Don we now our tin foil beanies!
Ala Mashhar in the Gulf News stuns with Plot to assassinate Arafat feared:

Palestinians have thrown a tight security cordon around President Yasser Arafat fearing his assassination by unconventional means that could be construed as "a natural death", highly informed sources told Gulf News yesterday.

The new security steps include searching and close monitoring of all Arafat's visitors. The sources said that one speculated method of assassination could be the direction of poisonous rays towards Arafat's brain.

These rays can cause palpitations in the heart leading to a failure of brain resulting in gradual stop in breathing and ultimate death.

Sorry Ala, but the senile old thug has too few brain cells left for this to work. But by all means, tote ole fishface around with a big foil chapeau - the dish towel is getting pretty grubby.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 11:22 AM -

 
He's pushing up daisies
Christopher Hitchens tells us in the odious Mirror, Why I Think Bin Laden is Dead:

Until two years ago, you could hardly shut Osama bin Laden up. He had a great fondness for the sermon, the proclamation, the taped fatwah. And all of these, like the captured video from Kabul showing his gloating over the World Trade Center, were extremely easy to authenticate. Indeed, they were too genuine for my taste. How likely is it that such a loquacious character would manage to sit out the whole Iraq war without feeling any need to orate?

And the recent tape, supposedly from the goat botherer?

It would be easy enough for his fellow-gangsters to prove me wrong. All they need to do, next time they point a video at their heroic guru, is to put in his hands a recent edition of an Arabic or Pakistani or Afghan newspaper. The date needn't be visible - the headline would do.
...
The voice-over seems to be that of Ayman al Zawahiri, one of the few uncaptured lieutenants. It is he who intones the usual jihad rant while his boss walks silently over some landscape. Why so shy, big guy? Cat got your tongue? Figure it out for yourself: it's a lot less risky for bin Laden to pose for an authentic picture, whether still or video, than it is for him to make even a local telephone call. (His deputy Hambali, recently grabbed in Thailand, was caught by using a phone-card.)

Yet this simple piece of photographic propaganda seems beyond him. Even the dullest and cruellest kidnappers know that, in order for their extortions to be taken seriously, they must produce what is known in the trade as "proof of life" before they can blackmail the relatives.

Bin Laden is only being asked to give proof of his own life and he can't even manage that.

In summary: his people badly want to prove that he is still with us. What they want to prove is easy enough to demonstrate. And they can't do it. Whether by induction or deduction, we can infer for now that there's a good case for saying "Hasta La Vista, Binnie".

Maybe he's just pining for the fjords?

And the best line about the "usual jihad rant" was Mark Steyn's:

Instead, Osama makes audio cassettes, and he licenses his subordinates to make audio cassettes, and they issue bloodcurdling threats against everyone from the Great Satan to hapless bystanders like Ireland and Canada, and none of those threats comes to pass. They’re all turban and no jihad.

Kinda like fleas. While mildly laughable, you still call the exterminator.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 10:30 AM -

 
Passing strange
Mark Steyn asks about the murder of Swedish Minister Anna Lindh, How can anyone be a bystander while someone is stabbed?

There seem to have been an awful lot of bystanders to Miss Lindh's stabbing - in broad daylight, in a crowded department store, after being pursued by her assailant up an escalator.

Sheesh! I hadn't heard all the details.

Granted that many of the people bystanding around were women, it still seems odd - at least from my side of the Atlantic - that no one attempted to intervene or halt the blood-drenched killer as he calmly left the store. I'm inclined to agree with Jimmy Hoffa that I'd rather jump a gun than a knife - and even Jimmy's luck ran out eventually - but, if just a handful of the dozens present had acted rather than bystanding, Miss Lindh might still be dead, but her killer would be in jail and not en route, like Olof Palme's, to becoming yet another man that got away.

With all due respect to Jimmy, his comment only applies if you are empty handed. A department store is chock full of all kinds of crap that can be used effectively. Hey, throw stuff at him, if you don't want to get too close.

