If Beyonce can't do it, how can your wife/girlfriend expect you to do it?

Beyonce tore a leg muscle rehearsing dance moves with Destiny's Child and her injury could delay some of the group's plans, a record company spokeswoman said Wednesday.

The singer tore her right hamstring, one of the muscles at the back of the knee, while practicing Tuesday in Los Angeles for an upcoming TV special.

The economy grew at an annual rate of 3.3% during the Spring, but as USA Today points out, it could be better... under Kerry.

The U.S. economy grew at an annual rate of 3.3% in the spring, the government reported Wednesday in the final revision to second-quarter gross domestic product.

That was better than a previous estimate but still the weakest showing in more than a year. [...]

Democratic presidential challenger John Kerry, arguing that he can do a better job managing the economy than President Bush, contends that the current recovery, especially in the area of jobs production, has been lackluster.

A Solid Record of Achievement
3.3 Percent Growth Under President Clinton. Today, the Commerce Department revised up their GDP estimates for 1995 through 1997. This means that since President Clinton took office, growth has averaged 3.3 percent per year, stronger than the Reagan Administration (3 percent) or the Bush Administration (1.3 percent)...

Two Italian women were kidnapped in Iraq, and then suddenly freed. Although the Italian government denies it, there is a general feeling that they paid a ransom to free the two girls from the terrorists.

Gustavo Selvo, the head of an Italian parliamentary foreign affairs commission, told reporters he believed a ransom of about $1 million was paid -- despite government denials.

Selvo, a member of the National Alliance, a partner in Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's conservative government, told France's RTL radio: "The lives of the girls was the most important thing." [...]

A front-page editorial in the Rome daily La Repubblica said a "ransom was paid and that is nothing to be ashamed of." Another paper, Il Messaggero, said as much as $20 million could have been paid.

Fox News is continuing to dominate the ratings. In fact, they are so popular that they beat all the other cable networks combined.

Hot on the heels of its beating the broadcast networks in coverage of the Republican National Convention, Fox News Channel has added another feather to its cap: It averaged more primetime viewers than its competitors combined in the third quarter.

Fox News Channel averaged 1.75 million viewers in primetime during the third quarter, up 39% from the nonconvention year of 2003, according to data released Tuesday by Nielsen Media Research.

Its competitors -- CNN, CNN Headline News, MSNBC and CNBC -- averaged an aggregate 1.67 million viewers in the third quarter, which ended Monday. It was Fox News Channel's highest-rated quarter since the Iraq war began last year.

So much for that gun show loophole the GFWs are always spreading lies about. If it were true that gun dealers don't have to conduct background checks at gun shows, just how did this happen?

Van Douglas Godette Jr., 23, from Lake Charles was sentenced Monday by United States District Judge Richard Haik to 21 months imprisonment to be followed by three years supervised release for making false statements to a firearms dealer while attempting to purchase a 9 mm semi-automatic pistol announced United States Attorney Donald W. Washington.

The offense occurred when Godette attempted to purchase firearms at a gun show in Lake Charles in November 2002. While completing the Alcohol, Tobacco & Firearms Form 4473 Godette answered "no" to questions which ask whether the purchaser has been convicted of a felony. [...]

Godette stipulated at the time of the guilty plea that he well knew tht he had been convicted of a felony when he tried to purchase the 9mm pistol and also an AK-47 type rifle at the gun show. The ATF was alerted to the transaction because of the required background check through the National Instant Criminal Information System which revealed Godette's prior felony convictions.

Pajamahadeen! LOL!

Kevin Baker bravely takes on the useful idiots of the New York media. Apparently their knowledge of firearms technology couldn't fill a thimble on a rainy day. (I have no idea what that means, but it makes one of us sound stupid; you pick which one.)

They are going on and on about AR-15s shooting 2-inch bullets, and the .223 caliber rifles being powerful enough to shatter concrete cinder blocks. *GASP* They'd probably shit themselves if they saw what my 1903 Springfield could shatter at twice the range.

You might find this hard to believe, but the media elites in New York are really wetting their pants over the expiration of the Federal Clinton Gun Ban. I know, New York has their own state-wide version of the Clinton Gun Ban, but they continue to blame the South for the influx of guns into the city. Apparently gun runners have the nerve to ignore the law and sell the guns on the black market any way. (How rude!)

Nevermind that our crime is much lower than theirs, it couldn't possibly be their idealistic utopian ideals that are flawed. No, it must be the proliferation of guns by us un-edumacated hillbillies in flyover country.

Prisons in California are going smoke-free. Now, I'm not one to champion the rights of prisoners. I think they should get rid of cable TV and all the other amenities they today's prisoners enjoy.

But I am a realist, and one of the things I realize is that banning tobacco will not get rid of it. Instead, it will open up yet another black market that will increase violence and smuggling. Both drugs and weapons are banned in prisons, yet *surprise* both are readily available. If you have the will and enough money, just about anything is possible.

Yet supporters of the neo-temperance movement are naive enough to think that this will actually increase the health of prisoners and lower prison costs. But instead it is more likely to get people killed.

The 2004 Boobiethon is almost here.

RU reader, Michael, points out that the Supreme Court is going to hear a case on eminent domain.

The Fifth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution states that no one shall "be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation." Despite the Constitutional protection, local governments are seizing private property to give to private developers with increasing regularity. Their justification has been that by building a new Wal-Mart or high priced homes, local tax revenues increase. This, they say, satisifies the "public use" clause in the Constitution.

I can only hope that Supreme Court will uphold the Constitution, and find that these seizures do not constituted "public use". If that does fail, it may be time for drastic action. I've always felt that when the Consitutional protections provided by the other Amendments are no longer upheld, it's time for good old Amendment Two to kick in.

Michele has been busy recruiting new members to the VRWC, so I figure I might as well do the same. If you are a photoshop novice, just send me a digital photo and your link (if applicable) and I'll have your card made up.

This offer is open to bloggers and non-bloggers alike. Email your info to vrwc - at - ravnwood.com.

If you have a card email the card and any link you want associated with it. If you need a card, email your photograph, link (if applicable) and what the signature line should read.

With former Clinton campaigners and CNN talk show hosts Paul Begala and James Carville working for the Kerry campaign I cannot help but think Kerry is being sabatoged to make room for Hillary 2008.

With October approaching, I also wonder what sort of 'October Surprise' is in store.

Fox News is reporting that the terrorist who brutally murdered reporter Daniel Pearl has begun his eternal dirt nap.

Amjad Hussain Farooqi, also accused in two attempts on the life of President Gen. Pervez Musharraf in December 2003, died in a four-hour shootout Sunday at a house in the southern town of Nawabshah.

James Taranto had this hilarious (but sad) observation:

Saratha Goggins became mayor of East Cleveland, Ohio, earlier this month when her predecessor, who is in prison for bribery, quit. Now, the Cleveland Plain Dealer reports, it turns out that Goggins stabbed a boyfriend to death 22 years ago.

"In interviews, Goggins said she petitioned a judge to seal the records in September 1991," the paper reports. "She recalled being convicted but said she could not remember the charge." Well, we suppose that's understandable. After all, do you remember all the details of every homicide you committed more than 20 years ago?

Goggins tells the paper: "It was an unfortunate incident that occurred in a time of my life. There is nothing I can do to change it. I have moved on. I am going to survive it." Of course, usually it's the person on the receiving end of a fatal stab wound whose survival is in doubt.

Back in June, I whined about the increasing use of police tasers. While the police taser is a useful, less than lethal alternative to using a firearm, it is increasingly being used for people that are simply uncooperative. Now the ACLU is calling on police departments to restrict their use.

"The Taser is just a cleaner, safer way to do business," Detective Bill Veteran, Fremont police spokesman, told the San Francisco Chronicle. "I've been in all kinds of wrestling matches, I've been pepper-sprayed, I've been hit by a baton, I've seen people get bit by a police dog."

But civil rights groups are alarmed that some agencies allow officers liberal use of Tasers rather than limiting their use to situations where a life is in danger.

Over the past five years, more than 70 suspects nationwide have died after being shocked by Tasers, including 10 in August, according the American Civil Liberties Union.

If you lock anything up with one of those little round keys, you might want to reconsider. Apparently some of them can be opened with a Bic pen.

What's that in her right hand?
(Via Boortz)

Remember the biker in Minnesota who was ticketed for driving 205 miles per hour? Well, it looks like some reasonable doubt is starting to surface.

