Journalists Freaking Out

When one of their own gets hurt in a war zone, journalists focus like a laser on that story. It's because of the "it could have been me" syndrome where even a backwater small town newspaper writer feels some connection to the brother of the pen who is harmed.


ABC ANCHOR BOB WOODRUFF
I am in prayer for Bob Woodruff and his photographer Doug Vogt. My feelings about what his family is going through are enhanced by my being a father too. Personally I can see the bravery of their sacrifice to be there and my rant is not intended to take anything away from their commitment to journalism.

My observation here is the overwhelming reporting from every national and local source about one of their own. How their delivery differs in tone, intensity and overall feel against the seemingly cold reporting of the death toll of soldiers. Check out the CNN reporter's comments I linked in the title.

I'll give another perspective to help this rant hit home: can anyone tell me without using google the number of soldiers injured or killed in the attack that injured Bob? This

article

is typical, no news except about the top dog anchor.

Journalists are human, after all. I've never asserted otherwise. They just really come un-hinged when it hits one of their own.

Sleight of Iran

The peaceful loving leaders of Iran who want Israel wiped off the face of the Earth
are talking out of both sides of their mouth again.


Codi and Larov, equal representatives of the USA and Russia, have agreed to put the Iranian nuke issue before the UN Security Council. In response, Iran is threatening to halt all UN inspections and slam the door on diplomacy.

In the mean time, to allay international fears the Iranians graciously handed over documents to the IAEA showing how to shape enriched uranium into a warhead. Of course they went through the trouble of gaining this information from the black market and did not bother to keep any copies of it. The real question is why acquire the information if you don't plan to use it?

Iranian leaders are saying just enough of what liberals want to hear. At the same time, their actions are revealing motives in the opposite direction of what they are saying? History teaches us to think with caution when dealing with well armed fanatical leadership who is just a little too smiling and open while preparing aggression behind their backs. Just look at Neville Chamberlain's famous quote

"peace in our time"

after the Munich Agreement with Hitler in 1938.

Taken in that particular historical context, this quote from Iran's top nuclear negotiator Ali Larijani:

""Europeans should pay more attention. Iran has called for dialogue and is moving in the direction of reaching an agreement through peaceful means," he said. "The Islamic Republic of Iran doesn't welcome this. We still think that this issue can be resolved peacefully. We recommend them not to do it.""

All the winds point in the direction that we should be preparing for military conflict in Iran. If not instigated by us, then to back up our ally Israel.

ADDENDUM: 3:45pm
My bull crap meter just pegged on this bit of information:

Iran "inadvertantly" acquired weaponized nuclear material instructions?

"You Might Be a Palestinian If..."

In the terminology of today the term redneck has been sanctified by Foxworthy into almost an acceptable moniker.
JEFF FOXWORTHY
I am a proud redneck for instance in that turn of phrase.

However there is a dark side to the term. One that speaks of the white racist blue collar types such as my Grandmother on my father's side certainly was. If you were "bread" as a redneck up until today you might think of African Americans as the race of "N" instead of a more polite term. The "N" word is an adjective or noun that did not begin badly but has become equal to a curse word-especially from the mouth of a white man.

The curse word version of Redneck is because the white people taught their children and children's children that the one race was inferior. Those kids learned to disrespect another human being based on some God-given attributes described in a label. The most hard core racist rednecks were told to wear a white sheet and use violence to push their message.

CHILD WEARING HAMAS HEADBAND
Hamas is no different from the Klu Klux Klan, except maybe more violent.

I am using the term to describe Palestinians in the harshest way possible.
Apparently Hamas has done quite well as an administrative body in areas of Palestine where it formerly held control. That in of itself is surprising and a point in Hamas' favor. However that same organization has also sent young men into crowds of innocent civilians wearing bombs with the intent to kill and promote fear. That same organization has not renounced violence. When you have leadership of one party it is not divided. The same leadership who ordered the attacks is making policy decisions.

I am curious to follow W and Condi's comments about Hamas and the issue of violence as a political tactic as this develops. While the Palestinians do have the absolute right to vote however they choose, their choice of the terrorist organization is telling. It says that their overwhelming majority thought is still racism and violence. If the US pulls their funding then they got what they asked for when they elected a terrorist organization to lead.

