Archive Listing
November 24, 2005 - November 17, 2005

Tuesday, January 18, 2005

Like a Friendly Uncle
We read the following at InstaPundit yesterday:

RATHERGATE UPDATE: The New York Times looks at the locked PDF file question. Meanwhile, John Podhoretz looks at the missing political bias, and Bill Kristol notes that quite a few unanswered questions remain.

We followed the link off of "Bill Kristol notes that quite a few unanswered questions remain," which led -- HERE. And, we thought Bill Kristol and friends were doing a bit more than noting quite a few unanswered questions. Not to quibble with our BlogFather, but Kristol is actually asking for answers and that they be submitted by the blogosphere (there's that word again).

Significant because it represents a definite moment of recognition of bloggers and their potential to get to the bottom of a live news story using what our friends at It's All Semantics call micro-employment. The dragnet is out and every researcher-wanna-be has just been given an offer by a fairly respectable source -- bring me the stuff. So, if you find yourself with an itching desire to get to the bottom of something, this is your chance.

It's You They Trust
A stimulating tonic for all the love that will be in the air this inaugural week courtesy of The Ludwig von Mises Institute. Any citation of John C. Calhoun just cannot be ignored by us.

Monday, January 17, 2005

What is the Matter with Italians?
We get up early around here, but this morning, we got a very early morning telephone call from our correspondent, S. He was winded, as if he had run quite a distance, and was screaming into his cell phone for all of us to hear over the speakerphone.

And all the words were not fit for print, but you'll get the idea. We could hear the wind and the sound of his over-worked vintage Dodge V-8 as he screamed something about having to go and he wouldn't be around for awhile. From what we could piece together, he had piled up enough on the Colts to get even for the first three losers -- especially the Vikings, where he went particularly heavy -- and get something nice when they won.

That last bet cost him the rest of his credit with the bookie so he had to go to Mr. Big-something and evidently promised to him something that he wasn't prepared to give him this morning. Anyway, he blamed us for giving him the idea that he could let everyone else see what he was doing without having it effect his karma and for us to tell InstaPunk he wasn't *%#@ing backpedaling on Friday, just updating the line -- which he said he would do on Monday and he didn't think it would be all that hard to say, "You're wrong," after the games are played. And, "accountability," in his business might involve eating something, but it didn't have anything to do with crow.

Then, the line went dead and we all just sat here for a minute and stared at each other. What had we done?

As many of you know, we do not pay our correspondents much of anything. So, when their writing causes them considerable risk of loss and personal injury, we feel it a bit deeper than most organizations involved in what we do. We wish S the best. We'll see if we can't get someone to cover the last three NFL games for us and, No, we do not know what S looks like, where he lives, where he is going, or even his real name . . . Good Luck, S -- it sound's like you're going to need it.

Mid-East Trouble
Speaking of being on the lam . . . Hammorabi is reporting that Zarqawi has been arrested. We also found THIS if it matters. Don't know if any of this is true, but let's hope so.

Sunday, January 16, 2005

MORE:  The Best Decisions are Made by Very Large Groups of Average People
More grist for the Iraqi mill started in our Friday post. If the large group is going to make a good decision, it might be good if the large group heard all the perspectives . . . to that end we offer additional reading -- HERE.

Additionally, Professor Bainbridge throws in more reading assignments.

Also, speaking of being informed, Blogs of War is launching a new News Service -- Take Back the News. Mentioned here for your information and edification.

OOPS. Last week, our sports correspondent $ offered the following confident appraisal of the NFL divisional playoffs:

I've got to take the points in all of these games except the Steelers. I don't think the Jets are going to have too much fun in Pittsburgh and I don't see them making use of the 9 points. The Eagles may walk away victors, but they'll be happy with a 7 point margin so the Vikings with 9.5 looks like the bet of the week. As our resident doctor of the point spread says, "They're givin' it away." The "it" being, of course, money.

It's courageous to make predictions, but it's also important to be accountable (despite any subsequent backpedaling). InstaPunk therefore calls upon $ to come forward and eat a tidy little dish of crow. The invincible Steelers looked like lucky chumps on Saturday, and the Eagles frittered away several golden opportunities and still thumped the Vikings by 13 points. What do you say, $?

HINT: A brave, correct prediction about next week would entirely wipe away the ignominy of last week. No one knows for sure whether the Eagles will show up next week or repeat their dismal absentee performances of the last three NFC championships. We could all use some guidance on this...

