Cool - the wreck of the ship General Anthony Wayne found in Lake Erie

After sinking 157 years ago in Lake Erie, the sidewheel steamer General Anthony Wayne has been discovered by Thomas Kowalczk 8 miles northeast of Vermillion, Ohio.

Located in 50 feet of water, the wreck is eminently divable, and apparently is in (at least) two pieces - given the boiler on the ship exploded, I'd bet there's a pretty nice sized debris field.

From the Detroit News:

The side-wheel steamship, named in honor of Revolutionary War hero Gen. "Mad" Anthony Wayne, sank in April 1850 while en route from the Toledo area to Buffalo, N.Y. Thirty-eight of the 93 passengers and crew on board died.

"I researched everything I could about it and knew the general area where the ship went down," Kowalczk said. "I laid out a grid search pattern and starting hunting."

Kowalczk saw an image of the wreckage on his sonar screen in September. He dived down in May and photographed the wreckage, which is in two sections.

Kowalczk and other members of the Cleveland Underwater Explorers plan to survey the wreck later this summer when underwater visibility improves.

The wreck belongs to the state and salvaging it is illegal, but divers can visit what is left of the ship after it is surveyed and the coordinates are disclosed, said Christopher Gillcrist, executive director of the historical society.

Congrats to Kowalczk on a great discovery, finding a lost ship is many a diver's and explorer's dream.

Father's Day 2007

For all you Fathers out there, this day is for you, reminding you that the toughest and most worthwhile job you'll ever have is being a father to your kids.

Since you have a vital role in how your kids will turn out, it is nice to get a day of recognition for the good you've done, and a day for reflection on how to do it even better.

For example, My Dad I'm sure is still reflecting how a fine, gun-disliking, liberal and proud Canadian ended up raising a conservative, gun-owning and patriotic American.

Other than that (and I don't consider the result to be a fault, indeed its a feature) he should be happy to know he did a bang-up job, and I owe him a lot. The greatest praise I have for him as I'm raising my own kids is my constant thoughts regarding how he raised me of "Oh Sh*t, he was right"...about just about everything.

Dad, you did, and still do, damn good.

Today for Father's day I was awakened with Abby my 3 1/2 year old giving me a kiss and a Father's day card, with an "A" on it that she drew herself. And the day just got better from there.

My fine wife took me out to breakfast, after which we looked at some cameras to see about replacing the ones that were stolen.

We returned home and then took the kids to Crossroads Village and the Huckleberry Railroad in Flint, Michigan. Think Greenfield Village, in terms of a historic array of 1800 vintage buildings and staff in period costume, but smaller, more quaint and a staff that is incredibly friendly and enthusiastic about their jobs.

Abby's highlights were a chance to get in a Fire Truck that was there from the Genesee Township Fire Department including getting a demonstration of what a firefighter in a mask coming to save her in a fire would look like, so she'd know to go toward them and tell them where she was -- important stuff and the firefighters were real nice to her and I think some of it sunk in. She then had a ride on a 1912 carousel that was fast - I was holding on to her worrying she was going to be spun off.

The Carousel was followed by a train ride on a vintage 2-8-2 Steam locomotive train along with vintage passenger cars from the 1800s for a 40 minute ride through the Genessee County countryside - with the train run exactly as it was in the 1800s when the track was part of the Flint Pere Marquette Railroad Line. Interestingly, some of the passenger cars came from a train that ran in California at the time when Wyatt and Virgil Earp left Arizona and took up in California, and there's a pretty strong belief that one or both of them had been in that passenger car at that time. Very cool. Leah, at 10 months, loved the train ride and was smiling and waving to people on the train - her first waves ever.

The Crossroads Village closed at 5 and we hadn't seen or done nearly enough -- we missed the paddle steamer boat ride and most of the building exhibits so we'll simple have to go back.

We then had a picnic at steppingstone falls and saw a man-made waterfall that was quite nice.

Then we piled back in the van and went to the beach for a swim.

The day ended with the tucking of the kids into bed - For me, Father's Day could not have been more perfect.

Palestinians may be in Civil War. But it's not a Civil War yet!

Finally the MSM and others are kinda-sort-maybe calling the fighting between Hamas and Fatah in Gaza a civil war. mainly saying that "Gaza is sliding into Civil war", or "Sky News - Gaza Descending Into Civil War" or "Palestinians in Gaza nearing civil war"

Never mind that the shooting, bombing and internecine squabbling has been going on for months between the two parties, interrupted only by the occasional rocket launching or terrorist attack on Israel.

Seems a bit out of a Monty Python skit -

Israeli - Here's a Civil War between Fatah and Hamas

Hamas/Fatah > I'm not a civil war yet"

Reporter = What?

Israeli - Nothing, here's your story.

Hamas/Fatah > I'm not a civil war.

Reporter = 'Ere! 'E says 'e's not a civil war!

Israeli - Yes he is.

Hamas/Fatah > I'm not!

Reporter = 'E isn't?

Israeli - Well... he will be soon-- he's been shooting and bombing at 'imself for weeks already

Hamas/Fatah > I'm getting better!

Israeli - No you're not, you'll be a civil war in a moment.

Reporter = I can't call 'im a Civil War like that! It's against regulations!

Hamas/Fatah > I don't want to be reported in the papers as a civil war....

Israeli - Oh, don't be such a baby, when you're not trying to kill us, you're killin' each other at a record pace.

Reporter = I can't report 'im as a civil war, they're Palestinians ya know

Hamas/Fatah > I feel fine!

Israeli - Well do us a favor and accurately report it as a civil war.

Reporter = I can't, there's only Arabs involved, journalistic standards!

Israeli - Can you hang around a couple of minutes? He won't be long to be a full blown civil war.

Reporter = No gotta get to Iraq, there's a civil war there and Americans are involved ya know.

Israeli - Well, when's your next round?

Reporter = Thursday.

Hamas/Fatah > I think I'll go for a walk....

Israeli - You're not fooling anyone, you know-- (shooting in the distance)(to Reporter) Look, isn't there something you can do...?

(more shooting in the distance)

Hamas/Fatah > I feel happy! I feel happy!

(lots more shooting in the distance)

Reporter: Gaza descends into civil warA supremacy struggle in the Gaza Strip is steadily escalating into civil war, Palestinian leaders have admitted.

Israeli - Ah. Close enough, thanks very much.

Reporter= Not at all. See you on Thursday!

The Center holds, but not the Center that Sen. Kennedy is talking about.

Thankfully the Immigration / Amnesty bill has been stopped for now. But its supporters on both sides of the aisle are trying their best to come back. Kennedy among others is pushing for the bill to be brought again and passed.

Kennedy: 'The center is holding'

Before the luncheon, Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Massachusetts, who worked with the White House and Republicans on writing the bill, issued a statement saying, "Like the president, many of us are very determined to get the job done and get it done now.

"The center is holding together: Last night we met to discuss the options for moving it forward, and today we'll continue that work. We share the sense of urgency that this important issue deserves."

The Center did hold Senator, the Center in this case were Americans that were not about to see another amnesty coupled with empty promises of tightening the border, with 12 million illegals swamping this country and overwhelming our social services.

The Center held and stopped the bill for now. Hopefully it will stay firm against both the left-wing love of illegals for their democratic voting tendencies and lack of American values, and the right-wing love of extra cheap labor and a flagging attempt by the President to build a domestic policy legacy.

This Immigration bill is so badly flawed the Center has told both sides pushing for this incredibly flawed bill to stop.

May the Center hold and stop this bill.

Mr. President, if you want a legacy that you will be remembered fondly for, pass a good bill to secure the border first, then pass a bill to encourage legal immigration and clamp down on illegal immigration. it's not to late to fix this latest tone-deaf mistake.

Ripped Off in Windsor

My wife was in Windsor today with the kids to pickup one of her friends who had taken the train there and was coming to visit us from Toronto.

So she and the kids picked her up and on the way in Windsor stopped by the Detroit River at a park for a picnic. I sadly was stuck up in Flint for a deposition.

Unfortunately, while they were having a pleasant lunch on the waterfront in peaceful Windsor, some scumbag yet unknown smashed the passenger window of the van and grabbed both our video camera and digital camera, which were in the car as we had just taken pictures of our 3.5 year olds first ever pre-school year graduation.

The Windsor Police took a report and were very kind, courteous, helpful and professional, especially to a bewildered 3.5 year old that didn't understand why the window was broken with glass everywhere and the cameras gone. I'm grateful for their assistance.

Needless to say, the loss of the cameras hurt, but the loss of the tapes in the camera and the bag and SD Card holding those pictures hurts much more.

