Blue Crab Boulevard

There were rallies all across the US today. Hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants, marching, chanting and waving flags, Even though the organizers told supporters to carry American flags, many of the demonstrators continued the practice of waving Mexican flags and the flags of other nations. Many bloggers have covered this and have a lot of pictures. The NYT, in a very sympathetic article, covered several of the marches. This quote says it all:

One man, José Piñeda, 30, who works at the American Girl doll factory in Madison and was at the rally with his wife and two young children, was asked if they were not afraid to march in a rally where they might be identified as illegal and therefore subject to capture or prosecution by authorities.

"No," Mr. Piñeda said. "We are not criminals."

The media have cast this in their classic class/race warfare storyline, and have made a preemptive bid to brand anyone who objects to this a racist and an enemy of the poor.

Bull. I don't have any dislike of people based on their skin color, race, ethnicity or religion. I have certain beliefs that some people's actions and choices are rather bad, but that's another discussion.

Unchecked illegal immigration will destroy the special place that is America. And despite all the howling from the fringes, it is a special place. And it will cease to exist if we do not get this issue under control. The illegals will succeed in killing the golden goose that they claim to love so much that they break the law to get here.

And yes, sir, Mr. Piñeda, you are a criminal.

UPDATE: Iowa Voice is on the same page. Build the fence. Republicans who vote to do this will beat the Democrats in November. Democrats who try to pander to the illegals will pay a bloody price from their core constituencies.

UPDATE: Glenn Reynolds weighs in with the (obvious when you think about it - and no, I didn't until he brought it up) observation that since Mexico is demanding a say in our immigration policies, we should have equal rights to demand changes in Mexico. And if they don't want to respect that idea, maybe annexing Mexico should be an option. (Clue to Republican and Democratic politicians both - you are losing the middle - which you all need. Better listen up.)

UPDATE: WaPo has a rather obviously biased report that paints the protests in a very sympathetic light. My guess is that if illegal immigrant journalists were taking their jobs, the tone would change.

UPDATE: Eckernet has a review of local news coverage from the rally he supplied photographs from. The conclusion: biased and manipulative.

I haven't blogged about the uproar going on in North Carolina over the allegations that members of the Duke University lacrosse team had raped a black female exotic dancer. The alleged incident took place at a party in a house where some team members lived. It's been all over the news, often reported as a "Poor townies against rich, privileged college folks". There have been repeated protests, the Duke lacrosse coach resigned and the season was canceled. 46 of the 47 team members were ordered to submit DNA samples.

Lawyers for the team members announced today that the DNA tests had cleared the accused players. Provided this is true (and the local prosecutor clammed up all of a sudden after being very vocal earlier) will the people who protested apologize? Will the press that cast doubt and aspersions on the players apologize?

Just wondering.

UPDATE: AP story here. It's from the Fox News site and has a picture of one of the protests. More coverage from a local outlet. This one has a detail omitted so far by all the wire service reports I have read on the; the prosecutor is facing reelection in about 3 weeks. Think politics has anything to do with this?

Nifong said the DNA results do not end anything.

“I’m not saying it’s over. If that’s what they expect, they will be sadly disappointed,” Nifong said at a candidate forum Monday night. “They can say anything they want, but I’m still in the middle of my investigation. … I believe a sexual assault took place.”

Based on what, Mr. Nifong? If there is no DNA, the accusers story is in ruins. There is nothing to continue persecuting the accused with. They will beat hell out of you in criminal court and will likely be in a very good position to pound you in civil court for wrongful prosecution. If your election strategy includes persecuting innocent victims for political gain, you don't deserve reelection.

And Lashawn Barber leaves a mark. A big mark.

Well, over the weekend the huge amount of electronic ink expended over the "Bush Leak" meme was astonishing.

Then it was gone - *pffft* - just disappeared. Media dropped it, left wing dropped it. Just gone.

I had my avalanche of very left commenters for a while, had to nuke the comment queue twice for obscenity laden posts. Got accused of stifling dissent because I did so, etc.

But the Scandal of the Day™ didn't work out. Again.

Peaktalk has a very thorough writeup. The Telegraph had another article up about it a few days ago. Bob Carter, writing in the Telegraph says that global warming essentially stopped in 1998. He's basing it off the actual records of the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia.

This ought to get a few folks spinning up to about 20,000 rpm.

