Shots Across The Bow

United 93 as a Call to Action

No, I haven't seen it yet.

Yes, I will be seeing it, but probably not tonight.

For a variety of reasons, it seems that most folks want to let 9/11 slide into the past, and those that don't mostly want to use it to manipulate other folks. I think it's time we remember exactly what happened that day, why it happened, and how a few Americans responded. To me, it bears directly on our future, and what we have to do to face it.

I'm going to indulge in a little speculation here. I'm betting that the passengers on Flight 93 didn't stop to ask "Why do they hate us?" when the terrorists took over the plane. I'm betting that any attempts at dialogue with the terrorists ended as soon as the flight attendant's throat was cut. I'm betting that when they organized and formed their action plane, they didn't ask each other if they were Republican or Democrat, conservative or liberal. I'm betting that they didn't fight or grandstand among themselves for glory, personal, or political gain.

In short, I'm betting that these few people, placed under enormous pressure, behaved better during that 111 minute flight than the vast majority of our politicians, bureaucrats, members of the press, and celebrity advocates have since then.

They acted as we all believe Americans should act. With courage, honor, and not a small measure of patriotism. Knowing that they were going to die if they did nothing, and were probably still going to die if they fought back, they chose to fight because they thought it was important to deny success to the terrorists.

We need to be reminded of their courage and honor so that maybe we all can find it in ourselves before we face the end of a gun.

After the last election, there was a lot of bitterness among the political folks about the divide between the Red States and the Blue States. Political junkies from the Blue states heaped scorn and derision on the Red staters, talking about leaving the country, naming the Red states "Jesusland," as if that were an insult, and mocking the values that the Red staters held dear. Red staters in turn jeered at the folks in the Blue states, rubbing their noses in the loss, and rejecting any possibility that their way of life had any value whatsoever. The argument grew so loud and rancorous that, if all you did was read blogs and political commentary, you would think that a vast and unrepairable ideological divide split America.

Flight 93 forever proves that wrong. The folks on that flight were almost entirely folks from the bluest of Blue states, but their actions tied in directly to the values cherished by Red staters.

So what does that mean?

It means that Americans are still Americans, regardless of where they live or their political ideology. It means that true American values run deep in all the states, despite the rants of political ideologues. It means that, far from being deeply divided, the vast majority of Americans share common values, common hopes and dreams, and a common vision for our country.

It means that the greatest threat to America comes not from terrorists, Flight 93 showed that the average citizen can take care of that, but from within, from political ideologues sowing hate and discord to advance their own personal agenda. It comes from politicians who will do anything to stay in office, including hiding or spinning the truth in order to make it fit their platform. It comes from pundits who claim that the other side has no validity, that those on the other side are stupid or evil, instead of acknowledging a sincere difference of opinion rooted in shared values.

Isn't it time we told them all to shut up? Isn't it time that we told all the haters, from Limbaugh to Franken, O'Reilly to Rhodes to just shut the hell up for a while? Advancing a political agenda is one thing; doing so by tearing down the folks on the other side is another. It's shamefull. And how about we get our representatives in Washington to stop futzing around and deal with real issues. How about leaving gas prices alone and dealing with immigration? Forget strangling the internet and deal with a nuclear North Korea. Stop worrying about who can get married, and start worrying about how to keep Iran from starting an apocalyptic war.

You know, establish some damn priorities!

I look at the squabbling in Congress, the political manuevering and jockeying, and I am disgusted with both sides. Neither side has the integrity to deal with real issues, preferring instead to manipulate them to score political points off their opposition. I look at the press, slanting their coverage to get the best ratings, instead of telling the truth. For example, how many stories have you heard about record profits in the oil industry? Now, how many stories have you heard in that same press discussing that the record profits are due to higher sales volume, and not increasing margins?

It's pathetic.

I get discouraged from time to time, and decide that America is headed the way of Rome, towards decadence and dissolution. But every now and then, something happens that gives me hope, that tells me that the rot may be confined to a minority, and that most of us still know what it means to be free and independant. It tells me that most of us, even if on an instinctive level, remember that freedom has a price, and that while the price is high, it is worth paying. And I begin to think that if most of us do remember that, and believe it, then we still have a fighting chance to keep our nation whole and strong.

United 93 is not just a memorial to those who fought and won the first battle against terrorism in America; it's a reminder to all of us that we, the people, are America. We are its strength, its glory, and its best hope. We just have to have the courage to act like it. The folks on Flight 93 prove that we do, all of us, have that courage.

That's why it is important.

One Last Post on Gouging

At the same site as the gas temperature map is this nice graph tracking gas prices. If you run the chart including oil prices you'll see that over a two year period, oil prices more than doubled while gas prices haven't quite doubled. IN other words, the oil companies profit margin has contracted over the last two years, not expanded.

It's very difficult to prove gouging when that happens.

Also, notice that price increases in gasoline are always led by price increases in oil.

Again, it's hard to accuse somebody of gouging when their final product price tracks their main ingredient price so closely.

But like I said before, there's never a shortage of folks who won't let the facts get in the way of a good smear.

Blue is Red and Red is Kinda Greenish Yellow

I was taking a closer look at the gas price map I linked yesterday via Gunner and I noticed something.

The states with the highest average gas prices are the states that voted for Kerry. The Blue States are finally going Red!

Bush and Illegal Immigration

By the way, put me down as one of those folks who will be parting company with the Bush Administration over the amnesty program for illegal immigrants.

And by parting company, I don't mean an intellectual disagreement.

As a libertarian, I've voted Republican in the last two elections simply because their platform was the closest to my own; strong defense and small government. I could swallow the social ideological crusades simply because I knew there were enough folks like me to keep them from going too far.

It was a matter of priorities.

But now that the Republicans have abandoned most of their platform (huge government spending, explosive growth in entitlement programs, and dramatically weaker borders), I have no reason to vote for them any more.

So, I'm looking for a new third party to waste my vote on: fiscally conservative, socially liberal, small government, strong on defense and border control. You know, one that actually follows the Constitution. The candidate closest to that gets my vote.

And if the Democrats win, don't come crying to me. I didn't abandon the Republicans; they abandoned me when they jettisoned their principles.

PS: My guess is that there will be a very strong third party in 2008 pulling much of the moderate middle away from both the Donks and the GOP. Maybe even enough to win, or at least throw the election into overtime.

Which kinda makes these off cycle elections pretty durn important, don't ya think?

Snow in D.C.

What do I think?

Seems like a good fit to me.

First, he has a good speaking voice, and also a decent stage presence. Yeah, I know, I'm being a little shallow here, but you have to remember that as Press Secretary, Tony Snow is first and foremost a PR guy. He's the face of the administration to a lot of folks, so it helps that he knows how to carry himself.

Second, his criticisms of the Bush Administration should immediately kill any claims that he's a partisan shill with no integrity. Of course it won't, (some folks never let reality get in the way of a good smear) but it should.

Third, it should help the President with his base, extremely important with the perception of impending doom running through the Republican ranks. Snow has the ability to clearly and forcefully articulate the positions of the Administration in a way that will reassure the base. That, along with his past history of criticizing some elements of Bush's policy should help bring some of the disenchanted back into the fold.

