Gateway Pundit continues to amaze me. He simply gets so much stuff pulled together.
In the wake of the CIA firing of Mary McCarthy, there's a lot of evidence out there that a couple of Senators are going to be subjected to polygraphs. Now I had the misfortune to have Dick (appropriate name) Durban for a Senator once. I can truthfully attest that he was completely useless when I contacted him with a problem. To put it in perspective, my Representative at the time, I guy I thought was useless, actually came through. Durban sent a form letter blow-off. Oh, and a newsletter.
Anyway, go read the stuff Jim put together on the Senators . See if you think they should be trusted with national security. Let me put it this way. You'd be better off letting Ted Kennedy drive your daughter home.
The debate link has a post that will chill you. It tells of some of the monstrous things that went on in the Iran-Iraq war. It is the story of the Basiji. The Iranian president belongs to that faction.
It's not a good story.
Bradley over at Southwest Left Coast and I have gone around and around a few times on the issue of global warming. I don't think we're going to resolve our differences anytime soon, but it's always interesting. I've pointed out that total emissions from all sources have declined by about 1/3 overall since 1970. Now the Opinion Journal weighs in with some pretty heavy duty numbers.
Since 1970, carbon monoxide emissions in the U.S. are down 55%, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. Particulate emissions are down nearly 80%, and sulfur dioxide emissions have been reduced by half. Lead emissions have declined more than 98%. All of this has been accomplished despite a doubling of the number of cars on the road and a near-tripling of the number of miles driven, according to Steven Hayward of the Pacific Research Institute.
….
There's no doubt the greens have succeeded in promoting higher environmental standards, which in turn have contributed to cleaner air, water and land almost everywhere you look. Today, game fish have returned to countless American streams and lakes, the Northeast has more forestland that at any time since the 19th century and smog is down dramatically in places like Los Angeles. But environmental activists don't want to believe their own success, much less advertise it. They need another looming catastrophe to stay relevant, not to mention to keep raising money.
Thus the cause of global warming has come at a fortuitous moment for clean-air warriors looking for alarms to ring. It is global in scope, will take decades to come to fruition–or to be revealed as another false alarm–and provides endless opportunities for government intrusion into the economy. It is, if you'll pardon the deliberate reference to a faith-based phenomenon, the green equivalent of manna from heaven. Or would be, if the greens hadn't spent so much time over the last three decades talking up scares that never came to pass.
This credibility deficit, combined with the slow-motion nature of the putative warming, has led to some desperate tactics by the global-warming true believers. To cite just one example, careful expounders of the idea of human-caused global warming used to take pains to distinguish between "climate" and "weather." Thus, snow storms in April or cold snaps in September were merely "weather" and told us nothing about long-term trends.
What do you think, Bradley?
The AP has a report on
several Iraqi bloggers. They tend (as usual) to focus on the more pessimistic posts. They do not mention Iraq the Model at all.
Meth addicts have no brains. Proof comes from the Journal of Neurosurgery, that details the case of an Oregon man who attempted suicide by firing twelve nails from a nail gun into his head. The man was depressed and taking methamphetamine when he decided to end it all with a handy nail gun. Later, he went to the hospital complaining of a headache. When the doctors took X-Rays, they were shocked to see the nails (apparently, they were hard to see from the outside!).
After removing the nails, the man survived. Doctors have never heard of any case where someone survived that many objects being fired into the brain.
What brain?
Inspired by a comment at Patterico's by the Purple Avenger, we proudly present the LA Times crack reporting staff. (Our photographer is wearing out a lot of pixels this week….)
Our sincere apologies to Patterico. We couldn't help ourselves……Our meds are wearing off.
UPDATE: This is probably not a fun time for the editors at the LAT. The other MSM buggies are taking note of the whole situation. Here's the New York Times today.
Full fledged assault by spambots yesterday and today. Anybody know of any way to head these bastards off before they even hit? These are coming from all over the place, not just one set IP.
The Seattle Post Intelligencer ran an essay by a soldier who recently returned from Iraq. It's one of the most moving pieces I have read.
On this particular day one of the locals had his little girl with him. She was shyly watching me from behind his legs. When I smiled and waved at her, she brazenly ran up to me with a big smile and held out her arms, expecting to be picked up. At first I was shocked at her sudden bravery, and it took me a second to reach down and pick her up. When I did, she immediately kissed me on my cheek and then nestled in as if she meant to stay a while.
I looked toward her father and he immediately began talking rapidly in Arabic and gesturing at me. Our translator quickly explained that he, the father, had been locked in a prison for most of the child's life. He had been sentenced to death for being a Shiite dissident traitor. The man went on to say that soldiers wearing the same patch on the shoulder as I was (the 101st Airborne Division) had freed him shortly after we began the liberation of Iraq. His daughter from then on believed that the famous Screaming Eagle patch of the 101st meant that we were angels sent to protect her family.
Please read the whole thing.
Jerry Ford issued a pretty strongly worded statement about the retired generals:
"Allowing retired generals to dictate our country's policies and its leadership would be a dangerous precedent that would severely undermine our country's long tradition of civilian control of the military," Ford said.
