On Nooooo

I just learned that there isn't a decent bookstore within 30 miles of my new house.

Crap crap crap.

Update on the teacher/test story from yesterday

All's well that ends well.

The verdict? The teacher didn't really present a question properly, so kids were being marked off for THAT when they thought they were getting points off for their "I didn't study" answer.

Monday morning wake-up

The next time I hear some asshat telling me about scientific consensus, I'm going to think about Michele's son and getting a 20% grade reduction on a science test for admitting that he hadn't studied.

Because, I guess there is some sort of consensus that kids should study even if they already know the material. Or kids should lie to make their teacher feel good about their chosen profession.

Regardless, the question asked by the teacher on the test has nothing to do with science. Which, when you come to think of it, reminds me of something else ... now what is that? It's just not coming to me this morning.

Oh well, I'm sure I'll eventually remember.

Announcement

This is my new favorite Tool song:

It's our fault, even when it's not

A bit of local news. "Local" as in really close; across the Detroit river in Windsor. First, the news story:

Over the past three weeks, 220 undocumented immigrants -- mostly from Mexico -- have driven from their homes in the United States to Detroit and crossed the border into Windsor to seek refugee status.

Much of the rush stems from groups in Florida that were putting false information on the Internet that Canada is now taking in illegal immigrants and offering them generous financial assistance, Windsor officials said.
"The word has spread like wildfire for other illegal immigrants to do the same," Mayor Eddie Francis said. "There seems to be an ongoing effort by community groups who have been advertising that by coming to Canada and seeking refugee status, you're able to escape enforcement and get access to social assistance and health care until your claim is heard. That's been the driving force."

So, let's all feel sorry for Windsor and Ontario. I can only imagine the cost in human services. Housing. Medical. It must just be, like, awful!

The city is required to pay 20% of their social services, with Ontario required to pay for the remaining 80%.
Francis said he spoke Friday with Canadian government officials, asking for financial help. He also asked them to expedite the refugee application process.
The city is working with area motels and the Salvation Army to help house the newcomers. About 10 to 12 families stayed at the Devonshire Motel on Howard Avenue in Windsor recently, said manager Mike Soni. And there were 22 people at the Salvation Army shelter on Church Street, said Salvation Army spokeswoman Maj. Patricia Phinney. Some of the immigrants have as many as eight children, she said.

Eight children! Well, I sure hope Windsor has bilingual education set up to handle all those kids.

Here's my favorite part of the article:

"Quite frankly, the city can't afford to pay for the consequences of U.S. immigration policy," Francis said. "We just can't."

Uhm ... hello? This is a consequence of our immigration policy? Actually, this is a consequence of the fact that these immigrants come from STINKHOLES who would rather break laws and take their chances with immigration officials than remain in the festering pustule (in terms of government, corruption, and crime) in which they were born? And, the only reason Canada doesn't have more Mexicans in the Great White North is because the U.S. serves as a buffer zone. Well, that and who wants to live in Canada? I keed, I keed. But, the situation is that they illegally immigrated to Canada JUST LIKE THEY illegally immigrated to the U.S. We don't want 'em either, because they are a drain on our resources as well.

EWWW

Iamfelix, from comments way down, recommends the blog What Jeff Killed; which chronicles the wide variety of things killed by a big, orange cat named Jeff. Yes, it's gross, but how could it not be?

Regardless, I think any cat owner knows the truth that many PETA people don't seem to understand. Man is NOT the only animal that kills for "fun."

Blogging Cat behavior

It takes Iggie about 2 minuets to notice someone has this blanket on their lap, before he is there, doing that cat/claw thing, purring like a madman.

Someone 'splain...

How I'm supposed to move with the following conditions:

1) No disorganization, mess in either house
and
2) no interruption in television viewing, via Direct TV?

If anyone has an answer to this, comment away.

Photobooth

My iMac has this little program that allows the children to easily take pictures of themselves, in a variety of "styles", while sitting right in front of the 'puter. They've taken about 600 of 'em. I think this one is Erin and Hannah.

Saturday Night Photo

We're party-all-the-time over here.

Here's a fun, new Blogger time-waster. It shows you photos (supposedly) as they're being uploaded to blogger. It's hypnotizing.

Confession

I didn't break my bones or anything, but I did bite my nails. I'm talking REALLY short.

And sometimes those awful cuticle-cuts occurred. Those really hurt. But, I say let the healing begin.

Mos Def

The left loves Mos Def. And, for the record, Mr. Def thought OJ was innocent. It would appear, according to his comments in the video, that black men are actually never guilty of any crime.