"It's terrible wherever it happens," said Fredrik Sanabria. "But you think you would be safe from this kind of violence in a country like Sweden."

Really? Why would you think that? Sweden's violent crime and murder rates have been going up, up, up over the past quarter-century. But just about every Swede quoted in every news story seems mired in what National Review's Dave Kopel described, after 9/11, as "the culture of passivity". The lone exception was Lanja Rashid, a Kurdish immigrant. "If I had been there at the stabbing, I would have ripped his face off," she said. "How could people just stand back and watch?"

It's nice that there's one Swede with her head screwed on straight. Must not have been there long enough.

You can blame it on a lack of police, as everyone's doing. But Miss Lindh's killer didn't get away with it because of the people who weren't there, but because of the people who were: the bystanders. When I bought my home in New Hampshire, I heard a strange rustling one night and, being new to rural life, asked my police chief the following morning, if it had turned out to be an intruder, whether I should have called him at home. "Well, you could," said Al. "But it would be better if you dealt with him. You're there and I'm not." That's the best advice I've ever been given.

This isn't an argument for guns, it's more basic than that: it's the difference between a citizen and a nanny-state baby. In Lee Harris's forthcoming book Civilization And Its Enemies, he talks about the threat of societal forgetfulness: "Forgetfulness occurs when those who have been long inured to civilized order can no longer remember a time in which they had to wonder whether their crops would grow to maturity without being stolen or their children sold into slavery by a victorious foe."

It wasn't that many centuries ago that the ancestors of these Swedes were some of the toughest customers around. I guess they did forget.

But sometimes folks remember.

But, of course, no one will ever hijack an American plane ever again - not because of idiotic confiscations of tweezers, but because of the brave passengers on the fourth flight. That's why the great British shoebomber had barely got the match to his sock before half the cabin pounded the crap out of him. Even the French. To expect the government to save you is to be a bystander in your own fate.

Amen, brother.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 8:56 PM -

 
And while we're having fun in California
Assembly approves bill to waive tuition for immigrant students. Since it is the SF Chronicle, we know that "immigrant" means "illegal alien":

A bill that would allow undocumented immigrants to apply for financial aid at California community colleges was approved by the state Assembly Thursday.

The bill, by Sen. Martha Escutia, D-Norwalk, would direct the board of governors to establish a process so students without legal immigration status can apply to have tuition waived.

It's great that California taxpayers have so much dough that they can have their own foreign aid program!

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 12:58 PM -

 
California governor makes stand on dirty toilets.
The headline writer could have tried a little harder. Anyhow:

California Governor Gray Davis, seeking to bolster his low popularity a month before a recall vote against him, has came out against dirty toilets in schools.

Wooho! There's a bold stance!

And while he was at it - Governor Allows Two New California Indian Casinos:

California Governor Gray Davis has signed compacts with two additional Indian tribes, allowing them to open small casinos with up to 350 slot machines in San Diego county in exchange for a 5-percent share of revenue for the state.

Leaders of the 17-member La Posta tribe and the 950-member Santa Ysabel tribe signed the compacts.

A 17 member tribe? Isn't that like a family?

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 12:39 PM -

 
Pond Scum Honor Roll
Because it's always nice to know who your friends aren't.

Jeff Jarvis in the NY Post on PBS's 9/11 Crime:

Leave it to PBS to turn the terror and tragedy, the unspeakable crime and pain of 9/11 into a cold, soulless exercise in political self-criticism.

If you watched the Ric Burns documentary "The Center of the World" this week, you saw an effort to rewrite the story of 9/11, so it is no longer about murderous fanatics and selfless heroes, not even about life and death.

It is about globalization.

We would expect nothing less from PBS.

British Muslims denied sites for celebrating 9/11:

A radical British Muslim group, which had planned to celebrate the September 11 attacks at public meetings across Britain, was forced to cancel the events yesterday when four chosen venues refused to make space available.

