24-The Series Comes To An End

Following years of more or less steady decline in the quality of the series, 24 is finally calling it quits after the current season 8, or as it is called, "Day 8". Fox Network has declined to renew the program, which NBC also declined to pick up. That is probably a good thing. To those of you who think 24 has veered too greatly into the arena of political correctness over the course of the last three years or so, can you imagine what a shadow of its former self it would become as an NBC program? The only worse fate would be were it to be picked up by CBS. As it stands now, perhaps it is best that it is ending its television run, after which it is slated to be made into a full length feature film.

As far as the political correctness goes, I can see where that might have something to do with the declining quality of the program, but I think its a minor factor in comparison to the fact that the show is just getting old and, even worse, predictable.

24 made its mark as one of those kinds of action suspense series where you never knew nor suspected what was going to happen next. It was a wild ride, an adrenaline rush which could easily take your breath away and keep you lighting up one cigarette after another with your eyes and attention breathlessly glued to the screen.

Naturally, it would be next to impossible to keep up that level of suspense year after year, especially when the show followed more or less the same formula, repeatedly. A terrorist threat, be it a nuclear or dirty bomb, or a chemical weapon attack, or biological weapon, threatened a major American city. Jack Bauer to the rescue. Jack learns there is a mole, at CTU, or close to the President, working with the villains. Jack engages in questionable tactics, usually some degree of torture, in order to extract the necessary information to save tens of thousands, potentially millions of lives. Some key character or characters eventually dies unexpectedly.

On to the next day, the next year, and the same formula. Naturally, as I said, it got predictable, and when Season 7 saw the inclusion of liberal comedienne activist Jeannine Garafolo in the role of an FBI analyst, it was taken by many as a sign of impending doom. Sure enough, Jack began to question his own methods. He felt guilty about many of his past actions. At the end of the show, when it looked as though he might be nearing the end of his life, he turned to an Islamic imam for spiritual guidance.

All of that most of us could have lived with and even accepted as an aspect of character growth and development, even if we didn't appreciate the apparent behind the scenes reasons. But the fact remains, after so long, you can only jump out at someone from around the same corner at the same time and scream "Booyah" so many times before such an exercise loses the element of surprise.

Like I said, there was a progressive decline over the years, speaking in a general sense, although Season 5 did seem to reverse the trend, and came close to matching the original adrenaline rush that was the premiere season. But as though to balance out this anomaly, Season 6 was to all intents and purposes execrable, generally agreed by most to be the series worst year. Season 7 was better, but still not quite up to the par of the old magic of the earlier seasons.

Ironically, this season has in my opinion been the best since 5, and by the time it is over with may well surpass that mark. Jack's lover Renee' Walker was killed in last nights episode, which most people might have saw coming, but at least in my own case only in the last couple of minutes before it actually happened.

The Prime Minister of the IRK, who has been trying to forge a peace deal with President Allison Taylor, was brutally murdered in the last episode after turning himself over to IRK terrorists in order to save tens of thousands of New York City lives from the explosion of a dirty bomb. This development took me totally by surprise.

A lot of people were surprised by the reveal of Jenny Scott as the CTU mole, but only because they spent so much time complaining about what seemed to be her useless subplot, the seemingly good-hearted beleaguered former criminal trying to turn her life around while being blackmailed by her redneck former boyfriend who was threatening to reveal the truth about her past. I was not surprised. In fact I figured that one out early on. It made no sense that someone with that background could hide her past and get a job that entails such sensitive responsibilities of national security as a CTU systems analyst involves.

Now, former President Logan is back, seemingly as villainous as ever. Where is all this leading to? With the death of Renee Walker, Jack has lost all hope for a happy ending to this series, though at least he still has his daughter and grandchild. Will he find at least some degree of peace and happiness through them? Will he acquire the justice and vengeance his heart has to crave? Will he make a conversion to Islam?

And, what of Tony Almeida? Will he get in on the action and get revenge on Logan for his involvement in the death of his wife and unborn son?

Will Chloe remain as CTU boss?

This season, incidentally, might well go down as the most cerebral one of the entire series, though not lacking in action and suspense.

Unfortunately, the formula for the series seems to have devolved into a presumed need for a high body count. Unfortunately, that only matters when you care about the bodies being counted. The vast majority of them are merely nameless, almost faceless figures-a handful of terrorists here, two or three members of this or that criminal crew there, a handful of cops, CTU or FBI agents, etc., and before you know it, you get numb to the carnage which seems to amount to nothing more than violence for the sake of the body count. Plot and character development all too often took a back seat for far too long.

But it was a hell of a ride while it lasted, and to be fair, even the disappointing Season 6 was better than most of the shit that is perpetrated on the American television viewing public.

At any rate, it was nice knowing you, Jack Bauer. See you at the movies.

Octodick

It's semi-official, I guess you could say. In the next James Bond film, the world's preeminent film spy is coming out of the closet, with at least one gay sex scene involving Bond, along with one scene depicting full-frontal nudity, as per star Daniel Craig's request.

Reportedly, the film will be set in India, with the pivotal role of what has been described as the "Bond guy" played by Bollywood actor Shahrukh Khan. No word yet on the overall story plot, still in development, parts of which take part in such diverse areas as Kashmir, Tibet, and a remote Indian village, in addition to New Delhi, Mumbai, and Calcutta.

Not to worry, though, purists, as there will also be the traditional Bond girl in the film, in the person of Freida Pinto, from Slumdog Millionaire.

So what would be a good title? Octodick might seem a little obvious.

Moonraker?

A Slice Of History

Street scene of San Francisco, April 14th, 1906-four days before the great earthquake and fire.



H/T Car Lust Blog

Obama Targets US Citizen Traitor For Assassination (Or, A Stopped Clock Is Right Twice A Day)

An American citizen has been targeted for assassination by the Obama Administration, and in this case, that's fine with me. New Mexico born Islamic cleric Anwar al-Alawki is a man who has openly declared war against the US, while living in Yemen, an Al-Queda stronghold, and has offered comfort and support to known terrorists. Specifically, the Fort Hood shooter and the Christmas "underwear bomber".

National Review Online supports the policy as well, though the linked article does call to attention the seeming disparity between this and other Obama Administration policies in regards to terrorists apprehended on and off the field of battle. Their stated preference of trying them in civilian courts, with full Miranda rights and other constitutional protection afforded to most common criminals, provides the most telling an obvious example of this disparity.

In the meantime, some leftist sites are on record as calling into question this policy-while some right-leaning blogs also criticize the policy, one of them going so far as to declare an "amber alert" on behalf of the constitution. No one on the left has joined in this particular cause, which is good, as most of those assholes wouldn't recognize the Constitution if it bit them on the ass, let alone was missing. They never bothered to familiarize themselves with it before, so it would be unseemly for them to put it on a fucking milk carton. Doubtless they would portray it in the form of an age-progression sketch which would look very little like the original document.

But for pundits on the Right to criticize this policy strikes me as no more than a knee-jerk anti-Obama reaction. While it is to be expected, it is every bit as unseemly as the Left with their constant harping about the Bush Administration, come what may, for whatever reason, which could pretty well be distilled in essence as, hey it's a new day, what can we find to bash Bush about?

I have yet to see anything by the Daily Kos or the HuffPo concerning the matter, which is not to say they haven't posted anything, I just haven't taken the time to go directly to those sites yet. I have not seen anything by them linked by other sites, however, which might be significant. Doubtless were this a Bush Administration policy, again, traffic to these and other leftist sites bitching about it might well crash the net. But so it goes.

Ordinarily, it would be legitimate cause for concern if the feds were to target a civilian citizen for assassination, or for some other action which might be seen as in violation of that person's constitutional rights. For example, suppose an AG were to kidnap a Mafia member and have him whisked away and unceremoniously dumped in the jungles of Guatemala without benefit of a trial or hearing, with nothing but the clothes on his back and money in his wallet, with not so much as a toothbrush, suitcase, or change of clothes otherwise. We would ordinarily be aghast at such unofficial official behavior, regardless of our lack of sympathy as to the plight of the individual in question. Unless of course the AG in question was Robert Kennedy, at which point, if you're a Democrat, you continue to bow and worship at the Kennedy altar.

This, however, is a man who is a known, proven, and demonstrated traitor to his country, who is acting in concert with declared enemies of the US, on foreign soil. He deserves no special consideration. No trial, hearing, or judicial review here in needed nor is it warranted. He is on record, in person, recorded on tape from Yemen, as encouraging attacks on this country and its citizens.