Finally, from everything I've read about the guy, he's a genuinely nice person, and it's good to see one of those guys get ahead for a change.

Of course, you have to take all this with a grain of salt. I am the guy who thought that Howard Dean could energize the Democrats under a united platform similar to the way Newt Gingrich energized Republicans.

Boy, did I miss on that one!

Andrea Clark's Battle for Life

John Hawkins continues to follow the case of Andrea Clark, the Texas woman who is about to be removed from life support, even though she is conscious and doesn't want to die.

I asked Melanie if the family had talked to Andrea since our last conversation. She said they had and that Andrea had asked for a whopper from Burger King =). But, she said when they told her that the hospital was going to pull the plug on her on Sunday, she became, as you'd imagine, very upset and angry.

This story is just too incredible to be believed. If true, then we're witnessing a conscious, aware, adult, being deliberately killed by a medical facility because in their judgment, her life isn't worth the fight. It's too hard to accept that something like this could actually happen.

And that may be why I'm troubled by a lingering doubt. The television station that broke the story says that:

n an e-mailed statement, the hospital referred to it is confidentiality policy regarding patient privacy, saying it is precluded from commenting on Clark’s case unless the family provides written consent.

The family hasn’t done that...

Why not allow the hospital to answer questions? If Andrea really is aware and communicative, the hospital would have to admit that, and then they would look even worse. The fact that the family doesn't want the hospital to be able to tell their side of the story, along with the very callous nature of the story bugs me. How does the family gain by silencing the hospital? Nothing.

Unless Andrea is worse off than the family has led us to believe.

I simply cannot believe that there are doctors out there who will remove life support from a woman who is capable of asking for a Whopper.

But here's the thing. As much as the possibility of this being some kind of manipulation bothers me, there's no getting around the fact that this scenario could happen under Texas law. It specifically states that the ethics committee can withhold life sustaining treatment against the wishes of the patient, if they believe that further treatment is futile. So even if Andrea's family is not telling the whole truth, the questions they've raised are still valid.

A Rocky Top Stroll

With Michael Silence out getting his heart repaired, I figured somebody should take over the Rocky Top Stroll until he's back on his feet. And since I'm somebody, I'm doing it.

#9 posts over at Uncle's about the difference in news coverage between shots fired into the Republican campaign headquarters and shots fired at Knoxville Mayoral candidate Steve Hall.

I can understand the urge to sell newspapers but how is a sensational event in 2004 given greater coverage than an attempt on the life of a current City Councilman and candidate for Knox County Mayor?

I would add a question; Are we seeing a trend, or are these just isolated incidents of violence?

Rising gas prices seem to be on everybody's mind.
Glenn Reynolds links to this chart, which gives a good comparison of the costs of different alternatibve fuels. I'll give you one guess which alternative fuel technology is the most expensive. Yep, it's everybody's favorite, the hydrogen fuel cell.
Les Jones links to a related story comparing the efficiencies of different fuel sources.
John Norris Brown links to Glen Dean who puts record oil company profits into perspective once again.
The five year average that oil companies make per gallon of gas is around 6 cents. With the surge in prices over the last year, they are now making about 9 cents per gallon. Government takes about 45.9 cents per gallon.
Gunner links to this map, which shows the average gas price by county throughout the US.

Crashing at the Bottom of the Slippery Slope

Inch by inch, we move closer and closer to state sanctioned euthanasia. Follow the link to read the whole thing but here's the gist.

A woman writes that her sister is in a hospital in Houston, and that the hospital's board of ethics has determined that continued treatment is futile. They've informed the woman that she has 10 days to find another facility to take her sister before they pull the plug. Now, before lapsing into unconsciousness, according to the sister due to overmedication for pain, the hospitalized woman made it very clear that she wanted full life support until she died naturally. But Texas has a law that says that doctors do not have to take the wishes of the patient, or whoever makes medical decisions for the patient, into account if in their judgment, continued treatment would be futile.

Now, while there are a lot of questions surrounding this woman's case, there aren't many questions for me surrounding this law. Back during the Schiavo case, I wrote the following:

I'm guessing that the next fight will be similar to the Schiavo case, except with the sides reversed. The family will be fighting to keep the victim alive, but the doctors, or just as likely, the insurance company, will sue to remove a feeding tube, or stop a ventilator.

Boy did I miss the mark! Not only was there a law allowing involuntary euthanasia already on the books, it had been there since 1999!
Let's take a look at the law in question.

§ 166.046. PROCEDURE IF NOT EFFECTUATING A DIRECTIVE OR TREATMENT DECISION.

(e) If the patient or the person responsible for the health care decisions of the patient is requesting life-sustaining treatment that the attending physician has decided and the review process has affirmed is inappropriate treatment, the patient shall be given available life-sustaining treatment pending transfer under Subsection (d). The patient is responsible for any costs incurred in transferring the patient to another facility. The physician and the health care facility are not obligated to provide life-sustaining treatment after the 10th day after the written decision required under Subsection (b) is provided to the patient or the person responsible for the health care decisions of the patient unless ordered to do so under Subsection (g).

And there it is in black and white. If the doctors decide you aren't fit to live, you don't live. If that isn't euthanasia, then what is it? Yeah, the law requires that the hospital help the patient find alternative care, but how many hospitals are going to take a transfer that has already been labeled futile?

None. Once an ethics panel (God the irony is so rich, isn't it?) determines that further treatment is futile, you're bound for the cemetery.

So, what are the ramifications of this law? Once a doctor has determined that treatment is futile, can insurance companies refuse to pay the claim? Also, the law intentionally refused to define just exactly what defines futility. There's nothing to restrict doctors and hospitals from extending the concept of "futile treatments" beyond life supporting/saving measures. If a patient has a history of severe heart trouble with multiple heart attacks and so on, could a medical panel determine that further treatment is futile, as he will certainly die of a heart attack eventually? How about treating illness in the elderly? If their life expectancy is only 5 or 6 years anyway, couldn't treating their illnesses be considered futile? Wow, insurance companies would save a bundle with that policy!

Again, there are a lot of unanswered questions concerning the case that brought this to my attention. It could turn out that the patient in question is much worse off than her sister is telling us, and further life support would indeed be futile.

But do you really want a panel of corporate ethicist making that decision for you?

Here's the real knee slapper.

§ 166.047. HONORING DIRECTIVE DOES NOT CONSTITUTE OFFENSE
OF AIDING SUICIDE. A person does not commit an offense under
Section 22.08, Penal Code, by withholding or withdrawing
life-sustaining treatment from a qualified patient in accordance
with this subchapter.

So in Texas, a doctor can kill you when you don't want to die, but he can't kill you when you do want to die!

Simply amazing.

Dad, I Need to Learn Spanish

That's what my daughter said to me today.

She'd just returned from a visit with her mother in Birmingham. Her mom works in a restaurant and there are a lot of Mexicans who work there. SOme of them speak some English, others not so much. My ex hangs out with them, so it was natural that my daughter did as well.

I asked her why she wanted to learn Spanish, and she said it was because she felt guilty, because all of her Mexican friends were having to learn English if they wanted to talk to her.