Instead, the Al Muhajiroun group held a news conference where it displayed portraits of the hijackers — labeled the "Magnificent 19" — with Osama bin Laden's face superimposed over an image of the New York's World Trade Center in flames.

Ulps! I hope they don't find out about the bacon fat on the mosque door!

Andrew Sullivan on the Baathist Broadcasting Corporation:

"At the one extreme you have George W Bush, at the other Osama Bin Laden.."

Good thing they never met me, it would upset their calibration.

At Daimnation:

Just after my clock radio came on this morning, I heard someone on CBC Radio's "World Report" talking about the need for Americans to seek "closure" after the events of September 11, 2001.

Bullshit.

Indeed.

(Via Dr. Frank) Guardian moonbat Roger Burbach opines:

"To understand better what happened in New York in 2001, go back to Chile in 1973."

This eructation was also featured in the NY Times and at Cornell's 9/11 celebration. Hmm, I must have missed the talking points when they were distributed! However, other than that they both occurred on Sept. 11 and are pet projects of leftoid whiners, the situations aren't at all alike. But it's a good way to fill column inches.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 8:18 AM -

 
Remembering 9/11



The Islamofascist knuckle draggers who believe that Western blood will assuage their rancor that their culture took a wrong turn into a stagnant cesspool about a thousand years ago are walking dead men and no one will miss their passing.

Or they will be, if the West doesn't succumb to the usual suspects calling for "closure"

• The barking moonbats on the left and their toffee nosed academic pals who blame America and its citizens for everything they can conjure up
• The garden variety politicians who are upset that their trough time was interrupted and their cousins, the disgusting quislings who think surrender is always the best plan
• The air brains who think warm hugs will cure the world's ills
• The smarmy media talking hair-dos who are distressed that the people are getting "off message"
• The Hollywood glitterati who think their ability to take a turn on the stage has endowed them with some sort of superior moral authority
• The peanut gallery of greasy self-serving bureaucrats infesting the United Nations and various other chancellories world wide

We've got your closure right here.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 9:14 AM -

 
Yet more hagfish
Jayson Blair has reportedly got a six figure book deal. The article features a snap of the stylish fellow.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 7:43 AM -

 
Action and reaction
A new poll says U.S. view of U.N. largely negative and on the PR Newswire we read Gillian Martin Sorensen Joins the United Nations Foundation:

The United Nations Foundation (UN Foundation) announced today the appointment of Gillian Martin Sorensen as a Senior Advisor to help expand and mobilize support for the United Nations and its partners across the United States.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 7:40 AM -

 
And speaking of slimier than a hagfish...
Dean Flips on Israel:

Under fire from pro-Israel leaders, Democratic 2004 front-runner Howard Dean last night retreated from his statement that America shouldn't "take sides" in the Mideast, and said he backs a "special relationship" with Israel.

Howie, you're supposed to hang out in the leftoid fever swamps until after they nominate you.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 7:34 AM -

 
I can't blog fast enough to keep up with Cruz!
Good thing Mickey Kaus and Daniel Weintraub are on it because Bustamante is slimier than a hagfish. In case you haven't been keeping up, here is just some of the latest:

Bustamante drops 'no on recall' as negative ratings rise. Since "no on recall" had been disappearing rapidly from the Cruzer's stump speeches, this is no real surprise. The biggest hoot was the other day when asked about this, ' "You didn't hear it over the roar of the crowd, but at the end of the speech, I said, 'No on recall, Yes on Bustamante," the Democratic lieutenant governor insisted.' The crowd also drowned out the sound of Gray Davis twisting in the wind.

But sometimes Cruz manages to get heard at campaign rallies as he did the other day by Kaus when he opined that anyone who worked in the USA and paid sales taxes should be a citizen. The Cruzer also had a sad spiel about illegal aliens fighting and dying in the US armed forces, but not being able to drive in California. It must have slipped the big guy's mind that illegal aliens can't serve in the armed forces.