POSTSCRIPT
-in passing a co-worker mentioned this so I'm attaching it:
Apparently Limbaugh pointed out this week that the next bomber attack would be state sanctioned rather than terrorist sanctioned. Interesting!

Bubbles and Kernels

I love a good movie as much as anyone else. Then we have hit director Stephen (Oceans 11, Erin Brokovitch, Pleasantville) come out and make a release of his movie "Bubble" directly to theatres, DVD and cable all in the same week.


BUBBLE CAST
Soderberg's bubble is inflating in the clogged arteries of Hollywood. Movie execs and bigwigs were not prepared for this unforeseen and undoubtedly needed angioplasty.

In a room full of Theater Executives and managers, Director M. Night Shyamalan (The Village, Sixth Sense, Signs, Unbreakable) went overboard preaching against Bubble saying that movies need cinemas for the experience. Shyamalan spoke comparing the experience of seeing Shreck at home to the movies and commented that the added emotion of being in the audience's response made the movie better.

While Shyamalan is a smart guy it just seems he is purposefully overlooking some tough kernels of truth at the bottom of the popcorn bucket. For a director of distinct and visionary movies it is surprising to find him sharing binders with the rest of Hollywood.

Then again, Shreck was an Ogre when it came to change as well.

What Shyamalan and the rest of Hollywood is blind to more than technological advance is society's decline in polite behavior. Home video has made people think that talking during movies is acceptable. Then they go out to the theatre, sit behind us and talk as if they are the only ones there. Don't even get me started on cell phones in cinemas. I get as wound up about that as seeing some lazy guy who won't lift the seat in a public toilet before relieving himself- yes I do equate the two on the rudeness scale.

How do you avoid rudeness? Stay home and let the technology create a theatre for you! I've got an Onkyo 400 watt digital receiver hooked into Boston acoustics surround with an MTX powered subwoffer. My TV is an older 36" model that is to be replaced in the next year with plasma as the prices come down and HD becomes required. I'll be downloading movies across my DSL line as soon as Bellsouth starts up their cable/movie on demand service. Boil down the rudeness and ticket prices against the "comforts of" home cinema and the more appealing one bubbles to the top.

As a bonus the toilets are clean thanks to the scrubbing bubbles.

Is Bubble breaking ground or just breaking rules? The jury is still out. Nobody involved with the flick is saying it is a great movie. Everyone is talking about the distribution channel. The question is will Hollywood embrace change or continue on to an uncertain future?

Border Cliche: "Mexican Standoff"

The LA Times told us there isn't a need to have the Minuteman militia out there on the border. The rest of the liberal media labeled the project "armed vigilantes" of "racists" out to get Mexican immigrants (aka "illegal aliens").

Now at least one sheriff in

Hudspeth County Texas

is asking for military assistance.

HUDSPETH COUNTY, TEXAS MAP

Paraphrased from NPR report linked in title:
sheriff deputies attempted to pull over three suspicious Cadillac Escalades traveling down interstate 10. A chase ensued and one of the Escalades blew a tire. The crash revealed the SUV was packed with illegal narcotics. The other two Caddies raced to a shallow point along the Rio Grande river known as a favorite spot to cross international borders. One Caddy made it, the other got stuck.


HUDSPETH COUNTY I-10 MAP
With sheriff deputies on hand taking pictures a military humvee pulled up from the Mexican side. Armed uniform soldiers flanked the floundering SUV while the occupants and drugs were offloaded into Mexico and the Caddy was torched.

AP PHOTO OF ARMED MEXICAN TROOPER AS DESCRIBED BY DEPUTIES
This is the second time where soldiers protected a drug smuggler racing across the border at the same point in November 2004.

Mexico has "flatly denied Army involvement" and "initiated an investigation." All I can say is the Sheriff has photographic proof. The place Mexican authorities need to investigate is the bank accounts of the commanding officers. After they review those pictures of course!

Finally, if the Mexican army has been bought by the cartels then the Minuteman Militia need to have more than a few shotguns and handguns to protect themselves. I'd argue that being out there unarmed would be foolhardy.

