Sound Familiar?

Where have we heard this exact logic before.

As he accelerates his push toward socialism, Chavez has decided that Venezuela's oldest private TV station must go off the air for good when its broadcast license expires on May 28.

"Their days are numbered. Squeal, kick, whatever they do: the license of that fascist channel is gone," Chavez said Saturday. "RCTV's signal will be nationalized for Venezuelans."

Emboldened by his sweeping re-election victory, Chavez now seems intent on transforming Venezuela's broadcast media. An expanding web of state-run and state-financed radio and TV stations shapes his image. And almost every Sunday, he preaches socialist ideals on "Hello President," his folksy talk-show program that runs for five hours or more…….

…….Chavez says he fully respects freedom of speech, and that turning over the channel's frequency to a "community" station will help democratize the airwaves, providing "communication power to those who almost never have a voice."

Venezuela's radio dial now includes hundreds of mostly state-financed and Chavez-friendly "community" stations, and three state-run TV channels have been launched since Chavez took office. They feature musicians singing songs about "El Comandante," segments calling opposition leaders CIA agents and documentaries about Argentine-born revolutionary Ernesto "Che" Guevara. Cuban-produced cartoons feature peasants who prevent invading soldiers from seizing a palm-dotted island.

Chavez also finances Telesur, the new Latin American network meant to provide a South American alternative to CNN. Telesur already claims 2.5 million cable viewers in 17 countries. The Venezuelan government holds a 51 percent stake, with smaller shares owned by Argentina, Cuba, Uruguay and Bolivia. Next up is Radiosur, an effort to share content with existing radio stations across the continent.

Oh, yeah:

Asked to explain why Fox News Channel is the highest rated cable news network, Peterson responded, "I think it's their scandalization of everything. If you make everything seem like a scandal, a huge deal when it is not, then you frighten people into listening to you."

Protesters held signs reading "Boycott Fox News - Time to flush Fox News extreme right wing-nuts," "Fox News lies," Faux News: We decide you lose," and "ABC Sucks, CBS Sucks, CNN Sucks, NBC Sucks, Fox really sucks."

Protester Beth Bernardo said Fox News is "so pro-Bush that it is disgusting." She said she thinks CNN is "more honest, they are more unbiased."

Another protester, Debbie Riga, criticized the corporate ownership of the media and said she believes that the Fox News' ratings dominance has resulted in making Americans "ignorant."

"I think [Fox News] keeps a lot of people ignorant. [Its high ratings] mean we are ignorant. We are an ignorant country," Riga told CNSNews.com.

Riga said she has found a way to get unbiased news by bypassing the American media. "I listen to the international media now. I no longer listen to any news local news," Riga said.

A protester who identified himself as Robert said, "People are fed up with the lies and deception that are going on throughout our media and throughout our government. Without an active, questioning, resilient news media, our country is really lost."

A protester who called himself Carlton carried a poster with the Fox News anchors all sporting fake, Hitler-style mustaches.

CNSNews.com asked Carlton if the stubby mustaches painted on everyone from Greta Van Susteren to Sean Hannity to Bill O'Reilly was his way of implying that the network had fascist tendencies. 

"I am a big Charlie Chaplin fan, and I think everyone should have a Charlie Chaplin mustache. So that is kind of the message behind [the poster]. You can make whatever implications you want out of it," Carlton responded.

When asked specifically if the mustaches were meant to conjure up images of the former Nazi dictator Adolph Hitler, Carlton replied, "Who is he?"

Other protesters were not as demure. One woman was selling stickers that read, "CIA Approved Fox News Channel," and a "Vote Republican" sticker with a swastika emblazoned across it. Another sign showed a hooded KKK member with the phrase "compassionate conservatism?"

Many of the protesters also singled out the Australian-born owner of Fox News, Rupert Murdoch, with signs saying, "Deport Rupert Murdoch" and "Stop Murdoch's war on journalism."

