A reward for evil

Sometimes it's a shiftless loser that likes to rape and murder little girls with some enablement by his airbrain pals. Sometimes it's a sleazy husband who denies his wife medical care and rehabilitation therapy after her suspicious accident, while he spends the money won in a lawsuit that was earmarked for that purpose. And sometimes it's a representative of a huge untaxed foundation that wants to brag about how he conspired to steal the American people's free speech rights.

I'm sure the toasting forks are ready in Hell for these folks, but sometimes you can't help wishing they would get an appropriate earthly reward too. If we're really lucky, the child killer will actually get one.

They still can't do the three R's

And that's just the teachers. But they are rather sneaky:

It's no secret that the public education establishment hates the No Child Left Behind Act. It calls for all of the things educrats resist: standards, testing, accountability for performance and a requirement that teachers be "highly qualified" in the subject field they're teaching.

Sadly, that last element has already been undermined by teachers' lobbies at the state level. A loophole in the original federal legislation left it to individual states to establish their own criteria for "high, objective, uniform state standards of evaluation" of teachers. As education expert Terry Moe of the Hoover Institute reports, rather than requiring competency testing or specific subject-matter degrees, states like Arkansas simply regard five years of experience as sufficient to satisfy the "highly qualified" standard. In New Hampshire, a teacher can meet the requirements by merely conducting a "self-assessment" with a supervisor and "partner," demonstrating once again that there's no education reform that educrats can't find a way to circumvent.

I don't know about you, but my self-assessment says I'm darn swell.

In addition to frontal assaults on No Child Left Behind by the teachers unions, there have been numerous, petty guerrilla attacks on the act. One recent example was in a school district in Lincoln, R.I., where assistant superintendent of schools Linda Newman and the district's elementary school principals decided to cancel the annual spelling bee, sponsored by Scripps Howard newspapers, for students in the fourth through eighth grades. According to these spoilsports, with only one child able to emerge as the ultimate winner, the spelling bee would violate the spirit of No Child Left Behind, since the rest of the contestants would necessarily be "left behind." Newman explained that the current fashion in public education circles emphasizes self-esteem, which is why activities that produce winners and losers, such as sports teams, are to be avoided.

You can see why a loser like ole Linda would feel that way.

More hilarity by following the link, but it's this kind of thing that leaves me less than troubled when I read an article in the local paper that the schools in our state were near the bottom of the list in per capita spendng per pupil. I figure it's less money for the "professional educators" to blow on worthless drivel as an excuse for not teaching the basics. Number 1 on the spending list was Washington D.C. which merely confirmed the impression. And don't get me started on "computers in the classroom."

What a pair!

Ward Churchill pretends to be an Indian-scholar-artist and the Associated Press pretends to report news.

Blogger continues misbehaving. Ignore the duplicates below - I will clean it up when I can.

Ruh Roh!

The Weekly Standard Scrapbook has some fun with The New York Times:

A January 1, 1995, Times editorial on proposals to restrict the use of Senate filibusters:

In the last session of Congress, the Republican minority invoked an endless string of filibusters to frustrate the will of the majority. This relentless abuse of a time-honored Senate tradition so disgusted Senator Tom Harkin, a Democrat from Iowa, that he is now willing to forgo easy retribution and drastically limit the filibuster. Hooray for him. . . . Once a rarely used tactic reserved for issues on which senators held passionate views, the filibuster has become the tool of the sore loser, . . . an archaic rule that frustrates democracy and serves no useful purpose.

A March 6, 2005, Times editorial on the same subject:

The Republicans are claiming that 51 votes should be enough to win confirmation of the White House's judicial nominees. This flies in the face of Senate history. . . . To block the nominees, the Democrats' weapon of choice has been the filibuster, a time-honored Senate procedure that prevents a bare majority of senators from running roughshod. . . . The Bush administration likes to call itself "conservative," but there is nothing conservative about endangering one of the great institutions of American democracy, the United States Senate, for the sake of an ideological crusade.

Smooth, real smooth.

