Question Of The Week

What is it?

Name that pic!

UPDATE:
My short survey has ended and I’m surprised. I received 36 e-mails and not one posted comment. I tested the comments thingy and it seems OK. Let me know (by e-mail) if there’s a problem with it.

Anyway, here’re the results:
14 – Mars photograph
13 – Correct (see below)
4 – Raw sponge from the sea
2 – Seed pod
2 – Ice cube from the Arctic or Antarctica
1 – Deep sea creature

Those sending the 13 correct answers must have peeked

It’s Saturn’s moon Hyperion and was just released by NASA from a flyby last week:

Cassini’ Doubleheader Flybys Score Home Run
09.29.05 — Cassini performed back-to-back flybys of Saturn moons Tethys and Hyperion last weekend, coming closer than ever before to each of them. Tethys has a scarred, ancient surface, while Hyperion is a strange, spongy-looking body with dark-floored craters that speckle its surface.

The story: Cassini-Huygens Mission to Saturn

Will Rather and Mapes ever give up?

On Wednesday I posted “Dan Rather: Lost In The Afterlife”, a brief note on an interview of Rather by Marvin Kalb that I had seen earlier on C-SPAM.

Scott Johnson at Power Line has now put up a more indepth piece that goes into Kalb’s mindset and conduct during the “interview.”

Good stuff: “The Klueless Kalb Report”

UPDATE I: John Hinderaker at Power Line has traded e-mails with Marvin Kalb debating the fake Bush-Rather memos. The latest is here: Marvin Kalb Responds

UPDATE II: AND THE WINNER (by a mile) IS, John Hinderaker, Scott Johnson, Power Line and the public.

Bill Bennett is 100% correct, and anyone that characterizes his remarks this morning as racist is a racist.

The MSM is harping on a short snippet that contains the words they want to spin. Republicans should take a stand. Here’s what Bill Bennett said [this part is for Washington Dems only because I'm convinced that D.C. Republicans can't read.]

BREITBART.com:

[...]

Bennett, on his radio show, “Morning in America,” was answering a caller’s question when he took issue with the hypothesis put forth in a recent book that one reason crime is down is that abortion is up.

“But I do know that it’s true that if you wanted to reduce crime, you could, if that were your sole purpose, you could abort every black baby in this country, and your crime rate would go down,” said Bennett, author of “The Book of Virtues.”

He went on to call that “an impossible, ridiculous and morally reprehensible thing to do, but your crime rate would go down. So these far-out, these far-reaching, extensive extrapolations are, I think, tricky.”

[...] BREITBART.com: Bennett: Black Abortions Would Lower Crime

TRANSLATION FOR WASHINGTON REPUBLICANS: Bennett said that if you abort every black baby, that will lower the crime rate. That’s absolutely correct.

Also, I can report to you, if you abort all white babies, that too will lower crime. If you abort all Asian babies, that will lower crime. If you abort all babies, that will lower crime. If you kill all humans, that will lower crime. — What’s so hard to understand about that? If some racists in Washington want to twist Bennett’s words into the lie-of-the-day, flip them a bird and go on your way, the wobbly-knees in the White House notwithstandig.

UPDATE: Lot’s of e-mail ‘offended’ by Bill Bennett’s statement and by my response. — Tough. Get a life. If you’re waiting for me to buy into the political correctness crap you have a long wait.

It takes a lot of arrogance for people to believe they’ve figured out that the Founding Fathers didn’t really mean what they wrote. David Dreier and Nancy Grace say they’ve done it. They claim to have learned that the Founders didn’t believe the words they put in Article V of the Constitution. They also figured out the old boys did believe the words of Articles I-IV and Articles VI and VII. According to David and Nancy, Article V should not be used. (I wonder if they mean, ‘unless Liberals need a fix’.) Isn’t it interesting: The First Amendment is important, big time; Article V … they were just filling up space.