"Well, they are living in America. Shouldn't they be learning English anyway? I know if I moved to Mexico, I'd be learning to speak Spanish."

"No dad, that's different. They don't have to learn English here."

"Why not? Isn't that a double standard?"

"No, because you'd have to learn Spanish to get by in Mexico. Mexicans have whole communities here so there's no need for them to learn English."

Then she said it was a very sensitive issue with her and she didn't want to talk to me about it because she'd just get mad.

Michael Silence Does Have A Heart

Get well soon Michael.

It's Dangerous to be a Muslim

And it's not because of George W Bush, either.

It's because of other Muslims.

Once again, we see Islamic terrorists killing Muslims in an attempt to, well, I don't know what the hell they're attempting. I could say that these bastards are so kill crazy that they no longer care who they kill, and since it's too dangerous to kill Americans, they kill whoever is handy, but that might seem insenstive of me.

So I won't say it.

An Apology to the Nashville Scene

I now understand what happened, and it wasn't their fault.

Through my own investigative skills, I found out that Karl Rove used to be a dedicated reader of Hobbs Online. Now that he's got some free time, Karl decided it was time for Bill to begin blogging again. And so, with the Machiavellian deviosity he's trademarked over several decades of political manipulation, Karl swung into action, beginning a whispering campaign, and leaving an anonymous tip for Mr. Kopp, who ran with it. The events that followed, leading up to Bill's departure from Belmont University, were all anticipated and guided by Mr. Rove to make sure that Bill had the time and the inclination to resume blogging once again.

So you see, it wasn't the folks at the Scene's fault. They couldn't help it; they were outwitted by the master strategist.

No Blogging Today

I just did a 10 hour road trip to Birmingham and back to take mydaughters to visit their mother over the weekend. The idea of sitting in a chair and staring at a monitor fills me with a dread normally associated with the phrases "You need a root canal", "We're showing home movies", and "Honey, we need to talk."

Back tomorrow

Did She Even Read What She Wrote?

Okay, first read this:

Beyond the sober reality of job loss, in which only the most heartless and anonymous blog-world gadflies take glee, last week’s exposure and subsequent hand-wringing over Hobbs’ tacky handiwork were colored and complicated by a host of entanglements.

Ahh, the sweet voice of reason. Nobody should take glee in another's misfortune. I'll bet she was responding to this bit:

How many bloggers actually have jobs? We don’t know, except to say one fewer now than before.

That’s because a poor blogging sap who’d made his bed—only to be snugly tucked in by the Scene—lost his job at Belmont University last week.

You can almost imagine the writer cackling with glee as they wrote it. Not only do they get in one more jab at Bill, but they get to take a swipe at all of blogdom at the same time. It's nice to see the editor of the Scene acknowledging that openly reveling in another man's misfortune is inappropriate behavior for a real journalist.

Just one problem; she wrote both quotes. In the same piece. And within 3 paragraphs.

So much for real journalism at the Scene.
Hat tip MKS

Michelle Malkin and UCSC SAW

I first read the story on Michelle's page. The Students Against the War group at UC Santa Cruz ran off military recruiters during a job fair on campus. Clearly this is a case of an abuse of free speech, as the students used their right to abridge the rights of the recruiters and the students who wished to talk to them. In her story, Michelle published the contact information of the SAW organizers which she obtained from their press release, available at multiple sites across the internet. Folks used that information to contact the student organizers, and some went over the line, threatening and harrassing them. Then supporters of SAW started threatening and harrassing Michelle. Now some of the left side of the blogosphere are saying that what Michelle did by publishing the contact information was unethical.

Here's a brief part of what Kevin at Lean Left has to say:

This is a despicable, loathsome thing to do. Malkin deliberately set out to harass people for the “crime” of protesting military recruiters. She didn’t attack their ideas, or debate their conclusions, or engage them in anything resembling an honest fashion...She set out to intimidate the students and make their lives miserable...

Here's what I find as odd; the SAW at UCSC were engaged in exactly the same kinds of activity when they protested the recruiters!

Now Kevin characterizes the protest as "peaceful;" I guess he missed the past history of SAW campus protests, which included slashing the tires on recruiters' cars, rock throwing, and intimidation and harassment of students wanting to talk to the recruiters last year; and the fact that this year, the protesters tried to break through the police lines while a group of students were talking to the recruiters. Maybe because nobody got hurt this time (One school employee was injured last year) that's all it takes for Kevin to consider it a "non-violent protest." But I'll bet any amount of money you want to put up that if a pro-life group set up outside an abortion clinic and engaged in the exact same tactics used by SAW, Kevin would stand squarely in favor of prosecuting them to the fullest extent of the law.

To paraphrase Kevin, SAW deliberately set out to intimidate the recruiters, and any student who wanted to talk to them. They set out to harass them for the crime of wanting to serve their country. Doesn't this activity also warrent the labels of 'despicable' and 'loathsome'?

Reading Michelle's piece further, including the updates, I found out that A) not one of the students whose contact information was given out has contacted Michelle in any way to ask that she take down the information, and B) that the information she posted could be found on several other websites. To argue that the information was somehow meant to be private is ludicrous at that point. To take a lesson from another current kerfluffle, we've been told by many on the left that because Bill Hobbs put the cartoon up, he's accountable, even if he didn't publicize it, and even if he took it down later.

Shouldn't the same standard of accountability apply to these protestors?

Good Advice for Bloggers

John Hawkins posts some rules to help bloggers stay out of trouble.

I've broken almost all of them, but then again, I'm a little dog, so I can get away with it.

New Additions to the Blog Roll

Loook to the right and you'll see a couple of new faces to the Daily Read list.

First off is Waiter Rants, a witty, perceptive, and sometimes painful look at life from the eyes of a waiter in an NYC bistro. Waiter writes some of the best stuff I've seen on the web. I stayed up way past my bedtime the might I found his sight, reading back over almost a year's worth of posts.

It's good stuff.

Second is Michelle Malkin. I've read her off and on for quite a while now and it's high time she makes the Daily Read list. (Not that it matters to her whether I read her daily or not; she's one of the big dogs.) I don't always agree with her, (Heck, I don't always agree with myself from sunup to sundown!) but I always enjoy reading her.

I've left the link to Donald Sensing alone because I still check back there from time to time. I still think he'll be back.

By the way, feel free to send me links if you think there's a blog I might like to add to the list. Like everybody else, I get set in my ways and don't go off exploring as much as I should.

I Don't Know How Youse Done It, But I Know Youse Done It!

DNA testing is a wonderful thing. It can prove beyond a reasonable doubt who did what to whom, or who didn't.

Unless you're a lacrosse player from Duke University.

Now let me make sure I have the story straight. A stripper went to work a party held by the lacrosse team. After the party, she filed rape charges, claiming she was attacked and raped by several members of the team. Evidence was collected from her person, and then every member of the team was tested and no matches were found. Additionally, there are photographs that show her injuries occurred prior to the party.

Now it seems to me that if the evidence collected from the young woman showed signs of rape, and that the evidence did not match any of the players on the lacrosse team, then somebody else raped her. Now, if I were a prosecuter, I'd be looking for somebody who actually matched the DNA evidence I had, instead of going after some kids who did not match the evidence.

