More Al-Foolery

In this installment of the Chicago Sun-Times, Al "Screamin' Mad" Gore and his Save the World GlowBull Warmening Circus are taken to task. Global warming tends cool down a bit under cold analysis of the facts.

In his new book, The Assault on Reason, Al Gore pleads, "We must stop tolerating the rejection and distortion of science. We must insist on an end to the cynical use of pseudo-studies known to be false for the purpose of intentionally clouding the public's ability to discern the truth." Gore repeatedly asks that science and reason displace cynical political posturing as the central focus of public discourse.

Science and Reason according to Al Gore's medical dosing cycle is the proper context of course.

Many of the assertions Gore makes in his movie, ''An Inconvenient Truth,'' have been refuted by science, both before and after he made them. Gore can show sincerity in his plea for scientific honesty by publicly acknowledging where science has rebutted his claims.

Winding up for the intellectual smacker pie, one has to ask this question, "What didn't he know and when didn't he know it?" The answer is, "Yes, all the time."

For example, Gore claims that Himalayan glaciers are shrinking and global warming is to blame. Yet the September 2006 issue of the American Meteorological Society's Journal of Climate reported, "Glaciers are growing in the Himalayan Mountains, confounding global warming alarmists who recently claimed the glaciers were shrinking and that global warming was to blame."

Gore claims the snowcap atop Africa's Mt. Kilimanjaro is shrinking and that global warming is to blame. Yet according to the November 23, 2003, issue of Nature magazine, "Although it's tempting to blame the ice loss on global warming, researchers think that deforestation of the mountain's foothills is the more likely culprit.

Without the forests' humidity, previously moisture-laden winds blew dry. No longer replenished with water, the ice is evaporating in the strong equatorial sunshine."

Gore claims global warming is causing more tornadoes. Yet the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change stated in February that there has been no scientific link established between global warming and tornadoes. [Emphasis mine]

This is the deadly "Gore claims ... Yet" formula, known to cause liberal asshats to rend their own flesh in agony before their heads explode. I wish my hemorrhoids were shrinking as fast as Gore claims the glaciers are.

Don't you know we're all going to die in ten years if we don't *insert liberal mantra here* right now this very moment and even then it may be too late??!!??

I kinda derailed my train of thought because for a minute I thought Gore was blaming global warming for causing more tomatoes. I'm okay now. But I really like tomatoes.

Gore claims global warming is causing more frequent and severe hurricanes. However, hurricane expert Chris Landsea published a study on May 1 documenting that hurricane activity is no higher now than in decades past. Hurricane expert William Gray reported just a few days earlier, on April 27, that the number of major hurricanes making landfall on the U.S. Atlantic coast has declined in the past 40 years. Hurricane scientists reported in the April 18 Geophysical Research Letters that global warming enhances wind shear, which will prevent a significant increase in future hurricane activity.

Gore claims global warming is causing an expansion of African deserts. However, the Sept. 16, 2002, issue of New Scientist reports, "Africa's deserts are in 'spectacular' retreat . . . making farming viable again in what were some of the most arid parts of Africa." [Emphasis, again, is contribution to Gore's debacle.]

Gore claims... and misses again. This passage is a variation of the "Gore claims .... Yet" formula. "However", however, is equally devestating.

Gore argues Greenland is in rapid meltdown, and that this threatens to raise sea levels by 20 feet. But according to a 2005 study in the Journal of Glaciology, "the Greenland ice sheet is thinning at the margins and growing inland, with a small overall mass gain." In late 2006, researchers at the Danish Meteorological Institute reported that the past two decades were the coldest for Greenland since the 1910s. [Emphasis, well, you know...]

The "Gore argues .... But" format is the terminal stage. No other contradictory element need be introduced after this. Global Warmening is now in meltdown, but not from the heat. Eventually a lack of oxygen will starve this inconvenient calumniation of science, this distortion of truth, this, this, this... pile of shit.

I dare say the Danes have also incurred the Wrath of Gore for refuting his illogical, inescapable, financially induced, spectacularly inaccurate, cross-my-offsets-and-hope-to-die scientific conclusions. Also know as bold ass lies.

Each of these cases provides an opportunity for Gore to lead by example in his call for an end to the distortion of science. Will he rise to the occasion? Only time will tell.

And ruin his retirement portfolio? Are you crazy?? This carbon offset BS is the sweetest scam Al Gore has managed to pull since his zinc mine was listed as a major environmental polluter.

THE WRATH OF GORE

Yeah, yeah I know. My PhotoShop (free knock off) kung fu is weak... Can any one fix this?

Let's Talk Border Control

Immigration Reform

Taking The Law When No One Else Will

The new Subway motto is "Eat Dead."

PLANTATION, Fla. -- One man is dead and another in critical condition after the duo was shot by a customer while they were attempting to rob a Plantation Subway shop Wednesday night, police said. Police said 71-year-old John Lovell II used a licensed gun to shoot the alleged robbers at the Subway on North Pine Island Road and Sunrise Boulevard.

According to investigators, two armed men entered the restaurant, pointing guns and demanding money. Lovell turned around and saw a gun pointed at his face. Plantation police said that's when he took the law into his own hands.

"As the customer was being forced into the restroom at gunpoint, the customer, who was in fear for his life and legally armed, shot the robbery suspects," said Plantation Police Department spokesman Robert Rittig.

Police said one of the suspects was fatally shot in the head. He was identified as 22-year-old Donicio Ricardo Arrindell. The other suspect, 21-year-old Fredrick Gerard Gadson, was shot in the chest and was able to run nearly 300 yards into a nearby Bank Atlantic parking lot while trying to escape, police said.

I am getting to really dislike the phrase "took the law into his own hands" as if there was anyone else there to do it. The cops were no where to be found when this went down. Since when are you taking the law into your own hands when you defend yourself from being robbed at gun point?

Thank God They're OK

It has been a hellish stretch of road for our brothers in the NY State Police. One Trooper narrowly escaped death in the following incident as reported in the Post Standard. It happened yesterday:

HELD AT TROOPER'S HEAD, GUN JAMMED

Ronald E. McCarthy, of Granby, had already rammed his minivan into a trooper's SUV, attacked him with a 4-by-4 and fought through pepper spray, according to police. Now the 250-pound man had state police Sgt. Joseph Domagola pinned against a roadside guiderail, pressing the trooper's pistol against the back of Domagola's head, witnesses told state police.

"Oh, my God! No! Don't do it!" shouted a woman driving by, according to one witness.

By chance, the .45-caliber Glock malfunctioned.

With the help of another officer and passers-by, Domagola wrestled McCarthy to the ground and handcuffed him, witnesses said. McCarthy, 45, of 250 state Route 48, is charged with attempted murder of a police officer, attempted aggravated assault of a police officer and menacing a police officer, all felonies.

This is where you got to suck it up, wrestling on the side of a country road with a maniac trying kill you with your own gun. This is the stuff cop nightmares are made of.

The drama began at about 5 a.m. Saturday when state police got a call asking them to respond to a suspicious fire at the McCarthy residence, said Maj. Frank J. DeGennaro, the commander of state police Troop D.

The home was severely damaged. State police Investigator Scott Harrington interviewed McCarthy, who said he returned to his home at 3 a.m. after being out of town. McCarthy said he became upset because his wife and family were gone and some of their personal belongings, as well as family furniture, were also missing.

During the interview, McCarthy was distraught and angry over issues with his family, DeGennaro said. McCarthy left the state police barracks at around 8 a.m.

McCarthy came back to the barracks around noon, swore at his family and police, threw an empty beer bottle at a Trooper and then sped off. That's like chumming the water in the Sea World Shark Tank.

DeGennaro said Domagola witnessed the incident, hopped into his marked Chevrolet Tahoe and drove after McCarthy. Domagola saw McCarthy make a U-turn. McCarthy "then tried to ram his car head-on into the trooper car, but he missed," DeGennaro said.

Domagola turned his vehicle around and gave chase and McCarthy again made a U-turn, pulling off and stopping on the west shoulder of Route 57. DeGennaro said McCarthy waited there and intentionally drove into the path of the Tahoe, this time striking it head-on.

Domagola got out of his SUV and went to check McCarthy for injuries, DeGennaro said. McCarthy immediately became combative, and Domagola tried to subdue him with pepper spray.