And not only did Cruz collect tons of money from California's voracious casino Indians, but his brother, Andrew Bustamante, is the general manager of an Indian casino. Not to worry though, Cruz says he'll donate all the cash to the anti proposition 54 campaign, as long as he can star in the TV ads made with the loot.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 7:22 AM -

 
Now for some real laughs
(Via Dave Barry) Giant dino feces excites researchers. Ruh oh, better keep the kids indoors!

And even better, the American Teleservices Association (a telemarketer trade group) is all upset with Dave for giving out their phone number. It seems they got a lot of unsolicited calls. Stop, you're breaking my heart!

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 9:38 PM -

 
Today's hoot ... but the laugh's on us!
Rich Lowry at The Corner got an email:

Mr. Lowry:

Regarding your Sept 9, 2003 New York Post Opinion `The Right Answer to North Korea': Regarding President Kim Jong Il, it is un-professional, and un-productive to refer to the head of a country as a "lunatic". It is also another sad example of White American Male Supremacy. Please don't become part of the problem with such name-calling."

[NAME WITHHELD]
Former U.S. Department of State Foreign Service 1985-88
1999-2001 contracted US Mission UN Protocol under Ambassador Richard C. Holbrooke

I wonder how much the benighted taxpayers paid for the services of this genius?

But wait, maybe I could overcome my WAMSS (White American Male Superiority Syndrome) if I broadened my horizons to take in the full glory of ole Juche Fruit. Here's a start - Naked girls, caviar and dog stew - Kim Jong-Il lives it up:

Kim Jong-Il, the leader of North Korea and the most dangerous remnant of George Bush's "axis of evil", orders his troupe of female dancers to strip for guests and dines on the finest imported foods while most of his countrymen starve to death in his famine-plagued land.

In a rare insight into his life of privilege and excess, Kim's former executive chef has described how the "Dear Leader" washes down exotic sushi, Iranian caviar and gourmet shark fin soup with vintage French wines from his 10,000-bottle cellar before treating himself to his favourite tipple, Hennessy XO cognac.

The diminutive dictator with the bouffant hair is also partial to the traditional Korean delicacy of dog stew. Yet his desperately impoverished people have been reduced to making gruel from wild roots and tree bark - and even eating human flesh on sale at farmers' markets, according to some recent reports.

I'll skip the hairdo and the dog stew, thanks, but what about the girls?

Kim's "Pleasure Group" of female singers and dancers are a staple attraction at all-night banquets prepared by dozens of highly-trained chefs.

On one occasion witnessed by Mr Fujimoto, Kim ordered the girls to strip naked, then made his guests dance with them, but warned them to go no further. "Dancing is okay but you can't touch. If you touch, it's theft," the Dear Leader told them. Kim, he writes, specifically forbade his underlings to sleep with members of the Pleasure Group.

Mr Fujimoto later married one of the troupe's entertainers whom he first glimpsed singing at one of Kim's late night banquets; the next time he saw her, she was boxing other women for the amusement of guests.

Woohoo! That puts WAMSS to shame fer sure! How can I get me some of that Absolutist Superiority Syndrome (acronym left to the reader)?

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 9:25 PM -

 
Dadgum sightings!
Although I am given to using the occasional countryism, "dadgum" is not one of my favorites. But it seems to be breaking out all over. First it was in the report of a NASCAR fracas in the pits:

"I wasn't even thinking there's an incident getting ready to happen, and I'm still in the car. It takes me a minute to get unbuckled, and as I'm unbuckling, I don't see Kevin yet but I see his crewmembers walking up and down my car like it's a dadgum runway or something, jumping up and down on the sheetmetal, collapsed the hood, and basically total lost the race car. And just absolutely absurd. I mean, I never seen anything like it."

NASCAR - hmm, I can understand that. But now it shows up in an article on the RIAA suing those pesky music downloaders:

A 71-year-old Texas man, Durwood Pickle, told the Associated Press yesterday that his teen-aged grandchildren must have downloaded songs during visits to his home, then left the sharing features enabled so other Internet users could access them. He said his grandchildren had explained the situation to the RIAA in an e-mail.