If I were the Hudspeth Sheriff I'd find an armored vehicle and plan on using it.

Common Road Rules:

A little girl lies in a Florida hospital with a gunshot wound to the head because of ignorance of rules of the road. Without more facts than presented in the news article linked in the title, we don't know who the aggressor was. We do confirm that you should NEVER confront someone about driving on the shoulder of the road.

Which leads me to a rant...
Because of the rampant ignorance of how to communicate car-to-car, here are some tips broken down by the sign and the signal:

Flashing Brights:
1)If the car behind you flashing its bright lights it signals an intent to pass. Move over slow poke and let them by.
2)If the oncoming car is flashing its bright lights it signals either you need to check your light settings (yes, your brights are too bright for oncoming traffic) or there is a speed trap ahead.
3)If you are signaling to change lanes in the daytime, a truck will flash brights to let you over.

Off/On lights:
Usually used in the daytime to indicate the same as #3 above: lane is clear to change and you are ok to move over.

All of those signals above are considered polite.

HOW TO SAY THANK YOU:
Hazard Lights A quick double flash is used to say "thank you" when someone is courteous and lets you over. Sometimes a quick right/left/right on the turn signal also says thanks.

Now, if someone gives you the finger you can figure it out for yourself. Quit giving the finger to someone who is trying to politely communicate with you. If you aren't in law enforcement, it isn't your job to correct someone else's driving. I don't know who was egging on who in this case but you should never pursue this kind of thing.

By the way, while I have your attention a mini-rant-addendum about merging onto interstate: while technically the car in the lane does have the right of way, the

BOOK

says that they must also use common sense to allow merging drivers on the road.

Filthy Mouth Libs Again

"YOU CAN'T HANDLE THE TRUTH" was the line from A FEW GOOD MEN.

Apparently it's directed at liberals too.

In the wake of the Abramoff scandal the truth that "both" parties were benefactors of the guilty pleading lobbyist created such "filth" that the Washington Post had to "shut down a blog".

In my personal experience both in life and on the blog I find this principle is constantly proven: The liberal will break down to personal attacks and filthy language first.

Virtually every time.

We would all like to think it is because the liberals are so emotional about their beliefs that they let anger in too easily. I would speculate that the anger and frustration is born out of a realization of falsehoods inherent in the core liberal psyche that they base their beliefs on. Once you show them the foundation of sand their emotional belief crumbles.

Thus the anger response.

Osama: Directors Cut was Accurate!

Check out yesterday's Al Jazerra broadcast of a Bin Laden message linked in the title.

I go tongue and cheek with my

"Bin Laden Directors Cut"

and that same day Al Qaeda releases to Al Jazerra a rant containing pretty much the same undertones I put in my farce.

Might as well pat myself on the back. Or not.
Turns out the problem with my source of news is the spin. Apparently the same message was heard differently depending on where you go???

Plutonians Protest Radiation

The heavily biased earth media largely ignored Plutonian objections to the New Horizons space craft and instead focused on Earthling environmentalists

rhetoric.

There were massive protests by Plutonian environmentalists regarding the Earth's hurtling of a potential radioactive rocket toward their planet.

NEW HORIZON SPACE PROBE

NASA scientists only predicted a 5.8% chance of

launch failure.

However, Plutonians are more worried about NASA's track record with unmanned objects when they reach their destination.

"There was a cover up of the Martian debacle. Nobody knows how many Martians were harmed when that other craft hit!" one Plutonian New Horizon protestor said.

Another Plutonian protestor was quoted as saying "Why are those crazy earthlingS spending all that money to send their radioactive stuff to us when their people are starving?"

NASA has refused to comment other than to say they expect the craft to fully perform the mission.

Bin Laden's Peace: Director's Cut

Bin Laden's latest remarks show he wants peace with those of us here in the land of the great Satan. Let's review the bonus feature director's cut of the Bin Laden tape that shows some behind the scenes action:

"Peace with the Great Satan!...Err, yeah!

