Blogging Break.

I have family coming in today. I probably won't be back here until Monday. Have a great weekend! Use this as an open thread!

Gay couple divorce.

Two years after getting married, Julie and Hillary Goodridge, lead plaintiffs in the state's landmark gay marriage case, are splitting.

Like the old saying goes, "Be careful what you ask for, you just might get it."

Milblogging the TV show?

Interesting thought.

I'd love to see it.

What is going on here?

All I hear all day is how Israel killed 4 U.N. peacekeepers. Israel say it's a tragic mistake but the usual suspects here in America say it wasn't. As does Kofi Annan. But then as I start surfing around the web I find this: (emphasis mine)

"What makes Annan’s allegation so unforgiveable is that his UN Interim Force in Lebanon has been warning for days about what almost certainly caused this tragedy. Hezbollah fighters, who have already been firing behind screens of women and children, have also been shooting from behind and next to the UN positions, presumably hoping Israel will not dare shoot back and risk exactly this kind of propaganda disaster.

Read the UNIFIL press releases for yourself to learn that Hezbollah has not just shot at and seriously wounded UNIFIL observers - without any protest from Kofi Annan or The Age. You’ll also learn that UNIFIL has repeatedly reported Israeli shelling and bombing near UNIFIL outposts because Hezbollah fighters were shooting from right beside them .

Says the UNIFIL press release of 20 July:

Hezbollah firing was also reported from the immediate vicinity of the UN positions in Naquora and Maroun Al Ras areas at the time of the incidents (of Israeli return fire).

Can the jeering critics of Israel stop catcalling for a minute and explain how Israel is to defend itself against an enemy that shoots from among women and children, and from behind UN soldiers? Can they explain why they are such apologists for terrorists? Can Annan explain why he did not call on Hezbollah to stop risking the lives of his staff, or pull them out when they were being used to screen terrorist fighters?

UPDATE 1: More evidence. Retired Canadian Major General Lewis Mackenzie says he recently received emails from the Canadian peacekeeper killed at the UN post who’d told him that Hezbollah was using his post as cover.

We received emails from him a few days ago, and he was describing the fact that he was taking fire within, in one case, three meters of his position for tactical necessity, not being targeted. Now that’s veiled speech in the military. What he was telling us was Hezbollah soldiers were all over his position and the IDF were targeting them. And that’s a favorite trick by people who don’t have representation in the UN. They use the UN as shields knowing that they can’t be punished for it.

This is what I cannot stand about the MSM. If we can't get an honest truth, can we at least hear both sides??? And can the left stop for one moment in it's disdain for Israel and consider that the news above could be the truth?

More love/hate for McCain.

RCP's Tom Bevan lays it out pretty well.

Related: John McCain on the Jon Stewart Show:

Charges filed against Miss. Indonesia.

For...well, for being Miss. Indonesia.

A True Believer

I am listening to Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki address congress. When he passionately described how the Iraqi people faced death as they went to the ballot box and always made the choice of Democracy and freedom and proved that as they waved their ink stained fingers, Congress began to clap, but who was the first to stand?

It was Joe Lieberman.

Who can not admire the Iraqi people for risking their life to vote? You can disagree with the war. You can believe that this administration manipulated intelligence. But how can one not think that what the Iraqi people did by voting was not courageous?

I thought that the showdown between Lieberman and the extreme left in his primary would be interesting. I thought that if Lieberman lost then it would prove once and for all how far the Democrats had let the extremists of their party win. I thought it would help us in future elections to point to that primary as how out of the mainstream the Democrats really are and how the leadership is supporting it. But after seeing the look on Lieberman's face of a deep felt belief in what he thinks is right, I am rooting for him. I hope he wins. I now hope that his primary will prove that the Democrat party still has people that truly care. That it rejects a radical agenda of unfettered abortion, a changing definition of marriage, and the belief that America is the problem instead of the answer.

I hope he wins, not just because he is a true believer in what is right, but because I am still not completely convinced that the party of my father and the party of my youth is lost forever in extremism.

I can't believe it myself. I am rooting for a Democrat.