As such, if you're in the Windsor area, and someone offers you the following for sale:

Canon ZR60 Digital Video Camera Serial # 172646350215 (with a extra-large battery mounted, plus spare battery, charger and remote and black letherette case)

Canon Powershot A540 Serial # 3222219295 (Also in the same black case along with 6 Radio Shack nimh recheargeable batteries)

Please do the following:

1. Buy them from the seller.
2. Take the cameras.
2. Kick the seller's ass, hard and repeatedly.
3. Take your money back,
4. Turn the seller or what is left of him over to the Windsor Police.
5. Let me know and I'd be grateful for the memory cards and tapes.

Update: Of course the insurance deductible is above the current value of comparable replacements so it makes no sense to do an insurance claim on the cameras. The window got fixed and we found the bugger had also damaged the window frame itself.

The cameras are replaceable, the images on the memory card and MiniDV tapes are not.

Another Trial victory and a great example of what not to do at trial

I just received a jury verdict on behalf of my client, after a two day trial, for the entire amount demanded, $160,000.

This was for a breech of contract case where defendants were seriously hosing my client, not only buying his business for very favorable terms but doing the deal in such a convoluted way that he stood to risk not getting anything at but the initial payment for the business.

The lesson my client has learned from this is that its better to have a lawyer review the deal up front rather than have to go to court later - no ehtical lawyer in the world would have let him go forward with this deal. The defendants drafted the contract (and had assistance from a lawyer or at least a legal secretary who um, was somewhat shady to say the least), which specified the sale was to be for $210,00 with 100k up front and 110 to be paid under a promissory note (without interest!) to be paid monthly as the revenue from the business permitted. My client was only paid 50k at the closing and told he'd get the other 50 in a week.

Oh, did I mention my client does not read english and only speaks it somewhat, and that he was relying on the other side to be truthful? Thankfully defendants messed up and had an integration clause to the contract, which precluded them from claiming all sorts of riddiculous allegations and side agremeents that they claimed occured but did not make any sense.

At the trial Defendants made two mutually exclusive arguments - The first was that they had paid my client 50k in cash at the closing in addition to the 50k they paid by check, and that they had paid the remaining 110k already. The second argument was that they claimed the revenue of the business did not permit the payments so they didn't have to pay under the promissory note and therfore did not owe him the 110K.

Anyone see the obvious contradiction between those arguments?

After I took the direct exam of their accountant and explained to the jury that the business in the two relevant years had the following amounts in cash: In 2003 it had 68,000 in cash at the end of the year and the business had bought a $80,000 Dodge Viper. Interestingly the business claimed on the tax forms that the Viper was solely and 100% for business use - but on the stand Defendant 1 first said it was just for the business but then admitted that he had exported it to Lebanon for a personal trip and had reimported it back. Hopefully the IRS will catch on to this guy's shennanigans (He's already in serious criminal trouble with some other federal agencies so the IRS may as well join in).

In 2004, the business ended the year with a cash entry of over $244,000 - certainly enough to at least make monthly payments under the proimissory note and even to pay it off fully.

Then the icing on the cake. Defendant 1's attorney for his closing argument says (slightly paraphrased):

'This is a case about credibility and figuring out what makes sense and who is telling the truth. Now I can't tell if my client is telling the truth or if plaintiff is telling the truth but you need to decide on what makes sense.'

Note to the aspiring lawyer out there - never tell a jury you can't tell if your client is being truthful, even if, as I suspect the defendant's lawyer knew in this case, that you know your client is lying. This other lawyer by the way was much more experienced than I was and really should have known better than to make this kind of a closing argument.

All in all, an excellent victory. It was again nice to be working on behalf of a client that I knew was the one being victimized and taken advantage of, and yes, my client was telling the truth and the jury clearly saw that.

Exercise update

Ah the joys of Exercise

As I mentioned back in November, I've gotten back into exercising. Not as often as I'd like, with two kids and a busy work schedule its hard to fit the gym sessions in, but I try to fit them in when I can.

Progress has been made.

Since November, in these last 6 months I've:
- lost 10 pounds and kept it off;
- dropped over 3 minutes from my 1.5 mile run time; and
- the sit ups and push ups are also getting better, with a small sidetrack on the push ups due to a shoulder injury that has since been fixed and I'm slowly restrengthening my upper body now that I'm allowed to do the exercises again.

I'm still not at my goals listed in November, but I will continue on my way to meet and beat them.

Dive Report for Tuesday

On Tuesday, right after work I headed off to Union Lake to dive with my two teammates. We were planning on getting two dives in, but it was not to be.

Right after we suited up, dark clouds rolled in. We had just enough time to get the gear stowed and then jump into the car as a massive rainstorm, complete with thunder and lots of lightning struck, and lasted for over an hour, with tantalizing pauses.

Finally it eased up enough so we could proceed with a dive.

The dive went reasonably well and reminded me that much practice is still needed on my buoyancy, frog and back kicks, ok, lots of practice. Did i mention lots, 'cause I surely need it.

Sunday's open water drysuit dives went close to perfect, with reasonably well controlled ascents (not perfect but 1000% better than anything that came before) which of course guaranteed I'd look like a total cluster on Tuesday. So here's hoping that Saturday will be more like Sunday than yesterday.

Detroit City Council to Police: Ignore Illegal Immigrants

Detroit has now joined the list of cities that have instructed their police forces to not do anything about illegal immigrants they may apprehend or come across.

From the Free Press:

City Council approves ordinance to prohibit the profiling of immigrants

An ordinance that bans profiling was approved Wednesday by the Detroit City Council. It prohibits police and city employees from asking about the immigration status of residents.

The council voted unanimously for the law prohibiting discrimination on the basis of race, ethnicity, dress, physical appearance and immigration status. Under the new law, police cannot ask people for their immigration papers unless it was related to a crime.

Newsflash: Being in the United States after entering illegally or overstaying a visa is a -- wait for it -- crime. Apparently immigration violations no longer exist in Detroit.

In Detroit, some immigrants complain that, after being pulled over by police, they have been asked for residency papers. Others say they are afraid to apply for city help or programs such as home-repair assistance because of their immigration status.

"It's not something a city employee should be asking," said City Council President Kenneth Cockrel Jr., who introduced the bill. "It's not within their purview."

No kidding illegals should not be receiving city help or home repair assistance if they're illegal - why are law-abiding city taxpayers to pay for criminals while they are committing a crime? If they need home-repair asistance perhaps they should go home and apply from there.

The ordinance was introduced after talks with Latino, Arab and Muslim groups. The Detroit-based group Metropolitan Organizing Strategy Enabling Strength played a lead role in pushing for the law.

Nice to know the interested parties. 3 of the 19 9/11 Hijackers were on expired visas, 6 others had violated immigration laws but remained in the country - all of them would have had these infractions ignored in Detroit under this policy and thus preventing a means to prevent future incidents.

On Tuesday, Detroit Police Chief Ella Bully-Cummings said she wants to make sure everyone feels comfortable contacting police when crimes are committed. In some cases, immigrants say they are reluctant to call police because they fear the police will turn them over to federal agents who could deport them.

Because that would be enforcing the law, and apparently that might make people uncomfortable.

Bully-Cummings also said the department is against profiling and that police should not generally enforce federal immigration laws.

Anyone ever hear of the Supremacy clause? Does this new approach now guarrantee Detorit police will not enforce any Federal law such as environmental, Firearms, Alcohol etc?

Dawud Walid, head of the Michigan branch of the Council of American-Islamic Relations, said he is pleased with the council's vote. "The city of Detroit should be seen as a place that is not hostile to immigrants."

Enforcement of immigration laws agaisnt illegals should not cause an issue, nor any hostility for legal immigrants, so who is Walid backing here, and why?

Samsung DVD Burner no longer pining for the fjords

Its dead. Its gone to meet its maker, literally as it is being returned and will likely end up back with Samsung. It will burneth no more, except perhaps if they melt it down to recycle it.

I purchased the drive, a Samsung SH-S182M from Newegg.com in October 2006. It worked well for awhile, burning efficiently at 16x, reading discs with aplomb and otherwise acting as a good DVD should. Unfortunately it recently seemed to have decided to have an early midlife crisis, and it began burning at only .7x-1x, a far slower speed than it is rated. Burning a CD of baby photos should not take almost an hour.

The drive also began to have trouble reading my cds and dvds, giving I/O errors and making playing games from the CD or DVD Rom impossible (thus confirming my dislike of games that require the original cd or DVD to be in the drive in order to play them, but that's another story).

Luckily for me, NewEgg.com has a 1 year return policy for defective hardware and they have courteously and promptly issued me an RMA. The Drive is on its way back to them, and I hope their exchange process goes smoothly and I have better luck with the replacement drive.

Update: Newegg replaced the dead drive with a comparable Lite-On Drive quickly and efficiently and in a very customer-service focussed and friendly way. No fuss, no muss and great customer service. If you're looking for a great online computer hardware vendor that sells great stuff and backs what they sell check them out.

Dive Report - Drysuit Training Class

Well it is finally starting to come together. Yesterday I had a drysuit trainign class in the pool. Drysuits are darn nice. Wish I had one when the water was 41 degrees in those previous dives i blogged about.

