say the extraordinary planetwide warm-up called the Paleocene Eocene Thermal Maximum must have been caused by an enormous outburst of heat-trapping, or greenhouse, gases like methane and carbon dioxide. But no one has found a clear cause for the gas discharge. Almost all climate experts agree that the present-day gas buildup is predominantly a result of emissions from smokestacks, tailpipes and burning forests.

Which means, of course, that their position is “global warming is a natural phenomenon – but this time is different,” despite the fact that they lack any evidence to differentiate between the two.

Dafydd at Big Lizards notes the problems this discovery creates for global warming alarmists, and offers the following suggestion.

We need a twenty-year moratorium on "doing" anything about climate Instead, let's commit vast treasure and human resources to improving our basic scientific understanding of climatology and all that's related. It would make little difference in the projected rise of MGT; we would better be able to decide whether the current rise was natural or anthropogenic; and even if we did decide to "do something," those twenty years would allow us to craft a much more intelligent and effective "thing" to do than striking out blindly today.

There is no significant downside to sentencing globaloney to a "timeout".

I agree wholeheartedly – we need to truly understand the “problem” – and the mechanisms at work – before implementing a “solution” that may or may not be necessary.

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You know, the last time I checked, this was well before the existence of homo sapiens sapiens, or any of our early ape-man/man-ape ancestors. Could it be that global warming is a transitory, natural phenomenon – followed by equally natural global cooling back to the norm?

The new analysis confirms that the Arctic Ocean warmed remarkably 55 million years ago, which is when many scientists say the extraordinary planetwide warm-up called the Paleocene Eocene Thermal Maximum must have been caused by an enormous outburst of heat-trapping, or greenhouse, gases like methane and carbon dioxide. But no one has found a clear cause for the gas discharge. Almost all climate experts agree that the present-day gas buildup is predominantly a result of emissions from smokestacks, tailpipes and burning forests.

Which means, of course, that their position is “global warming is a natural phenomenon – but this time is different,” despite the fact that they lack any evidence to differentiate between the two.

Dafydd at Big Lizards notes the problems this discovery creates for global warming alarmists, and offers the following suggestion.

We need a twenty-year moratorium on "doing" anything about climate Instead, let's commit vast treasure and human resources to improving our basic scientific understanding of climatology and all that's related. It would make little difference in the projected rise of MGT; we would better be able to decide whether the current rise was natural or anthropogenic; and even if we did decide to "do something," those twenty years would allow us to craft a much more intelligent and effective "thing" to do than striking out blindly today.

There is no significant downside to sentencing globaloney to a "timeout".

I agree wholeheartedly – we need to truly understand the “problem” – and the mechanisms at work – before implementing a “solution” that may or may not be necessary.

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You may remember my story of evacuating during Hurricane Rita last fall. It looks like the state has made arrangements to deal with a major issue during that stressful time -- the lack of fuel along the highway.

Some gas stations will let motorists pump for free if their fuel tanks run low during a hurricane evacuation, state officials said Tuesday.

The free fueling plan comes after thousands of cars were left abandoned on the side of highways during Hurricane Rita last year, when more than 3 million people evacuated the Houston area and jammed roads for hours.

Most stations along evacuation routes ran out of gas, making fuel availability a priority in the state's revamped evacuation plan.

Motorists won't be allowed to fill their tanks completely and only vehicles with little fuel remaining will be given access to the free pumps, said Jenniffier Hawes, a spokeswoman for the Texas Department of Public Safety.

Drivers looking to top off will be sent to pay at other stations, she said.

"It's going to be expeditious," Hawes said. "We don't want a lack of financial resources to leave someone stranded."

The free gas will be available at stations located at 50-mile intervals on evacuation routes, she said. Valero, Shell, Exxon Mobil and Marathon are the stations providing the free fuel.

Now, will they have provisions to get the needed fuel to the stations along the route?

And will they contra-flow the traffic early enough to get everyone out of Houston if the big one heads our way again?

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I guess the loons had it all wrong!