"I didn't do it, and I don't feel like I'm responsible," Pickle said. "Dadgum it, got to get a lawyer on this."

Durwood Pickle? Dadgum, you can't make this stuff up!

Of course, for something really unusual, there's the RIAA asshats themselves - check out the rest of the article for details.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 1:41 PM -

 
The reviews are in!
Zev Chafets in the NY Daily News liked the President's speech - W's Iraq sting ends Dems' summer daze:

On Sunday night, President Bush performed his annual homage to boxer Muhammad Ali. When the President retreats to Crawford, Tex., in August, his political opponents start slugging away. By Labor Day, the President appears to be bloody and beaten, just barely hanging on.

And then Bush comes back to Washington, springs into action and punches the arm-weary Democrats right in the nose. In boxing, this is called a rope-a-dope. In politics it is known as recasting the debate.

Last summer, Bush's critics were all over him for pursuing a unilateral Iraq policy. Last September, the President responded with a speech to the UN in which he called for - and got - a Security Council resolution. The resolution was worthless, of course; most UN decisions are. But by getting it, Bush knocked his opponents off balance. By the time they recovered, Gen. Tommy Franks was catching crawfish on the banks of the Tigris.

And this year:

Slowly, the Democratic candidates punched themselves into a frenzy. Former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean started calling for a U.S. withdrawal from Iraq. Rep. Dick Gephardt of Missouri labeled Bush "a miserable failure." Even Sen. Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut got in a few blows. The cheers of the partisan crowd convinced them that they were on the verge of a knockout.

And then, pow! Bush went on TV and told the country that Iraq is simply a battle in a much larger global war against terrorism. And you don't stop in the middle of a war to start fretting over money and counting casualties.

And of course, that's the fundamental disconnect. The leftoid Democrats think 9/11 is stale news and that with a lot of big hugs, the jihadists will be our pals. Earth to asshats, there's a war on - choose your side and reap the consequences.

Even the NY Daily News editorial page liked the speech - These colors don't run.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 9:57 AM -

 
More on MEChA Man (bloggers mentioned)
John Leo in the NY Daily News - Racial taint being ignored in Calif. recall:

California Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante's ties to the creepy Chicano secessionist group MEChA may not be the biggest story of the recall election, but voters surely have a right to expect some actual information about the leading Democratic candidate's views of a group that is certainly racialist, if not racist.
...
Now, it's safe to say that if a leading Republican candidate for governor had any ties to a MEChA-like group of white supremacists, past or present, 20 or so reporters would charge out of every California newsroom, eager to commit journalism. Nothing like that has happened.

Well now there's a huge honking shocker.

The heavy lifting on this story has been done by Internet bloggers. Glenn Reynolds (Instapundit), Mickey Kaus (Kausfiles) and two sites new to me (Tacitus and Pejmanesque) have been reporting on MEChA. (For a defense of Bustamante, go to Ted Barlow's site.) Tacitus argues that this can't be whisked away as a harmless youthful affiliation. He writes: "Former Klansmen and former Nazis don't get a pass unless they spend a great deal of time and energy apologizing for and explaining themselves in a convincing manner."

I agree. Defenders of MEChA portray it as a benign social group now distant from its radical roots. But MEChA sites tell Chicanos not to work outside "the bronze race" and to condemn "multinational" alliances. And there are hints of violence. El Plan de Aztlan calls for "self-defense against the occupying forces of the oppressors."

If this is leftover '60s bluster, why don't MEChA and Bustamante simply disavow it?

C'mon Cruzer, what's the deal?

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 9:44 AM -

 
I hope you're sitting down!
Because this is a real shock - Tim O'Brien from the New Jersey Law Journal reports Cuba Trips, Cigars Sink Bar Applicant:

A self-described liberal idealist who says his three visits to Cuba in violation of federal law were acts of civil disobedience has been denied admission to the New Jersey Bar by the state Supreme Court. Zachary Sanders, who passed the New Jersey bar exam in July 2001, first was given a thumbs down by the Committee on Character, which rejected his argument that he had a right to disobey what he called the "immoral and unjust" embargo on trade and travel to Cuba.

