Twitter, Twitter everywhere

The vacation buzz now long gone, I've seen two stories today about Twitter.  One remarkable.  The other despicable.

On the remarkable side is this story about an astronaut aboard the International Space Station who shot a picture of Hurricane Earl and tweeted it back to Earth.  Some reception they get there.

On the despicable side, I saw a  headline about a Twitter hoax and thought it was about the ISS photo.  Turns out, it was a sports reporter at my least favorite publication, the Washington Pravda, who, supposedly to make a point, put out a fabricated tweet about a five-game suspension for Ben Rothlisberger of the Pittsburgh Steelers.  With reporters like that, it's no wonder the Post, and most mainstream papers, are tanking.

Vacation Mellow or Just Slow News

 My general standard for writing an article is any story that make me say to myself, "WTF?!"  I can't decide whether it's that vacation buzz or a lull in the action, but I haven't been too outraged - for a few days now.

Of course, it won't last.

Ground Zero Mosque Supporter Gone Berserk

Granted, this guy  may be an even bigger jerk than other Ground Zero mosque supporters in his cussing out an 82 year old Holocaust survivor, but his arguments are emblematic of the pro-mosque supporters' complete insensitivity to the issue.



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Pancho Villa, the Reprise

Okay, now it's getting serious.  It's one thing if Mexico can't control their own criminals, but the firing of  bullets by feuding Mexican drug lords into El Paso government buildings requires nothing less than a swift, certain and severe military response from the United States akin to the Punitive Expedition to capture Pancho Villa who raided border towns early in the 20th century.

I'm not holding my breath.  With this administration, it's far more likely we'll invite the Mexican government build a consulate adjacent to the Alamo. Or give the drug lords US citizenship.

Carry A. Nation, the Reprise

Image via Wikipedia

For those of you too young to remember her, Carry A. Nation was a radical prohibitionist in the latter part of the 19th century famous for hacking up bars with her hatchet. She may have passed away nearly a hundred years ago, but her spirit lives on in group of Baptist ministers opposed to Gov. McDonnell's plans to privatize Virginia's government-run liquor stores.


Their arguments are as devoid of logic as Miller Lite is devoid of taste. For one, the ministers (insert gratuitous “bless their hearts” here) warn of a "lack of control" if the stores were privatized. Obviously, however, the state still controls the location of the stores not to mention the ability to tax the rot gut, so that one fails.

Their other argument is that privatization would adversely affect low income people. I don't get this one either. Last time I was in an ABC, there was plenty of Popov on the bottom shelf, not to mention Thunderbird in the grocery stores.

They didn't make the one argument that could justify greater restrictions on access to hard alcohol: increased public safety. Maybe that’s because there's no meaningful difference in the rate of alcohol-related traffic fatalities between states with closely regulated, state-run alcohol distribution (such as Virginia, the Carolinas and Pennsylvania) and those with private liquor stores (California and Nevada).

The bottom line is that this renewed attempt to regulate morality is off-base, particularly here where the privatization would generate revenue we could all use, and increased access to Scotch which I could use.

Coming to a Milk Carton Near You

You have to admit that this is a pretty cool heist.  $50 million?! 

Middle East Peace, Cold Fusion and a Nationals World Series

What do they have in common?

Ain't gonna happen.

Takes more than a beer on the back porch of the White House to calm eons of hostility - and Obama sure as heck doesn't have it.  No matter what he thinks of himself.

That is One Lawsuit Crazy Administration!

Sue BP!  Sue Arizona!  Now the Obama administration has sued New Jersey - for securities fraud of all things! Apparently, every one in the state is a Tony Soprano.

In this the first lawsuit ever by the SEC against a state, the Administration settled with New Jersey for  . . .$0.  Moreover, all remedial actions had been taken by the state three years ago.  Now that was an effective use of taxpayer money.

Makes you wonder who they'll sue next.  Parents who defrauded their kids about Santa Clause?

LCRC/Loudoun Gubernatorial Appointments

So far, I’ve seen the following LCRC members appointed to board or commissions by Governor Bob McDonnell:

Randy Minchew- Counselor to the Governor

Joseph Guzman – Educational Commission of the States

Kai Zhang – Advisory Council for Career and Technical Information

David Ramadan – Board of Visitors, George Mason University

Other Loudoun residents (not sure if they are LCRC or not) appointed by the governor include:

Harold McKenzie - Virginia Horse Industry Board

Jeff Flippo - Volunteer Firefighters Service Award Fund Board

Congratulations to all. And more Loudoun residents are sure to be named as the administration fills more than 700 vacancies on state boards and commissions.

UPDATED: “I believe Muslims have the right to build a place of worship . . . on private property in lower Manhattan”

8/15 UPDATE:

Obviously yielding to the great political pressure applied by this very blog, the president now says he does not have a position on whether it is appropriate to build a mosque at Ground Zero. 


Really?  First of all, did you see his enthusiastic support stated during a Ramadan celebration of all times (see video link below)?  And why not take a position?  Not that I often look to Sarah Palin for support, but she had a good quip here:    "We all know that they have the right to do it, but should they? And, no, this is not above your pay grade."