Conspiracy theorists, beware: That aluminum foil beanie—headwear believed, since at least the 1950s, to stop brain-control rays—may make it easier for The Man to read your mind, according to Massachusetts Institute of Technology grad students. Inspired by fringe beliefs that invasive radio signals can probe citizens’ thoughts and that wearing foil on your head may fend them off, an experiment by four Ph.D. candidates found that certain key frequencies—owned by the Feds, naturally—are actually enhanced by such “protection.”

(H/T Dr. Sanity)

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Well here we are, a weak-and-a-half after the search of Rep. William Jefferson's Capitol Hill office -- and the Houston Chronicle has finally deigned to weigh in on the issue. Most major media outlets have long since spoken on the matter, as have most of us political bloggers -- but the Chronicle acted with all deliberate speed and waited to say a word until now.

But to their credit, they do get it right.

The law, in its majestic equality,"Anatole France wrote, "forbids the rich and the poor alike to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets and to steal bread." Under the same principle, however, when an influential member of Congress is suspected of taking bribes, the law grants no immunity from court-approved investigation and, if warranted, prosecution.

The Constitution does grant members of Congress protection from arbitrary arrest while they are at or on their way to and from the Capitol. In the same passage, however, it withdraws such protection in cases of treason or other felonies.

The FBI's recent raid on the congressional office of U.S. Rep. William Jefferson was the first of its kind, but the blame for its necessity rests solely with Jefferson. The congressman from New Orleans refused to comply with a lawful subpoena for certain of his papers, saying he should not be forced to incriminate himself. Agreed, but he has no grounds to object if law enforcement officers, equipped with a court-approved warrant, do the job for him.

Haven't I been saying the same thing since the search?

I wonder what took them so long -- other than figuring out how to gratuitously slam Bush on an unrelated issue in the editorial even as they praise the work of his administration.

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It is according to Paul Richard, who opines that modern artistic style has failed to in its effort to adequately memorialize American heroes -- and that with it, we have lost some sense of truly memorializing those we claim to honor.

Remember, tomorrow's Memorial Day. That's what it's for, remembering.

The holiday's gone blurry. Now it's mostly fun (ballgames, setting up the barbecue, another day off work), but it used to be for focused recollections of the dead.

Not the dead in general, the dead in sharp particular. Half a million soldiers had died in the Civil War. When the rites were first observed in 1866, there were plenty to recall.

Each spring at the end of May, their graves were strewn with flowers, their faces brought to mind. This was deeply serious business. The fallen mustn't be forgotten. We used words like "the fallen" then. That seriousness bred art. That art would shape the country's look, and Washington's especially. Vast amounts of money, artistry and effort would be expended on its making. The beauty of the art would illumine its high purpose -- to immortalize remembrance. Strewn flowers weren't enough. The fallen would be given stone-and-metal monuments impervious to time.

Washington is filled with them. If you want to get Memorial Day, look around at the memorials. They're victors' monuments. They put generals on pedestals, and dead presidents above them. Washington's memorials share a certain style. Their statues aren't just portraits, though they're often that, as well; they're personified ideals. Their bronze laurel wreaths and eagles, and Greco-Roman lions, say: The past approves of us. They're insistently high-minded, august.

They represent an art movement, now dead. For a long time their architects and artists, their stone-carvers and bronze-founders got better and better. For a long time their elevated style got nobler and nobler. Then, suddenly, it died.

It died a poignant death -- at the peak of its accomplishment, just when it got great. We know the date exactly. Memorial sculpture's greatness left Washington forever on the 30th of May, Memorial Day, 1922.

I would tend to agree. While the stark black walls of the meorial to those who died in Vietnam are moving, the statuary additions are not. Other, more recent monuments and memorials are somehow lacking. And with that loss of purpose and definition, has come a loss of memory.

Jefferson standing, purposeless -- he should be seated, writing the mrvelous words that surround him in the Jefferson Memorial. Roosevelt -- ill-defined. Will we fail with the national commemoration of Dr. King?