A three-lawyer committee said, "it was crystal clear ... that Mr. Sanders believes himself to be absolutely morally justified in breaking the law." The panel said it viewed him as one who "detaches himself from responsibility to obey the law by endeavoring to distinguish the morality of the law from its legality."

The usual suspects are funny that way. But who would have thought in this modern age that failures to obey the law would keep one from practicing it?

Sanders, 29, admitted traveling to Cuba three times through Mexico, Canada and the Bahamas; deceiving U.S. Customs officials about the visits on re-entry to the country; lying to customs agents about trying to smuggle Cuban cigars into the United States and blowing off a query by the U.S. Treasury Department seeking information about his first visit. That last move led to a $10,000 department fine for ignoring the query, a fine Sanders acknowledged he made no effort to pay.

But ole Zack put on a stirring defense:

He invoked Gandhi, Thoreau and Martin Luther King Jr., and argued that if the committee's recommendation were to be followed, it would mean that "civil disobedience would be foreclosed."

How did civil disobedience come to mean doing whatever you want and not being held accountable? Must have happened about the same time free speech came to mean saying whatever you want and not letting anyone disagree with you.

But the smuggled cigars proved to be Sanders' undoing. The Committee on Character, the OAE brief and subsequent oral argument focused not so much on the trips and the cigars but on Sanders' lying about them. The committee said he offered no "good or political explanation" for trying to bring them back.

Ruh Oh! Contraband stogie alert!

Sanders said he committed an "error in judgment" by bringing boxes of cigars back for friends on his first and second trips. Apparently learning from his mistakes -- his bags were searched the first two times -- he brought no cigars back from his third trip, in August 2001, just after graduating from Benjamin Cardozo School of Law at Yeshiva University.

The committee report, written by Chairman Robert Ritter, said it was clear Sanders felt "morally justified in breaking the law and lying to Customs Officials not once, not twice, but three times."

Ritter, a partner with Hackensack, N.J.'s Schiffman, Berger, Abraham, Kaufman & Ritter, excoriated Sanders over his unremorseful and combative position. He wrote: "The explanation is not acceptable to the citizens of this country.

"Lawyers, in particular, cannot choose which laws they will violate because of political beliefs. Further, only after the committee expressed serious concern about his conduct did Mr. Sanders volunteer that he would only make future trips to Cuba with the appropriate government authorization. The testimony was self-serving as the committee believes that he would continue to violate the law with impunity but for the pending decision of this committee."

Ya think?

Much more wingnuttery in the article including a bio of the beamish boy subtitled "An Activist Comes East."

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 8:46 AM -

 
The media fifth column
(Via Instapundit) Over at Strategy Page, Jim Dunnigan writes on the media's role in asymmetric warfare:

The same thing almost happened in Iraq in 2003. During the first two weeks of the American advance into Iraq, any real, apparent or imagined delay of the coalition forces was instantly declared the beginning of a coalition defeat. Even as American troops moved within sight of Baghdad, the pundits were still gravely talking about bloody house to house fighting. There was much talk of asymmetric warfare by the Iraqis, and there was a lot of guerilla type attacks. But the American troops came up with new tactics faster than the Iraqis could think of ways to get around the American advantages.

Using the media as an asymmetric warfare weapon is pretty common, and sometimes it works. It worked in Somalia. It worked several times in the Balkans during the 1990s. Islamic fundamentalists use the media as one of their more potent weapons. The use of imbedded reporters during the Iraq war is seen by the Department of Defense as a use of asymmetric warfare against potentially dangerous media. Indeed, many media pundits have said as much, and darkly warn that the media cannot tolerate more such "defeats" in the future.

It's been working since at least the "Tet Offensive." But what I would be interested in knowing is how the media became the handmaiden of totalitarians everywhere and of every stripe?

