Sell All Your Pretzel Company Stock

Because beer and pretzels will be much less fashionable when this emerging trend hits the US. Beer and crunchy, deep-fried crickets!

Breeders of crickets say the insects have become "finger food for beer drinkers" in an age of increasing prosperity in Vietnam compared with the recent past when they might have been food for the hungry or for wartime soldiers surviving in the jungle.

Businessman Le Thanh Tung raises hundreds of thousands of the flying insects in barrels and sells them to restaurants in Ho Chi Minh City, the Southeast Asian country's largest urban area, or to other breeders in neighboring provinces.

"The taste is very particular, very special and it smells good and tastes delicious but it is very difficult to compare cricket to other meat," said Tung, 28, suggesting that crickets are an acquired taste.

At his small farm and restaurant about 25 km (16 miles) west of the city center, a plastic-covered menu with photographs of cricket dishes offers "young crickets deep fried," "cricket salad," "breaded cricket," "cricket noodle" and "peppered cricket."

One customer rode 340 km on a motorbike from his home near the border with Cambodia to buy two boxes full of twitching, chirping crickets to breed and serve at his restaurant.

"There is a demand because people like to eat better," said the customer, Nguyen Chinh Anh.

Gee, I wonder if PETA will go after these guys next?

The Microscope

One thing that makes it very difficult to get really first rate political candidates is the media microscope people get put under when they run for office. Literally everything one has ever done or said is picked up, turned over and over and discussed in detail. It happens to every candidate. And the attention can turn on a dime, from one candidate to the other.

It must be kind of uncomfortable for Ned Lamont to have to find that out.

Democratic Senate candidate Ned Lamont is having trouble moving from the small stage of a primary campaign with its appeal to partisans to the main stage of the general election, which requires the attention of the state's 2.1 million voters. Since the Aug. 8 primary, Lamont has done little more than repeat his opposition to the war in Iraq and carp about Sen. Joseph Lieberman's independent bid for a fourth term.

Part of the problem in getting to know more about Lamont is that he has no record in a public office that required him to take stands on issues. He is mostly free to make it up as he goes along. Lamont did get nabbed when he recently took a swing at Lieberman for criticizing then President Bill Clinton during the Lewinsky scandal. Oops, turns out he sent a rambling letter to Lieberman in 1998 praising Lieberman and calling Clinton's behavior "outrageous."

The public has to look at the fragments it can find of Lamont's private life to figure out what sort of public figure he would be. The man who seemed a fresh force in the spring is starting to look like a contrivance as the fall begins. Here are some examples:

Lamont, like all Democratic candidates, has been in hot pursuit of union endorsements. Lieberman snagged most of them in the primary campaign. Most, but by no means all, have stuck with Lieberman.

In his cable business, however, Lamont has not been so eager for union attention. At one conclave, Lamont gave the cold shoulder to Bill Henderson, president of Communications Workers of CT Local 1298, when Henderson had the temerity to suggest to the cable executive that he ought to let the union into Lamont Digital.

When Henderson, a Lieberman supporter, complained in public about Lamont's anti-union attitude in his own business, registered lobbyist and Lamont campaign manager Tom Swan called it a "red herring" because Lamont's employees are well compensated. But Henderson points out that unions aren't only about wages. They also secure better working conditions and the dignity of their members. Lamont and, suddenly, Swan aren't interested in the union credo.

There's more as well. These types of small things can add up. Joe Lieberman has endured the media microscope for many years. Lamont had it actually pretty easy during the primary. Now the media is looking a bit more.

PETA Becomes Self-Parody

You literally cannot make this stuff up. I posted a couple of days ago about a harmless, if exceedingly gross, promotion that Six Flags Great America was having for Halloween. A person could earn a pass good for an automatic cut to the front of the line on all the rides in the park. All one had to do to earn the pass was eat a live Madagascar hissing cockroach. Ok, it's gross and silly, but really not much in the great scheme of things. Well, until now.

PETA is protesting cruelty to cockroaches.

A spokeswoman for the animal rights organization says the contest at the amusement park's FrightFest is "gratuitously cruel."

The park in Gurnee, Ill., is joining other Six Flags parks in offering unlimited line-jumping privileges to anyone who eats a live Madagascar hissing cockroach. The bugs are up to three inches long.

The contest begins next month.

Amusement park officials are defending their menu choice. Great America spokesman Jim Taylor says the bugs are nutritious, high in protein and fat free.

Cockroach, the really, really other white meat. PETA, never all that sane to begin with, has achieved cartoon status.

Speaking Of Revolting Generals

Earlier, I recalled the revolting group of generals that Democrats proudly trotted out earlier this year. At the time, I likened them to new Praetorians. Guess what? They're baaaack. Today, a couple of generals are going to attack Donald Rumsfeld. Their "testimony" has already been given to the press in advance of the "hearings" the Democrats are throwing.