Thanks to a great instructor, who in addition to excellent teaching skills clearly has massive reserves of patience, a lot of my trim, body mechanics and breathing issues that make me look like a floppy fish rather than a Scuba Diver are being resolved and I now know what I'm doing wrong and can practice to cure the problems.

If you want to learn how to dive, and dive well, and you're in the Detroit, Michigan area, go to Sea The World Scuba Center and ask for James. You will not be sorry.

King Herod's Tomb Discovered

The Tomb of King Herod has been discovered in Herodium, Israel.

From the Detroit Free Press:

An Israeli archaeologist on Tuesday said he has found the tomb of King Herod, the legendary builder of ancient Jerusalem and the Holy Land.

Hebrew University archaeologist Ehud Netzer said the tomb was found at Herodium, a flattened hilltop in the Judean Desert where Herod built a palace compound. Netzer has been working at the site since the 1970s.

Netzer said the tomb was discovered when a team of researchers found pieces of a limestone sarcophagus believed to belong to the ancient king. Although there were no bones in the container, he said the sarcophagus’ location and ornate appearance indicated it is Herod’s.

“It’s a sarcophagus we don’t just see anywhere,” Netzer said at a news conference. “It is something very special.”

. . .

Herod became the ruler of the Holy Land under the Romans around 40 B.C. The wall he built around the Old City of Jerusalem during the time of the Jewish Second Temple is the one that can be seen today. He also undertook massive construction projects in Caesaria, Jericho, the hilltop fortress of Massada and other locations.

It has long been assumed that Herod was buried at Herodium, but decades of excavations failed to turn up the site until now. The First-Century historian Josephus Flavius described the tomb and Herod’s funeral procession.

A very impressive example of persistence, given that Netzer has been working on the site since the 1970s. Persistence and determination can ceetainly pay off in the long run.

This is a very important and exciting historical find indeed. Hopefully, more detailed reports of the find and related excavations will be published and made available. It will be interesting to learn what coins were found in situ with the tomb.

On Electoral Culture and Violence

An interesting comparison.

In enlightened, cosmopolitan, European and so multilateral France, after an election of a right-leaning (for the French anyway) President, we get
days of Rioting including burning cars, assaults on police etc.
Hundreds of cars have been torched in the riots.

Meanwhile in uncultured, cowboy, unenlightened, unilateral America, we've had a 2006
election of a right-leaning (for France, for American conservatives not so much)President without rioting or torching of cars, and only a few unfulfilled threats to move to France. In 2008, we had a congressional election that installed a Democrat, left-leaning (possibly centrist for France) Congress and Senate and there was no riots, no burning of cars and no assaults on police.

For some reason the unenlightened American culture seems to handle changes in government with far more aplomb than the chic and oh so culturally sophisticated French.

Cell Phones and Drivers

Traffic all messed up due to a massive bloom of
Michigan' s State Flower along the roads on the Lodge Freeway and Woodward, bringing traffic to an impressive halt.

Now to add to the fun, today I'm driving to work in all this mess and every driver -
to my front, rear, and both sides had cell phones growing out of their ears, and driving like their head is up their @**.

When you're in slow traffic I can understand - you're not going anywhere and you're presumably paying some attention to the car in front of you. However, during that brief shining moment in the commute where the road is clear and marked 45 mph and you're in front of me yaking on a cell phone and doing 35 on a one-lane road with no passing allowed, with occasional hitting of the brakes for no discernable reason, is an annoyance, and potentially dangerous.

I'm not against cell phone use in cars, provided the user pays attention and can handle the extra task loading without messing up for other drivers. I use a cell phone while driving, but with a hands-free device as I noticed there is a clear difference in situational awareness when you're holding the phone to your ear as compared to using theearbud. Too bad these other drivers seem so oblivious to their cluelessness while driving with a cell phone.

The Curse of The Fox - Drive to be Cancelled

Checking Fox's Drive website you see the following message: Final 2 Episodes to Air This Summer Stay Tuned.

Fox strikes yet again killing another great show before it gains its footing.

Let's see - Drive, Firefly, and so many more.

Sigh, bother and damn.

The curse of the Fox strikes again. Hopefully there is a clause somwhere in the show's contract that lets a more appreciative channel take it over.

Its pretty much confirmed that it is cancelled- see this wonderfully scathing reporting on Fox's latest folly - an article with which I agree 100%.

Excellent new fraud prevention service by Oakland County Register of Deeds

With Mortgage Fraud now on the rise as the housing spree cools down, and with Michigan as one of the top ten leading states for fraud (another fact this State can be "proud" of), Oakland County has taken a welcome and proactive step to help fight this kind of fraud.

As reported in the Oakland Press, The County Clerk's office is offering a free online service where residents of the county can check if there has been any filings made on their property.

Residents can go to Fraudcheck, enter their information and get a listing of documents filed on their property.

Excellent work on the part of Oakland County Clerk Ruth Johnson. Hopefully other counties will follow her lead in helping to prevent this insidious type of fraud.

Michigan's State Flower in Full Bloom

And a flower of terrible beauty it is.

It is a perennial flower, impervious to rain, snow, harsh weather conditions and rough soils. Practically unkillable with no known natural predators, where one is somehow destroyed, dozens more spring up in its place.

Popping up everywhere in Michigan with a vicious fecundity, this flower brings with it encumberances as everywhere traffic snarls while people ponder its terrible beauty and portent-laden meaning.


The Michigan state flower of course looks like this:

Detroit's Jewish Presence and History Memorialized

The City of Detroit has a Jewish presence dating back to 1762.

As reported in the Detroit Free Press, this presence has now been memorialized with a historical marker on the shoreline near the Renaissance Center.

After more than 200 years, Chapman Abraham touched ground along the Detroit River once again on Monday.

This time, the fur trader who was Detroit's first Jewish settler arrived at Tri-Centennial State Park just east of the Renaissance Center in the form of a gold-and-green Michigan Historic Site marker that workers installed on the shoreline.

Come Sunday afternoon, a couple of costumed voyageurs will cruise up to the site in a canoe to illustrate what it might have looked like when Abraham landed in 1762.

"On Sunday, we're celebrating ways that the Jewish community has been active in Detroit," Ellen Cole, president of the Jewish Historical Society of Michigan, said as she prepared for the events that are expected to draw hundreds of people to the riverfront.

On the other side of the marker that honors Chapman Abraham there's a description of the Jewish families who sent men to serve in the Civil War, Cole said.

Impressively, as reported in the article, Jews from Detroit disproportionately contributed soldiers to the Union cause in the civil war, with 150 families sending 188 men.

An interesting story of historical interest well reported by the Detroit Free Press.

Beating a Train is a Fool's Game

Trying to save a few minutes by ignoring the gates and trying to beat a train thorugh a rail crossing is simply not smart. For a few minutes saved you're risking being struck by a multi-ton speeding train that cannot stop on a time as a matter of simple physics.

Sadly, as Reported in the Detroit Free Press this driver found out this wasn't smart the hard way:

Pontiac police said a 56-year-old Pontiac woman died Tuesday evening when she tried to beat a passing train with her vehicle on the city’s east side.

Etoi Houston was killed after her Dodge Dakota stalled on railroad tracks at the intersection of Sanford Street and South Boulevard and an Amtrak train struck her car, said Pontiac Police Chief Val Gross.
. . .
Gross said witnesses told police the car went around the crossing gates and tried to beat the train before it crossed. He said the train dragged the car for about a quarter mile before a conductor was able to stop at Paddock and Woodward.

Be smart and don't try to outrun a multi-ton behemoth just so you can get to where you want to go a few minutes faster. The time saved by such foolishness just isn't worth your life.

Excellent Analysis of Armed Citizen Defense to Mass Shootings and Media Undercoverage

At the Classically Liberal Blog there is an excellent analysis of media coverage (in this case the lack therof) of how armed civillians helped stop ongoing mass shootings.

To have it most simply put, the killers do not stop killing until someone with a gun arrives to stop them. Having someone with a gun at the location, able to respond dramatically cuts down on the killers ability to assault more potential victims as the killer has much less time than would be otherwise available to him - i.e. while the police are informed, respond and finally react to the situation.

Read the descriptions of the incidents on Classically Liberal, then question why there is a clear lack of coverage of these heroes who helped stop the mass-kilers from continuing their attack.

Granholm's China Hypocrisy

Or simply Politics as usual

After lambasting Dick DeVos when he was running against her for the governorship of Michigan for daring to have opened a factory in China (a condition of doing business there) as the head of Amway-Alticore, and raising accusations that DeVos was up to outsourcing jobs from Michigan and being cozy with China, Granholm goes forth to do the same thing.