A word about pepper spray, mace and other non-lethal weapons. Sometimes they are more non-lethal than at other times. Some people do not react with getting sprayed with a highly irritating fluid other then getting highly irritated themselves. Or in numbnuts case, more irritated than he was to begin with. McCarthy tried to yank other people out of their cars but failed.

McCarthy reached into the bed of the truck and pulled out a 4-by-4, 8-foot long, wood fence post. He began swinging it at Domagola, witnesses said.

DeGennaro said Domagola drew his pistol and told McCarthy to drop the fence post several times. When he didn't comply, Domagola fired one round, but it landed in the pavement, the major said.

McCarthy dropped the lumber and Domagola put the pistol back in its holster, he said.

I'm not going to second guess the Trooper on this. The State Police are highly trained in the use of deadly physical force and he reacted as he was trained.

McCarthy charged at Domagola again and the two wrestled against a guide rail with McCarthy trying to grab the gun, police said.

"The man had all his weight against the trooper with the gun in his right hand," Miller said. "He was pointing and pressing the gun up against the trooper's head and at his neck, yelling something at him."

McCarthy weighs 250 pounds; Domagola weighs 200 pounds, DeGennaro said. Both men are a little over 6 feet tall, the major said.

"He pointed the barrel of the weapon at the sergeant's head," DeGennaro said. "They both had their fingers on the trigger guard."

DeGennaro said the empty shell from Domagola's first round was still in the chamber, likely preventing the second round from going off.

DeGennaro credits passersby and witnesses to the accident with distracting McCarthy, screaming at him to stop.

This is known as a "stove pipe jam." The gun could not go off because the spent cartridge never cleared the breech. Therefore the Glock could not cycle completely and the next round in the magazine was never loaded.

Thank the Good Lord above. The next paragraph is about gun control in a crisis.

Miller said Domagola took advantage of McCarthy's distraction to get the upper hand. "The next thing I know the trooper had his gun back," Miller said.

By then, the major said, Harrington had arrived on the scene.

Harrington "immediately went at him and I went right behind him," Miller said. Harrington "grabbed him on top and I grabbed his legs and the man fell to the ground. This man was still struggling to get free, but the officer ended up getting him handcuffed."

McCarthy and Domagola were treated at A.L. Lee Memorial Hospital in Fulton and released. Domagola had scrapes and bruises, DeGennaro said.

This round goes to the good guys. At the end of his tour Trooper Domagola went home to be with his family. Right where he belongs.

I wonder how long it took him to fall asleep that night...

Dunky D's - Donuts Si, Illegals No

I love Dunkin' Donuts with a passion. I favor the flavor of their coffee (yummmmmmmmmmm)above that of Krispy Kreme (which isn't bad) and Starbucks (yeeeech *hurl*rowf*choke*).

I now love Dunky D's more than ever. Michele Malkin has posted a story about Dunkin' Donuts' efforts to fight illegal immigration by cooperating with government programs to screen potential employees.

Last spring, I praised Dunkin’ Donuts for volunteering to participate in a government database program to verify that workers are here legally. The company was responding to customer concerns about illegal employees. Only 6,200 out of the nation’s 8 million employers participate in the screening program. The company continues to be vigilant.

The Star-Ledger reports today that Dunkin’ is suing franchisees that it says were knowingly employing illegal aliens...

From the Star Ledger:

A bill that would require businesses to perform tougher background checks to make sure job applicants are not illegal immigrants has stalled in the U.S. Senate.

But in the meantime, the nation's largest doughnut chain has taken matters into its own hands, requiring all franchise owners to perform the background checks and moving to fire those they accuse of accepting fake IDs commonly used by illegal immigrants to find work.

So far Dunkin' Donuts has sued two franchises in New Joisey and more in other parts of the country.

In April, Dunkin' Donuts filed a lawsuit in federal court asking a judge to terminate the franchise agreement it has with two stores in Central Jersey, saying the owners knowingly accepted false documents, used false Social Security numbers and paid employees in cash.

The company has filed similar lawsuits seeking to sever ties with franchises in Boston, Atlanta and Florida, where it is has accused three franchises of hiring illegal immigrants.

The lawsuits come a year after Dunkin' Donuts became the most well-known corporation to enroll in Basic Pilot, a voluntary U.S. Department of Homeland Security program that allows employers to perform electronic document checks to verify that applicants are eligible to work.

Dunkin' Donuts was started in 1950 by William Rosenberg in Quincy, MA.

From 1990 until December 2005, Dunkin' Donuts was owned by the fwench (Allied Domecq PLC which was acquired by Pernod Ricard). In March, 2006, Dunky D's was sold to a consortium of three US private equity firms, Thomas H. Lee Partners, the Carlyle Group and Bain Capital LLP for $2.43 billion.

Yes, Dunky D's found its way home again.
*sob*
I wonder if this cooperation with US immigration authorities would have occurred if the fwence still owned it? Somehow I doubt it.

So go ahead and stop by Dunky D's on the way to work tomorrow and grab a hot cuppa and maybe a few donuts for the guys at work.

Remember:
Everytime Dunky Ds' cash register rings,
Somewhere a wetback gets his wings ...
Clipped!

Big Weasel Goes To The Big House

Another anti-gun advocate says one thing and does another. Are we surprised?

From the LA Times.

The founder of an antiviolence group called No Guns pleaded not guilty Thursday to federal weapons charges. Hector "Big Weasel" Marroquin is accused of selling an assault rifle, a machine gun, two pistols and two silencers to undercover federal agents last fall.

But he needed this armament to protect his family, in case he decided to invade El Salvador.

Marroquin, 51, of Downey, is a onetime member of the 18th Street gang who founded No Guns in 1996.

The 18th Street gang is one of the most violent criminal organizations to come out of the City of Los Angeles in the past forty years. It spans several states and crosses international borders.

No Guns received $1.5 million from the city as a subcontractor on anti-gang efforts, but its contract was canceled last year.

The same people who were advocating for Tookie Williams must have hired this jackass to run anti-gang activities. It's like hiring a child molestor to babysit your kids.

But isn't this a lovely business model? Check it out.

1) You sell guns to the gangs that you were hired to eliminate.

2) When the gang shoots people with the guns you sold to them, you go back for to the idiots in City Hall and ask for more money to run your anti-gang gig because the gang problem is getting worse.

3) Then you sell more guns to that same gang because now their people are getting whacked by the friends of the people of the other gang they whacked so they need more guns to whack them back.

Sweeeeeeeeeet.

And the liberals say that the tobacco industry is dangerous.

Marroquin is charged with three counts of manufacture, distribution and transport for sale of an unlawful assault weapon, along with one count each of machine gun conversion and possession of a silencer. He remains free on $260,000 bail.

Now where do you suppose he got that kind of money to put up for bail? Sure, California taxpayers, who else? And who supported this knucklehead?

His champions included former state Sen. Tom Hayden.

This just gets better and better.

But some law enforcement officials believed that Marroquin was a front man for the Mexican Mafia prison gang and that NO GUNS was a facade for illegal activity and a channel for public funds.

One was Richard Valdemar, a retired sheriff's sergeant and expert on gangs who led an investigation that resulted in the first federal racketeering trial of Mexican Mafia members; it resulted in the conviction of 13. Valdemar said the Mexican Mafia has a long history of using anti-gang and drug rehabilitation groups as fronts to acquire public funds.

"This is a major part of their operation," said Valdemar, whom Marroquin unsuccessfully sued for defamation of character in 2002.

Valdemar said he and others voiced these concerns to the Sheriff's Department and the city of Los Angeles.

Hee! Hee! The cops knew what was going on with these so called advocate groups, but did the City listen? Did the Sheriff's Department listen?

Oops.... who is the Sheriff? Is he the guy that completely ignored a court order and released Paris Hilton after three days in the slammer? Oh, that Sheriff.

Nevermind.

As part of its gang intervention efforts, the city through its L.A. Bridges program contracted with Toberman Settlement House, a Harbor-area social services agency, which in turn hired NO GUNS in 2003.

Bill Martinez, director of gang intervention programs for Toberman, said NO GUNS was hired because it was the only group in South Los Angeles working with Latino gangs. Over the next three years, NO GUNS collected more than $1.5 million in city funds as a subcontractor.

Marroquin's organization was contracted to help find job training for gang members and to mediate cease-fires, said Angela Estell of the city's Community Development Department.