Another great essay...

By Bill Whittle at Eject! Eject Eject!

It's long, but worth every moment you spend reading it.

h/t Cotillion e-mail

Get married on a beach....

You take a risk. A few years ago one of my best friends and I went to the Cayman Islands. The first day we were walking down the beach yakking away and laughing when we suddenly noticed a wedding taking place about 30 feet from where we were. My Gosh! I figured there should have been some warning! We immediately shut up and turned around. I was embarrassed, but at least I wasn't wearing this. Do European women own mirrors? I saw this in Mexico this month. Come on! Some modesty. Please. Is an entire swimsuit really too much to ask for?

Who are these people?

WASHINGTON (July 25, 2006) — "Despite a 65-34 vote in the U.S. Senate late today to pass a bill to prohibit transporting minors across state lines for abortions in violation of parents' rights, the Senate Democratic leadership immediately erected a procedural roadblock in an attempt to kill the bill."

"Fourteen Democratic senators voted to pass the bill, but only minutes later the Democratic caucus collectively moved to kill the bill by objecting to the routine, necessary step of sending the bill to a conference committee," said NRLC Legislative Director Douglas Johnson. "The Senate Democratic leadership is now obstructing legislation supported by 80 percent of the public, doing the bidding of the abortion lobby. They are ignoring the 80 percent of the public that believes parental notification laws protect vulnerable minors and the rights of parents."

Look, this isn't about abortion being legal. It is legal. This is about a parents right to know when their daughter is having a surgical procedure. And not just any surgical procedure, but one that will affect her emotionally (and in many cases physically) for the rest of her life. The vast majority of Americans, both pro-life and pro-choice support this. It's quite simple. A parent not only has the right to know, but the child DESERVES to have her parents involved in such a major decision. Please don't give me the line about abusive parents. They are the rare exception and we all know it and God knows we have provided a loophole.

We all know what this is about. It is about the Democrat leadership's utter devotion to the pro-abortion lobby. Shame on them. Shame forever.

Whiney babies. Shutup.

Read this whiney article by a Canadian band called the Grey. They were deported and banned from the U.S. for five years. Why? In Feb. of 2005 the band was heading to Ogdensburg New York fo a show:

"When we got to the border, we, regrettably, lied at first about whether or not we were playing because we were uncertain whether or not we needed visas for a potentially non-paying show. After looking on the internet and searching our van, [the American border guards] saw that we were supposed to play and hauled us in for interviews one by one for the next 6 hours. We were fingerprinted, photographed and expedited as illegal aliens from the United States."

Yeah. See, here's the thing. You don't lie to border agents.

I see this all the time with youth. They seem to think that if they have reason enough, then it's ok to lie. When they suffer the consequences of this, they whine.

via boing boing

World War III?

TCS Daily has an excellent article on the notion of a WWIII, focusing mainly on Newt Gingrich's contention that we are there. Gringrich has written an article in Human Events entitled "A Third World War."

"In Gingrich's mind, the deadly attacks -- "on an almost daily basis in Baghdad, and previous attacks in New York, Washington, London, Madrid, Bali, Beslan, Jerusalem, Istanbul, Sharm-el-Sheikh, New Delhi, Amman and many other cities" -- make the reality of world war unmistakable."

Gringrich also doesn't care much for Bush's diplomatic policy:

"As he told The Washington Post, "We have accepted the lawyer-diplomatic fantasy that talking while North Korea builds bombs and missiles and talking while the Iranians build bombs and missiles is progress. Is the next stage for Condi to go dancing with Kim Jong Il? I am utterly puzzled."

If the left thinks that Bush is a war monger, they ain't seen nothing yet. Just imagine a President Gingrich. He would make Bush look like a peacenik.

I'll be honest, I don't like Newt Gingrich. I never have. To me he is the Republican version of Bill Clinton. A polished and smart politician who convinces himself of his positions as he makes sure those positions will get him elected. There is no moral grounding in either of these two men.

Do I think we are in the midst or the beginning of WWIII? No. I haven't been convinced of that yet but this sentence in the TCS article struck me:

"No, we aren't going to lose to the likes of Syria or Iran, although it's possible we could lose a city or two to a lucky (from their point of view) nuclear shot."