As reported in the Detroit news article Meet China's new friend: Granholm

The Michigan Economic Development Corp. announced this week that it plans an investment mission to China later this month. It has the full support of Gov. Jennifer Granholm, who was last seen running re-election ads complaining that her opponent's former company sold teddy bears made in China. And she criticized Michigan-based Alticor for locating a factory in China, which is a legal requirement for any American company that wants to sell in the country with the world's largest population. That was then; this is now: "We are working aggressively in China to sell Michigan as the best place in North America to do business and attract new jobs to the state," Granholm said in a statement. If only she had been so forthright during the campaign.

Indeed, but after all that's politics as usual, smear your opponent for something you are about to do yourself. granholm will of course argue she's pushing to have China invest here rather than Amway opening up the Chinese market to a Michigan corporation's products, but that rings hollow as both would lead to a better economic situation for Michigan, a state that both needs investment here, and a place for its corporations to do business elsewhere.

NBC's Irresponsible Airing of VTU killer's tape

Rather than devoting the majority of its airtime to the victims of the killer at Virginia Technical University, instead NBC and with the rest of themediapiling on gave massive coverage of the killer's video taped ranting.

While the killer may have created this massacre and video as the ultimate post-modern English project, there is no excuse for NBC to broadcast his rantings, as they held no real information of value.

The problem is the glorification by notoriety of these deranged mass shooters.

Quick, now without googling/wiki'ing do the following:

1. Name the killer at VTU

2. Now, name the victims.

1. Name the killers at Columbine

2. Now name the victims

3. Name the killer at Thurston High in Oregon

4. Now, name the victims.

How did you do? Remember more of the killers names than their innocent victims? Why - due to the incessant media coverage of these sociopaths, and concordantundercoverage of their victim's lives.

While the media itself is not responsible for these killings, certainly the massive coverage of them is leading to copycats, especially among the deranged seeking their claim to fame.

It would be far better if the names of the killers were reviled and suffered damnatio
(a total eradication from memory) and not given the publicity they clearly craved and instead focus on the innocents who were killed. While it won't stop all, it may stop those who believe that this act of mayhem is the key to fame and publicity.

Providing such publicity sends the message to these deranged individuals that the
way to achieve fame is to go out while taking as many people with you as possible in order to knock Don Imus out of the news and to get attention. Since these killers seem to think its "all about me and my greivances" real, or imagined, the message that if you go and kill enough people you'll get a massive airing of your delusions and dislikes is not a message that the media should send.

Dive Report Saturday and Sunday

Diving in a wetsuit is much more pleasant when the sun is shining.

Saturday and Sunday both had excellent weathe - sunshine and temps in the 76 degree F plus range. The water was also a bit warmer at around 45-46 degrees, and that made all the diffefence in the dives comfort-wise.

On Saturday the dive went well - I did the basic 5 skills (1. reg out & in; 2. reg out, change, clip off and reverse; 3. Long hose deployment; 4. mask flood and clear; and 5. mask removal, replacement and clear). The buoyancy was getting better, but still plenty to work on.

And on Sunday it all went to hell. It was Earth Day and the divers go out and clear trash off the bottom of the lake. The plan was to do a dive working on the buoyancy skills, then make our way back picking up trash as we went.

It did not work out that way.

Sunday started off decent, get in the water, swim out and quickly lose sight of everybody in the silt, which after not nearly enough time looking, I surfaced. This was a sign and I should have understood right then that the dive was not going to get any better.

So off we went and at the designated spot I began the basic skills while hovering. Skills 1 and 2 went ok, with being a little too buoyant from taking too deep a breath.

Skill 3 began well enough - reg out, full longhose deployment, and as I went to switch back and stow the hose it all went to hell in the prverbial handbasket. I began a really wicked out of control spin towards the surface (we're talking full 360 degree circles here). With thoughts of WTF? Oh F!, oh F!, Oh F-ity F! (this is a family audience blog so I'll keep the exact transcript censored), I kept heading up, spinning all the way, dumping air like hell from the wing, finally I was able to get it under control and descended back down.

We called the dive shortly thereafter, cause it was not going to get any better, not to mention that all those gyrations caused me to go through air like crazy, dropping me down to turnaround pressure much too quickly.

Lessons learned - I suck at hovering, while ok during movement. As my instructor said, even a trained monkey can be neutral while moving, to which I reply - "oo, oo, oo, eek eek eek!"

More practice, lots more practice is needed, as this precision buoyancy stuff ain't easy, no matter how easy they make it look. The plus side, for the first time this dive season I was at a comfortable temperature both in the water and on departure.

Dive Report - stating the obvious: 41 degree water in a wetsuit is cold!

So last night I went Scuba diving with my fellow DIR scuba divers in Union Lake, Michigan. All of them wore drysuits while I continued on with my humble Henderson Hyperstretch 7mm Farmer John Wetsuit. Some of the divers were looking at me quizzically at my sanity to dive wet, some admiringly at my endurance and fortitude, and others pityingly as they adjusted their drysuit seals before we proceeded in.

The water was a balmy 41 degrees Fahrenheit. i.e. as soon as I stepped in the reaction was "Yeouch that's cold". followed by "I really need a drysuit for this". Thankfully with the wetsuit it was bearable and I went on with the dive.

Visibility was very good for Union Lake with the viz exceeding 6 feet. Plenty of sunken boats to see each of which had a story many of such I suspect most likely had alcohol involved in one form or another. In addition to the boats there was other assorted stuff on the bottom, including the remains of a Model T Ford.

The downside to wearing so much neoprene is that after the suit compresses as you descend, on the way back up when you ascend to about 15 feet, the bubbles in the neoprene expand and make you very buoyant very quickly, which makes it hard to maintain your depth.

On getting out of the water I experienced the other significant downside to the wetsuit - it was darn cold. The ambient air temperature was similarly in the low 40s and I had a little shivering going on as I fevereshly jumped in my car, set the heater to full blast and changed. Luckily I followed the advice of both Terry and Lagniappe's keeper and poured a thermos of hot water into my wetsuit after I left the water but before I started to change - it helped a lot.

Not a bad dive, but as is the case for this time of year, getting out of the water in a wetsuit simply sucks. On the plus side, the diving practice is paying off and I'm getting better at my buoyancy control - if I cna hack it in the 40s, the 60s and 70s water temps of summer will be feeling positively tropical.

Obama, Edwards snub Fox and Detroit to play to their base

In the Washington Post Obama to Skip Fox-Sponsored Debate its reported that both Barak Obama and John Edwards are not going to attend the Democratic presidential debate sponsored by Fox and the Congressional Black Congress (hardly a stronghold of the right) to be held in Detroit (Detroit is a liberal stronghold).

Democrats have been under pressure from liberal activists to avoid Fox-hosted debates. . . . Democratic critics complain that the network displays a conservative bias in its news broadcasts.

yeesh, its democratic debate, its not even going to have any republiucans participate, whats the complaint?

Barak's representative gave the following non-explanation:

Obama, a member of the Congressional Black Caucus, will take part in a different debate hosted by the CBC Institute and CNN in January.

"CNN seemed like a more appropriate host," Obama spokesman Bill Burton said.

Nice to see acknowledgement of CNN's liberal bias by the left, but this banning of Fox from hosting Democratic Party debates is petty and vindictive at best, and kow-towing to the far-left nutroots in an effort to make a few cheap political percentage points in the presidential primary race at worst.

Let's see if Hillary Clinton follows the trend or defies the complainers and shows up on Fox, debates and gets her message across.

Update: Ah, that was quick, Clinton, not one to dissappoint expectations when it comes to playing to the base, showed the same level of courage as her fellow candidates and is also skipping the debate: As reported in the Washington Post

Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) and Barack Obama (D-Ill.) yesterday joined former North Carolina senator John Edwards (D) in deciding to skip a debate scheduled for September that Fox News is co-sponsoring with the Congressional Black Caucus.

Liberal activists, particularly the online group Moveon.org, have called for Democratic presidential candidates not to participate in debates by Fox

Michigan Dems upset about AG's Proposed Gym make a Mountain out of a Treadmill

Much Dem ado about fitness, signifying how petty Michigan politics continues to be.

The Detroit Free Press Reports in Gym pumps up anger of Dems, that the Democrats are in a tizzy as Attorney General Michael Cox has plans to install a fitness center in the Attorney General's Headquarter's office in Lansing.

But it's Democrats who are exercised over Attorney General Mike Cox's plans for a gym, noting that the state faces a $686-million budget shortfall and that Cox plans to let go of 21 full-time secretarial and clerical workers, effective April 20.

"It's just outrageous that he would spend tens of thousands of dollars on facilities like this when he's laying off attorney general employees," said Mark Brewer, chair of the Michigan Democratic Party.

Talk about apples and oranges, a deficit for the entire state in the amount of 686 Million, a deficit that is certainly not AG Cox's fault nor of his making, but rather than of the current Democrat Governor 9and to be fair others as well), and "tens of thousands of dollars" for excercise equipment for which there is a perfectly good reason:

Rusty Hills, a spokesman for Cox, a Republican, made no apologies. He said the gym would be geared, initially at least, to the 37 gun-toting investigators on staff.