Yep, no politics there.

"I believe that Secretary Rumsfeld and others in the administration did not tell the American people the truth for fear of losing support for the war in Iraq," retired Maj. Gen. John R. S. Batiste said in remarks prepared for a hearing by the Senate Democratic Policy Committee.

A second witness, retired Maj. Gen. Paul Eaton, is expected to assess Rumsfeld as "incompetent strategically, operationally and tactically …."

"Mr. Rumsfeld and his immediate team must be replaced or we will see two more years of extraordinarily bad decision-making," said his testimony prepared for the hearing, to be held six weeks before the Nov. 7 midterm elections in which the war is a central issue.

The conflict, now in its fourth year, has claimed the lives of more than 2,600 American troops and cost more than $300 billion.

Sen. Byron Dorgan (news, bio, voting record), D-N.D., the committee chairman, told reporters last week that he hoped the hearing would shed light on the planning and conduct of the war. He said majority Republicans had failed to conduct hearings on the issue, adding, "if they won't … we will."

Since he spoke, a government-produced National Intelligence Estimate became public that concluded the war has helped create a new generation of Islamic radicalism and that the overall terrorist threat has grown since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

Several members of the Senate Democratic leadership were expected to participate in the hearing. Dorgan said Republican lawmakers had been invited.

Even before the session convened, Republicans counter-attacked.

"Today's stunt may rile up the liberal base, but it won't kill a single terrorist or prevent a single attack," Sen. Mitch McConnell (news, bio, voting record), R-Ky., said in a statement. He called Rumsfeld an "excellent secretary of defense."

It is unusual for retired military officers to criticize the Pentagon while military operations are under way, particularly at a public event likely to draw widespread media attention.

But Batiste, Eaton and retired Col. Paul X. Hammes were unsparing in remarks that suggested deep anger at the way the military had been treated. All three served in Iraq, and Batiste also was senior military assistant to then-Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz.

Everyone, especially Democrats and the left, should be very concerned about politicized military officers. This is about the worst thing we could encourage. Besides rogue intelligence agents, of course. This country has been one of the few nations in history that has kept its military out of politics. Do we really want that to change? Really? Better think hard about this folks.

They Should Be Worried

AllahPundit linked this article while discussing what frankly looks an awful lot like the mother of all smear jobs. If the report is correct, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid are becoming very, very concerned with increasingly anti-Semitic and racist rhetoric coming from the left wing of the party.

They should be.

A lot of bloggers, myself included, have noticed this trend for quite some time. It is becoming a major problem for the Democrats. Joe Lieberman's picture altered to make him appear to be in black face for a HuffPo piece by Jane Hamsher was fairly mild compared to some of the more hateful, vitriolic language being used daily on the lefty sites.

"They have been monitoring the [Ben] Cardin and [James] Webb races and they are extremely concerned," says a Senate Democrat leadership aide. "On both campaigns' staffs and on the Internet we are hearing and reading an ugliness that we haven't seen in probably decades. It's embarrassing, but we're chalking it up to a small segment of young people who are frustrated at constantly losing and are lashing out. To think otherwise raises too many uncomfortable questions about our party."

Apparently the House and Senate leaders are more uncomfortable than their party's most visible leader, because according to Capitol Hill sources, both Reid and Pelosi have pressed Democrat National Committee chairman Howard Dean to renounce the racist and anti-Semitic language and campaign tactics employed by those most closely associated with Dean's wing of the party, but Dean has refused to do so.

"He doesn't think it's a problem," says a DNC source. "This is something dreamed up by desperate Republicans. If Dean were to speak out, it would undercut the morale of a party that is on the verge of a historic victory. He's not going to take that away."

In fact, the DNC may actually be encouraging it.

In the past two weeks, the DNC and Democrat Party have been embarrassed by racist and anti-Semitic attacks against Republican Senate candidates Michael Steele and Sen. George Allen. In the case of Steele, it was racist blogging posts. In Allen's it was planted questions in the media about his Jewish heritage. Within minutes of Allen's addressing the issue of his family's Jewish roots, popular Democrat Party sites, such as the Daily Kos, Daily DD, and MoveOn.org, were inundated with such posts as:

"George Allen's New Jew Revue"

"They seriously want us to believe that Allen never knew why is grandfather was thrown in a concentration camp?"

"[Allen has] something against Jews."

"… 1) he's an anti-Jewish bigot, or 2) he's afraid he'll lose the bubba vote if people think he's a Jew."

"George Allen has a nasty, sadistic, vicious, violent streak… "

"What did [George Allen's mother] tell her son all these years, that her father was imprisoned by the Nazis because he was gay or a gypsy?"