I wonder what kind of training the Latino gang members received? Based on Marroquin's past experience, let's see what he has to offer.

Marroquin and his family have a long history of run-ins with police.

In 1998, Marroquin was tried and acquitted on illegal weapons charges. At the time, he was on probation for brandishing a gun at sheriff's deputies who had gone to his house three years earlier in response to a domestic disturbance call.

In 2001, the charred body of Hector Romero, the boyfriend of Marroquin's daughter, Charleeda, was found near Wrightwood, Valdemar said.According to several Marroquin family members, Romero was playing Russian roulette and shot himself to death.

They allegedly drove the body to the Wrightwood area of San Bernardino County, where gasoline was poured on Romero's crotch and ignited, said Valdemar, who participated in the investigation. San Bernardino sheriff's homicide
detectives eventually filed the case as a suicide and charged Charleeda Marroquin with mutilating a body, Valdemar said.

During the investigation, police searched Marroquin Sr.'s house and found knives and police batons — a violation of his probation — as well as 18th Street gang writings. Marroquin was charged with a probation violation.

Valdemar said his last contact with Marroquin was in 2003, when Marroquin moved to Cudahy. He said Marroquin began taxing Cudahy gang members and drug dealers, claiming authority from the Mexican Mafia.

Sergio "Checo" Villa, a local gang leader with his own mafia ties, objected, Valdemar said. Villa put together a crew to kill Marroquin, which included a gang member who was a Sheriff's Department informant, he said. Fearing that the informant might kill Marroquin, Valdemar said he told Marroquin of Villa's plans.

"He thinks I'm going to kill him," Valdemar said. "I said, 'I'm not here to hurt you. But you're in trouble. They're going to kill you.' He's says, 'It's just a misunderstanding.'

"Several days later, Villa was shot dead on a street in Cudahy, according to a county coroner's report. The homicide remains unsolved.

This guy is just a fount of wisdom to gang members. And what's this tax crap?

Tax collection is another area of criminal activity where 18th Street is well established. Typically, in an area that is claimed as territory by 18th Street, gang members will collect a tax from any business: legitimate or criminal. The potential taxpayers include street vendors, shop owners, prostitutes, and drug dealers, as well as the businesses which exist in the neighborhood.

Members of 18th Street then threaten to kill any individual who refuses to pay the tax. In 1994 alone, the Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office prosecuted 30 murders that were the result of hits made by 18th Street gang members for failure to pay taxes.

When the Mob did it, it was called extortion. Well, that's the Left Coast for ya.

Anyone wanna hire Big Weasel as a tax consultant? Or a fire prevention specialist?

Next Time, Empty The Damn Gun In His Teeth

This story out of Louisiana where the cops are more interested in taking guns out of the hands of law abiding citizens rather than criminals.

METAIRIE, La. (AP) -- A man with a gun was trying to force a woman out of her car at a fast-food drive-through when the woman's 17-year-old son wrestled the gun away from him and shot him.

Carl Chestnut, 44, of Kenner, is expected to survive wounds to his head and body, and will face armed robbery charges once he is released from East Jefferson General Hospital, Col. John Fortunato, a Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office spokesman, said Monday.

It would have been safer to hand over the keys and let the gunman drive off, Sheriff Harry Lee said Monday.

What Sheriff Lee doesn't say is that the perp, Carl Chestnut, was wanted for the murder of a 60 year old trailer park manager.

Arby's Carjacker Wanted For Murder
Posted by Wanda Miles June 19, 2007

The suspect in Monday's attempted carjacking at a Metairie fast food restaurant is wanted for murder.

The Kenner Police Department issued an arrest warrant Tuesday for Carl Chestnut, 44, in connection with the death of Odrey Bordelon, a Kenner trailer park manager who was strangled in his home earlier this month.

Bordelon's body was found June 5 in his home at Dixieland Mobile Home and RV Park, 176 W. Airline Drive, Kenner. Authorities believe the motive was robbery.

And this....

Second Man Booked In Trailer Park Killing
Posted by Wanda Miles June 20, 2007

The second man wanted in the June 5 strangulation of a Kenner trailer park manager has surrendered to police, authorities said today.

Wayne Hayden, 50, of Metairie turned himself in Tuesday night, said Detective Shaun Watson, a Kenner Police Department spokesman.

Hayden and Carl Chestnut, 44, are suspects in the death of Odrey Bordelon, 60, who was found strangled in his apartment. Both will be booked with first-degree murder and aggravated burglary, police said.

Perhaps the Sheriff was just being particularly dense in this case. If that 17 year old lad had not wrestled the gun away from Chestnut and used it to defend his mother, who knows what other evil would have been committed by this murderer?

If every potential victim of a violent crime fought as hard as this teen, how many murders, robberies, etc. would be prevented? How many Sheriffs would be out of a job?

Criminals do what they do because 1) they like it, and 2) it's an easy way to get money. When a criminal perceives that there is a real risk of getting hurt or killed, all of a sudden that job at the car wash starts looking pretty good.

There are several studies, hotly contested by gun control advocates, that show how firearms are used by citizens to defend themselves. Called "Defensive Gun Use" (DGU), the studies indicate that at a minimum, over 100,000 DGU's occur every year (National Crime Victimization Study). Another study that strikes fear into gun confiscators, is that there are actually over 2 million DGU's annually (Kleck and Gertz). Whether you own a gun or, as in the instance cited above, take it away from someone else, you must be mentally and emotionally prepared to use deadly physical force to protect yourself and your loved ones.

Marvin Wolfgang, the late Director of the Sellin Center for Studies in Criminology and Criminal Law at the University of Pennsylvania, considered by many to be the foremost criminologist in he country, wrote this review of Kleck and Gertz's landmark defensive gun use study in The Journal of Criminal Law & Criminology, Northwestern University School of Law, Volume 86, Number 1, Fall, 1995:

"I am as strong a gun-control advocate as can be found among the criminologists in this country. If I were Mustapha Mond of Brave New World, I would eliminate all guns from the civilian population and maybe even from the police ... What troubles me is the article by Gary Kleck and Marc Gertz. ["Armed Resistance to Crime: The Prevalence and Nature of Self-Defense with a Gun," by Gary Kleck and Marc Gertz, published in that same issue of The Journal of Criminal Law & Criminology].

The reason I am troubled is that they have provided an almost clear cut case of methodologically sound research in support of something I have theoretically opposed for years, namely, the use of a gun in defense against a criminal perpetrator. ...I have to admit my admiration for the care and caution expressed in this article and this research.

Can it be true that about two million instances occur each year in which a gun was used as a defensive measure against crime? It is hard to believe. Yet, it is hard to challenge the data collected. We do not have contrary evidence.

The National Crime Victim Survey does not directly contravene this latest survey, nor do the Mauser and Hart Studies. ... the methodological soundness of the current Kleck and Gertz study is clear. I cannot further debate it. ... The Kleck and Gertz study impresses me for the caution the authors exercise and the elaborate nuances they examine methodologically.

I do not like their conclusions that having a gun can be useful, but I cannot fault their methodology. They have tried earnestly to meet all objections in advance and have done exceedingly well."

RIP Marty Henry

Officer Marty Henry went to his Maker last night.

Good bye Marty and rest easy, 'til we meet again.

Fortune Cookie Say, "No Way"

The Chinese want to sell cars in Europe and the United States. They are offering a product called the BS6, built by the Chinese auto manufacturer Brillance. The BS6 has failed rather dismally in its mandatory European crash tests.

Frankfurt - A car with which China's Brilliance wanted to conquer Europe's automobile market has failed to pass a benchmark German crash test, the German ADAC automobile club said today.

The BS6 sedan, made by Chinese car maker Brilliance, won only one out of a possible five stars in the crash test, carried out in accordance with Euro NCAP regulations, at ADAC's crash test laboratories, the organisation said.

It was the second time in less than two years that a Chinese-made car has failed the test, following the spectacular failure of the Landwind sports utility vehicle (SUV) made by Jiangling Motors 18 months ago, said ADAC spokesman Maximilian Maurer.

'The BS6 sedan performed almost as badly as the Landwind in November 2005,' Maurer said. .

Perhaps a better name for the vehicle might be the Death Star, or Mao's Most Excellent Revenge.

Here is the BS6 crash test video. It is in German but you can appreciate the images.



The article goes on.