"We buy books for attorneys, we have no problem buying weights for cops," Hills said. "We want the cops on our payroll to be in better shape than the criminals they're chasing."

Hills said the investigators' cases include child support, cold-case homicides, Internet predators and consumer and health-care fraud.

"They execute search warrants, transport prisoners, conduct interviews in the field," Hills said. "They are in situations that are dangerous with people who are very dangerous. We don't make a lot of arrests in Bloomfield Hills."

Hills said the Attorney General's Office has yet to determine where the funding will come from in its budget, or how much the gym will end up costing.

Indeed, excercise facilities for use by the entire Ag's office, not just the investigators would make sense: fit employees equals lower occurences of injuries and health problems and thus lower insurance claims, thus reducing health costs for the department and saving the department money. Given that health care is a major expense statewise and always a large compoent of employee expenses, its amazing Cox is not being lauded for progressive thinking by encouraging his employees to get in shape and offering them an oppotunity to do so.

The tens of thousands of dolaars will likely offer a far greater savings in reduced health costs and lost time from work accidents.

In addition, it appears in the comments accompanying the article in the Free press that the money for the gym may not even be from public funds but from private sources. If so, its not just the Dems making a mountain out of a treadmill, but a wholly false smear by the Dems against a very popular and effective Attorney General.

Tanks but no Tanks?

Canada may be updating its 20-year old Leopard C2 tank fleet by leasing 20 (yes twenty) Leopard C6 tanks from Germany. The main reason for the long-overdue replacement is that the C2 tanks lack air conditioning, making them unsuitable for operations in Afghanistan in the summer. This has the lib-left and the Toronto (red) Star all-a-flutter.

In Whether new or old, tanks just not for this war Star columnist James Travers opines that the tanks will not help win the hearts and minds of Afghanistanis and that's the vital point of Canada's participation.

Tanks, contra Travers, are an excellent force protection option and perfect for kicking Taliban ass and disrupting their actions, which is indeed a mission in addition to nation building that the lib-left in Canada dearly loves.

Travers undercuts his own arguments with the fact he reports that

It's no coincidence that Defence Minister Gordon O'Connor stressed this week that Canadian casualties have dropped since September when the nearly 30-year old Leopards were pressed into service. While the reasons for that happy decline have more to do with changed enemy tactics and limited winter fighting, any equipment that saves soldiers' lives is both welcome and a persuasive part of the continuing military campaign for more procurement.

Travers notes that the Tanks can be vulnerable to mines and antitank weapons - true, but the presence of a tank in a mutually-supporting combined arms unit can offer protection to the rest of the force while that force screens the tank from the mine and RPG threat, and reduces the overall threat that would exist if the tanks were not present.

Travers then states the long-held but erroneous belief that Tanks cannot operate in urban environments:

Designed for set-piece, Cold War confrontations, the 55-tonne behemoths are hardly the weapons of choice in the close and often urban encounters of today's hearts-and-minds wars.

(not that Afghanistan is completely full of cities, its not, but Travers seems to make you want to think with this objection that a city or village is the only place the tank would operate). Tanks can do well in Urban or village settings - read Thunder Run the story of how US tanks won the battle of Baghdad and helped bring a quick end to the Saddam regime - victory for armor in the ultimate urban environment.

Canadians in Afghanistan need tanks for protection and force flexibility. While Travers argues the touchy-feely objection that such tanks will be

weapons that alienate soldiers from the Afghans they must make friends.

In the best-case scenario, modern tanks will keep troops cooler and safer. In the worst, Canada will lease expensive weapons it decided it didn't need and lose a war that must be fought and won among the people.

The tanks aren't for nation-building but for defeating those who seek to prevent any nation-building or any progress at all beyond the level of medieval fundamentalist Islam in Afghanistan. The best way to win the "hearts and minds of the people" is to decisively defeat the Taliban and Al-Qaeda elements at every possible encounter - showing the people that they are no longer a viable threat. For that you want the best weapons available - including tanks.

Oh Canada, and the Kyoto Forests for the Trees

I've just spent a week in Toronto, and I've had a chance to examine the view of events in Canada especially by reading the Toronto (red) Star

One interesting bit of news is that Canada is removing its forests from the Kyoto carbon calculation as

the federal government has decided against using Canada's forests in the calculations for totalling up the country's greenhouse-gas emissions.

So the Kyoto treaty apparently lets you practice Enron-type accounting when totaling up your co2 emissions.

The reason:

"The problem is that ultimately we're going to have to include our forests because forests and ecosystems can be bigger emitters (of greenhouse gas) than industry," said Brinkman.

In 2003, Brinkman said, forest fires in Europe, the United States, Australia and Canada sent more emissions into the atmosphere globally than any other source, including industry.

Brinkman, a recognized specialist in sustainable forest management, is married to Joyce Murray, who is contesting the federal Liberal nomination in Vancouver Quadra riding.

Yes, you read that right: forests "sent more emissions into the atmosphere globally than any other source, including industry."

But don't worry it can all still be blamed on Global Warming and the general catch-all of "climate change" (ie it isn't getting provably warmer, but were se:

Louise Comeau, a climate-change expert in Ottawa, said Canada had always assumed it would realize a greenhouse-gas benefit from managed forests.

But she said damage caused by climate change has turned that assumption on its head. "We've got more trees being destroyed than we have growing, and so our forests are turning into a source of emissions as opposed to a sink for carbon."

Forests account for 402 million hectares of Canada's 909-million-hectare land area. Managed forests take up 240 million hectares.

Canada, a nice place if you like trees, but it forests are an evil source of arboreal CO2 emissions, exempted from Kyoto, so environmentally conscious visitors beware.

First Dives of 2007

On Thursday night and this morning I made the first two dives this year.

A group of divers and I dove Union Lake here in Michigan.

The water was a balmy 45 degrees Fahrenheit. In other words, it was cold, and I was diving in my 7mm Farmer John Wetsuit. Everyone else was sanley diving in their drysuits, but given I do not own one yet, I had to make do with what I had.

I was also diving in my new Backplate and Wing, as a beginning DIR diver, which made the dives very interesting. The BP/W was new to me but had been owned by an instructor of mine and it unknown to myself given my ignorance of how such a setup should fit, was set up much too large for me. Actually it was probably too large for two of me. I knew I had lost some weight but the fit was ridiculous, and the wing and tank slid from side to side messing up my buoyancy.

By this morning I had adjusted it a lot but it was still not quite right and will take some time to get it full adjusted just right. However, the fit was such that I was certainly doing better in the water but I've got a lot of practicing yet to do on improving my buoyancy.

The best part of both dives was getting out of the water into air that was in the 50s. Now that was cold. I was comfortable enough if a bit cool while in the water, but getting out was real cold, as was changing out of the suit while sitting in the car with the heater going full blast. Cold enough to convince me I need to start saving up for a drysuit now, but that I can survive the season diving wet for now while I save up.

$21 in Income Tax as a Crushing Burden

The Detroit Free Press in its editorial Find Tax Relief for State's Poor bemoans that Michigan's Income tax kicks in at one of the lowest income levels in the Country, and subjects the working poor to pay income tax like everyone else.

The press then has this nice chart showing the income amount and taxes imposed by such a low cut-off for levying the tax.

From the chart it seems a family of three making $11,645 or the minimum wage for one worker would pay a whopping $21, yes all of twenty-one dollars,
in income tax.

The Freep then states the new Michigan Earned Income Tax credit effective next year will "rectify" this problem by sheltering more of the income from tax and essentially removing many completely from the income tax rolls while they will still enjoy the benefits and subsidies from the State.

It is appropriate that all working residents of Michigan pay some income taxes, as long as we have an income tax, so that we do not continue our progression to where those with less can vote themselveslargess through tax increases that will not effect them. If you live here and work here, you should be subject to the same taxes as anyone else.

One Tone Deaf Administration

The Bush Administration has unnecessarily embroiled itself in a new scandal: that of the firing of the 8 United States District Attorneys by declaring that the were fired for performance reasons and then denying the possibility that the firings were political and possibly influenced by the White House.

Who gave the administration such asinine advice? The administration should have done what most employers do in similar circumstances: merely verify past employment and that the attorneys involved were no longer employed. To do otherwise in today’s hyper-partisan and hostile media environment was I=simply inane, and has created a scandal -- including the possibility of a Senior Justice Official taking the Fifth Amendment when questioned by Congress -- where one did not exist.. If necessary and when pressed the Administration could and should have simply announced that:

The United States District Attorney serve at will, at the will and pleasure of the Office of the President, and it was determined that they were no longer going to be retained for reasons which will not be discussed. The President appreciates their service and wishes them well.