As much as it pains me to admit it, Obama is right in this matter. The only problem is, he doesn't go far enough. It shouldn't stop with American citizens.

Any Islamic imam who declares war, jihad, fatwa, or otherwise engages in violent, or otherwise criminal activity against the US, should be taken out, along with his core supporters. This wouldn't be that hard to do. Yes, it might involve loss of innocent lives, but I would suggest that those around such people, in his immediate orbit, are mostly supporters. If this policy were pursued over a five year period, it might result in the loss of a few thousand lives, maybe even ten or twenty thousand or so, and yes, many of these will be relatively innocent family members, including children.

On the other hand, it would give these people pause to consider that maybe encouraging attacks against the US, against US citizens on US soil and abroad, and against US interests, might not be the wisest move they might make.

It's called cutting off the head of the snake. I say go for it. No matter how many deaths are the result of such a policy, it probably would be a fraction of the deaths that would otherwise occur, the vast majority of who might well be, in fact more than likely would be, innocents.

Of course, we would need a carrot to go with this stick. In this case, we might well find that, when it comes to the majority of people on the so-called Arab street, the carrot and the stick might well be one and the same thing. I honestly believe the Muslim population would be well served by cutting off this cancer in their midst. They just can't tell you that openly, for obvious reasons.

Tea-Party Racism

I'm going to preface this by stating that I don't give a shit how much of a hero John Lewis supposedly was during the Civil Rights era. What matters to me is what a lying stack of shit he is now. Lewis has a habit of playing the race card This is a man who called John McCain (whom I should first of all point out that I don't like at all) a latter-day George Wallace, in so many words, even though McCain has always spoke of Lewis in glowing, almost idolatrous terms (which is one among many reasons I don't like the despicable old RINO).

Representative Barney Frank of Massachusetts needs no introduction. We are all aware of his past running a brothel for male prostitution out of the basement of his house involving male staffers, something for which he was neither censored nor for that matter even criticized, at least not officially, by his Democratic compatriots. In the meantime, he has gone on to such a high-ranking position in the Democratic Party controlled Congress, he shares a large part of the blame for the current housing market woes and resultant financial meltdown, due to his influence on the committee charged with overseeing regulation of the housing and banking industries.

Not a man of integrity, to say the least.

When men of this quality claim they are verbally assaulted, called nigger and fag, and spat upon, while purposely walking through crowds of political opponents, I say they are liars. Particularly since there is no proof whatsoever, outside of their word, that the alleged racist and homosexual slurs take place. There is no proof on tape, film, or video, nor is there any verifiable proof from any independent source to corroborate their story, which sounds to me like the same kind of race-hustling politics the Democrats have been playing for decades.

For what its worth, if it did happen, it won't change my vote or my own political philosophy. It's just something that either happened or didn't. I ordinarily wouldn't even give enough of a damn to blog about.

But then, something happened. A poll came out, conducted by Gallup, which showed the overall make-up of the Tea-Party organization. When I saw the results of the poll, it suddenly occurred to me-maybe there are a small percentage of racists in the Tea-Party movement after all.

The results of the poll, according to Gallup-

Political/Ideological make-up of the Tea-Party

Republicans- 49%
Independents- 43%
Democrats- 8%

Conservatives- 70%
Moderates- 22%
Liberals- 7%

So there you have it, folks. I had always figured there would probably be a small number of bigots and racists in the Tea Party, but their numbers would probably be so marginal as to not amount to even one solid percent.

Now, come to find out, they might make up as much as-well, seven or eight percent?

Who knows? And, as long as they vote against the Democrat motherfuckers this fall-who cares?

LOST-It Only Ends Once (Pt. 2)

Okay, since episode ten has recently aired, I thought I would point out that, so far, I haven't seen anything to veer me away from my newest theory that-

1. Sun will eventually be the candidate to replace Jacob.

2. Jin will himself replace MIB (False Locke)

Or, possibly, it will be the other way around.

The two new candidates to take on the mantle of these godlike entities will then by virtue of their undying love for each other, utilize said love to make peace between the two entities-which according to my theory is actually one person. Jacob being the cold, logical rational side of the schizophrenic life force of the island, MIB being the primal, emotional side.

This has all been a game leading up to this healing of the self. Bear in mind, there have been past candidates. Jacob and MIB are themselves past candidates, which explains why they would appear as English speaking Americans, in 1867, to Richard Alpert, a Spanish man from the Canary Islands whose knowledge of English was rudimentary at best.

Otherwise, if Jacob and MIB were not themselves prior candidates, then the two entities would either appear as Spanish people, forms Richard could more easily relate to, or as their original selves-whoever or whatever that might be. Since it stands to reason this has been on-going for centuries, if not thousands of years, it becomes obvious the two original forms of the two entities were not as English speaking Americans.

Since whatever forms the entities take are locked in, the personalities and even emotions becoming merged, then it stands to reason they had no choice but to appear as they did. It also stands to reason that if Sun and Jin are the two ultimate candidates/replacements, their emotions and memories, including how they feel toward each other, will become an integral part of the equation.

So what happened in the last episode? Well, it became clear that Jacob's influence, while profound, is also not irreversible. A mere touch from the Flocke can undo it, though only to a point. When he touched an unconscious Sun in the last episode, he obviously couldn't undo the fact that she and Jin were married. However, he could and did negate another of Jacob's influences-her command of the English language. While she could still understand it, she could no longer speak it. Her communication skills, therefore, with the remainder of the candidates, and others, became limited at best.

The most important effect of Jacob's influence, however, was Sun and Jin's marriage. As we saw in the Sideways' time segment, Sun and Jin were destined to not marry, but merely be would-be secret lovers, a situation which, once it was discovered by Sun's Korean mobster father, led him to arrange a twenty-five thousand dollar payment (to be delivered unknowingly by Jin himself) to Keamy, to kill Jin. Thanks to Jacob's influence, however, this whole scenario was turned on its head. Thanks to him, Sun and Jin were not only legally married, but this came about with the actual blessings of Sun's father.

Seeing as how Sun and Jin were on Flight 815 originally, it stands to reason that this marital arrangement was important to Jacob. He did not want them to be mere lovers and parents of an illegitimate child (who in Sideways Time might turn out to die due to the bullet Sun took toward the end of the show), he wanted them to be united by the bonds of matrimony. That in itself has to be significant, while his desire for them to communicate fluently in English can be seen as a mere matter of convenience.

We have seen other examples of Jacob's influence. For example, originally Sayid, a former Republican Guard member loyal to Saddam's regime, was a brutal torturer who fell in love with a woman who had been destined to be just one more of his victims. This changed him, but apparently, not much. He cares for his family and his love, but knows he is not good enough for her, and so he arranges her marriage to his brother, a weak man he can easily control. When he discovered a bound and gagged Jin at the end of the episode, he showed no concern or sympathy, barely bringing himself to go to the trouble to place a box-cutter in Jin's hands in order for him to extricate himself from the tape with which he was bound. He is basically a cold, heartless thug, a bad man whose one redeeming feature is he knows it and doesn't want to negatively impact those he loves because of this.

Jacob's influence was to make him believe that he was a good man, or that he could become one, even to the point he might be able to live a good enough life with the woman he loved to make a fresh start.

Then, in the blink of an eye, Jacob took that love away from him. But the inspiration was still there, and provided an impetus for Sayid to insist, to himself as much as to others, that he was a good man.

And again, we saw the influence of Flocke's touch. He has reversed Jacob's influence, to where Sayid is now once again a stone cold, hard, uncaring brute of a man with no love, no compassion, and no hope for redemption.

The effects of Flocke's touch on Sawyer is yet to be determined, and thus far Kate has rejected his influence. Nor is it clear whether Flocke will exercise the power of his touch, the power to reverse Jacob's influence, on any of the other candidates. But one thing is abundantly clear, though perhaps not to Flocke. And that is, he can not hope to reverse Sun and Jin's love for each other, for that came about independent of Jacob's influence.

And that fact might well in the long run be what leads to Flock's undoing.

Note that Jacob has done bad things in his career, even evil things, while MIB has arguably presented clues that he is not totally evil. Again, this is not, in my opinion, a simple timeless battle between good and evil, but a question of balance between two warring aspects of the same personality. The marriage of Sun and Jin seems to be the most likely means to brings this conflict into balance.