I'll bet you could feel your lips moving there. This is leftist "freedom of speech". It absolutely only applies to their message. All other points of view must be silenced. The left is very fond of denouncing the "right wing noise machine". They do so in coordinated lockstep, screeching the same rhetoric at everyone who disagrees. They use, as Kos admitted, restricted mail lists to make sure all their messages coincide and that stories they want suppressed are "starved of oxygen."

Who exactly has a noise machine? Who exactly wants free speech cut off?

A Very, Very Painful Decision

El Pais, the newspaper that first broke the story that bad medical care may have been the cause of Fidel Castro's extremely slow recovery has another article out. This one reportedly uses sources that are doctors at the hospital where Castro underwent surgery. The article says that Castro and his advisers are the ones who decided that a risky procedure should be used rather than a colostomy.

After removing an inflamed piece of Castro's large intestine in an operation last year, the doctors connected the remainder directly to his rectum, rather than attaching a colostomy bag, El Pais said, quoting two medical sources at Madrid's Gregorio Maranon hospital. The operation failed when a suture burst.

"The Cuban dictator and his advisers are the ones who decided on the surgical technique that has led to the complications," the paper said.

While the newspaper article did not name the sources, one of the journalists who wrote it told The Associated Press that both were doctors at the hospital. The journalist, Oriel Guell, said none of the information in articles published Tuesday and Wednesday came from surgeon Jose Luis Garcia Sabrido, who flew to Cuba in December to treat the 80-year-old Castro.

Garcia Sabrido, the hospital's chief surgeon, declined comment Wednesday but said in an interview posted on CNN's Web site that El Pais' account of Castro's condition being grave was wrong.

"According to my information, there is even some progressive improvement," Sabrido was quoted as saying. "The only truthful parts of the newspaper's reports are the name of the patient, that he has been operated on, and that he has had complications. The rest is rumors."

The "recovery" is taking much too long and they know it. I've known people who had open heart surgery and recovered much faster. None were 80 years old, true, but the operation for open heart is generally a much worse one than removal of inflamed intestines. Cuban officials are spending a lot of time denying this at the moment. If Castro did make the decision as the report states, then he has caused his own agony. There is a certain ironic justice in that, isn't there?

Good News

Gary from Ex-Donkey Blog will be shutting down his blog in a couple of weeks, which saddened me when I read about it. But he just announced good news: he will not be gone for good. He has a new guest room over at the Llama Butchers site! So he won't be gone for good. (I'm not sure if that means he'll be gone for bad…. Language is so tricky sometimes.)

However, I'm pleased to announce that after intense negotiations (they generously asked, I gratefully accepted) that future is now clearer. Upon the formal moth-balling of this site in two weeks time, I will be signing on as an associate (if erratic) contributor to The Llama Butchers.

Steve and Robert have cleaned out one of the guest rooms at Orgle Manor for me with the only stipulation being that I have to clean my own bathroom. Actually, it's similar to an arrangement I made with my parents right after I graduated from college. I hope I'll be better about the bathroom thing this time around.

Well, as a lovely housewarming gift, we suggest that Steve and Robert should get Gary one of these. That will take care of the bathroom thing.

Schwarzenegger’s Policies Pay off!

Fabulous news from California! The Governator's stand on global warming has already yielded instant relief for California! Now, Malibu residents will no longer have to make that long boring trip to the mountains to ski! They will now be able to ski Kanan Dume!

NBC4 forecaster Fritz Coleman said the mixture of precipitation in West Los Angeles at about 3 p.m. included a dusting of snow. Residents in West Los Angeles said the snow accumulated in parking lots, on cars and around palm trees near Wilshire and Santa Monica boulevards and other areas.

Most of the snow fell south of Sunset Boulevard and just east of the 405 Freeway. Residents told NBC4 that several inches of snow fell in their yards.

The last snowfall recorded at Los Angeles International Airport was in January 1962, according to the National Weather Service. Trace amounts — less than 0.5 inches — were reported, according to the NWS.

Snow fell earlier Wednesday in Malibu and caused traffic problems on the area's winding and narrow roads. Sleet made driving treacherous on Kanan Dume Road, a steep route through the Santa Monica Mountains where it's more typical to see beach-bound cars loaded with surfboards than a snowplow.