I don't know whether to be disgusted by his cowardice or impressed by his ability to backtrack better than Michael Jackson ever did.

ORIGINAL POST:
Yet again, President Teleprompter gratuitously jumps into the middle of distinctively non-presidential issue: the building of a mosque near Ground Zero. And, yet again, he pokes a stick in the eye of all Americans. This time, counter to the opinion of 70% of Americans, he supports enthusiastically the clearly contemptuous construction of a Muslim mosque only two blocks from the site of a barbaric attack by radical members of that very religion

Certainly, America stands for the free exercise of religion. Indeed, America stands for many rights. However, just like your high school civics teacher taught, no constitutional right is absolute, and each must be exercised with due regard to the rights and sensibilities of others. The construction of the mosque at that location demonstrates an utter disregard for what that land has come to mean to all of us. It’s one thing for the Muslim builders of the mosque to ignore the concerns of others, but for the President of the United States to not only ignore them but to so unnecessarily sanction the mosque's construction, simply shocks the conscience. Indeed, his remarks in support of the mosque make little mention of the bravery of those who died there less than nine years ago, nor of the suffering of their families.

Not completely unexpected from Mr. Barack Hussein Obama, but appalling nonetheless.

Empathy? Really?

Yeah, flight attendants have SUCH a tough job.  The stress of showing people how to work a seat belt must be simply unbearable.

This article is so emblematic of the compulsion  mainstream media feels to offer  some kind of justification for the most abhorrent and aberrant conduct.

P.S.  Doesn't this picture remind you of Dick Black's facebook profile pic?

Arlington Cemetery UPDATE: Kudos to No. Va Tech Cos.

Apparently as outraged as I was by the report of the pathetic management of Arlington National Cemetery, but more active than I,  several northern Virginia technology companies have banded together to bring the cemetery's records management out of the dark ages.


Thank you, ACS, Blue Canopy, Booz Allen Hamilton, CACI, CGI, the Consumer Electronics Association, the Corporation for National Research Initiatives, CSC, IBM, Lee Technologies, MAXIMUS, Microsoft, MITRE, SoltechOne and Vistronix!

Where Do True Americans Vacation?

If you're the First Family, that is, purportedly the most American family in the country, where do you think you'd vacation?  Keep in mind that your nation is in a severe economic downturn, and any locale could use the tourism dollars.  Keep in mind, too, that your mere presence would give a lift to the entire local tourism industry.  So where do you go?

Spain, of course!  And you spend LOTS of money when you're there.

You'll recall that during the campaign, Obama's loyalty to America was questioned.  And, once again, Obama has shown he and his family care more about themselves than behaving like a real First Family should.

The Most Egregious Case of Judicial Activism Since Roe v. Wade

A travesty.  An absolute travesty.

After teasing and torturing the Constitution for 138 pages, Judge Vaughn Walker finally reached  the conclusion  that same sex marriage is guaranteed under the federal constitution.  Really?  I've read the Constitution a couple times and found nothing like that..  What did I miss?

To summarize the decision, the judge found that there was "no legitimate state interest" in banning same sex marriage and that the state was doing nothing more than legislating a moral view.  For those of you playing at home, the "legitimate state interest" standard is the lowest standard of judicial review and is extremely easily met.  Clearly, it was met on the facts before the court.

Thankfully, this is only one step in a long judicial journey.  Just like the Arizona immigration case and Cuccinelli's suit against Obamacare, we're early on in the proceedings and at least one more court will review each decsion.  But, boy, this sure has been one bad week for good jurisprudence. 

South Carolina Again Proving Itself the Wackiest Political Scene in the Country

Ah, yes, the poetry of South Carolina politics.

Chapter One:  Gov. Sanford slips off to South America to see his mistress, not telling anyone where he had gone.

Chapter Two:  Gubernatorial candidate Nikki Haley called a "f***ing raghead" by a fellow Republican and state senator speaking in a live webcast.

Chapter Three:  Alvin Greene, a political nobody and welfare recipient, wins the Democratic U.S. Senate nomination without running any kind of campaign

And, now, Chapter Four, and the latest chapter in the story of Republicans eating their own: two local Republican parties designate their two-term  Republican U.S. senator persona non grata. because he's just not conservative enough for them.

 As someone at Too Conservative said about South Carolina, "Too small to be a nation.  Too big to be a lunatic asylum."

0-2 (temporarily)

I lost two early rounds in my lawsuit pick-em game.  Arizona effectively lost the first round in the challenge to its immigration verification law, and Virginia/Cuccinelli won an early victory in the suit against Obamacare.

The result in the Arizona case is no big surprise, but the win for Cuccinelli is a shocker even if only preliminary.  Ultimately, I think he still loses on the merits  (I hope he wins, but I'm being realistic).

The next big showdown will be, oddly enough, a combination of the two:  Cuccinelli's opinion on immigration checks by police.  My prediction there is that he'll be sued shortly by MALDEF, the ACLU or some other such organization and he will lose, in the short term, just as Arizona did. 

I'm doubling down with another $20.

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