March 14, 2010

This Isn’t Political At ALL

The Times – Camberley churches protest at mosque that will tower over Sandhurst

Churches have joined together to protest against plans for a mosque that would tower over the Royal Military Academy at Sandhurst, with one minister describing it as a “supremacist statement” for Islam.

A collective comprising every church in Camberley, Surrey, has lambasted plans for the giant mosque, warning that will create only “division and discord” in the town.

The proposal has already caused security concerns in military circles as the mosque includes 30m (100ft) minarets that would overlook Sandhurst.

The planned mosque lies just 360m from the academy, where hundreds of newly commissioned Army officers take to the parade ground each year for their passing out ceremony. The event attracts senior members of the Royal Family as well as important military figures.

Good grief.

Moral Degeneracy and *Your* MSM!

I missed this. A report of Toby Harnden’s from 2004, relinked to by Instapundit, talking about yet another idiotic antiwar movie that’s bombing (I’d never even heard of it till last night) (I’d link to the original Spectator article but it just punts to the home page):

The other day, while taking a break by the Al-Hamra Hotel pool, fringed with the usual cast of tattooed defence contractors, I was accosted by an American magazine journalist of serious accomplishment and impeccable liberal credentials.

She had been disturbed by my argument that Iraqis were better off than they had been under Saddam and I was now — there was no choice about this — going to have to justify my bizarre and dangerous views. I’ll spare you most of the details because you know the script — no WMD, no ‘imminent threat’ (though the point was to deal with Saddam before such a threat could emerge), a diversion from the hunt for bin Laden, enraging the Arab world. Etcetera.

But then she came to the point. Not only had she ‘known’ the Iraq war would fail but she considered it essential that it did so because this would ensure that the ‘evil’ George W. Bush would no longer be running her country. Her editors back on the East Coast were giggling, she said, over what a disaster Iraq had turned out to be. ‘Lots of us talk about how awful it would be if this worked out.’ Startled by her candour, I asked whether thousands more dead Iraqis would be a good thing.

She nodded and mumbled something about Bush needing to go. By this logic, I ventured, another September 11 on, say, September 11 would be perfect for pushing up John Kerry’s poll numbers. ‘Well, that’s different — that would be Americans,’ she said, haltingly. ‘I guess I’m a bit of an isolationist.’ That’s one way of putting it.

The moral degeneracy of these sentiments didn’t really hit me until later when I dined at the home of Abu Salah, a father of six who took over as the Daily Telegraph’s chief driver in Baghdad when his predecessor was killed a year ago.

Fabulous. What a nice lady.

Let’s revisit that “I hope Obama fails” line of Rush’s and the OMG SCANDAL OMG that ensuuued

Happy Pi Day!

It’s 3.14. Imagine the nerds errupting on this date in 2015…

March 13, 2010

Not So Epic Discovery

This isn’t exactly new to any of us (certainly not to me), but getting old sucks. Went to say hi to baby’s great grandpa, who was discharged yesterday, and the tummy troubles continue.

Anyhoo, over ‘n out.

March 12, 2010

The Prii Don’t Deserve This, or: Journalists Might Wanna Learn How To Drive a Motorized Vehickle Before Reporting On Them

I’m no fan of the Prius, but seriously:

Forbes – Toyota Hybrid Horror Hoax, by Michael Fumento

Also, check out the Ken Doll byline headshot on this guy. Yeesh.

Obama Needs Naptime Or Else He’ll Create a Diplomatic Incident

Telegraph – Barack Obama ‘too tired’ to give proper welcome to Gordon Brown

Barack Obama’s offhand approach to Gordon Brown’s Washington visit last week came about because the president was facing exhaustion over America’s economic crisis and is unable to focus on foreign affairs, the Sunday Telegraph has been told.

How does he explain the box set of DVDs?

March 11, 2010

Epic Discovery

Funniest thing. Turns out, travelling alone with an 8-month-old is kinda tiring. Also taking 8-month-old to visit her great grandpa in hospital for weirdo stomach problems.

Anyway. Over ‘n out.

March 10, 2010

Oh, Gag Me With A Kate Spade Spoon

Telegraph headline:

Reese Witherspoon chides Michelle Obama for stealing capital’s style crown

Reese Witherspoon says her “Legally Blonde” character Elle Woods has been ousted as the most stylish woman to come to the US capital by Michelle Obama.

Government Healthcare

Another story I can’t stand so I’ll just quote Instapundit:

GOVERNMENT HEALTHCARE: Neglected by ‘lazy’ nurses, man, 22, dying of thirst rang the police to beg for water. “A man of 22 died in agony of dehydration after three days in a leading teaching hospital. Kane Gorny was so desperate for a drink that he rang police to beg for their help. They arrived on the ward only to be told by doctors that everything was under control. The next day his mother Rita Cronin found him delirious and he died within hours.”

Awful.

Argument Overrun By the Small Print

The other day I was scrolling along through my Google Reader and came across this from Charles Krauthammer in the Fox All Stars panel. And was mildly annoyed. So I wasn’t surprised to see Mark Steyn come along and:

Wilders does not need to be lectured condescendingly about distinctions within Islam, because he lives with them every day. And he has concluded, notwithstanding Dr. Krauthammer’s views on the precise “minority” that identifies as “Islamist,” that Islam itself is the issue — and that, therefore, regardless of the “moderation” of the “overwhelming majority” of Muslims, the more Islam the less Netherlands in any recognizable sense. Are the gangs of gay bashers on the streets of Amsterdam “Islamist” by Krauthammer’s definition? Maybe, maybe not. But, either way, they make the running, and the rest of the community is either indifferent or quiescent.