Oh and my attacks planned against the great Satan haven't been affected by vigilant security and monitoring. Yeah! We've got ASTRONOMICAL plans for killing you evil Americans...Yeah! And the great Satan is...err...losing in Iraq and Afghanistan...Yeah! That's the Ticket!

And you spineless monkey evolved dogs...uh... err you nice peoples don't really want to fight me. So I'll...uh... yeah-So as the head of Al Qaeda I'll generously offer a peaceful pact with the great Satan. Yeah! ... and maybe I'll get nomi---no WIN the --ah-- Nobel Peace Prize-- just like my fellow terror--ah statesman-er-yeah Yassir Arafat did! Yeah!"

DIE GREAT SATAN, oh wait-uh-no-... CONVERT OR DIE...uh-no- Peace to my Satanic--err American brothers!"


I couldn't help but think of the classic SNL skit by John Lovitz of the "compulsive liar" Tommy Flannagan. I hope you found it entertaining.

Why Blogging Works

I just got finished polishing off a sarcastic look at Bin Laden on my blog. I clicked the "NEXT BLOG" key on my site and got...

Totally weird without being blatantly disgusting Foot-loving

guy's (I assume) site.

Very quickly click next blog again to the musings of a deeply

Christian blogger.

Thoughtfully click next blog to a guy talking about his

gambling.

Rolling the dice on next blog to intelligent design from a point of view

against the Church.

Wondering what his issue against God is I click next blog to find...

Chocolate Schoolbus Preacher Man

Mayor Schoolbus Nagen apologizes for his vow to keep New Orleans "chocolate" and rant about how God is punishing the USA.

I wonder if he'll apologize to Pat Robertson for stealing his act of telling us what God is angry about.

Again, I digress. We all know the shameless double standard and what would happen if Bush or a Republican had made that remark. The poor guy is likely suffering from the stress of the truths he already knows. Let's look at them:

The biggest hurdle to re-populating New Orleans is simply to see it from the eyes of those affected: you rent your place and it gets destroyed. What motivation do you have to come back to it? As for others; you own your home that was destroyed destroyed that makes a motivation to come back. Assuming the city deems your neighborhood viable and doesn't turn it into a park/acceptable flood zone because your neighbors failed to return.

Then there is the other catch-

Neither person mentioned above has a job to come back to. In the meanwhile, you got a nice place to stay in a community that is desperate for workers and you quickly found a job. Your kids start in the local schools and are drawn in with open loving arms because of the tragedy. These new communities even made extraordinary effort to create conditions to bring your dog!

It's going to take years to get the city rebuilt, and what happens to those who are very happy with their new lives? Those same people are the "core of the New Orleans community" that Nagen and others want back. A recent survey finds that fully 60% of those people are happy where they are now?

What is their motivation to return? How happy the family combined with length of time away will dull the ache to live in New Orleans.

I am disgusted when on NPR I hear words like "the richest country on earth can't afford to house the black people of New Orleans..." or "the rebuilding is racially decided against the poor blacks of our town"... This racism twisted talk is an exploitation of a correlation to the reality, not the causation. Typical blind ignorance of truth to tweak the racial nerve any way possible.

Reality: wealthier individuals are more likely to have good insurance and higher land (therefore, more quickly repaired because less damage).
Reality: there are as many "white" neighborhoods devastated and not being prioritized as "black" neighborhoods.
Reality: flood water goes to the lowest point and doesn't care who is in the way.
Reality: major builders are looking at housing for Katrina victims in their new locations (Centex Homes) rather than building in New Orleans.

Reality is that many in the wake of Katrina are seeing the economic conditions available in Dallas, Atlanta, Birmingham, and Nashville (Memphis omitted intentionally). These cities have plentiful incomes and jobs versus the "good-old-boy-Democrat" AKA "Huey-Long-Style system" still fully functional and alive in Louisiana (and in Memphis under the family name "Ford").

Maybe Schoolbus's ranting about God and punishment are some kind of Freudian insight of his worst fears: God destroyed New Orleans to change it?

Peaceful Religion Mob (again)

The self-proclaimed peaceful religion has yet another mass casualty resulting from mob behavior of attendees.

" The site is a notorious bottleneck for the massive crowds that attend the hajj pilgrimage and has seen deadly stampedes in the past, including one in 1990 that killed 1,426 people and another in February 2004 that killed 244."

