Apoultry 13: A Not Ron Howard Film

Houston, we have a turkey. (Via Terrierman). Long. Worth it.

French Transport Union Folds - Strike Collapses

Nicolas Sarkozy appears to have won a major victory in his quest to improve the economy of France. The rail workers who went out on strike nine days ago have voted to end the strike.

The collapse of the strikes a day after the start of negotiations suggested defeat for labor unions — and could clear the way for the president's ambitious program to retool France.

In 42 of 45 morning meetings, rail workers voted to return to work Friday, a tendency that continued in the afternoon, union officials said.

The development was good news for travelers who have been forced to cancel trips and invent new ways to get to work. Parisians stung by a subway strike have walked or used bikes and scooters to cross town.

Prime Minister Francois Fillon called on rail workers to restart traffic "completely and without delay." He thanked the French for their patience and unions for their "responsible attitude."

It can take days to return the vast rail system to full speed. Both the SNCF train authority and the RATP which runs Paris public transport indicated there would be clear improvements Friday but nothing close to full service. Pockets of resistance remained in southern France where strikers held out.

Sarkozy's stock just rose appreciably in France. He appears to have taken the first step toward reforming some of the worst abuses of the out of control French welfare state.

Defending The Indefensible

Michael Van Der Galien does a masterful job of fisking Libby Spencer over at Newshoggers. I'll let him cover this one:

At The Newshoggers. Libby writes: “Now I don’t want to get into a debate over whether Chavez is crazy, or a communist or pursuing the right policies for Venezuela. I honestly don’t know the answer to that, but I do know that he is a democratically elected leader who still enjoys significant support among the majority of that nation’s poor.” And, more importantly to the left, of course: “These are the people who take to the streets to protest Chavez and his programs to help his country’s poor and in a way one can understand their hatred for him. Chavez, whom they consider to be an upstart meztito, has instituted socialist policies that have redistributed the wealth and power more equally and it came at their expense.”

To top it off, she also compares Chavez to Bush: “It strikes me that all this talk about his tyranny is more than a little misplaced considering Venezuelans have more of a voice in their government than we do under Bush.”

Now that is misplaced. Lord knows I respect Libby and consider her a friend, but she’s way out there on this one.

Firstly, it does matter whether Chavez is a wannabe dictator or not.

Secondly, he’s amassing so much power that it’s already difficult to say whether the majority truly supports his reforms or not.

Read the rest. MVDG points out one glaring fact here that explains much in the reasoning of the left:

Fifthly, it never ceases to amaze me that for all the talk about freedom, many progressives actually only care about one thing: distribution of wealth.

That insight is probably one of the best one-line descriptions of the left yet. Because economic egalitarianism does appear to be the main driver for many, if not the vast majority on the far left. No other issue comes close to it and it trumps everything else. Literally any behavior can be excused so long as the economic misery is spread evenly. (And it is misery under the socialist system.) Excusing dictatorial behavior because the dictator promises to spread wealth around until everyone gets a pittance is a horrible standard to use. Comparing the absolute power Chavez is taking - by using a mask of democracy - to Bush's behavior is more than disingenuous. It is dangerous. It shows a complete disconnect with reality.

Which American broadcast network has been taken off the air by executive order? Which loud, dissenting American voices on the left have been silenced by gunfire? How much trade in blood diamonds has the American government indulged in? Oh, that's right, none of those things happened here, it happened in Venezuela.

I have quoted this line by Winston Churchill before: "The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings; the inherent virtue of socialism is the equal sharing of miseries." Paying attention only to the even distribution of misery is a terrible philosophy.

UPDATE: Libby Spencer has updated her post with an explanation that she was misunderstood. Unfortunately, she then updates a second time and goes right off the deep end.

Meanwhile, even as my critics decry my equivalences, they make their own and suggest that dissent has not been stifled by this administration. Perhaps, they don't remember free speech zones, or how many have been arrested for wearing tshirts and holding signs, or that you can't get into a live speech by the president except by invitation. Perhaps they have forgotten the photos of injured demonstrators hit by rubber bullets. Oh wait, maybe they didn't see them because they only ran on Indymedia when they had their servers seized and didn't hear about them because almost all the low power broadcasters have been shut down by the FCC in deference to Clear Channel.