And while you're there, click back to page 1 of the column for the skinny on a deal between Clear Channel Communications and the Chinese Communists to bring Monster Truck Ralles to China!

Or, as Reuters put it: "House sized trucks that shoot fire" while "crushing everything in their path" may "soon have the Chinese gaping in awe."

Heh, heh, heh, heh, heh.

Incidentally, anybody know where we can get our hands on a couple billion Confederate flag decals?

Yeeehawww!

Who needs cash, he's got a whole country

The aging thug has his whine on - Castro Rebukes Forbes 'Infamy' on His Fortune.

Your United Nations at work

WHISTLEBLOWER READY TO TESTIFY:

A former U.N. official who was fired after warning his superiors of "flagrant mishandling" of the U.N. oil-for-food program will be the star witness at a congressional hearing this week.
Dr. Rehan Mullick, a Pakistani national who worked as a U.N. research officer in Baghdad from 2000 to 2002, is expected to be the first U.N. insider to publicly detail mass corruption in the program when he testifies before the House International Relations Committee tomorrow.

A spokesman for the committee said in a statement yesterday that Mullick "repeatedly warned his superiors in Baghdad and later in New York" that Saddam Hussein's regime was diverting humanitarian goods to his military and that Iraqi intelligence agents had penetrated the U.N. offices in Iraq.

"Despite his impassioned pleas, he was repeatedly demoted until his job was finally terminated by the United Nations in 2002," the committee statement said.

Stay tuned for the usual suspects to come out of the woodwork to attack this guy.

"This pair beats two thugs and a jackass burning something any day"

Here. And here:

I can look through the galleries and instantly guess with very nearly 100 percent accuracy whether a given image was from a pro- or anti-Syrian rally.

I suspect the principle has universal application.

How Chris Heinz thinks of himself.

How everyone else thinks of Chris Heinz

The only part of Blogger that is working today is picture posting via Picasa. Maybe I'll start sending smoke signals.

Hot girl on girl action!

In Iran. As I observed yesterday, this would be a lot more impressive if the erstwhile female cops were patting down a male ne'er-do-well.

All the usual suspects

TERROR FUNDS ARE 'TRASHED':

Newark used federal Department of Homeland Security funds to help pay for 10 top-of-the-line, air-conditioned garbage trucks — and a group of state lawmakers think that stinks.

Newark unveiled its new garbage trucks last month — and boasted that the financing had partly come from "Homeland Security grants."

Actually that's good news - they actually bought something with the bucks instead of enhancing the lifestyles of the usual politcal hacks.

African Leaders Back Tech Tax to Help Poor Nations. Ah, that's more like it! More Mercedes for the thugocracies, coming up!

International Criminal Court offers Darfur hope. Oh, please. The ICC is mighty cold comfort.

Boys will be boys!

Having a hard time explaining the UN Sexual Abuses Pandemic? You know, the "peacekeepers" bothering every animate object they can find? Well, Opinipundit points to an interview with Kofi Annan's new butt boy, er, Chief of Staff, Malloch Brown that 'splains it all:

WALLACE: But why over the last few weeks? The fact is, in Cambodia (search), in the early 1990s, there were allegations of this, and a top U.N. official said at the time, "Boys will be boys."

This isn't a recent incident. This has been going on for more than a decade. Why are you sending officials out in recent weeks saying this will not be tolerated?

MALLOCH BROWN: Because it's happened in some missions, and when it happened in Cambodia, it was attacked there, and we tried to address it.

But I think the problem is, we are dealing with something which in some ways is as old as soldiering itself. And the difference is that the U.S. military or my own military, the British military, have in recent decades invested a huge amount of leadership and resources to break these old habits of occupying military groups, to make them realize that this abuse of women in the community is utterly unacceptable.

In our case, our very underfunded peacekeeping missions, with soldiers stitched together from Bangladesh, Jordan, many other different countries, all under their own different commands and without the resources to give them the other recreational options, that the standards of behavior have not been modernized in the same way that has happened with the American or the British military, and we've now got to tackle that.

And the governments who support us in the Security Council have to help us do it by improving the lines of command and putting the resources in it to give soldiers other options.

