The Clinton administration launched an attack on people in Texas because those people were religious nuts with guns. Hell, this country was founded by religious nuts with guns. -- P. J. O'Rourke
Saturday, December 29, 2007
Cop Thoughts
Tuesday, December 25, 2007
Merry Christmas
May our Heavenly Father overwhelm you with His love.
Monday, December 24, 2007
The Debate Continues
I am a denier, a pejorative term applied to those of us who reject the now discredited report that 99 percent of climatologists agree that we are in a period of accelerated global warming, and that the debate is over.
I am in good company. The deniers include those scientists who are directly involved in actual measurements of global temperatures, or those who base their positions on solid science, as opposed to those who base their opinion on computer modeling.
He is referring to boutique science; research based on popular political flavors of the day. For it is the political process that determines where government funding goes. Examine this 1997 government document from the National Science Board that sets the stage for grant funding:These GCM models should not be relied upon to give global temperature information 50 to 100 years in the future where model verification in the lifetime of the model builders is not possible. These GCM modelers do not dare make public short-period global temperature forecasts for next season, next year, or a few years hence. This is because they know they do not have short range forecast skill. They would lose credibility if they issued forecasts that could actually be verified. These climate modelers live largely in a ‘virtual world’ of their own making where reality and model skill is determined largely by the modelers themselves. The climate models are so complicated that it takes teams of specialists to construct all of the various model components. No one person well understands any model’s complete numerical package. No independent outside person would ever know enough to realistically evaluate the model’s outputs. They are just giant black boxes telling us that humans are warming the globe at a dangerous rate. The fact that nearly all the GCMs give similar results (global warming of 2-5oC for a doubling of CO2 near the end of the 21st century) should not increase our confidence in these models. They all have similar flaws. For many modelers it appears that grant support and media coverage are more important than model reality.
[...] I believe that in the next few years the globe is going to enter a modest cooling period similar to what was experienced in the 30-years between the mid-1940s and the mid-1970s. I am convinced that in 15-20 years we will look back on this period of global warming hysteria as we now look back on other popular and trendy scientific ideas that have not stood the test of time.
Full paper can be downloaded here: Download ClimateCrisis.doc
This sets the stage for funding. Here are some of the grants available from the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's "Climate Program Office - Understanding climate variability and change to enhance society's ability to plan and understand." This whole office is set up to disburse funds for the following project purposes that have been set up by Congress:SECTION IV: FEDERAL SCIENCE PRIORITIES
Within the Federal budget, there should be an overall strategy for research, with areas of increased and areas of decreased emphasis. The budget as a whole should be adequate both to serve national priorities and to foster a world-class scientific and technical enterprise. To this end, Congress and the Administration need to establish a process that examines the complete Federal research budget before the total Federal budget is disaggregated. Departments and agencies should make decisions based on clearly articulated criteria that are congruent with the overall
strategy.Within the Executive branch, the interagency NSTC, and before it the Federal Coordinating Council for Science, Engineering and Technology (FCCSET), have successfully organized crosscutting research areas of national interest, such as global change, energy, transportation science, environmental science and technology, and human resources for the twenty-first century. However, in order for broader coordination and priority setting to be successful, general guidelines are required to provide clear direction.
[...] To ensure the most effective use of Federal discretionary funding it is essential that agreement be reached on which fields and which investment strategies hold the greatest promise for new knowledge that will contribute most effectively to better health, greater equity and social justice, improved living standards, a sustainable environment, a secure national defense, and to extending our understanding of nature.
2075552 Abrupt Climate Change
2074483 Arctic Research Program (ARP)
2075550 Assessing Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC)
2074475 Atmospheric Composition and Climate Program (ACC)
2074478 Climate Change Data and Detection (CCDD), including Paleoclimatology
2074479 Climate Dynamics and Experimental Prediction (CDEP)
2074480 Climate Prediction Program for the Americas (CPPA)
2074481 Climate Variability and Predictability (CVP)
2074477 Regional Integrated Sciences and Assessments (RISA)
2074474 Sector Applications Research Program (SARP)
2074482 Scientific Data Stewardship (SDS)
2074476 Transition of Research Applications to Climate Services (TRACS)
That's just what NOAA has to offer. The US Department of Agricuture does not want to be left out either. The USDA calls their program offerings "OUR CHANGING PLANET - The U.S. Climate Change Science Program for Fiscal Year 2008. And the USDA budget for global warming? It has run over $110 million for FY 2006 ($61 mn) and 2007 ($51.4 mn). Another $57.4 mn has been requested for 2008. This funding is bundled under the federal CCSP - Climate Change Science Program.
How much does the CCSP
The CCSP has two initiatives: the USGCRP - "US Global Change Research Program" and the CCRI - "Climate Change Research Initiative." The USGCRP was started by Clinton in 1989 and the CCRI was started by Bush 43 in 2001. The USGCRP gets the lion's share of the funding.
There are 13 federal agencies dispensing the goodies authorized by Congress.
Keep this in mind - these are discretionary funds. That means that it's up to the granting agency to determine who gets this money. It's like a line of petitioners lining up outside the door of the Grand Vizier with their hands held out, begging.
This doesn't include the non-discretionary funds authorized by Congress that goes directly to other government agencies, universities and not-for-profits.
Think about it.
No one wants to kill the goose that laid the golden egg.
Saturday, December 22, 2007
Tagged Again
1. Wrapping or gift bags?
I wrap. There is something about a package all squared away with the edges all neat and secure.
The presents were wrapped and snug in their beds with rivers of scotch tape surrounding their heads.
2. Real or artificial tree?
I tried the real trees for a while but for the last eighteen years or so it's been artificial trees.
The kids can't stop sighing, alack and alas, they hate artificial but real ones give me gas.
3. When do you put up the tree?
For the past few years it's been right after the 4th of July. Really, the kids want it up earlier and earlier.
They want it all decorated and up in a snap; but as for me, I don't give a crap.
4. When do you take the tree down?
As soon as we get out of rehab after New Year’s Day. Actually we are all teetotalers.
As soon as the New Year is here, I demand to see nothing but air where that tree used to stand.
5. Do you like egg nog?
I love egg nog, but it no longer loves me.
Egg nog is great, it goes down nice and slick; but if I drink it too much, it just makes me sick.
6. Favorite gift received as a child?
It was a train set my Dad made for my brother and I. He set it on a big board and built a Christmas village around it with lighted houses and trees and sidewalks and everything. I was eight so it had to be Christmas of 1957. It was behind some blankets and sheets hung from the floor joists in the basement.
He must have been listening to all of our prayers 'cause he built it in secret and hid it downstairs.
7. Do you have a nativity scene?
Yes, a Precious Moments one we keep on the mantle. My wife loves it and we have had it for years.
It really is charming, it makes quite a scene, we've had it a spell - in years 'bout fifteen.