But it is an election season, and the entire community has already tried and convicted the team, so what's a DA to do?

In an eerily similar story, preliminary testing of the bear trapped and killed for mauling a family in the Cherokee National Forest shows no signs that the bear was guilty.

However, the bear will remain dead while further testing takes place.

Free Speech Carries a High Price

Speaking our minds is one of the quintessential traits we think of as American. And that makes sense; our country was born when we told a king exactly what we thought of him and his rules. In fact, we thought the right to speak our minds freely was so important that we made sure that it was one of the few rights specifically mentioned by our Constitution.

But just because that right is important to us does not mean that it comes cheaply. In fact, just the opposite is true; the right to speak out freely is one that has always carried a high price. People have been imprisoned, tortured, even killed for saying what they believe. We generally don't go for that here in America, but there are still things you can lose by speaking out.

Like your job, for instance.

Bill Hobbs is the latest in a growing list of bloggers who have lost their jobs, seen their businesses suffer and/or fail, or had their anonymity stripped at the hands of folks who didn't like something they wrote. Bill drew a cartoon to illustrate the cowardice and hypocrisy of a media cowed by threats of violence from a fringe element of Islam. The same folks who wrote strongly worded editorials supporting works like he 'Piss Christ' refused to print the Mohammed cartoons, claiming that they had a duty to be 'sensitive' and 'tolerant' of other religions. Bill was angry at this hypocrisy and he went on the attack.

It's not surprising that the media he attacks should strike back; in fact it is to be expected. But there's another angle to this story that makes it disturbing. The attack was delayed. The cartoon was posted in February, about 6 weeks ago, with absolutely no impact. Nobody complained; it seems that Hobbs only became a big enough target when he became associated with the Bryson campaign. Reading Spragens' article, it seems to me that attacking Hobbs was simply a way to go after Jim Bryson. After sliming Hobbs, Spragens goes to great lengths to repeatedly link him with Bryson and Belmont College, not to mention this rather cryptic comment:

Bryson and Belmont, it should be noted, are both faith-based institutions.

So you can take your pick here. You can believe that Bill lost his job for creating an offensive cartoon in an attempt to halt the growing spinelessness of the American press, or you can believe he lost his job for supporting the wrong candidate. Neither choice paints a flattering picture of modern society does it?

Isn't it ironic that some members of the press, the institution charged with maintaining the free flow of news and ideas, instead act more often to suppress ideas they find dangerous through intimidation and personal attacks, or by slanting their coverage, to ignore stories that do not support their preconceived point of view?

So, what's to be done? Should Bill have some legal protections for speaking his mind? Should Belmont be forced to continue to employ a man they apparently find embarrassing?

It's hard for me to say, mainly because I look at the issue from a slightly different angle. The question I ask is this:

"Would you want to continue to work for an employer if the only way to do so was to keep your mouth shut about what you believe?"

I say no, I wouldn't. And based on his statements to date, Bill answers in the same way. Others choose differently; they hide either their beliefs or their names. They value their employment more than they value their right to speak their mind. They speak anonymously, or choose not to speak at all. I'm not saying that their choice is wrong; every person has to set their priorities as best they can. They may have families, or make work in a field where the predominant philosophies run counter to their own. They may believe that it is better to work quietly from within to achieve change. There are many legitimate reasons for some to choose silence over speech.

It's not a choice I can make.

I've written things in this blog that can potentially keep employers from hiring me. I'm a libertarian, the bastard child of American politics. That means I can irritate the left and the right with equal facility. To make matters worse, I'm a small l libertarian, which means I irritate the Big L libertarians almost as much.

But anybody who googles me, and reads some of this blog will know exactly what kind of a person they are hiring. Look at it this way, they have four years of resume to look through. They'll know for certain if there's a good match or not. If so, they'll hire me; if not, they won't, and that will be the best for both parties involved.

And it seems to me that Bill is in that place right now. He is paying a price for speaking out, for getting involved. But he was willing to pay that price, and is moving on with dignity.

As for Belmont College, they're being raked over the coals in the blogosphere now, and I don't know that they totally deserve it. After the Spragens hit piece, they were placed in a very awkward position. The cartoon was offensive, particularly when taken out of its context as a protest. The college had to react. It would have been nice to see them stand up to the pressure, but that's an unrealistic expectation, given the precarious nature of collegiate funding.

So where does that leave us? Well, let's sum it all up.

• Politics can be an ugly business.
  
• Some folks don't care who they hurt to achieve their aims.
  
• Freedom of speech does not always mean freedom from consequences.
  
• Sometimes, the cost of speaking out is less than the cost of remaining silent.
  
• Finally, a man acts according to the dictates of his conscience, then accepts the consequences of those actions, without whining or evasion.
  

Too Christian for Easter.

It kinda blows your mind, doesn't it?

But it's true. I know a lady who believes that there is too much pagan symbology associated with the Easter Holy Day so she refuses to celebrate it at all.

Now, I can understand objecting to the over commercialization of Holy Days, particularly Christmas, but this just seems silly to me, especially since the merging of pagan and Christian holidays was a deliberate tactic on the part of the early Christian church to replace the pagan traditions with Christian ones. That's why Christmas is celebrated in the middle of winter and Easter is in the spring.

The cool thing to me is that it works, especially for Easter. It's Spring; the world is being reborn. What better time to celebrate the Resurrection of Christ? And if a little bunny, and eggs come along with it, so much the better, particularly since they do reinforce the whole notion of salvation through rebirth.

Some folks just get way too serious about this stuff, like the folks Frank mentions here. Apparently, there's a movement to secularize the Easter Holy Day by deleting all references to the word Easter. It's hard to say which side is sillier, those trying to erase the word Easter because it's too Christian, or the Christians trying to save it, given that it derives from the name of a pagan goddess.

On the other hand, given that Christians co-opted the holiday for their own use, it seems to fulfil an almost karmic sense of justice that souless heathens are now trying to purge all religious aspects from the day.

Spring Break

Wow. The kids go on spring break and my free time disappears!

So when is it my turn to go on vacation?

Anyway, sorry for the lack of posting. It isn't all Spring Break related. I've been fairly busy on my own. I spent a couple of days melding pieces parts from two lawn mowers in an attempt, successful, I might add, to create a single functioning mower. The victory was a phyrric one, I'm afraid, because now that I had a functioning mower, I had no excuse not to mow the grass. And that, my friends, accounted for 2 more days. And a truly staggering case of poison ivy.

Yeah, I love yard work.

Anyway, while I was away, I missed the whole Bill Hobbs controversy, and though I may be a day late, I do have some things to say about that. Also, I've been doing some research on US immigration policy. A comment on my immigration story last week said that only 4000 unskilled workers were allowed into the US each year, and that was why so many entered illegally. That number seemed ridiculously low, so I started researching. What I found surprised me, and did change the way I view these protests. I'm still following up on that research, but look for a good piece before the end of the week.

And I'm sure I'll have a random piece or two about whatever piques my interest.

Illegal Immigrants Demonstrate Against Making Illegal Immigration...er...Illegal

Sorry for the late posting today, but I did something kind of different for today's post. Instead of commenting on other folk's reporting, I actually went to the event I wanted to talk about, the Anti-Anti-Illegal-Immigration rally.