"It would discourage civilian leaders at the (Defense) Department from having frank and candid exchanges with military officers. And, today, at a time of war, such an effort sends exactly the wrong message both to our troops deployed abroad and to our enemies who are watching for any signs of weakness or self-doubt."
Anyone who has been reading this blog since these guys started yapping knows that this has been been out position here all along. One thing that is interesting; notice that talk about these guys died out almost as suddenly as it started? Maybe the media figured out pretty fast that there is something wrong about the whole thing. It's also noteworthy that despite Holbooke's prediction last week, there have not been other joining the chorus.
H/T to Betsy Newmark for finding this.
Update: AP link.
Representative Alan Mollohan, the ranking Democrat on the House ethics committee has stepped down while his financial dealings are being investigated. That's a smart move for the Democrats. It just did not look good to have someone with a cloud hanging over them sitting on that committee. Early post on this subject here and here.
Personally, I would love to see my net worth quadruple in a few years. So vote for me this fall!
Yesterday, we noted with some dismay a decision made by the 9th circuit effectively banning any message the administrators at a school deem offensive. We said then, and still maintain, that this is an assault on free speech.
Now comes word of an even worse assault on the constitution of the United States. Texas Rainmaker discusses what would be, in effect, an end run around the constitution and the electoral process for the presidency. Legislation being considered in many states as the result of something called the "National Popular Vote" would invalidate the electoral college. They tyranny of the mob the founding fathers feared is at hand.
The Electoral College was set up to prevent the larger states from effectively owning the presidency. If this end run succeeds, the less populous states will effectively be shut out of the decision making process for the president. Consider that only eleven large states that contain a majority of the population will be needed to win the presidency. 39 states will be disenfranchised.
This is no less than an assault on the republic itself.
UPDATE: I notice that left-leaning blogs are studiously ignoring this issue. Jeff Goldstein is not. Nor Betsy Newmark. I disagree with Outside the Beltway's take on it, though. This is attempt to subvert the proper constitutional amendment process and should be frightening to every person in this country. What happens when a "compact of states" decides that nobody should own guns? Or a "compact of states" decides the press can only print certain things?
This is the road to tyranny.
Patterico has documented yet another sock puppet commenter from the Los Angeles Times. This time it is someone defending Hiltzik, using an IP from inside the LA Times!
Our fearless agent from Magic 8-Ball Photography and Septic Service went undercover to get this shot of the LA Times Newsroom! Remember, You saw it at Blue Crab Boulevard. Your spot for news that really matters!
Earlier posts here and here.
UPDATE: Believe it or not there's STILL more.
Related to the previous post we find this article. In it, the EU official investigating the alleged CIA secret detention facilities has, to date, found no evidence that these centers actually exist. While there has been testimony consisting of unsubstantiated allegations, there has also been testimony refuting those allegations. Here's the killer: investigators can find no evidence that there were hundreds of CIA flights. These flights were supposed to have existed in the hundreds.
So there is a lot of he said/she said testimony. But the one bit of hard evidence that should have been easily proved cannot be confirmed. How exactly one can have hundreds of airplanes flying hither and yon and have no record of them with today's air traffic control system indicates someone is not telling the truth.
Since I find it hardly credible that an EU official would be actively trying to protect the US, given all their other recent stances, something about this whole story begins to stink.
In order for the stories to hold together, there had to be hundreds of flights. If the flights did not occur, the whole story is a house of cards.
UPDATE: Captain Ed is speculating (along with several others) that there is a chance the entire "secret prisons" story may have been an elaborate canary trap. If so, that would explain why the EU can't find evidence and it will make an awful lot of people looking very foolish indeed. Starting with the Pulitzer folks. Boy, that would be very, very funny.
UPDATE: Dean Esmay says the word: "traitor".
Update: Still more. This is VERY hot in the blogosphere right now.
The CIA caught and fired a senior analyst for leaking classified material. The New York Times identifies the dismissed officer as Mary McCarthy. Ms. McCarthy has reportedly acknowledged her misbehavior. There is no word yet whether criminal charges will be brought. At this point we know that McCarthy violated her oath as a CIA employee.
In the article comes this little gem form the executive editor of the Washington Post:
Leonard Downie Jr., The Post's executive editor, said on its Web site that he could not comment on the firing because he did not know the details. "As a general principle," he said, "obviously I am opposed to criminalizing the dissemination of government information to the press." (emphasis added)
Here we again see the breathtaking arrogance of a media that somehow believes it is the arbiter of what is and is not fit to be secret. It is against the law, already. However, Mr. Downie thinks that the press is above that law. The leaker violated her oath, possibly endangered ongoing operations and people. But this leak is WaPo approved, therefore it is a good leak and must be protected.
I have a flash for the media, you are not elected and you do not have the right to decide what is good for the rest of us.
UPDATE: This just got even worse. Ace of Spades has the details.
Blogosphere, Politics | Gaius Saturday, 22 April , 2006 | 
Comments Off 