Or put differently, can we, as a people, recover our capacity for historical memory?

Posted by: Greg at 10:03 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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George McGovern has always appeared to be one of the dying breed of socialist dinosaurs. But even he understands enough about politics to get what the problem is with the current attacks on Wal-Mart.

It can be galling to hear companies argue that they have to cut wages and benefits for hourly workers — even as they reward top executives with millions of dollars in stock options. The chief executive of Wal-Mart earns $27 million a year, while the company's average worker takes home about $10 an hour. But let's assume that the chief executive got 27 cents instead of $27 million, and that Wal-Mart distributed the savings to its hourly workers. They would each receive a bonus of less than $20. It's not executive pay that has created this new world.

I understand the attraction of asking business — the perceived "deep pockets" — to shoulder more of the responsibility for social welfare. But there are plenty of businesses that don't have deep pockets. Many large corporations operate with razor-thin profit margins as competitors, both foreign and domestic, attract consumers by offering lower prices.

The current frenzy over Wal-Mart is instructive. Its size is unprecedented. Yet for all its billions in profit, it still amounts to less than four cents on the dollar. Raise the cost of employing people, and the company will eliminate jobs. Its business model only works on low prices, which require low labor costs. Whether that is fair or not is a debate for another time. It is instructive, however, that consumers continue to enjoy these low prices and that thousands of applicants continue to apply for those jobs.

Now notice that statistic -- Wal-Mart has only a 4% profit margin. Raise costs, and either prices will go up or jobs will go down -- or both.

Now McGovern uses that to support socialized medicine, an increasingly progressive tax rate, and more transfer payments. He is, of course, wrong on those issues, not recognizing that such policies ultimately fail wherever tehy are tried. But the essentially capitalistic notion he supports regarding Wal-Mart is correct, and i praise him for that.

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Something like this happened at my university about 20 years ago.

A student advertising campaign that "just went bad" left an indelible -- and apparently unintended -- mark on downtown Portland and the Pearl District.

Three Art Institute of Portland students said they thought they were using spray chalk when they laid down a couple dozen markings on sidewalks aimed at drawing attention to a fundraising concert for the Oregon Food Bank.

Turns out the spray cans contained indelible paint, not chalk.

"We thought it would wash away," said Jody Desimone, one of the students. The students had completed much of their project Wednesday night before they learned that the spray cans contained paint.

Desimone, Jessie Grav and Carina Close also learned that the unauthorized markings on public property amounted to graffiti, which can be prosecuted as criminal mischief.

The paint was applied on sidewalks in the South Park Blocks, Waterfront Park, Old Town and the Pearl. The markings included stencils of Oregon landmarks, such as Mount Hood, and a large phone number and Web address.

"We didn't think putting it on sidewalks was illegal," Grav said.

OOPS!

The College Democrats, left-wing losers that they were (they couldn't muster a dozen members, while the College Republicns had well over 100 active members) did something like this at Illinois State when I was there.

They decided to do the "Shadows of Nuclear War" deal, painting outlines of human bodies on sidewalks and buildings around campus to simulate the shadows left at Hiroshima and Nagasaki. They even set up a booth in the Student Center with a flier explaining their deeds.

Imagine their shock when they discovered that a water-based exterior house paint doesn't wash off with a garden hose. They never considered the possibility that a good old acrylic latex paint might be sort of permanent.

I understand that it cost them every cent in their treasury, their recognition as a student organization, and some serious disciplinary action against the individuals involved.

Part of me hopes that these students are shown a little more mercy.

Posted by: Greg at 08:32 AM | Comments (9) | Add Comment
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This is a clear abuse of his authority.

A Chicago Police officer is accused of arresting a traffic control aide for jaywalking last week in retaliation for ticketing his vehicle for being illegally parked, authorities said Tuesday.

The female traffic aide slapped a parking ticket on the officer's personal vehicle last Thursday afternoon in the 700 block of North Michigan, said Monique Bond, a police spokeswoman.

