Because it worked so well for Belgium

Who are the bigger fools? A Brattleboro, VT activist group seeking universal jurisdiction for it’s town council to try Bush and Cheney for high crimes and misdemeanors (is Chavez next?) or the Vermont attorney general who thinks the effort is “of dubious legality” but vacillates because he has “not seen the proposal” nor done “legal research on any of the issues”.

I didn’t realize extrajudicial laws were tough calls for state AGs.

Originally posted in UNCoRRELATED 29 Dec, 2007

Simulated Thrills but Real Hubris

Glenn Reynolds can land a jetliner in an emergency, given the right conditions.

I'm with Glenn. I once was confident my Flight Simulator prowess would come in handy during an emergency. Then I invited a career pilot with several thousand hours of multi-engine time to "fly" my computer. He passed, saying he never was good at those things and always wound up crashing the landing.

I've hardly flown the simulation since.

Originally posted in UNCoRRELATED 27 Dec, 2007

Blood for Pulitzers

Last week a military spokesman stated AP photographer and accused terrorist, Bilal Hussein:

“possessed foreknowledge of an improvised explosive device (I.E.D.) attack” on American and Iraqi forces, “that he was standing next to the I.E.D. triggerman at the time of the attempted attack, and that he conspired with the I.E.D. triggerman to synchronize his photograph with the explosion.”

AP stated “The Associated Press continues to believe that claims Bilal is involved with insurgent activities are false.” Recall, however, their loose definition of involvement made back in 2005, after winning the Pulitzer prize for several controversial Iraq photographs including a murder conveniently committed in front of an unnamed AP photographer:

Several brave Iraqi photographers work for The Associated Press in places that only Iraqis can cover. Many are covering the communities they live in where family and tribal relations give them access that would not be available to Western photographers, or even Iraqi photographers who are not from the area.

Insurgents want their stories told as much as other people and some are willing to let Iraqi photographers take their pictures. It's important to note, though, that the photographers are not "embedded" with the insurgents. They do not have to swear allegiance or otherwise join up philosophically with them just to take their pictures.

In the above photo, AP conceded the photographer was "tipped off to a demonstration that was supposed to take place on Haifa Street." Is it too much of a stretch for the AP to wonder if their chroniclers of Iraqi terrorism also happen to be terrorist? Or are they trying to protect their Pulitzer?

H/T Neo-Neocon who compares the ethics of Mike Wallace with Bilal and finds Wallace lacking.

Related: The Jawa Report chronicles the Bilal Hussein story

Michelle Makin provides Bilal photographs. AP still thinks this guy just happens to be in the right place at the right time?

Originally posted in UNCoRRELATED 26 Dec, 2007

Why LA Needs a County Fair

Originally posted in UNCoRRELATED 22 Dec, 2007

Covering vs Covering Over

One way to be labeled a media conservative is to cover all the news :

Then there is the complaint that Drudge is a conservative.

But he seldom writes. He links. And the things he links to appear in liberal publications as well as conservative ones as well as middle-of-the-road sites.

He did not become popular by suppressing the news. That seems to be the job of the editors at Newsweek.

Related: Powerline questions Romney and Obama coverage: "Why the disparate treatment? It's hard to avoid the conclusion that the Associated Press covers candidates based on their party affiliation."

Originally posted in UNCoRRELATED 22 Dec, 2007

Suffering North American Muslims

Rabbi Eric Yoffie addresses The Islamic Society, one of the biggest Muslim organizations in the country:

"As a once-persecuted minority in countries where anti-Semitism is still a force, we understand the plight of Muslims in North America today," Yoffie said.

Really? Muslims are suffering pogroms right here in River City?

Who am I to question a Rabbi’s understanding of the plight of North American Muslims; but in drawing an equivalency, doesn’t Yoffie’s understanding of Jewish persecution seem lacking?

Originally posted in UNCoRRELATED 22 Dec, 2007

Clinton Library or Favor Factory?

Now that the Clinton Foundation tops a half billion dollars, I guess Hillary does have a basis for believing in Santa Claus:

With the presidential election approaching, Clinton Foundation donations skyrocketed last year to $135 million, 70% more than the year before, with two-thirds of the booty from only 11 donors.

The former president steadfastly refused to reveal the donors' identities — including one super-rich donor giving $31.3 million.

We can certainly now see why. The $31-million-dollar man turned out to be Canadian mining mogul and founder of Lionsgate Entertainment (distributor of Michael Moore's "Fahrenheit 9/11") Frank Giustra, who plans to give another $100 million, plus half his future earnings.