Saturday, January 15, 2005

It's Perfectly Okay for Us to Rant and Rave and Carry On
Wow-wee! Who knew? Gee Kos is in big trouble -- does he care? It doesn't seem like it -- of course there is the requisite amount of the dropping of the F and other pornications to let us know he is all that. Man, if we could all get paid $XX,XXX a month to be so cool.

Hugh Hewitt is attempting to get the Koster to come clean. Good luck Hugh, but get yourself a copy of The Boomer Bible and you will know just why Gee Kos is fine -- just the way he is -- So There.

Friday, January 14, 2005

The Best Decisions are Made by Very Large Groups of Average People
American Digest is rubbing our noses in this topic and our own Mars has been beating the War Drums for us all to get serious about this War and define and achieve Victory. This topic requires a lot of thought and a lot of reading, so we thought we'd give you a head start while we noodle this around here.

Take a look at RULES? IN A KNIFE FIGHT?. Vanderleun expounds upon the phrase, "unconditional victory over Islamic Totalitarianism." Bracing, indeed. What Norman Podhoretz calls a Superhawk in his follow-up piece to World War IV entitled, "The War Against World War IV. If you haven't read both of these, you should while forming your own conclusion. And, get yourself a look at Pat Buchanan's, Where the Right Went Wrong for the other side of all this. Both Podoretz and Buchanan name names and will no doubt lead you into other perspectives -- oh yeah, they really don't seem to like each other all that much either.

After considering just what rules we could expect to set in a knife fight we're all closer to Superhawks right now. Especially after recently having acquired a Ka-Bar and learning that a fight between two well-trained knife fighters lasts between four and seven seconds and ends with one combatant going to the hospital and the other going to the morgue.

But don't worry, we don't command any men or weapon systems and we're still thinking . . . but feel free to let us know what you're thinking.

UPDATE: Football - a great high school and college game
Here's the latest lines for the weekend. Looks like the Vikings sale is over from Monday.

According to SportsBook.com:

FAV	LINE	DOG	Venue	Game Day
Steelers	8.5	Jets	Heinz Field Pittsburgh, PA	JAN 15, 4:30 ET (CBS)
Falcons	7	Rams	Georgia Dome Atlanta, GA	JAN 15, 8:00 ET (FOX)
Eagles	8.5	Vikings	Lincoln Financial Field Philadelphia, PA	JAN 16, 1:00 ET (FOX)
Patriots	2	Colts	Gillette Stadium Foxborough, MA	JAN 16, 4:30 ET (CBS)

Good luck to you all.

Thursday, January 13, 2005

For the Kids
How could we have missed this? Oh, yeah, we remember . . .

Last fall, Bill O'Reilly released, The O'Reilly Factor for Kids (sorry, we don't have that 'Kids' font that make 'Kids' everywhere perk right up and say, "Let me have some of that!"). Although we've requested a review copy of the book on a number of occasions, none has been provided, so we're forced to provide you with the following list of reviews:

Pop Matters
Powell
Patriot Boy and Friends

We'd like to read this, but we're loath to pay for the privilege. For us, the cover says it all.

NOTE: We understand the link from the book cover graphic may not take you where you expected, but it is a much better use of your money and a much better use of your kids' reading time.

O How Beautiful is a Generous Spirit
Wally Bangs is considering a name-change for Soulfish Stew. We'd like to say, "Thanks," for the kind words and the link. Good luck, Wally.

QUOTES OF THE DAY. Famous people have cool stuff to say every day, and sometimes we like to pause and give them a moment of recognition. Today we're happy to share this gem from Clint Eastwood, who spoke at some banquet or other where Michael Moore was also in attendance:

"Michael Moore and I actually have a lot in common - we both appreciate living in a country where there's free expression," Eastwood told the star-dotted crowd attending the National Board of Review awards dinner at Tavern on the Green, where Eastwood picked up a Special Filmmaking Achievement prize for "Million Dollar Baby."

Then, the Republican-leaning actor/director advised the lefty filmmaker: "But, Michael, if you ever show up at my front door with a camera - I'll kill you."

The audience erupted in laughter, and Eastwood grinned dangerously.

"I mean it," he added.

It made our day, anyway.

At the other end of the political spectrum, Maureen Dowd seems to have run out of good humor altogether if today's column is at all indicative. A spicy sample:

In all those great Tracy/Hepburn movies more than a half-century ago, it was the snap and crackle of a romance between equals that was so exciting. Moviemakers these days seem far more interested in the soothing aura of romances between unequals.