The test consisted of a frontal and side crash at 64 kilometres (40 miles) per hour, and the front crash showed that the safety cell of the Brilliance BS6 was too soft and not stable enough, ADAC said.

Most European-made cars win four or five stars in the crash test, so the result is not encouraging for the BS6, which was launched at the last Geneva Motor Show.

'After Landwind's 2005 test result, it stopped being sold in Europe,' said ADAC's Maurer.

The BS6 could therefore face the same fate, he warned.

In the next video you can hear the German engineers laughing hysterically as the Landwind hits the barrier and almost disintegrates in this 2005 crash test.

The Chinese Landwind SUV was banned after a lawsuit was filed by the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Crash Dummies. This video ain't pretty. The Crumble Zone on the Landwind extends all the way to the next area code. This vehicle wasn't safe even after it was fed into an auto compactor at the recycling center.

Obviously this car was designed with China's overpopulation problem in mind.

What, Me Bored?

This is another cool vid from glumbert.com. Some bizarre stuff but it is SFW.

glumbert.com - When graphic artists get bored

Officer Marty Henry

Marty Henry is a 32 year veteran of the Syracuse Police Department. He came on about a year or so behind me. We worked the south side together for a while back in the late 70's. Marty is a huge man, 6'5" and almost 300 pounds. And he is a gentle soul. For the last ten years Marty worked in the Personnel Division.

Yesterday morning a special ceremony was held in his honor outside St. Joseph's Hospital. The event was captured in this morning's Post Standard.

Hundreds attend "Signal 94" ceremony for Marty Henry, a cancer patient.

A line of Syracuse police officers stood at attention Thursday morning in a courtyard and saluted toward a hospital room containing one of their own.

Ten cars with lights flashing were in front of them. Behind them were more than 200 people, some in uniform, some in hospital scrubs, some in civilian clothes.

The parking garage and the skywalk that connects it to St. Joseph's Hospital Health Center were lined with people at 9 a.m. All were quiet.

Officer Marty Henry, a man Sgt. Tom Connellan called "the most beloved police officer on the force," was unseen behind a tinted window receiving his "Signal 94," a ceremony marking the end of his last shift on duty.

Henry, 56, an officer with the force since 1975, is being treated at the hospital. He has cancer, his family said.

The officers in the courtyard held the salute for almost 10 minutes. The cadets in the police academy saluted in their sweats. Tears moved down more than one cheek.

"God bless our friend. You're a fine example for all of us to follow," Deputy Chief Michael Kerwin said before the 911 center made the radio broadcast marking Henry's end of service.

Henry last served in the chief's office but was more known for his work in the personnel department. "Anyone hired (by the Police Department) in the last 10 years went through Marty to get here," Connellan said. When you came on the job, he gave you your badge. When you retired, he took it back," Deputy Chief Dave Barrette said.

He was also the man who planned Signal 94 ceremonies for retiring officers, Barrette said.

"Marty took sick a week after putting in his retirement papers," Barrette said.
He was supposed to retire in May but decided not to when he learned of his illness, Barrette said.

During his career, Henry had a couple of brushes with death. He almost died in the summer of 1981 when he was stabbed as he was going through a door, Barrette said.

Henry also was forced off Interstate 481 in 1999 whnen his vehicle was rammed from behind by a speeding sport utility vehicle. Henry went across the median and through oncoming traffic before hitting a tree, records state. His sons, Tom and Chris, were in the room with him. Tom works for Google in California, and Chris is in the Washington, D.C., police academy.

"He was shocked," Tom Henry said. "I don't think he realized the impact the ceremony would have."

The numbers of people that Henry had touched moved everyone in the room, he said.

After the service, as the police cars pulled away, police Chief Gary Miguel told officers that Henry was moved.

"He saw the whole thing and so did his family," an emotional Miguel said.

"I said, 'Marty, how many people do you think are out there?' " Miguel told officers.

"He said, 'A lot.'

I said, 'They're all here for you.' "

Marty is very close to death now. Say a prayer for his family. We're all going to miss him.

The Pattern

There is a pattern to the dire predictions of global warming proponents who demand immediate action to "save the planet." The planet is doing just fine thank you. It's the nutjobs that are in danger of overheating and exploding. From the Canadian Financial Post, here is an article written by Professor R. Timothy Patterson (director of the Ottawa-Carleton Geoscience Centre, Department of Earth Sciences, Carleton University):

The mud at the bottom of B.C. fjords reveals that solar output drives climate change - and that we should prepare now for dangerous global cooling.

This flies in the face of the pattern of global warming.

Politicians and environmentalists these days convey the impression that climate-change research is an exceptionally dull field with little left to discover. We are assured by everyone from David Suzuki to Al Gore to Prime Minister Stephen Harper that "the science is settled."

At the recent G8 summit, German Chancellor Angela Merkel even attempted to convince world leaders to play God by restricting carbon-dioxide emissions to a level that would magically limit the rise in world temperatures to 2C.

This is the typical liberal reaction to a perceived problem. Remember LBJ's War On Poverty? Just throw money at whatever is bothering you and it willl magically disappear.

The fact that science is many years away from properly understanding global climate doesn't seem to bother our leaders at all. Inviting testimony only from those who don't question political orthodoxy on the issue, parliamentarians are charging ahead with the impossible and expensive goal of "stopping global climate change."

This is not about science, this is about control. The communist/socialist models have all failed and have been discredited. This is the new communism.

Climate stability has never been a feature of planet Earth. The only constant about climate is change; it changes continually and, at times, quite rapidly. Many times in the past, temperatures were far higher than today, and occasionally, temperatures were colder. As recently as 6,000 years ago, it was about 3C warmer than now. Ten thousand years ago, while the world was coming out of the thousand-year-long "Younger Dryas" cold episode, temperatures rose as much as 6C in a decade -- 100 times faster than the past century's 0.6C warming that has so upset environmentalists.

But let's not allow opposing fact or opinions to get in the way of the global warming debate.

Climate-change research is now literally exploding with new findings. Since the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, the field has had more research than in all previous years combined and the discoveries are completely shattering the myths. For example, I and the first-class scientists I work with are consistently finding excellent correlations between the regular fluctuations in the brightness of the sun and earthly climate. This is not surprising. The sun and the stars are the ultimate source of all energy on the planet.

In many investigations you follow the money to find the motive and the suspects. If you want to investigate the earth's climate you follow the energy that produces the weather.

Prof. Patterson was funded by a Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council strategic project grant to investigate the causes of variations in commercial fish populations. Patterson collected mud cores 11 miters thick (36') from the bottom of Canadian fjords in order to analyze approximately 5,000 years of climate change.

Using computers to conduct what is referred to as a "time series analysis" on the colouration and thickness of the annual layers, we have discovered repeated cycles in marine productivity in this, a region larger than Europe. Specifically, we find a very strong and consistent 11-year cycle throughout the whole record in the sediments and diatom remains. This correlates closely to the well-known 11-year "Schwabe" sunspot cycle, during which the output of the sun varies by about 0.1%. Sunspots, violent storms on the surface of the sun, have the effect of increasing solar output, so, by counting the spots visible on the surface of our star, we have an indirect measure of its varying brightness. Such records have been kept for many centuries and match very well with the changes in marine productivity we are observing.

I think we're starting to see a pattern.

In the sediment, diatom and fish-scale records, we also see longer period cycles, all correlating closely with other well-known regular solar variations. In particular, we see marine productivity cycles that match well with the sun's 75-90-year "Gleissberg Cycle," the 200-500-year "Suess Cycle" and the 1,100-1,500-year "Bond Cycle." The strength of these cycles is seen to vary over time, fading in and out over the millennia. The variation in the sun's brightness over these longer cycles may be many times greater in magnitude than that measured over the short Schwabe cycle and so are seen to impact marine productivity even more significantly.

But there was a problem. The variations in solar energy, on their own, were not enough to cause the climate changes. Therefore another mechanism had to be present for these climate changes to occur.

Indeed, that is precisely what has been discovered. In a series of groundbreaking scientific papers starting in 2002, Veizer, Shaviv, Carslaw, and most recently Svensmark et al., have collectively demonstrated that as the output of the sun varies, and with it, our star's protective solar wind, varying amounts of galactic cosmic rays from deep space are able to enter our solar system and penetrate the Earth's atmosphere. These cosmic rays enhance cloud formation which, overall, has a cooling effect on the planet. When the sun's energy output is greater, not only does the Earth warm slightly due to direct solar heating, but the stronger solar wind generated during these "high sun" periods blocks many of the cosmic rays from entering our atmosphere. Cloud cover decreases and the Earth warms still more.