As for whether Wilders is “extremist,” his views on the cultural compatibility of immigrants were routine and unexceptional until the 1960s, not only in Europe, but also in the U.S. And, even in North America today, they are the stated policy of the Government of Quebec. One can certainly disagree with that, but does that make Quebec also “fascist” (Beck) or even “extreme” (Krauthammer)?

Dr. Krauthammer is also incorrect to suggest there are two issues here. When the state attempts to constrain further Europe’s already too shriveled bounds of public discourse, the only issue is state power. The Continental political class does not want to debate the question of its ever more assertive Muslim populations, and so has decided to criminalize that debate. Geert Wilders lives under 24/7 security because Muslims (including the killer of Theo van Gogh) have pledged to murder him. Yet he’s the one on trial for incitement? The issue is not Wilders or his views, but the Dutch state and their ever more “extreme, radical, and wrong” views on core Western liberties.

Sigh

Mark Steyn, of course, tends to preface (or used to) a lot of his stuff with the “of courses”:

of course, not all Muslims are terrorists — though enough are hot for jihad to provide an impressive support network of mosques from Vienna to Stockholm to Toronto to Seattle.

…etc. Krauthammer seems to have gotten stuff in the first half of that sentence so it’s perfectly okay to put a person on trial for going straight to the second half.

Movie Title: This Is Amazing

I can’t believe how good this is.

Totally ripped off from Wheat & Weeds.

March 9, 2010

Remember the Yellow River Dolphin?

This is how they tried to save the Yellow River Dolphin: “Jiangsu province Changshu City Fluorine Chemical industry land sewage treatment plant (江苏省常熟市氟化学工业园污水处理厂) was responsible for collection and processing of the industrial sewage. However they did not, the sewage pipe was extended 1500 meters under the Yangtze River and releasing the sewage there. 2009 June 11

Villagers from Kang village in Linfen City, Shanxi Province (山西省临汾市下康村) due to long-term consumption of the polluted water contaminated by industrial waste, there were 50 people who have cancer and cerebral thrombosis. 64-year-old Wang Baosheng got ill since 2003, he has fester all over his body so he cannot go to bed and lying face down on the edge of the bed each day. July 10, 2005

And I can’t even handle looking at the pictures of the children.

China Hush – Amazing Pictures, Pollution in China

Lu Guang (卢广) from People’s Republic of China won the $30,000 W. Eugene Smith Grant in Humanistic Photography for his documentary project “Pollution in China.”

Click through to see the whole collection.

March 8, 2010

More Than Crazy, Perhaps

An infographic:

North Korea: The Craziest Country In the World

The Best Kind of Research

Telegraph – Bad weather blamed for Scotland having ‘more people with ginger hair’
Scotland’s notoriously bad weather appears to be behind why more of the country’s population appeared to be blessed with ginger hair, new research has claimed.

The non scientific research found that in areas where the temperatures in summer were cooler and winter days were shorter – such as in Scotland – people with ginger hair were more likely to survive and evolve.

I love this story.

March 7, 2010

What Doesn’t Represent a Majority of the Republican Caucus

NRO – AWOL in the Bunning Battle
The GOP shows why Obamacare is a good bet for the Left. By Andrew McCarthy

If Obamacare passes, Obamacare is forever. Just ask Jim Bunning.

The Kentucky Republican finally caved in Tuesday after relentless pressure from other senators — including Republicans — to drop what the Politico called his “one man” filibuster of a bill to extend expiring unemployment benefits. …

In this case, there ought to have been raging controversy: Bunning was objecting to yet another monthly extension of unemploymentpayments absent an explanation of how it would be paid for. …

That proved unacceptable, and not only to Democrats. Maine’s Susan Collins took to the Senate floor to assure Americans that Bunning’s radical views about Congress’s not spending yet more billions it doesn’t have “do not represent a majority of the Republican caucus.” And sure enough, they didn’t. Once Bunning backed down, the measure passed by a whopping 78-19.

And that’s for something that had a finite time period. An ending. A limit. And there’s more!

Besides unemployment compensation, what is in the bill Bunning was blocking? The proposed goodies include public funds to prevent what would otherwise be a 21 percent reduction in payments to doctors who treat Medicare patients.

Of course, these are exactly the sort of steep cuts that enacting Obamacare would accomplish. Given that enacting Obamacare is the Left’s ne plus ultra, why not just let the Medicare payments get slashed now? Because Democrats realize that if people get a load of how Obamacare would actually work before it is a fait accompli, they will scream bloody murder. So the game is to make certain that doctors don’t feel the pinch now, just as the game is to pass Obamacare now but delay its implementation until 2013 — allowing Obama and Democrats to get through the 2010 and 2012 election cycles without being held accountable for the epic disaster that will be government-controlled medicine.

I’ve managed to ignore this story for a little while, but I’m back to feeling anxious and discouraged.

In sum, Bunning’s battle gave Republicans a chance to make points about runaway deficit spending, the fraudulence of PAYGO posturing, the foolish redistribution of wealth to create expensive and unproductive government jobs, unemployment-benefit extensions that Democrats refuse to pay for and that actually increase unemployment, and the monstrous rationing that would be wrought by Obamacare. So, did Republicans rally behind Bunning? Not a chance.

Read the whole thing to feel EVEN BETTER about our Republican protectors.

He was right to do so. These extensions happen continually. The stimulus — which is a redistribution of wealth from the private to the public sector, and from people who work to people who don’t — extended unemployment benefits for 53 weeks. Another extension in November added 20 more weeks. Cato’s Alan Reynolds reports that this brings the total to 99 weeks of benefits in high-unemployment states. The measure on which Bunning has relented adds another month. And having browbeaten him into withdrawing his objection, Democrats will now seek an extension through the end of this year, i.e., another 36 weeks or so.