The uniformed foot patrol officer was on duty and responding to a call for service, Bond said. "On his return at about 12:15 p.m., he noticed a ticket on his vehicle," she said. "He asked the traffic control aide to 'non-suit' the ticket."
The woman, a supervising traffic control aide, says she told the officer she could not void it, according to Bond.

The officer allegedly handcuffed the woman, arrested her for jaywalking and brought her to the Near North District at 1160 N. Larrabee. The district commander intervened, and the woman was released without being charged, Bond said.

The Chicago Police Department has opened an internal investigation into the officer's behavior after the aide complained that she was the victim of "injury and retaliation," Bond said.

It is obvious that this is a case of retaliation. The ticket was issued by the traffic control aide because the private vehicle was parked illegally. Once the ticket was issued, she could not void it out. The cop didn’t want to follow the departmental procedure for dealing with a ticket issued in such a situation, and so he decided to flex his muscle and make life difficult for this woman who was doing exactly what her job required – ticketing illegally parked cars.

Such actions are unprofessional and smack of a perverse lawlessness on the part of the Chicago Police Department – because this cop is still on the street, despite being under investigation.

Posted by: Greg at 12:54 PM | Comments (146) | Add Comment
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Proving once again that members of the press consider themselves a royal priesthood not subject to the laws that apply to non-journalists, The Houston Chronicle is demanding that a press shield law be passed by Congress.

Thanks to federal prosecutors probing a grand jury leak in the BALCO investigation of steroid use by professional baseball players in California, the secretary of state can add the names of San Francisco Chronicle reporters Lance Williams and Mark Fainaru-Wade to that long list of journalists threatened by potential imprisonment.

The pair's stories and subsequent book, Game of Shadows, exposed the scope of steroid use by athletes, forced major league baseball to institute reforms to prevent their continued use, and won the praise of the sport's highest-ranking fan, President George W. Bush.

Yet U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales told the Houston Chronicle editorial board on Friday he approved the issuance of subpoenas that would force the journalists and their paper to identify confidential sources and produce any grand jury transcripts in their possession.

* * *

Unfortunately, such attempts by law enforcement to compel journalists' testimony and pry open their notebooks and computers are becoming all too frequent. According to the Newspaper Association of America, more than 30 reporters have been pressured by authorities in the last two years to divulge information for investigations, creating a national atmosphere that makes investigative reporting more difficult and whistleblowers more fearful about talking to journalists. When that happens, both good journalism and good government are endangered.

It's appropriate that this week a bipartisan group of senators introduced the Free Flow of Information Act of 2006, a long-sought federal shield law to protect journalists and their employers from being forced in most cases to reveal confidential sources. It also would prevent authorities from mining telephone, Internet and other communications data to identify journalist contacts. The only exceptions would be threats to national security or the physical safety of the public.

"We believe the legislation establishes important ground rules for confidential sources and reporters," said Newspaper Association of America President and CEO John F. Sturm. "It is a very positive step toward safeguarding the free flow of information to the public."

Such a law would provide for American journalists the kind of freedom to do their jobs that Secretary Rice so eloquently espoused for their foreign counterparts. Those words ring hollow if they are not accompanied by the same concern and concrete actions to protect journalists at home as well.

I say NO -- in fact, I say HELL NO!

What the Chronicle demands is nothing less than a press exemption from the obligations that apply to every citizen. You know -- the obligation to provide information and material subpoenaed by a court, to testify truthfully before a grand jury or in a trial, and to not traffic is stolen or illicitly obtained documents. They seek to exempt the press from law enforcemnt tactics which are regularly and legitimately applied against citizens in every other walk of life. The seek to make journalists -- as defined by the obsolescent media elite -- a class apart from the rest of citizens. I find the notion of estalishing a journalistic aristocracy to be repugnant.

The press often speaks piously of "the public's right to know." Let's not give them the capacity to keep the public in the dark in situations that any other citizen would be required to speak.