That is all that should have been said and it would likely have headed off the entire brouhaha over performance issues, politics and what role if any the White house had in the decision.

Then when asked if politics had anything to do with it they, instead of heatedly denying it, should have responded: These are political appointments, so of course there are political considerations, once again we will not discuss the reasons for their removal but note that they serve at will, and the Presidnet thanks them for their service.

In doing so the administration would have likely headed off this current faux scandal, and also prevented casting these attorneys in a bad light due to claims they were fired for performance issues. In contrast, their current tone-deaf approach of blithely declaring the situation was purely due to performance issues, and without political considerations, has opened them to this attack by the Media and Democrats when it is almost unquestionable that politics did have some role in their firings.

A New Jersey Court's Polemic Against Unmonitored Homeschooling

An interesting article from Constitutionally Correct was forwarded to me by Scott at Providentia Blog the posting on CC links to an unpublished decision by A New Jersey court that, in the decision, was shocked, simply shocked that a mother is homeschooling her 7 children and that

no one from any Board of Education in Montclair (where they lived until October 2006) ever visited the home. Ms. Hamilton never went to any school or board office, no lesson plan was ever reviewed and no progress report or testing of the children was ever performed. This is shocking to the court.

The Court apparently expresses this dismay based on an interesting concern:

In this day and age where we seek to protect children from harm and sexual predators, so many children are left unsupervised. . . . In today’s threatening world, where we seek to protect children from abuse, not just physical, but also educational abuse, how can we not monitor the educational welfare of all our children? A child in New Jersey, who recently was found unfed and locked in a putrid bedroom was allegedly “home schooled” and because no one, such as a teacher or nurse, was able to observe any abuse in a school setting, it went undiscovered.

There was no allegation of physical or emotional abuse in this case and at most an allegation from the father that the mother was unable to educate all of their children at the appropriate level. Stretching real concerns of physical and emotional abuse of children to this court's new issue of educational abuse certainly goes too far.

The Court then goes on to state measure it would like to see the state adopt - all of them quite intrusive. This would not be proper for a Court to impose but rather properly within the sphere of the legislature.

The court then finishes with a suggestion to the husband to file an educational neglect action against the mother in municipal court to involve the local public school system and force the mother to show she is giving the children an education equivalent to public or parochial schools. The court then suggests that

"if the district does not take affirmative action, and the Department of Education is unresponsive then this court will consider, by formal motion, a request to join those parties to this action."

i.e. Should the father do so and the educational authorities do not react and do something the court will.

Of course, the question of equivalent to public school education would be interesting - would the equivalent be based merely on the type of curriculum taught or the comparative testing of the home schooled children vis-a-vis the public school kids, and if so what yardstick would be used? Would the children simply have to do better academically than the worst student at the public school, meet the average or do better than average? The court doesn't say.

There is after all, a constitutional right to direct the education of one's children, and especially given the religious background of the parents involved this would potentially implicate the Supreme Court's decision in Wisconsin v Yoder that religious parents can direct the education of their children.

On the other hand, the court does seem to express a valid concern that was raised by the father that some of the children have possible dyslexia - if so the mother should likely seek some testing. The father even "stipulated the he does not object
to continue home schooling, but only if each individual child is receiving
equivalent instruction to what is offered in the public or parochial schools." Which is quite reasonable on his part.

The court essentially gave a guide to the father in how to pursue an educational neglect case against the mother, and nothing more and concluded that "Here it is the child’s best interests for the court not to exercise its discretion, and allow the parents and the school district to resolve this educational issue." Most likely the father will involve the school district in the dispute and there may very well be further court action in the case.

While I do not home school my kids, as one is in preschool now, and the other is but six months of age, and I'm quite happy with the quality of education my child is getting at preschool, but I know quite a few people that do or who were themselves home schooled. The majority of home schooled people I know are just as well educated as anyone else -- if not more so. One colleague of mine at University went on to become a Professor of History, has a position at a well-known university and can intellectually and socially hold his own with anyone and was home schooled (very rigorously I might add).

On the other hand I've seen a home school situation where the kids were not well educated and were taught by parents who while loving did not have a structured or successful approach, and as a result their younger child is seriously behind now that the child is in regular school and the older one as an adult has a serious educational, not to mention employment deficiency and is very underemployed given his innate abilities and potential.

For the court to go on a diatribe about the unmonitored nature of home schooling in New Jersey is quite outside the scope of the true issue raised in the case, and likely has raised the ire of many home schooling parents - after all many pulled their children out of public school due to the lousy education the children were, or would have received in the public system.

The parents clearly disagree about the quality of the education the children are receiving and unfortunately were, and probably still are, unable to resolve the issue without outside (i.e. court) involvement. By taking the dispute to court the parents opened up the question of the measure of the education given to the children and the court essentially gave the father a road map to deal with his concern should it not be resolved outside the legal system including a pretty pointed warning to the parents that it would be best that the court is not involved in the decision - which is rather reasonable rather than the court forcing a situation on the parents. Aside from the diatribe the decision is neither terrible nor particularly troublesome and hopefully will get the parents to come to a resolution on their own.

Southern Poverty Law Center's Diminishing Relevance

When its hunting for racists and it goes after a University Campus' conservative group with a very flimsy rationale for labeling it racist and white-supremacist, you know they're stretching and playing to more ideological concerns by going after a right-leaning student group than truly ferreting out racist groups.

MSU student group on hate list
YAF is 'white supremacist,' according to legal center
By Matthew Miller - Lansing State Journal
When the Southern Poverty Law Center releases its annual list of hate groups next month, the Michigan State University chapter of the Young Americans for Freedom will be on it.

The MSU group is "white supremacist," "have a lot of anti-gay beliefs" and "a
lot of anti-immigrant sentiment," said Heidi Beirich, with the SPLC.

Last year, the MSU chapter of the conservative student organization drew national attention, much of it negative, for its plans to sponsor a "Catch an
Illegal Immigrant Day" on campus.

...

However, Beirich, deputy director of the SPLC's Intelligence Project, said it
was several proposals put forward by the YAF's MSU chapter, among them that MSU
should defund minority student organizations and that there should be a white
student council on MSU's student government, that earned the group a place on
the list. "Our interest in determining a hate group is, 'Do they have an ideology that denigrates an entire class of people for their inherent traits?' " she said.

Kyle Bristow, chairman of the group, called the SPLC's characterization of his
chapter "ridiculous."

"We're a center-right group, politically," he said. "We've done nothing hateful. We've advocated for beliefs that most Americans believe: the sanctity of marriage, border security."

He added that he believes the proposal for a white student council was misconstrued by the SPLC. Because MSU's student government gives unelected seats to other racial and ethnic groups, Bristow said, he proposed that "every single group should be recognized."

The majority of MSU's student government seats are held by whites.

'Character defamation'
Bristow said he's considering filing a lawsuit against the SPLC because "what they're doing is character defamation."

William Allen, a professor of political science who serves as the group's adviser, said in an e-mail sent Wednesday that, "It is evident to any fair observer that YAF, whether nationally or in this chapter, does not deserve to be on this list."

Thankfully MSU is showing some common sense and not paying attention to this laughable SPLC labelling:

Terry Denbow, MSU's vice president for university relations, said that
registered student groups are required to adhere to the university's
nondiscrimination policy and that, to his knowledge, the YAF had not violated
that stipulation. He also said the hate group designation would not change the
group's status.
"An institution must be allowed to set forth its own values-based criteria for
student organizations and not to assume or impose criteria - agreed with or not
- of external affairs groups," Denbow said, "because there will be many, many
groups willing to tell us what the criteria should be."

In addition, one wonders why the various Arab and anarchist student groups at Berkley that disrupted pro-Israel speakers there with anti-Israel and anti-semitic rhetoric and violent demonstrations did not make the list - they must not fit the SPLC's notion of what a racist or hate group is.

In the past, the SPLC did yeoman work in fighting real racists: neo-nazis, klansmen, and the like. Now, to list a college student group that opposes illegal immigration and affirmative action as racists seems to be an overreach for relevance once all the true dragons are slain or forced back under the rocks they crawled out from.

US Mint Mistake - Some Dollars don't Trust in God.

A number of the new US One Dollar Coins, the first in the new Presidential series featuring George Washington, escaped the Philadelphia mint and entered circulation missing the inscription "In God we Trust" on the Edge of the coins.

U.S. Mint goof: Unknown number of new dollar coins missing 'In God We Trust'

Joann Loviglio / Associated Press

PHILADELPHIA -- An unknown number of new George Washington dollar coins were
mistakenly struck without their edge inscriptions, including "In God We Trust,"
and are fetching around $50 apiece online.

The properly struck dollar coins, bearing the likeness of the nation's first
president, are inscribed along the edge with "In God We Trust," "E Pluribus
Unum" and the year and mint mark. They made it past inspectors and went into
circulation Feb. 15.