Warning!: Link is to about a 2MB panorama file.Looks pretty but it's big.

As I walked up to the scene, cutting through the Federal Courthouse building, I saw a moderately large crowd gathered on the lawn, probably 300-400 people. The predominant colors were red and white. Many folks in the crowd were wearing T-shirts that read "Where are our rights? Dignity and justice for all" written in Spanish and English. I walked around and through the crowd, listening to conversations, taking pictures, and waiting for the rally to get going.

The crowd slowly grew, peaking around 700-800 people or so, milling about and enjoying the nice weather. Eventually, the rally got underway, with the speaker using the ever faithful bullhorn to address the crowd. The message wasn't surprising. She asked the people present to sign three letters to be sent to Bill Frist, John Duncan and Lamar Alexander asking for fair immigration reform. Their vision of what would be fair remains a bit hazy, since the speaker didn't go into too many detail, although she did add, almost as an afterthought, that she wanted Tennessee to resume issuing driver's licenses to illegals so they could drive legally.

She also announced to the crowd the size of the marches in other cities, 500,000 in Dallas, 250,000 in Atlanta, and 500,000 in LA. Each announcement was followed by a loud cheer. The crowd broke into chants, sometimes lead by the speaker, other times spontaneously.

Si se puede! (Yes we can!)

Latinos united will never give up.

And the ever popular and always useful, "What do we want? Justice! When do we want it? Now!

After the chanting died down, they lined up and began their march around the Federal Court building. The crowd was big enough that the line stretched all the way around the building. They made several circuits around the block before the rally ended, and they cleaned up the site and then left.

But I wondered whether they'd really accomplished anything. After all, a rally has to have a purpose, some goal to accomplish. If the goal was to rally the base, and get the immigrant community active, then the rally was successful. If, on the other hand, their purpose was to garner support for their cause, they fell well short of that goal. While there was only one active protestor, all of the people I talked to during and after the event expressed disagreement with the cause.

"Charity starts at home," one older gentleman told me. "Who do you feed first, your own kids, or somebody else’s? We have too many problems here to deal with. We need to clean our own house before we have guests over for dinner."

I overheard another man responding to the 'justice' chant, "Does justice include deporting felons?"

I didn't hear any outright racist comments, but I didn't hear anything supporting the demonstrators either.

After the rally, I came home, downloaded my pictures, and began writing this post. I was curious to see how the local news channels handled their coverage of the story. The stories were all basically the same, (Immigrants protested, one guy opposed), but there were two interesting things I noticed.

First the size estimates. WVLT came in the highest, with 2000. WATE came in the lowest with 300, and WBIR came in the slipperiest, claiming "Thousands" in the headline, but just "over a thousand," in the body of their article. Like I said, I was there, and it seemed to me that the crowd was about 800 strong, so an estimate of just over a thousand is fairly accurate. I don't know what the other two stations were thinking.

The other thing I noticed was that none of the three stations' reports included any real questions of the organizers or the supporters. Some questions I would have liked to hear:

• You are chanting that you want justice. Define justice? What exactly do you want?
  
• Do you believe that people who enter this country illegally deserve the same treatment as those who enter legally?
  
• Do you believe that people who entered illegally should be rewarded for their behavior by granting them amnesty?
  
• What do you say to all the people waiting in line to enter the country legally?
  
• Do you believe that the fact that your home country cannot offer you the economic opportunities of the US somehow gives you the right to come here illegally?
  
• Do you believe the US should have an open border policy? If not, how would you restrict immigration? What measures would you put into place? How would you enforce those restrictions?
  
• Mexico has immigration policies that are much stricter than the US. Isn't it hypocritical, then, to criticize US policy? Isn't it even more hypocritical if you're here illegally, and ignoring that policy?
  
• Recently, Harry Reid and the Democrats filibustered an amendment to the immigration reform bill that would have made those illegals convicted of a felony ineligible for the guest worker program. DO you agree or disagree wit his stand?
  
• Is it possible for a person to support strict enforcement of immigration laws without being a racist or a bigot?

Maybe the Sentinel will have answers for those questions tomorrow. If not, maybe I'll give the organizer a call and see what answers I can get. Until then, here are a few pictures of the event.

The rally begins


Issue of concern

At no point during the rally did I hear any mention of why the licensing program was shut down to begin with, ie abuse by other illegal immigrants coming from out of state to get a valid driver's license.


A hope, or a thinly veiled threat?


Isn't it funny how that 'wall of separation' gets breached whenever it's convenient?


Selling the revolution.


Pride in his homeland. That he left behind to find a better life. Puzzling.


Wearing his pride.


Professionally printed and homemade T-shirts were the rule of the day. No signs of extensive involvement by national organizations.


A most dangerous sentiment


Flags from Mexico, Honduras, and El Salvador were in evidence throughout the crowd.


I think I was victimized by racial profiling here. I didn't get any of these handouts.



Here's the only picture I really had a hard time with. This is Knoxville's monument to the folks murdered on 9/11. It's not a resting place, and seeing them lean on it like that just seemed disrespectful.

Leaning on the 911 memorial.


A lonely vigil


Marchers move from the City County lawn to surround the Federal Building


The march stretches around the Federal Building.


Should illegal aliens be allowed to vote? This gentleman thinks so.


Apparently, while I was taking pictures of the rally, Mr. David Garrett was taking pictures of me, and in the process of capturing my best side, he also revealed my deepest secret to the world.

I have no butt.


While the rally was very peaceful, and I saw no signs of the La Raza or Mexica movements, a few blocks away, on Wall street, I did find this:

Comments Fixed

For those of you who tried to leave a comment over the last...well...I don't know how long, I've fixed it.

I think.

Somehow, my comment script got renamed, with a .out added after the cgi. Moveable type didn't recognize the new file name, and comments were disabled. I tracked my spam logs, and it looks like it happened on March 20.

Anyway, I corrected the file name, and mow everything appears to be working again.

I hope.

DHS = Department of Humongous Stupidity

Michelle Malkin lays out a blistering denunciation of the Homeland Security Department, one that is nearly impossible to refute.

You know, if I were wanting to win the Presidency and control of Congress, I think I'd campaign using these facts, instead of cobbled up rumor and hysteria.

Maybe that's why I'm not a Democrat.

The DHS has been the biggest waste of time and money I've seen in a long time. All we needed post 9-11 was a streamlined chain of command and more open communication between the various security and intelligence agencies. Instead, we get a bureaucratic behemoth staffed by Bush cronies and other incompetents, incapable of reacting quickly to a crisis (Katrina anyone?).

The worst thing though is that they admit that they are unable to achieve their most basic mission, to keep the country safe from another terrorist attack. How many times have we heard that "it's not a matter of 'if,' but 'when' the next terrorist attack will occur?" If they can't stop a terrorist attack, then what in the blazes are we paying for?

I'll tell you what. Find a candidate who will:

• Strengthen our borders
  
• Continue the war on terror, in Iraq, and wherever needed
  
• Veto any non balanced budget
  
• Disband the DHS, or radically downsize and streamline it's functions
  
• Allow the provisions of the Patriot Act to sunset
  
• Replace the income tax with a flat sales tax, including a poverty cap, and excluding food/clothing/medicine.
  