I guess he means we should dig deep to give these "peacekeepers" some knitting and crafts kits and other "recreational options". You ever notice how at the United Nations the answer is always to give them some more cash? They're funny that way, I guess.

Washington Pest

Paul Bedard at US News and World Report:

It was a classic Washington story. According to a Page 1 Washington Post story, short-fused Defense Secretary Don Rumsfeld had about had enough of pesky members of Congress during a recent hearing of the House Armed Services Committee. So he cut his testimony short, went to lunch, and headed to an afternoon Senate hearing. "Donald Rumsfeld," said the paper the GOP loves to hate, "doesn't do accommodating very well." Loaded language? Some inside the paper thought so. Worse: Committee Chairman Duncan Hunter said the story wasn't right. Seems there was a deal to let Rummy leave early. Hunter wrote the Post, but the paper didn't run the letter. So when Rumsfeld appeared before the panel again last week, Hunter explained, "You did precisely as we agreed to." Rumsfeld thanked Hunter for the "very accurate explanation." Then he added, "I wonder if it will appear in the Washington Post. Probably not." It didn't.

Hey, they're real busy over at the Pest singing Kumbaya.

"Who is Dotty Lynch?"

Cliff Kincaid has a hint:

But lacking facts didn't deter Lynch, who offered her bottom line: "Planting or even just sanctioning a political operative in the WH [White House] press room is a dangerous precedent and Karl Rove's hope to become a respected policymaker will be hampered if the dirty tricks from his political past are more apparent than his desire to spread liberty around the globe."

Now where's the evidence of Rove planting or sanctioning a political operative in the White House press room? There is absolutely no evidence. Speaking of political operatives, did you know that Dotty Lynch is a self-described liberal who worked as a pollster for Democratic candidates and liberal causes from 1972 until 1985? Did you know that in 1984, by her own admission, she was an "ardent feminist?" Did you know that in 1984, by her own admission, she was "very involved" in the successful effort to get a woman, Geraldine Ferraro, on the Democratic ticket? We could run our own story about Lynch headlined, "CBS News-Democratic Party Connection," and we wouldn't have to use a question mark.

Ole Wingnut Dotty is the political editor of CBS News. I'm sure she fits in there real nicely.

Bloggin' Fun!

Patrick Hynes reports on the Politics Online Conference 2005:

Somehow the subject of Fox News came up and one bloated, goateed attendee went into a frenzy. Snarl-faced and glassy-eyed, he declared, "Fox News isn't journalism! It's a direct arm of the Republican National Committee! They meet with the Republican National Committee every morning!" Even Nicco from the Dean campaign looked uncomfortable.

Turns out the fellow was a blogger with "The Raw Story," a vehemently pro-homosexual blog and webzine, which specializes in "outing" Republican members of Congress. While not a member of the panel, he took it upon himself to insert his opinion on just about everything discussed or mumbled by anyone in the room.

"If you're a rightwinger, you are a fascist," he vociferated to no one in particular.

"I'm a rightwinger," I responded. "Am I a fascist?"

"Pretty much."

It dawned on me: this clown's free speech was more of a nuisance in this, a public setting than in electronic form on his blog. At least when it's on his blog, I need neither to hear nor read it.

And you don't have to constantly worry about staying upwind of him too!

Mary Poppins Ninjas!

Actually, according to Reuters, it's "Iranian female police cadets." Sheesh, the mullahs are really quite a few bricks shy of a full load, aren't they? As one of the folks on FR observes:

What would happen to those Muslim women should they put their hands on a man not related to them? How are they going to arrest them if they can't touch them? And would the men even listen to them? I can't see them as anything more than window dressing to placate the Iranians.

That does make the whole proposition rather difficult, I guess. Maybe the Mullahs could get a few tips (on fashion, if nothing else) from Gaddafi?

