Archive » 2005 » May

My new column on a just-published children’s book called “Rainbow Party” is up. USA Today’s coverage of the book–aimed at 14-year-olds–is here.
So, what’s a rainbow party? Here’s the column intro:
Here’s a rich irony: I’m writing today about a new children’s book, but I can’t describe the plot in a family newspaper without warning you first [...]

BusinessWeek says Congress and the White House are inching toward a compromise on Social Security. Private accounts will not be part of the plan. Instead, the compromise would include (a) reducing the rate of growth in benefits paid to upper-income beneficiaries (as President Bush has suggested) and (b) sharply increasing taxes on upper-income taxpayers (i.e., [...]

Scheduled to appear on Fox News Live at 12:30 pm eastern time.

Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney is shifting his position on abortion, just as George H.W. Bush did prior to the 1980 election:
Governor Mitt Romney said this week in a nationally published interview that he is ”in a different place” on abortion than at the time of his first run for public office in Massachusetts, when he [...]

When last we peeked in on the anarchists and anti-war moonbats at Indymedia, they were organizing superglue vandalism across the country. Their new stunt in the works? A national flag burning day. (Hat tip: Indymedia Watch.)
So on this Fourth of July we call on you to express your feelings on their “Independence Day” by burning [...]

Looks like Brooklyn College professor Timothy Shortell is off his meds again:
A CUNY professor who called religious believers “moral retards” has gone on another Internet rant - calling himself a defiant “superman” and comparing religion to oppressive regimes.
A firestorm erupted at Brooklyn College after the views of Timothy Shortell - elected to head the sociology [...]

The latest Arbitron ratings (you know, the ones Al Franken says aren’t available to the public) show that Air Amerca continues to struggle.
Don’t worry about Franken though. He has back-up plans.
Related entries here.

The claim that Power Line failed to acknowledge the provenance of the Schiavo “GOP Talking Points” memo continues to be made even though it is demonstrably false.
Note to Wall Street Journal editors: If you’re going to quote someone making an absurd attack on a blog, you might at least publish the blog’s correct URL. (This [...]

Here’s the roll call from this afternoon’s vote, 81-18.
Gerry Daly sez…”Those who were not signatories for the deal, but who voted for cloture now, deserve mockery.”

Oh yeah, there it is…today’s poisonous dose from Pulitzer Prize-winning liberal cartoonist David Horsey at the Seattle Post-Intelligencer:

For balance, recall this. And bookmark embedded reporter Michael Yon’s excellent blog.

Lots of readers e-mailing about new reports that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi is wounded and possibly dying. Athena at Terrorism Unveiled writes:
An al-Qa’ida website posted today that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi has been wounded and asked for Muslims to pray for his recovery.
Just about a week ago, however, there was a report by an Iraqi doctor that [...]

During an interview yesterday with Boston Globe editorial writers and columnists, John Kerry said he signed Form SF 180. The form will be sent to the U.S. Navy within the next few days.
Globe columnist Joan Vennochi writes:
During an interview yesterday with Globe editorial writers and columnists, the former Democratic presidential nominee was asked [...]

As if the story weren’t horrible enough: The teenage monster accused of raping and burying that 8-year-old girl in Florida who was found alive in a landfill was here illegally. Despite numerous arrests for burglary and vandalism, no action was taken to deport him. According to the Palm Beach Post:
Two years ago, [Milagro] Cunningham’s mother [...]

Looks like federal prosecutors are ratcheting up the case against Larry Franklin. Prosecutors are expected to file new charges related to the classified documents allegedly found at Franklin’s West Virginia home, according to the New York Times.

As I’ve noted before, many (most?) of the 10 million blogs tracked by Technorati are computer-generated (aka “spam blogs”). AdLand notes,
Seems there is a rather large boom in faux blogs lately. I mean blogs that have no real author, but are auto-generated somehow and geared to a very specific topic. I noticed that if [...]

Thanks to reader/blogger Greg Martin for sending this graphic that says it all:

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Related:
- Breaking: Filibuster compromise
- Patterico makes a pledge
- Round-ups: Joe Gandelman, Pardon My English, Conservative Outpost
- More Photoshop-inion from Slublog: Frist as Chamberlain.
- Captain Ed’s sober deconstruction of the deal and a vow: “Not One Dime for the NRSC as long as Frist [...]

