Irresponsible Politics? Or Worse?

Sabotage in Wartime By Thomas Sowell

If Congress has gone nearly a century without passing a resolution accusing the Turks of genocide, why now, in the midst of the Iraq war?

It is hard to avoid the conclusion that this resolution is just the latest in a series of Congressional efforts to sabotage the conduct of that war.

Large numbers of American troops and vast amounts of military equipment go to Iraq through Turkey, one of the few nations in the Islamic Middle East that has long been an American ally.

Turkey has also thus far refrained from retaliating against guerrilla attacks from the Kurdish regions of Iraq onto Turkish soil. But the Turks could retaliate big time if they chose.

There are more Turkish troops on the border of Iraq than there are American troops within Iraq.

Turkey has already recalled its ambassador from Washington to show its displeasure over Congress' raising this issue. The Turks may or may not stop at that.

In this touchy situation, why stir up a hornet's nest over something in the past that neither we nor anybody else can do anything about today?

Japan has yet to acknowledge its atrocities from the Second World War. Yet the Congress of the United States does not try to make worldwide pariahs of today's Japanese, most of whom were not even born when those atrocities occurred.

Even fewer, if any, Turks who took part in attacks on Armenians during the First World War are likely to still be alive.

Too many Democrats in Congress have gotten into the habit of treating the Iraq war as President Bush's war -- and therefore fair game for political tactics making it harder for him to conduct that war.

In a rare but revealing slip, Democratic Congressman James Clyburn said that an American victory in Iraq "would be a real big problem for us" in the 2008 elections.

Unwilling to take responsibility for ending the war by cutting off the money to fight it, as many of their supporters want them to, Congressional Democrats have instead tried to sabotage the prospects of victory by seeking to micro-manage the deployment of troops, delaying the passing of appropriations -- and now this genocide resolution that is the latest, and perhaps lowest, of these tactics.

It isn't all that long ago that people who did this sort of thing in a time of war would face the firing squad or hangman's noose. America has lost it's heart and soul.

Complacent Western Assumptions

Mark Steyn: Time for the U.S. to get comfortable with ideology

Well, one reason is we're not really comfortable with ideology, either ours or anybody else's. Insofar as we have an ideology it's a belief in the virtues of "multiculturalism," "tolerance," "celebrate diversity" – a bumper-sticker ideology that is, in effect, an anti-ideology which explicitly rejects the very idea of drawing distinctions between your beliefs and anybody else's.

Less sentimental chaps may (at least privately) regard the above as bunk, and prefer to place their faith in economics and technology. In Britain in the 1960s, the political class declared that the country "needed" mass immigration. When the less-enlightened lower orders in northern England fretted that they would lose their towns to the "Pakis", they were dismissed as paranoid racists. The experts were right in a narrow, economic sense: The immigrants became mill workers and bus drivers. But the paranoid racists were right, too: The mills closed anyway, and mosques sprouted in their place; and Oldham and Dewesbury adopted the arranged cousin-marriage traditions of Mirpur in Pakistan; and Yorkshire can now boast among its native sons the July 7th London Tube bombers. The experts thought economics trumped all; the knuckle-dragging masses had a more basic unease, convinced that it's culture that's determinative.

To take another example, on CNN the other night Anderson Cooper was worrying about the homicide rate in Philadelphia. The City of Brotherly Love is the murder capital of the nation, and CNN had dispatched a reporter to interview the grieving mother of a young black boy killed while riding his bicycle in the street. Apparently, a couple of cars had got backed up behind him, and an impatient passenger in one of them pulled out a gun and shot the kid. Anderson Cooper then went to commercials and, when he returned, introduced a report on how easy it is to buy guns in Philadelphia and how local politicians are reluctant to do anything about it. This is, again, an argument only the expert class could make. In the 1990s, the number of guns in America went up by 40 million, but the murder rate fell dramatically. If firearms availability were the determining factor, Vermont and Switzerland would have high murder rates. Yet in Montpelier or Geneva the solution to a boy carelessly bicycling in front of you down a city street when you're in a hurry is not to grab your gun and blow him away. It's the culture, not the technology.