What remains to be determined is who these entities are, and their origins. Are they Djinn, as I speculated in my last post, or are they possibly literally sons, or the scizophrenic son, of the goddess Tiawaret? My own opinion on that is the statue of the goddess was built during a time when visitors to the island interpreted the island's properties based on their own cultural and religious proclivities, during a time when the constantly moving island appeared for a brief time in the Mediterranean or Red Sea region.

At any rate, the true identity/identities of the two warring entities, regardless of whether or not they turn out to be one schizophrenic entity or two separate ones, might well be one of those mysteries the writers alluded might not be completely answered, at least not in full. We might get the who and why, but not the how or when, for example. We'll just have to wait and see.

LOST-It Only Ends Once

Forget everything I said previously about what I thought about who the potential candidates are to replace Jacob, and conceivable MIB. I have a new, even more compelling theory, based on what seemed to be an almost throw-away line by Sun in last week's Richard Alpert-centric episode.

Before I go into that, however, a few words about that episode.

We finally learned a lot about Richard Alpert last week, though any reveal concerning him wasn't exactly earth-shattering. We did learn why he never ages. Jacob did not possess the power to restore to life his lost love Isabella, nor did he have it within his means to forgive "Ricardo" his sin of accidentally killing the doctor who refused to heal her of the tuberculosis that eventually claimed her life. Since Riccardo could find no one to forgive him for this sin, he opted for the one gift Jacob could bestow-eternal life, a life that unfortunately would keep him eternally separate from Isabella.

We also learned how the statue of Tiawaret was destroyed-a gigantic tsunami wave crashed the Black Rock into it, while somehow leaving the Black Rick itself intact. We'll just assume for the sake of argument that the wave actually gets the lion's share of the credit for smashing the statue, and the Black Rock just helped it along.

We saw how the island was explained as a cork in a bottle which contained the evil of the Smoke (by the way, could MIB, and Jacob as well, possibly be Djinn?). MIB symbolically destroyed the bottle, telling Jacob that the latter would see him "sooner than you think".

Finally, Riccardo, now convinced that he has been dead and in hell all along, digs up the crucifix necklace that had belonged to Isabella from where he had buried it after the MIB had given it back to him, having found it after the wreck of the Black Rock, the ship on which Riccardo had been destined to voyage to a life of slavery in the "New World", a previous bit of good fortune he had experienced due to his rudimentary at best knowledge of English, and his strong, white teeth. (evidently his lush eyebrows were not a factor).

Anyway, having dug up the necklace, Riccardo proclaimed that he was now ready to accept MIB's previous offer, provided it still stands. That's when Hurley appeared, and convinced him that Isabella was still with him, relaying her messages to him. Riccardo was convinced to stick with the good side. It probably was not that hard a sell. MIB had previously scanned Riccardo's mind and presented an illusion of Isabella, which told him they were in hell and the devil was after them. She run and was seemingly attacked by something Riccardo assumed was the same smoke monster that had earlier destroyed the ship's crew and Captain Whitfield, plus what few of the slaves were left that Whitfield himself had not run through with his sword.

MIB appeared and convinced him the devil was-Jacob, of course. When Riccardo went with the dagger, given the same speech by MIB as Dogun had earlier given Sayid, he got his ass kicked. He was then almost drowned by Jacob, which convinced Riccardo he was still alive after all.

Riccardo now has the mission of acting as an intermediary between Jacob and the Others, and anyone else Jacob brings to the island, including the survivors of Flight 815, all of whom Jacob would prefer to avoid. He wants them to make the right decisions of their own initiative. He thinks they have that capacity. The MIB does not. He thinks all mankind is by nature evil, violent, and corrupt.

It all goes back to the season five finale, "The Incident", where MIB and Jacob were engaged in conversation outside the statue, both watching the approach of a ship that may or may not have been the Black Rock, depending on who you believe.

MIB declared that "it always ends the same", that they come, they fight, they corrupt, they destroy, etc.

Jacob's response was telling.

"It only ends once", he replied. "Everything else is just progress."

It only ends once. In other words, this "game" has been going on for, presumably, centuries at least. All of which begs the question-and it is an important one-

Why would Jacob and MIB appear-in 1867-to Richard, a Spanish prisoner and slave with a rudimentary at best knowledge of English-as two English speaking Americans? Would this conceivable be the true forms of two entities who have existed for centuries, if not thousands of years?

The obvious answer to this would be that the forms of Jacob and MIB are themselves former candidates-chosen replacements of previous replacements, all of whom have taken on the mantle, for a limited time span, of what I hold to be two different sides of the same schizophrenic personality, the life force of the island.

You have the coldly calculating, shrewdly rational Jacob, in an ageless conflict with the primal, emotional, contained rage and chaos of the MIB.

So, if it only ends once, it stands to reason that the coming end will be more than just which candidate replaces Jacob, and presumably which of the other candidates replaces MIB. Whoever replaces him (or them) this time around will finally bring the ages old contest to an end. But how? Will MIB be killed, or destroyed, his vast terrible energy broken up and dissipated?

I don't think so. For one thing, while that might sound reasonable (even obvious), its a bit too pat of an answer. I think there's more to it than that. I think that the goal will turn out to be to establish a resolution to the on-going conflict that will entail re-integrating the two sides of the personalities of this schizophrenic entity.

To that end, I remind those who watched last week's episode of what might have been the biggest reveal of the evening, yet one that went so fast, if you blinked, or farted, or burped, you might well have missed it.

That reveal, which had nothing to do with the Riccardo saga-

Sun identified herself as a candidate.

Whoooahhh! Think about that. Sun-identified herself as a candidate. That is a significant development.

Previously, we only knew that one of the candidates was named Kwon, and that the Kwon in question might be Sun, or it might be her South Korean mobster husband Jin. Not even Illana expressed a knowledge of which one of the two was one of the six candidates, and some have even speculated that the candidate might be Sun and Jin's child.

But let's think about this. All of the candidates have one thing in common. They have daddy issues. Sun does, but insofar as I am aware, Jin does not. He was simply a hired thug of Sun's Korean mobster father, who more or less arranged for the two of them to marry.

However, there is another point that might be even more pertinent. And that is-what if both of them are the true candidates? What if Sun ends up being the candidate to replace Jacob, while Jin ends up being the candidate to replace MIB-or vice versa?

Remember, even though Sun and Jin were forced into a marriage, they grew to love each other, and have sought each other for three years, ever since they were separated by events on the island.

Remember also, that when MIB takes on a form, he seems to also adapt the personalities, and well as memories, of the form he takes. This was on full display in episode four of this season, when False Locke (Smokey in the form of John Locke) on being reminded by the unknown child who confronted him that he could not kill somebody, went into a rage and screamed "Don't tell me what I can't do!"

So there you have it. If Sun takes on the identity of Jacob (or MIB), and Jin takes on the identity of MIB (or Jacob), does it not stand to reason both Jacob and MIB will adapt the same personalities, emotions, memories, etc., as these two prospective candidates?

If this is true, could this not help but lead to a re-integration of the two warring personalities?

Remember-It only ends once. Everything else is just progress.

For that matter, it could well be that the other candidates are yet not out of the picture in the grand final scenario. With the island now transformed into a veritable hidden paradise, they too could have a role, as candidates for other missions. Hurley could be a replacement for Riccardo, who might finally find peace and salvation, and go off to spend eternity with his beloved Isabella. Sayid, hopefully healed of the darkness taking him over, could be a replacement for Dogun, whom he killed, as Temple Master. Jack could be the new leader of the Others. And so on.

Tonight's episode, the tenth of the season, will be Sun and Jin-centric, so maybe we'll see some more clues that might shed more light on things.

The Idiot's Guide To Political Correctness

A lot of people are up in arms over the recent treatment Anne Coulter received at the University of Ottawa, where she had been scheduled to appear as part of a speaking tour that took her to various places in Canada. Unfortunately, due to security concerns, her speech was canceled. Prior to this, she received a communication from one Francois Houle', an official of the University, in which she was oh so politely advised to refrain from hate speech-defined in part as speaking against any recognized group-on pain of prosecution, fine, and possibly incarceration. After sending the e-mail, he leaked it to various Canadian press and government officials.

I am as appalled as anyone about this, but I am by no means surprised. Nor would I be surprised were this to happen to her during a speaking engagement in almost any place in Europe. Nor would I be surprised if, during an appearance in China, North Korea, Venezuela, or Cuba, she were arrested and sentenced to a labor camp.

