Big Brother is coming

Via TheGeekWithA.45:

On the surface, this sounds like a good idea.

The Pinellas school system is ready to approve a new technology that uses student fingerprints to keep track of who is riding school buses.

Beginning in the fall, the fingerprint system would identify students as they board and leave. The goal is to ensure they are getting on the right bus and getting off at the right stop.

There will also be a GPS unit in the system, which will allow the district to track where the buses are, where they've been, and how long it is taking to drive the routes. However, the potential for abuse of the fingerprint system is significant, not to mention the implications of any tracking system of this kind:

"This is probably a really good idea, but in my mind it was just this terrible feeling, like they're watching my kids wherever they go," said Nancy McKibben, mother of three teenagers at Palm Harbor University High School and president of the school's PTSA.

Critics say programs of this nature raise significant privacy concerns and teach students at a young age to accept what amounts to a "Big Brother" surveillance society.

"We are conditioning these children to understand that they have no personal space, no personal privacy," said Barry Steinhardt, director of the American Civil Liberties Union's Program on Technology and Liberty.

When I read the last paragraph in this next excerpt, my first impression was to go "BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!"

[Michelle Bianco] thinks a fingerprint system would be a good idea. Not only would it prevent children from getting lost, she said she has no qualms about her children's privacy being compromised.

"I wouldn't be concerned about a privacy issue, because I know the School Board is very concerned about not letting anyone get hold of that information," she said.

On second thought, the board probably is very concerned. However, that concern has the potential to be overridden for any number of reasons. Not least of which is:

Superintendent Howard Hinesely said the district also plans to apply for a federal Homeland Security grant that could reimburse some of the cost.

"Each State, in ratifying the Constitution, is considered as a sovereign body, independent of all others, and only to be bound by its own voluntary act. In this relation, then, the new Constitution will, if established, be a FEDERAL, and not a NATIONAL constitution." --James Madison, Federalist No. 39

Via The Federalist

Why Leftism will lead to Totalitarianism

Via QandO comes a link to this excellent essay by Dale Franks:

Populist Leftism: Our Social Cancer

There are many great quotes, here are a few:

Quite simply, I believe that modern Populist Leftism (which for convenience, I will refer to as PL) will destroy our civil society, and replace it with totalitarianism. Indeed, I believe that PL must lead inexorably to totalitarianism by its very nature, because the philosophical principles upon which it is based are antithetical to both self-government and personal liberty.

...

PL policies are simply not predicated on rational evidence or historical experience, but rather on ideological suppositions that are immune from proof. In another context, we would refer to such ideological suppositions as a "religion".

...

The second danger inherent in the ideology of PL is the concept of government it promotes. Rather than conceiving of government as a means of protecting persons and their property from the predations of another, the PL concept defines government as a tool for perfecting humanity. The PL assumes that human nature is perfectible, and that the power of government can be harnessed to achieve this perfectibility. Rather than taking a pessimistic view of human nature, PL is utopian. By definition, this means that, for the PL, the power of government is not best used in preventing you from doing evil, but requiring you to do good. There is a vast difference between those two concepts. Under such a concept, the power of government is limitless as a practical matter, which invites the most egregious abuse.

...

We graduate children from high school who are functionally illiterate, but who know beyond doubt that animals have "rights", and that capitalism destroys the environment. One hundred years ago, the average high school graduate spoke and wrote in English, Greek, Latin and probably German, knew algebra and trigonometry, and would have laughed uproariously at the very thought that he had a moral imperative to become a vegan.

Summary and analysis

Over at Triggerfinger is a concise summary of what happened in the Senate over the past five days regarding Senate bill 1805. It pretty much sums up what happened and why. I would like to add something, though.

Basically what we saw here was a case of the anti-gun-rights crowd in the Senate trying to have their cake *or* eat it. The ideal situation was that they do neither but, in this case, they got the least objectionable of the two. By corrupting the bill with the amendments that were tacked onto it, they put themselves in a win-win situation. If the bill fails, then efforts to bankrupt the gun industry via baseless lawsuits can continue. If the bill succeeds, they get their precious AWB extended and expanded, as well as other things. I think that's what they were truly hoping would happen because, so far, no lawsuit of the type that would have been prohibited has succeeded. They wanted something tangible rather than something that was only potential. In the end, we the people came out ahead. Once the bill was amended we were never going to get a pure victory. But we did get the better of the two possible outcomes.

Much credit must go to Senator Larry Craig of Idaho, the author of the bill, who fought so vigorously to protect what he crafted and who had the courage and integrity to call for its death when he saw how mangled it had become.

Much shame must go to those who voted for those heinous amendments and especially to those who authored and introduced them. Of particular note are Diane Feinstein and Charles Schumer. GeekWithA.45 sums it up rather well in this post.

Look at me!

When Harvey looked at my blogroll, and noticed his site was included, he posted about the experience of seeing his site's name listed with the others.

Look at those names. It's like a who's freakin' who of blogdom... come to think of it, it looks a lot like my first blogroll.

Except this one's got MY name on it.

I think I can relate, though. Because I felt a similar feeling, though probably not to the same degree. The reason was this: Someone on my blogroll *noticed* me, took the time to post about me, and even requested that I write something about myself so that he could "make fun of [me] properly." It's like having a celebrity call you by name and ask you to come hang with her.

When I started this little foray into the 'net I basically figured that a few people here and there might come and read what I write. That's basically how it still is. However, I feel like I've crossed some kind of threshold. Harvey is read by a lot more folks than I am but now they're going to see what he wrote about me and maybe, just maybe, they'll click the link and see for themselves just who this Radar Rider guy is and what he's all about. And maybe, just maybe, they'll like what they see and come back again a while later to see if there's anything new. Who knows?

Actually, this isn't the first time this has happened. One of my other blogrollee's, Joe Kelly at The Sake of Argument, put me in his blogroll and, when I saw that, I felt that same sort of giddiness. He didn't post anything about me, though.

And now the possibility exists that someone will read this and want to ask, "How did you come to their attention in the first place?" Well I'll tell you... (he's going to tell, he's going to tell)

I did it be leaving comments on their weblogs and trying to make them insightful. Sure, I could just leave a note that says, "Hey! Look! I have a blog, too! Come see!" It may get one or two clicks but not many. Unless you provide some idea of your writing style and what you think, most people probably aren't going to be interested. But give them something good, something that makes them think, and (in my opinion) they'll be more likely to take a look at the rest of what you got.

Wow, look at that! I've only been at this for six months and I'm already giving advice about blogging. Is this arrogance or hubris? I guess only time will tell.

In the end, the reason most of us do this is because we want people to want to read what we write. It's like the Open Source Software community where many if not most of the members write and modify software for the recognition. With a few notable exceptions, people who author weblogs do not make any money at it. We do it for pure enjoyment, to get our words out on the net, and in the hope that someone will stop by, read what we wrote, and say, "Good job."

Senate Bill 1805 has been defeated

Senator Larry Craig, the primary sponsor of the bill, was the last to speak before the final vote. In his own words: "I believe it is so dramatically wounded that it should not pass, I ask my colleagues to vote against it." As GeekWithA.45 said, he called for his own bill to be taken out behind the barn and shot.

The final vote was 8 yeas and 90 nays. This effort to extend and expand the AWB has failed.

Oh bloody hell

GeekWithA.45 and Publicola, among others, have been keeping an eye on the Senate debate over S. 1805. This is the new designation for S. 659, the bill that would prohibit frivolous lawsuits against gun manufacturers and dealers whose lawfully-sold and non-defective products are used in crimes. Unfortunately, there have been three anti-gun amendments added to the bill.

• Requiring all guns to be sold with a gun lock


• The McCain amendment to "close" the so-called "gun show loophole"


• Renewal of the 1994 Assault Weapon Ban that is scheduled to sunset this coming September

In addition, another amendment has been added that would give law enforcement officers the right to carry concealed weapons in other states, but not other citizens who have a concealed weapon permit. As GeekWithA.45 says:

The message I'm getting is pretty clear: Annointed agents of the State are noble and holy, and peasants "have no right to military weapons".

Other amendments are coming up for a vote later today.

The House has already passed a clean version of this bill but the Senate bill is now irreparably poisoned. It's possible that, should the Senate pass this bill, the amendments would be stripped back out in the committee to reconcile it with the House version or that, if they aren't, the President would veto it (he has stated he wants only a clean version). But I don't know if we can take that chance. I'm leaning toward the opinion that it would be better to kill this bill now and not risk passage of these amendments. Let the AWB ban sunset and then try this bill again next year.

New subdomain

I now have the site set up so that it's at radarrider.stormy-night.org. Any page requests at the old subdomain should bring you to the equivalent page in the new one, including those with anchors (i.e. of the form http://[domain]/[page]#[something]) to specific posts on the page. I'm working on making the entire site conistent with my handle, Radar Rider. I still have one thing left to do but that will likely result in the loss of any comments so far. But since there are less than ten total I'll probably just go ahead and do it.