Rep. David Dreier (R-CA), Chairman of the House Rules Committee, showed up last night on the Hannity and Colmes show. He may have been there to defend his voting record or he may have just been upset over the rejection of his candidacy by House Republicans to fill Tom Delay’s position. Whatever. Earlier, I had posted this comment about Dreier and complimented my friend Bernard at ACSOL for his excellent critique of Dreier. I thought that we had said enough and could move on to other things.

But Dreier’s performance on H & C was not good. It proved to me that, contrary to his repeated claims on the show, he is no conservative. In fact, after listening to him I don’t believe he could find a conservative in a room full of Barry Goldwaters. He even demonstrated a Liberal mindset when he explained why he objected to amending the Constitution.

Colmes provided some background for the first question of why House Republicans rejected Dreier. Colmes said that Time Magazine was reporting that some Republicans objected to Dreier’s elevation because he might be ‘too moderate.’ Specifically, Republicans were unhappy with his positions on stem cell research and gay marriage.

Dreier jumped in (here’s the audio : mp3, 3:07) with some stuff that Colmes had overlooked: his past arguments with Hannity over China policy, trade, the flag burning Amendment and his objection to changing the Constitution. Then he abandoned the unanswered questions and went into Delay’s case and Delay’s nemesis, Ronnie Earle.

But before he got off track, Dreier said that he opposed amending the Constitution, period. As an example, he said that before he came to Congress [25 years ago] he opposed the Equal Rights Amendment. (He didn’t say that he opposed the ERA per se; His point was that he opposed changing the Constitution.)

He mentioned that he has voted against a Constitutional Amendment to ban flag burning. He said he ‘virulently’ opposes flag burning but he’s against changing the Constitution for that purpose. He says he opposes an Amendment to ban gay marriage. He says he’s an ‘ardent proponent’ of traditional marriage but repeats that he opposes a Constitutional Amendment to ban gay marriages. (On H & C he never says that he opposes gay marriage, just that he supports traditional marriage.) He never mentions the “Full faith and credit” clause of Article IV, sec. 1.

Although he never uses the exact words, Dreier sounds like he objects to amending the Constitution for ‘any purpose.’ That’s exactly the stance Liberals take to keep conservatives in a hole on issues like right to life, gay marriage, hate crimes (some lives more valuable than others), tax dollars for faith-based charities, school vouchers, prayer in schools, etc. Dreier objects to giving any consideration for an Amendment on any of those because he objects to Amendments, period. That’s the kind of rhetoric Liberals use to win debate points.

It makes me ill to listen to the moronic argument that somehow the Founders didn’t want the Constitution to change. But Dreier really gets me going because he goes one better; He says he’s sure that James Madison would object to change. It’s an argument that makes me livid. WHO THE HELL DOES HE THINK INTRODUCED THE FIRST AMENDMENTS? IT WAS JAMES MADISON! WHAT DOES HE THINK ARTICLE V IS IN THERE FOR? FILLER?

A couple of days ago I posted this and pointed out that the Constitution was designed with changes in mind. Nancy Grace had made the stupid remark on her CNBC show that it was a living document because the Founders couldn’t possibly have anticipated airplanes and TV. I said then: the Founders didn’t overlook airplanes, they overlooked the ignorance of future generations and that includes her and David Dreier.

Move follows alleged posting of gruesome photos from Iraq

U.S. military personnel in Iraq, Afghanistan, Kosovo and other theaters overseas have been distributing images and information to the world via digital cameras, cell/satellite phones and portable computers on a loosely restrictive basis.

The possibility that some undesirable elements within the military may be releasing restricted images and information is forcing the Pentagon to rethink its policy.

The Boston Globe:
WASHINGTON — The Pentagon has tightened guidelines governing the use of photography, e-mail, Web logs, and other electronic media by US troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, amid allegations that some soldiers snapped close-up photographs of corpses in Iraq and posted them on a pornographic website.