Press conference about to begin…Sen McCain et al.
Sen. McCain: We are here, 14 Republicans and Democrats, to announce we have reached an agreement to try and avert a crisis…and pull the Senate back from the precipice..grateful for efforts of Sen. Frist and Sen. Reid…[singles out Sen. Byrd and Sen. Warner] vital to this process.
Pledged to [...]

Via AP with a hat tip to Daly Thoughts:
Radio host Al Franken, who is mulling a run against Sen. Norm Coleman, R-Minn., in 2008, has purchased a town house on the edge of downtown Minneapolis and will establish residency in Minnesota.
“It’s one of the things I need to do if I decide to make a [...]

They’re rolling out the cots for an all-night debate in the Senate tonight on the nomination of Priscilla Owen. More on the non-slumber party preparations here.
Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid has arranged to deliver a 90-second nationally televised pitch sometime this evening.
The lefties are gearing up over at The Daily Kos.
On the right, Captain Ed [...]

Meet Timothy Shortell, Brooklyn College’s recently-elected chairman of the school’s sociology department:

Shortell received 7 out of 12 faculty votes to secure his new position, despite (or perhaps because of) crackpot online rants comparing Karl Rove to Joseph Goebbels and attacking religious people as “moral retards.”
It says something that students are more outraged at Shortell’s election [...]

Must-read of the day is at the WSJ Online: “An American Soldier.” It’s an essay from Michael C. Carson of St. Paul, Minnesota, a fallen American soldier, written five years ago when he was a high school senior. Laura Ingraham read it on her show this morning. You won’t get through it with dry eyes. [...]

Democrat Maurice Hinchey, the N.Y. congressman who claims Karl Rove planted the CBS Rathergate memos, is still unhinged.
Now, he’s blaming “Republican spin” for his junket addiction.
The Federal Review takes down Hinchey’s excuses.

Confederate Yankee and GOP and the City weigh in.

…because you might end up in The Parade of Unfortunate Star Wars Costumes.
Warning: Beverage-spewing-inducing.

Pia de Solenni has a jaw-dropping piece in NRO today about a morning radio show here in D.C. that aired a vulgar broadcast interviewing callers who joked about having multiple abortions. The host, “Elliott” of Elliott in the Morning on D.C. 101, held a contest to find the woman who had had the most abortions. [...]

Lots of buzzing over Howard Dean’s telling slip o’ the tongue on Meet the Press yesterday in which he confused Saddam and Osama (video via Jackson’s Junction; transcript at MSNBC):
But the thing that really bothered me the most, which the 9-11 Commission said also wasn’t true, is the insinuation that the president continues to make [...]

That’s the gist of a recent survey of college-educated men and women in Egypt, Morocco and Indonesia.
Anti-American feelings are widespread in the Muslim world and extend to U.S. consumer brands, according to a report released Wednesday. It suggested the U.S. burnish its image with a change in tone and by publicizing aid programs.
But as blogger [...]

The NY comptroller says sex offenders are getting taxpayer-subsidized Viagra because of a federal Department of Health and Human Services directive. Sen. Chuck Schumer gets the Sherlock Holmes Award for making this observation:
“While I believe that HHS did not do this intentionally, when the government pays for Viagra for sex offenders, it could well hurt [...]

Iraqi police hero Maj. Imad Shakir Mahmoud died last week stopping a suicide bomber on Sunday, May 15, in the city of Baqouba, northeast of Baghdad. There was a memorial parade for Mahmoud today. His young daughter, carrying a large portrait of her slain father, led the way.
R.I.P., Maj. Mahmoud.

The Newsweek fallout continues…
- From the Stockton Record:
A San Joaquin Delta College student discovered a copy of the Quran in a library toilet Wednesday evening, an incident similar to one described in a now-retracted news report that sparked Muslim protests worldwide last week.
Delta police wouldn’t release the name of the student, whom they say [...]

There’s a new documentary on Sen. Robert Byrd’s life story “of strength and fortitude” debuting this week. It’s called “The Soul of the Senate” (website to be launched soon here). The Sunday Gazette-Mail reports:
Some historic shots were discovered in the massive television video archives WSAZ-TV has given to the Cultural Center in Charleston and Marshall [...]