The U.S. Mint struck 300 million of the coins, which are golden in color and
slightly larger and thicker than a quarter.

About half were made in Philadelphia and the rest in Denver. So far the mint
has only received reports of error coins coming from Philadelphia, mint
spokeswoman Becky Bailey said.

These coins are currently selling for a premium on Ebay:

Ron Guth,
president of Professional Coin Grading Service, one of the world's largest coin
authentication companies, said he believes that at least 50,000 error coins
were put in circulation.

"The first one sold for $600 before everyone knew how common they actually
were," he said. "They're going for around $40 to $60 on eBay now, and they'll
probably settle in the $50 range."

So don't expect a fortune if you find one, and given there were at least 50 thousand released with the missing inscription, its unlikely they will appreciate much beyond the expected $50 premium anytime soon, so if you got 'em, join the hordes now on ebay where they are selling like crazy for $200 plus.

Happy Purim!

Yesterday night marked the beginning of the holiday of Purim. The family went to synoguage were we had a boisterously good time with dancing, food, and many games, which is traditional for the celebration of Purim.

The story of Purim, contained in the Scroll of Esther, retells the story of an evil Persian man, Haman, who plotted to destroy the Jewish people. Some things never change. There always seems to be a ready supply of evil Persians:


Perhaps in the future there will be a Purim Amhadinejad, where his name is blotted out like that of Haman.

For an excellent retelling of the Story of Purim, see The Aish website Purim section.

Purim follows the standard Jewish holiday framework:

1. Someone tried to kills us

2. They didn't succeed (typically due to divine intervention).

3. Let's Eat.

Happy Purim!

Bill Maher - Idiot

Bill Maher continues his descent into idiotarian madness, approving the comments on HuffPo that wished that Cheney had been assassinated in the recent bombing at Bagram Air Force Base in Afghanistan.

From Newsbusters go to the site for the full recap and video of this disgusting episode.

Maher: Well, what did they say?

Ridley: They said “We wish he would die.” I mean, it was (?) hate language.

Barney Frank: They said the bomb was wasted. (laughter and applause)

Maher: That’s a funny joke. But, seriously, if this isn’t China, shouldn’t you be able to say that? Why did Arianna Huffington, my girlfriend, I love her, but why did she take that off right away?
....
Maher: But I have zero doubt that if Dick Cheney was not in power, people wouldn’t be dying needlessly tomorrow. (applause)

Scarborough: If someone on this panel said that they wished that Dick Cheney had been blown up, and you didn’t say…

Frank: I think he did.

Scarborough: Okay. Did you say…

Maher: No, no. I quoted that.

Frank: You don’t believe that?

Maher: I’m just saying if he did die, other people, more people would live. That’s a fact.

So Can We Finally Question Their Patriotism Now?

Coin of the Week- A Denarius of The Roman Republic

Continuing to post my collection in chronological order, here is a silver coin of the Roman Republic, dating to 101 BCE:

Moneyer: L. Julius
Obverse: Head of Roma facing right, ear of wheat (the Romans and most coin books refer to it as "corn") behind
Reverse: Victory in a biga (a 2 wheeled chariot) with the inscription L.IVLI below.

Catalog: Roman Silver Coins Julia 3

The denarius was the silver coin of the Roman Republic and was typically a day's wages for a Roman Legionary.

UFOs, Global Warming and Former Canadian Defense Ministers

Oh my.

OTTAWA (AFP) - A former Canadian defense minister is demanding governments worldwide disclose and use secret alien technologies obtained in alleged UFO crashes to stem climate change, a local paper said Wednesday.

"I would like to see what (alien) technology there might be that could eliminate the burning of fossil fuels within a generation ... that could be a way to save our planet," Paul Hellyer, 83, told the Ottawa Citizen.

. . .

Hellyer became defense minister in former prime minister Lester Pearson's cabinet in 1963, and oversaw the controversial integration and unification of Canada's army, air force and navy into the Canadian Forces.

As the article states, Paul Hellyer oversaw the unification of the Canadian Army, Navy and Air Force into the Canadian Forces.

The Navy and Air Force never forgave him for his unification of their proud and independent arms into the Canadian Forces,and most especially for his making them wear green uniforms. Not to mention turning the name of the once proud Canadian Navy (all 3 kayaks and the canoe) into "Maritime Command".

His reported UFO encounter may explain a lot of his past actions.

The Infield Fly Rule, Law Reviews and Biblical Baseball References

While doing some legal research I happened upon this hilarious law review article, suitable for both lawyers and non-lawyers, and most especially for baseball fans of both groups.

THE CONTRIBUTION OF THE INFIELD FLY RULE TO WESTERN CIVILIZATION (AND VICE VERSA)
By Professor Anthony D’Amato. (link opens a .pdf version of the article).

Professor D'Amato does make one eggregious error in the article, that of agreeing with previous authors' mistaken conclusion that the Bible does not mention Baseball.

....despite the fact that the authors are technically correct in noting that baseball itself is not mentioned in the Bible, they overlook the more specific biblical reference to the Infield Fly Rule.

In fact, the game of Baseball is the very first thing mentioned in the Bible:

Genesis 1:1 In the Big Inning, God created the heavens and the earth.

Later this event was mistransalated as the Big Bang, instead it should be correctly referred to as it was originally: God throwing out the First Pitch.

Coin of The Week - A Tetradrachm of Lysimachos

Its been a long time since I posted a coin. Now that I have a new digital camera, a Canon A540, I thought it would be fitting to feature some coins from my own collection.

This is my Oldest Coin:




It is a Tetdracham (4 drachma) silver coin of Lysimachos from 323-281 BCE.

Lysimachos was one of the successor kings after the death of Alexander, and he ruled Thrace in Greece and parts of northwest Asia minor.

Details of the Coin:
Silver, 16.76grams, Kalchedon mint, in Good VF condition.

Obverse: Head of the deified Alexander The Great (the horn of Zeus on the side of his head in the picture shows his ascension to deity-like status).

Reverse: Athena Seated bearing a spear and shield. DI monogram in left field and grain ear in exergue. Legend: Basileus Lysimachoy - Of King Lysimachus.

This coin is over 2000 years old. Simply holding this heavy coin and staring at the portrait of Alexander the Great takes one back in time to the days of the end of Alexander's empire when his generals divided his empire and its spoils among themselves.

Armed Idiot and an Annoying Tailgater is a bad mix

What not to do when someone tailgates you:
Armed woman: 'I'm tired of people tailgating me'

Authorities say Bernadette Houghton Headd had an explanation for them when she was arrested on charges of pulling out a handgun and firing at another car:

"I'm tired of people tailgating me," she told police.

Headd, 39, of Macomb Township was charged Thursday in 41-B District Court with assault with a deadly weapon, discharge of a firearm from a motor vehicle and using a firearm during a felony. She could face up to 10 years in prison if convicted.

People, there are only three reasons why you may use deadly force to protect yourself from harm. They are:

1. a reasonable and honest belief that you are about to suffer imminent Death

2. a reasonable and honest belief that you are about to suffer imminent grievous bodily harm

3. a reasonable and honest belief that you are about to suffer imminent forcible sexual penetration.

Suffering imminent tailgating did not make the list.

Headd, who you can see from her picture on the Detroit Free Press site, and from her actions does not appear to be the sharpest tool in the shed to say the least, clearly did not absorb this basic rule of the use of deadly force and certainly deserves a very stiff punishment and should never be allowed to carry a firearm again.

Luckily her aim was as bad as her judgment and no one was hurt.

Tailgating sucks, and can be horrendously dangerous in bad conditions, but it is not grounds for using deadly force.

Don't Melt or Export Your Pennies....

A new regulation from the US Treasury:

NEW FEDERAL REGULATION PROHIBITING EXPORTATION, MELTING, OR TREATMENT OF UNITED STATES ONE-CENT AND 5-CENT COINS

On December 12, 2006, United States Mint Director Edmund Moy approved an
interim rule that generally prohibits the exportation, melting, or treatment of
United States one-cent coins (pennies) and 5-cent coins (nickels), which became
effective upon publication in the Federal Register on December 20, 2006.
Because of the rising commodity prices of copper, nickel and zinc, the value of
the metal content of both pennies and nickels now exceeds their respective face
values. Accordingly, there is concern that speculators could remove pennies and
nickels from circulation and sell them as scrap metal for profit. Widespread
withdrawal of pennies and nickels from circulation could cause coin shortages,
and it would be extremely costly to replenish them, given prevailing metal
prices and production costs.

This measure has been implemented to protect the coinage of the United States.
A violation of the new restrictions can lead to a fine of up to $10,000,
imprisonment of up to 5 years, and forfeiture of the subject coins or metal.
The authority for implementing this regulation is Title 31 of the United States
Code, Section 5111(d).