[David Edwards, editor-in-chief of Cycle World] is among the many experts who doubt Tilley's bike could have gone so fast. "More likely, the cop with the stopwatch had an itchy trigger finger," he told the Star Tribune of Minneapolis.

"There are lots of guys who have been spending a lot of money and a lot of years at the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah trying to join the official 200 Club and most still haven't done it," Edwards said. He said Tilley's bike would have needed an add-on turbo charger to go above 165 mph.

You would think that with experts casting doubt on the technical limits of the bike, this guy would get off scot-free. All they need to do is prove that the bike can't go 205, and he's free, right? In theory, yes, but in reality, I know how court works. For his sake I hope I'm wrong, but five bucks says the powers that be reduce it down to 150 or 160 to try to save face. They'll say something like, 'He may not have been going 205, but he was still speeding.' (They just don't know by how much.)

It's beginning to look like Mount St. Helens may erupt again.

For those of you that take donations via Paypal, you might want to know that they are starting to censor bloggers. They recently sent Daily Pundit a threatening letter regarding their web content.

This site being 100% funded by the Staff Writers, is not subject to Paypal's terms and conditions. That means we maintain the editorial freedom to "promote hate, violence, or racial intolerance" for your reading pleasure.

Then again, the next time I use my paypal account to buy something they don't want me to, I may be subject to a $500 fine.

On August 23, PayPal gave users via e-mail 30 days' notice that it could levy a fine of $500 on those who violate its acceptable use policies. Its compliance team will strictly enforce the new acceptable use policy to implement the monetary fines on both buyers and sellers who use the transaction service to trade in items the San Jose, Calif.-based company has outlawed.

Those policies prohibit a wide variety of things, from stuffed migratory birds to used airbags. But the user agreement revision singles out those who, despite the transaction platform's best efforts, persist in using it to pay for forbidden goods and services in the mature audiences, prescription drugs and gambling categories.

Remember the car rental company that decided to start fining renters for speeding. The government doesn't take kindly to private companies trying to horn in on their racket.

The Memogate kerfuffle is not going away as CBS and Dan Ra^ther had hoped. Now, the Center for Individual Freedom has filed a complaint with the FEC for electioneering.

The complaint, filed by the Center for Individual Freedom, accuses CBS and the Kerry campaign of colluding on a calculated attack on Bush. The network's "60 Minutes" program aired a now infamous segment Sept. 8 featuring discredited documents on Bush's National Guard service.

"The broadcast segment bore far more resemblance to a political attack advertisement coordinated with and supported by the opponent's campaign and political party than to a journalistically sound, well-researched 'news story,' " according to the group's complaint.

The center's executive director, Jeff Mazzella, described the connections between CBS and the Kerry campaign as improper and in conflict with journalism ethics. He also said the network's actions violated federal campaign laws.

If you haven't yet seen Shaun of the Dead, I recommend it. It had me in stiches through most of the movie. At one point I had to fight to keep from spitting out my coke.

The movie is very watchable and centers more around the failing relationship between the main character and his girlfriend. As our hero tries to win back his girl, the zombies just more or less get in the way.

Okay, while there are zombies, the movie isn't very scary or gory. There is some blood and a lot of foul language, but overall it's just a raucous British comedy. I had expected it to have a lot of cheesy gags like Scary Movie, but was pleasantly suprised that the humor was original and genuine. Sure, they played hommage to the different zombie flicks, but it was subtle and not forced like you would expect from a Leslie Neilson movie.

When it's released, I plan to buy the DVD, and might to see it again in the theater.

The folks at CNN must know something we don't. Apparently they know what Kerry's plan to win the war on terror is. Every Kerry interview I've seen, he says he is going to wait until after he's elected to share what his plan for winning the war will be.

Something else that strikes me as odd: perhaps it's because the poll was just put up, but the vote totals seem to be missing. Is this one of those "fake but accurate" documents?

UPDATE: (10 minutes later) That was fast. They must have had a computer hiccup. I still want to know how all those people know what Kerry's plan is.

If I were going to rob a convenience store, this is how I would do it.

Via Say Uncle:

There is someone going around (again) to Summit county convenient stores and gas stations telling them that they must post 'No CCW' signs because they sell alcohol. The gentleman in question is even nice enough to give the stores the 'No CCW' signs free of charge. I have compiled info and supplied it to a couple stores. Upon seeing the truth, they have removed the signs.

"The interpretation I have right now is that his death was an accident." -- R. Joe Clark, special agent in charge of the FBI office in Knoxville.

What drove Clark to this interpretation?

[James Dale] Cockman was last seen buying a cup of coffee at a convenience store near a parking lot where he was supposed to meet a couple interested in his 1996 GMC Suburban. The Edens and Holloway gave him a $100 deposit the day before and were to pay him the remaining $8,400 the next day.

In a statement to authorities, Holloway said she and Edens met Cockman, forced him into the Suburban, placed duct tape over his mouth and drove directly to their home.

"When they got here they realized their victim was dead," Clark said in Sevierville. "Mr. Edens put him in a deep freeze and took the (body) to a storage facility and left it there. Why, I don't know."

My parents were in town last weekend, and I took them downtown for some sightseeing. Here are a few of the photos I took.

(click to supersize)

This is the long awaited World War II Memorial.

This gentleman is a Filipino WWII veteran. He was kind enough to pose for a photograph, and snapped a salute for me. Afterward, he actually thanked me and all of America for liberating the Philippines during World War II. I was dumbfounded.

I tried to get his entire flag in the picture, but it required backing up so far that it would be hard to see him. Plus I wasn't sure how long he would hold the salute, and I risked losing the Lincoln Memorial in the background.

This is the Korean War Memorial. This photo is a reflection of the memorial off the granite walls. I thought it was an interesting look, and the lighting was perfect.

Here is a more traditional view of the Korean War Memorial.

I had many other photos, but these are my favorites. They will have to do for now. Eventually, I'll add the others to the gallery.

The very comely Stephanie Kennedy Sailor is running for Congress again. This time she takes on Jesse Jackson Jr. It's Jackson's huge campaign war chest against her huge... um.. uh.. nevermind.

Maybe I could convince her to move to Virginia and challenge Jim "Blame the J-E-W-S" Moran.

I hadn't rented a movie for nearly 4 years. To be honest, I hadn't even thought of renting a video in the past four years. A quick glance at my DVD collection will tell you that any movie I like well enough to rent, I just go out and buy it. The last movie I rented was American Beauty during the fall of the year 2000. I remember it because my parents had come down to see my new house in Atlanta.

So it was with no great deal of familiarity that I wandered into Blockbuster Video last night. My only reason for going was because my mother gave me a gift card for a free rental. Oh, she wasn't being all that charitable. It was getting ready to expire, and would have gone to waste while my parents are touring the European countryside. So last night, I stepped into a video store for the first time in years.

I entered the store, which was empty save for the two employees standing behind the front counter, and headed for the back. I had a title already picked out, so I didn't waste any time. I wanted to see the remake of The Ladykillers for two reasons. One because I love Tom Hanks and two, because I had just heard of the movie ten days ago. So I grabbed the movie and headed for the counter. I didn't have a membership, so I had to get one of those. The manager, James, took my gift card and gave me a receipt. Although it cost me nothing, I could see that the regular rental fee was $4.50 for less than 2 days. I asked about late fees, and James told me that they no longer use daily late fees. Instead they just charge you another $4.50 for another 2 days. Lovely.

Although I thoroughly enjoyed the movie, I can see that I will probably never rent another movie in my life. At least not for another 4 years.

Aside: And I don't want to hear any crap from you Netflix users. It's a well known fact that Netflix is a religious cult, and it's only a matter of time before the Hale-Bopp comet returns to wisk them away to a far off universe.

John Kerry claims he won't fight the war on terror unless the French are on board with it. That would be the same French who want to excise a global tax to cash in on the U.S. economy.

Public schools performing terrorist drills is nothing new, however as Michelle Malkin notes, some teachers are using the occasion to opine on the subject of homeschooling.

"The exercise will simulate an attack by a fictitious radical group called Wackos Against Schools and Education who believe everyone should be homeschooled. Under the scenario, a bomb is placed on the bus and is detonated while the bus is traveling on Durham, causing the bus to land on its side and fill with smoke."

Congress is prepared to extend the middle class tax cuts, something for which George Bush has been pushing.

The child tax credit was extended for five years, while the marriage penalty relief was extended for four years and the expanded 10 percent tax bracket for six years.