Nor would I be surprised if, during an appearance in Iran or Saudi Arabia, or any number of places in the Muslim world (read-any of them) she were arrested and put to death by beheading or stoning-whether the appearance in question was as part of a speaking tour or merely as an immodestly dressed tourist.

Plainly speaking, it is a hard, cold, brutal world we live in, and if you don't like it, the obvious recourse is-don't even go there.

Citizens of those countries have less recourse, but they do have some options-they can leave, they can rebel, or they can learn to live with it.

While what happened in Canada is maddening-infuriating, even-it is not my country, so I don't get a vote. The people in Canada can change things if they want to, which evidently, they would prefer not to. That's too bad.

However, as enraged in principle as I am at stories like this, it is nothing in comparison to the outrage I feel when the elites of these countries, individually and collectively, express the wish that their "values" should in some way be imposed on my country.

But even more to the point, is the outright disgust and enmity I hold towards any here in this country who, for whatever reason, wants to turn this country into a mirror image of Canada, or Europe. Or anywhere else.

Luckily, that can't happen here. Or can it? What we have, that those nations don't have, is a constitution in which freedom of expression is enshrined in the Bill of Rights, specifically in the First Amendment. We also have a tradition of respect for both majority and minority rights-and opinions, both spoken and printed.

Unfortunately, we also are to a great extent controlled by a major political party who seems to think the Constitution can be tweaked to mean anything at any given time, according to the convenience of the moment. It has not been that long ago that a sizable portion, possibly a slim majority, of these so-called Americans honestly believed that the Second Amendment referred to an actual militia, and not the right of private citizens to keep and bear arms (as though Amendments 1 plus 3-10 were meant to limit the power of the federal government, yet for some unknown reason Amendment 2 was meant to strengthen the federal government at the expense of the states and states citizens). Those who believe this are not as significant in numbers as they once were, but they are still around. And waiting.

So too are those who want to change the context and spirit of the First Amendment. It won't be long before someone, somewhere, will stand up for the rights of these University of Ottawa student rioters. After all, they too were exercising their freedom of expression. Anne Coulter was merely outnumbered, and outshouted. Or she would have been if she had been allowed to speak. She also may have been seriously injured or killed, but that's beside the point.

Canada believes in equality, to be sure. It just seems that some people are more equal than others, certainly when it comes to speech and expression.

It's almost irrelevant to me what Canadian policy is in regards to these matters, or what the attitudes of Canadian citizens are regarding them. What happens here, on the other hand, in the United States, or what may happen here at some future date, concerns me very much.

Is this what we want our country to be? I damn sure don't, nor would I ever accept it as long as I lived. Luckily, the First Amendment-for now, at least-guarantees that my rights of freedom of speech and expression cannot be infringed, by either a majority, or by a loud and vocal minority. It cannot be infringed, by the government, or by the states, or by the rabble.

Thankfully, when it comes to this, we do not get a vote.

Now Comes The Law Of Unintended Consequences

Rob Taylor at Red Alerts has a compelling post up about a recent article from the New England Journal of Medicine, concerning a survey conducted sometime before the passage last night of the Senate Health Care Bill by the House of Representatives. What it basically states is that, such a bill will likely result in close to one third of American doctors leaving the medical profession, either taking early retirement or in some cases leaving in the prime of their careers.

It could have been worse. Had the bill contained a public option, of the kind wanted by most Democrats (though not enough of them to overcome Republican opposition) the percentage of doctors leaving the field would be something more like a little more than forty percent. I shudder to think of what it would have been like with single-payer.

When all is said and done, I doubt it will be that bad, at least not at first. Doubtless it will be bad, but I tend to think most doctors are far too tied up in paying off their mortgages and medical school loans to seriously consider walking off the job. At least, not right away. However, somewhere down the road, this could be a possibility, and I have no doubt it could result in as many as ten or even twenty percent of doctors quitting, in many cases precisely because many of them will no longer be able to meet their financial obligations under any scenario.

But it could get even worse. We are talking here about the number of currently practicing physicians who might or might not leave. The most unnerving possibility is later down the line, when enrollment in medical school, and so new entries into the medical profession, takes a steep dive of ten, twenty, even thirty percent or more. Nor is it likely that all of these reductions will be made up by immigrants. In fact, passage of this law will probably reduce those numbers considerably as well. In the meantime, we have a significantly aging and ailing population. Rationed care may well have never been a considered factor or plan in drawing up this bill, but harsh reality might nevertheless make it a foregone conclusion.

There are some things that might be done to stem the tide of defections of currently practicing physicians, things that might not be popular, but may yet be unavoidable. A federal law mandating the ability of doctors to renegotiate the terms of their loan payments and mortgages might be one example. An increase in the number and amounts of student loans, with guaranteed locked in rates of low interest. All of this of course would serve to add to the deficit, and may do little to reduce the numbers of those leaving the medical profession, and more importantly, encouraging new students to enter medical school.

This is going to sour real quick. It would have been a far better approach to work piecemeal toward health care reform. However, that would not have been in the short-term best interests of those who actually control the Democratic congressional majority. This is not just an entitlement, this is or will be a giant, Byzantine structure equal in size and bureaucracy to the largest of cabinet departments. Who will run this thing? How?

By ramming this massive bill through into law, by its nature limited debate. It was intended to discourage transparency, but that proved more difficult than the proponents had hoped. Had they approached the problem one aspect at a time, it would have heightened transparency and allowed more room for substantive debate. Of course, that's the last thing Obama and the Democrats wanted. Had they done that, reform would have looked more like what the people actually wanted. As it stands now, we now are faced with the first case of the federal government mandating that US citizens will now be forced to buy a commercial product, or face fines-possibly jail time.

For this reason, as many as thirty states are in the process of filing suit against the federal government.

We might well be faced before long with the looming of a potential constitutional crisis. We might even see a constitutional amendment somewhere down the road.

It's not over yet.

The Hypocritical and Conniving Obama Administration

A number of points about the recent dust-up over Vice-President Biden's visit to Israel, and the "humiliation" visited upon him by the announcement of the issuance of building permits in East Jerusalem. But first, a little background. There are two different definitions of East Jerusalem. To Westerners, East Jerusalem generally means Arab East Jerusalem. To Arabs, however, specifically to Palestinian Arabs, East Jerusalem entails an entirely different meaning. Though it would include Arab East Jerusalem, it also encompasses that part of Jerusalem which is east of the "green line"-in other words, any part of the area taken by Israel in the 1967 war.

So, with this in mind, which part of East Jerusalem do you think the recent announcement during the Biden visit was concerned with? Arab East Jerusalem, or the entirety of East Jerusalem that is east of the "green line"?

The answer-neither. That's right, neither nor. Ramat Shlomo, the neighborhood-the JEWISH NEIGHBORHOOD, incidentally-that is slated or at least was the subject for the announced future housing units, is-in NORTH JERUSALEM. A JEWISH NEIGHBORHOOD at its core. It is not now, nor has it ever been, a part of East Jerusalem, nor is it a part of the territories taken by Israel in the 1967 war, nor, finally, is it an Arab neighborhood, but a Jewish neighborhood.

So what is all this about? I don't know, but I suspect its an attempt to destabilize the current Israeli government with the goal of bringing down the coalition headed by Netanyahu, the current conservative Prime Minister. It may also have to do with appeasing the Arab, and especially, the Palestinian Arab populations, who, far from being appeased, have started protests and even riots in Jerusalem in response to the controversy.

Here's the main problem, as I see it. The American left, including the majority of politicians, bureaucrats, and office-holders of the Democratic Party, see the Israelis as responsible for the lion's share of the problems in the Middle East. Not just in their own neck of the woods, if the truth were known, but probably for the entire region. It doesn't hurt that possibly a majority (certainly a large and vocal segment) of the rank-and-file Democratic voters in the US sees Israel as the major problem and obstacle to Mid-East peace.

However, here is another important point to remember. The earlier promise by the Israelis to refrain from building any further settlements, did not apply to Jerusalem, at least not to those sections of Jerusalem that are Jewish neighborhoods, which is exactly where Ramat Schlomo is located-again, it can't be stressed too much, in North, nor East, Jerusalem. Their agreement to refrain from building future settlements simply applied to territories taken in the previous wars-Gaza, the West Bank, and the Golan.