This could be disastrous for the Democrats if this really starts getting reported by the mainstream media. The attacks on Allen appear to now be reaching the level of absolute insanity. That will backfire on the Webb campaign if the latest Salon hit piece gets picked up by the major media. Assuming the Prowler report is true, then Reid and Pelosi are exhibiting quite a lot of responsibility - provided they continue to press the issue. Dean is probably the biggest mistake the Democrats have ever made for a chairman, however.

Woodpeckers In The News

It seems that folks in Boiling Spring Lakes, North Carolina take a dim view of Federal regulators stripping the value fro their land by imposing regulations. So landowners are taking preemptive action to avoid having their properties listed on a new map that would designate their property as "protected habitat for red-cockaded woodpecker. They are making it impossible to be included on the map.

They're cutting down all the trees on their land.

BOILING SPRING LAKES, N.C., Sept. 23 (AP) — Over the past six months, landowners here have been clear-cutting thousands of trees to keep them from becoming homes for the endangered red-cockaded woodpecker.

The chain saws started in February, when the federal Fish and Wildlife Service put Boiling Spring Lakes on notice that rapid development threatened to squeeze out the woodpecker.

The agency issued a map marking 15 active woodpecker “clusters,” and announced it was working on a new one that could potentially designate whole neighborhoods of this town in southeastern North Carolina as protected habitat, subject to more-stringent building restrictions.

Hoping to beat the mapmakers, landowners swarmed City Hall to apply for lot-clearing permits. Treeless land, after all, would not need to be set aside for woodpeckers. Since February, the city has issued 368 logging permits, a vast majority without accompanying building permits.

The results can be seen all over town. Along the roadsides, scattered brown bark is all that is left of pine stands. Mayor Joan Kinney has watched with dismay as waterfront lots across from her home on Big Lake have been stripped down to sandy wasteland.

“It’s ruined the beauty of our city,” Ms. Kinney said. To stop the rash of cutting, city commissioners have proposed a one-year moratorium on lot-clearing permits.

This seems kind of extreme, but then, so can the Federal regulations. Especially when the courts get into it and the regulations are imposed with the sighting of an imaginary Woodpecker.

Pope Meets With Muslims

Pope Benedict XVI met with representatives from Muslim majority 21 countries and the Arab League today. He appears, from initial reports at least, not to have apologized but instead used the meeting to call for reciprocity in all fields and religious freedom.

The pontiff quoted from his predecessor, John Paul II, who had close relations with the Muslim world, when he described the need for "reciprocity in all fields," including religious freedom. Benedict spoke in French to a roomful of diplomats from 21 countries and the Arab League in his summer residence in Castel Gandolfo in the Alban Hills near Rome.

After his five-minute speech in a salon in the papal palace, Benedict greeted each envoy individually, clasping their hands warmly and chatting for a few moments with every one.

"The circumstances which have given risen to our gathering are well known," Benedict said, referring to his remarks on Islam in a Sept. 12 speech at Regensburg, Germany. He did not address those remarks at length.

Well, he aimed to start a dialog. Let's see what happens.

Rogue Elements

The New York Times publishes yet more "secret" government reports. Other papers follow out of competitive necessity. The Democrats begin an all out campaign based on those leaks. The blogosphere goes into overdrive.

Just another day in US politics.

Just another day of anonymous sources leaking portions of highly classified assessments which may or may not be accurate or in context. Just another willing reporter - as usual from the New York Times first - spinning those undoubtedly already highly spun words. And everybody goes right on in the same pattern. The same pattern that brought three years of highly manufactured outrage over Valerie Plame.

More importantly, the same pattern of highly classified information used for political purposes coming out of an agency that is supposed to be helping keep the nation safe. Instead, certain rogue elements within that intelligence community are leaking information for partisan political purposes. The Democrats and the left pounce on the information and cheerfully use it to club the administration. Business as usual. Frighteningly so.

No matter what political party you support, or even if you support none whatsoever, you should be very worried about what is happening here. We have unelected officials from government bureaucracies using official US intelligence for partisan politics. You should be angry that first, these shadowy anonymous sources are revealing secrets and second that these shadowy sources are busier playing politics than they are doing what they are supposed to be doing - keeping the country safe.

You should be worried. You should not be embracing this behavior. This is exactly the same scenario as when the Democrats trotted out a revolting group of retired generals to denounce the war. Do you really want the military involved in domestic politics? Do you really want a Praetorian Guard? I ask the same question now: do you really want rogue elements in intelligence services involved in deciding elections? Do you want them as your new Praetorians?

Because if you do, then you have let ideology blind you to the road to tyranny you are walking on. Do you really want government functionaries deciding who will govern? Because how long do you think it will be until they decide to cut out the middleman, so to speak.