In addition to those three provisions, the tax package would extend for one year current relief from the alternative minimum tax...

I wonder if Senator Kerry will make a rare appearance at his day job to cast a vote against extending the tax cuts.

Scott Norvell asks "Where's the Outrage?"

The Detroit City Council wants to implement an economic development plan that rails against immigrants and non-black minorities and sets aside city money for an exclusively African-American business district, reports the Detroit Free Press.

Members of the council want to adopt a plan dubbed "Powernomics" that advocates spending taxpayers' money on a business district dubbed African Town. The plan explicitly blames the plight of Detroit's black residents on immigrants from Mexico, Asia and the Middle East.

In voting to implement the Powernomics plan, the council also passed a resolution that designates blacks, who make up 83 percent of Detroit's population, as the "majority minority" group and another that creates a development corporation that would operate as a loan fund exclusively for black entrepreneurs.

Whenever I read about beheadings by terrorists, or see the gory pictures, I feel nothing but rage and anger. But my rage isn't directed at George Bush or America. It's directed at the terrorists who commit these atrocities. We must hunt them down and kill each and every one of them. They have declared war on America and our very way of life, and losing the war on terror is not an option.

(Warning: The photos are not for the squeamish!)

(Link via Acidman)

James Taranto points out a bit of media bias from the Houston Chronicle. Check out the filename they gave the photo of the little girl who supports George W. Bush.

Taranto must get results, because the filename has since been changed, but check out this screen capture.

In 1998, the tobacco industry made a deal with the devil. That is, they settled for nearly $250 Billion with 46 states. Now the federal government hopes to sue them out of existance, to the tune of $280 Billion.

In what would surely bankrupt the industry, the Department of Justice is seeking monetary damages (nearly the size of the federal budget deficit), and wants the tobacco industry to fund programs that will beg people to stop using tobacco. The suit doesn't just accuse tobacco companies of selling a dangerous product, but of racketeering and fraud that goes back as far as the 1950s.

I've long held the belief that the neo-temperance movement will make extraordinary grounds in the next five years, and will ultimately end up banning or effectively banning (for instance pricing them out of business) cigarettes and tobacco. This is certainly a huge step in that direction. Ironically, making cigarettes illegal, or so heavily regulated that buttlegging becomes commonplace, will benefit the regulators the most; with a steady stream of tax dollars coming in for waging the "War on Tobacco". And with illegal cigarettes being sold on the street, they will be more available than ever to young children and teens.

It is being reported that, John Kerry is claiming that if George Bush is elected he will bring back the draft. Although some claim that the media is twisting Kerry's words, his campaign has gone on record as the anti-draft choice. Part of what makes this so laughable is that it was Democrats who first proposed bringing back the draft back in 2002, and even went so far as to create legislation to do just that.

With the magic of the internet, the wayback machine takes us to January 2003, when Charles Rangel, D-NY, introduced a bill to bring back military conscription. But Rangel's goal was not to strengthen the military, it was to weaken it. Rangel, who is black, thinks there are too many minorities volunteering for the military, and would like to draft more rich white kids to make it more "equitable". Rangel feels that with more people serving in the military against their will, war would be a lot less likely.

Rep. Charles Rangel introduced a bill in Congress Tuesday to reinstate the military draft, saying fighting forces should more closely reflect the economic makeup of the nation.

The New York Democrat told reporters his goal is two-fold: to jolt Americans into realizing the import of a possible unilateral strike against Iraq, which he opposes, and "to make it clear that if there were a war, there would be more equitable representation of people making sacrifices."

Did I miss the memo that said the mainstream media is now abbreviated MSM?

Without warning, my hosting company decided to deactivate the counter script they provide with their service. That means I have had to revert back to the legacy script I had running before. The odometer appears exactly the same as it did before, but every once in a while an error occurs while writing to the counter file and it reverts back to 0.

It's a huge pain in my ass, but I'll have to live with it for now.

They say that the average lottery winner is broke again within 10 years. For this guy, five years looks like a safe bet.

It's looking more and more like CBS Producer, Mary Mapes, will be the fall guy for the Rathergate memo scandal. Although I still think Rather is done after this year, Mapes looks to be the immediate scapegoat for CBS.

CBS acknowledged Mapes passed on Burkett's number to Kerry adviser Joe Lockhart, and Lockhart called him. Spokeswoman Kelli Edwards said CBS wasn't aware that this was part of any deal, but it's one of the things that will be examined by an independent commission CBS will soon appoint to look into the incident.

"It is obviously against CBS News standards and those of every other reputable news organization to be associated with any political agenda," Edwards said.

More Schwarzenegger on guns.

Meanwhile, Schwarzenegger signed two gun control measures: SB1858, by Sen. Joe Dunn, D-Garden Grove, which prohibits public display of fake guns that look real. He also signed AB2431, by Assemblyman Darrell Steinberg, which will require police to return firearms seized if owners pass a background check showing they can legally own a gun.

The governor vetoed two gun measures by Sen. Jack Scott, D-Altadena: SB1152 would have required stores that sell bullets to keep information about buyers; SB1140 would have made it a crime to store a handgun where a child can easily find it.

Schwarzenegger said the federal government had rejected the bullet bill as unworkable, with no evidence it would promote public safety.

He said the handgun storage measure's restrictions were "vague" and that California law already requires owners to safely store guns.

"In today's New York Post, Roger Stone, who became associated with political 'dirty tricks' while working for Nixon, refused to deny that he was the source the CBS documents. Will Ed Gillespie or the White House admit today what they know about Mr. Stone's relationship with these forged documents? Will they unequivocally rule out Mr. Stone's involvement? Or for that matter, others with a known history of dirty tricks, such as Karl Rove or Ralph Reed?" -- DNC Chairman Terry McAuliff.

This phenomonon is called 'projection', whereby people project their own faults onto others.

"How can you be so serious on a film where you are dodging explosions and running away with Sir Alec Guinness on this side and an eight-foot monkey on this side, and the eight-foot monkey is the one flying the spaceship?" -- Mark Hamill, on fans who take Star Wars too seriously.

"In hindsight, was it a mistake for the U.S. to invade Iraq without the backing of the U.N. Security Council?" -- CNN Poll Question, September 21, 2004.

"[The United Nations Security Council] Decides that Iraq has been and remains in material breach of its obligations under relevant resolutions... ...Recalls, in that context, that the Council has repeatedly warned Iraq that it will face serious consequences as a result of its continued violations of its obligations." -- U.N. Security Council Resolution 1441, November 8, 2002.

Those of us without amnesia will recall that Resolution 1441 was passed unanimously, with a vote of 15-0, and authorized the use of force to enforce 12 years of prior resolutions.

From the latest edition of Tongue Tied, the pleasure police are killing off holidays:

WCMH-TV in Ohio reports that an elementary school there has banned celebrations of Halloween, Christmas and Valentine's Day, in part because some of the students don't participate in such holidays because of personal beliefs.

The kiddies at Glendening Elementary School in Groveport will no longer be able to play dress-up, eat candy canes or exchange Valentine's cards because school officials say they also need the four or five hours a year they spent in those parties to improve academic results.

They've even managed to quash birthday celebrations in favor on big birthday bash at some point during the year during which everyone's special day will be celebrated.

George Will writes that the Supreme Court may soon have the opportunity to rule on the Fifth Amendment protection of property rights. On the subject of property rights, Five states quite simply:

No person shall be. . .deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

That city, like many cities, needs more revenues. To enhance the Pfizer pharmaceutical company's $270 million research facility, it empowered a private entity, the New London Development Corporation, to exercise the power of eminent domain to condemn most of the Fort Trumbull neighborhood along the Thames River. The aim is to make space for upscale condominiums, a luxury hotel and private offices that would yield the city more tax revenues than can be extracted from the neighborhood's middle-class homeowners.

The question is: Does the Constitution empower governments to seize a person's most precious property -- a home, a business -- and give it to more wealthy interests so that the government can reap, in taxes, ancillary benefits of that wealth? Connecticut's court says yes, which turns the Fifth Amendment from a protection of the individual against overbearing government into a license for government to coerce individuals on behalf of society's strongest interests. Henceforth, what home or business will be safe from grasping governments pursuing their own convenience?

Fat lawsuits are on the way, and lawyers are licking their chops. They view obesity as smoking and food companies as the next "Big Tobacco".

An overhead projection on display yesterday at a public health law conference summed up the group's efforts: "Patience, hell. Let's sue somebody."

