On the list of safest American cities, Dallas ranks 338th out of 371.  Plano, right next door, is 41st.

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Proof that not all Republican-led governments need to be big spenders. New York State will have a surplus of  over $1 billion this year and has a reserve of $3 billion.

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John Yoo is a former employee of the Justice Department and is best known for his memos which became rather notorious as he advocated the possible legality of torture and that enemy combatants could be denied protection under the Geneva Convention as a means of diminishing legal challenges regarding war crimes.   He has written a book, “War by Other Means” which is criticized in a NY Times review today.

..he has written a book that reads like a combination of White House talking points and a partisan brief on presidential prerogatives — a book that is strewn with preposterous assertions, contorted reasoning and illogical conclusions. He writes that “because of our aggressive policies post 9/11, al Qaeda is no longer the threat it was.”

Now of course, I would argue that an organization that has been able to carry out exactly zero attacks against us for over 5 years could be considered somewhat of a lesser threat.  But let's go to the opening statement of the recently declassified NIE document which the left has used as a tool to prove that we are losing the War on Terror.

United States-led counterterrorism efforts have seriously damaged the leadership of al-Qa’ida and disrupted its operations;

Wouldn't that make them less of a threat?  Especially when "seriously damaged" is a euphemism for killed or captured. Or is that preposterous, contorted and illogical?  I understand that the document goes on discuss the overall threat of jihadi terror which is changing and may even get worse overall, but Yoo's statement as presented above is factually correct.

Republican Michael Steele of Maryland has produced a very personal video ad response to those who accuse him of not supporting stem cell research.

Just finished watching Steven Spielberg's Munich, which includes a brief opening commentary by the director.

I enjoyed the movie, probably a 7 or 8 on a scale of 10.  There can be no doubt that the movie goes a little out of the way to be even handed, but I think the focus is more on the notion that violence doesn't solve anything, and in fact only makes things worse - that and working undercover is a particularly dangerous and nerve-wracking career.

Personally, the entertainment value of the film far exceeded the pound-you-over-the head moral posturing, but I wouldn't want this movie to be the entry point for someone to learn about the Israeli-Palestinian issue.

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I spent a little time with the 6 year-old teaching her how to ride a bike without training wheels.  It's amazing how tiring running up and down the block two times can be.  I can only let her go for one or two seconds at a time, but little by little she's getting the hang of it.  This also seems like a good time to mention that I am glad I live in a place that's 75-80 degrees at the end of October.

I love the Cooliris plug in for Firefox which I added when I upgraded to 2.0 - it lets you preview a link by opening it up on part of your screen just by rolling the mouse over the link. I also downloaded Explorer 7.0 They both have tabbed browsing and a small "x' in each tab to make it easier to close individual tabs. Let the browser wars begin!

CNET Prizefight: Internet Explorer 7 vs. Firefox 2

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Well, at least the Mets gave them more fight than the Tigers and whoever it was they played in the first round. Red Reign: Cards clinch 10th World Series title

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Warning - you'll get a little torah learning regarding Noah with this one.  On a deeper level a therapist friend tells me that therapy is often about getting someone to halt a behavior that once saved his or her life, but is now restricting them from moving forward with that life. I really think that's true, at least in my case.

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100 year old Jewish recordings that make fun of Jews.  Oy.

I don't know comedienne Karith Foster from a hole in the wall and I never saw her name until today. I would like to tell her that her press releases show her to be an obnoxious idiot of the first order and my adopted hometown is much better off without her.

Raised in Plano, Texas ( the affluent suburb north of Dallas with the ethnic diversity of a Klan rally ), Foster indulged her performing bug by starring in her high school’s all-white production of “A Raisin in the Sun.” 

Now let's ignore the fact that an all-black production of The Diary of Anne Frank would be seen as daring and provocative and that white kids might actually learn something from delving into African-American history.

As of the 2000 census, Plano was 78% white.  That's all of 3% higher than the United States as a whole.

All this does is show that Ms. Foster lived in a primarily white neighboorhood in Plano and perhaps didn't get out much.   Whatever the case, I tired of people hearing "Plano" and assuming "White" and "Racist". 