"One of our sergeants said he hadn't seen anything like this in 20 years," said California Highway Patrol Officer Leland Tang at the West Valley Station.

A probation officer at a juvenile camp in the Santa Monicas said he was traveling down Kanan Dume when it began to snow.

"It was snowing pretty good," said Officer Oscar Cross. "The road was covered in ice and slush, and I saw one car slide into a ditch. Everyone seemed scared to drive."

Schwarzenegger: So tough, Gaia is scared!

Savage Shrimp Storm Great Lakes

An invasive Eurasian shrimp has been found in the waters of lake Ontario near Oswego, New York. The latest invader from the Animal Uprising™, of course. The shrimp, known as bloody red mysid, have been found in both adult and juvenile stages of development, indicating that they have been able to establish a population and are breeding. The shrimp are described as "an opportunistic predator. They will eat whatever is available, which means they will be infringing on the food sources for other species".

The discovery of bloody red mysid — whose scientific name is Hemimysis anomala — was made in a lake sample taken near Oswego last spring, said Chuck O'Neill, Jr., an invasive species specialist with New York Sea Grant and a member of New York State's Invasive Species Task Force, on Wednesday.

Its only other confirmed appearance in the Great Lakes region was last November in a channel of Muskegon Lake, which empties into Lake Michigan.

The red mysid is closely related to the possum shrimp that live in the Great Lakes. It is native to the Caspian Sea and Black Sea areas of Eurasia — the same region that sent zebra mussels, quagga mussels and gobies, other invasive species, to the Great Lakes. Like most non-native species in the Great Lakes, the red mysid is presumed to have arrived in the ballast of oceangoing ships.

The shrimp has already been documented in parts of Europe.

The red mysid has "strong potential" to severely affect the lake's food chain, O'Neill said.

Typically, the shrimp feast on phytoplankton and zooplankton, the foundation of the lake's food chain. Zooplankton are also what many young fish thrive on.

Scientists are asking the public to help document the extent of the shrimp's incursion. A fact sheet is being prepared. In the meantime, we here at Blue Crab Boulevard are ever ready to distribute the important facts about the bloody red mysid. Also known as the "mysid vicious". The name "shrimp" is somewhat misleading. They are actually the size of a bus and are attracted to the sound of people splashing in the water. They have been known to devour an entire swimming party in under a minute. When they are hungry enough, they emerge from the water and raid nearby homes for a quick snack.

Did we ever mention that we have a brother-in-law who owns a home on Lake Ontario? Sleep well, Jimmy……..

(Much clearer photo from the long-suffering PDPhoto.org.)

Appeals Court Upholds Dismissal Of MD Wal-Mart Law

The anti-Wal-Mart jihad continues to unravel. A Federal appeals court has upheld the dismissal of Maryland's law that attempted to force Wal-Mart into paying additional money for health care.

Maryland's law would have required non-governmental employers with 10,000 or more workers to spend at least 8 percent of payroll on health care or pay the difference in taxes. The lower court ruled that the state law was pre-empted by the 1974 Employee Retirement Income Security Act, or ERISA.

The measure was aimed at Bentonville, Ark.-based Wal-Mart Stores Inc., which has been under attack by critics who say that its inadequate health care benefits is forcing some employees to use state-funded plans.

"Were we to approve Maryland's enactment solely for its noble purpose, we would be leading a charge against the foundational policy of ERISA, and surely other states and local governments would follow," the ruling by the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals reads. "As sensitive as we are to the right of Maryland and other states to enact laws of their own choosing, we are also bound to enforce ERISA as the 'supreme law of the land.'"

Since the recent poll that showed that the Wal-Mart jihad was a political loser for the Democrats, it has been very, very quiet on the political trail, hasn't it? Haven't been hearing a lot of bloviating about it from presidential hopefuls. Maybe this will be the whimper that ends the campaign. Too bad in a way. It would have been amusing watching the hopefuls ticking off a lot of voters.