Seattle and France

(Via LGF)

As a resident of the Seattle area, I find this article in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer particularly interesting. David Horsey is an award-winning editorial cartoonist for the P-I. Recently, he and three other cartoonists attended a cartoon festival in France. Mr. Horsey is not noted for his love of the current administration but, after reading this article, I find myself respecting him more than I did before (not that loving the administration is what you need to do to earn my respect given that there are many things about it that I don't love either). Some excerpts:

At one point, as we stood onstage getting our pictures taken with yet another student being awarded a prize for yet another anti-American image, I turned to Benson and said I felt like one of the Dixie Chicks, the all-girl country singers who got heat in the heartland for denouncing their president at a concert in Europe. We realized it was one thing for us to point out our country's flaws in our daily cartoons and quite another to see our homeland portrayed in such brutal imagery by French schoolkids echoing what they hear from their parents and teachers and see in the media.

As sharp critics who, nevertheless, love our home, we tried to point out that the America simplistically rendered in the children's drawings was a mere caricature, that our country, like theirs, is a complex society struggling to make real its founding principles of liberty, justice and equality. But it was impossible to move the conversation far from the president and his triumphalist foreign policy. Europeans are preoccupied with their disdain of Bush.

...

Bush-hating has also given Europeans a marvelous distraction from their own failures; their failure in the Balkans, their failure to come up with a constitution for the European Union, their failure to build an independent military force, their failure to put together a single, coherent European foreign policy. In so many ways, Europeans who once ran the world now feel impotent to affect international events or even get their own house in order. They float like a lovely but rudderless old yacht in the surging wake of an American aircraft carrier.

So, Europeans do the one thing that makes them feel superior: revile Bush, the lunatic cowboy, and all those gun-toting, overweight, money-obsessed, religion-crazed Americans who chose him as their president.

It's nice to see a well-known critic of the administration that knows the difference between thoughtful criticism and mindless hatred.

Raq and Roll

My girlfriend likes country music and, while I'm not a true fan, I have lately come to appreciate what it has to offer even for an old rocker like myself. We usually listen to the local country station on the way in for that reason and because they have the most frequent and complete traffic reports of any station in the area. On the way in this morning we heard the new single by Clint Black, "I Raq and Roll." It's an unabashed song in support of the troops and America and we had to check it out when we got to our respective workplaces and web access.

Turns out it's not on his latest CD, out tomorrow, but you can download the song in mp3 format from his website, as well as view the lyrics. Clint Black has also established a charity fund for the families of soldiers killed in combat. Here's the excerpt from the news page:

Clint Black Establishes Charitable Foundation -- The Clint Black Foundation has established a fund to benefit the families of soldiers killed in Operation Iraqi Freedom. Clint Black is providing all the necessary administrative costs to make sure 100% of the proceeds will go to the families. One way to contribute to this fund is to purchase a specially designed t-shirt with a design that highlights his latest single, "I Raq & Roll." Those who do not want to purchase a t-shirt, but want to make a donation, can simply make out a check to The Clint Black Foundation, Families Of The Fallen Soldiers Fund and send it to: The Clint Black Foundation, C/O Sussman & Associates, 1222 16th Ave South, 3rd floor, Nashville, TN 37212.

The song can be downloaded here (right-click and save as). The lyrics are here.

The duToits visit Dachau

Kim writes with uncommon power even for him after he and his family visit the Dachau concentration camp in Germany.

At the end of the trip, we turned to the kids and said: "One day, someone may say to you that this never happened. You are here to bear witness that it did. Never, ever allow those lies to take root and spread. Make sure your children know that this happened, too. This cannot be allowed to happen again." (emphasis in original)

He also has some strong words for those who equate Bush with Hitler.

What I care about is that by trivializing the issue, by using your absurd hyperbole, you dishonor the suffering and the loss suffered by the people who were victimized by the real Hitler. Your own illusory suffering at the hands of this Republican president is not only trivial, it is non-existent, and do not even think you can begin to equate the two.

I can take it further. Your grotesque equation of the two leaders is a profound exaggeration: and it's the same kind of gross exaggeration used by Hitler and his henchmen to inflate the "Jewish problem" into a manifest danger, whereby people could ignore the excesses of places like Dachau as being justified. In case that isn't clear enough to you, let me connect the dots. George W. Bush isn't using Hitlerian tactics, you are. (emphasis in original)

I would like to add to his words the following: If you say that Bush is the same as Hitler, the fact that you can say so and have not been imprisoned or killed is unequivocal proof that you are wrong. I believe Kim when he says there will never be a Dachau in the United States. There are simply too many armed citizens to let that happen.

Since it dovetails nicely with the above, I would like to direct you to the website of Jews for the Protection of Firearms Ownership. They understand that there's only one way to ensure that the words "Never Again" have meaning.

List of gun quotes

Harvey links to a list of gun-related quotes and includes the list because "they're just that good." Most of them are right on but I would like to comment on a couple of them:

14. Guns only have two enemies: rust and liberals.
Only one of these applies to my Glocks. :)

23. Enforce the "gun control laws" we have, don't make more.
Actually, we need to eliminate most, if not all, of the gun control laws that we currently have.

The Machine

So, since this site is "Musings of a Techno-Geek" and since almost all, if not all, of the posts so far have dealt with politics, here's some technology. It occurred to me that there is a small, but non-zero, probability that at least one person who reads this is interested in what I use for a home computer. Thus, I present you with the specs for...

The Neue Regel

• CPU: Athlon 2800+


• RAM: 1 GB Corsair SDRAM


• MB: Asus A7N8X Deluxe with nVidia nForce2 chipset and SoundStorm digital audio plus two integrated network adapters


• Video: ATi Radeon 9800 Pro with 128 MB RAM


• HD's: One 120 GB Western Digital Ultra ATA and one 40 GB Maxtor Ultra ATA


• Optical: One Asus DVD-ROM drive and one Plextore CD-RW drive


• Power Supply: Antec TrueBlue 480W with lighted fans


• Case: Antec/Chenming-style aluminum case with window


• Monitor: Viewsonic VX800 18" LCD flat panel at 1280x1024


• Mouse: Logitech MX500 optical mouse


• Keyboard: Microsoft Natural Keyboard Pro


• Joystick: Microsoft Sidewinder Force Feedback


• Additional: Antec 80mm blue LED fan on CPU heatsink with adapter, two blue LED fans in the front of the case, and a cold cathode light that I never use because the LED fans light up the interior just fine

It's totally a gaming rig, which means it will do everything else plenty fast as well. The aluminum case and flat panel monitor are especially nice when hauling it to LAN parties. I've yet to encounter a game that it can't run totally smooth at 1024x768 resolution or higher. Most games I run at the monitor's native resolution of 1280x1024 with all the visual goodies turned on and maxed out. I bought this machine in anticipation of Half-Life 2 and Doom 3. Well, I have to wait a bit longer than I originally thought but the system should still run both titles with no problem.

Trackback

Not like anyone actually reads this site but I now have trackback ability through Haloscan. It's kinda clunky right now but it works and the Haloscan guys assure their users that they will be working to simplify it in the future.

Real corporate welfare

Via QandO

From John Stossel's article in Reason Online:

Ronald Reagan memorably complained about "welfare queens," but he never told us that the biggest welfare queens are the already wealthy. Their lobbyists fawn over politicians, giving them little bits of money -- campaign contributions, plane trips, dinners, golf outings -- in exchange for huge chunks of taxpayers’ money. Millionaires who own your favorite sports teams get subsidies, as do millionaire farmers, corporations, and well-connected plutocrats of every variety. Even successful, wealthy TV journalists.

That’s right, I got some of your money too.

He goes on to describe just how that happened. Here's the answer he was given when he asked about why it's done the way it is:

Why does Uncle Sam offer me cheap insurance? "It saves federal dollars," replied James Lee Witt, head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), when I did a 20/20 report on this boondoggle. "If this insurance wasn’t here," he said, "then people would be building in those areas anyway. Then it would cost the American taxpayers more [in relief funds] if a disaster hit."

That’s government logic: Since we always mindlessly use taxpayer money to bail out every idiot who takes an expensive risk, let’s get some money up front by selling them insurance first.

He then proceeds to detail several types of government handouts that benefit primarily the wealthy. For example, he brings up the reason why the Coca Cola you get in Canada tastes better than that which you get in the US:

When public interest groups compile lists of corporate welfare recipients, a company called Archer Daniels Midland (ADM) is usually at the top of the list. You may never have heard of ADM, because its name rarely appears on consumer products, but it’s huge. Its products are in most processed foods.

ADM collects welfare because of two cleverly designed special deals. The first is the government’s mandated minimum price for sugar. Because of the price supports, if a soft drink maker wants to buy sugar for its soda, it has to pay 22 cents a pound -- more than twice the world price. So Coca-Cola (and almost everyone else) buys corn sweetener instead. Guess who makes corn sweetener? ADM, of course. Now guess who finances the groups that lobby to keep sugar prices high?