This year it was 345 killed. This is just the pattern of casualties from one event!

As a side note, Billy Graham and other Christian groups have managed to gather literally tens of thousands in a group hundreds of times with no stampede, no death. Maybe a twisted ankle or two but never a stampede? Here are images from 1996 Minneapolis where 70,000 were inside and overflow of 10,000 plus were outside the stadium.

70,000 CROWD IN 1996 MINNEAPOLIS

OVERFLOW CROWD OUTSIDE

Why is this such a common occurrence for Muslims yet Christians do not have this issue? The specific question here lies in the comparison.

BTW: I know it's some kind of rite that has to be done at a specific part of the day and all that tripe so don't use that as an excuse to trample and kill people.

HOORAY! IRANIAN Nuke Program!

Anyone who agrees with that title should seriously have their head examined.


IRANIAN PRESIDENT AHMADINEJAD
The good news is that I predict that Israel will not sit idle while Iran reinvigorates their uranium enrichment program. (Enrichment usually means "weaponization" of uranium).

I wonder how exactly Israel plans to destroy those facilities... this will be "fun" to watch.

Communist Evo and Citgo?

Just great. I love my local Citgo mom-and-pop station. It's an independent and usually cheaper than the chain stores next door. Having worked as a rep for a tobacco company I know which stores are independents and which are chains. I always try to support the little guy.

As a side benefit, Citgo oil comes from South America. Not the Middle East.


With the election of Communistic minded Evo Morales, there is no good choice for where to spend gas money. It looks like my spending dollars that were avoiding middle-eastern ties are going into the far east communist accounts.

"Bolivia's left-leaning president-elect, who is on a world tour ..."(said)"...he made visiting China a priority because he considers China to be a "political, ideological and programmatic ally of the Bolivian people." "

Bolivia, along with much of the popular sentiment in South America, is shifting communist. The Chinese are as excited as I am horrified and quickly investing in the oil business in South America.

Proliferation of Communist thought is NOT a good thing for Americans. If the education of South Americans was better than they would realize the multiple shortfalls of voting for a Communistic state. It all sounds good until you realize that some animals are more equal than others.

Schumer: Trash The judiciary

D-SEN. CHUCKY SCHUMER
"The democratic party will ask questions on key issues (READ: ABORTION)... if we don't like his answers we will filibuster." (Source link to WASH TIMES in title).

That ain't how it works.

Here is how it works in our Democratic Republic: your party wins the election. Winning party gets to decide who to nominate. As long as the nominee is somewhat qualified they get the job. Bush & Republicans won so they get to pick.

Somebody out there please pass along to Senator Harry Reid (also a Democrat) about how the winner gets to decide while we are at this

"...Senate like the house of commons..." (whiner)

To be fair he was whining about a budget but the same lack of logic applies.

Now, back to Alito. This one just happens to be not only over qualified, but also has traditionally had the backing of both conservatives and liberals for his even-handed fair minded rulings. Now Chuckie Schumer wants to say "abortion or nothing" and that is a trashing of the system. Never mind that the Abortion issue while volatile is a mere speck of sand compared to all the other issues this court must address during this nominee's lifetime.

The effort is so transparent on the democrats part: control the court as the last holdout of liberal ideologly. However I do want them to keep saying these stupid things. Why? Because the more they yell it, the more people realize how far gone the democratic party is.

Wiretap: Bush's Lawyers Thinking

"Why would Bush ignore checks and balances? What about the 4th Amendment?"

Is W a cowboy outside of the law?

While trying to explain why some excellent anti-wiretap points were moot, I stumbled upon the actual decision that incorporate all decisions relative to wiretaps, criminal activities and terrorist intelligence.

When you read this decision (linked in the title) you too may better see how the evolution of the application of protection of the Constitution was clarified and removed under certain circumstances.

The clear issues that lawmakers agreed on were in cases of criminal misconduct that were then bridged to include international espionage and later terrorism.

Several additional cases listed below clarify the pattern. In a side note, some of these cases also created the walls that blocked cross-communication between intelligence agencies. Those same walls that are removed under the Patriot Act.