Very few members of the transnational jet set want to hear this. They're convinced that economic and technological factors shape the world all but exclusively, and that the sexy buzz words – "globalization", "networking" – cure all ills.

Yea, Right

Pope John Paul II waving from the grave.

Not!

With All Of Our Technological Advancement...

You would think they could find a less disgusting way to "reintroduce friendly bacteria into the gut."

Trials in a Scottish hospital have shown patients suffering from the Clostridium difficile bug can be cured using 'donor stool' administered via a tube through the nose into their stomach.

Who thought up this procedure? Brilliant thinking about the bacteria but not so much on the dosing part. They put all kinds of friendly bacteria in yogurt these days, why not these? Not disgusting enough for a hospital setting?

An Inconvenient Truth Lie

What? Al Gore Lied?

The inaccuracies, according to the court, are:

1. The film claims that melting snows on Mount Kilimanjaro evidence global warming. The Government's expert was forced to concede that this is not correct.

2. The film suggests that evidence from ice cores proves that rising CO2 causes temperature increases over 650,000 years. The court found that the film was misleading: Over that period the rises in CO2 lagged behind the temperature rises by 800-2000 years.

3. The film uses emotive images of Hurricane Katrina and suggests that this has been caused by global warming. The Government's expert had to accept that it was "not possible" to attribute one-off events to global warming.

4. The film shows the drying up of Lake Chad and claims that this was caused by global warming. The Government's expert had to accept that this was not the case.

5. The film claims that a study showed that polar bears had drowned due to disappearing arctic ice. It turned out that Mr. Gore had misread the study: In fact four polar bears drowned, and this was because of a particularly violent storm.

6. The film threatens that global warming could stop the Gulf Stream, throwing Europe into an ice age: The Claimant's evidence was that this was a scientific impossibility.

7. The film blames global warming for species losses including coral reef bleaching. The Government could not find any evidence to support this claim.

8. The film suggests that the Greenland ice covering could melt, causing sea levels to rise dangerously. The evidence is that Greenland will not melt for millennia.

9. The film suggests that the Antarctic ice covering is melting; the evidence was that it is in fact increasing.

10. The film suggests that sea levels could rise by seven meters, causing the displacement of millions of people. In fact, the evidence is that sea levels are expected to rise by about 40 centimeters over the next hundred years and that there is no such threat of massive migration.

11. The film claims that rising sea levels has caused the evacuation of certain Pacific islands to New Zealand. The Government are unable to substantiate this and the Court observed that this appears to be a false claim.

Hey, Nice Slogan!

This is New York

Abridging the Freedom of Speech

Chuck Asay

Questioning Belief

Religion – including Christianity and Judaism – is "violent, irrational, intolerant, allied to racism, tribalism, and bigotry, invested in ignorance and hostile to free inquiry, contemptuous of women and coercive toward children." At least that's according to the No. 1 New York Times bestseller "God is Not Great: Why Religion Poisons Everything" by journalist Christopher Hitchens.

He's partially correct, let me slightly modify that thought:

Humanity is "violent, irrational, intolerant, allied to racism, tribalism, and bigotry, invested in ignorance and hostile to free inquiry, contemptuous of women and coercive toward children and therefore, religion includes those elements.

It's this human element that poisons everything, including religion.

Quoted from How atheism is being sold to America, which is actually well worth reading - lots of good stuff in there. I had only read the first paragraph when I wrote the above but went back and read the whole thing after - David Kupelian does an excellent job taking on this subject.

Exploring St. Augustine

The St. Augustine Lighthouse, among the majestic oaks.



Take an hour or two and wander through the lighthouse and museum. If you time it right you can climb the light at night and watch the full moon rise, complete with champagne toast. Or just take the Dark of the Moon Tour if there is no full moon.



Looking up from inside.

Blessed

Men hold two views of what happiness consists in, viz., having and doing. To possess much, or to do some great thing, constitutes the sum of human blessedness according to popular theory. Our Teacher sweeps those conceptions away by absolutely ignoring them ... Being is everything. A man's happiness depends upon what he is in himself.

-- G. Campbell Morgan

Brainiac

Even if they did exist, how could anyone actually think they could get change for a one million dollar bill at a supermarket?