While public health advocates, trial lawyers and nutritionists had bandied about ideas of regulating food ads, obesity-related lawsuits were the frontline issue for the conclusion of the three-day conference at Northeastern University. [...]

"We must remember that the anti-tobacco movement did not just sue the tobacco companies. We sued lots of people," Mr. Banzhaf said. He advised his colleagues to consider suits against doctors who do not warn obese patients about their health risks.

Even parents of morbidly obese children, where it could be shown the parents did not try to protect their children from related health risks, could be fair game in custody disputes, he said. Those suits would follow the lead of ones where parents who smoked around their children lost partial or full custody.

This isn't about social justice, it's about money for greedy trial lawyers.

Thomas E. Nugent explains Kerrynomics and how disastrous it could be for America.

You need to read the whole thing to appreciate it.

I watched CBS News tonight to see how they handled the Rathergate memo scandal. Dan Rather downplayed that the documents are obvious forgeries. In his interview with Bill Burkett, Rather said Burkett "misled" CBS about the source of the documents. Now CBS is saying they "cannot verify" the source of the documents, and cannot "authenticate" the documents themselves. Because of this, it was a mistake to air them. (Talk about understated.)

Rather asked Burkett if he forged or faked the documents, and Burkett replied that he didn't. Rather followed up with a tough question asking Burkett to explain why they appear to have been written in a modern day Microsoft Word word processing software. Um.. well, actually, Rather didn't ask Burkett any tough questions. Instead he let Burkett continue to air the fake but accurate Democrat talking points. Rather let Burkett slide and claimed, "Burkett still insists the documents are real." He also failed to ask him about the real source of the documents and simply stated that Burkett wouldn't reveal the source.

Rather then blamed CBS News and himself for failing to "authenticate" the documents, and said they deeply regret their mistake.

Overall, I found Dan's apology to ring hollow. Despite the overwhelming evidence against him, Rather let Burkett go on record as saying the documents are real, which Rather emphasized. He mounted absolutely no challenge to Burkett's claim, save for a halfhearted 'why should I believe you?' question, to which Burkett replied 'That's gonna have to be your judgment'.

Way to get to the meat of it there Dan. This man made an ass of Dan Rather and CBS and the best Dan can do is "Why would I or anyone believe you won't mislead us about something else?" Overall Rather left me with the impression that he wants me to believe the documents are real but the source is unknown. Instead, I came away from it with the impression that CBS and Dan Rather have zero credibility.

On the up side, the local CBS affiliate provided a flashback to the Bush (41) vs. Dan Rather sparring contest from 1988, when Bush slammed Rather for walking off the set and leaving the network with 7 minutes of dead air.

UPDATE: Allah asks the right question.

The Bloomfield Press points out that if John Kerry really did accept that semi-automatic shotgun as a gift, he committed a felony. As an out of state resident, accepting the gun as a gift in West Virginia would land a normal person in legal hot water.

If Kerry took it back to his Massachussets home, he committed another felony, and if he got rid of it by giving it to someone else in West Virginia, that is a felony as well.

Although it has not been reported, Kerry in all likelihood never accepted the gun. But refusing it would not have painted him as a friend to gunowners.

The Washington Post offers pretty good evidence that the CBS memos are indeed fake. Anyone who still isn't convinced is intentionally deluding themselves.

Republicans need to keep their mouth shut on this one. Never murder a man who is committing suicide.

This represents just about everything that bugs me about those busybody homeowner's associations that are always so worried about how their neighbors run their lives.

A blind couple is headed to court to resolve a dispute with their homeowner association about droppings left in the street by their guide dogs.

Dennis and Shirley Bartlett are aware of the pooper-scooper rules for their Desert Grove homeowner association, but said they sometimes miss droppings left by their dogs.

"You can't get everything all the time," Dennis Bartlett said.

An article on Wednesday about disputed memos obtained by CBS News that cast doubt on aspects of President Bush's service in the Texas Air National Guard truncated a quotation from David Van Os, a lawyer for Bill Burkett, a retired National Guard officer whom Newsweek called a source of the memos. Asked what role Mr. Burkett had in raising questions about Mr. Bush's military service, Mr. Van Os posed a hypothetical chain of events in which someone - not Mr. Burkett, he said - reconstructed documents that the preparer believed existed in 1972 or 1973. Mr. Van Os then asked "what difference would even that make'' to the "factual reality of where was George W. Bush at the times in question and what was he doing?'' -- The New York Times

Teacher Arrested After Bookmark Called Concealed Weapon

A weight may soon be lifted off a Maryland woman charged with carrying a concealed weapon in an airport.

It wasn't a gun or a knife. It was a weighted bookmark.

Kathryn Harrington was flying home from vacation last month when screeners at the Tampa, Fla., airport found her bookmark. It's an 8.5-inch leather strip with small lead weights at each end.

Airport police said it resembled a weighted weapon that could be used to knock people unconscious. So the 52-year-old special education teacher was handcuffed, put into a police car, and charged with carrying a concealed weapon.

She faced a possible criminal trial and a $10,000 fine. But the state declined to prosecute, and the Transportation Security Administration said it probably won't impose a fine.

Harrington said she'll never again carry her bookmark into an airport.

"She was crying; they were pushing and shoving her," said Mr. Parlock, a Huntington real estate agent. "She was scared."

The Washington Times caption reads:

Sophia Parlock, 3, cries while seated on the shoulders of her father, Phil Parlock, a supporter of President Bush, after a Bush-Cheney sign she and her father were holding was torn up by another person standing in the crowd that had gathered to greet Democratic vice presidential nominee Sen. John Edwards, D-N.C.

UPDATE: Was this all a hoax? Well the Democratic Underground seems to think so, and some bloggers offer evidence that it was all staged. Personally, I've seen professional protestors get pretty nasty so this may just be evidence that they are reliably thuggish.

Apparently some union employees of Border's bookstore have been bragging about hiding or damaging copies of Unfit for Command so that they cannot be sold.

My parental units are coming into town today. I've spent the past week in housekeeping panic mode. I think everything has been scrubbed, buffed, or vacuumed at least twice. As long as they don't open any closet doors or look behind the couch, I think it'll be alright.

Advertisers in the U.K. are being told that their ads shouldn't discriminate against slackers.

A businesswoman has been banned from asking for 'hard-working' staff in a job ad because it discriminates against the lazy.

Beryl King was told by a Jobcentre that her advert for warehouse workers discriminated against people who were not industrious. [...]

Beryl, who owns two job agencies in Totton, Hants, offered �5.42 an hour for "warehouse packers who must be hard-working and reliable".

The Southampton Jobcentre is investigating. A spokesman said: "Words such as 'hardworking' can be accepted if used with a clear job description."

Until it hurts.

This is terrible news:

Now you see it. Soon you won't. In a trend sure to be a relief to some and a disappointment to others, women will cover up instead of baring it all next season as the "slutwear" look comes to an end.

In recent seasons, fashion has been filled with skimpy tops exposing midriffs, cleavage-revealing necklines and jeans slung so low that precious little was left to the imagination -- looks impossible to avoid on such pop icons as Paris Hilton and Britney Spears.

This season, blousy linen took the place of sheer chiffon, while shades of white chased away an edgier black. Necklines were up, while hemlines were hovering down at the knee.

"It's very ladylike. It's not jump-into-bed fashion," Deeny said of the new look on runways as established powerhouses to new designers trotted out more fabric and less skin than in seasons past.

The U.S. Navy released documents Wednesday contradicting claims by Democratic Presidential candidate John Kerry that all of his available military records have been released. -- CNS News, September 16, 2004.

A federal judge has ordered the Pentagon to find and make public by next week any unreleased files about President Bush's Vietnam-era Air National Guard service to resolve a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit filed by The Associated Press. -- Associated Press, September 16, 2004.

Certain politicians from a certain political party insist that the economy is taking and that we are in a recession. But through all their whining and bitching, the economy just keeps chugging along. Now Reuters reports that household wealth has swelled to a new record, while the growth of debt has slowed.

In its quarterly Flow of Funds report, the Fed said household balance sheets increased 1.4 percent to $45.907 trillion in the second quarter, compared to an upwardly revised $45.270 trillion in the first quarter of this year.

First-quarter household wealth was initially reported at $45.153 trillion.

If you are looking for great seats to VT-NC State, here is your chance. These are Ravenwood's Tickets and available for shipment or pickup in the D.C. area.