8. Worst Christmas gift you ever received?
From my mother. Horrid, simply horrid "I Hate My Sons" baggy green corduroy pants with black flecks.
I was heart broken that morning, it was not what I wished, whenever I walked the dang things went "swish."
9. Mail or e-mail Christmas cards?
Mail. But the gubmint is making this harder and harder. I can remember 3 cent stamps.
They've gone up another three cents since this summer; I hate sending letters, it's really a bummer.
10. Favorite Christmas movie?
The Great Escape. It is my favorite movie to on Christmas or any time.
Steve McQueen is the bomb, dodging ground fire; escaping the Nazis by jumping barbed wire.
11. When do you start shopping for Christmas?
As early as possible or whenever I can get paid. Sometimes that's a real problem - like this year.
I'm just too discouraged to bang out a rhyme, it's been two and a half months since they paid me a dime.
12. Favorite thing to eat at Christmas?
Roast Turkey. Not fried. With all the fixin's.
I'd run twenty miles, all huffing and puffing, for a roast turkey dinner with potatoes and stuffing.
13. Clear lights or colored on the tree?
Clear. And colored. We have one of those trees with the fiber optic bundles that change color. It really is pretty and not gaudy at all.
It may have come on a midnight clear, but fiber optic lights are the in thing this year.
14. Favorite Christmas song?
This is a tough one. I love Christmas carols, but "Hark! The Herald Angels Sing" is my fave.
Hark! The Herald Angels sing, "Glory to the newborn King."
There just ain't no improving that.
Following the tradition, I’m tagging…
Ten Ten
The Merry Widow
Thursday, December 20, 2007
Slip, Sliding Away
If I read this correctly, Mama Gaia is now having hot flashes that are melting her icy bonds, easing the lubricous movement of her glaciers as they slide between her soft, dewy, silky fjiords...Scientists have discovered what they think may be another reason why Greenland's ice is melting: a thin spot in Earth's crust is enabling underground magma to heat the ice.
[...] The researchers don't yet know how warm the hotspot is. But if it is warm enough to melt the ice above it even a little, it could be lubricating the base of the ice sheet and enabling the ice to slide more rapidly out to sea.
“The behavior of the great ice sheets is an important barometer of global climate change,” said Ralph von Frese, leader of the project and a professor of earth sciences at Ohio State University. “However, to effectively separate and quantify human impacts on climate change, we must understand the natural impacts, too.
I gotta lay down.
Al Gore's Love Muffin
Senate Report Debunks "Consensus"
I'll bet this doesn't receive anywhere near as much press as the hysterical sisters in Bali crying over the terrible fate awaiting Mother Gaia if we don't start loving her the way she deserves.
Poor Mama Gaia. She'll end up in a truck stop outside Butte, Montana, with a squalling, hungry child at her breast, no clean diapers and Al Gore's love muffin baking in her oven.
Just more of the liberal lovin' extended to people who do not agree with the We Are All Going To Die hype. It's a new version of the Emperor's New Clothes only he ain't bare-assed, parading down Fifth Avenue. Now it is Al Gore in drag wearing an environmentally friendly thong with his carbon offset-lined ermine cloak.This blockbuster Senate report lists the scientists by name, country of residence, and academic/institutional affiliation. It also features their own words, biographies, and weblinks to their peer reviewed studies and original source materials as gathered from public statements, various news outlets, and websites in 2007. This new “consensus busters” report is poised to redefine the debate.
Many of the scientists featured in this report consistently stated that numerous colleagues shared their views, but they will not speak out publicly for fear of retribution. Atmospheric scientist Dr. Nathan Paldor, Professor of Dynamical Meteorology and Physical Oceanography at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, author of almost 70 peer-reviewed studies, explains how many of his fellow scientists have been intimidated.
“Many of my colleagues with whom I spoke share these views and report on their inability to publish their skepticism in the scientific or public media,” Paldor wrote.
This new report details how teams of international scientists are dissenting from the UN IPCC’s view of climate science. In such nations as Germany, Brazil, the Netherlands, Russia, New Zealand and France nations, scientists banded together in 2007 to oppose climate alarmism. In addition, over 100 prominent international scientists sent an open letter in December 2007 to the UN stating attempts to control climate were “futile.”
Paleoclimatologist Dr. Tim Patterson, professor in the department of Earth Sciences at Carleton University in Ottawa, recently converted from a believer in man-made climate change to a skeptic. Patterson noted that the notion of a “consensus” of scientists aligned with the UN IPCC or former Vice President Al Gore is false.“I was at the Geological Society of America meeting in Philadelphia in the fall and I would say that people with my opinion were probably in the majority.”
This new committee report, a first of its kind, comes after the UN IPCC chairman Rajendra Pachauri implied that there were only “about half a dozen” skeptical scientists left in the world. Former Vice President Gore has claimed that scientists skeptical of climate change are akin to “flat Earth society members” and similar in number to those who “believe the moon landing was actually staged in a movie lot in Arizona.”
The over 400 skeptical scientists featured in this new report outnumber by nearly eight times the number of scientists who participated in the 2007 UN IPCC Summary for Policymakers. The notion of “hundreds” or “thousands” of UN scientists agreeing to a scientific statement does not hold up to scrutiny. (See report debunking “consensus” LINK) Recent research by Australian climate data analyst Dr. John McLean revealed that the IPCC’s peer-review process for the Summary for Policymakers leaves much to be desired. (LINK)
Proponents of man-made global warming like to note how the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) and the American Meteorological Society (AMS) have issued statements endorsing the so-called "consensus" view that man is driving global warming. But both the NAS and AMS never allowed member scientists to directly vote on these climate statements. Essentially, only two dozen or so members on the governing boards of these institutions produced the "consensus" statements.The most recent attempt to imply there was an overwhelming scientific “consensus” in favor of man-made global warming fears came in December 2007 during the UN climate conference in Bali. A letter signed by only 215 scientists urged the UN to mandate deep cuts in carbon dioxide emissions by 2050. But absent from the letter were the signatures of these alleged “thousands” of scientists. (See AP article: - LINK )
Wednesday, December 19, 2007
On This Day....
On this day, December 19th, in history:
1154 - Henry II became King of England.
1562 - The Battle of Dreux was fought between the Huguenots and the Catholics, beginning the French Wars of Religion.
1732 - Benjamin Franklin began publishing "Poor Richard's Almanac."
1776 - Thomas Paine published his first "American Crisis" essay.
1777 - General George Washington led his army of about 11,000 men to Valley Forge, PA, to camp for the winter.
1842 - Hawaii's independence was recognized by the U.S.
1843 - Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol" was first published in England.
1871 - Corrugated paper was patented by Albert L. Jones.
1887 - Jake Kilrain and Jim Smith fought in a bare knuckles fight which lasted 106 rounds and 2 hours and 30 minutes. The fight was ruled a draw and was halted due to darkness.