In James Brooks's "Spanglish," Adam Sandler, as a Los Angeles chef, falls for his hot Mexican maid. The maid, who cleans up after Mr. Sandler without being able to speak English, is presented as the ideal woman. The wife, played by Téa Leoni, is repellent: a jangly, yakking, overachieving, overexercised, unfaithful, shallow she-monster who has just lost her job with a commercial design firm. Picture Faye Dunaway in "Network" if she'd had to stay home, or Glenn Close in "Fatal Attraction" without the charm.

The same attraction of unequals animated Richard Curtis's "Love Actually," a 2003 holiday hit. The witty and sophisticated British prime minister, played by Hugh Grant, falls for the chubby girl who wheels the tea and scones into his office. A businessman married to the substantial Emma Thompson falls for his sultry secretary. A writer falls for his maid, who speaks only Portuguese.

(I wonder if the trend in making maids who don't speak English heroines is related to the trend of guys who like to watch Kelly Ripa in the morning with the sound turned off?)

Art is imitating life, turning women who seek equality into selfish narcissists and objects of rejection, rather than affection.

Poor thing. I didn't know it was equality women like Maureen were seeking. I thought it was something else, maybe something like, well, you know, control. I'm sure she'd hasten to say I'm dead wrong about that, but the funny thing is, I got the idea from actually talking to a whole bunch of women like Maureen. Maybe they were just in a bad mood at the time(s).

It reminds me of a joke I heard today. It was attributed to an "unknown man, probably deceased." You'll see why. It goes like this:

Q: Why do they call it PMS?
A: Because Mad Cow Disease was already taken.

Get that look off your face. I didn't say it. It's a quote, dammit.

Wednesday, January 12, 2005

You Kiss Your Mother with that Mouth?
Wow. Michelle Malkin gets blasted via email in very horrific ways. You might just want to drop her a line and say something nice -- email her now. We're just a bunch of angry Celts, but we think Ms Malkin does a fine job -- writing. And, let's just hope the punks don't find out where these deviants live.

UPDATE: Michelle Malkin says, "Thanks."

PUTTING THE WOMEN IN CHARGE. If you haven't been paying attention to the West Wing (and according to the Nielsen's you haven't), it's time to take another look. The venerable propaganda arm of the Democratic Party has, in the wake of George W. Bush's astounding victory, finally lost its marbles altogether. A veritable tsunami of estrogen has swept through the show, flattening the White House landscape to a featureless expanse of tedious female monologues. President Bartlet, never more than 'cute' as a male role model, has been subjected by the writers to an attack of MS that leaves him so emasculated he can't even put on his short little trousers unaided. His aggressively masculine chief of staff has suffered a heart attack that reduces his role to an occasional walk-on. The feminist hordes who pen the scripts replaced him not with the deputy chief of staff or the communications director who got Bartlet elected (and reelected) in the first place, but with the tall female geek who spent the first 10 years of the Bartlet administration in the position of press secretary. Never heard of a press secretary becoming the president's chief of staff? That's because you don't watch the West Wing. Get busy. When you do, you'll find that the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, John Amos, who was once the sole figure in the administration who had anything to do with foreign policy, has been killed off in a terrorist bombing in the mideast. Now the only remaining authority on non-domestic matters is the National Security Adviser, a reasonably comely Lesbian who seems drop-dead gorgeous compared to the new press secretary, a three-foot-six-inch troll who sounds like she's been huffing helium in the ladies john. The other blond in the series, Donna, who used to answer the phone and make simple things complicated for Deputy COS Josh, has accepted an important position (of course) in the idiot vice president's campaign for the oval office, leaving her erstwhile boss with nothing to do but cower in fear of the huge black woman sent to replace his gofer by the temp agency. Meanwhile, the First Lady -- curiously back in physician harness as Jed's doctor-in-chief -- appears to be warming up for a turn as Mrs. Wilson, who ran the country (into the ground) as de facto president after Woodrow lost his mind early in his second term.

Clearly. the West Wing crew just can't wait for the day when Hillary takes office in 2009 and flushes all those nasty old white men out of our hair with a gush of menopausal wisdom. Maybe it's what we need (or not), but it sure does make for boring television. One more five-minute soliloquy by C.J. about how hard it is to be a female press secretary turned chief of staff, and I'm going to defect to Desperate White Housewives, or whatever they call that show with the not naked enough older women. So there.

Tuesday, January 11, 2005

Hollywood -- a mecca for the most beautiful and talented people in the world
Anyone who dislikes Oliver Stone and the "culture" of Hollywood may have a challenging time not taking some robust gratification, or at least amusement, from this Guardian piece regarding Oliver Stone and his $150mm disaster, Alexander.

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