My crush on Mos Def aside, do check out the video. Feminists and other equal rights activists often discuss the value of simply putting non-male, non-white, non-heterosexual, non-able-bodied people on TV, in newsrooms, and in the public eye, and I think this video helps to illustrate why that argument is important. It’s not because there’s one Woman’s View or Black View or Queer View; it’s because it (a) helps to normalize regularly “othered” groups, and (b) it shifts the conversation and the hierarchy of what’s important. When you have more women in newsrooms, regardless of whether or not those women self-identify as feminist, things that are important to women but traditionally demeaned as “women’s issues” — education, health care, child and elder care, etc — get more front-page play. They become normalized as everyone’s issues. When the people who are setting the agenda come from a wider range of backgrounds, the agenda becomes more inclusive

What kind of bubble does Jill live in that she doesn't regularly hear "othered" groups? I hear crap like this all the time.



But,then I don't live in bubble.

But, for the record, just about everything out of Mos Def's mouth is crap.

9/11 Commemoration, Commie Style

Truthers have a new spokesman in their corner. Fidel Castro:

"Today one knows there was deliberate misinformation," wrote Castro, who has not appeared in public since July of 2006 when life-threatening surgery for a secret illness forced him to hand over power to his brother Raul Castro.

"Studying the impact of planes, similar to those that hit the Twin Towers, that had accidentally fallen on densely populated cities, one concludes that it was not a plane that crashed into the Pentagon," Castro said.

"Only a projectile could have caused the geometrically round hole that allegedly was made by the plane," he said.

"We were fooled like the rest of the planet's inhabitants," he wrote.

I'm sorry, but I don't buy the "We're only asking questions" defense. From my perspective, the questions being asked, have been answered again and again. The question I have for truthers is "why"? Because, really, that gets to the meat of the truther movement.

Why would Bush either cause or allow (see I know the movement is divided into two groups) allow this to happen. At the BASE of this movement, which is what keeps the flame burning, is a hatred for Bush.

All I need to remember

And, a big F-U to truthers of all types; You're as looney as you look.





Image by Zombie. There is much more at the above link; go and see how thin the line is between Peace rallies and communism. The mind wobbles.

Policitical Closet Dead?

I don't know how prevalent this is around the country, but Detroit has a editorial columnist whose entire focus is gay issues. Deb Price never, ever, writes about anything else but issues relating to gays. How can that be? I mean, gays compromise, what, 3% of the population, right? Anyway, I read her column for the same reason I can't help looking at car accidents. I don't want to, I know I shouldn't, but I just can't stop myself.

So, today Price's column is entitled "Closeted anti-gay politicians can run but not hide." Yep, she is advocating the outing of public gay officials. Probably Republican (because, you see, they are hypocrites.) It's only a "weapon" to those that are viewed as being anti-gay, when, in reality, Rethuglian are mostly against gay-marriage, not against gays in general. Some of my best friends ... but, whatever.

The political closet is dead. Debating the ethics or value of "outing" is now a waste of breath. It's a weapon that's here to stay. And in the Internet era - with the pressures of 24/7 news coverage and bloggers often setting the pace - if politicians are gay, they're foolish not to come out before they get shoved out.

So, sexuality is not a private matter. Because so many gay people define themselves by their sexuality, it seems incomprehensible that some people who prefer to not have it public knowledge. I find it interesting and confusing that for years we were told to not "judge" people by who they chose to sleep with (but the content of their character, I suppose) but now it is their sexuality that is being shoved in our faces.

But, really this isn't the big reason I'm bringing up Deb Price's article. The impetus of the piece was, of course, the Larry Craig episode. What's her opinion of that?

Gay and bisexual men, many of whom are married, are swept up every day in outrageous police sex stings. Bumping shoes in a men's room stall signals interest; it's not actual public sex and shouldn't be treated as criminal. Countless men have had their lives ruined by overzealous cops.

So gay and bisexual men are swept up by (outrageous) sex stings, but the shoe bumping only signals interest and shouldn't be a crime. She's admitting that it's a signal. For what? Meeting in the nearest hotel? Uhm, no. It's a signal for bathroom sex. Which is illegal. Should the cops actual start engaging in sex with these men - so the actual crime occurs? I can't see a lot of cops lining up for that detail.

As a parent, I'm all for ensuring that gay/bisexual men aren't prowling bathrooms. It's disgusting, degenerate behavior that shouldn't be protected in the least. It isn't (so much) that these are gay men - it's that the behavior is so improper, so beyond the acceptable, I can't believe anyone would defend it. Yet, defend it Deb does.

These sex stings are set-up where the behavior is prevalent. I'm not a man, but I've used a public toilet and I've never come even mildly close to tapping a neighbor's foot. Wide stance or not.