1903 - The Williamsburg Bridge opened in New York City. It opened as the largest suspension bridge on Earth and remained the largest until 1924. It was also the first major suspension bridge to use steel towers to support the main cable.
1959 - Walter Williams died in Houston, TX, at the age of 117. He was said to be the last surviving veteran of the U.S. Civil War.
1972 - Apollo 17 splashed down in the Pacific, ending the Apollo program of manned lunar landings.
1984 - Britain and China signed an accord returning Hong Kong to Chinese sovereignty on July 1, 1997.
1986 - The Soviet Union announced it had freed dissident Andrei Sakharov from internal exile, and pardoned his wife, Yelena Bonner.
1989 - U.S. troops invaded Panama to overthrow the regime of General Noriega.
1998 - U.S. President Bill Clinton was impeached on two charges of perjury and obstruction of justice by the U.S. House of Representatives.
1998 - A four-day bombing of Iraq by British and American forces ended.
2000 - The U.N. Security Council voted to impose sanctions on Afghanistan's Taliban rulers unless they closed all terrorist training camps and surrender U.S. embassy bombing suspect Osama bin Laden.
What grabs my attention is that prior to the 1900's, all the other dates were remembered for something important. I have deleted alot of crap that deals with sports, movies and other media hype.
Except for that 1897 boxing match.
Crikey! 106 ROUNDS!! WITH BARE KNUCKLES!!!111!!!
A Raisin In The Sun
First off, let me state this; Islam does not hold the patent on external appearances of piety while maintaining an internal spirit of ungodliness; there's plenty of that going around.CAIRO — There is a strong undercurrent of competition in Egypt these days, an unstated contest among people eager to prove just how religious they are. The field of battle is the street and the focus tends to be on appearance, as opposed to conviction.It is not that the two are mutually exclusive, but they are not necessarily linked. As Egyptians increasingly emphasize Islam as the cornerstone of identity, there has been a growing emphasis on public displays of piety.
For women, that has rapidly translated into the nearly universal adoption of the hijab, a scarf fitted over the hair and ears and wrapped around the neck. For men, it is more and more popular to have a zebibah.
The zebibah, Arabic for raisin, is a dark circle of callused skin, or in some cases a protruding bump, between the hairline and the eyebrows. It emerges on the spot where worshipers press their foreheads into the ground during their daily prayers.
That being said, let me continue.
To my understanding, one of the hallmarks of truly devout people are the ways they comport themselves in their public and private lives. You cannot make any judgement on a person's commitment to religious principles based on their appearance. It is a matter of heart... Has the infividual internalized the teachings he or she has received? There is only one way to be sure, and you have to get to know the person to make that determination.It may sometimes look like a painful wound, but in Egypt it is worn proudly, the way American professionals in the 1980s felt good about the dark circles under their eyes as a sign of long work hours and little sleep.
Two decades ago, Egypt was a Muslim country with a relatively secular style. Nationalism and Arabism had alternated places as the main element of identity. But today, Egypt, like much of the Arab Middle East, is experiencing the rise of Islam as the ideology of the day.
With that, religious symbols have become the fashion.
“The zebibah is a way to show how important religion is for us,” said Muhammad al-Bikali, a hairstylist in Cairo, in an interview last month. Mr. Bikali had a well-trimmed mustache and an ever-so-subtle brown spot just beneath his hairline. “It shows how religious we are. It is a mark from God.”
Observant Muslims pray five times a day. Each prayer involves kneeling and touching one’s forehead and nose to the ground. All five prayers require placing one’s head on the ground for a total of 34 times, though many people add prayers and with them, more chances to press their heads to the ground. Some people say the bump is the inevitable result of so many prayers — and that is often the point: The person with the mark is broadcasting his observance, his adherence to one of the five pillars of Islam.
Jesus commented on this in Luke 18:9-14:
"And He spake this parable unto certain which trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and despised others; Two men went up into the temple to pray; the one a Pharisee and the other a publican. The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, God, I thank thee, that I am not as other men are, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican. I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess. And the publican, standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes unto heaven, but smote upon his breast, saying, God be merciful to me a sinner. I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other; for everyone that exalteth himself shall be abased; and he that humbleth himself shall be exalted."
We are not to do religious "things" to draw attention to our spirituality, for in doing so we are prompting others to honor ourselves. We are to honor God instead.
And this is my favorite, Matthew 6:5-8:
"And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him."
For right after these words, Christ gave us the Lord's Prayer.
I'm sorry, but the "raisin" on his head looks more like he forgot to close the cupboard door.
H/T to my daughter Danielle for this story.
Words Fail Me.....
H/T to my SeaBee nephew stationed in Djbouti waiting for his pass into the sandbox.
Tuesday, December 18, 2007
The UN
UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - The U.S. ambassador to the United Nations called on Tuesday for a full investigation into alleged corruption in contracts worth some $610 million linked to U.N. peacekeeping missions.
The Washington Post reported on Tuesday that a U.N. task force had uncovered a pervasive pattern of corruption and mismanagement involving contracts for fuel, food, construction and other services for peacekeeping operations.
The Post said that in recent weeks 10 U.N. procurement officials had been charged with misconduct for allegedly soliciting bribes and rigging bids for peacekeeping forces in Congo and Haiti.
U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad said he was very concerned about the report. "We want these allegations to be fully investigated and where appropriate to have criminal references made," he told reporters at U.N. headquarters.
And no doubt a vicious wrist slapping followed by a letter of reprimand on bonded paper will haunt the perpetrators for the rest of their natural lives. Which will be spent in comparative luxury after making the obligatory bribes, gifts and offerings in their respective home countries.
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon's spokeswoman Michele Montas declined to comment on individual cases in the report but said staff members accused of misconduct in Haiti and Congo were "under consideration in the internal justice system."
"Under consideration in the internal justice system" in UNese means that this case will be buried under so much red tape, hand wringing, obfuscation and bold assed lies that it will be like it never happened. And the MSM will help speed the process.
"The cases are being accorded the highest priority," Montas told a news briefing, adding that it was a U.N. investigation that had uncovered the alleged cases of fraud.
Just like every other UN corruption investigation in Africa that went no where.
"The United Nations does not want in any case to sweep anything under the rug," she said, adding that Ban planned to present proposals on reforms to fight graft next year.
That's because there isn't any room left under the rugs in the UN. Nor is there any room left under the carpets, above the ceiling tiles or in the ladies room Tampax dispensers. No room at the inn to hide another stolen drachma. Go hide your shit in the stable.
A report by the U.N. Procurement Task Force, which was created in January 2006, gave details of investigations into contracts in various missions including Congo, Haiti, Liberia, Eritrea, Sudan, Kenya and at U.N. headquarters in New York.
