Blue Crab Boulevard

More than 200 motorists had to be rescued from what has been described, just yesterday, as a "mild winter" in Britain when their vehicles were trapped in a massive snowfall.

An emergency operation to rescue more than 200 motorists trapped in their cars by heavy snow swung into operation last night.

Around 45 pensioners and 15 schoolchildren were among those stranded on the A66 in County Durham as blizzards blocked roads and brought travel chaos.

Between two and five inches of snow fell in some parts of Northern England and Scotland.

One driver, George Harvey, 45, from Middlesbrough, said: "The road was clear one second and then white the next. It came in so fast, I've never seen anything like it.

"My car was sliding around and the wheels were just spinning. I thought I might be stuck there all night."

Many of those rescued from the A66 between Penrith and Scotch Corner were taken to nearby villages by police.

Simon Wilson, 49, of The Castle Hotel in Brough, Cumbria, said 45 pensioners on their way back to the North East from Blackpool were brought to his premises.

"Some of them were really scared and disorientated when they came in - it was really worrying," he added.

"They congregated in the bar and once they had all had a cup of tea or a whisky, they settled down. After a couple of hours another bus came and took them onwards."

Sue Henley, 54, of Bowes, near Barnard Castle, County Durham, helped many bedraggled motorists in the village hall.

"It's the worst snow I have seen in many years," she said. "Motorists started arriving at the hall on foot. They were cold, wet and miserable.

"The hall has heating, but is not equipped to provide sleeping accommodation. The villagers are rallying round, but it's going to be a massive operation."

They are also having to rescue folks off of sinking ships as the article notes. It has already been a rough winter and it is only February 1st.

Ed Morrisey asks if Ann Coulter has jumped the shark with her promise to campaign for Hillary Clinton if John McCain wins the Republican nomination.

So let's walk through the logic here. John McCain gets castigated by Coulter because he aligns himself too often with the Democrats. Her solution to that is — to campaign for the Democrats? Maybe someone can explain the thought process to me, but it sounds like a hysterical demand for extortion rather than a considered and thoughtful political position.

I'm supporting Mitt Romney because I think he is the better option. If Mitt doesn't win the nomination, I plan to support John McCain. He will have won the support of more of the party, and that would make him the man to carry the banner. I will still oppose some of his policy stands and acknowledge his apparent animus at times to the party base, but he will still be a much better choice for the nation than Hillary Clinton.

I don't read Ann Coulter and almost never mention her here at the Crabitat. But the shortest answer to Ed's question is a simple yes in this case. An all or nothing mindset is political suicide, frankly. And a rejection of your basic principles in a fit of pique because you did not get your way brings your principles into question in the first place. Maybe that's a harsh way to put it, but maybe it is time for some harsh words. I regularly castigate the same behavior coming from the left. I do not wish to see the right go down that same road.

I've said before that I did not vote for Ronald Reagan because he represented everything I expected in a candidate. He did not. I voted for him despite the fact that he was not my ideal - because he was more than good enough, despite what I saw as flaws. Politics has been described as the art of the possible. Holding candidates to impossible standards doesn't help make anything possible.

UPDATE: Comments are heavy on this post. Others bloggers posting: Sister Toldjah, Conservative Reader, American Power, Just One Minute, Classical Values, Poliblog, And here's one to think about: The Gun Toting Liberal wonders if this is confirmation that Ann Coulter is actually a liberal who has been running an act on conservatives. No, I'm not endorsing it, it is just something to think about for a moment.

If you needed any further evidence of the utter depravity of the islamist jihadis - or of their complete inhumanity - you only have to read this report.

BAGHDAD - Remote-controlled explosives strapped to two mentally retarded women detonated in a coordinated attack on Baghdad pet bazaars Friday, Iraqi officials said, killing at least 73 people in the deadliest day since the U.S. sent 30,000 extra troops to the capital last spring.
 
The chief Iraqi military spokesman in Baghdad, Brig. Gen. Qassim al-Moussawi, claimed the female bombers had Down syndrome and that the explosives were detonated by remote control, indicating they may not having been willing attackers in what could be a new method by suspected Sunni insurgents to subvert stepped up security measures.

U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker said the bombings showed that a resilient al-Qaida has "found a different, deadly way" to try to destabilize Iraq.

"There is nothing they won't do if they think it will work in creating carnage and the political fallout that comes from that," he told The Associated Press in an interview at the State Department.

Or this one.

Two women thought to suffer from Down's syndrome may have been unwilling suicide bombers in twin blasts that killed up to 73 people at pet markets in Baghdad today.

The first bomber instantly killed 45 people at a packed pet market in Baghdad in the deadliest attack in the Iraqi capital in six months.