UPDATE: In a related vein, Kathy Kinsley points to Time to watch the BBC bias that costs each of us £116 a year.

No, BBC bias is not a piece of partisan trickery - it is a state of mind. So strong is the state of mind that a great many of the acts of bias, perhaps the majority of them, are quite unconscious. It is time to delve into that unconscious. Hence our Beebwatch, which starts on the opinion pages today.
...
Why are we bothering? Because anyone who wants to watch television in this country must by law pay £116 a year to the BBC for the privilege. It is like compulsory tithes to the Church of England in the 18th century. You may be interested to know what sermons your money is paying for.

And of course, that is the part that grates the sensibilities. It's one thing for fulminating asshats to spout nonsense. It's quite another for them to do it on the taxpayers' nickel.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 8:09 AM -

 
Naked Wingnut Alert!
It's WTO conference time which means it's wingnut marching season! WTO protesters bare resentments _ and bodies _ at beach in Cancun:

Anti-globalization protesters stripped out of their clothes and spelled out the words "No WTO" with their naked bodies Monday, the first of several actions against the World Trade Organization meeting in this Caribbean resort.
...
A policeman scanned the protest through binoculars, but didn't try to stop it.
...
Many of the laughing, sand-covered protesters demanded that Mexican President Vicente Fox come and roll on the beach naked.

Sadly, there are no photos, but since the only protestor quotes in the article are from men, it may be just as well (and why the police kept a safe distance). However, to fulfill the obligatory photo requirement here's a comely protestor apparently dressed up as a member of the Klan.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 3:58 PM -

 
Country hijinks alert!
P.J. O'Rourke in Forbes - Diary of a Country Gentleman, Part IV: Long on advice, short on gratitude, the French lead a coalition of kvetching in New Hampshire:

I've never told this to anyone before, but my wife has French blood. She's lived in the U.S. since she was eight, so she's recovering. But her sister, Françoise, who went to the Sorbonne and married her professor of Pre-Deconstructionist Literary Criticism, is not expected to survive.

That's OK, P.J. Those things happen even in the best of families.

Especially not if my neighbors in Quaintford, New Hampshire, get their hands on her.

Ruh Oh!

My wife is also ready to kill her sister. Françoise makes a lot of comments about my wife's clothes.

Françoise: "Those boots, the heel is too flat. They do not flatter your calves. The boots lack a certain chic."

My wife: "I'm hosing out the barn."

Much more by following the link, including P.J.'s hunting dog, "Barbie," and fine French cuisine.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 8:40 AM -

 
And speaking of Gray Davis' sequinned hot pants
Gray found the whoring lucrative on Friday - Davis Faulted on Immigrant License Bill:

LOS ANGELES - Gov. Gray Davis signed a bill granting driver's licenses to illegal immigrants and told cheering supporters, many of them waving flags from Central American countries, that they should be able to drive to jobs.

And then he ushered them into the waiting Border Patrol buses for the first step in their trips back to their native lands?

Oh sorry, I was dreaming - the mantra is to help the poor lawbreakers take jobs from American citizens:

For Francisco Zedino, a 42-year-old immigrant from Guatemala, though, the license is important. In the seven years he has lived in the United States, he has had two cars impounded because he was driving without a license, he said.

Too bad nobody impounded Francisco.

So what does Gray say?

"Hardworking people deserve to have their license," said Davis, who was also scheduled to give the Democratic response to President Bush's weekly address Saturday. "Now they can drive to work. They can drive their kids to school. They can drive their parents to the hospital."

Jobs that could be filled by American citizens. Hospitals and schools that are paid for by law abiding American citizens.

And I'm sure when they get their licenses, all the illegal aliens are going to decline the Motor Voter check off to register to vote. Yeah, right.

There's not much the citizens of California can do except to recall the vote slut and his flying monkey henchmen, but US Rep. Tom Tancredo has a Federal angle:

In response, House Immigration Reform Caucus Chairman Tom Tancredo (R-CO) plans to introduce legislation Tuesday, Sept. 9, to strip federal highway money from states that either already have or plan to adopt similar legislation.