It runs in the family

You may recall that Teresa's baby boy, Chris Heinz, took time out from dating celebrities to help out in Lurch's campaign with a variety of assorted wingnuttery including chatting up the peons on Democratic Underground. The latest news on the Chris front is that Momma has been touting him for a Congressional run and that he has a new celeb "pal". Ho hum - business as usual for limousine liberalism. But the DUmmies are pining for a little of that celebrity stardust to wear off on them - DUmmie FUnnies 03-11-05 ("Chris Heinz for Senate in PA!!!):

When rumors spread a couple of months ago that Chris Heinz was thinking of running for Congress, we all thought it was hilarious since Chris has spent his entire life doing exactly NOTHING except act as a wealthy paperweight. Now comes word of something that overshadows even that in HILARITY content. It is that Chris Heinz might run for the U.S. Senate as you can see in this DUmmie THREAD titled, "Chris Heinz for Senate in PA!!!"

Please run, Chris! I will send a donation!

[Chris Heinz has so much money he should be sending you a donation.]

Me too! Hear that, Chris? Your warchest is starting already. He's got it all and I could really get behind him as the Dem candidate.

[Chris Heinz is heir to a billion bucks and DUmmies want to send HIM money???]
...

Chris Heinz is HOT HOT HOT!!!! He would be ADORABLE to look at on TV. This lady approves!!!! PLEASE RUN CHRIS!!!!!

[Yes! PLEASE RUN CHRIS!!!!! The comedy material would be LIMITLESS!!!]

I'd love to see him run for Hart's seat . . .There's no doubt in my mind that Chris could be a great senator someday, but he probably needs to get a little more political experience and pay some dues before jumping to that level. I hope Chris does decide to run for something because, from what I've seen, he's a very intelligent and well-spoken person. BTW, Chris, are you here lurking among us? What are your thoughts?

[Chris Heinz is probably thinking what it will be like to have a job for the first time in his life.]

I agree! He came to Harvard to speak to students, and in the Q+A thing, I asked "Has anyone ever told you that you look like JFK Jr?" He lauched into this huge story about how the answer was yes, and how he dated gwenyth paltrow

[An intellectual heavyweight that Chris Heinz is but to reach the stature of JFK, Jr., he needs to date Darryl Hannah or Sharon Stone.]

And Chris, not to worry about that icky work thing in Congress. Step-dad has never let it slow down his social pace!

The groves of academe

Are mostly inhabited by moonbats as Maj. Gen. Robert H. Scales Jr. demonstrates in - Confessions of a Military Student:

My reward for surviving the Battle of Hamburger Hill was graduate school. The Army offered me two fully paid semesters away to study a subject of my choice and my choice was military history. My dad was a professional soldier and veteran of three wars so I grew up listening to war stories from a colorful and rich collection of war veterans. I walked battlefields in places we lived overseas like The Philippines and Germany. My mother told me that I read The Red Badge of Courage when I was eight and Grant’s Memoirs at twelve.

I arrived at Duke in the summer of 1971 on what was a pilgrimage to the Mecca of war studies. Something like sixty generals have advanced degrees from Duke. Two chiefs of service, Ron Folgelman, Air Force, and Rick Shinseki, Army, earned master’s there before me. Second year officer students greeted me with the warning that Vietnam had changed the atmospherics at Duke mostly for the worse. Their advice to the new guy was unambiguous: take courses only from that terrific cadre of esteemed professors who joined the faculty after serving in World War II. Men like Ted Ropp, I B Holley and Richard Preston quite literally invented the discipline of war studies during the fifties.

I chose one. Unfortunately shortly before Labor Day, he died. In his place marched into the classroom the first of the History Department’s young Turks hastily tenured in fear after the student riots in the late sixties. Professor “X” was about four years older than me. He was a Marxist on the make when Marxism was the rage on campus. His first group of graduate students would be the clay that he would mold to become an edifice to his brand of dialectical scholarship. He changed all the pedagogical rules. Only one four hour session per week; each would be a student’s hell with brutal show and tell exercises during which we would learn just how stupid we were. We would get a grade every week. Immediately, half the students bolted. But not me. After all I’d survived an AK -47 in my face. Could this be any worse?

Well, actually, yes it was.

Been there, done that.