joyfulchristian

Dead

That pretty neatly summarizes what my child would be if she was involved in this:

A 10-year-old boy has been charged with stealing a car and leading police on a 75km pursuit along West Australian roads at speeds of up to 170km/h.

Police say it was lucky no-one was hurt as the boy and his three passengers led officers on the high-speed chase along dark country roads south of Perth.

Officers said the pursuit began in Narrogin at 4.15am (WDT) on Sunday after officers tried to pull the car over, suspecting the four boys inside the car had been doing burnouts in the town.

I've heard of some pretty young kids stealing cars, but this is pretty extreme.

Clearly he wasn't scared enough

If I ever get convicted of a crime, I guess I need to make sure the judge knows I'm scared:

A ROOKIE drug dealer has been spared a jail sentence because of his fear of imprisonment.

Kym Sidney Tyrone O'Hara last week faced a 25-year prison term for selling $700 worth of ecstasy and methylamphetamine to friends at Port Lincoln in 2003 and 2004.

But Judge Barry Beazley said the "hard working and highly motivated" 22-year-old's "fear of imprisonment" and his sporting abilities would lead him to reassess his life.

If fear of prison is such a deterrent (and it should be), then shouldn't the judge want to amplify that fear, both in the current defendant and in every crook who hears about this case? By letting this guy off he is certainly not doing either.  All he's done is told crooks that if they get caught, they should pretend to be really scared.

Unfair comparison

Joe Carter makes, what I think, is an unfair comparison between two speeches. First he quotes at length from from a speech President Bush made at the March for Life about his opposition to abortion and federal abortion funding.  Then he says this about the State of Union address:

Here is what President Bush said tonight, to the American people, about human dignity and protecting life:

(Begin speech)
            
            
            
            
            
            
(End speech)

What changed since yesterday, Mr. President?

Of course, the answer is "The Audience." Joe seems to be implying (although I could be wrong) that there is some sort of inconsistency between the President making a big deal about his opposition to abortion at an anti-abortion event and not mentioning it at all in the State of the Union address.

I simply don't believe this is true. When addressing pro-life activists, there is no doubt that they want to hear the President's views on abortion. However, the purpose of the State of the Union is to:

... from time to time give to the Congress Information of the State of the Union, and recommend to their Consideration such Measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient ...

In the first speech Joe quotes, Bush makes three main points:

1. His opposition to abortion in general and his desire to "expand legal protection to every life, including early life."
2. His opposition to partial birth abortion.
3. His opposition to public funding for abortion.

Unfortunately, the President there are limits to how much the President can say in a speech and he has to prioritize. Like it or not, he obviously felt that there were other matters more important to the State of the Union than these. I personally don't like it, but I find nothing inconsistent between saying he holds these positions and not including them in the State of the Union. That's not entirely unreasonable since, as I understand it, the federal government does not currently provide funding for abortion and the chances of passing laws to expand legal rights to fetuses or ban partial birth abortions with the current Congress are nil.

I don't like it, but I don't believe the dichotomy Joe implies exists.  Joe is usually ruthlessly logical, so I find this jump of reason strange on his part.

Or maybe I'm just missing something.

Rosie thinks the American people are idiots

That's the only conclusion I know to draw from this American Idol crack:

On ABC's "The View" this past week, Rosie O'Donnell lashed out at the way contestants were treated by "three millionaires, one probably intoxicated."

"If you keep serving people crap and telling them it's a meal, they're eventually going to think it is a meal," O'Donnell said.

If you're opinion of audiences is that low, you must think the American people are easily influenced morons. Of course, lots of people watch The View, so ...

Nothing like guilt by association

Check this story out:

Washington - A former Congressman from US President George W Bush's Republican Party was sentenced Friday to 30 months in prison for accepting bribes in return for influencing legislation and providing other favours.

Despite Democratic claims to the contrary during the last election cycle, Congressional corruption is hardly a Republican only affair. Still, I have no problem with Ney being listed as a Republican. It's pretty typical to list current and former members of Congress by party affiliation. I have occasionally noticed that D's sometimes disappear from Democrats when they get in trouble, but that's another story.

I'm more interested in the totally gratuitous insertion of President Bush's name into this story. Why mention President Bush here? The only reason I can think of is to link him in the reader's mind to the corruption. I realize that this story was written for foreign readers so I suppose you might argue that they are reminding their readers who Republicans are, but that seems, at best, a pretense.

The minimum wage

I was over at Right Wing News reading his post about how the Republican's have faced down the Democrats hypocrisy on the minimum wage by forcing them to include American Samoa.  He finishes by saying:

If 40% of the work force in American Samoa does actually end up losing their jobs because of a minimum wage, that will be a terrible thing, but it will also be a concrete example of the sort of damage that liberal economy policies cause in people's lives.

I must admit that my first thought when hearing that Republicans had forced Samoa under the same roof was, "That will show them."  After I thought about it a little, it occurred to me that if we're correct about the impact the minimum wage has on companies, it's virtually certain that a lot of people in Samoa will lose their jobs.

Is it really worth that to prove we're right?

I've dealt with snow storms before

... but I've never really had an ice storm to deal with before. We haven't had a new downfall today and the skies have cleared, so that's good news.  The bad news is that we now have, quite literally, a solid sheet of ice. It's amazing that my dogs don't just go sliding across the backyard; they don't even leave prints on our sheet of ice.

Interesting typo

I'm still trying to figure out how that would work:

Two men, one of them armed with a handgun, entered a Burger King restaurant in Salinas Saturday morning and robbed cash from the office before fleeing on food, Salinas police reported. (Emphasis added.)

Things that make you go hmm!

Good advice

This morning as our daughter was letting the dogs in I heard her yell, "Precious! Don't eat the yellow snow!"

I second that motion.

I love sweet and sour pork

... but I believe I'll pass on sweet and sour pork flavored stamps.

Cpl. Jason L. Dunham, R.I.P.

Another fallen hero:

President Bush awarded yesterday only the second Congressional Medal of Honor for actions in the War on Terror. Like the one awarded Paul Ray Smith in April 2005, it was given posthumously. Marine Cpl. Jason L. Dunham was assisting an ambushed convoy in Karabilah, Iraq, searching vehicles leaving the site of the ambush. An insurgent jumped him, but Dunham refused the help offered by two of his Marines; he had spotted the grenade his attacker was clutching. When the live grenade was dropped, Corporal Dunham didn’t hesitate, covering it with his Kevlar helmet and smothering it with his body. His actions saved the lives of his men; he died eight days later of his wounds. As the president said Thursday, “He was a Marine’s Marine who led by example. . . . He was the guy who signed on for an extra two months in Iraq so he could stay with his squad. As he explained it, he wanted to ‘make sure that everyone makes it home alive.’” Thanks to his heroism, his men lived to return home. A true Marine, he. R.I.P.

Amen.

Yay, Rissa!

We just found out that Larissa was named "Exemplary student of the month" for January.  Hooray for my kiddo!

Saddam is dead

I was traveling (otherwise known as visiting family, exchanging gifts, and experiencing extended power outages) when Saddam Hussein was executed, so I didn't comment at the time.

However, I'm still not sure I have much to say. Much of the glee I've seen in the blogosphere seems unseemly, at the very least. Let it suffice to say that he was a murder like few the world has ever seen and no manner of death sentence could possibly equal the pain he inflicted.  His guilt was never in question, so the only reason for a trial at all was to help the Iraqi people establish the rule of law. I hope they will be successful.