Foreign contributions to presidential campaigns are illegal, but foreigners such as Giustra can anonymously give as much as they like to presidential foundations. So can the Saudi royal family, the king of Morocco, a United Arab Emirates foundation, and the governments of Kuwait and Qatar, all of whom reportedly gave undisclosed amounts to the Clinton Foundation.

Norman Hsu was just a diversion.

It will be interesting to see how the "take" fares if Hillary tanks in Iowa and New Hampshire.
Other eye-raising donations:

..Anheuser-Busch gave $1 million after the Clinton administration's Federal Trade Commission agreed not to regulate beer, wine and liquor ads.

Chicago bankruptcy lawyer William A. Brandt Jr. pledged $1 million in 1999 as the Justice Department investigated whether he lied about using a big-money fundraiser for Clinton's 1996 re-election to lobby a top bankruptcy official. Later that year, Clinton's Justice Department cleared Brandt, who has since given big to Hil-lary's campaign.

When Loral Space and Communications' then-chairman, Bernard Schwartz,
agreed to give $1 million in 2000, the firm was being investigated over whether it gave satellite technology to China. Under the Bush administration, Loral agreed to a $14 million fine.

Other million-dollar contributors got themselves deals on things like Medicare reimbursements for hospitals in Puerto Rico and special treatment on cell phone licenses from the Federal Communications Commission. One is an Iranian-born aviation executive who provided military equipment to Tehran during Iran-Contra.

Then there's the notorious income tax fugitive Marc Rich, pardoned by Bill after his ex-wife, Denise, gave $450,000 to the Clinton Library.

h/t SDA

Originally posted in UNCoRRELATED 22 Dec, 2007

Baptists make great Mormons?

Slate did some digging into the dynamics underlying, presidential candidate and Baptist pastor, Mike Huckabee’s smear on Mormons:

In the early 1980s, Southern Baptist Convention leaders discovered—much to their horror—that 40 percent of Mormonism's 217,000 converts in 1980 came from Baptist backgrounds.

…And the SBC got serious about tempering the expansion of what was becoming the fastest-growing religion in the world. They developed programs, trained pastors, hosted Mormonism-awareness conferences, and published articles to help spread the message to Southern Baptists that Mormonism was a dangerous cult religion they had to avoid.

Huckabee may obfuscate what he knows or doesn't know about Mormons, but rest assured he knows Baptists and is making no subtle attempt to tap into their fears about Mormons.

Originally posted in UNCoRRELATED 22 Dec, 2007

How about 10 extra minutes for critical thinking?

USA Today reports:

The idea that more time in school produces better results could get a small boost today with the release of international data from the Brookings Institution. The study finds adding 10 minutes of math instruction to an eighth-grader's day translates into a jump in math skills…

…Most U.S. eighth-graders got 45 minutes of daily math instruction in 2003, down from 49 in 1995, but their scores on the Trends in Mathematics and Science Survey improved slightly.

Come again?

Researcher Tom Loveless says that is an anomaly, and more time in class could
help boost scores.

Tom needs to be sure his definition of an anomaly isn't a fact that runs counter to a pre-ordained conclusion (see also Global Warming ...)

Originally posted in UNCoRRELATED 11 Dec, 2007

You keep using that word…

… I don’t think it means what you think it means.

Improvised explosive device (IED) is the term for homemade mines fashioned by terrorists using explosives on hand – TNT, mortar rounds, howitzer shells etc.

The drawing of a production Explosively Formed Penetrator (EFP) in today’s edition of USA Today belies the accompaning term, IED, and the implied home grown insurgency. Armor piercing shaped charges aren’t cobbled together in the kitchen.

Despite using the wrong descriptor, USA Today does report the Iranian EFP connection and also notes the decline in their use as well as IED attacks coinciding with the surge. Overall, another good news article (unless you are a victory eschewing Democrat).

Electronic USA Today article (sans drawing) here.

Originally posted in UNCoRRELATED 11 Dec, 2007

Trading Hillarycare for Kindercare

Don Surber thinks the Clinton Campaign was too clever by half in pointing out Obama's kindergarten presidental aspirations:

I think Hillary’s intent is to sneak in that old — discredited — Muslim school rumor... ...You have to wade through 554 words to get to the Kindergarten Kwote.

So intent were they to gin a link to a headline sporting "Obama" with "Islamic" they failed to ponder the ramifications of the word "kindergarten" in their press release. Unbelievable.

I'm impressed. Obama was writing kindergarten essays while the only thing I could write was my name.

Originally posted in UNCoRRELATED 3 Dec, 2007