Funny video from Power Line - Mitt Romney reminds a reporter which one of them has their job based on the will of the people.

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On being a Jewish 'fundamentalist'

Writing in the national Jewish weekly Forward, Klinghoffer points out that the "fundamentalist" label is regularly used to cast people who hew to foundational religious beliefs as "stupid," "obnoxious" or "backward." Klinghoffer's context is the assertion by former New Republic editor and current Time magazine blogger Andrew Sullivan that fundamentalists - i.e. people with deep religious beliefs - are inherently arrogant, because they believe they know what is right and what is wrong and apply their convictions to political and social issues. Instead, Sullivan advocates "spiritual humility and sincere religious doubt" and champions "a faith that... picks and chooses between doctrines under the guidance of individual conscience."

Klinghoffer makes the obvious point: If one's conscience is one's only guide, then he is "his own ultimate authority," hardly a reflection of humility.

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Fox has a trailer up for the next season of "24".  Suicide bombs explode across the US and someone in government wants to run roughshod over the Constitution.  Premieres in January.  I was nervous just watching the trailer.  God, I love that show.

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Toddler gets stuck in vending machine

This happened to me the other day, but I just knocked the machine around after putting in the two dollars and the kid came out fine.  It happens a lot with the bagsof potato chips too.

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Someone out there has a strong opinion. The Unconscionable Claims of Michael J. Fox

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I'm about halfway through Rory Stewart's "The Places In Between" about his walk through the heart of tribal Afghanistan shortly after the Taliban fell from power.  It's very interesting for the first 50 pages or so, but then seems repetitve to me.  Every village has it's wary elders, destroyed ancient sites and lies near the same river.  I was palnning to follow up with is book on Iraq, "The Prince of the Marshes", but now I'm not so sure.

Now that some conservatives/neocons are giving up on the Iraq-as-democracy line, they are proposing a "third way" solution - pull our troops back to the desert in Western Iraq, let the Iraqis kill themselves and if a specific terrorist threat arises, attack only then. Daniel Pipes and Peter Bergen (in the NY Times) have proposed this as the way forward.

At first, this sounded reasonable to me and certainly more so than Rep. Murhta's idiotic proposal to move our troops to Okinawa which is actually as far or further from Iraq than is the United States (aside from the fact that we'd need to fly over China and Iran to get there.

However, I'm afraid that all this would do is set up Israel version 2.0 in the Middle East - a Western outpost set up surrounded by hostiles who will just start lobbing missiles into the "American sector" every once in awhile drawing us out and back into the larger conflict.

Here's the laugher of the day and should put to rest any notion of the New York Times being considered a serious newspaper.

About a week before the Michael J. Fox ad appeared, the Times had a story entitled "Missouri Candidates Step Lightly on Stem Cell Measure" and I quote:

"Mr. Talent and Ms. McCaskill are battling over a tiny percentage of undecided voters and dare not risk offending them by drawing attention to such a polarizing issue."

Michael J. Fox video here.

It's amazing how little actually gets said in eight minutes, but interesting nonetheless - video of Bill O'Reilly on "The View".

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I do agree with most of what Ann Coulter writes about here - O.J. Trials for Terrorists

Hey, Osama bin Laden, Hamas, Hizbollah - they've all provided needed social services to their people.  Maybe they should get reduced sentences too.

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Early voting in Texas begins on Monday, October 23.  My trigger finger is gettin' itchy.



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This shabbos we begin the annual cycle of Torah readings with parsha Bereishit.  "In the Beginning..." and all that.  Even though we just celebrated the Jewish New Year, it's always nice to have another excuse to reflect on things as if life is just beginning. 

My rabbi sent out a message to the congregation about a family who recently visited a judaica store to purchase all kinds of items so that they could celebrate Shabbat at home for the first time, all based on a sermon the rabbi gave during the Holidays about a return to ritual.  This is probably the first time in four years that I am really proud to belong to my shul.  I'm really looking forward to Kabalat Shabbat services tonight.