A city or two????? If we get hit in any way, then all bets are off. The American people will be 100% behind wiping off the face of the earth anyone who did it. Then maybe you could convince me of WWIII.

The one thing Bush understood was to put reponsibility on the shoulders of governments who harbor terrorists. The world (and especially the Middle East) needed to understand that they could not stand by while terrorists trained among them. I'm afraid Lebanon is learning that the hard way.

Americans ignored the Middle East for too long. We live our cushy lives and feel sorry for those who live in that part of the world. In the 90's we showed weakness and we paid for it. Even now most Americans may not recognize the battles we see on TV every night having anything to do with us, but they do. One cannot ignore cancer. It grows. It has to be aggressively treated. This cancer of terrorism touched us on 9-11 and we can never again imagine that it won't return.

But, sometimes the cure is worse than the disease. People like Gingrich seem to want to go too far for me. People like Clinton didn't do enough. Bush seems to be striking the right balance, even if he doesn't get much credit for it.

Reader Survey

Bumped.

Keep at it!

Teh Top five Stupid Stories for Monday.

“If I was president, this wouldn’t have happened,” said Kerry during a noon stop at Honest John’s bar and grill in Detroit’s Cass Corridor.

Steely Dan ( the band ) writes an open letter to Luke Wilson accusing his brother Owen of stealing the idea for the new movie You Me and Dupree from their song "Cousin Dupree."

Prince Harry dons a Che t-shirt.

Another politician gets taken in by Stephen Colbert.

Nobel peace laureate Betty Williams speculates how she would l ike to kill President George Bush during a speech to hundreds of schoolchildren.

Oh, this should be interesting...

or stupid.

I'm betting on stupid.

NEW YORK ABC reportedly has huge hopes for a new series to air this fall called "Brothers & Sisters," which will follow the hit "Desperate Housewives" on the schedule. Calista Flockhart, best known as Ally McBeal, plays a conservative radio host turned TV pundit. Others in the high-powered cast include Patricia Wettig, Rachel Griffiths, Ron Rifkin and Sally Field.

Uh huh.

Writer Jon Robin Baitz added, "No, I think she's a thoughtful conservative. She's ideologically, in some respects, very much in mind with the older parts of the party, the sort of Eisenhower Republican, the William Buckley conservative. She's also a humanist.

"She's not someone who is apologetic about being a conservative. But it's very, very interesting and compelling to us to try and understand this, to leave behind some of the smug presuppositions of the two coasts, . . . to look at evolving patriotism and evolving traditionalism,"

"For years and years, the left has looked at the right in complete incomprehension and felt, 'We just can't connect.' And maybe there's an effort in the show to try and bridge that in some way.”



I'm just wondering where they are going to get these "conservative ideas" that she will espouse. I mean, come on...Hollywood has never been able to really create a solid conservative character because they have no idea what one really is.

via Powerline

What you are looking at here...

If you could actually look at me...is a chick who has painted her last room.

I love to decorate. Since moving in this house 6 years ago I have painted the dining room, the office, my bedroom, my daughter's bedroom, one of my son's bedrooms, the playroom, and now the guest room.

I usually use different faux techniques and many different colors. My youngest son's room looks like an army tent ( ceiling painted as well) with every stick of furniture painted camo with a few pieces in black. I got posters from the Army surplus store to finish the walls. There are "bullet holes" on his closet doors. My daughter's room is painted to look like a blue sky with clouds floating above. Her ceiling fan is painted bright yellow (the sun, of course) She has butterflies everywhere. I hung pastels of every color in chiffon layers on her windows and even her canopy over her bed. Attached to the canopy are butterflies, flowers, and monkeys. (not real, duh) She has the coolest room ever.

But I digress.

Today I painted my last room. My back can't take it anymore. Getting older just sucks.

I am loving your responses to my survey below. Please continue! Hopefully I will be able to walk tomorrow and get to the computer.

Reader Survey.