John Kerry just cannot seem to shake his stuffy rich guy image. While visiting Wisconsin, Kerry thanked the crowd at the famed Lambeau Field for welcoming him to Lambert Field.

That's akin to calling the Yankees the Yankers or the Chicago Bulls the Bells. This is a place where Packers jackets often outnumber sports coats in church and thousands of fans wear a big chunk of yellow foam cheese atop their head with the pride of a new parent. [...]

This strategy is not confined to Cheeseland either. Republicans poked fun of Kerry for talking about the Buckeyes (of Ohio State University) while visiting arch rival Michigan (home of the Wolverines). These seemingly innocuous digs fit into a larger Bush-Cheney plan of fashioning the president as a common man and Kerry as a pandering patrician.

But then these are the people that drone on and on about Bush's pronunciation of "nucular" and "misunderestimated". For some reason I find Bush's speech endearing, while Kerry's just shows how out of touch he really is.

UPDATE: Hahaha.. Football Fans for the Truth.

Effort to Renew Colorado River Launched -- Washington Post, September 15, 2004.

You know, between fighting to keep Ralph Nader's name off of every ballot in the country, and conspiring to prevent a special election in New Jersey, the Dems seem awfully anti-democratic again this election year. I'm just waiting for them to pull a "Torricelli" with John Kerry and put Hillary Clinton on the ballot instead.

It looks like former Washington D.C. Mayor Marion Barry is on his way to winning back his old city council seat in DC's Ward 8.

By winning the Democrat Primary, Barry pretty much assures himself a victory in November. Just how overwhelming is the District's support for Democrats? In 2000, Gore beat Bush 85.2 to 9%.

After he was caught on a drug sting video tape snorting smoking crack cocaine, Barry was elected to the Ward 8 seat. He used it as a stepping stone to regain his position as Mayor in 1995, and many political pundits feel he is looking to repeat that success.

Thomas Sowell makes the case for price gouging in Florida. Of course, anyone who understands the laws of supply and demand know that there is no such thing as price gouging. In a sort of grand irony, government price controls such as those in Florida, actually do more harm than good. Mr. Sowell explains:

Those who are long on indignation and short on economics may say that these hotels were now "charging all that the traffic will bear." But they were probably charging all that the traffic would bear when such hotels were charging $40 a night.

The real question is: Why will the traffic bear more now? Obviously because supply and demand have both changed. Since both homes and hotels have been damaged or destroyed by the hurricanes, there are now more people seeking more rooms from fewer hotels.

What if prices were frozen where they were before all this happened?

Those who got to the hotel first would fill up the rooms and those who got there later would be out of luck -- and perhaps out of doors or out of the community. At higher prices, a family that might have rented one room for the parents and another for the children will now double up in just one room because of the "exorbitant" prices. That leaves another room for someone else.

Someone whose home was damaged, but not destroyed, may decide to stay home and make do in less than ideal conditions, rather than pay the higher prices at the local hotel. That too will leave another room for someone whose home was damaged worse or destroyed.

Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, who made his fortune shooting up the Hollywood big screen, signed a bill into law that bans the sale of .50-caliber rifles.

The California measure adds .50-caliber BMG rifles to the state's list of so-called assault weapons and bans the sale of .50 BMG ammunition. Those who already own the rifles would be required to register with the state.

George Lucas, creator of the pop culture Star Wars universe, claimed that an "Assault Weapons Ban" similar to the one that expired September 13th would have kept the Empire from striking back against the Rebel Alliance.

"Assault Weapons are modeled after military weapons," said Lucas, "and had there been a ban as effective as the one we had here, the Empire would have been unable to defeat the rebel base on Hoth. These guns are not used for hunting. Not once did you see a stormtrooper out hunting wampas with a blaster rifle."

The Empire, relied heavily on military-style, rapid-fire assault weapons with pistol grips. These guns have no sporting purpose and are precisely the type of guns targeted by the 1994 gun ban passed by then President Bill Clinton. Imperial troops used the guns to spray fire from the hip and slash through the hapless rebel resistance very quickly. The whole battle was over in the opening act.

House Republicans are set to repeal the draconian Washington D.C. gun ban. With 228 co-sponsors, the bill has more than enough votes to pass the House, but the anti-gun Senate seems unlikely to vote for passage.

If the Senate refuses to pass the bill (which is likely) they should at least pass a law that says Senators must obey the same restrictions that disarm the regular folks. No more armed security, no more special exemptions for the political elite, no more guns in Dianne Feinstein's purse.

Lets see how they like roaming the Washington D.C. killing fields completely defenseless.

I don't think I will ever understand why pro athletes think they are justified in attacking the fans who taunt them. Recently a Texas Rangers pitcher was arrested after he allegedly threw a chair into the crowd striking two fans in the head. (Geraldo Rivera was unavailable for comment.)

Despite the obvious physical battery by one of his players, the Ranger's manager blamed the Oakland fans who were taunting them:

"Tonight, it went over the line," Rangers manager Buck Showalter said. "It was a real break from the normal trash you hear from fans. We've had problems about every time we've come here."

Just think, Pete Rose is banned for betting, but players who attack obnoxious fans usually get off with a small fine.

(Aside: Didn't George W. Bush once own the Texas Rangers? I bet this is somehow his fault.)

I'm not sure I understand why, but Democrats seem to be fighting Ralph Nader more than George W. Bush. In Florida, Dems have sued to keep Nader off the ballot, and attempts to let the people choose Nader have been called "partisan".

"I'm in disbelief," said Scott Maddox, chairman of the Florida Democratic Party. "This is blatant partisan maneuvering on the part of Jeb Bush to give his brother a leg up on election day."

"They are trying to get ballots printed with Nader's name on them," said Maddox. "I am astounded that Jeb Bush is willing to defy the judiciary to help his brother."

For a so-called pro-gun candidate, John Kerry sure is ratcheting up the anti-gun rhetoric.

John Kerry is criticizing President Bush for letting a decade-long ban on assault weapons expire while unveiling his own $5 billion plan to fight crime and picking up a police union endorsement. [...]

"George Bush made a choice today. . . He chose his powerful friends in the gun lobby over the police officers [unions] and the [union's] families he promised to protect."

"Let me be very clear. I support the Second Amendment. I've been a hunter all my life. . . But I don't think we need to make the job of terrorists any easier."

This all plays into his soft national security stance. He votes against $87 Billion funding for our troops fighting the war on terror, and then says he could solve the war on terror could be won with $5 Billion spent on police unions and a domestic gun ban.

If you missed the VT-WMU game, where the Hokies won 63-0, you missed a play that is all too rare in football. Defensive End, Jason Lallis, got a paw up there and tipped a Western Michigan pass. Confusion ensued as opposing players scrummed for the ball. Keeping his head, Lallis then reached in and plucked the ball from an offensive lineman's hands and lumbered into the endzone for the score.

Almost none of the players on the field even saw Lallis strip the ball, but the crowd went nuts as bulky lineman lived the lineman's dream. These guys rarely get their hands on the ball and most of their time is spent pushing and shoving.

Sure, he was penalized 15 yards on the ensuing kickoff (for excessive celebration) but it was well earned. It must be the first time I had ever seen 60,000 people cheer a 15 yard unsportsmanlike conduct penalty on their own team. Boo ya!

Stat of the day: In the three game, four year series, Western Michigan hasn't even scored on Virginia Tech.

the Hokies concluded their three game series with Western Michigan by shutting out the Broncos in all three meetings. Tech won by scores of 31-0 (2001), 30-0 (2002), and 63-0 (2004). It's nearly impossible to shut out the same team three straight times, but defensive coordinator Bud Foster and his staff pulled-off that 'hat trick.'

Making this feat more unusual is this: Western Michigan has traditionally been one of the higher scoring teams in the Mid-American Conference. In fact, the Broncos have been shut out only three times since 1997 - all three games against Virginia Tech.

This, from the Washington Post, discussing ways Kerry could win the election:

The fastest route is to win the biggest states: Florida (27 electoral votes), Pennsylvania (21) and Ohio (20). Bush won two of them in 2000 -- Florida only after a 36-day recount and a Supreme Court decision that effectively gave him the state and the presidency -- and both sides believe that whoever claims two of those three this year will win the election.

Eight days left.

I cannot help but wonder if the CBS forged document kerfuffle was caused by the Clintons. Many people have been predicting that the Clintons might torpedo Kerry's campaign to ensure a spot for Hillary in 2008. I know this is an off the wall theory, but what if the Clintons sent these documents over to CBS to see what they could stir up.