The current different Jewish religious movements have also been explained, with tongue in cheek, as follows:

At an Orthodox wedding, the bride’s mother is pregnant.
At a Conservative wedding, the bride is pregnant.
At a Reform wedding, the rabbi is pregnant.
At a Reconstructionist wedding, the rabbi and her wife are both pregnant.

Fernando Botero, well-known for his sculptures and other artwork of Rubenesque figures has put on display in a NY art gallery a series of paintings "inspired" by the Abu Ghraib scandal.



Outraged by the news reports and the camera-phone images of shackled, beaten, naked prisoners sent around the world via the news media and the Internet, the 74-year-old Botero created a suite of about 45 protest paintings and drawings that are now on view at the Marlborough Gallery in New York.....

Few other artists have tackled the Abu Ghraib scandal, which is still unfolding, and Botero gets points for keeping the subject open for discussion, lest anyone forget. Clearly, he wants to join the ranks of Goya and Picasso, who captured the disasters and savagery of war with grandeur and gravity.

No word on when Botero will do a study on the brutality of hijacked airplanes, suicide bombers, which seem to me to be more in line with the civilian suffering immortalized in Picasso's Guernica.  Maybe those things don't produce outrage for him.

Some background on Guernica - On April 27th, 1937, unprecedented atrocities are perpetrated on behalf of Franco against the civilian population of a little Basque village in northern Spain. Chosen for bombing practice by Hitler's burgeoning war machine, the hamlet is pounded with high-explosive and incendiary bombs for over three hours. Townspeople are cut down as they run from the crumbling buildings. Guernica burns for three days. Sixteen hundred civilians are killed or wounded.

Abu Ghraib - same thing.  Panties on the head - savagery.  Isn't there enough horrible crap that goes on in Botero's own country of Colombia that can inspire him?  Maybe he could even bring attention to horrors that nobody knows about (or would that take courage?) instead of portraying something that every media outlet in the world did quite a nice job of already?

Lets Go Mets! The truth is, I'm so emotionally drained and physically tired, that I don't know if I can stand another week or so of baseball if the Mets make it to the World Series. I found this fantastic site with the results and comments on every post-season game the Mets have been in, from 1969 through last night. That led me to Mets By The Numbers, a site with the history of every uniform number and who's worn them.

I was listening to Curtis and Kuby on WABC-770 this morning, followed by the sports talk on WFAN. I just needed to listen to some strong New York accents this morning.

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We shoud re-elect Bill Clinton. Why? He would condone torture (yes, real torture) where appropriate and make people, especially women, feel good about it by smiling at them.

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Now, I'm even more confused about the Military Commissions Act - you know the one that officially makes the U.S. a dictatorship. According to a NY Times editorial today, the law "suspend(s) the fundamental principle of habeas corpus". However, the editorial also states that "the law does not apply to American citizens." That's not what many on the left have been telling us since the act was passed, so now I'm really confused. A few weeks ago I was sitting at a table full of liberals at a Shabbos kiddush at my synagogue and I felt terribly uncomfortable defending myself when one of the most well-respected members of the congregation (and a lawyer) assured us all that we could all be put away even as citizens - I figured he can't be wrong. The guy's wife is one of those angry feminist types of a certain age that wears a tallis, so I knew even double not to argue.

Because there are no religious customs that the New York Times does not approve of.

Behind the Veil

The public attacks on a religious custom by Mr. Straw and Mr. Blair will only feed the suspicions of non-Muslim Europeans and the sense of stigma and segregation among European Muslims.

God forbid. It might feed the suspicions of Muslims that one of the principles of modern Western society is based on increasing freedom and equality for it's women instead of less.  While the Times is capable of linking the veil issue to unemployment, they are incapable of linking it to cultures where women are never seen, much less heard.

Apart from this, how stupid is it to allow for all intents and purposes, the perfect disguise for Muslim terorrists who want to move freely around Europe?  And don't think it hasn't been done many times before.

Sigh.


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There are probably people in Guantanamo that have committed lesser offenses than this woman.  Yet she mocks our justice system (and a Clinton-appointed judge at that).  Any more questions as to why we don't want to give terorrists access to our courts?