Don’t Hold Back

Tell us how you really feel. Sister Toldjah and the grand opening of her new Jimmy Carter anti-fan club franchise. I want to join, too. Especially since Jimmy reportedly tried to intercede on behalf of a former Nazi death camp guard. Even reading about this guy is like fingernails on a blackboard.

Carter was the worst president in my lifetime and will likely go down in history as the worst former president in the history of the universe. Ok, that may be exaggeration. In this galaxy, then.

Criminal Finds Armed Citizens Are A Pain In The Butt

Literally. An attempted carjacking in Columbia, South Carolina went rather badly for the gunman. When he stuck a gun into a man's stomach in a Wal-Mart parking lot, the man's female companion pulled out her gun and commenced to firing. One of the five shots struck home, sending a bullet into the would be robber's buttocks.

Harold Levar Jeffcoat, 29, was arrested Sunday at the hospital where he was being treated for a gunshot wound to the buttocks, Lott said.

Jeffcoat was shot Saturday night after he stuck a gun into the stomach of a man getting into his car at a Wal-Mart in suburban northeast Richland County and demanded his keys, deputies said.

A woman in the passenger seat pulled a gun from the glove compartment and fired five shots at Jeffcoat, hitting him once, investigators said.

The police are calling the feisty couple heroes. Good for them. Jeffcoat was wanted for a string of nine other armed robberies. No word on whether he sat during his court appearance. If he did, we bet it was gingerly. 

Yup. Meaningful Reform Again.

Harry Reid is at it again it seems. He is attempting to block a meaningful reform offered by Republican Senator Judd Gregg to essentially allow the President to force pork barrel spending items inserted into other bills back to the Congress for a real vote. It is not exactly a line item veto as I understand this although some are calling it just that. It is more like a "you want it, you go on record for it" bill.

And Harry wants it dead.

A Senate source tells me that Harry Reid is again attempting to block an important fiscal reform. Senator Judd Gregg's line-item veto amendment stands in the Reid crosshairs now. He has threatened to make it a "long weekend" for Republicans if they attempt to force a vote on it.

NTU signed a coalition letter last year supporting a House version of the line-item veto and we sent a Vote Alert on the Gregg Amendment to the Senate indicating that we are watching this issue closely and will rate it heavily in our annual Rating of Congress.

If anything, Harry Reid is showing the country that the Democratic Senate wants pork and lots of it. So much for fiscal responsibility. So much for the campaign rhetoric. This is something everyone should be able to get behind - stop the earmarks. Cut the pork.

UPDATE: Others: Instapundit, Power Line, Outside The Beltway, Club for Growth, PoliPundit,

Internal Pressure Increasing For Ahmadinejad?

I posted about an article in the Guardian a couple days ago that indicated that internal political pressure against Iran's president appeared to be growing. The Associated Press today notices the same phenomenon. They report that skyrocketing prices for basic food items is really piling the pressure on Mad Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. It couldn't happen to a nicer guy.

Ahmadinejad's government "has been strong on populist slogans but weak on achievement," said Khoshchehreh, who campaigned for Ahmadinejad during the election.

The president has touted himself as a tough anti-Western leader, frequently denouncing the United States. His comments that Israel should be "wiped off the map" and his questioning of the Nazi Holocaust have sparked anger in the West and increased Iran's isolation.

At the same time, he has aggressively pushed ahead Iran's nuclear program, shrugging off U.N. demands that the country halt uranium enrichment. As a result, the U.N. in December imposed sanctions on Iran.

The sanctions were limited to a ban on selling materials and technology that could be used in Iran's nuclear and missile programs and the freezing of assets of 10 Iranian companies and individuals.

But since then the price of fruit, vegetables and other widely used commodities in Iran — already rising — have skyrocketed, apparently because of fears of harsher punishment.

The inflation has hit Iranians hard, along with unemployment, which the government puts at 10 percent but which economists say could be as high as 30 percent. The government also says inflation is 11 percent, but experts estimate it at 30 percent.

Tehran housewife Maryam Hatamkhani, 28, said her family has given up buying potatoes and tomatoes because prices have tripled or quadrupled in the past month. Tomatoes have gone from around 33 cents a pound to $1.50.