"The Task Force identified multiple instances of fraud, corruption, waste and mismanagement at United Nations headquarters and peacekeeping missions, including 10 significant instances of fraud and corruption in cases with an aggregate value in excess of $610 million," said the report, seen by Reuters on Tuesday.
The report said the fraud in those cases cost the United Nations more than $25 million, which it called "a very conservative estimate."
This must be the new UN math where "fraud and corruption in cases worth an aggregate value in excess of $610 million" now only cost the UN $25 million.
The Washington Post detailed a case in Congo where a U.N. official was said to have accepted a $10,000 bribe, steered a lucrative contract to a friend and persuaded a U.N. contractor to paint his apartment and swimming pool at no cost.
The Task Force report described investigations into Congo contracts worth more than $25 million and what it called a "collapse of ethical culture and extensive corruption in procurement in the Mission which has existed for years.
This UN corruption must be addictive. Let's allow the UN's internal justice system to handle the William Jefferson investigation.
"Jefferson is charged with bribery, obstruction of justice, wire fraud, money laundering and racketeering. Officials alleged Monday that the nine-term representative used the power of his office to take hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes — benefiting himself and his family — from U.S. businesses and to influence foreign officials.
The indictment says Jefferson received more than $500,000 in bribes and sought millions more in separate schemes to enrich himself by using his office to broker business deals in Africa. The charges came almost two years after investigators raided Jefferson's home in Washington and found $90,000 in cash stuffed in his freezer. If convicted on all charges, Jefferson could face a maximum sentence of 235 years.
Remember that movie, "Earth Girls Are Easy"? There must be a manual, a web site, a bathroom stall or someplace that tells thieves that Africa Is Easy; that the dark continent is the place to go pull a fast one. And as for this Jefferson investigation to be dragged out for well over two years means one thing to me: that nothing is going to happen.
Same as the UN invest.
Monday, December 17, 2007
1,000 Reasons Why
SAN DIEGO - The Border Patrol says its agents were attacked nearly 1,000 times during a one-year period along the Mexican border, typically by assailants hurling rocks, bottles and bricks. Now the agency is responding with tear gas and powerful, pepper-spray weapons, including firing into Mexico.
The counteroffensive has drawn complaints that innocent families are being caught in the crossfire.
"A neighbor shouted, 'Stop it! There are children living here," said Esther Arias Medina, 41, who on Wednesday fled her Tijuana, Mexico, shanty with her 3-week-old grandson after the infant began coughing from smokethat seeped through the walls.
"We don't deserve this," Arias said. "The people who live here don't throw rocks. Those are people who come from the outside, but we're paying the price." Witnesses in Arias' neighborhood described eight attacks since August that involved tear gas or pepper spray, some that forced residents to evacuate.
The Border Patrol's top official in San Diego, Mike Fisher, said his agents are taking action because Mexican authorities have been slow to respond. When an attack happens, he said, American authorities often wait hours for them to come, and help usually never arrives.
"We have been taking steps to ensure that our agents are safe," Fisher said.
Mebbe we should bring back mustard and phosgene gas. Might as well give them something to really bitch about. Plus the sight of all those BP agents in chemical warfare gas masks would really jack up the tourist trade, no?
Mexico's acting consul general in San Diego, Ricardo Pineda, has insisted that U.S. authorities stop firing onto Mexican soil. He met with Border Patrol officials last month after the agency fired tear gas into Mexico. The agency defended that counterattack, saying agents were being hit with a hail of ball bearings from slingshots in Mexico.
U.S. officials say the violence indicates that smugglers are growing more desperate as stepped-up security makes it harder to sneak across the border. The assailants try to distract agents long enough to let people dash in the United States.
The head of a union representing Border Patrol employees said the violence also results from the decision to put agents right up against the border, a departure from the early 1990s when they waited farther back to make arrests.
"When you get that close to the fence, your agents are sitting ducks," said T.J. Bonner, president of the National Border Patrol Council.
The last I knew, they were using ball bearings as ammo to hunt small game. A ball bearing whizzing along at several hundred fps can kill a man.
That is just ridiculous. Forget the pepper spray. What's needed are snipers.Border Patrol agents were attacked 987 times along the U.S.-Mexico border during the 12-month period that ended Sept. 30, the agency said. That's up 31 percent from 752 attacks a year earlier, and it's the highest number since the agency began recording attacks in the late 1990s.
It appears that Mexico will do nothing to control its border. If that is the case, put up the fence and shoot everyone who walks, crawls, swims, flies or saunters across it illegally. Stop this nonsense.About two-thirds of the attacks were with rocks. Many of the rest involved physical assaults, such as illegal immigrants getting into fistfights with guards.
About one of every four attacks occurred in San Diego, and most of those happened along a heavily fortified, 10-mile stretch of the border starting at the Pacific Ocean.
Agent Joseph Ralph estimates he has been struck by rocks 20 times since joining the Border Patrol in 1987, once suffering a broken a shoulder blade. "You find yourself trying to take cover," he said.
About four months ago, a large rock struck the hood of agent Ellery Taylor's vehicle.
"The only thing you can think is, 'I'm glad that that wasn't my head.' There's no way to see it coming," Taylor said.
In October, agents in California and Arizona received compressed-air guns that shoot pepper-spray canisters more than 200 feet. Agents already had less powerful pepper-launchers that lose their punch after about 30 feet — even less if absorbed by thick clothing or cardboard.
The Border Patrol says the pepper weapons are a less lethal alternative to regular guns, but they have caused at least one fatality. In October 2004, a college student died after she was struck in the eye by a pepper-spray canister that officers fired to control a celebration of the Red Sox's pennant win.
Border Patrol SWAT teams along the 1,952-mile U.S.-Mexico border are also equipped with tear gas, "flash bombs" that emit blinding light and "sting ball" grenades that disperse hundreds of tiny rubber pellets.
U.S. officials say the new tactics may spare lives. In March, an agent shot and killed a 20-year-old Mexican man whose arm was cocked back in Calexico, Calif., where rock attacks have soared in the last year. Two years ago, an agent fatally shot a rock thrower at the San Diego-Tijuana border.
No criminal charges were filed in either case.
Friday, December 14, 2007
RIP Rocky Fallo
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
Assault And Buttockery
From the Charleston Daily Mail:
Next comes the Criminal Use Of Ass charge.A Nitro woman was arrested for allegedly fighting with her boyfriend and keeping him against his will.
Constance Ann Hertel, 48, of Kanawha Avenue, had been arguing with her boyfriend for several hours Friday, and when the man tried to leave she wouldn't let him, according to a criminal complaint filed in Kanawha County Magistrate Court.
According to the complaint, when the man tried to pack his belongings, Hertel came into his bedroom and threw a screwdriver at him, hitting him in the back. She also struck him in the torso with a plastic cup, the complaint said.