Senior Army officials said yesterday that criminal investigators have not been able to authenticate the photos or determine whether American troops snapped the gruesome scenes of mutilated corpses and provided them to an adult website — which would clearly be a violation of the code of conduct and possibly the international laws of armed conflict.

The existence of the images was first reported in August by an Italian Web blogger and then this week by a small San Francisco alternative newspaper, the East Bay Express.

[...] The Boston Globe: Military tightens use of electronic media

Pretty sad.

Ex-Mayor of NYC, Ed Koch (Dem):

Cindy Sheehan, whose son Casey was killed in action in Iraq on April 4, 2004, has become the face of the anti-war movement in the United States. While her grief is understandable, her rhetoric is outrageous.

[...]

Many Americans, myself included, now see her as a person who has come to enjoy the celebratory status accorded to her by the radicals on the extreme left who see America as the outlaw of the world. These radicals are not content to be constructive critics. They are bent on destroying this country.

Some of them want to turn America into a radical socialist state. Others hope to create a utopia. But regardless of their agendas, how can Cindy Sheehan’s supporters defend her shameful statement, “This country is not worth dying for.”

[...] — Jewish World Review: “Sheehan has spent her sympathy”

My heartiest congratulations to Sgt. Daniel Felten at Schadenfreude who has been
Seeeelected! for advancement to Warrant Officer by the Army’s Warrant Officer Accessions Board. — Way t’ go Sarge, er, Mister Felten.

In January Peggy Noonan wrote a critical column on George Bush’s 2nd inaugural speech and conservatives went nuts. She now delivers a definitive piece on the aftermath of Katria and what it means to America. — Its time to see if she gets offsetting kudos.

Here’s a sampler:

No one took responsibility, but there was plenty of authority. People in authority sent the lost to the Superdome and the Convention Center. People in authority blocked the bridges out of town. People in authority tried to confiscate guns after the looting was over.

And they did things like this: The day before hurricane Rita hit Texas, last Friday, I saw on TV something that disturbed me. It was not the usual scene of crashing waves and hardy reporters being blown sideways by wind gusts. It was a fat Texas guy swimming in the waves off Galveston. He’d apparently decided the high surf was a good thing to jump into, so he went for a prehurricane swim. Two cops saw him, waded into the surf and arrested him. When I saw it the guy was standing there in orange trunks being astonished as the cops put handcuffs on him and hauled him away.

I thought: Oh no, this is isn’t good. This is authority, not responsibility.

You’d have to be crazy, in my judgment, to decide you were going to go swim in the ocean as a hurricane comes. But in the America where I grew up, you were allowed to be crazy. You had the right. Sometimes you were crazy and survived whatever you did. Sometimes you didn’t, and afterwards everyone said, “He was crazy.”

Last week I quoted Gerald Ford: “The government big enough to give you everything you want is big enough to take away everything you have.” I was talking about money. But it applies also to personal freedom, to the rights of the individual, including his right to do something stupid as long as it’s legal, like swimming.

My reaction: I think she’s 100% right-on … both times.

Highly recommended reading:
OpinionJournal, Peggy Noonan: The Scofflaw Swimmer

I started work on a post about Congressman David Dreier (R-CA). I wanted to point out how conservatives wanting stronger border security had dodged a bullet when Dreier was pushed aside by House members that favored Roy Blunt (R-MO) to replace Tom Delay. I got lucky. My friend Bernard at ACSOL thankfully beat me to posting on the subject. He’s a much better writer and he clearly knows more about Dreier than I do.

This is a great post:
CONGRESSMAN DAVID DREIER UNACCEPTABLE TO REPUBLICAN CONSERVATIVES

The Alliance of 15 Major 9/11 Family Member Groups has released the following statement regarding the removal of the IFC from Ground Zero. — Thank You, Governor!

UPDATE: The International Freedom Center has announced it is going out of business. lgf has the story and concludes that this proves the I.F.C. was formed solely to exploit Ground Zero. — I ceratinly agree!