A separate attack shortly after killed 20 people and wounded scores at a bird market in southern Baghdad.

I am completely sickened by this. I happen to have a brother that has Down Syndrome, so this one really gets to me. There are real monsters in this world.

The Daily Mail has a report of a self-proclaimed "slider" or one who causes havoc with streetlights and other electrical and electronic gadgetry just be being near to them. Critics note that the "slider" effect has never been shown to exist in a controlled setting.

Street lamps flicker when she passes, TVs change channels when she walks into a room and she sends electronic clocks haywire.

Debbie Wolf claims she is one of Britain's growing army of "sliders" - people who believe their presence causes havoc with household appliances, radios and light bulbs.

Her bizarre abilities, dubbed by paranormal experts "Street Light Interference" syndrome or SLI, don't just make life a nuisance for Debbie, they have earned her international fame.

In Japan she has been likened to heroines from cult Manga comic strips. Others have made comparisons with the cult fantasy show Heroes - in which ordinary people develop superhero abilities.

Sceptics say SLI is purely wishful thinking and coincidence - and has yet to be demonstrated by Debbie or anyone else in a controlled laboratory experiment.

But if Debbie and her fellow "electric people" are proved right, scientists will have to re-write all the known rules of physics.

Well, no, they wouldn't necessarily. They would have to figure out how the sliders manage to send interference. Different thing altogether. But onward to the skeptics:

Prof Richard Wiseman - who studies paranormal phenomena at the University of Hertfordshire - said he is contacted by two new sliders each week.

He suspects that phenomenon is caused by "observer bias" - and the fact that aging sodium street lamps flick on and off for days or weeks before they day.

"There's nothing cranky about this - this are ordinary people who genuinely believe they have this effect," said Prof Wiseman.

"However, to my knowledge this effect has never been demonstrated in a controlled setting.

"I think it is most likely to be the result of selective attention. Street lamps are going on and off all the time because they are faulty or because their timers aren't set properly.

"People only have to walk under a couple of lamps going off to think that they might be the cause.

And once they think that, they start noticing every instance where a light goes off and ignore the times when they don't."

He added: "I was once sent a video where a man filmed himself walking under street lamps for three hours.

"At the end of three hours one went out and he was convinced he had caused it. But statistically, nothing special was going on."

I'd go with observer bias unless and until the effect is shown under controlled, replicable experiment. I'm sure the people involved truly believe they have this power, but I have serious doubts about the claims. Of course, if they want to claim they can pull an Uncle Fester, they may end up being wired to the electrical grid.

In the previous post, we noted that the criminal behavior of British sheep was not as bad as that of the pigs. We rest our case.

A wild boar has been shot dead at a school after it became aggressive while children were being dropped off at the gates.

The adult male, which had entered the primary's fenced off conservation area, began stomping its feet and charging after a Forestry Commission ranger was called to assess the situation.

Staff at Ruardean Church of England school, Glos, said that the alarmed children, aged four to 11, were taken inside before the animal was put down.

Is this the end of the Boar of the Baskervilles? They didn't need the ranger, incidentally. All they needed was a grandmother with a dog leash. Or a few Australians:

SYDNEY (Reuters) - Three Australian pig hunters face 58 criminal charges after a wild hunting spree in which they drove their truck through fences and gates on 11 farms and were pursued by a farmer in an aircraft and police.
 
The pig hunters are charged with a "spate of malicious damage incidents", over almost 12 hours on "Australia Day" on Saturday, in western New South Wales state, police said on Monday.

The pig hunters, who smashed their four-wheel drive through fences and gates across 11 properties, were finally arrested on Sunday, police said.

"Three men have been charged after their vehicle was tracked by witnesses in a small aircraft following a spate of malicious damage incidents," police said in a statement.

"It will be alleged the occupants had dogs with them, intended to be used to chase wild pigs," police said.

Frankly, we are surprised that the badly behaved bacon was put down. We'd have thought they'd issue an ASBO like they do with the sheep.

A local government in Britain has issued an "anti-social behaviour order", or ASBO, against a gang of marauding sheep. Well, the order actually applies to the sheep's owner, but it amounts to the same thing.

A sheep farmer has been given an Asbo that deprives him of the ancient right to graze his flock in his village.

Jeremy Awdry, 59, was given an interim anti-social behaviour order after allegations from neighbours that he could not control his livestock.

Mr Awdry, of Bream in the Forest of Dean, has been excluded from taking his animals into the village. His own home falls just outside the no-go zone.

For 500 years, Forest of Dean-born commoners known as "sheep badgers" have been able to let their livestock graze freely.

However, in recent times the district and parish councils have received complaints relating to sheep mess, damage to property and the animals becoming a hazard on the roads.