This technique was originally developed at a secret Army base in Iraq to control disruptive terrorists. Al Qaeda operatives feared and loathed the high pressure and the choking/smothering sensation caused by this technique. They called it "Butt Boarding The Prophet."Nitro Police Patrolman T.A. Fouch said in the report that Hertel then pinned the man against the wall with her buttocks, and as he tried to free himself, she grabbed him around the head and scratched him across the chest.
These were caused by the suspect's rim piercings.Fouch said he observed multiple large fingernail scratches from the top of the man's left shoulder to the center of his chest, the complaint said.
There oughta be a law.Hertel also struck him several times in the facial area with an open hand and threw a television in the middle of the floor, the complaint said.
The complaint said that during an interview with police, Hertel said she also threw the victim's daughter's computer in the river.
She was charged with domestic battery.
Nice To See This Happening
This kid has got some stones. The last time I used a subway was New Year's Eve, 1968, on my way to party at Times Square. No, I don't want to talk about it.The Good Samaritan who tried to stop the Christmas-versus-Chanukah subway beating has two black eyes and a sore nose - but no regrets.
"I did what I thought was right," said Hassan Askari, 20. "I did the best that I could to help."
Askari, a Bangladeshi Muslim studying at Berkeley College in Manhattan, was on a Q train headed to Brooklyn late Friday when he came to the aid of young women confronted by a group of 10 thugs.
Fearful for the women's safety, he pushed one of the men away - and was then pounced on by the group, he said.
"They grabbed me and punched and beat me up," Askari said. "They punched me first. I didn't get a chance to punch him back."
Askari, all of 5-feet-7 and 140 pounds, said he was left with a swollen face.
He said he didn't go to the doctor because he's too busy working two waiter jobs and doesn't have the money for medical care.
Thugs are thugs no matter where they are, what language they speak or what religion they claim to follow. These thugs deserve a good, old-fashioned NYPD broomstick interrogation.He was mystified as to why the men became so outraged when the women and their male friends wished them a "Happy Chanukah" while they were yelling Merry Christmas" on the train car.
"I don't understand," he said. "They were just being nice."
One of the Jewish victims, Walter Adler, expressed amazement that Askari took the risk to try to help.
"That a random Muslim kid helped some Jewish kids, that's what's positive about New York," said Adler, 23, who suffered a broken nose and required four stitches to close a lip wound.
Tuesday, December 11, 2007
She's Home
She bought me a new Starbucks traveling coffee mug too! I met her roommate's fiancee. She said that he talked like the toy character "Charlie In The Box" from the animated Rudolph the Red-Nosed Raindeer, but he didn't say much to me. I really wanted to hear his voice crack.
We got back at about 5:30 and I barely had a chance to change my clothes (I got soaked loading the cars, it was raining like crazy). Then we all went to my oldest daughter's house to celebrate my granddaughter's sixth birthday. It was a great evening. My 4 year old granddaughter keeps on trying to tickle my neck under my chin. I am not ticklish there but for some reason when she does it it cracks me up. My grandson tries kung fu moves on his young aunts and they beat the crap out of him then tickle him. I told them that I had dream fantasies like that until I was in my late twenties.
When my daughters get together, they are a trip. It's like an insane ministrel show. We had a blast.
Did I mention that it is sooooooo good to have then all under one roof again?
On our way home the girls started a conversation thread that went something like this: "Hey, what if we all stay home and never go any where? Yeah, we just hang out at home. Wow, we don't work or go to school or nothing. We all live in the house together. Yeah and I'd be 43 and we'd have like a hundred cats. Yeah, and no boyfriends. Ehhhhhhh, that would really stink."
Tonight I'm beat.
Monday, December 10, 2007
He Hated Christians
24-year-old Matthew Murray has been identified as the shooter who has killed four people in Colorado. Murray had a beef with a suburban missionary school outside Denver and seems to have threatened the facility. The program he had trouble with is called "Youth With A Mission."
After shooting four people (killing two) yesterday morning in Arvata, he then drove 75 miles to the New Life Church in Colorado Springs, which also has a ‘Youth With a Mission’ outreach program.
It is reported that he was carrying as much as a thousand rounds of ammunition. He threw a smoke grenade into the New Life Church building just as the 11 am service was ending .
Murray shot into a vehicle in the parking lot, killing two sisters. Murray then returns to the main building where he is shot by a volunteer female security guard. She shot him in the chest but the belts of ammunition afford him some protection. He reaches for what is described as a hand grenade and the guard delivers a fatal shot.
I wonder where he got hand grenades, if he had them at all. This kid sounds like he should have been on medication some time ago.
I volunteer once a month to work security for my church. I will not say whether or not I am armed while serving in this capacity.
Sunday, December 09, 2007
More Christians Shot In Colorado
This occurred about 70 miles from the scene of the first shootings.
This reminds me of the events of 9/11.
I watched on TV as the second tower was struck by a plane.
The first tower was coincidence.
The second one was war.
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (AP) - A gunman opened fire in the parking lot of a Colorado Springs church on Sunday, striking four people, the church's pastor said. The conditions of the people shot outside the New Life Church were not known, El Paso County Sheriff's Lt. Lari Sevene said.
Lance Coles, a pastor at New Life Church, told The Associated Press he received a report that a man was shooting at people in the church parking lot and that the gunman may have entered the church.
It was not immediately known whether the shootings were related to an earlier shooting about 70 miles away in the Denver suburb of Arvada. There, two people died and two were wounded early Sunday when a gunman opened fire in a dormitory at a missionary training center on the campus of Faith Bible Chapel.
2 Dead, 2 Wounded
ARVADA, Colo. - A gunman walked into a training center dormitory for young Christian missionaries early Sunday and opened fire, killing two of the center’s staff members and wounding two others. No arrests had been made by late morning.
The shooting happened at about 12:30 a.m. at the Youth With a Mission center, police spokeswoman Susan Medina said. About 45 people were evacuated from the dormitory in this Denver suburb.
A man and a woman in their mid-20s died, and two men ages 22 and 23 were wounded, Medina said. One of the injured men was in critical condition, said Paul Filidis, a Colorado Springs-based spokesman with Youth With a Mission.
All four of the victims were staff members, Filidis said.
Witnesses told police that the gunman was a 20-year-old white male, wearing a dark jacket and skull cap. He may have glasses or a beard.
“There’s no blueprint for this, we’re just going to be honest and pray for one another, cry with one another,” center director Peter Warren told KUSA-TV. “Who knows what was going on in this young man’s life.”
Saturday, December 08, 2007
Ohhhhhh I Dunno
Biker Spawn
Up, Up and awa..... What's that funky smell?