The pattern is clearer still.

The opposite occurs when the sun is less bright. More cosmic rays are able to get through to Earth's atmosphere, more clouds form, and the planet cools more than would otherwise be the case due to direct solar effects alone. This is precisely what happened from the middle of the 17th century into the early 18th century, when the solar energy input to our atmosphere, as indicated by the number of sunspots, was at a minimum and the planet was stuck in the Little Ice Age. These new findings suggest that changes in the output of the sun caused the most recent climate change. By comparison, CO2 variations show little correlation with our planet's climate on long, medium and even short time scales.

The pattern is now crystal clear, a pattern of denial, obfuscation and intimidation. This is the pattern of the politics surrounding gobal warming. It isn't about science and it never was. The science is still emerging. The science is not understood. It's about control.

In some fields the science is indeed "settled." For example, plate tectonics, once highly controversial, is now so well-established that we rarely see papers on the subject at all. But the science of global climate change is still in its infancy, with many thousands of papers published every year. In a 2003 poll conducted by German environmental researchers Dennis Bray and Hans von Storch, two-thirds of more than 530 climate scientists from 27 countries surveyed did not believe that "the current state of scientific knowledge is developed well enough to allow for a reasonable assessment of the effects of greenhouse gases." About half of those polled stated that the science of climate change was not sufficiently settled to pass the issue over to policymakers at all.

Another part of the pattern is that you'll never hear information contradicting global warming coming from the MSM.

Solar scientists predict that, by 2020, the sun will be starting into its weakest Schwabe solar cycle of the past two centuries, likely leading to unusually cool conditions on Earth. Beginning to plan for adaptation to such a cool period, one which may continue well beyond one 11-year cycle, as did the Little Ice Age, should be a priority for governments. It is global cooling, not warming, that is the major climate threat to the world, especially Canada. As a country at the northern limit to agriculture in the world, it would take very little cooling to destroy much of our food crops, while a warming would only require that we adopt farming techniques practiced to the south of us.

So if the global warming crowd is wrong, then Canada's economy may be in serious trouble. Think about it; a shortened growing season and higher energy costs for heating. But the pattern is such that these possibilities are ignored.

Meantime, we need to continue research into this, the most complex field of science ever tackled, and immediately halt wasted expenditures on the King Canute-like task of "stopping climate change."

King Canute allegedly commanded the waves to turn back. The waves didn't listen nor could they. Even the power of the media has it's limitations.

Now We'll Know Where To Look

From the UK Guardian:

US soldiers and airmen fighting in Iraq are to receive a new weapon in their arsenal: a pack of playing cards to help them identify ancient ruins before creating new ones.

The Pentagon's move, echoing its post-invasion production of a deck of cards depicting "Iraq's most wanted", is part of a belated Pentagon scheme to prevent further war damage to the country's 11,000 archaeological sites.

More than four years after priceless antiquities housed in Iraq's National Museum were looted and much of the country's ancient heritage was despoiled, 40,000 packs of the playing cards will be dealt out to American troops - roughly one deck for every four soldiers.

The cards are illustrated with pictures of rare artefacts or sites of special interest, in the hope that soldiers will avoid turning them into battlefields.

You just know that the terrorists will flock to these sites like drunken college sophmores to Daytona during spring break. We'd be better off mining these sites and building tourist knock offs after we kill all the terrorists.

Each suit has a theme: diamonds for artefacts, spades for digs, hearts for "winning hearts and minds", and clubs for heritage preservation.

The cards also carry handy slogans. The five of clubs says: "Drive around, not over archaeological sites". Another asks: "This site has survived 17 centuries. Will it and others survive you?"

In what may be seen as an optimistic initiative, troops are asked to consider taking up alternative firing positions if historical treasures are at risk. Likewise, air force pilots are urged to bomb sensitively.

That's how to win a war - with alternative firing positions (perhaps less safe as you expose yourself by leaving vantage points that puts the enemy and a mural of Nebuchadnezzar's favorite goat at risk) and with delicate, caring, sensative bomb runs.

In one infamous incident in 2003, a site at Nebuchadnezzar's ancient city of Babylon was used as a helicopter landing pad and a camp for 2,000 troops.

Cool. I'd bivouac those bad boys right where the harem used to be.

Last year Donny George, Iraq's most prominent archaeologist, fled the country saying growing insecurity was making preservation work impossible.

Gee, that's what the Germans said after we fire bombed Dresden. Not many vets really gave a royal flush about that either.

Thousands of historic landmarks were annihilated during WWII throughout Europe. All of a sudden a garbage dump (that's what an archeological tell is, a heap of garbage and rubble) is more valuable than 1,000 year old Christian churches?

Hearts and minds? Grab them by the balls, the hearts and minds will follow.

Way Too Cool

This was just too cool not to steal. I dropped in on Phred's World and found this.

This is a B-1 bomber breaking the sound barrier. Now I come from a Navy family (my Dad worked on the F-14 back in the early 70's when he worked for Grumman's, my brother-in-law was the civilian administrator for the last avionics make over of the F-14 at the Pautuxet NAS) and my favorite shots of supersonic flight is that of an F-14 going supersonic about 200' from an aircraft carrier.

But this is a bomber! And this is Phred's story behind it.

Jet Noise is the Sound of Freedom

A story from a U.S. Soldier somewhere in Afghanistan...

"So we are up in the mountains at about 0100 hrs looking for a bad guy that we thought was in the area. There are ten of us, pitch black, crystal clear night, about 25 degrees. We know there are bad guys in the area; a few shots have been fired but no big deal. We decide that we need air cover and the only thing in the area is a solo B-1 bomber. He flies around at about 20,000 feet and tells us there is nothing in the area.He then asks if we would like a low level show of force. Stupid question. Of course we tell him yes.

The controller who is attached to the team then is heard talking to the pilot. Pilot asks if we want it subsonic or supersonic. Very stupid question.

Pilot advises he is twenty miles out and stand by. The controller gets us all sitting down in a line and points out the proper location. You have to picture this. Pitch black, ten killers sitting down, dead quiet and overlooking this about 30 mile long valley. All of a sudden, way out (below our level) you see a set of four 200' white flames coming at us. The controller says, "Ah-- guys-- you might want to plug your ears".

Faster than you can think a B-1, supersonic, 1000' over our heads, blasts the sound barrier and it feels like God just hit you in the head with a hammer.

He then stands it straight up with 4 white trails of flame coming out and disappears.

"Cost of gas for that: Probably $50,000

Hearing damage: For certain.

Bunch of Taliban thinking twice about shooting at us: Priceless.

Have a nice day from the good 'ol USA!

I get chills just thinking about this. I love the sound of jets. It is indeed the sound of freedom.

YEEEEEEEEEHHHAAAAAAAAAH!

A friend of the family has a brother who was a co-pilot for one of these babies. They flew so low once that the air turbulance took a barn right off it's foundation at an air show. And they were subsonic at the time. Oh baby...

Faith Of Their Fathers

Happy Father's Day. Hopefully even the secular media is starting to grasp just how important the role of fathers is in childrearing.

The following is an except from the June 3, 2007, Syracuse Post Standard. It is a message to every father who wants his children to grow up respecting the precepts of God.

Church attendance among men had already fallen to 43 percent in 1992, according to the Barna Group, which specializes in researching trends among Evangelicals. Then that number crashed to 28 percent in 1996...

The American numbers are sobering [...] but they are nowhere near as stunning as another set of statistics in an essay titled "The Demographic Characteristics of the Linguistic and Religious Groups in Switzerland," published in 2000 in a volume covering trends in several European nations. The numbers that trouble traditionalists come from a 1994 survey in which the Swiss government tried to determine how religious practices are carried down from one generation to another.

Apparently, if a father and mother were both faithful churchgoers, 33 percent of their children followed their example with another 41 percent attending on an irregular basis and a quarter shunning church altogether.

But what if the father had little or no faith? If the father was semiactive and the mother was a faithful worshipper, only 3 percent of their children became active church members and 59 percent were irregular in their worship attendance -- with the rest lost to the church altogether.