So what does this all mean? It means that Obama, Biden, Clinton, and everyone else pursuing this reckless disregard for the facts, and for regional stability, and for the sake of our decades long alliance with the Israeli government and people-are frankly full of shit. They are playing geopolitics with an aim of establishing a position of solidarity with a group of people (in this case Fatah, but also, looking at the long-term, Hamas and Hezbollah) with a history of terror, murder, and corruption. If they can cause the current Israeli government to fall and hopefully be replaced by a more liberal government, one more to their liking, so much the better.

Very much more of this and the whole thing could unravel. Bear in mind, the Palestinians are not being unduly pressured by the Obama Administration to make concessions, only obliquely encouraged to come to the table and to not conduct terror or otherwise assault the Israeli citizens. The Israelis get the smackdown-the Palestinians are presented with "pretty please". And they are responding to this, again, by staging riots.

And the whole thing, the entire scenario as presented by the American media and by the Obama Administration-is a lie, a complete fabrication.

It's beyond disgusting.

Lost Tonight

Just a quick note about tonight's Sawyer-centric episode-we saw at the end of last week's episode, the imminent return to the island of Widmore, who was the head of The Others prior to Ben, who replaced him and drove him from the island. As we have seen, there are two alternate time-lines going on. One of these involves what is going on, on the island, as it involves the lives of the main characters as we generally know them. The other, "sideways time", deals with what would have happened if the survivors' plane had never crashed on the island, and they went on living their lives per usual, free not only of the island, but free from the influence and lifelong interference of the mysterious Jacob.

However, it's important to remember, these time lines are all going on in the same earth universe. It is not two different world's coexisting side by side in two different dimensions, or "alternate universes". Now, in the current Fox series, Fringe, that is exactly the case. In that series, there are two different alternate universes on two different earth dimensions, or two different planes of existence, if you will. They are very much the same in almost every way, but they are also very different, due to different choices and events that have occurred, which has contributed to subtle and not too subtle differences in the two dimensions, the two alternate realities.

Again, it's important to stress that the situation in Lost is different from that of Fringe. In Lost, we are dealing not with two alternate realities, in two different dimensiona. We are dealing with a wrinkle in time that has created two alternate time lines, but each one coexisting in the same dimension-the exact same time-line. This is due to Juliette's successful explosion of "Jughead", a nuclear bomb which at least temporarily sunk the island, apparently after the survivors were sent off to another time, thus saving their lives. Of course, they are not aware that Jughead actually was detonated. The whole point of this was to prevent the electromagnetic discharge which caused the survivors plane to crash. Which, this was possible due to the fact the survivors, or "Losties", had been sent back to that time (when they first arrived) by the same electromagnetic energy.

Which brings me back to Widmore. When he finally meets one, or some, or all, of the Losties, will he even know who they are? Will he remember them? In other words, which of the two concurrently existing time lines is he now a part of? Is he a part of the time line of the current Lost survivors? Or is he instead now a part of, and been influenced by, the new time line created by the explosion of Jughead?

I guess we'll know the answer to that when he sees one of more of the Survivors and says, "who the hell are you people"-or something to that effect.

Update-Well. so much for that. Maybe I should have wrote tonight's episode, which was in some ways the worse one so far this season. Sawyer, a cop? Really? So why would he have helped Kate get away from the cops in the season premiere. You know, sometimes when you write a surprise element, just for the sake of surprise, you need to cover your bases.

Still, there were some good elements in tonight's show. Sayid just sitting there looking forlorn and resigned while the crazed Claire had a knife at Kate's throat, until she was saved by Smokey Locke-who a little later almost chokes up while explaining to Kate how his mother was as crazy as Claire and how that was the cause of so many of his own problems. In sideways time, it was seeing Sawyer (though here he doesn't use that name) still after the man who caused the murder-suicide of his parents (who, remember, in sideways time has a good relationship with the real sideways time John Locke, though we are still in the dark as to how this Locke version is in a wheelchair).

Otherwise, not much going on of note. Miles, who is Ford's partner in sideways time, is even more annoying than on the island. Maybe it's just me, but I wouldn't consider it a big favor to be fixed up with somebody that wants to hop into the sack the first night I meet her. From friends like that, I need no favors. Then he declares their partnership over because he lied about a round trip to Sydney? I would say good riddance, but again, that's just me. Other than the Sawyer folder, and the bump into sideways Kate at the end, most boring sideways storyline of the season. Of course, I had high expectations.

The island wasn't much better, other than those parts I already mentioned. The confrontation on Hydra Island and the lead-up to the "deal" with Widmore was pretty much standard. Evidently, nothing's changed for Widmore, as he referred to John Locke as being dead. From that, it would stand to reason that it is the same old Widmore, with the same past history. Of course, it could still very well be that his story could be the one that eventually intersects the two parallel story lines, seeing as how he is the only one going freely back and forth, to and from island.

Next week-we learn the history of Richard Alpert. A few points here. Alpert was probably blessed by Jacob with immortality in order to avoid his message being diluted through the years, a distinct possibility if he is unable to communicate directly with average persons on a consistent basis. Also, it would stand to reason that, if Alpert is one of a very few people blessed with the ability to communicate, and to see, Jacob, then the young child we saw in episode four could not have been Jacob, seeing as Alpert couldn't see him, yet Sawyer could. I'll probably end up being wrong about that too.

ONE MORE POINT-This was some really shabby writing, when you stop to think about it. Why was Jodi Lynn O'Keefe's character arrested at the beginning of the sideways time segment? No clear-cut answer there. Why was she even being investigated? Ditto. Did Ford and Miles go to all that trouble to set up a sting to catch her pulling a gun on somebody? To charge her with falsely accusing them of trying to conduct a scam, even though that was precisely what they were doing? Was she wanted for extortion, robbery, or anything at all? And if so, what exactly did she do in this segment that provided them the evidence they needed to arrest her? Just doesn't make sense. Hopefully, whoever wrote this turd of an episode was either having an uncommonly bad day, or this is the last episode they'll be involved with.

Muddy Waters

I don't think the Coffee Party people are getting the point of the Tea Party movement. It started as a way of protesting the growing government, increasing debt, specter of increased taxes and regulation, and ever intrusive presence of the federal government in ever more areas of people's lives. Its not likely that any significant number of them are going to be wooed over to a movement-if that's what it really is-that proclaims big government and government spending to be a good thing. Yet, that seems to be the impetus behind the idea, which started as a Yearbook rant by a Democratic activist/operative and turned into a petition to start a corresponding party which has been promoted by a puff piece coverage on CBS News and hailed as an example of how the two different major factions of American political discourse might get together and agree on common goals.

Well, that's not likely, to say the least. I'll go on record once again as reminding everyone that I initially had reservations about the Tea Party movement, but this was basically due to the fact that it seemed, at first, like it might turn into the type of confrontational, in-your-face style of protest disruptions that so turned me against the Left in general, and the Democratic Party in particular, during the Bush years.

Happily, this turned out not to be the case. The Tea-Party people have turned out to be restrained, responsible, and yet effective as critics of government and as potential watchdogs of both political parties-not just Democrats, but Republicans as well.

To be sure, there are those factions within the movement that seem determined to bring them in line with the great GOP "tent", and to that end, Sarah Palin, wrong-headedly in my opinion, appeared at the last Tea=Party convention in Nashville trumpeting the need to keep America in the forefront of protecting the world and to that end keeping our military strong.

Which up to a point is fine. I don't disagree with that, though I do call bullshit on some aspects of it (NATO, for example). The main point is, this has nothing to do with the Tea-Party, and in fact it is vital to cut waste in all aspects of government spending, not only including the military, but especially the military.

Now I do also understand the concerns some might have that the Tea-Party could, potentially, split the Republican Party at a time when it, and the nation, can least afford for that to happen.

However, the way to prevent that eventuality is not for the GOP to vainly try to drag the Tea-Partiers back into line with their agenda. It is for them the GOP, to face the harsh realities of the day, reform themselves, and get in line behind the Tea=Party movement, with all it's hopes and aspirations. Thankfully, it is that aspect of the Tea-Party, that element that will hold all political parties accountable, and will hold all politicians feet to the fire (yes, even Palin's), that is the majority sentiment of the party.

This is not the case with the Coffee Party, which is nothing but a publicity stunt designed to bring Democrats and Independents back in line with the by-gone days of the "Hope and Change" snake-oil of Obama's Democratic Party.

It won't work. We've already woke up, and we can smell that coffee from a mile away.