Two five hundred thousand dollar bills OK, sir? Or do you need singles?

It All Comes Around In The End

Senator Larry Craig (the bathroom guy) has a favorite recipe for Super Tubers on the Congress Cooks website.

With an apple corer or small knife, core out the potato center (end to end). Push hot dog through the center.

St. Augustine Alligator Farm

The Alligator Farm is a must see if you're visiting St. Augustine, at least if you're with your kids. It's very clean and you can tell they really care for the alligators. The shows are interesting and informative, not flashy, they work with the animals and some of the gators actually respond to their name. They have a huge saltwater crocodile named Maximo (see the video below) but when we were there he had put himself off display - he does whatever he wants. We could see his back. A little disappointing. Overall, it's a nice place to spend a couple of hours.

Fire One!

Here's a picture of the cannons firing at Castillo de San Marcos. They re-enact a recruiting speech (in period attire) and shoot the cannons after. Pretty cool. And loud. Don't know what that guy's doing with the stick in his butt - I think it's a knife but it just don't look right.

Castillo de San Marcos

Probably the most famous landmark in St. Augustine, Castillo de San Marcos is a very interesting place to visit. If you look closely at the tower in the picture you can see bullet holes. They shoot off cannons regularly, which you can hear throughout the city. And James asked one of the men why he didn't see where the cannonballs hit. He said because the people in those houses across the bay would get really angry if we used real cannonballs. There is limited parking on-site but the city parking garage is close by and I recommend parking in it for your visit to St. Augustine rather than fight 2 hour parking limits or feeding parking meters - if you can find one open. Be careful parking along the seawall. It wasn't obvious why the first two days but the third day it had rained and those cars were flooded out over the bottoms of the doors - not a pretty picture. It really didn't rain all that much either.

Hot Stuff

The ipod is so hot it will set your pants on fire.

Can't get enough.

Bush Gore Lied, People Died

You have to listen to this all the way through and let what he is saying really sink in, keeping in mind what he and other liberals have been saying since taking out Saddam Hussein. How can anyone in their right mind take anything these clowns say seriously? They don't let the truth get in the way of their agenda. They will use the truth, partial truth, complete lies, or any combination of the three to further their desires. They will use you, chew you up, and spit you out. They don't give a rats ass about anyone but themselves. They would rather destroy the United States of America than let it continue as it was originally conceived. It's their way or nothing. How sad for this country that they have come this far, what a tragedy that so many believe them.

The Founders Intention

The Founders Intended A Christian, Not Secular, Society

“It has been the error of the schools to teach astronomy, and all the other sciences and subjects of natural philosophy, as accomplishments only; whereas they should be taught theologically, or with reference to the Being who is the author of them: for all the principles of science are of Divine origin,” Thomas Paine declaimed. “Man cannot make, or invent, or contrive principles. He can only discover them; and he ought to look through the discovery to the Author."

When we examine an extraordinary piece of machinery, an astonishing pile of architecture, a well executed statue or a highly finished painting where life and action are imitated, and habit only prevents our mistaking a surface of light and shade for cubical solidity, our ideas are naturally led to think of the extensive genius and talents of the artist. When we study the elements of geometry, we think of Euclid. When we speak of gravitation, we think of Newton. How then is it, that when we study the works of God in the creation, we stop short, and do not think of God? It is from the error of the schools in having taught those subjects as accomplishments only, and thereby separated the study of them from the Being who is the author of them.” In short, even the least religiously committed of the founders wanted to approach public education in a manner that would deeply offend today’s uncompromising separationists, and those who ludicrously claim that the designers of our Constitution intended a “secular nation.”

The ludicrous indignation about Senator McCain’s recent remarks remains an expression of both ignorance and intolerance, and a mean-spirited refusal to recognize the simple truth in his statements. The framers may not have mentioned Christianity in the Constitution, but they clearly intended that charter of liberty to govern a society of fervent faith, freely encouraged by government for the benefit of all. Their noble and unprecedented experiment never involved a religion-free or faithless state but did indeed presuppose America’s unequivocal identity as a Christian nation.

St. Augustine

We just got back from St. Augustine and we had a great time. St. Augustine has something for everyone but it is heavy on the tourist market, you have to do a little searching to find all the gems hidden in this city - there's a lot of them. Bring money.