The servers seized thing may or may not be this event as documented by Truthout. I'd only point out that this is the same outfit that swore until they were blue in the face that Karl Rove had been indicted. I'd also just point out that not everything you read on the internet is Stone Tablet Truth® and that there may be more than a few liberties taken by the less than credible. But if you believe all you read, we know a good place to get some rat cheese.

Seriously, Libby, you really are making this worse - and sounding more unhinged by the minute.

Why In The World Would She Want This?

Bernadette Chirac, the wife of former French President Jacques Chirac, has endorsed Hillary Clinton. She has also offered to attend the Democratic National convention and campaign for Clinton.

"She's a woman who is not liked by everybody. But she's strong and she has convictions," Bernadette Chirac, well-known for a forceful character of her own, told the weekly Le Figaro magazine……

……She even expressed interest in attending the Democratic convention in Denver in August. "And if I can be of any use to her somewhere in the campaign, I'm available. I'd like to go with her and I'm going to suggest it to her."

Well, I guess that ties up the all-important French vote in the US elections. Most Americans have never heard of Bernadette Chirac, of course. But they will remember - not fondly - Jacques Chirac, who was blatantly anti-American long before the invasion of Iraq. It won't exactly help that Chirac himself is now the target of at least two investigations into official corruption. Specifically, embezzlement of public funds.

 "Formal investigation" means a suspect could eventually be ordered to stand trial, but the judge investigating the case could also decide there is not enough evidence to prosecute.

Chirac, 74, is the first former president of modern-day France to be placed under investigation by magistrates.

The case, one of a number hanging over Chirac, revolves around 40 jobs allegedly handed out to centre-right sympathisers by Paris city hall.

The former president was questioned over a separate case of alleged fake jobs in July.

Wow, Hillary must be jumping with joy. Endorsed by a French national who is the wife of an anti-American politician suspected of theft of public funds. It just doesn't get any better than that, does it?

Scientific Turkey

Why is dark meat dark and white meat light? Ever wonder why? There is, of course, a scientifical-type answer: So that there is a reason to fight over the drumstick. Okay, that's not really the reason. It actually has to do with the presence of myoglobin in the muscle tissue.

Myoglobin is similar to hemoglobin, which gives blood its bright red color and carries oxygen through the bloodstream. Myoglobin is found in muscle tissue and also has an affinity for oxygen.

"It is the binding state of oxygen to the myoglobin that creates the variation in meat color," explains Daniel L. Fletcher at the University of Connecticut Department of Animal Science. "The more myoglobin, the darker the meat."

Turkey meat is turkey muscle. Muscles are made of two types of fibers: Fast-twitch fibers contract quickly for infrequent bursts of activity. Durable slow-twitch fibers are used for regular, extended periods of activity.

All that exercise makes the slow-twitchers suck wind. Luckily, myoglobin keeps a supply on hand.

There you go, a nice, fun, practically useless factoid to bore your kids with this Thanksgiving! We're here to serve.

A Proclamation

By the President of the United States of America.

A Proclamation.

The year that is drawing towards its close, has been filled with the blessings of fruitful fields and healthful skies. To these bounties, which are so constantly enjoyed that we are prone to forget the source from which they come, others have been added, which are of so extraordinary a nature, that they cannot fail to penetrate and soften even the heart which is habitually insensible to the ever watchful providence of Almighty God. In the midst of a civil war of unequaled magnitude and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign States to invite and to provoke their aggression, peace has been preserved with all nations, order has been maintained, the laws have been respected and obeyed, and harmony has prevailed everywhere except in the theatre of military conflict; while that theatre has been greatly contracted by the advancing armies and navies of the Union. Needful diversions of wealth and of strength from the fields of peaceful industry to the national defence, have not arrested the plough, the shuttle or the ship; the axe has enlarged the borders of our settlements, and the mines, as well of iron and coal as of the precious metals, have yielded even more abundantly than heretofore. Population has steadily increased, notwithstanding the waste that has been made in the camp, the siege and the battle-field; and the country, rejoicing in the consiousness of augmented strength and vigor, is permitted to expect continuance of years with large increase of freedom.

No human counsel hath devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy. It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and one voice by the whole American People. I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens. And I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to His tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquillity and Union.

In testimony whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the Seal of the United States to be affixed.