Attention Whhaat?

Lindsay Lohan can cry to her mother all she wants, I just don't think she has a case. She has filed a 100 million dollar lawsuit against E-Trade, claiming that she has one name recognition-like Oprah or Madonna-and that the commercial in question is obviously an attack of some kind on her. For its part, E-Trade claims they just picked one of any number of currently popular baby names, in this case one that is also shared by one of their employees. I know that I've seen the following commercial numerous times, and it never occurred to me that it might be a kind of parody of Lindsay.



But, even if it was inspired by her antics, the key here is, it would be classified as a parody by federal law, the vagaries of New York state law notwithstanding. In which case, the outcome of this projected case, assuming it ever sees the light of day in a New York State courtroom, is pretty much a foregone conclusion in the long run. In fact, this is a matter of settled law, as decided in The Supreme Court Hustler Magazine versus Fallwell, better known by its film name The People versus Larry Flynt.

In fact, you could easily make the case that Falwell's complaint had far greater merit than Lohan's. Following is the reproduction of the ad parody from Hustler, in which Falwell waxes poetic about the day when, drunk on Campari, he and his mother had sex in the outhouse-for the first time. Unlike the work of political cartoonists going all the way back to Thomas Nast, when he skewered the corrupt New York Boss Tweed, there was no truth to the parody. Still, it was ultimately decided in favor of Flynt by an 8-0 vote, with Justice Kennedy declining to cast a vote.




Whether this is nothing but a play for attention, or whether Lohan is suffering from some kind of drug induced haze or otherwise is just naturally some kind of paranoid schizophrenic, possible suffering delusions of grandeur and/or persecution, it seems pretty plain to me that she has no case. Too bad she can't see it. And for her mother to encourage this-even referring to the now twenty-three year old woman as a child-goes a long way towards explaining Lindsay Lohan's current mental state.

While Toyota keeps yammering away about how floormats are the likely cause of the problem of sudden acceleration of so many of their vehicles-despite the fact that the problem strangely enough seems insurmountable by the simple process of brake override-I think I should point out that, until the problem is finally solved, its not only Toyota drivers who are in danger. It's anybody who happens to be on the road in proximity to anybody driving a Toyota. I'm no expert, but it sounds like a computer problem to me, or possibly something to do with the transmission. Whatever the case, somebody better fix this problem, and fast.

The good news for me-I'm not good at identifying makes and models of all the different vehicles out there, so I don't have to worry about suffering a panic attack every time I see a Toyota.

The bad news-I drive in a constant state of anxiety.

Possibly The Craziest Story Ever Told

Because it's just too damn good to pass up, I copied, from the blog Covert History, this rabidly stupid tale of how Sarah Palin, in order to gain some kind of political advantage out of the alleged myth that she had given birth to a child afflicted with Down's Syndrome when she obviously had not, found herself in an awkward situation when the original child died. After a round of discussion with her advisers, she somehow procured a replacement child similarly afflicted, and then went the extra mile of burying the original in her back yard.

So, what happened next, you ask? Read on if you dare.

This tragedy was increased when the neighbor’s Rottweiler, Guenther, apparently dug up the baby’s remains and when neighbors saw the dog running down the street with its dreadful prize clamped in its jaws, law enforcement and animal control people were called. After a wild chase and the use of tranquilizer darts, the dog was asleep on the sidewalk and the horrified officials were left with the half-eaten remains. These would have normally been turned over to the county medical examiner but the Governor’s rank and political aspirations resulted in a reburial. A bucket of cement was used to fill the hole dug out by Guenther (who later regained consciousness and was turned over to his owners with the instructions to not ever let him out of the house again without a leash.)

This incredible tale, originally an obscure post printed in the June 14th 2009 edition of the website TBR News, apparently inspired the investigative talents, otherwise known as the fevered imaginations, contained in the blog The Immoral Minority, which is the product of an Alaskan blogger who goes by the screen name of Gryphen, and who has seemingly devoted the entirety of his time and resources to blogging about the supposed crimes, indiscretions, and dangers posed by the former Alaskan governor and Republican vice-presidential candidate. Nothing is too sordid as to be beyond her manipulative grasp, according to Gryphen, who insists not only that there have actually been two, and possibly even three Trig Palins, all afflicted with Downs Sybdrome and none of whom actually were birthed by Sarah Palin-he claims he has discovered proof to this effect due to an apparent abnormality of the ears of the first Trig, which is not apparent in any of the other supposed incarnations.

This guy actually has a large following, judging by the comments section of his blog, but I'd like to know who he's fronting for? Are we to believe that he spends his time blogging so extensively about Palin due to some misguided loyalty to his version of the truth? Or is he simply a mouthpiece for some rabid left-wing progressive faction of an Alaskan political entity? I have followed him off and on, and I seriously believe he is tied up with the Green movement, basically, although I have nothing in the way of proof to go on.

I do think though that it offers a good glimpse into the mindset of someone who is so ideologically compromised that there exists no boundaries of decency or good taste.

What no one has as yet managed to explain-what's so great about having a child afflicted with Down's Syndrome to begin with, and what could possibly be the advantage in undergoing such subterfuge, and to such ridiculous lengths, in comparison to the fallout if the truth ever did manage to leak out?

I don't discount all conspiracy theories. I myself have always maintained that the best way to denigrate someone who proposes a conspiracy is to, well, call them a conspiracy theorist. I personally always believed JFK died as the result of a conspiracy, and still do. I probably always will.

But then there are those conspiracy theories that are rightly derided-the 9/11 truthers, the birthers, etc. A good rule of thumb is, if a conspiracy theory makes tales of alien abductions seem sane by comparison, it's probably either a purposeful lie, or some kind of insane delusion, or both.

This Trig Palin tale fits the bill on both counts. I don't think even Andrew Sullivan would buy this nonsense. Well, at least not to this extent.

Lost

I'm not clear whether there's ten more episodes of Lost total, or ten plus the two hour series finale, but whatever the case, this is the year the series ends and most, though not all, questions are answered.

At the end of season five, which saw the Losties stranded via time travel back in time prior to their original crash on the island, Juliette (originally one of The Others) successfully set off a nuclear device which managed to forestall the release of electromagnetic energy which caused the crash. It worked, though they don't know it on the island, and they know even less in the "sideways time" where they now also live parallel lives, though evidently in the same dimension, each group completely unaware of the other, parallel existence.

In the fifth episode of this season, we saw something that was previously unrevealed, either to us the viewers or to the survivors. A huge lighthouse with the unusual function that it shows, from within mirrors high up inside the top, aspects of the viewers life. Or it did until Jack Shepherd smashed the mirrors in a fit of pique after one of them showed him a glimpse of his childhood home.

The fact that this lighthouse has presented itself would seem to suggest that, after Juliette exploded the bomb, the entirety of the island's inhabitants were doubtless whisked away from that time to another, and it would seem to be sometime in the past, when the lighthouse was yet present. Possibly before any of their births. On the other hand, they should have run into The Others by now, so maybe not. All we know is someone is coming to the island, and I for one wonder whether this might herald the first approach of The Black Rock, the ship that first brought The Others to the island sometime around 1850. If so, is this an opportunity to completely change the history of the Island? And what exactly is the Island?

I have long suspected the Island is itself a living, breathing, sentient, even conscious entity, with feelings and a will to live, and that Jacob and the Man In Black (now False John Locke) represent two sides of it's personality. One of them, Jacob, is coldly rational and logical, while the other, Jacob's nemesis, represents its more primal and emotional side. The latter wants to go home (wherever home is) while Jacob's motives remain for the most part unclear, aside from protecting the island, and keeping Smokey contained therein, perhaps eventually destroying him.

But what if the true goal is to integrate the two sides of the personality into a functional whole, something the more erratic, emotional, "smokey" side would tend to reject?

The island can move from place to place via its unusual electromagnetic qualities, and it has been strongly hinted that it is or contains the life force of an ancient Egyptian goddess, Tiawarat. However, the statue of the goddess might well have been erected by ancient inhabitants due to a misunderstanding of the island's nature, at a time when it held its position somewhere within the Red Sea area.

As for who will be the candidate to replace Jacob, my guess is it will eventually be either Sawyer, with Jack Shepherd eventually replacing Smokey, or it will be Hurley who will eventually reign supreme as the newly and finally integrated personality of the two. Or perhaps the island's power will somehow be dissipated and it will become-nothing but just another island. Who knows?