Because this artificial price elevation doesn't occur in Canada, real sugar is cheap enough that they can use it in their soft drinks.

Here's what I consider the most profound sentence in the entire article:

Letting businesses fail is vital for the creative destruction that allows the market to work.

I think those who are complaining about "tax cuts for the rich" are missing the point. The rich still pay a hugely disproportionate amount of the total amount of income tax collected by the IRS. But, as this article shows, it's true that some of them are getting handouts and kickbacks that they don't need to stay rich, let alone stay in business.

I also noted that he didn't focus on one political party. He mentions the Bush and Kennedy families, Richard Gephardt, and Alan Keyes. This is the kind of stuff that makes we with we had a real, viable third party in this country.

Harvey commandeth and I must obey

I left a couple of comments over at Harvey's blog, Bad Money, and he, for some strange reason, decided to take a look at my blog. Then, for a yet more unfathomable reason, he deigned to mention it in one of his posts and even provide a link to it. He ended said post with:

And Radar Rider, you need to get an "About Me" post up sometime soon so that I can make fun of you properly ;-)

Therefore, I feel compelled to do as he asks and provide grist for his humor mill.

So... about me... *ahem*

I'm a 30-something computer geek who lives in the Pacific Northwet [sic], specifically the Puget Sound area, and works for one of the software companies located here. Some people who work with computers during the day go home and don't want anything to do with them. I, on the other hand, spend an inordinate amount of time in front of my home rig playing games, surfing the web, and other pursuits that are no doubt corrupting my fragile mind and will end up with me as the center of attention in a large, humming chair. Or not (as The Emperor is fond of saying).

As far as my political views go, I guess I would say I'm conservative with strong leanings toward (little "L") libertarianism. Like most people, though, I don't think I can really pigenhole myself, especially as my political views are constantly evolving. I really only became "politically aware" in the last four or five years and it's rather interesting to note how much I have come to agree with my father's views. The older I get, the more I look like him so I guess it's not surprising that I think more like him as well. I just hope this doesn't mean I'm all grown up now and have to stop acting like an overgrown kid.

A few other tidbits: I enjoy riding motorcycles and I'm a licensed private pilot. I live with a wonderful woman and a cute but somewhat neurotic cat. I leave finding out more about me as an exercise for the reader; it shouldn't be hard as I haven't tried seriously to be an anonymous blogger.

Can't wait to see what Harvey does with this....

Another one of my favorite weblogs is The Sake of Argument by Joe Kelley. He also has a rather down-to-earth and practical style. Here is his latest on gay marriage. Some excerpts:

As a conservative, I can’t understand how America would be would be set back by encouraging promiscuous homosexuals to engage in long-term, committed monogamous relationships. Homosexuals are fighting for access to health insurance, pensions, family medical leave, hospital visitation, bereavement leave, and a variety of other basic legal protections for families and children. None of these options will be available to them if they are divorced from (or not married to) their partners, thus establishing government-regulated encouragement to stay committed. With less promiscuity, we’ll see less sexually transmitted diseases and lower private and taxpayer-funded health insurance payments.

...

In absence of a good argument supporting it, I can see no reason to expressly prohibit homosexual marriage through a Constitutional Amendment. The solution, as I have previously argued, is to take the state completely out of “marriage” and grant all couples, both homo and hetero, civil unions. Allow marriages to be the sole property of churches.

...

Frankly, the two functions of the existing DOMA are in contradiction of each other. You cannot allow states to create their own marriage laws for the benefits of the participants if the participants can’t benefit from the marriage laws.

The ideal role of Uncle Sam would be to Constitutionally prohibit one state from defining marriage for other states and to recognize marriage (for purposes of federal law) as defined by each individual state.

Mike on SSM

One of the weblogs I like to read the most is Cold Fury. The author, Mike Hendrix is a fellow biker (though he might argue that I'm not a *real* biker as I don't ride a Harley) and he always presents a down-to-earth and practical viewpoint. He posts about same-sex marriage and the proposed Constitutional amendment here and here. These two paragraphs from the first post caught my eye (emphasis mine):

Gay activists are speaking of marriage as if it were a fundamental human right, one whose abrogation calls for the strongest possible resistance as a matter of simple human decency. But is it really? My off-the-cuff answer is that it isn’t, not at all. Marriage as it has been traditionally understood is a function of churches and state governments; it’s something that carries the stamp of religious and state authority, which is one of the primary reasons I’ve never had any personal interest in subjecting myself to it. I want as little state and church interference in my personal life as I can manage, thank you, and have never felt the need for any lawyer’s, bureaucrat’s, or priest’s official seal of approval on my romantic attachments. I forego certain benefits because of this attitude, but that’s my choice, and so far I’ve stuck with it, although that may not always and forever be the case. It doesn’t stop me from loving anybody, from being truly committed to any relationship, to living my life in the way I choose to live it. It doesn’t, and it hasn’t, and it won’t.

I can understand the point made by the SSM advocates: I’ve made a choice not to bother with the institution of marriage freely and without much in the way of restraint (even though living with someone out of wedlock is still illegal in my state), but I can also change my mind about that. They can make one choice but not the other. They don’t think that’s fair, and they’re probably right. I can’t really see how allowing them to make a similar choice will threaten the institution in any meaningful way. The institution of marriage has probably been battered and bruised more by no-fault divorce and meaningless Hollywood marriages that are undertaken as much for publicity’s sake as any other reason than it ever will be by two people in a long-term relationship who happen to be the same sex being allowed access to it.

The Washington Times on Kerry

This Washington Times editorial doesn't mince words when it comes to Kerry's recent "open letter" to the president.

Sen. Kerry's dead letter

This is the money quote:

Mr. Kerry's accusation against Republicans constitutes McCarthyism of the first water, and should be shunned and condemned by responsible citizens and news organizations.

The Washington Times also has this article on Kerry's voting record:

Kerry opposed key weapons

Over at the RNC site is a page which details Kerry's voting record when it comes to specific weapons programs. There was a post someone made that just listed out the things he's voted against that I wanted to use but couldn't find it so this'll have to do:

Senator Kerry's Specific Record - Again!

And just because Kerry is playing off his service in Vietnam so much, I had to include this:

Veterans Sound off on Kerry

This is interesting

Whether you agree with the author's conclusions or not, I find it very interesting that this article was published in the Village Voice of all places.

When John Kerry's Courage Went M.I.A. by Sydney H. Schanberg

Probably a good idea but still...

Blackfive posts about why he believes we must elect George Bush in November. What caught my eye was this:

We simply need more troops to protect our freedom. The Pentagon just cancelled the Comanche helicopter program. This comes on the heels of the cancellation of the Crusader missle system. This is the right train of thought - cancel the expensive tech programs and focus on what works.

He's probably right. But, damn, the Comanche sure is a kick-ass piece of hardware and it's a shame it had to be cancelled.

On Unions

Over at dgci.net, the author speaks about why he is in a union even though he doesn't want to be. I posted a rather lengthy comment to the post and decided to go ahead and repeat it here.

------------

My father was an air traffic controller when the union, PATCO (Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization for those unfamiliar with the acronym), went on strike. It was actually in 1981 when that happened. It was against federal law for air traffic controllers to strike, I think it applied to all "essential services." As I recall, they went on strike not so much over pay but over working conditions. They were using outdated equipment and the job was simply amazingly stressful. By order of President Reagan, they were all fired.

Not only were they fired, they were prohibited from working for the federal government in any capacity. People, like my father, who only had a few years or so left until retirement were essentially screwed. Later, that restriction was eased and they just couldn't work for the FAA again (ultimately even that restriction was removed by President Clinton).

We bought an RV park in eastern Oregon and managed it for a few years but, when we determined that we just couldn't sink enough money into it to really make money owning it, we sold it and got out. We moved to Yakima, WA where my father worked odd jobs around the city, even picking apples with the migrant workers for a time. And yet we never wanted for shelter, clothing, or food, though we did take advantage of the local food bank (and, yes, we ate government cheese).

It wasn't long, however, before my father got a job with Immigration up in Blaine, WA at the border crossing. He lived up there in a small trailer we had while the rest of us stayed in Yakima and we children finished the school year. We then moved to Bellingham where I started college at Western Washington University and my siblings continued public school. Dad put in his remaining time and retired.

And now the interesting part. As you mentioned, the FAA contracts out to private companies to provide ATC service at a lot of smaller airports. Such is the case at Bellingham and Dad got a job there. At this time, the restriction against working for the FAA was still in effect. He worked there for several years and was by far the most experienced controller they had. After all, he had worked at much larger airports like Oakland, Reno, Miramar NAS, and Edwards AFB (he got to watch the shuttle Columbia land for the first time).

I believe he regrets going on strike and wishes he'd crossed the picket lines and kept his job. Even though Reagan fired him, I think he doesn't hold it against him and considers him one of the greatest, if not *the* greatest, president of his lifetime. He had to give up the house, the boat, and the airplanes (yes, plural). He never did regain his dream of airplane ownership (though he did rent while in Bellingham, and did eventually get another boat) and now hopes that I can fulfill that dream now that I'm a private pilot myself.