Done at the City of Washington, this Third day of October, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and of the Independence of the Unites States the Eighty-eighth.

By the President: Abraham Lincoln

William H. Seward,
Secretary of State

The Monster That Congress Built Comes Home

Robert Novak notes the abject failure of Harry Reid to manage to get a "patch" for the Alternative Minimum Tax through the Senate. In past years the Congress has managed to put on a patch so as to keep even more people from getting sucked into the monster that the Democrat-controlled Congress unleashed some 38-years ago. That flawed AMT law was never indexed for inflation and more and more taxpayers have been grabbed by it through the years. But this year, people will be directly impacted by the failure to get the patch through. Refunds will be delayed for millions of taxpayers. This one is going to leave a mark - on Reid.

Habitual congressional gridlock usually has no impact on the lives of ordinary Americans. But what happened on the Senate floor last Friday just before lawmakers left for their Thanksgiving break will delay tax refunds next year for some 50 million taxpayers who count on them.

The underlying reason is a 38-year-old congressional tax blunder that has never been corrected. In 1969, Congress passed the alternative minimum tax (AMT) to collect from 155 tax-avoiding millionaires. But because the scheme was not indexed for inflation, this year alone it would hit 23 million extra people with higher taxes. The AMT will be "patched" to provide relief, as it has been in every Congress, but not in time this year. Refunds totaling more than $75 billion will arrive many weeks late not only for taxpayers earning $100,000 to $200,000 who are unintentionally affected by the AMT but also for lower-income persons because the IRS refund procedure will be disrupted by the delay.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's eleventh-hour effort to fix the problem on Friday collapsed when he refused to open the proceedings to votes on Republican tax-cutting proposals. At the heart of this deadlock is a debate between Democrats and Republicans over whether the level of federal taxation should be controlled. For once, the debate comes home to ordinary taxpayers in the form of delayed refund checks.

The Bush administration had been asking Congress for the patch for months. The Democrats have been well aware that this is a critical issue that needed to be addressed. But Reid managed to throw a roundhouse right that landed on his own eye. Both parties have their hands in all this, of course, but Reid has been transparently playing posturing partisan politics with several bills that were never intended to pass, merely to be introduced for show purposes. Reid decided on partisan brinkmanship and was unable to keep from going over the cliff this time.

Average people are going to be very angry at this. Reid pulled a stunt of keeping the Senate in session - on paper, at least - to prevent recess appointments. People are going to ask why the Senate could not have stayed in session long enough to actually get the work done that taxpayers pay them to do. This one is going to hurt Reid badly.

British Data Loss Scandal Deepens

The Telegraph is reporting that British ministers and officials ignored repeated warnings about serious flaws in data security in the years leading up to the newest loss of personal data of 25 million Britons - including those of every, single child in the country. By the time this is over, some careers will en in disgrace and the government itself may fall. Because Gordon Brown was one of th people who was warned about the problems, while he was still the Chancellor.

Gordon Brown has been dragged into the centre of the lost personal data crisis after it emerged that ministers ignored a series of warnings that security procedures in Government departments urgently needed to be reviewed.

During his time as Chancellor, the Treasury and other departments were told repeatedly that slack practices among officials created a serious risk of confidential information falling into the wrong hands.

Only a few weeks ago, the Government insisted the current enforcement regime for data protection was "fit for purpose" - despite a Lords committee warning over the summer that steps needed to be taken to improve it.

As the scandal over the loss of 25 million personal records escalated, the Chancellor, Alistair Darling, was accused of misleading parliament by saying a "junior official" at HM Revenue and Customs was to blame for the loss of the data, whereas email evidence shows he was told two senior managers had authorised the procedure.

He was also said to have misled MPs over the reason he delayed announcing the loss of the child benefit records for 10 days.

Details on the severity of the problems are emerging that make this look much, much worse than initial reports - and those were pretty horrible. There have been more than 2,000 security breaches in just the past year. A report from 2003 warned of the security problems and strongly recommended data encryption for all records. Brown himself appears to have ignored that recommendation. Obviously, the Tories are going berserk over this and Labor has been knocked back on its collective heels. Britons are furious about this. Adding insult to injury, a government help line set up to answer questions about the fiasco turns out to be a toll call. (Boy, was that stupid.)