"People are really under pressure. We are unhappy. Instead of bringing welfare, this government has given us hardship," she said.

Vahid Yousefi, a factory worker, moonlights as an informal cab driver at night to get by, picking up passengers in his car. He had hoped to buy a modest apartment in downtown Tehran last year but couldn't afford it. In the six months since, home prices have doubled.

"I really can't make ends meet," said Yousefi, the father of two. "I will never be able to live in my own house."

Lawmakers summoned Ahmadinejad's Housing Minister Mohammad Saeedikia to parliament for questioning over the rising prices, which he blamed on increasing demand. He promised a plan to control prices, but gave no specifics.

Since Ahmadinejad's plans to date have been to throw money into an attempt to gain nuclear weapons and to glad hand money to other countries as well as pumping cash and weapons to Hezbollah and Iraq, his domestic programs are likely pretty low on cash. To the extent the US has been able to apply pressure to Iran, we do seem to be adding to his woes. Good. Keep it up. With oil prices falling, his revenue has to be about stretched to the breaking point.

“Daredevil” To Swim Amazon!

AFP informs us that a "daredevil" Slovenian swimmer plans on swimming the Amazon river. He plans to have live, real-time broadcasts of the entire "adventure". (We would have chosen slightly different descriptive words, but "lunatic" and "suicide swim" just don't have the same ring in French, I guess.)

RIO DE JANEIRO (AFP) - Daredevil Slovenian swimmer Martin Strel, who has swum the Yangtze, the Danube and the Mississippi rivers, plans to embark on a 70-day swim down the Amazon, from Peru to Brazil, local media reported.

The never-before-attempted 5,430-kilometer (3,370-mile) feat will be filmed and broadcast in real time starting February 1 over the Internet on www.amazonswim.com, Andre Souza, a member of Strel's team, told the daily Folha de Sao Paulo on Wednesday.

The intrepid Slovene, who has become a national hero in his home country, has already earned three mentions in the Guinness World Records book.

"Candiru, piranhas and pororoca" are among the dangers Strel, 52, says he will face on his latest mission.

Well, at least he's aware of what he's getting into. Or what might be getting into him, as the case may be. Candiru are actually more feared by the natives than the piranhas. With *shudder* good reason. The pororoca is a walk in the park comparatively. Far be it from us to discourage him in his endeavors. We'd never do anything like that. Well, except to remind him of what might happen. We're nice that way.

Iran Claims Shootdown

An Iranian lawmaker announced that Iran shot down an American drone surveillance aircraft, "during the last few days" according to a report from Xinhua.

TEHRAN, Jan. 16 (Xinhua) — Iranian troops have shot down a U.S. pilotless spy plane recently, an Iranian lawmaker announced on Tuesday as the Islamic Republic was facing increasing military pressure from its arch rival — the United States.

The aircraft was brought down when it was trying to cross the borders "during the last few days," Seyed Nezam Mola Hoveizeh, a member of the parliament, was quoted by the local Fars News Agency as saying.

The semi-official Iranian news agency IMFULLOFIT, (not quite as well known as IRNA) provided this: "officially official photograph of the official shootdown of the officially high-tech US spyplane of the very latest design. Officially."

(Another beautiful picture from PDPhoto.org senselessly butchered for your amusement.)

Spiffy

Jules Crittenden has moved his blog, Forward Movement, to a new host. Adjust your bookmarks accordingly.

http://www.julescrittenden.com/

The High Cost Of Pie

Pie in the sky, that is. There is an interesting little article from Reuters that describes - in glowing terms - a house in New Jersey that is run entirely on solar energy. It is quite a complicated system.

His conventional-looking family home in the pinewoods of western New Jersey is the first in the United States to show that a combination of solar and hydrogen power can generate all the electricity needed for a home.

The Hopewell Project, named for a nearby town, comes at a time of increasing concern over U.S. energy security and worries over the effects of burning fossil fuels on the climate.

"People understand that climate change is a big concern but they don't know what they can do about it," said Gian-Paolo Caminiti of Renewable Energy Associates, the commercial arm of the project. "There's a psychological dividend in doing the right thing," he said.