Considering some of the dems are blaming Karl Rove for masterminding the whole thing, I don't think it's too farfetched.

The Clinton Gun Ban (or so-called "assault weapons ban") expired today. That means we can go back to using normal capacity magazines, folding stocks, and bayonet lugs.

Also note that the sky hasn't fallen, and the world hasn't ended.

What will be the first thing you run out and buy? I'm thinking about some normal capacity magazines for my Glock.

UPDATE: Here is the ATF press release. Please note the ban has expired as of 12:01 AM this morning, not tomorrow morning. Also, some states (like California) still have state-wide bans, so you guys are SOL.

That's what you'd hear if your baby fell victim to the thousands of death traps lurking in the average American home.

Some people are more than a little upset at law abiding citizens once again being able to purchase guns that are mean and scary looking. Telling lies isn't enough, they feel compelled to try to scare the bejesus out of people. (Sorry, but when I read this headline I couldn't help but think of the Simpsons babyproofer.)

Murder guns

- To be legal Monday

REPUBLICAN leaders of Congress acted this week to ensure that rapid-fire, mass-killing weapons will begin flooding America's streets Monday. [...]

But Bush didn't lift a finger to help. Now the gun lobby is exulting in victory.

The power that the gun lobby wields over U.S. politicians is astounding. Only a tiny fringe of Americans like to carry loaded pistols hidden in their pockets - and the number who want rapid-fire assault guns is even smaller. Why does this small fringe terrify politicians? It's a mystery.

CBS seems to be circling the wagons. In a long, drawn out explanation, CBS tries to counter each of the inconsistencies of Wednesday's '60 Minutes' Memogate fiasco (which they call an "unusual campaign issue").

Most notably, General Hodges, who supposedly independently verified the memos authenticity, says he did nothing of the sort. CBS apparently read the memos to him over the phone instead of letting him view them, and they informed Hodges that the memos came from Col. Jerry Killian as a matter of fact, rather than a matter of doubt. Hodges says he thought they were handwritten and told CBS that "well if he wrote them that's what he felt."

CBS also says that the Boston Globe says that document expert Phillip Broussard says that he has changed his mind. Apparently the letters *could* have been typed on an IBM Selectric Composer typewriter. But Broussard says the Boston Globe is lying and twisting his words. CBS contacted Broussard, but they don't give any statement from him and instead say only that "he could not dismiss the documents as fake". (So that must mean they're real!)

As for the issue of Col. Staudt, who retired a year and a half before he was supposedly pressuring the Guard to "sugarcoat" Bush's record, CBS amazing (and without evidence) claims that he could have maintained his influence long after he left the guard.

Yadda yadda yadda, CBS caps off their defense with this childish (and hilarious) bit of redirection:

In a separate development, the Boston Globe this week reported that Mr. Bush promised to sign up with a Boston-area unit when he left his Texas unit in 1973 to attend Harvard Business School. Mr. Bush never signed up with a Boston unit.

I wonder if Rather's career is over. Someone take away his shoelaces.

"We are not going to stand by and allow another million African American votes to go uncounted in this election. We are not going to stand by and allow acts of voter suppression, and we're hearing those things again in this election. What they did in Florida in 2000, some say they may be planning to do this year in battleground states all across this country. Well, we are here to let them know that we will fight tooth and nail to make sure that this time, every vote is counted and every vote counts." -- John Kerry, speaking to the Congressional Black Caucus.

Every election year, "some say" that the GOP is systematically disenfranchising minority voters, yet for some reason they never offer any evidence.

Colorado voters will have an interesting choice to make in November. A referendum has been placed on the ballot that would apportion the state's electors in relation to the popular vote. It doesn't seem to bother anyone (and probably wouldn't bother an activist judge) that this violates the United States Constitution, which says the Legislature is to decide the manner for appointing electors: (Article 2, Section 1: "Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors...").

It's interesting to note, that the Legislature doesn't appear to want any part of it. Republicans are blaming Democrats:

Republicans, who hold a 185,000 edge in registered voters over Democrats in Colorado, say the plan is a plot to take the state's nine electoral votes from Bush and give them to Kerry.

"Many Democrats feel this state is in play and this is a state we can win. They think this is a way to give George Bush four electoral votes in Colorado," [State Democratic Party chairman Chris] Gates said.

Katy Atkinson, a GOP pollster, said Colorado could end up always splitting its votes 5-4, in effect giving it one electoral vote. That would make the state a political backwater no candidate would waste time visiting.

You might want to think twice the next time you stiff your waitress for bad service. In New York, it might just land you in jail.

A New York City man accused of leaving an inadequate tip at a restaurant was arrested, fingerprinted and photographed for a mug shot.

Humberto A. Taveras, 41, faces a misdemeanor charge of theft of services after he and his fellow diners argued with Soprano's Italian and American Grill managers over the legality of requiring an 18 percent tip for large parties.

"They chased us down like a bunch of criminals," Taveras said. "It killed our weekend."

Taveras and eight others had pizza at the restaurant Sunday night. He told the Glens Falls Post-Star they weren't completely satisfied with the food and left a tip of under 10 percent. Taveras said they also were not told of a mandatory 18 percent gratuity for parties of six or more and did not see notice of it on their menus.

UPDATE: The charges were dropped. The DA apparently realized that a "gratuity" cannot be made compulsory. However, had they billed it as a "service charge", they would have had a case.

Chicago has now started confiscating registered firearms.

An elderly first-generation Chicago resident was recently paid a visit by an Illinois State Police trooper. After asking to come inside the man's home, the trooper asked if the man owned a gun - to which he replied yes. The trooper then directed the individual to surrender the firearm. The man complied with the officer's demand and the trooper left with the gun. And the story gets better...

The gun in question was purchased legally by the man in the 1970s shortly after he became a U.S. citizen. When Chicago's infamous gun registration scheme went into effect in the early 1980s, the man registered the firearm as per the requirement. However, over the years, the fellow apparently forgot to re-register the firearm, and forgot to renew his Illinois FOID Card.

So...what does this all mean?

In the last edition of The Illinois Shooter, we reported on the activities of a shady taskforce known as the Chicago Anti Gun Enforcement (CAGE) unit. This elite squad, operated jointly by the Illinois State Police, the Chicago Police Department, and the Cook County State's Attorney's Office, supposedly exists to identify illegal gunrunners. However, information gained by the ISRA makes it clear that the CAGE unit is targeting law-abiding citizens, not criminal gunrunners.

Thanks to a ruling by a liberal federal judge, the CAGE unit now has the name of every single person in the United States who, since 1992, lawfully purchased more than one handgun in the period of a week. The CAGE unit also has all the makes, models and serial numbers of those guns. In essence, the Chicago Police Department is now registering guns and gun owners nationwide.

The ISRA has also learned that the CAGE unit has compiled a list of families where more than one person in that family holds a FOID card. Acting on that information, the CAGE unit is now contacting gun shops where those families have shopped, and is illegally registering all guns purchased by those families.

Now, it appears that the CAGE unit is scrubbing Chicago's gun registration list against the list of FOID card holders. Indications are that folks who have let their registrations and FOIDs lapse will have their guns confiscated. We have to wonder how long it will be until state troopers show up at the doors to confiscate the guns of non-Chicago residents who have let their FOIDs expire.

Spoons is having an RCOB moment over the Chicago Sun Times' anti-gun bigotry. Last week they ran an op-ed that basically said extending the Clinton Gun Ban is important because machine guns are evil and dangerous.

After receiving letters and phone calls pointing out that the Clinton Ban had nothing to do with machine guns, they ran this cryptic "clarification", buried at the bottom of the letters to the editor page:

An editorial in the Sept. 7 editions about the need to extend the assault weapons ban included a reference to machineguns. The assault weapons ban covers semiautomatic weapons.

Maybe we should pass an Assault Pitchfork Ban.

A robber who used a rusty pitchfork to stick up a bank got away -- and so far, finding him has been like looking for a needle in a haystack.

The man, wearing sunglasses and a mask, entered Security Federal Bank Tuesday morning and threatened employees with the 4-foot-long pitchfork. The man took an undisclosed amount of money.

Ed Wasserman thinks that News producers are under siege from the digital brownshirts Vast Right Wing Conspiracy.

It's hard now even to write for publication without being aware of just how thoroughly what you say is going to be inspected for any trace of undesirable political tilt and denounced by a free-floating cadre of rightist warriors.