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In an attempt to overcome fundamental laws of economics, the City of Chicago has taken action to make the nation’s most competitive retailers a little less so. The result will be higher prices, fewer jobs, and a decrease in shopping choices for Chicago residents – but hey, they’re gonna stick it to WalMart!

With a nudge from organized labor, 33 aldermen have signed on to a groundbreaking ordinance that would make Chicago the nation's first major city to establish a wage and benefit standard for "big box" retailers.

On Thursday, they got an earful from the other side: business leaders and an impoverished and retail-starved West Side community that's about to become home to Chicago's first and only Wal-Mart.

They argued that the minimum wage standard is the exclusive purview of the General Assembly, and that making demands that apply only to the largest retailers would violate the constitutional guarantee to equal protection.

They further contended that nowhere in the United States is there a living wage ordinance that applies exclusively to retailing giants, and that passing one here would put Chicago at a competitive disadvantage.

* * *

Introduced by Ald. Joe Moore (49th), it would apply to both newly built and existing stores with at least 75,000 square feet of space owned by companies with $1 billion in annual gross revenues. They would be required to pay any employee who works more than five hours a week a "living wage" of at least $10 an hour, along with $3 an hour in benefits.

There is, of course, a simple solution available to WalMart, Target, and other large retailers who might be considering the possibility of doing business in Chicago – locate outside the city limits, in one of the many suburbs that are interwoven along the edge of (often nearly surrounded by) the city itself. Then just suck all the business and cash out of the city while giving a major tax-revenue boost to the county and the suburbs – leaving Chicago a desiccated husk of a once great city with no retail base to meet the needs of the city’s poorest residents – they can buy the higher priced goods of smaller stores with their welfare checks, or their checks from the WalMart located just on the other side of the city limits.

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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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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?

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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.

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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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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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This Tuesday, one of the perpetrators of one of the most horrific killings in Houston history will get what he has coming to him. Hopefully, two of his fellow predators will follow. And unfortunately, two others will escape due to the failure of the US Supreme Court to rule based upon American law and the US Constitution.

Catching up with friends after a family vacation in Florida, Elizabeth Peña beamed as she showed off the stuff she'd bought with her 16th birthday money: a new pager, some new underclothes.

As the summer evening waned, Jennifer Ertman, 14, another Waltrip High School sophomore, checked her Goofy wristwatch and saw that it was pushing midnight. She and Peña would break their curfews if they didn't get home in a hurry.

The girls debated how to get to Peña's Oak Forest home in northwest Houston. One route would take half an hour; a well-known shortcut along the railroad tracks through T.C. Jester Park would save about 10 minutes.

The shorter route instead led the girls into the hands of six teenage gang members who had just finished an initiation ritual. For an hour, the six raped and tortured the girls before strangling them — stomping on their necks for good measure.

Their bodies were discovered four days later, horrifying a city that shrugs off hundreds of homicides each year. The Ertman-Peña case captivated a generation of Houstonians the way the Dean Corll-Elmer Wayne Henley multiple murders had an earlier one.

On Tuesday, the first of Ertman and Peña's killers is set to die by injection.

Sadly, the do-gooders think that it is in the best interest of society to save teh first of these animals from death -- Derrick Sean O'Brien. I wholeheartedly hope they fail in his case, and in those of Peter Anthony Cantu and Jose Medellin. For that matter, I wish that the state of Texas would set execution dates for Raul Villarreal and Efrain Perez, in an effort to overturn the extra-constitutional decision in Roper v. Simmons.

Because as we say down here in Texas -- some folks just need killing.

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Posted by: Greg at 09:35 AM | Comments (40) | Add Comment
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They found DNA.

And it doesn't match anyone from the team.

It matches her boyfriend.

Will Nifong have the honesty to admit this is a hoax, apologize to the players, and drop all charges against them?

Will he have the guts to charge the accuser with making false statements to police?