• Respect the Bill of Rights as written

Find a candidate like that, and I won't give a durn what his social policies are; I'll vote for him. Or her.

The Last American Generation: A Cautionary Tale

Once Upon a Time, there was a great king. He was the greatest king in the history of his land. In fact, he was so great, that some called him the High King. The king, being a wise man, called himself "The First Among Equals," believing that he was a leader, not a ruler.

The land around his kingdom was a fractious and unruly place, filled with rival kingdoms and barbarian hordes, all of whom would like nothing more than to wipe out his kingdom and take the land for their own.

While the king was pragmatic and powerful, and knew that he had to defend his borders, lest the barbarian hordes overrun his kingdom and displace his people, his people were lazy, and lacked the will to fight to protect their homes.

So the king, sorely troubled, looked for a way to find the men he needed to do the job his people wouldn't do. He pondered the question for many months, seeking a way to preserve his kingdom, and at last, he hit upon a masterstroke. He would invite into his kingdom one of the barbarian hordes. He would offer them a place for them and their families to live forever, if they would fight for his kingdom, protecting it from the other hordes, and rival kingdoms.

Now, the king had an advisor, a very wise man who learned much by studying the ancient scrolls, and this advisor warned the king that by opening his borders to the horde, he was only postponing what would then be inevitable, the end of the kingdom.

"Oh great king," his advisor said, "It is true that this horde will fight for you, and will drive out the other invaders, but once the job is done, they will turn on you, and drive your people out as well, and take the kingdom for themselves."

The king was troubled by this counsel, for he know that his advisor was wise, but he also knew that his kingdom would crumble if he didn't find men willing to work. He called for a meeting with the leader of the horde, and extracted a binding promise. In return for being allowed to enter the kingdom, the leader of the horde swore never to turn on the king, and to live peacefully among the people of the kingdom.

The king accepted the leader's oath, and allowed him to bring his people into the country, despite the misgivings of his advisor. And the horde, no longer invaders, entered the kingdom, along with their wives, their families, their customs, and their languages. They built homes and towns within the kingdom, and they sttled, while their men did fight for the kingdom, repulsing the invading hordes, and strengthening the borders. Everything the king had hoped for had occurred. His kingdom was secure from outside threat, and his people continued on, happy and lazy.

For awhile.

As the people of the horde settled in to a peaceful existence, their numbers grew. Soon, they became unsatisfied with the amount of land granted to them by the king. They demanded more room, so that their people could continue to thrive and grow. But the king, pointed to the covenant made by him and the leader, and refused their demands. And the people of the horde grew angry and restless, and began attacking the people of the kingdom. The leader of the horde tried to restrain them, and sent his son to fight against the rebels, and in this way kept the troubles from getting worse.

For awhile.

Eventually, the leader of the horde, now old and weak, died. His son took over leadership of the people of the horde, and came before the king. He told the king that the covenant had died with his father, and he was going to take the land he needed. The king cursed him, seeing that his old advisor had been right, and declared war on the people of the horde. But his people, fat and lazy, had lost the will to fight for what was theirs, and though the battles were bloody, the people of the horde won, killing the king, and driving all of his people out of kingdom.

The king's advisor, now very old and very weak, wept over his king's lifeless body. All that he had forseen had come to pass, and there was nothing to be done, but to join the train of refugees, looking for a new home.

This story is not an allegory, or a prediction of the future; it's a recitation of the past. The king was Vortigern of Briton, and the story took place about 1600 years ago, give or take a century. Part of the story is legend, part myth, but the man called Vortigern did exist; he did make an alliance with an invading people, and that alliance eventually failed, leading to the death of Vortigern and the destruction of his kingdom.

The story can be read many different ways, particularly in light of the current debate on illegal immigration and our border security. I'll just leave you with this quotation:

Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.
George Santayana

Bush Authorized Intelligence Leaks; News Evokes Pavlovian Drooling

And the feeding frenzy begins, including this little gem:

Who here wants to start a Libby death pool? I'll lay 2 to 1 odds he won't live to kiss his kids on graduation day.

.

Nothing gets the day going like slinging assassination predictions around, does it?

Oh, but that's all just a joke, I'm sure.

Ha ha.

I'm guessing that the excitement will die down when they realize that the document mentions only specific parts of the National Intelligence Estimate, and says nothing at all about Valerie Plame.

Key quotes from the NYSun story:

Defendant testified that he was specifically authorized in advance of the meeting to disclose the key judgments of the classified NIE...

Hmmm. No mention of Plame here, and since she didn't participate in the building of the NIE, hard to see how her name could conceivably fall under such a narrowly focused authorization. If Libby did release her name at the time, it would not appear to be covered by the President's authorization.

Mr. Bush's alleged instruction to release the conclusions of the intelligence estimate appears to have been squarely within his authority and Mr. Fitzgerald makes no argument that it was illegal.

It'll be tough to run an impeachment when the boss prosecuter finds no evidence of a crime.

Once again, a lot of sizzle, but no steak.

Now, there is a little for the left to get happy about in this report. They can now make a case that the President released classified intelligence for the purpose of discrediting a vocal critic. It's not illegal; it's not even unethical unless releasing the information could damage national security. Since we had already made the charge that Iraq was trying to purchase uranium, releasing evidence that supported the charge doesn't fall under that catagory.

Also, the President has not only the right, but the responsibility to respond to critics, particularly when they're lying, as Joe Wilson was, and their lies can affect national policy, as well as national security. Viewed in this light, the case that the President was abusing his power to silence a critic loses credibility. It looks more like a reasoned response to a scurrilous attack.

Giving up the Flag, or Preserving Its Meaning?

A school in Colorado has altered its dress code to forbid the wearing of any patriotic clothing. According to the principal of Shaw Heights Middle School, Myla Shepard, it was a safety issue. From the CBS Channel 4 website:
We started seeing name calling, Shepherd said. Safety is my first concern, so I'm going to do things to keep us from getting to a point where anybody is hurt or being suspended for fighting.

What the article doesn't say is why the principal felt her only resort was to stifle the free speech of the students rather than identify and punish those guilty of creating a disruption.

So I called her.

Not unexpectedly, I didn't get to talk to her directly; instead I was referred to the community relations office, where I spoke to Deb Haviland.

I asked her about the policy banning patriotic clothing, and she quickly corrected me. The actual policy, called the Neutral Clothing Policy, bans clothing, banners, and flags expressing a political statement, all camoflage clothing, and all bandanas. It is a temporary policy meant to diffuse tensions at the ethnically diverse campus while the national debate over immigration policy continues.

According to Ms. Haviland, the school normally enjoys a very close relationship among the students, but that began to change as the kids saw media coverage of demonstrations in Denver and around the nation. Students began carrying and wearing flags not just out of pride, but also as a more divisive statement. She didn't go into particulars, but did say that more students bagan wearing clothing that made "sensitive political statements," that were not indicative of normal behaviors of the student body. The tension began to affect the learning environment, so some action had to be taken.