Whether or not Larry Craig did or didn't - honestly I don't care. He's not my senator, and I'm sure his own voters will decide what should be done with the matter.

Riddle Me This/ Animal edition

Ok, this just isn't funny anymore. I've mentioned before the proclivity my cats have for killing (or at least capturing) assorted vermin and flying creatures. Well, this morning I discovered, dead on the floor in my dining room, God only knows what. It wasn't a mouse or rat, and it wasn't a bird. It looked sorta like a baby dog, but much smaller.

Would it be gross if I took a picture of it?

My life ...

New Digs

View from across the lake. Gonna start moving crap this week.

We did it

We got the spam comments off the front page. Good job.

This and That

Fat March; anyone watching it? I caught part of the last episode. Really, rather inspiring; losing all that weight just walking and dieting.

And, Greta is now in heat. I didn't mention it, but I found a white German Shepherd near-by. The time is now.

Michigan News

I am loving this.

All Michigan is asking for is an opportunity to weigh in on the nominees before the race is all but decided. It wants to move primaries for both Republicans and Democrats to Jan. 15. The earlier date would force candidates to campaign in Michigan and address the issues of a struggling industrial state.

But Democrats are having none of it. The national party says if Michigan moves its primary into January -- as it will do under a bill signed Tuesday by Gov. Jennifer Granholm -- it will not seat its delegates at next summer's national convention.

Clinton, Obama, and Edwards have agreed to isolate Michigan. Of course, what does it matter to them? Michigan is a blue state failure. It's blue cities, blue governor, and state government are mired in unemployement, budget shortfalls, and rising taxes. Yes, I suppose it's just best to completely step over this turd instead of showing up and having to answer questions and come up with possible solutions.

In other Michigan news, VW is picking up its ball and moving to another state. Another 1000 jobs lost. THANKS JENNY!

You see, this is comthing people don't seem to understand. You can raise taxes and claim it's all about people paying thier "fair share", but people, and companies aren't stuck in Michigan. They can, and will, leave.

Bahahahaha

A British Yatchmnan who set out to to cross the Russian Arctic north, demonstrating the affects of global warming on Arctic ice, is stuck in the ice. He's hoping the Russians will send a nuclear powered ice breaker to get him out of the mess.

To me, the carbon footprint left by a nuclear powered ice breaker seems a bit extreme for the rescue of one man lefty moonbat.

Football Announcement

I'm only a passing-fan of football. But, all the Michigan bashing that has occurred since Saturday is turning me into a Michigan booster. That's just the way I roll.

Can we care now? Updated

About that foreign-named Clinton donor? I mean, now that Kos has come out and agreed that it's news-worthy too? Doesn't that give it a stamp of legitimacy now in the eyes of the non-right-wing-wingnuts?

Before his forced resignation last week, Norman Yuan Yuen Hsu (pictured with Hillary) sat on the board of trustees of the liberal New School university in New York with former Loral Corp. head Bernard L. Schwartz, who was allowed to transfer restricted satellite and missile technology to a People's Liberation Army front after contributing a record amount of cash to President Clinton's 1996 campaign.

It's not the foreign-sounding name that bugs me. It's the whole ties to a country with questionable intentions that is the sticking point.

Update: There's more. I mean, even more shady donors associated with the Clintons.

Sant S. Chatwal, an Indian American businessman, has helped raise hundreds of thousands of dollars for Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's campaigns, even as he battled governments on two continents to escape bankruptcy and millions of dollars in tax liens.

The founder of the Bombay Palace restaurant chain, Chatwal is one of a growing number of fundraisers in the 2008 presidential campaign whose backgrounds have prompted questions about how much screening the candidates devote to their "bundlers" while they press to raise record amounts.

Chatwal's case reached from his native India to New York City. The IRS pursued him for approximately $4 million in unpaid business taxes, while New York state placed a lien seeking more than $5 million in taxes. He forfeited a building to New York City on which he was delinquent on property taxes and was sued by federal regulators seeking to recoup millions of dollars in loans from a failed bank where he served as a director.

Across the ocean, three Indian banks forced him into U.S. bankruptcy, and he was charged with bank fraud. He was out on bond when he showed up in India in 2001 during a visit by his longtime friend Bill Clinton.

Democrates delinquent on paying their taxes? Say it isn't so!

Free Speech, unless we're talking about Islam ...

You may have missed this Opus comic over the weekend, since many papers were too cowardly to run it. It was the second week in a row that The Detroit News/Detroit Free Press decided that Islam is the protected religion that must not be mocked.

Shame on the papers that refused to carry the strip.