Strizki runs the 3,000-square-foot house with electricity generated by a 1,000-square-foot roof full of photovoltaic cells on a nearby building, an electrolyzer that uses the solar power to generate hydrogen from water, and a number of hydrogen tanks that store the gas until it is needed by the fuel cell.

In the summer, the solar panels generate 60 percent more electricity than the super-insulated house needs. The excess is stored in the form of hydrogen which is used in the winter — when the solar panels can't meet all the domestic demand — to make electricity in the fuel cell. Strizki also uses the hydrogen to power his fuel-cell driven car, which, like the domestic power plant, is pollution-free.

Sounds expensive. Which it is. The system cost around $500,000. Now, Strizki says that copying the house's systems would be much cheaper now that they are all developed. (I personally don't believe they would drop that much, but let's just run with that number, shall we?) Which is all well and good, I suppose. But I ran a quick back-of-the-envelope calculation based on data from the census. Retrofitting every dwelling in the US would cost around $10,820 billion.  The total worth of the US GDP was $11,733.5 billion in 2004. That isn't even figuring the land area involved for the solar arrays.

Anyone who tells you that these alternatives are actually workable on a large scale is fooling you or themselves. (And no, magic does not occur later to make it all affordable, there are certain limits to how much costs will come down).

Chimpmania!

It appears to be chimpanzee day in the world media. Generally, one has to hunt about to find a trifecta of related articles. Not today, however. There are chimps making news all over the wire services:

Item: Paternity tests for chimps! It seems that a chimpanzee refuge which requires all the male chimps to have vasectomies has nonetheless experienced the arrival of a baby chimp. No, it isn't a miracle or a case of parthenogenesis. It's a case of "whoops" - and it does happen to humans, too. Sometimes the snip doesn't work.

Teresa, who's been at Chimp Haven for the past year and a half, was missing during the morning rounds. Later, she appeared with a newborn chimpanzee in her arms.

"Well, we were all just a little bit surprised when we heard the news," said Linda Brent, a spokeswoman for Chimp Haven.

Teresa was in a group with 17 other chimpanzees — seven of them males.

Now Chimp Haven will have to determine paternity. "We're going to be doing a paternity test, just like you would do on people," Brent said.

Workers have started collecting hair samples from the chimps for testing. Once they identify the father, it's back to the operating room for him.

Geeze. And you thought child support was harsh. Item: No good deed goes unpunished. A female chimp at the Little Rock, Arkansas zoo thought she'd do a little housecleaning. All she asked in exchange was a few snacks. Were the zookeepers grateful that she cleaned their toilet? No, they rewarded her by knocking her out cold.

The 120-pound primate, Judy, escaped yesterday into a service area when a zookeeper opened a door to her sleeping quarters, unaware the animal was still inside.

As keepers tried to woo Judy back into her cage, she rummaged through a refrigerator where chimp snacks are stored. She opened kitchen cupboards, pulled out juice and soft drinks and took a swig from bottles she managed to open.

Keeper Ann Rademacher says Judy went into the bathroom, picked up a toilet brush and cleaned the toilet. Rademacher says the 37-year-old Judy was a house pet before the zoo acquired her in 1988, so she may have been familiar with housekeeping chores. Judy wrung out a sponge and scrubbed down the fridge.

It took a couple of tries, but the zoo sedated the chimp, who fell asleep on top of the refrigerator with half a loaf of cinnamon-raisin bread she had pulled out of the freezer.

We suspect that the zoo staff was upset that Judy thought their housekeeping was sub-subhuman. Item: Chimpdom's cigarette smoking helicopter hero has gone to visit that great Marlboro Country in the sky. The Congo reports Gregory has butted out.

BRAZZAVILLE (Reuters) - Gregory the chimpanzee, known for asking visitors for a drag of their cigarettes and his dramatic rescue by helicopter from Congo Republic's civil war, has died aged 62, zoo officials said on Wednesday.

The Jane Goodall institute arranged a helicopter rescue for Gregory in 1997 when the civil war was raging. We suspect that's when he took up smoking.