If the father never went to church while the mother was faithful, only 2 percent of the children became regular churchgoers and 37 percent were semiactive. Thus, more than 60 percent were lost.

The bottom line from the Swiss study is this:

IF THE FATHER DID NOT GO TO CHURCH, ONLY ONE CHILD IN 50 GREW UP TO BE AN ADULT WHO REGULARLY ATTENDED CHURCH.

THE STRENGTH OF THE MOTHER'S FAITH WAS IRRELEVANT.

More recent surveys in America (Rev. Rick Kingham, National Coalition of Men's Ministries) found that if a father made a decision to become a Christian, the rest of the family followed 93 percent of the time. If the mother made a similar decision, only 17 percent of the family followed her example.

"It seems that when a man takes that kind of spiritual stand, it usually affects everyone else in the whole constellation around him, including his family and even other men that he knows."

Men, are you regular church goers? Those beautiful young eyes of your children are watching you constantly and YOU provide the examples that guide them the rest of their lives.

Good Riddance

Mike Nifong has been disbarred.

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) - A disciplinary committee said Saturday disgraced prosecutor Mike Nifong will be disbarred for his disastrous prosecution of three Duke University lacrosse players falsely accused of rape—a punishment the veteran prosecutor admitted was appropriate."

This matter has been a fiasco. There's no doubt about it," said committee chairman F. Lane Williamson.

This was no fiasco, it was an outrage. Nifong discredited the entire North Carolina criminal justice system by his actions. Nifong will literally be dragged from pillar to post by the legal community in retribution. And he'll deserve every second of it.

Don't Mess With the Young'uns

This is crazy. A tourist video captured a water buffalo calf getting snagged and mauled by a pride of lions, then a crocodile wants a piece of the calf and fights the lions for it, then the water buffalos come charging to the rescue. Watch this.

glumbert.com

Let's Kill That Server

I hate smart-mouthed servers who think they can handle any kind of traffic. It appears the Marines have one that thinks it is immortal.

I beg to differ!

From Blackfive:

What I want to be hearing is grunts of pain from RCT-6's PAO, as he hefts box after box of printed-out emails supporting our Marines. Since I'm not hearing any complaining yet, I think we need to do it harder.

You read how our Marines need, more than anything else, to hear that you love them. By God, you ought to. And according to my email, Col. Simcock "admonished" them into getting a separate email account set up for us, just hours after we started mailing. Let's fill it.

And that my friends is an order. This is the target:

RCT-6lettersfromh@gcemnf-wiraq.usmc.mil

I want that smartass server begging to have some one pull it's plug.

And everyone in the Armed Forces should please keep this in perspective, that the nutroots are incapable of retaining a clue, even if they use Superglue and a C-clamp.

She's Back

Last night we picked up our daughter at the airport. I can't believe how good it is to have her back home. All her sisters were there and we had balloons and flowers for her. The grandkids joined the party too.

She has a lot of pictures and stories about Egypt. I'll try to put some up on the blog.

I still can't believe how good it is to have her back home...

The Dims and Immigration

I wandered over to a link LC Scoot put up at democrats.org about something Fred Thompson said.

Mexican leaders apparently have an economic policy based on exporting their own citizens, while complaining about US immigration policies that are far less exclusionary than their own. The French jail perfectly nice people for politically incorrect comments, but scold us for holding terrorists at Guantanamo.

Russia, though, takes the cake. Here is a government apparently run by ex-KGB agents who have no problem blackmailing whole countries by turning the crank on their oil pipelines. They're not doing anything shady, they say. They can’t help it if their opponents are so notoriously accident-prone. Criticize these guys and you might accidentally drink a cup of tea laced with a few million dollars worth of deadly, and extremely rare, radioactive poison. Oppose the Russian leadership, and you could trip and fall off a tall building or stumble into the path of a bullet."

Now I have nothing to say about Fred's quote because I basically agree with everything in it. Of course the dems raised quite a stink, throwing names, feces and everything else except a reasoned response.

But in the give and take in the comments section I ran across Supersexyspacemonkey's response. Read this:

Afte 8 years of president Bush, I would not vote for Fred Thompson, or any Republican, to save my life. However, my political disposition is no excuse to sit by while this article attacks his comments. I say this as a Democrat, as an opponent of strict immigration policies, and as a Mexican-American dual citizen who lived in Mexico a quarter of his life:

He Is Absolutely Right.

Mexico indeed has a policy of exporting and exploiting its citizens, and treating them as both an economic and a political commodity, whilst benefitting economically from it, and tightening its own borders.

They export their citizens to avoid feeding them, avoid hiring them, and to keep the flow of US-earned dollars coming into Mexico as a sort of artificial welfare for the
country.

Immigration is, for Mexican politicians, what the "Global War on Terror" is for Republicans: an issue of convenience, and an opportunity to blame someone else for their own problems, their own crimes, and their own mistakes. Both sides of the American immigration debate are distorted, exaggerated, and wrong: the xenophobes who think illegals are taking over, and the racists who think that no white man would do an immigrant's job. Both arguments are products of simple-monded intellectual charlatanry.

Fact: there is a labor shortage and immigrants are necessary for the economy. Fact: even if domestic labor doesn't meet the demand, we are still screwing over many poor, white Americans who would gladly pick strawberries, clean toilets, cut grass, and mop floors, if it paid them minimum wage.

The difference is we have a meaningful social security system that allows one to avoid slave labor as a means of subsistance. The Mexican social security system is a sham, and people would rather migrate and shovel manure for 3 dollars a day than watch their children starve to death. Most unemployed Americans are NOT exploiting the system or trying to get a free ride. Most of them would rather work, and would gladly take the illegal's job if they could compete.

Large corporations hire illegal aliens, and illegally pay them next-to-nothing. Under those conditions, even the relatively small demographic that is the unemployed American labor force, will always be disadvantaged by far more desperate illegals who are willing to be exploited and treated like dogs rather than die in Mexico.

So long as we keep talking about how we have to "crack down" on illegals and arrest starving people for the crime of being hungry, so long as we ignore the more pertinent issue of cracking down on corporations that hire illegals, we are making scape-goats out of victims, and letting the pimps go free.

So long as the Mexican government does everything in its power to maintain and promote a society of uneducated workers, so long as ultra-corrupt officials keep ransacking the Mexican treasuring and stealing tax-payer money, forcing Mexico to remain a third-world country despite having a first-world GDP ranking, so long as Mexico continues to demand everything from the US in terms of immigration policy without offering anything in return, and uses the issue as the basis of virrulent antiamerican propaganda, instilling hate and anti-yankee bigotry/paranoia in Mexican citizens, so long as they keep growing fatter off of their countrymen's blood and off of the American teat, these hypocritical and Machiavellian politicians will never be able to wash their hands clean of their crimes against the Mexican people, especially the Mexican illegals living in the US. Thank you

Now I don't agree with every word that supersexyspacemonkey says, but there is a large element of truth in his statement and an underlying passion for truth. I can respect his opinion and I'll give it some air time here.

I am not concerned so much with decent hard working people who bust their asses eking out an existence in our country. I would much rather go after the criminals and others who exploit the generous, good nature of Americans. We must control our borders and still afford an opportunity for our poor neighbors to the South to better themselves. But the chaos and madness of the present system (due to the neglect of our elected politicians) must be fixed first.

Fatwa Free For All

My daughter sent me a NY Times article on what is happening in IslamaLand with respect to the religious edicts that are flying out out of every imam's ass like farts out of a bean burrito junkie.

There is no Pope or controlling religious authority in Islam. It's like a hillbilly holy roller convention only they're dancing with knives and AK47's.

CAIRO, June 11 — First came the breast-feeding fatwa. It declared that the Islamic restriction on unmarried men and women being together could be lifted at work if the woman breast-fed her male colleagues five times, to establish family ties. Then came the urine fatwa. It said that drinking the urine of the Prophet Muhammad was deemed a blessing.

For the past few weeks, the breast-feeding and urine fatwas have proved a source of national embarrassment in Egypt, not least because they were issued by representatives of the highest religious authorities in the land.

Urine and breast milk, sounds like Uncle Mo got into the corn likker again and needed a chaser.

“We were very angered when we heard about the Danish cartoons concerning our prophet; however, these two fatwas are harming our Islamic religion and our prophet more than the cartoons,” Galal Amin, a professor of economics at the American University in Cairo, wrote in Al Masry Al Yom, a daily newspaper here.