Parental rights

Joe Kelly over at The Sake of Argument provides his opinion regarding the opposition to a proposed amendment to the Florida State Constitution. Here's an excerpt from the article:

A Florida lawmaker Monday unveiled a proposed constitutional amendment ensuring parents could eavesdrop on their children's phone calls, snoop in their rooms and search their school bags.

The Florida Parental Rights Amendment also would clear the way for parents to obtain notice of an abortion -- a state law struck down last year by the Florida Supreme Court, supporters say.

Opposition to the proposal from Planned Parenthood was swift:

"Quite honestly, Speaker Byrd's proposal today makes minors property of their parents," said Stephanie Grutman, executive director of Planned Parenthood of Florida. "They want to get at every aspect of our life. Privacy is our most fundamental, basic right."

Joe has some choice words in response:

I am red-faced, fuming and foaming at the mouth mad at the pro-choicers who are so fanatical in their love for abortions that they would fight this type of legislation. I think Planned Parenthood is one of the most destructive and horrific organizations in America today.

They argue that, “Privacy is our most fundamental, basic right.”

Wrong!

And he also makes a very good point:

My child can’t go to the doctor and have a wart removed without my permission. Yet, Planned Parenthood wants her to be able to go get an abortion without my consent and without my knowledge.

For the record, I don't think that Planned Parenthood is "one of the most destructive and horrific organizations in America today." I'm willing to assume that they're simply trying to do what is right. However, I agree with Joe that they are wrong in this case, but for different reasons.

In our society, we consider that children are not sufficiently experienced and knowledgeable to take responsibility for themselves. Instead, their parents or guardians are responsible for their actions, just as they are responsible for caring for the children. Let's say a child of 12 breaks a neighbor's window while hitting golf balls from his own front yard. The parent is responsible for paying for it (though this could also serve as a chance to teach the child about taking responsibility for his actions *). This responsibility also means that the parent has to know what the child is doing and so the child's privacy is not a primary consideration. The parent has the right to enter the child's room at will and search it. Naturally parents will want to provide their children with some privacy, you don't want to be opressive. But the child doesn't have the same rights as an adult because they are not yet responsible for themselves.

Even so, I think there shouldn't be a need for an amendment to the state constitution. Given that the previous law was struck down by the State Supreme Court (which smacks of judicial activism, though I'd need to read the ruling to be sure), this may be the only way.

* Yes, I speak from direct experience. I did end up paying for the window out of my allowance and I did learn my lesson.

They asked, but not for help.

Via The Geek with a .45:

Their Finest Hour

In the future many observations will be made of this battle: that the Al Qaeda timed their assaults to coincide with US unit rotations through Iraq; that they chose the moment when the baton is passing from US soldier to Iraqi policeman. But if the Iraqi nation goes on to live another hundred years, it will remember this:

Officers from the 82nd Airborne Division stationed a 10-minute drive away could hear the battle clearly. They offered help but the Hammad said it wasn't needed. The Americans did provide additional ammunition and weapons, including light machine guns. After the battle, soldiers at the civil defense base proudly displayed a light machine gun and a pair of rocket propelled grenade launchers they had captured from the attackers.

That when dying and bleeding, beset by the flower of terrorism, with pistol to set against automatic rifle and grenade, the Iraqi police did not ask for help from 82nd Airborne. They asked for ammunition.

They didn't ask for help, they asked for the means to help themselves. The 82nd Airborne could have gone over there anyway and taken charge, but they didn't. They let the Iraqi's fight, and win, their own battle.

Via Fark:

The New Mexico State House of Representatives has approved a measure that would require ignition interlocks on all vehicles sold in New Mexico. This applies to all vehicles, new and used. New vehicles would have to have them by 2008, used by 2009.

Would this save lives? Probably. However, what this means is that every person who drives a car in New Mexico must prove that he or she is not a criminal before driving. Another way of looking at this is that it removes personal responsibility from the driver and relegates it to the state. I see this as yet another step along the path to making personal responsibility completely irrelevant. If that happens, there will be no freedom. None. Period. Unsurprisingly, the measure's sponsor is a Democrat.

This brings up some questions:

• What will be the limit beyond which the interlock won't release the ignition?


• How will the interlocks' accuracy be verified and maintained?


• What happens if the interlock malfunctions?


• Will it default to allowing the car to start or preventing it if it does fail?


• What happens if someone disables the interlock on their car?


• How will the police find out about it?


• Will there be "interlock inspection" stops?


• Who will provide the interlocks?


• Will more than one manufacturer be able to provide them?


• Who will install them?


• How much will it all cost?


• Will there be public funds available to help cover the costs?

Of course, all you will have to do to defeat this is buy and sell your car in another state. For example, suppose I know that there will be times when I will try to drive after having a drink or two. I just head over to Arizona to trade my current car for a new one. I will have to register it in NM, and pay the excise tax but the car won't have an interlock. And what about all the people who are visiting from out of state?

This will turn into a bureaucratic nightmare and will probably end up having little or no actual effect. Except to increase the size of government and cost the citizens of New Mexico a lot of money.

And, to follow up on that...

"...[I]t is only fair to add that many of Bush's steps in the direction of bigger government (notably the Medicare and education bills) include reforms that, if they can be built upon, should greatly improve the performance of those programs. In addition, the federal deficit at the end of 2003, though dollar-wise the largest in history, represented only 4.2 percent of GDP -- by no means a record. Still, a widely circulated Office of Management and Budget chart showing the percentage increases in discretionary domestic spending reveals just how far President Bush has wandered from fiscal discipline: Lyndon Johnson, 1965-69, 4.3 percent; Richard Nixon, 1970-75, 6.8 percent; Gerald Ford, 1976-77, 8.0 percent; Jimmy Carter, 1978-81, 2.0 percent; Ronald Reagan, 1982-89, 1.3 percent; George Bush, Sr., 1990-93, 4.0 percent; Bill Clinton, 1994-2001, 2.5 percent; George W. Bush, 2002-04, 8.2 percent. Historically, one of the chief things the Republican party and the conservative movement have had going for them is the public belief that they are financially more responsible than their opponents and less inclined to expand government. If Bush squanders those assets in pursuit of 'bolder, more inspirational ideas,' he will bear a heavy responsibility for the future fates of the party and the movement. No wonder many conservatives are ill at ease. There is probably still time -- though just barely -- for Bush to make policy corrections that will signal his continued allegiance to the basic principles of traditional conservatism. Unless he does, he may win the next election at the price of presiding over the political destruction of the conservative movement." --William Rusher

Quote of the day

"Our out-of-control budget also erodes personal freedom. When government grows, as Thomas Jefferson once famously put it, 'liberty yields.' Dollar by trillion dollar we are voluntarily giving up our liberties for a government that promises us, in return, a blanket of protection from cradle to coffin. Republicans are steering us in the direction of the 'workers' paradise' of a European socialist welfare state. The reply from the Democrats is faster, faster." --Stephen Moore

As usual, from The Federalist

2.5

Mac Johnson, writing for Right Wing News, has a proposal for those in the Libertarian Party who want to win elections: The Two and a Half Party System

He brings up several good points. For example:

(E)ach party, in an effort to win 50% of the population's votes in every election, in every district, in every state, among every race, gender, industry, and income group, has had to turn itself into a big tent coalition consisting of individually self-interested and organized components. In effect, both parties resemble the multi-party parliamentary coalition governments of Europe. The only difference is that the coalitions must be formed up before the election and are very stable for that reason. But other than that, they even function like coalition governments once in office. One interest group is promised trade policy, another gets dibs on civil rights law, a third is given farm policy, and so on. The subparties even threaten to leave the coalitions when ignored or hungry for more power: Reagan Democrats, Southern Dixiecrats, Buchananite Republicans etc.

Basically what he's saying is that, because of the entrenched nature of the two party system we have today, Libertarians at best generally collect a small portion of the vote and, at worst, siphon votes from the Republican candidate which results in a Democrat victory. He proposes an alternate way:

All it will take is for the Libertarians of this country to start thinking of themselves as The Libertarian Party and Caucus, rather than solely as The Libertarian Party. Like the National Rifle Association, the American Civil Liberties Union, Labor Unions, and a gaggle of lobbying interests, the Libertarians of this country can leverage their dedication into an influence well beyond their numbers by forcing the two great coalition parties to begin competing for their votes, campaign work, and donations. The Libertarian Party can still run candidates under its own flag, but it can also begin acknowledging candidates of Libertarian beliefs running under other flags. Think of it as a Two and a Half Party system.

He fleshes it out quite a bit more so go read the whole thing.

Cars and trucks

Subaru has introduced the 2005 Outback which will be classified as a truck according to federal fuel economy and emissions rules. Environmental activists are charging that Subaru is exploiting a loophole in the regulations to avoid having to improve the overall fuel economy of its product line.