Here are the decisions:

Foreign Intel "wall" removal

Executive branch may be excused from a warrant if involves agent of a foreign power (paraph) or if the surveillance is conducted ‘primarily’ for foreign intelligence reason"
United States v. Megahey, 553 F. Supp. 1180 (E.D.N.Y. 1982), aff'd sub nom. United States v. Duggan, 743 F.2d 59 (2d Cir. 1984)

Fourth Circuit case decided in 1980. United States v. Truong Dinh Hung, 629 F.2d 908 (4th Cir. 1980)
This leads into a brain pretzel of wording that evolves in several more decisions to accept foreign intelligence operations as separate from criminal activities except where foreign espionage is a criminal activity. UGH!

The jist is that FISA is primarliy concerned that agencies not share information without strict regulation.

Vernonia School Dist. 47J v. Acton, 515 U.S. 646, 653 (1995) (quoting Griffin v. Wisconsin, 483 U.S. 868, 873 (1987) The distinction between ordinary criminal prosecutions and extraordinary situations underlies the Supreme Court'’s approval of entirely warrantless and even suspicionless searches that are designed to serve the government's "“special" needs, beyond the normal need for law enforcement.

This addresses special circumstances outside of the normal need for checks and balances.

There is much here, far more than the typical operate-seat-of-the pants lazy journalist will dig into. Some of it I understand and some I do not because I'm not a lawyer (yeah, I look for the II to work me over on this one ;) because she is a lawyer). However I can see pretty clearly where the legal thinking applied to existing cases as follows:
1) war time situation
2) application against international terrorism concerns versus domestic crime
3) Objective of thwarting terror versus prosecuting criminals
**** that part is the key to the difference in thinking

IF the goal was to arrest and convict an American citizen for a crime then there would be a HUGE PROBLEM with the White House authorizing wire taps. However, clearly that is not the goal of this operation and thus this interpretation: "So long as the government entertains a realistic option of dealing with the agent other than through criminal prosecution, it satisfies the significant purpose test." The goal is to prevent another terror attack on our soil by agents of international terror.

It seems the secret court did not always agree to this perspective and switched from previous graceful allowances to narrowing scopes and blocking taps of suspects. To be fair this would have been a reasonable course of action prior to 9/11. However this limit does not rise to meet the abilities and scope of the threat. While the terrorist suspect may not be a criminal he still may be waiting for an order to execute. The goal is to pinpoint the cells and block them from acting. When applied this way, the rulings favor Bush's pro-active order over the secret court's blocking and hesitations.

I just do not see the threat to citizens given the focus and circumstances. The wording specifically prohibits use against subjects who are citizens and clearly not foreign agents and also explicitly protects the press. I do not even see how it could be deemed a reasonable basis in the future to wiretap citizen to citizen communications? Is the concern constitutional and/or precedent? Or is it rather a ploy to spin a negative view against a political enemy for personal gain to hell with the consequences to security?

I welcome the comments to come, and any corrections to what I've misinterpreted. I find it very hard to believe this is anything more than another "Bush Bashing" ploy.

Wiretap Timing Clarified

Well, I was speculating that there was a backstory to the

timing

of the wiretap scandal release because they sat on it for a YEAR... and the article I quoted was highly speculative of this as well but was written well before the release of the book on January 3rd...

But now it becomes crystal clear:


Written by a guy with ties to the Times? The NY Times? You gotta be kidding me!

Release the story to coincide with a big vote. The furor hits just as you start shipping the book you want to promote. I smell a rat. A big, fat, New York Times rat. The good news is that the early reviewers smell the same rat I do. It looks like national security was sacrificed and journalistic credibility bent to make a fast buck. That makes me righteously indignant!

Mine Survivor: Perils Of Folklore

I just grabbed a cup of coffee at a c-store. On the way there I was hearing about the lone survivor on NPR and the huge issue of the "rumor" of 12 survivors. Imagine my surprise when I saw the USA Today headline: "12 SURVIVORS!"

I met many miners and their families when I worked in Kentucky. All are the bravest and hardest working peoples you will meet. My prayers are with those who lost their fathers and sons in this tragedy. With that said I feel some righteous indignation at how they have been misled with false hope and look at how it happened.