If any religion can be harmed by a cartoon, then it is not a religion. It is a cult that cannot withstand the scrutiny of Tom and Jerry or Mighty Mouse. Think about it. Christianity was assailed by the most powerful government on the face of the planet, the Roman Empire. And Christianity won. Islam trembled at the sight of Mohammed wearing a bomb hat. What would they do with a picture of the Prophet in a tutu?

For many Muslims, fatwas, or religious edicts, are the bridge between the principles of their faith and modern life. They are supposed to be issued by religious scholars who look to the Koran and teachings of the Prophet Muhammad for guidance. While the more sensational pronouncements grab attention, the bulk of the fatwas involve the routine of daily life. In Egypt alone, thousands are issued every month.

The controversy in Cairo has been more than just embarrassing. It comes at a time when religious and political leaders say that there is a crisis in Islam because too many fatwas are being issued, and that many of them rely on ideology more than learning. The complaint has been the subject of recent conferences as government-appointed arbiters of Islamic standards say the fatwa free-for-all has led to the promotion of extremism and intolerance.

The thing is that no one probably has any idea just how many fatwas are issued and by whom and for what. The only ones we hear about are the breast milk swilling, piss drinking, neck chopping variety that make the news. The rest of this crap is under the radar just waiting to erupt in another round of Muslim insanity.

The conflict in Egypt served as a difficult reminder of a central challenge facing Islamic communities as they debate the true nature of the faith and how to accommodate modernity. The fatwa is the front line in the theological battle between often opposing worldviews. It is where interpretation meets daily life.

“It is a very critical issue for us,” said Abdullah Megawer, the former head of the Fatwa Committee at Al Azhar University, the centuries-old seat of Sunni Muslim learning in Egypt. “You are explaining God’s message in ways that really affect people’s lives.”

Imam For A Day may be a better way to arbitrate this mess. Christian doctrine has been pretty well established for two thousand years. Jewish doctrine even longer. That's why it is hard for an independant Baptist minister to start a holy war by declaring that Jesus wants all Christendom to wear tie dyed doo rags. Everyone would know this preacher's cheese slid off his cracker. Not so in Islam.

Technically, the fatwa is nonbinding and recipients are free to look elsewhere for a better ruling. In a faith with no central doctrinal authority, there has been an explosion of places offering fatwas, from Web sites that respond to written queries, to satellite television shows that take phone calls, to radical and terrorist organizations that set up their own fatwa committees.

“There is chaos now,” Mr. Megawer said. “The problem created is confusion in thought, confusion about what is right and what is wrong, religiously.”

And yet CAIR is espousing Muslim guidelines on how American society is supposed to accomodate this religion; a religion that can change course in midstride.

Governments have tried to guide and control the process, but as they struggled with their own legitimacy, they have often undermined the perceived legitimacy of those they appoint as religious leaders. In Egypt, there are two official institutions responsible for religious interpretation: the House of Fatwa, or Dar Al-Ifta, which formally falls under the Ministry of Justice, and Al Azhar University. All court sentences of death must be approved by Dar Al-Ifta, for example.

“These people in fact are defined as agencies of the government,” said Muhammad Serag, a professor of Islamic Studies at the American University in Cairo. “They are not trusted anymore.”

And what do these fatwa factories do? They regulate every activity in your life that you can dream of. Read some of them:

... a young woman entered and sat in the chair opposite him. She held her son, about 4, on her knee as she explained that her husband had married another woman (four wives are allowed in Islam) and that the new wife was only 18. “He said he would spend five nights with her and one with me,” the woman complained. “Can I ask for a divorce?” Under Islam, the sheik advised, all wives must be treated equally. So if she could not work the matter out “peacefully, then yes, she could ask for a divorce.”

A couple approached. The man’s clothes were tattered, and his wife looked distressed. Their 9-year-old son’s clothing was clean, his hair gelled, his smile bright. The man explained that they had adopted the child when he was 9 months old, and that they had just heard that under Islam their son had to be put out of the house, because the mother had not given birth to him or breast-fed him.He would reach puberty as an outsider, and could not, technically, be around the woman he knew as his mother. The imam at their local mosque said it was haram — forbidden under Islam — to live with the boy.

A man wanted to know if he could keep money he had found.

Another wanted to know if he needed to testify at a trial if called.

A third wanted to know if it was O.K. to buy a car on an installment plan.

A mother did not like her son’s wife and wanted to know if she could do anything about the marriage.

This is Islamic, or Sharia, Law. This the type of law that Muslims want to start in Canada. What is scary is that these people seem incapable of making a decision for themselves. They need to run to an authority to tell them what to do even for trival matters. And suppose different fatwas are issued for the exact same circumstances? But that's the way the way it is. as fatwas are non-binding, just shop around! If you don't like the flavor of today's fatwa, maybe tomorrow's or next month's will do the trick.

What a way to run a religion much less a country.

In Egypt, and other Muslim countries, where laws must abide by the Koran, fatwas by government-appointed officials can have the weight of law.

Oh wait, they do run the country. Think about it, some nutjob who thinks that breast milk should determine family status may decide on your criminal or civil court case.

HOME!

My daughter is finally coming home after almost a year in Cairo, Egypt. Her mama and I are beside ourselves waiting for her. She was going to take another linguistics course this summer and come home at the end of July, but decided that enough is enough. She is homesick and she's bailing out of MohammedWorld and hightailing it back to the States. Her plane arrives tomorrow.

I think the tipping point came when her sister visited her last week in Tel Aviv. Her sister has been to the Middle East TWICE this year to visit her ; once in Cairo this past January and again last week when they vacationed in Israel for ten days. And they talked about her coming home sooner than she had planned.

Israel was such a relief after the stench, pollution and rude arabs of Cairo; both girls enjoyed themselves enormously touring the Holy Land via the inexpensive hostels. The people were friendly, although just a few did not like Americans, but hey, deal with it. And Israel is a garden compared to the lands around it.

Last Friday after dropping her sister off at Tel Aviv, she returned to Cairo by way of an eleven hour bus ride. She decided on the way back that she was going to change her return ticket asap so she could leave the dust of the Pharoahs behind her. And she did. Tomorrow she'll be home with us.

It's like a giant weight off my chest.

She wants, in the following order, her mom's pasta and sauce, meatballs, pork sausage, pork chops, pork tenderloin and babyback ribs.

We're gonna have the Mother of all BBQ's in her honor.

We're gonna call it Death By Pork.

Mass Murder, Inc.

This week a monument will be dedicated in Washington, DC. The memorial is dedicated to the victims of international communism, AKA Mass Murder, Inc.

Lee Edwards, the chairman of The Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation (VOCMF), has attracted bipartisan support for the memorial, including Rep. Tom Lantos (D-Calif.) and Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Calif.), who are offering remarks at the dedication. It comes on the 20th anniversary of Ronald Reagan’s Berlin speech during which he famously said, “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.”

International communism is responsible for the deaths of anywhere from 60 to 100 million people. One such estimate is R.J. Rummel's book, Death by Government, where the following estimates are given:

Soviet Union (1979 -1990) 61,900,000
Communist China (1949 -2007) 38,700,000 (includes communist guerrillas from 1923-48 and the communist government established in 1949)

Just between the PRC and the USSR there are 100,600,000 deaths. There should be a new word minted just for slaughter on a scale such as this: hypergenocide.

Now add to the mix:

Cambodia (1975-1979) 2,000,000
Vietnam (1945-2007) 1,700,000
North Korea (1948-2007) 1,700,000
Poland (1945-1948) 1,600,000
Yugoslavia (1944-1990) 1,100,000

The total is 108,700,000 souls murdered by communist governments. These are not war deaths, for that is an entirely different accounting. These are the deaths of noncombatants , persons snuffed out because they did not agree with the government or were perceived as being disloyal. Or they were just plain inconvenient like the kulaks.

Put this in perspective; Hitler and the Nazis are vilified for murdering 20,900,000 people.

Communists murdered over five times that amount and still the liberals give them a pass. Six million jews were slaughtered in the camps and in Germany you may be imprisoned for denying that the holocaust ever existed. Yet there is little or no awareness of the slaughter perpetrated by the Soviet Union and China. There are no movies, no "Schindler's List," no Spielberg scripts to call attention to these horrific deeds. Just nutroots calling Bush a murderer and Rosie O'Donnell calling our troops terrorists.