"Instead of making more gas guzzlers, Subaru should pledge to bring its fleet average fuel economy up to 40 miles per gallon," Katherine Morrison, an attorney with the U.S. Public Interest Research Group, said in a statement. "By using currently available technologies, they can start improving the fuel economy of their best-selling vehicles and reduce global warming pollution and oil dependence."

Actually, Suburu "should" not do anything of the kind provided it doesn't violate the rules. The company is in the business of selling vehicles and they will do what they legally can to maximize their sales.

Jim Murphy, general manager of governmental affairs for Subaru, said the change from car to truck was a consequence of other decisions to make the Outback wagons more closely resemble sport utility vehicles, and was not a goal for Subaru.

“If we had wanted to make it a truck, we would have made it much closer to the standards,” Murphy said. “In today’s world, there’s no benefit.”

Of course, he could be lying but he does have a point. It's the styling that people care about. I personally wouldn't take most SUV's off road. Dirt roads, sure, but not totally off the road. For that I'd use a vehicle that has been specifically designed to do that, a true 4x4. This is reflected in the fact that more and more "SUV's" are being designed to handle more like cars. The Outback and Outback Sport models were among the first to have this design philosophy. The Toyota RAV4, built on a car frame (the Camry as I recall), is another one.

I personally own my second Subaru vehicle. My current one is a 2002 Impreza 2.5 RS. It's the next step down from the WRX, the only differences that I know of are that it has the less-powerful, non-turbocharged engine, and the transmission is an automatic. Even so, it has plenty of performance. When I bought it, I traded in my 1997 Outback Sport, which is based on the Impreza wagon.

Murphy and Adcock said the new Outback will have about a 5 percent improvement in fuel economy over the current model and average about 27.5 mpg, despite an increase in horsepower.

That number is the average fuel economy for cars required by federal regulations. My Outback Sport had a very consistent fuel economy of about 25 mpg. My new car actually averages a bit less, about 23. I do a considerable amount of driving in town, though, and the mileage goes up noticeably if I go on a long trip; the Outback Sport once did 29. This new Outback, which is larger than both my Subarus, gets better average mileage. It sounds to me like Subaru is doing a good job. More and more people are becoming conscious about fuel economy and desire cars that get better mileage, if only because fuel costs are reduced. For Subaru, or any other company, to make a profit, they have to give the people what they want.

Military service and disservice

Mike over at Cold Fury compares and contrasts the military service, or lack thereof, of the following three people:

• Bill Clinton. He quotes heavily from the letter that Clinton wrote in 1969 to Col. Eugene Holmes, then Director of the ROTC program at the University of Arkansas. He then includes excerpts from Col. Holmes 1992 affidavit, in which he addresses Bill Clinton and the draft. Mike sums up with:
  

  In summary, Clinton was then and remains now a duplicitous, conniving, self-seeking dirtbag, unfit to command a military he has little regard or respect for, as I said about a certain someone else at Bill’s joint last night. Unless you’re a Democrat, that is, in which case Clinton is the greatest President we ever had, an honorable man worthy of respect and high regard, and far less morally objectionable than George “AWOL” Bush.



• Al Gore. He presents documentation that Gore's service in Vietnam was likely not as dangerous as it has been portrayed.


• John Kerry. There's some question as to the actions for which Kerry was awarded the Silver Star. However, that's not what's important. It's Kerry's actions after he came home from Veitnam which are the real issue and Mike addresses them as many others have.

And then he wraps it up with this post. Some excerpts:

Kerry may have served with distinction, but his conduct after the war reveals him to be cut from the same cloth as Clinton and Gore. In my comment at DP I referred to Kerry as “Clinton V2.0 (or, maybe, 1.0.1)” and said that he seemed to be “the best the Dems could do, and the sanest, most mainstream of the lot of them.” But it ought to be plain to the meanest intelligence that if this is in fact the best the Dems can do, then their best is just not good enough. Not now, not in a dangerous age when we’re going to be relying on the US military for so much.

...

Clinton is by any standards indisputably a profoundly dishonest and dishonorable man. It’s my belief that he’s borderline sociopathic in his pursuit of his own interests, and regardless of what you may believe about the role of the federal government in the life of the individual, there were plenty of perfectly justified reasons to despise Clinton. Some on the Right may have taken their loathing of the man to ridiculous extremes, and the wish for vengeance against them on the part of the Left is understandable; but the kind of smear campaign mounted against Bush since day one of his presidency is hardly explained by that alone. (And Day One is really what it all comes back to with Bush, I think; they’re still so angry about losing the 2000 election it’s driven even some of the sanest among them right over the edge.)

...

The Dems and their supporters are now in the wholly unenviable position of having to hitch their rattletrap wagons to a dim and feeble star like Kerry because he at least has some claim on an honorable military record - and all the while they’re smearing a man who did a dangerous and perfectly respectable job in the Texas Air National Guard as a coward and a deserter. Their now-familiar desire to paint all conservatives as bloodthirsty megalomaniacs has come back to haunt them in an almost hilariously ironic way. The Dems’ election hopes now rest entirely on the ability of their lapdogs in the media to prevent the ugly truth about who and what Kerry really is from coming to broader notice. (That’s assuming Kerry will be the nominee, by the way, which is hardly a given but seems reasonable at this point.) They may well succeed, but anybody who truly cares about the nation’s future would have to hope that they do not.

The lie that Bush was AWOL from the Texas National Guard has been thoroughly debunked. It's amazing that this lie is still being disseminated by his opponents. I personally don't consider military service a prerequisite for being President. If you didn't serve, that's fine as long as your honest about it. And if you did serve, be honest about that, too.

Lileks rants

The incomparable James Lileks addresses a couple points in today's Bleat.

1) Actor Patrick Stewart's comments on space travel:

The 63-year-old British actor says manned missions are too expensive. "It would take up so many resources, which I personally feel should be directed at our own planet," he said.

Making movies takes up many resources which could be directed at our own planet. For that matter, millions of pounds are spent in England annually for theater productions – I propose a ten-year moratorium on all stage shows, with the money distributed directly to our own planet. And after we have gotten things right on this planet we can get back to such frivolous luxuries as theater. What’s that, you say – theater employs many people? Theater inspires imaginations, adds to our store of knowledge, helps us define what it means to be human?

2) John Kerry:

If Kerry wants to bring this era back, he’s demonstrated that his branch of the party are the modern-day Bourbons. They have forgotten nothing and learned nothing. For them the great evil wasn’t communism, but America’s response to communism. And now the threat isn’t Islamic terrorism, but what we do to combat it. We act without French approval. We act after 170 UN resolutions instead of crafting a 171st which forbids us from acting. We deploy anti-missile defenses around the Korean peninsula instead of striking a deal to give them more food, more oil, more time. In short, we act as if we have a pair.

...

I’m waiting for a Kerry speech in which he seems angrier about 9/11 than he does about tax cuts.

I’m waiting for an ad that simply puts the matter plainly: who do you think Al Qaeda wants to win the election? Who do you think will make Syria relax? Who do you think Hezbollah worries about more? Who would Iran want to deal with when it comes to its nuclear program – Cowboy Bush or “Send in the bribed French inspectors” Kerry? Which candidate would our enemies prefer?

Wisconsin: Victim disarmament zone

The Wisconsin assembly failed, by one vote, to override Governor Jim Doyle's veto of a bill that would allow law-abiding citizens to carry concealed weapons. In a stunning display of political expediency at the expense of the public's safety and will, 34 representatives voted to uphold the veto. From the article:

(Executive director of the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA) Joe) Waldron singled out Rep. Gary Sherman, a National Rifle Association member and a Democrat, who just three months ago voted in favor of the concealed carry law. But on Tuesday, Sherman switched his vote -- "to protect his governor and what limited power the minority Assembly Democrats have," one newspaper quoted him as saying.

"Sherman's vote switch, placing the interests of Jim Doyle and his anti-gun Democrat cronies above public safety and the citizens' constitutional rights, was despicable, and should be remembered when he runs for re-election," Waldron said.

I hope that the citizens of Wisconsin remember this when it comes time to elect their state representatives. Until then, criminals are hereby notified that they have nothing to fear from law-abiding citizens in that state. It is now open season.

Via Neal Boortz.

Quote of the day

"Financial considerations aside, we cannot continue to ignore the cultural aspects of immigration. The vast majority of Americans welcome immigrants who want to come here, work hard, and build a better life. This is a basic human desire that Americans understand, especially when so many immigrants are born into hopeless poverty in their own nations. But we rightfully expect immigrants to show a sincere desire to become American citizens, speak English, and assimilate themselves culturally. More importantly, we expect immigrants to respect our political and legal traditions, which are rooted in liberty and constitutionally limited government. After all, a lack of respect for the rule of law causes much of the poverty around the world that immigrants seek to escape. Problems arise when immigrants refuse to assimilate and show little interest in becoming American citizens. One hundred years ago, immigrants arrived in America after dangerous journeys fully prepared to embrace their new country. In most cases, returning home was not an option. Most led very hard lives, took pride in American citizenship, and asked for nothing but the opportunity to work. Today, however, some immigrants travel between countries frequently, enjoying the benefits of America but showing no desire to become Americans. Some even display hostility toward America and our ideals, joining the chorus of voices demanding that the United States become a multicultural society that rejects our own history. It is this cultural conflict that soon must be addressed, and the President's amnesty proposal simply turns a blind eye to the problem." --Ron Paul

Via The Federalist

Lies told by university professors

J.D. Cassidy, writing for PoliticallyRight.com, presents a list of eight lies that he was told by his college professors, and provides counter arguments.