I am painting the guest room today. So I decided to leave you with one of my reader surveys I do now and again. Even if you are just a lurker and not a commenter, please answer. I will not share any of this information with anyone. I just like to know who you are. Also, just use your screen name.

1) Where are you from?
2) What is your age?
3) Male or Female?
4) Do you consider yourself liberal or conservative?
5) Do you usually vote Republican or Democrat?
6) What type of business are you in?
7) Other than mine, what other blogs do you read?
8) Why do you read blogs?
9) What do you like best about my blog?
10) What do you like least?
11) What would you like to see more coverage of on this blog?
12) what top 3 issues are important to you?
13) If you were to vote today for the President in '08, who would you vote for?
14) What do you consider to be the best thing about the "new media?"
15) What do you consider to be the worst thing about the "new media?"
16) Regarding mainstream media, who do you trust the most with the news?
17) If you could change 3 things about America, what would they be?

Pretty Boys Report.

When all the pretty boy anchors fell over themselves trying to get into the war zone, I wondered why the heck would they do that after what happened to Bob Woodruff? Jeff Jarvis over at BuzzMachine has the answer:

"After a network anchor was nearly killed in the Middle East, we still have the networks sending their talking heads there, in hopes they won’t be blown off. Why? All they do is stand and read the Teleprompter, the same as they do back in the studio. What do they add?

ABC’s Charlie Gibson was humble enough to say:

“Just because the guy who anchors flies in doesn’t mean he knows it better than the people who are on the ground,” said Gibson.

“If I come in, or Katie comes in or Brian comes in, does that necessarily increase how good the coverage is?” asked Gibson. “Does it necessarily mean it’s going to be better because you have an anchor there?”

I agree. So why does he go?

“I think probably it calls more attention to the story. But I’m very mindful of the fact that the people who regularly cover the beat know it best, and I don’t want to do anything in terms of anchor travel to preempt the prerogatives of those who really know the stories best.”

I think Gibson’s attitude about what the stars add or don’t add to coverage is exactly right. But I also think that the idea that sending an anchor alone brings more attention to a story is sadly egotistical and not just of Gibson but of the networks and the profession.

This is ego as journalism. It’s no different, at its heart, than my favorite hobby horse about journalistic oversupply: Sending 15,000 journalists to the political conventions just so you can have a byline. It says the story is important. It says we’re important. It’s ego."

Pepsi=Bullets?

Well, yeah.

"Parvin Heydari, an Iranian mother of two, was flipping back and forth between the nightly news and Oprah when a bulletin on an Iranian state channel caught her attention. It urged Iranians to boycott what it called "Zionist products," including those made by Pepsi, Nestlé and Calvin Klein, and warned that profits from such products "are converted into bullets piercing the chests of Lebanese and Palestinian children."

As hard as it is to imagine underwear being converted into bullets, I am having just as hard of a time imagining an Iranian mother watching Oprah. This week she gets to learn how to wear a bra properly. "Turn flat, saggy, and busty befores into beautiful afters! Change your bra, change your life!" (that is actual advertisement for this week, I kid you not. The following are real as well) Or maybe she caught one of February shows, "Women Who Use Sex to Find Love." or "The Young Boy Lured into Becoming an Internet Porn Star." Or maybe last month's, "Secret Sex in the Suburbs" or "Gay For 30 Days."

Good grief. I hope they don't get Jerry Springer.

"God's Army"

Times Online has this:

"You are the sun of Islam, shining on the universe!” This is how Muhammad Khatami, the mullah who was president of Iran until last year, described Hezbollah last week. It would be no exaggeration to describe Hezbollah — the Lebanese Shi’ite militia — as Tehran’s regional trump card. Each time Tehran has played it, it has won. As war rages between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon, Tehran policymakers think that this time, too, they can win.

“I invite the faithful to wait for good news,” Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said last Tuesday. “We shall soon witness the elimination of the Zionist stain of shame.”

It's like listening to some medieval movie, isn't it?

If you want some history on this, read the whole thing.

via LGF

Speaking of those who twist God's way, the Phelps group is in the news again. The ever wrong ACLU is helping them out this time.