The criminal behavior of British sheep is, of course, well documented. They're not as bad as the pigs, though. (They have some seriously bad bacon over there.)  

Microsoft has made an offer to buy Yahoo.

Microsoft Corp. has offered to buy struggling internet search provider Yahoo for $44.6 billion, a merger that would combine two of the technology world's most well-known names into a potentially potent competitor for Google in the lucrative Web search and advertising market.

Microsoft, which manufactures the operating system and Web browser used on the vast majority of the world's desktop and laptop computers, has been struggling to capture more of the internet search and advertising traffic that has been Google's undisputed province. The Web advertising market is growing rapidly, anticipated to increase from around $40 billion last year to $80 billion in 2010, Microsoft said in a press release.

Though the world's dominant software maker, Microsoft has not fared as well in efforts to promote its own search engine and other Web-based services, or to capture part of that advertising revenue. The offer for Yahoo reflects the importance that Redmond, Washington-based Microsoft places on becoming competitive in that arena — and finding a way to erode Google's current dominance of it.

Google's share of the internet search market is estimated at 56 percent — far outdistancing Yahoo, an early entrant in the Web search field which has had trouble translating the large audience for its Web site into consistent financial performance.

At $31 a share, the proposed purchase price represents a roughly 60 percent premium over Yahoo's closing stock price on Thursday of $19.18. In addition, Microsoft chief executive Steven A. Ballmer hinted that if Yahoo's board rejects the deal, Microsoft would pursue a hostile takeover, attempting to lure Yahoo stockholders with an attractive price. Yahoo stock has fallen in excess of 40 percent in recent weeks, and Ballmer said Microsoft would take "all necessary steps to ensure that Yahoo's shareholders are provided with the opportunity to realize the value inherent in our proposal."

Resistance is futile. Joking aside, I have become even less of a fan of Microsoft as the years have gone by. I think there are serious privacy issues with the internet already - this is likely to make things worse. I'm also not at all sure that MicroYahoo will fare any better against Google than the separate companies have - face it, there really is a trust issue with Microsoft. (I do not use MSN at all, personally, for just that reason).

Besides, who wants a blue screen of death on their search engine?

Charles Krauthammer analyzes Bill Clinton's legacy this morning in his Washington Post column. Or, more correctly, Bill Clinton's lack of a legacy. Krauthammer writes that Clinton simply threw away any real chance of a legacy from his time in the White House and is simply trying to claw his way back to the Oval Office, even if he has to do so by proxy by getting his wife into the Presidency.

Reagan changed history. At home, he radically altered both the shape and perception of government. Abroad, he changed the entire structure of the international system by bringing down the Soviet empire, giving birth to a unipolar world of unprecedented American dominance.

By comparison, Clinton was a historical parenthesis. He can console himself — with considerable justification — that he simply drew the short straw in the chronological lottery: His time just happened to be the 1990s, which, through no fault of his own, was the most inconsequential decade of the 20th century. His was the interval between the collapse of the Soviet Union on Dec. 26, 1991, and the return of history with a vengeance on Sept. 11, 2001.

Clinton's decade, that holiday from history, was certainly a time of peace and prosperity — but a soporific Golden Age that made no great demands on leadership. What, after all, was his greatest crisis? A farcical sexual dalliance.

Clinton no doubt wishes he'd been president on Sept. 11. It is nearly impossible for a president to rise to greatness in the absence of a great crisis, preferably war. Theodore Roosevelt is the only clear counterexample, and Bill is no Teddy.

What is the legacy of the Clinton presidency? Consolidator of the Reagan revolution. As Dwight Eisenhower made permanent FDR's New Deal and Tony Blair institutionalized Thatcherism, Clinton consolidated Reaganism. He did so most symbolically with his 1996 State of the Union declaration that "the era of big government is over." And more concretely, with a presidency that only tinkered with such structural Reaganite changes as tax cuts and deregulation, and whose major domestic achievement was the abolition of welfare, Reagan's ultimate social bête noire.

These are serious achievements, but of a second order. Obama did little more than echo that truism. But one can imagine how it made Clinton burn. He is, after all, a relatively young man who has decades to brood over his lost opportunity for greatness and yet is constitutionally barred from doing anything about it.

Unless you count Clinton's failure to adequately address the rise of islamist terrorism during his time in office as a legacy, Krauthammer has pretty well nailed it. Clinton actually accomplished little and has been judged more on the basis of the historical accident of a good economy during his tenure. Krauthammer is quite correct: that must enrage Clinton. While Clinton has toned down the attacks on Obama in recent days, one can be sure that he is still actively working to destroy the man who stands between him and some chance of the redemption of his lost legacy.