I don't recall this being an issue during my college years. However, I was a Math/Computer Science student so the majority of my classes had nothing to do with politics or history (unless it was the history of computing). I did have to take various classes to satisfy my general university requirements, and that included a couple history classes, but I don't recall my professors being exceedingly leftist in any way. I guess I was lucky.

For example...

Where in the Constitution does it say the federal government has the power to do this?

I'm not against art. I'm all for it. I think that the arts are a valuable part of our culture and should be encouraged. However, I do not think the government should be using my tax dollars for this purpose. If private individuals want to fund the arts, great. Should we return to the system of patronage that characterized previous centuries and which produced such works as the plays of Shakespeare and the paintings of Michelangelo? Maybe. That's a good topic for discussion.

One of the things you run into with government sponsorship of the arts is trying to figure out just which artistic endeavors merit such support. From the article:

Public support for the arts was hotly debated in the 1990's. Conservatives complained that the agency was financing obscene or sacrilegious works by artists like Robert Mapplethorpe and Andres Serrano. Former Senator Jesse Helms, Republican of North Carolina, repeatedly tried to eliminate the agency.

So who decides? I, for one, consider the works of Lorenzo Sperlonga to be very artistic. They're also, mostly, very erotic (i.e. Not Safe For Work), but you can't deny the talent behind them. Should the federal government be funding his work? I think it should be up to the public to decide what artists they want to support. The arts won't go away without the NEA.

The Tenth Amendment

Amendment X to the Constitution of the United States of America states:

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people.

First of all, we must keep in mind that governments (federal, state, local) do not have rights; they have powers. Only people have rights. The Tenth Amendment defines a class of powers and then defines their status.

"... not delegated to the United States by the Constitution,..." - This first clause of the definition excludes all powers that are specifically delegated to the United States, referring to the federal government. Most of these powers are described in the original text of the Constitution, some are described in later amendments.

"... nor prohibited by it to the states,..." - The second clause excludes all powers that the Constitution specifically says the state governments do not have. For the most part, these are listed in Article I, Section 10, which states:

Section 10. No state shall enter into any treaty, alliance, or confederation; grant letters of marque and reprisal; coin money; emit bills of credit; make anything but gold and silver coin a tender in payment of debts; pass any bill of attainder, ex post facto law, or law impairing the obligation of contracts, or grant any title of nobility.

No state shall, without the consent of the Congress, lay any imposts or duties on imports or exports, except what may be absolutely necessary for executing it's inspection laws: and the net produce of all duties and imposts, laid by any state on imports or exports, shall be for the use of the treasury of the United States; and all such laws shall be subject to the revision and control of the Congress.

No state shall, without the consent of Congress, lay any duty of tonnage, keep troops, or ships of war in time of peace, enter into any agreement or compact with another state, or with a foreign power, or engage in war, unless actually invaded, or in such imminent danger as will not admit of delay.

The final clause, "... are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people," designates the status of these powers. They are reserved to the states or the people. The federal government does not have these powers. Period. For example, until the Sixteenth Amendment was ratified in 1913 (and there is question as to whether it was properly ratified), the federal government could not assess an income tax. But the states could, and many still do. Should an amendment be added that says states can't do that, then that would become one of those powers prohibited by the Constitution to the states.

A strict interpretation of the Tenth Amendment leads to the conclusion that a great number of the powers the federal government now exercises are unconstitutional. The amendment essentially says to the federal government, "You can do these things and no more." Unless it's something specifically listed in the Constitution, the federal government shouldn't be doing it.

This, of course, is one of the reasons the amendment process was incorporated into the Constitution in the first place. The authors knew that they couldn't plan for all eventualities to come so they created a mechanism whereby the Constitution could be modified to deal with things they missed, or with things that would develop in the future. But they also made sure that amendments could not be passed easily. The Constitution is a "living" document in this sense but it grows and evolves slowly, not subject to the whim of the moment.

Quote of the day

"Each individual of the society has a right to be protected by it in the enjoyment of his life, liberty, and property, according to standing laws. He is obliged, consequently, to contribute his share to the expense of this protection; and to give his personal service, or an equivalent, when necessary. But no part of the property of any individual can, with justice, be taken from him, or applied to public uses, without his own consent, or that of the representative body of the people. In fine, the people of this commonwealth are not controllable by any other laws than those to which their constitutional representative body have given their consent." --John Adams


Via The Federalist

Help! Help! I'm being repressed!

Check it:
Al Franken Knocks Down Dean Heckler

Excerpts:

Wise-cracking funnyman Al Franken yesterday body-slammed a demonstrator to the ground after the man tried to shout down Gov. Howard Dean.

and

Franken said he's not backing Dean but merely wanted to protect the right of people to speak freely. "I would have done it if he was a Dean supporter at a Kerry rally," he said.

"I'm neutral in this race but I'm for freedom of speech, which means people should be able to assemble and speak without being shouted down."

My response:
So Al Franken commits assault and justifies it by saying he's for freedom of speech. How did Al Franken arrogate to himself the role of Protector of Free Speech? The obvious question is whether or not he would have done the same thing if it had been a rally for Bush. The answer to that question cannot be known without that situation actually occurring, and I doubt it ever will. But it ultimately doesn't matter. What matters is that Al Franken took it upon himself to attack a person physically because he was making noise. I'm willing to bet that trying to shout down a speaker at a rally is not a crime in Exeter, New Hampshire. Even if it is, it certainly doesn't justify physical violence.

Quote of the day

"Leaders from both parties -- Republican Senator Orrin Hatch and Democrat Ted Kennedy -- have vowed to push through a new, wide-reaching federal 'hate crimes' bill before the end of the current session. A 'hate crimes' law would make crimes motivated by enmity toward blacks, gays or other protected groups into a special federal offense....The proposed law declares that criminals motivated by a government-designated set of intolerable ideas -- racism, sexism, religious sectarianism, anti-homosexuality -- deserve special prosecution and additional punishment. But to subject someone to trial and punishment on the basis of his ideas -- regardless of how despicable those ideas might be -- constitutes a politicization of criminal law.... A 'hate crimes' law would expand the law's concern from criminal action to 'criminal thought.' It would institute the premise that the purpose of our legal system is not to defend the rights of the victim, but to punish socially unacceptable ideas. This is a premise that should be abhorrent to a free society....It is an attempt to import into America's legal system a class of crimes formerly reserved only to dictatorships: political crimes. Instead, we should insist on the one principle that forms the foundation for the protection of all rights, i.e., that the purpose of law is to punish criminals for initiating force against others, not for holding bad ideas." --Robert Tracinski

Let's go over this again...

Mike over at Cold Fury reiterates some very important points regarding Iraq, Saddam's weapons of mass destruction, how intelligence works, and why we were justified in removing Saddam from power. You can read his post here.

Some choice excerpts:

And flawed interpretation of intelligence is simply not the point anyway. There are three facts pertaining here that evidently need to be stated and restated: 1) that the onus was on Saddam to prove beyond any reasonable doubt that he had in fact destroyed the weapons that we knew he had - and not on the current administration to prove their continued existence; 2) that he do so within fifteen days of agreeing to the cease-fire; and 3) that he not actively pursue the development and acquisition of such weapons ever again.

Saddam did none of those things. He was in direct, clear violation of the terms of the cease-fire right from the beginning; Saddam was subject to perfectly legitimate and justified removal from power not merely since UN Resolution 1441 (which an alarmingly large number of people really ought to read again, apparently), but from April 3, 1991 - the date of the adoption of UN Resolution 687, which says in part:

8. Decides that Iraq shall unconditionally accept the destruction, removal, or rendering harmless, under international supervision, of: (a) All chemical and biological weapons and all stocks of agents and all related subsystems and components and all research, development, support and manufacturing facilities; (b) All ballistic missiles with a range greater than 150 kilometres and related major parts, and repair and production facilities;

Saddam was never in compliance with any of the multiple resolutions calling for his cooperation as demanded in 687 and all the others. And as far as I’m concerned, that’s not even the half of it.