If that's apparent to me as a mere columnist, I can only imagine the current mind-set of supervising editors: If we give prominence to this story of carnage in Iraq, will we be accused of anti-administration bias? And - here it gets interesting - will we therefore owe our readers an offsetting story, perhaps an inspirational tale of Marines teaching young Iraqis how to play softball?

Now, both stories may well be integral to the news. If so, both should be told. The problem arises when the pressure to tell the softball story comes not from a principled desire to deliver a factual account that is broadly emblematic of significant happenings in Iraq, but from a gutless attempt to buy off a hostile and suspicious fragment of the audience base.

News then becomes a negotiation - not a negotiation among discordant pictures of reality, as it always is, but an abject negotiation with a loud and bullying sliver of the audience. News of great significance becomes not an honest attempt to reflect genuinely contradictory realities, but a daily bargaining session with an increasingly factionalized public, a corrupted process in which elements of the news become offerings - payments really - in a kind of intellectual extortion.

News is entertainment. They have one job, and one job only. That is to keep people glued to the set long enough to sit through the commercials which pay the bills. That's it! The only exception to this is NPR, which even then relies heavily on contributions from "pledge drives", paid sponsors, and of course taxpayer dollars.

Any newsman that tells you they are working for the greater good, or have some grand and glorious responsibility to their viewers is lying. The "fair and balanced" shtick is nothing more than good marketing. For the most part, honesty and fair-mindedness is built in to the system. People don't like to be lied to, and nobody is going to tune in every night at 6 O'clock for the Weekly World News or Dan Rather pawning off bogus 1972 emails about Bush's National Guard Service. This explains why Fox News gets better ratings even though it's available on less TV sets.

Now this is America, and Wasserman can present the news however he chooses. But if he can't hold an audience, what's the point?

For the 3rd anniversary of the September 11th attacks, I'm getting the hell out of D.C.; but not for reasons that you might think. There's football going on and tomorrow the Hokies take on Western Michigan, the toughest football program to come out of Kalamazoo. It won't be on TV, so unless you are at the game, don't look for me.

ScrappleFace: Kerry Honorably Discharged from Senate

ScrappleFace: 1972 Email Casts Doubt on Bush Guard Service

Someone threw a tomato at one of Gerhard Schroeder's politicos, and the Germans are in a quandry about how best to punish him.

Had it been a soft red one, the man would have faced a lesser charge of causing malicious damage. A harder, green tomato could carry the tougher charge of bodily harm.

A yellow one is somewhere in between. "In these types of cases it has to do with the consistency (of the fruit)," said Caecilia Cramer-Krahforst, spokeswoman for the court in the eastern city of Cottbus.

Big brother is coming to Chicago. The mayor announced that he plans to link 2000 cameras together, so that government officials can keep tabs on those that they survey.

He's a Senator, he's one of George Bush's biggest nemesis, and his flip-flopping is catching up to him in the polls. I'll give you a hint, it's not John Kerry.

CBS' news magazine '60 Minutes', who routinely runs infomercials for all the latest anti-Bush books, is touting new documents surrounding George Bush's National Guard service. Bush, who served for almost 6 years, is accused of being AWOL for a few months in 1972, toward the end of his term. The problem is that the documents, which '60 Minutes' claims are authentic, appear to have been created with a modern version of Microsoft Word. I'm going on record as saying that I'm convinced they are fake.

The problems with the document include:

John Hawkins takes the next step from my Chasing Jobs post. He looks at GDP, a key economic indicator that reporters tend to ignore.

Hawkins notes:

3rd quarter of 2003 - GDP +7.4%
4th quarter of 2003 - GDP +4.2%
1st quarter of 2004 - GDP +4.5%
2nd quarter of 2004 - GDP + 2.8%

Average GDP growth over the last year - +4.7%
Average GDP growth in the 90s - +3.1%
Average GDP growth in the 80s - +2.9%

While the media is going haywire trying to prove that George Bush was missing or AWOL for a few months in 1972, Byron York puts things into perspective:

The future president joined the Guard in May 1968. Almost immediately, he began an extended period of training. Six weeks of basic training. Fifty-three weeks of flight training. Twenty-one weeks of fighter-interceptor training.

That was 80 weeks to begin with, and there were other training periods thrown in as well. It was full-time work. By the time it was over, Bush had served nearly two years.

Not two years of weekends. Two years.

After training, Bush kept flying, racking up hundreds of hours in F-102 jets. As he did, he accumulated points toward his National Guard service requirements. At the time, guardsmen were required to accumulate a minimum of 50 points to meet their yearly obligation.

According to records released earlier this year, Bush earned 253 points in his first year, May 1968 to May 1969 (since he joined in May 1968, his service thereafter was measured on a May-to-May basis).

Bush earned 340 points in 1969-1970. He earned 137 points in 1970-1971. And he earned 112 points in 1971-1972. The numbers indicate that in his first four years, Bush not only showed up, he showed up a lot. Did you know that?

That brings the story to May 1972 - the time that has been the focus of so many news reports - when Bush "deserted" (according to anti-Bush filmmaker Michael Moore) or went "AWOL" (according to Terry McAuliffe, chairman of the Democratic National Committee).

Bush asked for permission to go to Alabama to work on a Senate campaign. His superior officers said OK. Requests like that weren't unusual, says retired Col. William Campenni, who flew with Bush in 1970 and 1971.

"In 1972, there was an enormous glut of pilots," Campenni says. "The Vietnam War was winding down, and the Air Force was putting pilots in desk jobs. In '72 or '73, if you were a pilot, active or Guard, and you had an obligation and wanted to get out, no problem. In fact, you were helping them solve their problem."

So Bush stopped flying. From May 1972 to May 1973, he earned just 56 points - not much, but enough to meet his requirement.

Then, in 1973, as Bush made plans to leave the Guard and go to Harvard Business School, he again started showing up frequently.

In June and July of 1973, he accumulated 56 points, enough to meet the minimum requirement for the 1973-1974 year.

Then, at his request, he was given permission to go. Bush received an honorable discharge after serving five years, four months and five days of his original six-year commitment. By that time, however, he had accumulated enough points in each year to cover six years of service.

Over the past few months, Bill Cosby has put himself out there by standing up for personal responsibility. After the original reaction of shock and awe wore off, Cosby's words seemed to be welcomed by many. And with Cosby getting lots of praise and attention, it was only a matter of time before the usual suspects of race warlords started jumping onto his bandwagon.

The Rev. Al Sharpton and African-American members of Congress had one word Wednesday for Bill Cosby: amen.

"We are all in debt to Bill Cosby, who did not have to come on the firing line" in opening a crusade for personal responsibility in the black community, said Sharpton.

They say there's nothing safer than a Volvo?

With stories like this, there's no wonder why people have such a misunderstanding about guns.

It's an all-too-realistic lesson in gun safety. An Indiana coroner is recovering from a leg wound after accidentally shooting himself.

Monroe County Coroner David Toumey says he was demonstrating gun safety late one night last week at a boat ramp, when the gun went off.

He tells The Herald-Times as he was checking to make sure the gun was unloaded, it fired. The local sheriff's office hasn't released details of the accident, saying a deputy has yet to file a report.

"Accidents" like this are 100% preventable, and this guy should be required to attend a gun safety course rather than teaching one ad hoc.

A gang of would-be robbers picked the wrong target. A fourth degree black belt.

Craig Nordstrand, 47, had just beaten off four of the attackers. The other two had unsuccessfully had a go at his mate Peter Roche.

After taking an initial beating, the six backed off and surrounded the pair.

Nordstrand tried to give his attackers a warning. "Do you want karate?" he asked.

One of the robbers did, but it was a bad mistake.

"I kicked him straight under the chin and into the throat," Nordstrand said. The gang of thugs scarpered into the Suva darkness.

Walter E. Williams debunks John Edwards "Two Americas" theory.

The Media Research Center reports that the networks are downplaying August's job creation figures and the low 5.4% unemployment rate.

Jack has the answer.

The preliminary employment numbers for August are out, and it appears as though 144,000 jobs were created. Likewise the unemployment rate dipped from an already low 5.5% to 5.4%.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 1.44 million jobs have been created in 2004. If the preliminary July and August figures are correct, we are on pace for 2.2 million jobs to be created in 2004. Although this is slightly less than the 2.6 million that the Bush Administration originally predicted, it's still a good number. If you remember, liberals originally scoffed at Bush's optimism, as if 2.6 million wasn't even possible.

To achieve Bush's goal, 290,000 jobs a month need to be created. While optimistic, that is still altogether feasible.