Let the liberals and their cohorts in the MSM and educational institutions be tripled damned on Judgement Day.

Cal Thomas goes on to say:

The brutality of communism was quickly swept under history’s rug, in large part because so many on the left had embraced it as the solution to humankind’s problems. The memorial stands as a rebuke to such twisted thinking.“The Black Book of Communism: Crimes, Terror, Repression” by Stephane Courtois, Nicolas Werth, Jean-Louis Panne, Andrzej Paczkowski, Karel Bartosek and Jean-Louis Margolin lists by country the number of people murdered under communist regimes...

[...] In short, communism, an evil ideology unlike any the world has seen, is responsible for the slaughter of more than 94 million human beings. It tops all plagues, natural disasters, crime, and other political ideologies, probably combined. While many Westerners recall Nazi-run death camps like Auschwitz and
Buchenwald, few remember Soviet death camps named Kolyma and Magadan.

True, Alexandr Solzhenitsyn mentioned them in “The Gulag Archipelago” as did Varlam Sjalamov in “Tales from Kolyma,” but as the late Swedish journalist Andres Kung wrote, “There are people who have still not heard of these communist extermination camps — even though the communists preceded the Nazis in creating such camps and killed an even larger number of people in their camps.

When Ronald Reagan called for Gorbachev to tear down the wall, he was also calling for the end of Mass Murder, Inc.; the most brutal, savage governments in the history of the world.

Mohammed al-Limpnoodle's Lament

I caught this post over to My Vast Right Wing Conspiracy and had to read it twice. It appears that post bellum erectile dysfunction has plagued the Middle East since the triumph of the IDF in 1967. This cycle of defeat was responsible for initiating a cycle of soft meat and no sex, otherwise known as the Infi-nada.

Egyptian columnist Wael Abdel Fattah wrote in the independent weekly Al-Fagr newspaper that Arabs blame the defeat for “everything” — from “price hikes, dictatorship, religious extremism, sectarian strife, even sexual impotence.”

Now I can't help with the military side of this problem, but there is certainly a lot of help available for the other side. Here is just a brief offering of products and services for the vertically challenged:

Oldies But Goodies

I know these photos have been around awhile, perhaps years.

But certain things need to be said again and again and again.

And these photos say it just right.

The black patch says "Doing the work of"

There's always a need for this.

And this.

It does't matter if it's Imperial Majesty or Jean Nate bath splash ... it's her.

Somehow you just know he's a grandpa.

Go Directly To Jail - Do Not Pass Go - Throw A Fit If You Like

Looks like there is a judge in LA that has some stones.

Screaming and crying, Paris Hilton was escorted out of a courtroom and back to jail Friday after a judge ruled that she must serve out her entire 45-day sentence behind bars rather than in her Hollywood Hills home. "It's not right!" shouted the weeping Hilton, who violated her parole in a reckless driving case. "Mom!" she called out to her mother in the audience.

Hopefully Mom was listening today 'cause for sure no one was listening when this kid was brought up as a child. It's time she learned that no amount of kicking and screaming is going to get her way for her. I hope every 14 year old Paris wanna be sees this photo. And the next one.

Hilton, who was brought to court in handcuffs in a sheriff's car, came into the courtroom disheveled and weeping, hair askew, sans makeup, wearing a gray fuzzy sweatshirt over slacks. She cried throughout the hearing, her body shook constantly and she dabbed at her eyes. Several times she turned to her parents, seated behind her in the courtroom, and mouthed, "I love you."

Superior Court Judge Michael T. Sauer was calm but apparently irked by the morning's developments. He said he had left the courthouse Thursday night having signed an order for Hilton to appear for the hearing. When he got in his car early Friday, he said, he heard a radio report that he had approved Hilton's participation in the hearing by telephone, but he had not.

"I at no time condoned the actions of the sheriff and at no time told him I approved the actions," he said of the decision to release Hilton from jail after three days.

"At no time did I approve the defendant being released from custody to her home on Kings Road," Sauer said.

"At no time..." means jail time for Ms. Hilton.

And is it me or does that female deputy in the second photo look like she's trying hard not to crack a smile?

UPDATE:

SOme "noise" is coming out regarding how the sheriff is facing pressure from official and legal sources to reduce the prison population and that is why he let her go home. My take is this:

1) Paris Hilton was not a prisoner awaiting trial. There are pre-trial release programs aplenty but her release was not related to this.

2) Paris Hilon was specifically remanded to prison (jail actually) per court order. The order precluded any possibility of an alternative sentence. This is big. Sheriff Baca violated a court order by releasing her to home detention. That's why the judge is pissed.

I am not familar with the California penal system but in NYS jail is reserved for :

a) those who cannot make bail and are held pending a trial, or

b) those who are ordered held without bail, or

c) those who have been found guilty and sentenced as a result of a legal proceding and are being held prior to entering the state or federal penal system.

There may be some who do not understand the difference. Once you are sentenced you are then remanded to the appropriate correctional facilty. A correctional facility is not a jail. It is a prison.

If you are found guilty of a felony, off you go to into the state prison system. Not a felony? Then you are entertained at the local county prison or penitentiary.

Footnote: Penitentiary is an old English word, penitenciarie, a priest who administers penance.

Justice For Some

I haven't bothered with the Paris Hilton story because this skanky pusbucket doesn't deserve all the bandwidth devoted to her screwed up life. Much like Nicole Smith (who is now nothing but rotting meat inside a steel-slow cook coffin so the worms can't have their way with her before the maggots are done), this chick will also hit the greased skids of life hard enough and soon enough to shut her up for good.

From the SmokingGun:

Paris Hilton was booked into a Los Angeles jail in June 2007 to begin serving time for violating terms of a probation sentence imposed following a drunk driving plea. In January, weeks after pleading no contest to a reckless driving charge, the 26-year-old Hilton was cited for driving with a suspended license. After signing a document acknowledging she was not to drive, Hilton was pulled over by cops in February and charged with a probation violation. As a result, she was sentenced to 45 days in jail. Hilton posed for the below left mug shot after her September 2006 arrest. The second booking photo was taken when she surrendered to Los Angeles Sheriff's Department to begin her brief sentence.

This chick just don't get it. She looks like she's going to do the booking deputy.

And now the Los Angeles County Sheriff, Lee Baca, who is responsible for her confinement, has managed to stick his chops (he looks like a balding OB-GYN) in the middle of it and release her to home confinement in contradiction of a Superior Court Justice sentencing instructions.

Well, I've had enough. This is just another instance where celebrity status wins over justice. the sentencing judge specifically ruled out home arrest as an option. All this OB-GYN has done is reduce the respect for law another notch.

I don't care if her rash broke out in a rash or she's got the terminal squirts. Let her do the time, 'cause you know she's going to be pulling this DWI crap again. And if she kills someone the next time she has a lip lock on a sixteen ouncer of XXX ZIMA critus lime punkass puke water, I'd sue the badge off that useless Sheriff.

All the young people watching this farce, and believe me - they're watching this closely, are learning a valuable lesson. It doesn't matter what you do because you can scam the system.

UPDATE:

Hours after Paris Hilton was sent home under house arrest Thursday, the judge who put her in jail ordered her into court to determine whether she should be put back behind bars. Hilton must report to court at 9 a.m. Friday, Superior Court spokesman Allan Parachini told The Associated Press.

The judge' issuing this order isthe same one who sentenced Hilton to a jail term.

Superior Court Judge Michael T. Sauer issued his order after the city attorney filed a petition late Thursday afternoon questioning if Sheriff Lee Baca should be held in contempt of court for releasing Hilton Thursday morning.

This may prove to be very interesting, although I doubt a contempt citation will happen. Wait for the next County election cycle to see the real blowback on this.

The celebrity inmate was sent home from the L.A. County jail's Lynwood lockup shortly after 2 a.m. for an unspecified medical condition in a stunning reduction to her original 45-day sentence.

She was ordered to finish her 45-day sentence under house arrest, meaning she could not leave her four-bedroom, three-bath 2,700-square-foot Hollywood Hills home until next month.

That's gotta be rough. There's probably enough booze in that house to keep her and a dozen of her friends blind for a month.

Even Al Sharpton is on his way to L.A. to protest celebrity injustice in front of Hilton's house.