Clap On, Clap Off
Human Rights
Nothing illustrates this clearer than the actions of the Canadian Islamic Congress in filing three lawsuits against a Canadian current affairs magazine and its editor-in-chief, Kenneth Whyte, for publishing sections of a book that analyzes the growth of Islam. The book, "The Future Belongs to Islam", was authored by conservative columnist Mark Steyn. Excerpts from it appeared in the October 23, 2007, edition of Maclean's.
Steyn goes on to point out some very disturbing comparative demographics that show that western civilization, as we know it, is "running out of babies."The future belongs to Islam
The Muslim world has youth, numbers and global ambitions. The West is growing old and enfeebled, and lacks the will to rebuff those who would supplant it. It's the end of the world as we've known it. An excerpt from 'America Alone'.
MARK STEYN Oct 20, 2006Sept. 11, 2001, was not "the day everything changed," but the day that revealed how much had already changed. On Sept. 10, how many journalists had the Council of American-Islamic Relations or the Canadian Islamic Congress or the Muslim Council of Britain in their Rolodexes? If you'd said that whether something does or does not cause offence to Muslims would be the early 21st century's principal political dynamic in Denmark, Sweden, the Netherlands, Belgium, France and the United Kingdom, most folks would have thought you were crazy. Yet on that Tuesday morning the top of the iceberg bobbed up and toppled the Twin Towers.
This is about the seven-eighths below the surface -- the larger forces at play in the developed world that have left Europe too enfeebled to resist its remorseless transformation into Eurabia and that call into question the future of much of the rest of the world. The key factors are: demographic decline; the unsustainability of the social democratic state; and civilizational exhaustion.
Demographic decline and the unsustainability of the social democratic state are closely related. In America, politicians upset about the federal deficit like to complain that we're piling up debts our children and grandchildren will have to pay off. But in Europe the unaffordable entitlements are in even worse shape: there are no kids or grandkids to stick it to.
You might formulate it like this:
Age + Welfare = Disaster for you;
Youth + Will = Disaster for whoever gets in your way.Islam has youth and will, Europe has age and welfare.
We are witnessing the end of the late 20th-century progressive welfare democracy. Its fiscal bankruptcy is merely a symptom of a more fundamental bankruptcy: its insufficiency as an animating principle for society. The children and grandchildren of those fascists and republicans who waged a bitter civil war for the future of Spain now shrug when a bunch of foreigners blow up their capital.
Too sedated even to sue for terms, they capitulate instantly. Over on the other side of the equation, the modern multicultural state is too watery a concept to bind huge numbers of immigrants to the land of their nominal citizenship. So they look elsewhere and find the jihad. The Western Muslim's pan-Islamic identity is merely the first great cause in a world where globalized pathologies are taking the place of old-school nationalism.
The point is: Steyn is not mocking or criticizing their precious child molesting prophet. He is commenting about demographic forces shaping the future of Europe. And even this is too much for the mad imams of the ROP because Steyn hammers home some some incredibly salient points:
The Canadian Islamic Congress and its counterpart in the States, CAIR, would have us remain ignorant of these considerations, for it involves the very future of civilization as we know it.We can argue about what consequences these demographic trends will have, but to say blithely they have none is ridiculous. The basic demography explains, for example, the critical difference between the "war on terror" for Americans and Europeans: in the U.S., the war is something to be fought in the treacherous sands of the Sunni Triangle and the caves of the Hindu Kush; you go to faraway places and kill foreigners. But, in Europe, it's a civil war. Neville Chamberlain dismissed Czechoslovakia as "a faraway country of which we know little." This time round, for much of western Europe it turned out the faraway country of which they knew little was their own.
Demographic origin need not be the final word. In 1775, Benjamin Franklin wrote a letter to Joseph Priestly suggesting a mutual English friend might like to apply his mind to the conundrum the Crown faced:
Britain, at the expense of three millions, has killed 150 Yankees this campaign, which is £20000 a head... During the same time, 60000 children have been born in America. From these data his mathematical head will easily calculate the time and the expense necessary to kill us all.
Obviously, Franklin was oversimplifying. Not every American colonist identified himself as a rebel. After the revolution, there were massive population displacements: as United Empire Loyalists well know, large numbers of New Yorkers left the colony to resettle in what's now Ontario. Some American Negroes were so anxious to remain subjects of King George III they resettled as far as Sierra Leone. For these people, their primary identity was not as American colonists but as British subjects. For others, their new identity as Americans had supplanted their formal allegiance to the Crown. The question for today's Europe is whether the primary identity of their fastest-growing demographic is Muslim or Belgian, Muslim or Dutch, Muslim or French.
Our future will not be determined by technology, war, famine, plague or any other factors. It will will be determined by God, first and foremost. Those who cherish the Christian roots of America have made their contribution to the future through their children and grandchildren. As we have abandoned the precepts that forged our nation, we have also abandoned the socio-political adhesive that binds us. Europe is finding this out as did Israel thousands of years ago. As the Israelites turned to other gods, they became enslaved by surrounding nations.
Who or what do we worship? For many Americans it certainly is not the Creator as revealed in Scripture. We can see the same effect in Europe as they abandoned their faith, for if all faiths are the same, then you believe in nothing. And you will pass on to your children exactly what you believe: snail darters and kangaroo rats and being inoffensive are more important than families to grow a nation.
In a modern twist, Europe will become enslaved not from without, but from within. And the same fate awaits us if we don't wake up.[...]In Seville, King Ferdinand III is no longer patron saint of the annual fiesta because his splendid record in fighting for Spanish independence from the Moors was felt to be insensitive to Muslims. In London, a judge agreed to the removal of Jews and Hindus from a trial jury because the Muslim defendant's counsel argued he couldn't get a fair verdict from them. The Church of England is considering removing St. George as the country's patron saint on the grounds that, according to various Anglican clergy, he's too "militaristic" and "offensive to Muslims." They wish to replace him with St. Alban, and replace St. George's cross on the revamped Union Flag, which would instead show St. Alban's cross as a thin yellow streak.
Thursday, December 06, 2007
More UN Shenanigans
Idris is Sudanese. He was named Director General of the World Intellectual Property Organization in 1997. He is also the head of the International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants.Senior UN official gets $300,000, pension benefits to resign over age change
GENEVA - The U.N. copyright and patent chief who used a false birth date for more than two decades has accepted an extra year's salary of over $300,000 and full pension benefits.
It's part of a generous package to secure his resignation. Kamil Idris has agreed to step down in September 2008, a year before the end of his second term as director-general of the World Intellectual Property Organization, under pressure from Western countries.
This guy operates under three DOB's - 08/26/1945, 08/26/1953 and 08/26/1954. The only other time I run across phoney DOB's is when I am looking at a criminal history and the perp is using phoney dates of birth to try to confuse the system. What makes this interesting is the pattern of use. His DOB's only change the year of birth - this is exactly what criminals do since it is easier to remember and not get your false personas all mixed up when the cops got you all cranked up against the side of a squad car.