Now I doubt this regulation prohibits you from taking some spare change across the border when you go to Canada or Mexico, but if you take more than $5 in change in these coins out of the country, or if you ship more than $100 in these coins out of the country in any one shipment for legitimate coinage and numismatic purposes you're in trouble.

A copy of the Federal Register with this regulation can be found here.

Must-Read Accident Analysis - A Review of Diver Down

A good way to learn is from your Own mistakes.

The best and often far safer way to learn is from Somebody Else's mistakes.

In Diver Down, Michael R. Ange analyses 20 accidents, fatal and non-fatal
that befell scuba divers in both recreational and technical dives. He
recounts in detail the series of events that caused the accident as
well as the aftermath.

Many of these accidents occur due to the divers disregarding the basic safety
rules of diving, such as attempting activities for which they lacked
training or equipment (wreck penetration, cave diving), taking
shortcuts with their equipment, or of breathing gas management.

Many of the accidents are such that the reader will think to himself "I
can't believe the diver just did that!". The choices made probably made
perfect sense at the time to the diver involved, but through either
ignorance or bravado the choices led to at best a near-death experience
or to injury or even death. Reading about these mistakes helps one spot
and prevent themselves from making similar bad decisions.

From these accidents Mr. Ange, a highly experienced scuba diver and
instructor, clarifies and reemphasises the "rules" of Scuba Diving.When
followed the rules keep diving a safer and much less dangerous,
although scuba diving is always an inherently dangerous activity.

Such rules include:

-Plan the Dive and Dive the Plan.

-The rules of thirds (use one third of your breathing gas to get there, one
third to get back, and one third for the emergency you didn't expect).

-The dive will not get any better. If there's something wrong fix it or
terminate the dive right there, don't let problems cascade into a
disaster, the dive isn't worth it.

-Listen to people who know. The divemaster or captain of the boat is giving a safety briefing for a reason. In addition, a more experienced diver telling you about the conditions or pointing out errors in your diving methodology is well worth listening
to, and your instructor is teaching you skills and impartingwarnings to you for a reason.

The only detraction to my enjoyment and learning from the book were the technical digressions (He has them labelled as "Special Topics")that were inserted into each incident. These shaded pages separated and slowed down the action involved in the accident story and distracted from it. While the technical sections were each relevant to their particular story and informative, inserting them inside the story was needlessly distracting and caused much flipping of pages (much like reading a magazine) to find the rest of the article. Placing these technical digressions either before each accident story or after them would have been much more reader-friendly.

This is a must-have book for a Scuba Diver's library. As divers, we can all learn from these mistakes and avoid repeating them.

US to Release new one dollar coins

Base metal dollar coins have not had a history of success in the United States.

Since the demise of the silver dollar, both the old quarter-sized Susan B Anthony dollar and the recent Sacajawea Dollar met with very little sucess and even less common usage.

Since these base metal coins have no intrinsic value and are heavier and more cumbersome than dollar bills, they have not been well received or circulated.

Not letter past performance stop them, the Treasury is about to release a new series of dollar coins with portraits of the Presidents on them.

While I believe this will be a hit with collectors and may get the general public's interest much like the State Quarter series has done, I don't believe these will be accepted any better than the dollar coins that have gone before.

Short of removing the Dollar Bill from circulation as Canada did when they introduced the Loonie, The American public will not replace paper fiat money bills with metallic fiat money coins.

Who was that nut?

On the Lighter Side, Lagniappe's Keeper has a Interesting Theory as to the identity of the anti-semitic, holocaust-denying nutcase attacker of Elie Wiesel.

Too good to miss.

Apparently Global Warming is now beyond repair.

If so, then why the fuss? Just enjoy the warmer temperatures.

Look atthese great headlines and subheadlines: Earth's status beyond dire

Best case? Try to ease worst fallout of warming

Alan Zarembo / Los Angeles Times

Everybody in the United States could trade their cars for bicycles.

The Chinese could close all their factories.

Europe could give up electricity and return to the age of the lantern.

But all those steps together would not come close to stopping global warming.

Ok, so it won't help so lets quit worrying about it unless these "expert" truly propose taking these drastic measures, and attendant consequences.

A landmark report from the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released last week warned that there is so much carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere that even if concentrations could be held at current levels, the effects would continue for centuries.

There is hope. The report notes that a concerted world effort could stave off the more dire consequences of global warming, such as widespread flooding, drought and extreme weather.

To reach the ultimate goal, however, of eliminating the threat of global warming would require radical action.

Stabilizing atmospheric levels of carbon dioxide -- the primary contributor to global warming -- would require reducing CO2 emissions 70 percent to 80 percent, said Richard Somerville, a theoretical meteorologist at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in San Diego.

Such a reduction would bring emissions into equilibrium with the planet's natural ability to absorb carbon dioxide. The last time the planet was in balance was more than 150 years ago, before the widespread use of coal and steam engines.

What would it take to bring that kind of reduction?

"All truck, all trains, all airplanes, cars, motorcycles and boats in the United States -- that's 7.3 percent of global emissions," said Gregg Marland, a fossil fuel pollution expert at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee.

Scrapping all fossil fuel-powered electricity plants worldwide and replacing them with windmills, solar panels and nuclear power plants would make a serious dent in the problem -- "a 39 percent reduction globally," Marland said.

Of course, that calculation doesn't include all the fossil fuels that would have to be burned to build the green facilities, he said.

Given the scale of the problem, experts said there is no realistic way to lower the concentration of atmospheric carbon.

In fact, Robert Socolow, a carbon mitigation expert at Princeton University, said that even if the entire world stopped burning fossil fuels, it would take several hundred years for carbon levels to approach those found before the Industrial Revolution.

So the Global Warming theorists's goal from this seems to be getting CO2 emissions down to below the Industrial revolution period - i.e. to eliminate Industrialization and have us go back to pre-industrialized society and all of its wonderful associations such as disease, lousy standards of living and peasants living in hovels.

No. Thanks.

Such hysterics and proposed costs far outweigh any benefit to stop the very marginal increase in the earth's temperature that is caused by man-made CO2.

Never mind that the Global warming theory still can't explain and account for the Medieval Warming period or the little ice age, both of which occurred before the industrial era, when they go over the top predicting doom and the only solution is wholesale de-industrialization, you can see their real goals, and the anti-human and anti-western aim of their theory.

Today's AP Misleading Headline Award

Headline: 200 Israeli police descend on thousands of Muslim worshipers

What a wonderfully loaded and biased headline. Israeli police "descend" on thousands of Muslim worshipers - conveying an image of these Muslims simply peacefully worshiping.

What were these worshippers doing? The usual -

thousands of Muslim worshippers who hurled stones, bottles and trash in an eruption of outrage over Israeli renovation nearby.

The clash at the end of noon prayers came after days of mounting tensions over the work and raised concern that protests at the site could spread to the West Bank and Gaza, as they did at the start of the second Palestinian uprising in 2000. No serious injuries were reported. About 200 police streamed on to the hilltop compound known to Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary and to Jews as the Temple Mount, to try to quell Muslims rioting over the repair work on a centuries-old ramp, police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said.

So it wasn't the Police descending but rather responding to the riot of these "worshipers" who after prayer apparently continue to worship by

"thr[owing] stones, iron bars and at least one firebomb"

Of course, the headline is both misleading and biased as to what actually occurred. Not that we should expect any better from the AP.

Granholm's solution to economic woes - release prisoners and raise taxes

Yep, in order to alleviate the economic state of Michigan the Governor among other things wants to:

Levy a 2% sales tax on services

Great - exactly what the state needs - a tax to further drive businesses away and further costs on citizens.

Release prisoners

The releasing prisoner part is also quite troubling. While this will save costs of incarceration to the State, it will almost surely impose direct and indirect costs on the citizens of Michigan by increasing the criminal population in civil society.

Those to be released include:

3,400 prisoners who are serving time for such crimes as drug offenses, larceny, bad checks, home invasion and car theft. They would be placed in halfway houses and supervised with electronic tethers.

Sounds like a great idea. This would save the State $122 million in costs and likely lead to more crime, causing the citizens to demand the Governor to do something about crime, so she'll raise taxes to hire more police and pay for incarcerating those who she let out - its a brilliant solution!


If the governor believes that nonviolent criminals for such things as drug offenses, larceny, bad checks, home invasion and car theft etc., should not be in prison or should have lesser sentences, she should have the courage to request her party (in charge of the Legislature) have bills introduced to change the law accordingly, not do this early release game.

As if you were expecting a different result

So what does Governor Granholm's blue ribbon panel say about how to deal with Michigan's economic situation?

Raise Taxes of Course.

From the Detroit Free Press:

A financial emergency advisory panel appointed by Gov. Jennifer Granholm concludes that Michigan policy makers have no choice but to raise taxes to address the state’s looming budget deficits without sacrificing essential services.

A definite example of a Governor handpicking a panel to get the Governor's desired result.