She said that initial attempts to reduce the tension by dealing with the behaviors directly were ineffective, as the behaviors continued to spread. In order to keep the school safe and focussed on learning, Principal Shepard eventually had to resort to banning the political clothing altogether.

I asked Ms. Haviland if she thought that the clothing ban would resolve the underlying tension in the student body, or merely push them back under the surface. She said that the purpose of the ban was to maintain a safe and secure learning environment while the school addressed those tensions through a variety of methods, including unity activities and mending processes.

She also stressed that the immigration debate and the resulting tension in the student body are being used as a learning opportunity, both from a legislative standpoint as well as a cultural one. Students are followng the legislative process, while also seeing first hand how the debate itself has social ramifications for them, even though they are just students.

I'm glad I called the school, because the full story is somewhat different from the reports we got from the Denver TV station. While I'm very leery about the suppression of political speech, especially when it goes as far as a dress code ban, it seems fairly clear that there was more going on here than simply waving the flag.

Having put 6 kids through Middle School myself, I'm well aware that kids at that age will seize any pretext to divide into cliques, and try to elevate themselves by putting another group down. When that happens, it doesn't matter what the pretext is; it needs to be addressed. What makes this situation more complicated is that the pretext used was our national pride. All of us, American, Mexican, or other, feel proud of our heritage, and rightly so. However, to use that pride as a pretext for diminishing another's heritage inescapably devalues our own.

We have to separate pride from pretext, and I believe that's what Principal Shepard did. I don't want my flag used to denigrate somebody else; it's a misuse of the flag and a corruption of what it stands for. Had Southerners stood up and defended the Confederate Flag in the 1960s when it was adopted by white supremecists as a symbol of their hate, it might have avoided the undeserved reputation it carries today. I won't see the same thing happen to the US flag.

Immigration Invasion

Yeah, I know. A lot of you think I'm being overly dramatic, referring to the wave of illegals entering the country as an invasion. But remember two things.

First, like I said before, I'm not referring to a military type invasion. I'm talking about a population invasion where two civilizations/cultures compete for the same land. While this can lead to war and violence, it isn't primarily a military thing.

Second, many of them see it as an invasion as well.

Half a million marchers (the number claimed by the website) announcing that all of the American continent is Mexican, which probably comes as a surprise to the Canadians, not to mention all the folks in Central and South America.

This Entry Has No Purpose...

...other than to memorialize this unique time stamp.

Sharon Stone's Crotch and Its Lame Sequel

One of the stories making the rounds of the blogosphere concerns the tanking ofBasic Instinct 2 and Paul Verhoeven's assessment of who is to blame.

Anything that is erotic has been banned in the United States. Look at the people at the top. We are living under a government that is constantly hammering out Christian values. And Christianity and sex have never been good friends.

First, you have to admit that any director who can turn a movie about lapdancing into a stultifyingly dull 3 hour movie may not actually have a good grasp on what is erotic.

Nicholas Meyer chimes in as well.

We're in a big puritanical mode. Now, it's like the McCarthy era, except it's not 'Are you a communist?' but 'Have you ever put sex in a movie?

Please.

Let's take a look at our supposedly sexually oppressed, Puritanical culture.

• Tonight on TV on Cinemax, ActionMax, and MoreMax, there are about 4.5 hours of "adult drama," AKA soft pron. I didn't even look at HBO or Showtime.
  
• The biggest selling issue of Sports Illustrated features nearly naked women cavorting on beaches the world over. It sells millions of copies.
  
• MTV programming consists largely of putting attractive young men and women in close proximity for a long period of time, and filming the results, including moments of intimacy.
  
• Playboy, Penthouse, and similar magaines are sold in gas stations, convenience stores, and book stores.
  
• Television programming allows far more nudity and sexuality than at any time other time in our history, and rumblings from the FCC notwithstanding, I see no real effort to stop it. Yeah, there was a huge controversy over Janet Jackson's breast, but you can see almost as much on any given episode of Las Vegas.
  
• I'm not going to say anything about the internet, because it's too easy of a target, but if you can't find pictures or movies of everything you ever wanted to see (and quite a few you didn't want to see), you aren't loking very hard.
  
• Listen to music; listen to the actual words. Country, R&B, rock,alternative, rap, it doesn't matter. Sex has always been a huge part of music; the difference is that today it is much more blatant about it.
  
• Let's take a look at advertising. Sex has always sold, but now sex itself is being sold. Often, the images used to sell a product have absolutely nothing to do with the product at all. They don't need to; they just need to be sexy.

Now, don't get me wrong. I'm not saying that the pervasiveness of sexuality throughout our society is either good or bad; that's for another discussion down the road. What I am saying is that only somebody totally wrapped up in their own little world could possibly think we live in a puritanical society.

So, if we aren't all puritans, then why have big budget Hollywood erotic thrillers bit the dust?

Could it be that they're all full of crap, and we can see better work on cable, or for free on the internet?

Let's take a look and see, shall we. The neat thing is that we need go no further than the article we're already talking about. Here again is Mr. Verhoeven:

I like erotic thrillers. But in the last 10 years, I haven't found any scripts that interested me.

Here's the really scary part. The article mentions two upcoming erotic thrillers. One is a Disney flick starring Jennifer Garner. Yep, the mouse is doing pron. I can't wait.

Okay, I can.

It gets worse. The other one stars Ace Ventura himself, Jim Carrey. The thought of a naked Jim Carrey making love to a beautiful woman is enough to drive me to embrace celibacy for a decade or so.

The bottom line on Basic Instinct is this; in the original, we, along with Michael Douglas, didn't know whether Ms. Trammel was a killer or not. Along with the sex, there was a mystery. Yeah, we were pretty sure she did it, but the movie toyed with us just as she toyed with Douglas. However, at the end of the movie, we find out for certain that she i a killer, and the mystery is over. Now 2 decades later, they make a sequel where there's no mystery, only the sex, and while Sharon Stone is still a durn good looking woman, that's not enough to carry a movie as lame as this one.

However, we'll never hear Hollywood admit this; it's much easier to blame a "puritannical public" than it is to actually admit you made a crappy movie.

Simple, and Misleading: A Response to the "Pro-Life Beliefs" Chart

Via Smijer comes this post about inconsistencies within the pro life position.

The basic premise is that if pro-lifers believe that abortion is the same as infanticide, why then do their policies not carry that belief out to the fullest extreme. Amp goes on to show a table (reproduced below) that, according to him, reveals the most damning inconsistencies.

On its face, the chart indeed looks very damning. It does seem to demonstrate that the pro-life movement is really the anti-"women having sex" movement. Unfortunately for the pro-choice folks, appearances are deceiving. Let's put aside for a moment the fact that the positions of the pro-life movement are in fact compromises designed to gain the most support, and therefore by nature will be inconsistent with an absolutist position. While this argument alone explains Amp's "inconsistencies," I think it's very instructive to look at the chart in detail.

What I find most interesting about the chart in question is its inherent bias against the pro-life position. In various places, it contains lgical flaws, buried assumptions, and raises straw man type arguments that fall apart when examined closely.