Posted by: Greg at 05:58 AM | Comments (7) | Add Comment
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I posted on the Ashley Reeves story, and it generated a lot of traffic and comments from a group of girls. One of them made a particularly nasty allegation, and when I saw it refuted today by Ashley's mother, I thought it was important to post it.

he parents of Ashley Reeves, 17, who was strangled and left for dead in a Belleville park on April 29, said their daughter "is fighting various injuries related to brain trauma" and is not on life support, according to a statement released by the hospital this afternoon.

Mother Michelle Reeves said in the statement that Ashley has a high fever "that may be related to the many insect bites on her body."

Responding to rumors that have circulated on the case, the family said that Ashley "is not pregnant, nor has she ever been pregnant."

So thank you, Kim, for taking a rumor that you heard somewhere and broadcasting it to the world without a shred of actual evidence to back it up, so that the mother of a grievously injured girl has to go public and deny such lies. I won't say where I believe such behavior puts you on the morality scale -- but I suggest you remove that beam from your eye before your criticize either Ashley or your sister.

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Legislators in many states have passed laws limiting access to cold remedies and model glue -- will bans on the purchase of seeds for ornamental plants be next?

After all, one type of seed is becoming popular again in the never-endig quest by foliks to get a buzz on.

They have such whimsical names as heavenly blue, crimson rambler and pearly gates, and delicate blooms that crawl quickly up trellises.

But when morning glory seeds aren't planted -- when they are instead ingested -- whimsical thoughts can crawl through altered minds with kaleidoscope-like visions.

And teenagers know this.

Once popular in the hippie era of the 1960s, morning glory seeds as a hallucinogen seem to have sprouted once again. Local gardening shops have noticed their seed stocks depleted by adolescent hands, and poison control centers in the District and its suburbs have received calls from hospitals with patients experiencing adverse reactions, or bad trips, from the seeds.

"They are certainly being used," said Chris Holstege, a doctor who runs Virginia's Blue Ridge Poison Center. "Kids are getting brighter. Between the Internet and magazines like High Times, they are learning about this."

Just a few weeks ago, he said, a mother called the center after finding seed packets in her teenage son's bedroom. She wanted to know what they were used for, Holstege said. A more serious call came from hospital emergency officials who needed to know how to treat an 18-year-old who had taken the seeds along with an antidepressant and cough syrup. His heart rate spiked to 150, his body went rigid and his mind reeled with hallucinations.

"These kids have a misconception that it's natural, that it's more safe" than other drugs, Holstege said. "They are not. It alters your perception, and that puts you at risk."

The seeds have an effect similar to LSD,according to the article.

I guess this also means that I have one more thing to look for as a teacher -- and that anyone wanting to start a gardening club is now a suspected drug user.

Posted by: Greg at 10:22 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Is the guy working behind the counter with your teenager a sex offender? Is the fellow with the broom in the play area a convicted child molester? It could be at McDonalds.

No company has attracted children more successfully than McDonald's.

"They tout their environment as being safe and kid friendly."

It's a message delivered through its commercials, its products, even its kid-friendly spokesman.

"You always think of Happy Meals, the playground, the golden arch, Ronald McDonald."

By some estimates, 96 percent of all American children recognize Ronald McDonald -- second only to Santa Claus.

And the company boasts that Ronald's Play Places make it the world's largest operator of children's playgrounds.

"And it's a mecca, it's a magnet apparently for child molesters."

Customer Thomas Wesley says, "The last thing you expect is somebody who's a monster working behind the counter."

But when Wesley visited a McDonald's in Franklin, Tennessee, that's just what he says he discovered: a sex offender -- convicted of soliciting sex from a minor -- who'd also approached him for sex in a public park.

"Right when I saw him, I thought, 'Oh, God that's the same guy that told me he worked at a McDonald's and I knew was a pedophile," Wesley recalls.

Probation officers had rated Nicolas Aloyo as a "high-risk" to commit new sex crimes -- and the judge released him on condition that he accept "no employment ... in contact with minors."

McDonald’s has a corporate policy to do background checks – but it may not always be followed by all stores owned by the company. And franchise units are not required to run background checks at all.

Doesn’t corporate responsibility require background checks? And what about state monitoring of perverts – are they not enforcing “no contact with children” policies?