Related articles:
Chasing Jobs II - 06/04/2004
Chasing Jobs - 05/07/2004

AOL's unscientific straw poll shows John Kerry carrying only the District of Columbia, and Bush winning the election 535-3.

The labor union, United Mine Workers of America, gave John Kerry a Browning Auto-5 semi-automatic shotgun. The Kerry campaign is hoping that the gift will make gun owners such as myself warm up to their french-looking candidate. So, where's the irony?

Kerry co-sponsored Senate Bill 1431. Under the bill, the Browning Auto-5 would be classified as an "assault weapon" and thus be illegal.

UPDATE: For those of you that are getting bogged down in semantics, S.1431 bans any semi-auto shotgun with a "pistol grip" The text of the bill reads: "(42) PISTOL GRIP- The term `pistol grip' means a grip, a thumbhole stock, or any other characteristic that can function as a grip."

I'd say that's vague enough to cover just about every semi-auto shotgun there is.

C.R. Smokin' Chicks is attracting some attractive job applicants.

The carryout, scheduled to open in a couple weeks, will sell flame-roasted rotisserie-smoked chicken. But some people haven't gotten the message yet.

"We had two girls, according to builders, pull in wanting to fill out applications to be dancers," Baja said. "We've had two groups of cars coming in with all males dressed very nicely, thinking it was a strip club, to come in and see the dancers."

Now rip it out. The state funded University of Nebraska is banning free speech outside the football stadium.

A new policy at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln bans politicking outside Memorial Stadium. That means no speeches, buttons, bumper stickers, leaflets or campaign signs.

Ironically, Memorial Stadium is named in honor of Nebraskans who fought and died preserving the very freedom Chancellor Perlman is violating. Perhaps he should rename the stadium, whilst those men turn over in their graves.

"Kerry stands by 'yes' vote on Iraq war" - CNN, August 9, 2004

"Kerry on Iraq: 'Wrong War, Wrong Place, Wrong Time' " - Reuters, September 6, 2004.

No more blogging until Tuesday. I'm off to Sin City Friday morning for Jenn with two 'n's Vegas wedding extravaganza. I'll be meeting scores of friends out there, including the blogosphere's very own, Goddess.

I hope to get out of town before Hurricane Frances wreaks too much havoc on air traffic. We shouldn't be in the path of the storm, but you know how airlines like to delay-delay-delay-cancel-blame the weather. I hope to avoid all that.

I should be back late on Monday, so blogging on Tuesday might be light as well. Here's hoping that everyone has a great Labor Day weekend.

Ciao.

If you think Zell Miller was tough on John Kerry, you should have seen him taking Chris Matthews to task. James Taranto pointed out this hilarious exchange:

Matthews: Do you believe, Senator, truthfully, that John Kerry wants to defend the country with spitballs? Do you believe that?

Miller: That was a metaphor, wasn't it? Do you know what a metaphor is?

Matthews: Well, what do you mean by a metaphor?

MATTHEWS: Well, let me ask you, when Democrats come out, as they often do, liberal Democrats, and attack conservatives, and say they want to starve little kids, they want to get rid of education, they want to kill the old people...

MILLER: I am not saying that. Wait a minute.

MATTHEWS: That kind of rhetoric is not educational, is it?

MILLER: Wait a minute.

Now, this is your program. And I am a guest on your program.

MATTHEWS: Yes, sir.

MILLER: And so I want to try to be as nice as I possibly can to you. I wish I was over there, where I could get a little closer up into your face.

MILLER: But I don't have to stand here and listen to that kind of stuff. I didn't say anything about not feeding poor kids. What are you doing?

MATTHEWS: No, I'm saying that when you said tonight-I just want you to...

MILLER: Well, you are saying a bunch of baloney that didn't have

anything to do with what I said up there on the [stage]

I've never been attacked by a peace protester, but I have to say, I think Goddess handled it pretty well.

Sometimes the tone of a headline speaks volumes:

1,000 use vouchers to flee D.C. schools - CNN

Many D.C. School Vouchers Go Unused - Washington Post

The figures seem to indicate that D.C. schools are bad, and people are fleeing. CNN offers some real numbers about the popularity of the program which the Post ignores. During just 17 days last spring, the families of more than 8500 students inquired about the voucher program, a figure that the Post doesn't mention. Of those, 1800 of them met the income cap. However, the Post goes out of it's way to emphasize that while 1359 vouchers were approved, 290 went unused, leaving just over 1000 students actually using the program. Using the Post's numbers (1359 approved, 290 dropped out) that translates to about 21% of approved vouchers that go unused. The Post calls this "many".

Regardless of how many students use the program, vouchers appear to be working. Here is something else CNN emphasizes (that the Post minimizes):

The program provides up to $7,500 per child to cover tuition, fees and other educational expenses. While tuition rates range from $3,000 to $22,415 per year, participating institutions have waived costs exceeding the grant limit, or provided other financial aid.

Are there red light cameras in your town? Check out Photoenforced.com and find out.

(Hat tip to reader, Jeff.)

Although reasons were not given, this has to be political correctness gone awry.

Government cutbacks are hitting a continental soldier below the belt.

The statue of Copper John, a continental soldier that sits atop the state's Auburn Correctional Facility, was removed earlier this summer for renovation.

The beloved figure is set to return to his perch this fall, albeit a lesser man.

Workers sprucing up the 156-year-old statue were told to reduce the size of Copper John's crotch.

California lawmakers frequently break the law by using gut and amend tactics to get unpopular bills passed.

Assemblyman Marco Firebaugh tried every trick in his political playbook to make California the first state in the nation to fine parents caught smoking in cars with small children present.

When his bill was killed by fellow lawmakers in public hearings, he gutted an entirely different bill and filled the empty shell with his anti-smoking measure. When that bill failed, the Los Angeles Democrat gutted another one and did it again.

I haven't watched much of the RNCC, but I just caught my former Senator, Zell Miller's speech on Fox. The only thing I can say about it is HOLY SHIT. He certainly doesn't look like a guy that's just out to sell a book.

"For more than 20 years, on every one of the great issues of freedom and security, John Kerry has been more wrong, more weak and more wobbly than any other national figure," Miller said. "As a war protester, Kerry blamed our military. As a senator, he voted to weaken our military."

Miller, D-Ga., said Kerry had voted to cut key weapon systems. "This is a man who wants to be the commander in chief of our U.S. armed forces? U.S. forces armed with what? Spitballs?" Miller said. [...]

"Kerry would let Paris decide when America needs defending. I want Bush to decide," Miller said.

Miller, a former Marine, also accused the Democrats of putting soldiers in danger just to get at Bush.

"While young Americans are dying in the sands of Iraq and the mountains of Afghanistan, our nation is being torn apart and made weaker because of the Democrats' manic obsession to bring down our commander in chief," he said.

This from Drudge:

FOXNEWS BEATS BROADCAST NETWORKS FOR TUESDAY NIGHT COVERAGE OF CONVENTION -- HISTORIC UNPRECEDENTED NUMBERS FOR CABLE

10-11PM

FOXNEWS -- 5.2 MILLION
NBC -- 5.1 MILLION
CBS -- 4.4 MILLION
ABC -- 4.3 MILLION
MSNBC -- 1.6 MILLION
CNN -- 1.5 MILLION

FOXNEWS peak came during Laura Bush's speech with 5,216,000 viewers... [5,124,000 during Schwarzenegger]...

UPDATE: Reuters picks up the story.

Drudge points out that Al Franken needs to up the dosage on his blood pressure medicine.

If it weren't a Mac, this would be cool.

I've known for years that Virginia is the land of a thousand vanity plates, but I never realized that Jimmy Buffett fans had their own plate.

Political protesting is one thing, but the long haired hippies in New York City seem to be getting out of hand. Yesterday an arsonist almost killed three people, and now they've taken to threatening ordinary people who are just trying to attend the theater.

...individual protesters kept tensions high, some of them hissing or cursing at well-heeled couples heading to popular Broadway musicals like "Thoroughly Modern Millie" and "Fiddler on the Roof."

"Republican murderers go home and kill your babies!" one young man yelled at theatergoers, a far cry from local public service messages urging New Yorkers to "make nice" to party delegates in the city for the four-day convention, where Bush will be nominated for another four-year term.

A second protester shoved a middle-aged woman in a black cocktail dress, shouting:

"Bitch, go home! We don't want you here!"

They needed a study to tell them this.