Iraq was a member of the UN. That means it was legally bound to comply with UN resolutions. Failure to comply should have resulted in action by the UN, but they refused to do anything. So we, with help from various other nations, most notably Great Britain and Australia, did what the UN lacked the will to do.

if Saddam didn’t have them and had destroyed them according to the agreements he had made years ago, why would he risk a war he knew he couldn’t win to keep us all thinking he still had them? Why would Saddam have put himself into that sewer-smelling rathole he was found in when all he had to do to avoid that fate was invite the inspectors in with open arms and give them documentation of the destruction of the WMDs? He could have ended Iraq’s pariah-nation status, started to repair the damage done by years of sanctions, discontinued the no-fly zones, and gone blithely on with enriching himself at the expense of his own people for the rest of his natural life without so much as a murmur of protest from the saintly UN with one simple gesture. And he didn’t do it.

I think it ought to be obvious to anyone who’s not a fully paid-up member of the Bushate Brigade that Bush believed that Saddam still possessed WMDs. And I also happen to think that there’s more than ample reason for the sensible among us to believe that he did in fact have them, and that the stalling and dickering at the UN allowed him time to remove them to another location for safekeeping (best guess: Syria) until the pressure was off and the storm had blown over. Given the conduct of previous administrations, his apparent belief that Bush would eventually leave him be in the face of opposition to war from states like France and Germany - who had a proven vested interest in continuing the status quo in Iraq - was at least somewhat justified. The thing that really tripped Saddam up was 9/11, and his underestimation of the impact that those 3000 dead had not just on Bush but on all of us.

One current theory is that Iraq didn't have many, if any, WMD's but Saddam didn't know it. His top people mislead him for any number of plausible reasons. Even in this case, all the evidence available to us outside Iraq indicated that they existed. Assuming this is true, everyone else was deceived the same way Saddam was.

And what was the proper course of action to take to guarantee American security in the post-9/11 age?

The Left’s answer was the same thing it’s always been: to trust in the strength of negotiations and diplomacy in the face of abundant evidence of their failure, to rely on the UN to enforce its resolutions in the face of mounting evidence that it lacked the will, and to basically continue on as if 9/11 had never happened - to keep trying to kick that football after Lucy has pulled it away for the thousandth time.

Doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result when all the previous attempts ended up the same is one definition of insanity. Sure, it would be nice if diplomacy and negotiation could solve all the world's problems. The problem with the belief that they will is that it is predicated on the assumption that the other guy wants the same thing.

Read the comments to the post as well. The first commenter makes a very good point:

To believe that Bush lied about Iraq's WMD abilities means giving the benefit of the doubt to Saddam Hussien but not G.W. Bush. It means you assume pure motives on Saddam's part and nefarious ones on Bush's. It means you believe that Saddam should be innocent until proven guilty but that the opposite standard applies to Bush. And let me tell you,9Zlabelieve such things is nothing short of demented.

This is a test

This is a test post to test commenting through HaloScan.

Update: Looks like it works.

Comments on the SOTU Address

There are already a ton of commentaries on the President's address so I won't be exhaustive in mine. I do, however, want to address a couple of points that he made.

First of all, the section of the speech where he talked about steroid use in sports seemed out of place. The general discussion about the problems of drug use among youth was appropriate but I've never heard steroids addressed specifically before by a president. Perhaps he put it in because the quarterback of the New England Patriots was in attendance. Still, it seemed to disrupt the flow of the speech.

Second, I want to address the section where he talked about marriage. Here are the relevant paragraphs:

A strong America must also value the institution of marriage. I believe we should respect individuals as we take a principled stand for one of the most fundamental, enduring institutions of our civilization. Congress has already taken a stand on this issue by passing the Defense of Marriage Act, signed in 1996 by President Clinton. That statute protects marriage under federal law as a union of a man and a woman, and declares that one state may not redefine marriage for other states.

Activist judges, however, have begun redefining marriage by court order, without regard for the will of the people and their elected representatives. On an issue of such great consequence, the people's voice must be heard. If judges insist on forcing their arbitrary will upon the people, the only alternative left to the people would be the constitutional process. Our nation must defend the sanctity of marriage.

Note that he refers to the fact that President Clinton signed the Defense of Marriage Act. This could be taken several ways, I'll leave it up to you to determine which way(s) you take it. The last part is what made me cringe. Regardless of whether you support or oppose marriage, civil unions, or whatever between two people of the same gender, I oppose a Constitutional amendment. This is something that is properly left up to the states. The bit about "one state may not redefine marriage for other states" addresses Article IV, Section 1 of the Constitution which states:

Full faith and credit shall be given in each state to the public acts, records, and judicial proceedings of every other state. And the Congress may by general laws prescribe the manner in which such acts, records, and proceedings shall be proved, and the effect thereof.

For example, this is why states recognize the driver's licenses of other states. It also applies to marriage licenses. The second sentence of this section is the authority under which the Congress passed the DoMA. This provides specific exception to how marriages are treated. Similar laws could be passed regarding driver's licenses or concealed weapon permits.

I'm not a Constitutional scholar but, on the face of it, the DoMA itself appears constitutional. As I interpret it, it says that, if one state allows marriages/civil unions between two people of the same gender, other states are not required to recognize them, although they can do so if they so choose. I think that's good enough. Now, I do think that there are activist judges out there that are using the bench to advance their own agendas. However, I also think that an amendment to the Constitution is like using a sledgehammer to pound a thumbtack. One comment I read speculated that the "constitutional process" Bush referred to is not that of amendment (he never actually said the word "amendment") but rather the process of impeachment. Assuming the charges are justified, my initial opinion is that it would be a better way to deal with judges that step over the line.

Massaging the numbers

According to this article:

A gun safety group says nearly one in seven guns linked to crimes or considered suspicious from 1996 through 2000 can be traced back to the same 120 gun stores.

Later in the article, it says:

Kessler says the 120 gun stores are located in 22 states and make up less than 1 percent of all individuals and stores licensed to sell guns during the five-year period. Yet the stores supplied nearly 15 percent of guns recovered in crime, according to Kessler's group.

This does sound alarming. And there may, in fact, be a problem. However, as Kim Du Toit points out, what if it's just because these stores simply sell that percentage of the guns sold in that 22 state area? From his post on the subject:

So if the sales from the 120 stores reflected, say, 20% of all handguns sold in the area, then the "guns used in crime" percentage is essentially meaningless. The number of "crime" guns is just a factor of their gross sales volume -- just as Chevrolets are used by many bank robbers, because more Chevys are sold than Audis.

He goes on to say:

All that said, there may a problem -- but it can't be solved by additional legislation (which is what those gun-controlling dickheads at AGS want).

If the salesmen at Don's, Chuck's and Badger are selling to "straw purchasers" -- people who buy guns and then resell them to criminals, then the ATF should go after the individuals, not the gun stores.

I've worked in a gun store before, and let me tell you, you can't tell whether the person you sell a gun to isn't going to turn around and sell or give it to someone else. You may have an idea, of course -- but you try to refuse a sale to Lakeesha Washington or Maria Lopez, just because they're poorly-dressed and fit the profile of a gang-banger's girlfriend. Can you say "ACLU", children? If they pass the NICS check, you are required to sell them the guns they want -- which is as it should be.

It's an insoluble problem. Even if the ATF manages to close down these three stores, or all one hundred and twenty, the scumbags will just go to other stores.

All very good points. As I and other proponents of gun rights say over and over again, laws that limit access to guns only do so for law-abiding people. Criminals, by definition, don't obey the law so they have no problem violating laws that say they can't have guns.

Lileks on space

I keep saying that nobody says it like James Lileks. I wish my writing could be half as creative and entertaining as his. Oh well, I'm still just starting out at this and I'm working on it. Who knows, maybe some day someone will look at what I write and say "I wish I could write like that." But I'm not going to hold my breath.

Someone wrote an article basically lambasting James. His response? See it here.

Most of the article talks about how he feels regarding the plan to return humans to the moon and why America is the country he feels is best suited to do so. Excerpt:

Yes, I know - cheap robots do the job just as well, and sometimes better. Our cosmological imaging programs have returned stunning results. It only seems like we’ve stalled because we don’t see grainy photos of men on another planet driving around and playing golf.

But we’re not driving around and playing golf. More to the point: It has been too long since a human hand put a flag on another planet, and I’d like to see that happen again. It will happen; it's just a question of who does it. I would prefer that the hand be American.

In other words, I’d rather that hand represent the world.

Huh? You say. Wha? A UN flag would represent the world.

No, a UN flag would represent bureaucrats and governments. When I think of an American astronaut on Mars, I can’t imagine a face for the event. I can tell you who staffed the Apollo program, because they were drawn from a specific stratum of American life. But things have changed. Who knows who we'd send to Mars? Black pilot? White astrophysicist? A navigator whose parents came over from India in 1972? Asian female doctor? If we all saw a bulky person bounce out of the landing craft and plant the flag, we’d see that wide blank mirrored visor. Sex or creed or skin hue - we’d have no idea.

This is the quintessence of America: whatever face you’d see when the visor was raised, it wouldn’t be a surprise.

To prove I am a rank sentimentalist: I say the first foot on Mars belongs to a Navajo. No: a Navajo from the Marine Corps. Just because. I can’t think of a reason why not. Can you?