One thing I am fairly certain of, is Dogun is not dead. He was murdered by Sayid, yes, but remember, Sayid drowned him in the sacred pool of the Temple, and left him there. Assuming Dogun managed to purify the previously polluted waters, this should be sufficient to bring him back, after some time.

As for other things, such as the significance of Aaron, or the yet unborn child of Sun and Jin, the identity of the child who presented himself to False Locke and Sawyer, and other mysteries too numerous to mention, and many of which may well be left unresolved, we'll just have to wait and see.

The Shroud Of Turin

This story out of Italy has got to be the most amazing example I've ever seen of overreach by European courts in quite some time. Four Google executives have been tried and three of them convicted, in an Italian court, for allowing some teenage boys in Turin to upload a video on YouTube which portrayed them bullying an autistic kid. Technically, they were convicted of violating Italian privacy laws, though found not guilty of deformation of the law.

As for the kids in question, they were convicted, and received ten months of community service. The three convicted Google executives received a jail sentence. This despite the fact they had nothing to do with the video, which Google removed as soon as they were informed of its presence on YouTube.

An appeal of the case is pending. It should never have been brought to court to begin with. Naturally, I am not in favor of bullying autistic people, or anybody else for that matter, but does anybody really believe this case is just about that?

I have this strange idea this whole thing is a test case, with the broader goal of enforcing European standards on the worldwide global net. Unlike China, who at least are not hypocrites about it-they'll just ban offending sites outright-the Europeans just seem to have it in their DNA, I suppose, to make the rest of the world bow down to their will.

They know perfectly well they can't directly impose their will on bloggers or social networking site users, but they seem to be ready to attack the companies, and even company personnel. If they are successful, its only a matter of time before the terms of service on a lot of sites become a lot more stringent. After all, they will be seen as having a responsibility to rein in hate speech, bigotry, prejudice, racism, homophobia, sexism, etc., and anything that might be presented as contributing directly or perhaps even indirectly to such things, which of course will be defined by the courts, mostly European. Look for yet another push for global regulation of the net, probably through the UN.

An attack on free speech? Not directly. It's first an attack on free enterprise, the purpose of which will be the establishment of the duty of blog sites and social networking sites to limit speech on their own private businesses.

Of course, they have a right to do that now, and could anytime they want. You are not guaranteed the right to freedom of speech on a blog which you do not own but which is hosted by a business entity. That entity has the right to set its terms of service. You have no rights other than to comply or leave.

Before long, that right of the hosting company to set its own limits as to what is considered acceptable speech or conduct might well become an obligation under international law.

This is a perfect example of why the US should refrain, for now and forever, from becoming signatories to any multinational treaty, of any kind, and to remove ourselves from the entanglements of any other such treaty.

British PM Brown-Out Of Control?

Gordon Brown's wife denies the British Prime Minister is a bully, but of course she would, the question is, why the hell would anybody ask her to begin with? Any relevant question directed at her should begin with "Has the Prime Minister ever"-

One should not necessarily expect a truthful answer in any event. Remember, she lives with the man who is alleged to have done, among other things too numerous to list here, the following-

A FACTORY worker claims that during an official visit to his plant the PM hurled a tangerine into a laminating machine after flying into a rage while on a phone call. He said: "The fruit got stuck in the machine and clogged it.

"It was very embarrassing, we had to stop the tour and he got even more angry. He called the person that gave him the tangerine an idiot."

POLITICAL blogger Iain Dale claimed that IT experts were called to fix the PM's computer — only to find the keyboard had been hurled through the screen.


Read more:

It's pretty bad when a leader of a country is so allegedly abusive his own staff calls the National Bullying Hotline to report his harassment. Naturally, its a political embarrassment to Brown, but its also caused some problems for the Hotline, who are not supposed to go public with such information. On the other hand, this is the Prime Minister of one of the preeminent nations of the world. This is not exactly a private matter. Brown would be a fool to harass his staff in anger over the whistle blowing. But then again, maybe he's too far gone to control himself. The Sun article reads like a man who is barely in control of his own self. How is he supposed to run a country like Britain, especially since he's not exactly well-loved to begin with?

When you stop to think about it though, bullies almost always back down when confronted. His unpopularity with the voters might be the only thing keeping him in check. Who knows how he would act if his poll numbers were solid. How long would it take him to declare war on Scotland if one of their MP's looked at him wrong?

The British ought to give this guy the boot, but then again, this might increase his popularity, who knows? The Brits seem to put up with a lot of impositions we would never tolerate here. One can only assume they must like it.

H/T-The English Blog.

Obama And The Philosophy Of Christian Realism

Obama's favorite philosopher is, according to him, Reinhold Niebuhr. What is interesting about that is, Reinhold Niebuhr, throughout the course of a very long career, changed his mind with every successive decade. In the 1910's he was pro-American and pro-war. In the 1920's, he was a pacifist. In the 1930's, he was a socialist. In the 1940's, he was apparently a centrist Democrat. In the 1950's, he was an anti-communist who believed in the policy of containment. In the 1960's, he was a pacifist again, somewhat, staking out a position against the Vietnam War and promoting a philosophy of tolerance towards the Soviet Union, claiming the anti-communist movement had been hi-jacked by ideologues. What do all of these stands have in common, besides a seeming divergence with every new decade? Well, they all seem to be outgrowths of what is termed Christian Realism. His philosophy might best be encapsulated by the Serenity Prayer, which he authored.

But how exactly has he influenced Obama? Though some might proclaim it to be a positive influence, might there be other, less beneficent aspects, at least when applied to the political realm?

Niebuhr believed in international cooperation as the best means of attaining national goals and in the spreading and furtherance of American and Western ideals. He disavowed the idealism of most church philosophies of his day, which he charged took man's divine rights and inherent goodness too much for granted. However, he also loathed the inclination of many demagogues who would pursue a might makes right policy. He believed in cooperation, and a kind of carrot-and-stick approach, seemingly with an emphasis on the carrot. Democracy and social justice, he claimed, could be fostered and encouraged, and rewarded, but they could never be forced. Nor did he deem it accurate to suppose that because we believe our way was the best way, that everyone else would necessarily follow suit and adopt Western-American values. That might happen over time, with the proper encouragement and patience. It might never happen.

Many see this philosophy expressed in Obama's recent trip to Cairo and his address from there to the Arab world. America is not always right, nor are her enemies always evil. Almost every word from the speech could have been written by Reinhold Niebuhr. Frankly, there is much to Niebuhrs approach to foreign affairs I can concur with, up to a point, but in this case, it seems odd to spell out such a philosophy openly in an address to such a large segment of the world population, many of with whom we are, like it or not, at war. It seems to reek of the kind of air-headed idealism, minus pragmatic considerations, which Niebuhr himself reportedly deplored.

Interestingly, much of Niebuhr's approach to domestic politics seems drawn from the same philosophy. He knew early on there was going to be increasing racial tensions. His prescribed method of dealing with the eventuality was to encourage the majority to reach out to the minority populations. I have found no indications as to his beliefs as to how minority peoples should respond. He seems to intimate that it will take time, in the form of successive generations, to heal the breach. Of course, we have seen this philosophy expressed multiple times through the filter of leftist progressive politics. While Obama, for perhaps self-conscious reasons, has refrained from this, we have still seen it expressed in other ways, like for example AG Eric Holders denunciation of the self-segregation that envelops society on so many levels and his expressed call for a national dialogue on race in order to deal with it.

Earlier in his career, Niebuhr was a staunch supporter of the union movement, and a harsh critic of Henry Ford, disparaging Ford's assembly line method of automobile production and the loss of real income to Ford's workers, due to inflation and to reduced work hours.

Niebuhr has followers among all branches of politics-liberal, radical, conservative, and even among the neocons. He himself was unabashedly political, yet he was, again, a "Christian Realist" in his approach to problems and policies. Nevertheless, he was unquestioningly liberal in almost all of his incarnations. The following snippet of a critique leveled at a conservative foe of the "Welfare State", during the nineteen fifties, says it all-

Mr. Russell Kirk in his Conservative Mind seems to assume that there is some authentic conservatism in the mere desire to preserve the status quo of the American paradise; and he rather uncritically seeks to relate this American conservatism with a British conservatism which is rooted in the aristocratic tradition and has none of Kirk’s prejudice against the Welfare State, and with the rather pathetic aristocratic tradition of our own Southland, as expounded by Randolph and Calhoun. This Southern tradition was pathetic because it was but a remnant of an old aristocratic society in a nation which had no conscious relations with the European feudal past, and because it was a form of aristocracy based upon chattel slavery and was naturally destroyed with the institution of slavery.