We stayed at the Castillo Real Hotel on Anastasia Island. It's one block from the ocean and has a nice pool for the kids. The pool goes from zero to about 5.5 feet, just like at the beach. Our poolside room was very quiet, you cannot hear the noise at the pool. The room was comfortable, has a fridge/microwave, jacuzzi, and large shower. Great internet access, too - wired or wireless. It was a nice area to stay in and was only a short drive to downtown St. Augustine.

The bonus was finding Cafe 11 almost right across the street. This is one of the gems of St. Augustine. Others agree. We would have been happy to eat every meal there and there were a few occasions when we wish we had. The menu is on their website, check it out. The weekend brunch is excellent and very busy, especially on Sunday. Nice jazz plays from one corner, not loud, just right and the weekend buffet is on the stage, among the speakers and amplifiers used for the live gigs. They could use less shaky tables, though. And the bathroom was impressively clean, a big plus for me since I invariably have to take James there and wait for him.

The first night we ate at the A1A Ale Works. I had the Spicy Ahi Sticks appetizer - to die for - and Irma had the Fried Lobster Bites, which she liked. I don't eat lobster. I had the Blackened Salmon and Irma had the Ragtime Shrimp dinner - both were excellent. I tried the stout but was not that impressed, although I am not a big beer drinker, I have had better. It wasn't bad, though, just not as good as I thought it would be. After all, it's called Ale works. The restaurant has great views and you can sit outside on the 2nd floor deck. James loved the saltwater fish tanks they have.

We also ate at the Santa Maria. If you have kids with you, you should eat here. It sits out over the water and there are little trap doors so you can feed the fish or birds. The catfish are so thick in the water trying to get at the food you can almost walk on them. The view is fantastic and we watched in frustration (well, I did, everyone else watched in fascination) as bait fish boiled about 20 yards outside the windows, just wishing I could throw a line in the water. One boat out of the bunch we saw actually did and pulled in a nice fish - I couldn't quite make it out. Don't go here for the food, though. Just go for lunch, get a grilled fish sandwich (not fried) and let the kids enjoy themselves. They will bring old bread to feed the fish and they brought a 2nd basket at James' request. Bring your own bread, too. If they would remodel the place and the menu - put some heart and soul into it - this place would be killer. At least get a new head chef, someone to bring life to the menu. I can easily deal with the out of date decor if the food rocks.

Another night we ate dinner at the Sunset Grill (somewhere on A1A), actually about a mile from the hotel. The restaurant is clean and comfortable with TV's on all the walls with the game on. Irma and I had a completely different food experience at this place. I had the Tuna on a bed of Spinach and Rice Pilaf. It was wonderful. It was a nice size, thick chunk of tuna, cooked rare and absolutely delicious. The spinach and rice were good, too. Irma had a fried seafood platter and she didn't care for it. She had a nice fillet of flounder and I couldn't imagine what could be wrong with it until I tried it. It wasn't seasoned. Obviously they didn't go to the Emeril Lagasse school of cooking. Salt, pepper and spices - how do you forget that? Anyway, James loved his pizza and Joshua liked his hamburger. I'd go back but I'd get the tuna.

We went to another place but I won't even mention it, just don't eat anywhere they say they are world famous. The place is way south of St. Augustine on A1A, near Saltwater Cowboys, which didn't open until 5pm, unfortunately. The catch of the day was Basa and they tried to tell me it is an Asian grouper. Wrong! It's a catfish and I don't want it. Why would a restaurant on the shore in Florida import cheap catfish from Asia and try to pass it off as grouper if not to rip you off? At least they said it was Basa.

There are so many restaurants in and around St. Augustine it would be impossible to try them all. There are also many upscale restaurants. I don't care about fine dining so much, I like to be comfortable, but the food has to be good. One place I missed but wish I hadn't is Osteens. Unfortunately they were closed Sunday when we stopped by. They are closed Sunday and Monday. They have a great reputation, though and I will be sure to eat there next time.

This turned into a restaurant review of sorts, I'll have a few more things to say about St. Augustine in another post.

FedEx vs. Government Bureaucracy