There also seems to be some controversy over the kinds of degrees Idris claims he has earned. On one hand he states that he has a Master's Degree in International Law and International Affairs from Ohio University. On the other hand, the University states that he received a Master's Degree in African Studies.
Maybe we're just funny that way, but here in the States we call that fraud. Now where does that extra $300,000 fit into the picture?It was learned last year that he joined the body claiming his birth date was 1945, which helped him land the job and win promotions. He was hired in 1982 for a job requiring a decade of professional experience.
According to his revised account, he was 28, not 37. He changed the birth date to 1954 last year.
An internal audit said the younger age would enable him to work longer within the UN system and considerably benefit him by further building up UN pension credits before retirement.
So the megabucks bribe goes on top of the benefits he stole. Sorta like spreading mustard on a pus sandwich. Leave it to the UN to turn your stomach.Idris blames the age discrepancy on a typographical error and he rejects allegations that he sought to benefit either from the misstatement or from the correction.
U.S. officials say Idris, a Sudanese national, has an annual salary of $311,753. His pension benefits could be worth much more.
500 Magnum
In comparison, the 7.62mm (.308) NATO round, a 148gr grain bullet delivers 2,486 ft.lbs of energy.
This is what makes a bear shit in the woods.
It would make me shit in Starbucks during the noon rush hour.
And here it is again.
I haven't seen flames that big coming out of an opening that small since little Tommy Flavin lit a bare assed fart at Boy Scout camp after bean burrito night and fried his butthole.
Big Dawg
In Hot Pursuit
Back came the reply in true laconic RAF style:
"Thank you for your message, which allows us to complete the file on this incident. You may be interested to know that the tactical computer in the Tornado had detected the presence of, and subsequently locked onto, your hostile radar equipment and automatically sent a jamming signal back to it.
Furthermore, an air-to-ground missile aboard the fully-armed aircraft had also automatically locked onto your equipment. Fortunately the pilot flying the Tornado recognized the situation for what it was, quickly responded to the missile systems alert status, and was able to override the automated defence system before the missile was launched and your hostile radar installation was destroyed.
Good Day..."
H/T to me brudder.
UPDATE: Took me awhile to find it, but Snopes says that this is an urban legend. It's been around for years but still a good read.
Wednesday, December 05, 2007
Bias
Contaminated data
Hot cities, not CO2, cause urban thermometers to rise
Ross McKitrick, Financial Post Published: Wednesday, December 05, 2007Below is the famous graph of "global average surface temperature," or "global temperature" for short. The data come from thermometers around the world, but between the thermometer readings and the final, famous, warming ramp, a lot of statistical modelling aims at removing known sources of exaggeration in the warming trend.
In a new article just published in the Journal of Geophysical Research -- Atmospheres, a co-author and I have concluded that the manipulations for the steep post-1980 period are inadequate, and the above graph is an exaggeration. Along the way, I have also found that the United Nations agency promoting the global temperature graph has made false claims about the quality of its data.
It's just so hard to believe that the UN could or would try to misrepresent the truth. After all, these are the folks who brought us the Oil For Food scam plan. Maybe its the cop in me, but I truly would like to see how many UN cronies are hooked up with these carbon offset investment firms that are headed by the likes of Al Gore.
The surface-measured data has many well-known problems. Over the post-war era, equipment has changed, station sites have been moved, and the time of day at which the data is collected has changed.
Many long-term weather records come from in or near cities, which have gotten warmer as they grow. Many poor countries have sparse weather-station records and few resources to ensure data quality. Fewer than one-third of the weather stations operating in the 1970s remain in operation.
Scientists readily acknowledged that temperature measurements are contaminated for the purpose of measuring climate change. But they argue that adjustments fix the problem. To deal with a false warming generated by urbanization, they have the "Urbanization Adjustment." To deal with biases due to changing the time of day when temperatures are observed, they have the "Time of Observation Bias Adjustment." And so forth.
Maybe they are working on "Change of Life Adjustments" to deal with sensors located near the homes of middle aged women. We could also sell them as "Hot Flash Offsets." Mope, you listening?
Let's cut to the chase.The papers describing the adjustments aim to construct data showing what the temperature would be in a region if nobody had ever lived there. If the adjustments are right, the final output should not be correlated with the extent of industrial development and variations in socioeconomic conditions. But in a 2004 study with climatologist Patrick Michaels, we found that the adjustment models were not removing the contamination patterns as claimed. If the contamination were removed, we estimated the average measured warming rate over land would decline by about half. Dutch meteorologists using different data and a different testing methodology had come to the same conclusions.
[...]Scientists who attribute warming to greenhouse gases argue that their climate models cannot reproduce the surface trends from natural variability alone. They then attribute it to greenhouse gases, since (they assume) all other human influences have been removed from the data by the adjustment models. If that has not happened, however, they cannot claim to be able to identify the role of greenhouse gases. Despite the vast number of studies involved, and the large number of contributors to the IPCC reports, the core message of the IPCC hinges on the assumption that their main surface climate data set is uncontaminated. And by the time they began writing the recent Fourth Assessment Report, they had before them a set of papers proving the data are contaminated.
How did they handle this issue? In the first draft of the IPCC report, they simply claimed that, while city data are distorted by urban warming, this does not affect the global averages. They cited two familiar studies to support their position and ignored the new counter-evidence. I submitted lengthy comments criticizing this section. In the second draft there was still no discussion, so again I put in lengthy comments. This time the IPCC authors wrote a response. They conceded the evidence of contamination, but in a stunning admission, said: "The locations of socioeconomic development happen to have coincided with maximum warming, not for the reason given by McKitrick and Mihaels [sic] (2004), but because of the strengthening of the Arctic Oscillation and the greater sensitivity of land than ocean to greenhouse forcing, owing to the smaller thermal capacity of land." Note the irony: Confronted with published evidence of an anthropogenic (but non-greenhouse) explanation for warming, they dismissed it with an unproven conjecture of natural causes. Who's the "denialist" now?
Furthermore, the claim is preposterous. The comparison of land and ocean is irrelevant since we were only talking about land areas. The Arctic Oscillation is a wind-circulation pattern that affects long-term weather trends in the Arctic. It certainly plays a role in explaining Arctic warming over the past few decades. But for IPCC lead authors to invoke it to explain a worldwide correlation between industrialization and warming patterns is nonsense.
This is rather important. The IPCC is pulling another Rwanda on us. Ignore the corpses, there's nothing going on here folks.So there are two points to note here. First, the IPCC concedes the existence of a correlation pattern that shows its main data set is contaminated, and it has no coherent counterargument. Its claim that it is due to natural circulation changes contradicts its later (and prominently advertised) claims that recent warming patterns cannot be attributed to natural atmospheric circulation changes [emphasis mine].