As a student of what folklore is and how it operates let me tell you that this is one of the most harmful results possible. I am sure this will be a black eye on USA Today and cause someone to lose their job. The damage is already done though.

The timing was key to this paper's failure to get the story right. Printing deadlines ended before the correct information was put forward. The main sources of folklore are print media and the internet. The unfortunate aspect of this is the pain it is causing for those in this circumstance.

Folklore is exactly what the word means: "people information". Some references use folklore rather than a more apt application of "folklife" about remedies & techniques. In my education and use Folklore applies to any story that sounds just true enough to be real but actually is totally fabricated and disseminated through the available media. It usually sounds like "A friend of a friend told me X and I just know it's true!" Here are some examples you may have forwarded to your friends:
Heard the one about the girl slowly cooked in a tanning bed?
What about getting aids from a needle in the behind in a theatre?
Did you know that Saran Wrap in the microwave releases toxic chemicals into food?
Febreeze kills cats (personally tried that one at home, no luck).
Some foreign guys (insert nationality of bad guy of the day) selling perfume knocking women out at gas stations and robbing them?
Got a tracking email that Bill Gates will pay you $100 to forward?
All completely false.

In my tactless blunt nature I have peeved quite a few of my friends and family by pointing out that it isn't true. Why someone doesn't want to be told that some stupid scheme or horrific fabrication isn't real and they shouldn't spread it is way beyond my ability to comprehend.

Then we come to this situation: a supposed reliable source puts out information that is not true or confirmed. At this point we don't know where the rumor started, it reports to have started from the search and rescue office. Exactly typical of folklore, we have no exact named source of this information. The information spreads rapidly by word of mouth and is accepted as true. It even makes the print media before confirmation of the accuracy is made.

I despise the results of folkore, and work hard to help prevent it. You can read more about it and search folklore topics

urbanlegends.about.com.

OMG...Somebody Slap Me.

I actually see something I totally and unequivocally agree with on...

hold your breath

drum roll...


DAILY KOS????

Sheehan is right, and I'm linking the story she linked. It is totally wrong for MSN to yank those who are anti-Chinese on their blog just for a bid to cozy up to the commies. Proof of that adage of a broken clock is still right twice a day. Or something like that. Sheehan definitely qualifies as broken on any level, but she is right on this rare occasion.

That's a REALLY WEIRD start to my year! I'm still pulling my link to her blog because she doesn't need any more press. We should all eliminate any links to her blog.

Dave's Predictions

Resolutions are up so now I need a prediction or two:

Time to put on my Swami outfit.

Of course I have some ideas about politics and the world:

Namely the continued "surprising" strength of the dollar against the weak euro. If you don't understand why trade deficits don't ultimately hurt us then you should ask economist WALTER WILLIAMS.

Expect great leaps and bounds in the Iraqi economy. Also see fewer terrorist/insurgent attacks.

Expect big trouble in little Iran. Israel will not sit by and let some leader who says "wipe them off the map" and "make their country in Europe" have a fully capable nuclear program. That will be messy.

The eavesdropping "scandal" will become the "leak of eavesdropping scandal" and somebody will get prosecuted.

Aside from politics, lets look at media:
The continued rise of alternate media and bloggers coinciding with the tremendous decline of newspaper circulations.

The biggest and most long term change will be whatever Google cooks up. That will be the ultimate harbringer of what is to come for traditional media. A new computer with a Google OS? Combine that with Google Media? Sell it through Wal-Mart for $200? Wow, POWERFUL would be an understatement!

Prices will drop on the flat screen TVs as that new screen manufacturing technique developed by TI hits shelves, if it hasn't already. I look for some brands to die, some new ones to emerge and a continued push from HP and Dell into consumer household electronics.

Continued decline in Movie box office, even though they raise prices again. I already plan on seeing

PIXAR's "Cars"

and have some positive anticipation of "Superman" and

X-3

and a new Spiderman installment with Tobey(darn, not til '07).

To wrap it up, it will be an interesting year. I look forward to seeing how my predictions pan out.