I've tried to leave comments on your sites thanking everyone who linked me in the past couple of days. As a newish blog, it can be a bit hard getting people to read what I write. I do want to thank everyone publicly here. So thanks (in no particular order) to:

Brainster's Blog, The Real Ugly American, Mike's America, Carry On America, Flopping Aces, Starboard, Memeorandum, National Journal Blogometer, Cathy Seipp, Hugh Hewitt, Joanne Jacobs, Tom's Common Sense, Gateway Pundit and Nail Yale- If I have missed anyone, I humbly apologize and I will try to find any others and make sure the list is complete. 

UPDATE: Finding more folks. Don Surber, Dad Manly, Daou Report, My Election Analysis and A Newer World. I'll keep adding them as I find them.

Incidentally, Technorati is not updating properly for this site. They are working on the problem, but links are not showing up there properly right now.

UPDATE: Missed EckerNet yesterday, sorry.

UPDATE: And thanks to Chez Diva.

More superbly accurate exit polling, from Italy this time. All day long the headlines have been saying that Prime Minister Berlusconi was trailing his challenger Prodi.

Only now it looks like Berlusconi may just have pulled out a win. An excruciatingly narrow win, but a win. Pollsters are now calling results too close to call (even though the numbers appear to be against Prodi right now).

Fair warning to anyone attempting to exit poll. Blue Crab Boulevard strongly encourages lying to pollsters no matter what the question. Or telling said pollster where to go and what to do when they get there. Why? Because we don't think government should be run by opinion polls. Stupidest damn way to run a country ever.

UPDATE: OK, I thought Bloomberg was a pretty tightly run operation. Someone over there needs to get cracking on some decent editing. This report is either completely confused or willfully stupid. Headline: Berlusconi Overtakes Prodi in Italian Election. First few paragraphs support that and say that poll tabulations show a 0.3 percentage point lead. LAST paragraph says:

Official counting of the votes continues. With a third of the votes for the Chamber counted, that tally gives Prodi a lead over Berlusconi with 52 percent to 47 percent.

Would someone please get off your butt and straighten the report out?

UPDATE: AP is reporting that Prodi is declaring victory, but Berlusconi is not conceding yet. Challenges are expected, this isn't over just yet.

Just a thought.

We may have to start a new "Bad Samaritan" category just for items like this.

A German woman found a wallet containing over $1,200 (in Euros, of course) and decided to do the honest thing and return it to it's rightful owner. However, she also decided that she deserved a reward for doing the right thing. Which is a bit self-serving, but still understandable. But this is where she really went off the rails; she called the owner and told the man she would return the wallet only if he gave her the reward.

Somehow, the irony of committing extortion to get a reward for doing right missed this woman entirely.

But as we like to say here at Blue Crab Boulevard, two wrongs don't make a right. Three lefts do.

Gene Weingarten in Sunday's WaPo reports on his experiment in naked telecommuting. It seems that about 10% of telecommuters do their work in the raw. Which kind of answers a question I asked here.

His rule #5 is great:

5. The state of working naked is so foreign that one is constantly aware of it, and of its silliness and inappropriateness. This can be a crippling awareness, particularly when someone telephones. It is no problem with a call from one's wife, but it does become a problem with a call from one's daughter, who will want to know why one is giggling. It is bad to lie to one's daughter, but sometimes it is imperative. Also, giggling produces jiggling, which is not good.

Full disclosure. I am fully dressed as I write this. Honest. Trust me.

A Malaysian man has received a collection notice for an overdue phone bill. The notice says he must pay up within ten days or face prosecution. He's having a little trouble raising the cash, though. I mean, who keeps 218 TRILLION dollars lying around?

That's right, the bill is for $218 trillion. Making it even worse, the bill is actually for his late father's phone line which should have been disconnected in January.

Ernie K-Doe is running for mayor of New Orleans, scaring other politicians to death. Despite a lack of campaign funds and Little or no political experience, the doughty R&B singer plans to bury Mayor Nagin in the election. While some candidates consider him a grave danger, others say he doesn't stand a ghost of a chance. Once a promising R&B singer, K-Doe saw his hopes for national fame die after only one chart-topping record in 1961. Nevertheless, he became a local fixture in New Orleans entertainment. Now he hopes for heavenly intervention in his political aspirations. K-Doe will need that intervention.

Ernie K-Doe is dead.

He has been dead for five years or so. His widow is running this tongue in cheek campaign. I rather hope he wins. Hey, if the dead can vote in Chicago, why shouldn't they be entitled to run for office?