Second, the claim that our evidence is statistically insignificant is, in my opinion, a plain fabrication. The IPCC offered no supporting evidence. Confronted with two lines of independent evidence that the data set on which it bases its fundamental conclusions is contaminated, it conceded the point, but then dismissed it on the basis of non-existent counter-evidence.
Tuesday, December 04, 2007
Be Thou Healed
Let's Spring These Guys
This is certainly good news. By golly Judge Jolly ain't Judge Judy, but he sounds like he may be saying, "Don't piss on my shoes and tell me it's raining." It has been said that you can indict a ham sandwich, but the logic behind arresting two men for non-reporting an incident and sentencing them to 10 years in prison escapes me. Especially if they were justified in using deadly physical force in the first place.NEW ORLEANS — Federal prosecutors may have overreacted in their case against two Border Patrol agents who were sentenced to lengthy prison terms after jurors convicted them of shooting a fleeing drug suspect and hiding evidence of the incident, an appeals court judge said Monday.
Judge E. Grady Jolly, one of three judges from the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals hearing the case of Ignacio Ramos and Jose Alonso Compean, questioned whether the two agents would have been charged if they had reported the shooting.
It would appear that it escaped Hizzoner Jolly also."For some reason, this one got out of hand, it seems to me," Jolly said of the agents' prosecution.
This case really gets my ass all cranked up because the US Attorney gave the mule a Get Out of Jail Free card for testifying against the agents and then the mule gets arrested AGAIN smuggling a thousand pounds of reefer. This time he is using a car the US Attorney gave him so he can get to court from his home across the border. I wonder how much weed he stuffed into that car and brought into the US before he finally got caught.A federal jury in Texas convicted Ramos and Compean of assault, obstruction of justice and civil rights violations in the wounding of Osvaldo Aldrete Davila on the Texas border near El Paso in 2005. A federal judge sentenced Compean to 12 years in prison and Ramos to 11 years.
The agents' attorneys are asking the 5th Circuit to throw out the convictions. The judges didn't indicate when they will rule on the appeals.
"It does seem to me like the government overreacted here," Jolly said, noting the severity of the charges and the lengthy sentences prosecutors sought, as he questioned Assistant U.S. Attorney Mark Stelmach..
I can see the BP guys getting fired or demoted/suspended/reamed etc. for their actions - and they should be. But 10 years or more in the slammer for shooting a major dope runner? This dirtbag got caught with nearly a ton of weed so far and they want to give him a break???In exchange for his testimony against the agents, Aldrete was given immunity from prosecution for allegedly trying to smuggle drugs the day he was shot. Jurors didn't hear evidence that Aldrete allegedly smuggled marijuana in the United States several months after the shooting.
Botsford said Judge Kathleen Cardone, who presided over the trial in El Paso, Tex., should have allowed jurors to hear evidence that Aldrete was "not a (drug) mule, a simple one-time (border) crosser."
"He basically left a false impression for that jury," Botsford said of Aldrete.
Judge Patrick Higginbotham, who heard the appeal with Jolly and Judge Edward Prado, said evidence that Aldrete made multiple attempts to smuggle drugs across the border "strikes me as very relevant."Stelmach acknowledged that Aldrete told "some lies" to investigators, but he said jurors rejected the agents' argument that they acted in self-defense when they shot at Aldrete.
Aldrete was arrested last month following an October indictment on various drug charges. Mebbe someone else should be prosecuting this.
Monday, December 03, 2007
And Thou Shalt Make A Plate Of Pure Gold...
37 And thou shalt put it on a thread of blue, and it shall be upon the mitre; upon the forefront of the mitre it shall be.
38 And it shall be upon Aaron's forehead, and Aaron shall bear the iniquity committed in the holy things, which the children of Israel shall hallow, even in all their holy gifts; and it shall be always upon his forehead, that they may be accepted before the LORD. (Exodus 28:36-37)
In this video, we are informed by the Temple Institute that the tzitz, the High Priest's golden crown, has been made and is ready for use in Temple worship. It is made from 600 grams of pure gold, took a year to fabricate and cost close to $30,000.
So what?
So this. Biblical prophecy revolves around Israel. One of the indicators of the beginning of the end times is the return of Old Testament worship to a restored Temple. Since the destruction of Solomon's Temple by the Roman General Titus in 70 A.D., there has been no Temple worship by the Jews. Temple worship cannot be initiated without the proper garments as described in the Book of Exodus, Chapter 28.
Revelation 11:2 "Leave out the court which is outside the temple and do not measure it, for it has been given to the nations; and they will tread under foot the holy city for forty-two months."
The Book of Revelation was written by the Apostle John while he was in exile on the Isle of Patmos. It is likely that this Book was written before the destruction of the Temple, perhaps 67 AD.
Daniel 9:27 "And he will make a firm covenant with the many for one week, but in the middle of the week he will put a stop to sacrifice and grain offering; and on the wing of abominations will come one who makes desolation, even until a complete destruction, one that is decreed, is poured out on the one who makes desolate."
This is the Anti-Christ. There is a seven year period (a week of years) foretold here. In the middle of this period (after forty-two weeks), the Anti-Christ (the one who makes desolate) will disrupt Temple worship and demand that he be worshiped as G-d. This is the abomination of desolation. The next three and a half years will be the most awful period in human history. This will be the Tribulation, after which Christ will return to establish His Kingdom on Earth AKA the Millennium.
One Christian site describes a possible scenario for the reconstruction of the Temple thusly:
Some archeologists believe that the temple mount is actually 340 feet south of the Dome of the Rock site, putting the Dome of the Rock within the Court of the Gentiles. This may be the court outside the temple that is left out.
There are many groups already working on preparations for the new temple. The blueprints are already done, the temple garments have been made, and there have already been attempts to lay the cornerstone of the temple. The only thing standing in the way of the construction of the new temple is Islam's third holiest site, the Dome of the Rock and government support for such an undertaking. Some possible scenarios for the rebuilding of the temple are as follows:
1. The persuasion and performing of miracles by the Antichrist and False Prophet convinces the Islamic world to approve the rebuilding.
2. The United Nations will negotiate the rebuilding of the temple following a war with the armies from the North (Russia and Islamic forces). This assumes that the
war with the armies from the North is not the battle of Armageddon as some feel and that this attack occurs before the rapture or tribulation period begins. The supernatural destruction of the Russian army and Islamic forces will cause an outpouring of Christian worship and zeal amongst the Jewish people who will reconstruct the temple.
3. It is determined that the site of the first two temples is actually south of the Dome of the Rock, and the court of the gentiles (Dome of the Rock) will be left out of the 3rd temple.
A group in Israel called the Temple Mount Faithful have obtained most of the clothing, instruments and other equipment required for temple worship and are actively preparing for the laying of the third temple's cornerstone.