For example, consider the phrasing throughout the chart. Rather than being a normal outcome of sexual activity, pregnancy is referred to as 'suffering' or 'punishment' and placed on the same level as acquiring an STD. Isn't this the rather medieval outlook that Amp is accusing the pro-lifers of having? Most pro-lifers I have known view pregnancy as a natural consequence of sexual activity, a consequence that must be dealt with, not tossed aside.

All adult choices carry with them consequences that must be dealt with. If I choose to drink too much and drive, there will be consequences. If I choose to spend all my money having fun and neglect to pay my bills, there will be consequences to face. If I choose to indulge in risky activities, like hang gliding, or scuba diving, there may be consequences.

To immediately characterize the process of facing the sometimes difficult consequences of our decisions as 'suffering' or 'punishment'is to assume that it is somehow unfair to the one who made the decision, in essence saying they aren't accountable for their actions.

Granted, the availablity of contraception has enhanced the availability of recreational vice procreational sex, the hard fact remains that the sex drive is primarily procreative, and pregnancy is a forseeable result of sexual activity regardless of intent. That means that the possibility of an unexpected pregnancy must be a factor in the decision to have sex in the first place.

Now, let's look at the decision process a little bit closer. For some reason, most pro-choice advocates believe that the decision to have sex should bear no consequences to the female unless she chooses to accept them, while at the same time denying that same choice to the male. His consequences are determined solely by her choices. The usual defense for this is that biology places the greater burden on the woman, therfore she should have the greater choice. I would agree with that, except that most pro-choicers ignore the logical extension of that principle. By nature of her greater burden, and subsequently greater choice, shouldn't she bear a greater responsibility during the initial choice on whether to be sexually active?

The logical answer is yes; implicit in the power to make decisions is the responsibility to make good decisions, and to accept the consequences of those decisions. Abortion on demand is not facing the consequences, but avoiding them by destroying them. As a practical matter, the answer is also yes. It's her body that will be affected; therefore she should be extra cautious about the decisions she makes, and fully cognizant of the potential consequences.

Once we get past this subtle bias in the chart, we find it also contains a few glaring logical errors. Let's start with the first entry.

It claims that nobody would be sympathetic to parents who kill their children, therefore, any provision to protect the woman receiving the abortion from legal repercussions is hypocritical. May I remind Amp about the tremendous support Mrs. Andrea Yates received after drowning her 5 children? Thre were many who supported letting her go free; some of whom wanted to put her husband on trial for getting he pregnant in the first place. Apparently in some people's minds, there are circumstance where parents can be held blameless for murdering their children.

Further on, the chart claims that supporting lower welfare for poor single mothers is inconsistent with the belief that a fetus is a life. It characterizes the conservative position as saying that welfare encourages poor women to have babies, then argues that by cutting welfare, more poor mothers will abort their babies. The assumption buried in this conjecture is that poor women will get pregnant at the same rate regardless of welfare status, and that the amount of welfare available only affects the decision to keep the baby or abort it.

That assumption has not been tested. In fact, the evidence suggests that the opposite is true. Pregnancies to single women on welfare (particularly young women)have decreased and the abortion ratio has also decreased, indicating that not only are there are fewer overall pregnancies among welfare recipients, there's proportionally fewer abortions as well. Clearly, the argument in the chart is flawed. Supporting welfare reduction results in lower pregnancy rates, a lower abortion ratio, and fewer overall abortions, making it perfectly consistent with a pro-life position.

Another logical flaw is contained in the section on abortion bombers. The chart suggests that those who believe abortion is murder must support the bombers, who are only acting to protect the innocent. The flaw is that this analysis overlooks a key ethical standard; the ends do not justify the means. It's the same old moral dilemma; if you could go back in time and strangle Hitler in his crib, would you? If not, are you now partially responsible for the deaths of millions of innocents? The answer to the second question is obviously, "No." The only one responsible for those murders is the one who ordered it done. And this implies the answer to the first question; if you aren't responsible for the murders, how can you justify doing murder yourself?

The next flaw in the chart is it deals in outdated information. For example, the claim that most pro-lifers are against contraception and sex education. Twenty years ago, even ten years ago, this charge was true. Today however, many pro-life groups support sex education and contraception; even those who still favor abstinance as their favored method now grudgingly accept contraception as a better alternative to abortion. The absolutist position is held only by the extreme fringes of the pro-life camp, just as abortion as contraception is approved of only on the fringes of the pro-choice camp.

Another flaw is the section dealing with partial birth abortion. The chart claims that banning the procedure will not result in a single life saved, since doctors will use another process. There are two logical flaws here. The first is obvious. Just because some folks will find a way around a law does not make the law invalid. You could just as well argue that since murder is illegal, but some folks still commit murder, we should abolish all statutes against murder. The second flaw is more subtle. The objective of the ban is to make late term abortions a matter of medical necessity, rather than convenience, a position recognized as constitutional even by Justice Blackmon in the original Roe v Wade decision. Medical opinion on whether D&X is ever a medical necessity is divided with OB/GYNs falling on either side. Eliminating a medical procedure of dubious value, one that has been abused in the past, will save lives, even if another technique is eventually found. If that new technique is as close to murder as is D&X(the difference between a D&X and infanticide is approx 5"; the average length of a fetal head) then that process too will be scrutinized and opposed if appropriate.

So, now the chart is much less damning than it first appeared. Removing the bias, the inaccuracies, and the logical flaws, it is apparent that the chart is basically a well constructed bit of misleading propaganda. Pro-life is not anti-woman in a thin disguise. Most pro-lifers are motivated by a profound belief that a fetus is a person. Now, while many of the apparent contradictions can be resolved with the application of a little research and thought, those that remain are real, but are usually the result of compromise in order to create a larger base of support.

Important Disclosure: As a single male, I have a vested interest in the pro "women having sex" camp, but that interest in no way contributed to this post, or biased me in any way.

The Hammer Gets Nailed

Tom Delay quit today.

Why?

He is almost certainly going to beat the indictment for violating campaign laws.

So why would a man known for fighting hard, dirty, and to the end, suddenly quit?

Maybe because he knows the end is coming.

It's the only explanation that makes any sense. While known for playing hardball, he's also known as a man committed to his party, and for him to drop out now, knowing he has the full support of Texas Republicans, means he must know that somthing is coming that will either cost him that support, or do damage to the party somewhere down the line. By removing himself from the line of fire, he's acting to minimize the damage to his party.

My best guess is that whatever is coming down the line is connected to the Abramoff scandal, but regardless of what the bullet is, by quitting, Delay has signalled that it is on target, and will leave a mortal wound.

Just for fun, let's compare Delay's resignation to McKinney's steadfast defense of her assault on a Federal officer. If I'm right, Delay fell on his sword to minimize the damage of his acts on his party, and the causes he supports. By contrast, McKinney is pulling as many people as possible into the path of the oncoming train of her potential indictment, arrest, and conviction, hoping to salvage her career by spreading the pain.

So, which is the more principled approach?

Improper Touching

I think Ms. McKinney may be a bit unclear on the whole concept of an improper touch. Allow me to clarify.

When Michael Jackson fondles a 12 year old boy, that's an improper touch.

When a Catholic priest gropes an altar boy, that's an improper t