Cool - the "hardworking people" will feel right at home riding their donkey carts down the rutted dirt roads. But don't drink the water!

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 10:14 AM -

 
California Hijinks and Gray Davis' Sequinned Hot Pants
Jill Stewart smites the stupid of the California Dreamin' variety in The Worst Laws I Have Ever Seen: What You Should Have Been Watching Instead of that Boring Debate

Wednesday's recall debate broke little new ground as meek journalists and inexperienced citizens lobbed softballs at Gov. Gray Davis and the candidates, failed to ask the toughest questions and let false statements go unchallenged.

The utter fallacy, repeated two or three times by Cruz Bustamante, that illegal immigrants pour $1,400 more into California's economy than they get back, for example, should have been stopped cold. Look closely at his wording, and you will see that each time Bustamante was asked about all the troubles surrounding "illegal immigrants," he altered his answer and spoke only of what we gain from "immigrants."

He well knows, or sure as hell ought to know by now, that an in-depth state audit showed only 19% of illegals bother to file taxes, and the best data on illegal immigrants, from the late 1990s National Science Foundation study, shows that each citizen-headed household in California pays out a net extra $1,178 to shore up 3 million mostly low-income illegal immigrants. Bustamante also knows that underground cash-for-work economy created by the 3 million illegal immigrants in California is one reason income taxes paid to California state coffers are so out of balance.

Good ole Cruzer is shiftier than a telemarketer talking to a senior citizen. But the newshawks were on top of him, right? Dream on.

Now, is the $1,400 he cited a figure Bustamante got from some think tank study about how much money our legal immigrants pour into California? Faced with experienced tough journalists, Bustamante would never have gotten away with that kind of slimy word game during a debate.

But look at who was doing the questioning: small-market journalists from public radio, a small Bay Area paper and a Spanish-language paper, whose questions about abortion rights and other irrelevancies betrayed their left-leaning sympathies and their intellectual flaccidity in the face of phony Davis propaganda.

What no Weekly Shopper reporter? I'm sure one of them would have asked, "If illegal aliens are such a fantastic deal, why don't we send engraved invitations to everyone in Mexico?"

But then Jill points out where the real action was - Gray Davis standing on a street corner asking passersby if they'd like to party:

The debate merely distracted journalists while some of the worst legislation in years hurtled toward Davis' desk.

Let's review some of the worst stinker bills in Sacramento, shall we?

Senate Bill 2 comes closer to socialism than anything I've seen heading for approval in 20 years. It would force California's hard-hit small and medium-sized businesses, with 20 or more employees, to pay 80 percent of employees' health coverage. Companies with more than 200 employees would be forced to pay that for the whole family. Even part-timers get this big perk.
...
The goal here is to co-opt workers before the recall, then let the chips fall. They'll say: "We won free health care for you! We made history!" No kidding. Watch for businesses to stream out of state.

Gosh, there's nothing like free health care! But wait there's more:

Davis says he'll sign SB 18, giving the obscure Native American Heritage Commission the power to stop development on anyone's land in California if tribes feel construction interferes with a sacred site anywhere in the region.

Initially, this turkey included a five-mile zone around each sacred site, meaning construction could be challenged five miles down the freeway from a burial grounds or other site.

SB 18 was idiotic, and opposition by cities was intense. But Sacramento is Backwards World. So its authors (Burton again, and also ditzy San Diego Democrat state Sen. Denise Ducheny) changed the law. Now, tribes can challenge development even further removed from sacred sites. Now, there's no five-mile limit at all.

Oh yeah, the proceedings of the Heritage Commission are closed to the public. I wonder how much cash will the commission members will require per building permit?

And hit the article for the details of Gray Davis' big "reform" of the already ridiculous worker's compensation laws in California. Surf's up dude, so I'm feeling poorly!

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 9:54 AM -