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I saw "A Prairie Home Companion", the movie, the other day.  I'm not what you would call a huge fan of the radio show or of Garrison Keillor, but whenever I stumble across it, I just want to shut out the rest of the world and soak up that all-Amercian buttermilk buiscuit goodness.  It's such a weird experience to watch "G.K." do his thing on the screen instead of on the radio and match the voice with the face.  In any case, definitely worth seeing for fans of the show, although I thought the movie got progressively weaker and tired as it went along.

Keillor insults Texans during the film and recently caused a bit of a stir after speaking to a friendly audience in Dallas and then turning around and writing how stupid they were.  He's a strange man, but I guess that explains a lot.

Last night we watched "Bonjour Monsieur Shlomi" an Israeli coming of age film from a few years ago that I discovered while rummaging through the Foreign film section at Blackbuster.  We really enjoyed it - ah, young love!

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If you're not listening now, you probably won't listen then, but Sirius is having a free Howard Stern trial online on October 25-26.  I hadn't listened in a long time since I decided to put our Sirius receiver in the wife's car for long trips, but they finally made the his channels available online to subscribers.

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The usual sources are complaining that the British and the IOC will eventually be caving in to Muslim demands, but I think someone really f*cked up by scheduling the 2012 London Olympics during Ramadan.  They should change the dates.

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Best. Gift. Ever.  I found something on eBay that I've been dying to find for my wife for years - a DVD of a TV special showing Queen performing live in Argentina from 1981.  She's from there, and still thinks that Freddie Mercury was the best singer alive.  Plus the concert took place at the height of their popularity when she was still a teenager.  Now I just have to pray that it gets here OK, it's actually watchable, and she doesn't open the package by accident when it comes in the mail.

I heard a fascinating interview this morning on the Mike Gallagher show with Michael Rogers of Blogactive.com.  The basics are that he is a gay man who "outs" politicians and those that work for them that he believes are gay yet are involved in what he considers to be anti-gay actions or legislations.  He also claims that he does not want to "out" every gay person in Washington, just those who pretend to be what they are not.

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More proof that Jimmy Carter is a fool....or a tool..it's hard to decide which.

When the U.N. went about to re-establish it's Human Rights oversight in the form of a new Human Rights Council, big bad John Bolton and the Bush administration were strongly against it, claiming that it's structure involving countries that were serious human rights violators themselves would render it ineffective.  Jimmy Carter, of course was all for it.

Normblog reports on Human Rights Watch's disappointment in the new do-nothing UN-fit Council.

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I've expounded on something I found at LGF, but have tried to be a little more even-handed:

"I am concerned that every time something happens that's not good for President Bush, he plays this trump card, which is terrorism." - Howard Dean - August 1, 2004

It should be noted that Dean clarified his statement on August 3 to say that he thought Bush was holding on to 3 year-old information and then waiting until the appropriate political moment, in this case just after the Democrat National Convention, to scare people.
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"I plead guilty," Dhiran Barot, 34, said in a clear voice at Woolwich Crown Court in south London.

A British man pleaded guilty Thursday to conspiracy to murder in a plot to bomb high-profile targets in the United States, including the New York Stock Exchange and the International Monetary Fund headquarters in Washington.

Prosecutors said the plot, foiled by Barot's arrest in 2004, involved targets in both Britain and the United States. Besides the stock exchange and IMF headquarters, other alleged targets included the World Bank headquarters in Washington, the Citigroup building in New York and the Prudential building in Newark, N.J. Associated Press - October 12, 2006

So the terror scare was definitely valid, although there could still be a question about the timing.
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Barot, who was arrested on Aug. 3, was also accused of possessing reconnaissance plans of the New York Stock Exchange, the Citigroup building and other offices in New York, Washington and Newark, N.J. These were the same plans as those discovered on a computer in Pakistan in July, prompting U.S. officials to issue a public terror warning on Sunday, Aug. 1. - Newsweek - August 20, 2004

Only the Shadow knows.....