How many more kids will be abused because of such failures?

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This story just gets worse every time I see an update.

The 17-year-old Spring boy who was savagely beaten and sodomized with a pipe more than a week ago still can't speak or squeeze his mother's hand. But his face — once swollen almost beyond recognition — has started to heal and friends are sure he can hear their prayers, his older brother said Monday.

In the family's first public statement since the attack, the boy's 21-year-old brother said the family's attention remains focused solely on the teen's health, which is still too poor to undergo operations on his internal organs.

Details on the attackers are even worse, if you can imagine that.

Authorities are still investigating whether either of the suspects has any gang affiliations, Trent said.

However, he said, "It appears at least one of them may be tied to some extremist groups."

Tuck has tattoos of swastikas and other such markings favored by skinheads, sheriff's Lt. John Denholm has said.

Present and past neighbors also have reported that swastika flags were sometimes displayed at Tuck's home in the 3400 block of Nutwood and that people at the residence exchanged Nazi salutes and cries of "Heil!" when visitors with shaved heads arrived.

Neighbors on Nutwood Lane said the teen once marched down the street waiving a Nazi flag on Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

"I have lived here 11 years and you just knew this is the corner where you don't send your kids around," said Robin Storrs, 35.

Given what they did, I have to agree with the assessment of the victim's brother.

The victim's older brother said he believes Tuck and Turner could be treated harshly by other inmates if they are convicted and go to prison — and he said he has no problem with that.

"What goes around comes around," the brother said. "I'm a big believer in Karma."

I suspect these boys are going to get a little bit of justice of the type we are forbidden to impose.

Posted by: Greg at 10:33 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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1 You need to OK my "smarterspam[dot]com" E-Mail & Website. Simply because of "spam[dot]com" being filtered, I can't post my URL

Anyways, I'd be satisfied with the death penalty on this one, though the victim has not (yet) died. This sort of brutality is unfathomable. I hope those punks who did this get raped with a shiv. A nice, thick, spiky shiv.

Horrible I know, but I think that's more than fair.

Posted by: Eric Clemmons at Tue May 2 06:04:51 2006 (yPOKC)

2 So much for the Horses Ass's that say the EVIL doesn't exist or there is no such worry to be concerned with. THIS IS PURE VILE EVIL! Go ahead a TRY to explain it away. People like this are too far gone. An example should be made of them to others who maintain the same- so called-values.

Posted by: JimBD at Tue May 2 11:23:06 2006 (GoE0N)

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One more victory for government regulation -- and added cost for consumers.

EVERY house which is either built or refurbished in Scotland will from today have to be fitted with new valves restricting the temperature of the hot water.

Ministers decided to act in an attempt to prevent children from being scalded in the bath and regulations forcing the change on house builders came into force today.

The new rules mean that £80 thermostats will have to be built in to all new hot water systems, regulating the temperature to 48C or less. The new rules represent a major success for the petitions process in the Scottish Parliament.

The campaign for a change in the law was started by the Scottish Burned Children's Club, which presented a petition to the Scottish Parliament in November 2004 and which has now seen its request adopted by ministers.

The club is fronted by Darren Ferguson, a teenager from Stenhousemuir who suffered permanent facial disfigurement from scalding hot bath water when he was a baby.

Mr Ferguson appeared before the public petitions committee and persuaded the convener, Michael McMahon, to write to ministers with the club's concerns.

After all, we can't expect the people to responsibly set the temperature of their own water heaters -- government must do it for them.

Posted by: Greg at 10:29 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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Maybe it is because we know the alternative was worse, Helen. You know -- Saddam, continued genocide, etc.

Legendary White House correspondent Helen Thomas has sharply questioned U.S. presidents for 46 years, but when she spoke at Centre College Thursday, she had a question for the American people.

“Where is the outrage?”

The subject of that outrage, Thomas said, should be the war in Iraq and President George W. Bush.

We've always known of your preference for foreign dictators over Republican presidents.

Posted by: Greg at 07:40 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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