In today's Bleat, Lileks talks more about the plan and addresses its detractors. In particular, he refers to an editorial cartoon which shows a little girl in a wheelchair reading the paper and saying, "They're prepared to spend how much so a man can walk on Mars?" Here's an excerpt:

Yes, we could make that little fictional girl walk if only we spent the money. But curing spinal cord injuries wouldn’t inspire us. Maybe it’s a stem-cell funding research reference - a valid jibe, I suppose, if this was an either-or thing, and people had deeply-held moral objections to a Mars mission. It just strikes me as the same old provincial jibe I dimly recall from the Apollo era: why are we going to the Moon when there are so many problems here?

Because there’s an entirely different set of problems up there.

And the answers might come in handy.

There are many things that it is worthwhile to do. I believe the exploration of space is one of them; apparently the artist does not. Certainly medical research to help people like this little girl is a worthwhile endeavor. But that doesn't mean that it's the only thing that we should be spending money on. Nor does it necessarily follow that redirecting the money intended for space exploration to medical research will make that much of a difference. Yes, we do need to have priorities. If I had to choose between putting a man on the moon by 2030 and curing cancer by the same date, it would be a no brainer. The nice thing is that these are not mutually exclusive options.

Quote of the day

"The 1998 missile strike on the Sudan was an unannounced, unprovoked attack that destroyed that Third World nation’s only medicine factory. Yet it provoked no opposition outcry on the left. The Clinton air strike violated every principle of the current liberal critique of Bush foreign policy. The target of the attack was an alleged chemical weapons factory (which the Administration subsequently was forced to concede contained no chemical weapons facility). Yet, there were no inspections, UN or otherwise, preceding the attack to determine whether the factory was actually producing chemical weapons, as the Clinton White House claimed. There was not even a presidential phone call to the head of a state with whom the United States had diplomatic relations to request such an inspection. The strike in the Sudan was ordered without a UN resolution, without a congressional authorization and without approval from the Joint Chiefs of Staff (who actually opposed it). Yet no critic of the current Bush foreign policy on Iraq expressed concern over the aggression. This is in dramatic contrast to the present critique of a war policy that is based on 12 years of disregarded UN resolutions and thwarted UN inspections, and two congressional resolutions (under two Presidents) supporting a regime change by force." - David Horowitz

For many more quotes from Mr. Horowitz, click here.

Quote of the day

"My ardent desire is, and my aim has been...to comply strictly with all our engagements foreign and domestic; but to keep the United States free from political connections with every other Country. To see that they may be independent of all, and under the influence of none. In a word, I want an American character, that the powers of Europe may be convinced we act for ourselves and not for others; this, in my judgment, is the only way to be respected abroad and happy at home." --George Washington

And then there's this view on immigration reform

The Federalist, which bills itself as "The Conservative e-Journal of Record" has its own take on the President's proposed immigration reform. The entire thing is here (it's under the heading "Top of the fold"). Here's an excerpt:

In the 48 hours since the announcement, the Bush immigration-reform plan has met with vehement resistance from every band of the political spectrum. Indeed, a sizeable majority of Americans are opposed to any expansion of existing immigration, or any legitimization of existing illegal aliens. While a great deal of this reticence was anticipated, and some of it justified, a number of qualifications on the issue of immigration reform must be brought to light.

First, this is not a new issue. Following a February, 2001, meeting between President Bush and Mexican President Vicente Fox, a U.S.-Mexico High Level Working Group on Migration was established. This group would be tasked with addressing the problem of illegal immigration from Mexico to the U.S., which is estimated to compose more than 60% of all such immigration into the U.S. On September 6, 2001, the U.S. and Mexico agreed to "match willing workers with willing employers" and "ensure migration takes place through safe and legal channels." Five days later, of course, the discussion of immigration reform, border policies and economic integration would come to an abrupt halt with the terrorist attacks of 9/11.

Second, the Bush plan is, in part, politically timed and motivated. With the ascendancy of Arnold Schwarzenegger, California will likely be hotly contested in the upcoming presidential race. As such, the Hispanic vote will become critical to either party's hopes of carrying the Golden State -- and its treasure trove of 54 electoral votes. Should President Bush carry California, his re-election would be assured. However, when seen alongside a strong economic recovery and significant progress in the war on terror, California is not essential to the President's prospects.

Consequently, charges of "hispandering" don't stand up to scrutiny. Rather, the Bush immigration-reform plan should be seen as a first step toward the more substantive reform we anticipate after this election cycle. Even congressional proponents of the measure do not anticipate a bill to pass in 2004, indicating that the Bush team is using this occasion to gauge and build public support for farther-reaching reform beginning in 2005 with the President's second term.

They sum up their analysis with this:

Summing up, the plan is intended to confront the realities of illegal immigration. Illegal immigrants are in the U.S. now -- between 8 million and 14 million of them, according to various estimates. Simply by being here, these illegals benefit from a wide array of social services at the local, state and federal levels; they do not, however, pay taxes on their earnings. A temporary-worker program like that proposed by the Bush administration will channel this immigrant labor into the tax base, rather than permitting it to siphon off government resources.

One thing I've noticed about The Federalist is that they are not prone to knee-jerk reactions about this kind of thing. They take their time and present careful, studied analyses which sometimes disagree with the rest of the Conservative establishment. This may turn out to be a case of the President and/or those who advise him being a lot more shrewd than they appear to be initially.

And another one

I've been hearing about this for a while now. I was hoping that there was a reasonable explanation for it, or that it was exaggeration by Bush's opponents. However, given the source of the article, and the number of reports I've heard about this, it looks to be pretty much true. As usual, someone else has already said what I would have said so I'll just link to their superior words. In this case, the irascible Kim du Toit doesn't hold back and has the added benefit of experience with a truly oppressive regime.

When the election comes around this November, I'm going to find myself in the position I found myself in last year, namely that of trying to decide which is the lesser of two evils. Last year I ducked the issue by voting for Harry Brown, the Libertarian candidate. This year I'll probably go ahead and vote for Bush since the alternative (unless by some miracle the Democrats nominate Joe Lieberman) will be unthinkable.

For those that think I'm a total Bush fan

Bush the President, that is, not Bush the band.... As I've mentioned in the past, although I agree for the most part with how he's handling the war against terror and other foreign policy issues, I'm rather disappointed in his extreme lack of conservatism when it comes to domestic issues. For example, he apparently signed the campaign finance reform law in the hope that it would be struck down as unconstitutional. That plan backfired spectacularly with the recent Supreme Court ruling. He also signed the Medicare drug benefit into law, thereby hugely increasing government spending and expanding the power of the federal government. The most recent example is his proposed immigration reform. Since others have already detailed what is wrong with it, I'll save time and link to them.

John Hawkins at Right Wing News comments here and here.
Emperor Misha I, as usual, makes his point very well if very bluntly.
Joe Kelly at The Sake of Argument comments here and here.

This is a tough one, I admit. I'm not unsympathetic to those coming to this country trying to find a better life for themselves and their families. However, we have a process in place and those that bypass it and are subsequently rewarded for it rather than punished are metaphorically spitting in the eyes of those who take the time and effort to enter this country and achieve citizenship legally.

Faxes and spam

The FCC has fined Fax.com, Inc. 5.4 million dollars for faxing unsolicited advertisements to consumers.

From the article:

The commission said it rejected arguments from Fax.com that the ban on unsolicited faxes was unconstitutional and that the fine was excessive.

Whether or not the fine was excessive, their activities are not protected by the Constitution. You see, "freedom of speech" doesn't mean "speech paid for by others against their will." When someone sends a junk fax, the recipient pays a significant portion, if not the majority, of the total cost in the form of electricity, paper, and toner. In addition, there's the cost of having their fax machine tied up receiving ads so it can't receive legitimate faxes.

When I get junk mail via the US Postal Service, I'm not paying anything to receive it. The sender has incurred the full cost. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if junk mail helps keep postal costs down for everyone else since it must represent a large amount of income for the USPS. Therefore, I don't mind receiving it, especially since I get a credit on my waste collection bill based on the weight of my recyclables.

Spam email has the same problems as junk faxes. If anything, the sender pays even less of the total cost. The cost to get the email to me is paid, in succession, by every system it passes through. And, ultimately, it's the consumers of Internet access that have the costs passed on to them. It is for this reason that I believe the Telephone Consumer Protection Act of 1991, which gave the FCC authorization to enact rules about junk faxes, should be extended to cover spam email. The analogy between junk faxes and junk email is nearly exact.

The S Factor

In this guest column for the Seattle P-I you have it in a nutshell, the attitude of the liberal elite toward those who disagree with them. How can George W. Bush be so popular? There's only one possible explanation: His supporters are all stupid!

The S factor explains Bush's popularity

Or is it a parody?

Emperor Misha I has some choice invective in response: We're All Stupid, I Tell You, STUPID!
John Hawkins at Right Wing News also comments: Vote For The Democrats Or You're Stupid!.
Mike at Cold Fury has his usual incisive take on it: Hey, stupid!