Note that the policy of the Mr. Kirk in question had nothing to do with the nascent Civil Rights movement of the day, had nothing to do with race relations in any fashion-it was simply a matter of limiting the growth of the federal government, and keeping it in check. Mr. Niehbuhr might well have fathered the tactic of conflating the conservative philosophy of low taxes and small government to racism and bigotry, and all of its later and equally foul brethren, such as accusatory slurs as to sexism and homophobia.


In other words, such charges, whether leveled yesterday or today, are not reasoned responses based on science or empirical observation towards a coherent understanding of ones ideological opponents. They are, at best, emotional excrement, based on attachments to the ideals and theories of a Christian philosopher who adapted his philosophy, along with his strategies, to suit the times or the situation.

It takes the following formula-

A. The Antebellum South owned slaves and fought to defend its rights to keep them
and to expand those rights into other territories.

B. Modern conservatives believe in states rights against encroachments by an ever growing and expanding federal government

Therefore-

C. Modern conservatives are racists and bigots. They are also sexists and homophobes.

And thus turns logic completely on its head.

This then is the natural outgrowth of the Christian Realism movement.
In his own day, Reinhold was criticized for such rhetoric, as well as for his liberal progressive views, with much the same tenor that an Anne Coulter or Glenn Beck today might tear into a Keith Olbermann, and for much the same reasons. His is a philosophy based on a religious principle, but with political applications. Not unlike Nietzche in many ways, it is indeed a kind of "Realism" in approach, yet seasoned with a dash of ethics and morals, at least on the surface. Simmering at the bottom of the stew, however, is the same kind of moralizing prejudice-Judgementality, if you will-modern progressives so readily decry in their opponents. It doesn't take a lot to bring it erupting to the surface, as we have seen innumerable times. It also doesn't take long to reveal a liberal progressive who proclaims his love for democracy, tolerance, and free speech, for the unmitigated hypocrite he truly is.

When it comes to politics, at least and especially as it involves foreign affairs, an extra dose of Nietzche might be the more appropriate formula. As for domestic situations, there again, a greater emphasis on pragmatic approaches with less emphasis on high-minded idealism is more in-line with the attainment of realistic goals.

Tiger Woods And The Road To Nirvana-Are We There Yet?

Now that Tiger Woods has humbled himself and offered what seems to be a very sincere and Con-Trite apology to his remaining sponsors (while doing so in the course of an event sponsored by one of those who abandoned ship on their association with Woods), what have we learned?

Well, we have learned that Woods is one tone-deaf individual. There are ways in which this is good, however. For one thing, it lends itself to sincerity. Tiger has personally vowed to return to the practice of his Buddhist faith, claiming he has over the years fallen away from it.

In true Buddhist terms, of course, Woods did not commit a sin, he merely allowed himself to be swept away by his attachments, which led to a form of delusion, and in the meantime, he acted not only against his own best interests, but he acted unethically towards his wife and children. And of course, Nike.

However, while being tone deaf does have it's advantages, it also has its drawbacks. In his case, he actually wanted his wife to stand by his side at this presser-the penultimate "The Good Wife". Thankfully, Elan was having none of that, and refused to appear at his side. In fact, she refused to be seen in public that day.

This shows that, if anything, Woods is still somewhat delusional. Having been made the butt of jokes over a period of three months time on all the late night talk shows and Comedy Central, how does he propose to shore up his tarnished image? By having he, with wife obediently and faithfully at his side, join the ranks of Bill Clinton, basketball great Kobe Bryant, disgraced former governors Elliot Spitzer and Jim MacGreevy, and disgraced former televangelists Ted Haggarty, Jimmy Swaggert, and Jim Baker.

Elan might well decide to stand by her man like Hillary, will probably get a hell of a lot more than a diamond ring like Kobe Bryant's wife if she does so, and might even honestly forgive him like many of these women seem to have done. But she made the right decision here to spare herself the ordeal of presenting herself as a public spectacle inviting yet more ridicule and abuse.

For one thing, even though Woods denied that she attacked him the night of Thanksgiving with one of his own golf clubs, there will always be questions as to whether he is being completely honest about that. His exact statement in addressing the matter is vague at best. He insists that she never attacked him with the golf club. Of course, technically, she is said to have attacked the car he was driving, properly speaking, not him. He did say there had never been any domestic violence between them, but what does that really mean, and even if you take it at face value, what is it worth? What about mental, emotional, verbal, or for that matter sexual abuse?

The last thing Elan Woods wants is to publicly be put in the situation of being questioned about her own actions, or the nature of her overall relationship with Woods, as she sees it. As Woods said, correctly, he and his wife's relationship was strictly between she and him.

Some people never learn. Woods has barely begin this journey of convenience, while others want to latch onto the gravy train of opportunity. One of these is the abominable Gloria Alred, the inside out watermelon woman-red on the outside, green on the inside, the green in her case standing for money.

She has presented herself now as the attorney, not for one, but for two of Woods's former mistresses, the latest being a former porn star who claims to have been made pregnant by Woods twice, the first time resulting in a miscarriage, the second one in an abortion.

These women too want apologies, and here Woods might be tone deaf, but he at least demonstrated that he isn't a complete ignoramus. The proffering of an apology to these deadbeat whores would only serve as an admission that Woods wronged them as much as he wronged his wife and children, a laughable proposition on the face of it. Such an apology would only encourage what Allred doubtless wants, a lawsuit. In her depraved mind, she probably fantasizes here about the potential for a class action, with her representing all nineteen (or is it more now) or the "wronged women".

I hate to break it to them, but they knew Woods was a married man. A married man with two children. Young children. In some cases, they carried on these affairs with Woods for multiple years. They had no realistic expectation that he was going to leave his wife and children, for any of them. But that is irrelevant to the likes of Gloria Allred. She wants you to see these skanks as wronged women, women who were emotionally abused and deserted by Woods, women who deserve compensation. It's nothing but a game to her, a game with a big payday in the end should she be successful. She would probably prefer to bully Woods into making a settlement, along with a public apology, but she would be more than content to take the matter into civil court, and she has the resources to do so.

This by the way is not a defense of Woods, whose behavior was reprehensible, nor do I necessarily believe he sincerely intends to change. Maybe he sincerely wants to change, for now, but wishing and doing what it takes despite the temptations that present themselves might well be two different things. But for Gloria Allred, or anybody else, to try to paint these women as wronged, duped victims who were emotionally deceived by Woods, whom they loved, is beyond the pale. They deserve nothing more than public scorn and derision, exactly the same as Woods.

Some people might say that Elan, Woods's wife, is really no better, because she is a gold-digger who only married Woods for his money and fame. And that might well be true.

It is also beside the point, from any legal standpoint of which I am aware. Admittedly, I am an amateur when it comes to legal matters, and not even a well-versed amateur at that. But I think I can state with pretty reasonable assurance that Woods's children and wife would receive, and deserve to get, the lions share if not all of any court settlement that might arise from Woods flagrant infidelities.

All of these other bimbos deserve nothing more than exactly what they have already got. Fucked.

Elton John Really, REALLY Loves Jesus Christ

Elton John has lately bemoaned the fact that he is famous, because bad things happen to famous people, such as John Lennon, Gianni Versace, and Princess Di. If Elton John had his way about it, he would not be famous at all, you see, because famous people, well, they just draw the nuts and lunatics, which is precisely why he hired a bodyguard.

In conclusion, he then added that Jesus Christ was a compassionate homosexual.

Elton John-just another one of these dull, boring artistic types you would probably never notice, what with this tendency he has to just kind of blend into the woodwork, and the knack for avoiding making outrageous statements of opinion presented as fact. Who could possibly pick him out in a crowd? Not a drama queen at all.

Look At This Fucking Hipster

When people devote their time to giving folks reason to laugh at them, people should kindly and politely oblige them. That is the whole purpose of Look At This Fucking Hipster.

I'm going to be looking for my own contributions for the site, complete with obligatory caption.



HaHaHaHa Look at this old ass leftist hipster phony trying to hit that ass. Worse, look at this stupid hipster bitch actually thinking about it.

Hat Tip to Rob at Red Alerts

A Tale Of Two Americas

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