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I haven't posted for the last few days because I've been really out of it - DirecTV has totally screwed up the installation of HD satellite service at my house and it literally took me 4-5 hours on the phone yesterday to speak to a supervisor who could only promise me that she would ask the installers to send out a different technician another day.  The person they sent out a couple of days ago was new to the job, spoke only broken English and was at my house for 7 hours.  Even after all of that he managed to only correctly install service on two of the three TVs and he knocked out my internet service to boot.

I basically threatened to "grab someone by the collar" when I was on with one of the phone operators which is not like me at all....but it worked.....for now .
 
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There's a fascinating piece with a first print interview with "Abu Ghraib leash girl" Lynndie England here.  Sometimes it's really hard for me to believe that we're all part of the same species.
 
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Economic good news - Unemployment was announced as down last week to 4.6%.  Aside from the tech bubble of the late ’90s, the unemployment rate has not fallen below 4.6 percent since 1970.

The budget deficit for 2006 was the lowest it's been in 4 years at $256bn dollars.  As a percentage of GDP it is 1.9% which is historically pretty reasonable and less than half of the average during the Reagan and Bush I presidencies which everyone seems to use as the "we're even worse than then" standard for deficit spending.

The stock market is breaking new records and is almost close to 12,000.

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'

Ah, the good old days! All we wanted was to be loved!

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Watched "Looking For Comedy in the Muslim World" with Albert Brooks. Some of it is cute, but most of it is just not funny.  Which is funny itself since the movie is about Albert Brooks not being funny in the first place. C-

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Just for the historical record, I'm adding a link to the Cory Lidle plane crash.  I'll never forget when Thurman Munson died (another  Yankee who died in a small plane crash) becuase the front pages of all the newspapers on my 13th birthday showed the Yankees lined up in mourning at the ballpark.  I didn't even realize Lidle pitched for the Mets in his rookie year in 1997, but that's when I was in Argentina, so I was pretty disconnected from U.S. sports at the time.

I decided to take the plunge and get an HDTV.  I can't really give an opinion on the quality of broadcast pictures yet as the DirecTV guys aren't coming to install the new satellite and HD receivers until Tuesday.  However, DVDs look pretty good - I wouldn't say "better", but maybe there's a better way to hook it up.  I did also hook up an old Bose speaker system that for the last four years I was too lazy to set up and it really makes huge difference in the small room, especialy with the surround sound speakers.  Overall, I'm glad I made the investment.

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If you haven't seen it already, you're probably not interested, but here's a link to video of the Texas Gubernatorial debate from Friday night.  Readers of this journal know who I'll probably vote for, but it really is a pretty sad group of candidates for such a large state.

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Jeb Bush gets chased into a closet by protesters.   People probably think this is really funny or really not.

PITTSBURGH -- Florida Gov. Jeb Bush took refuge in a subway station supply closet when he was greeted by protesters on his way to a campaign event for a Pennsylvania Republican senator.

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Watchng Eight Below now (what did people call multi-tasking before there was multi-tasking?)  I think it's actually pretty good.  The new TV (see above) and the Antarctic scenery don't hurt.

The fact that a Republican can even say this without expecting laughter in return just confirms the point I've been making for some time now - an increasing number of those on the Left have a problem with Jews.

Dick Wadhams, Allen's campaign manager, said Ibis's e-mail "fits a pattern of anti-Semitic behavior" by Democrats.

Democratic Organizer Quits After Calling Allen 'Macacawitz'

Hell, the Global Left is alienating so many Jews that now the extreme right is actively recruiting them! Belgian right-wing leader asks Jews for support

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Via Pajamas Media...



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More crushing of dissent by the Left at Columbia Univeristy. Protesters storm the stage to stop a presentation sponsored by Columbia Republicans.

Leftists Attack Minuteman Founder

One would think that if one, or many, student organizations physically disrupt an event sponsored by another student organzization that their would be some consequences under Columbia's free speech policy. Let's see. And if the organizations that sponsored protests truly diassociate themselves from the actions taken at the speech as they claim, I wonder if they will take action within theor own ranks against those who would act as they did.

"I don't feel like we need to apologize or anything. It was fundamentally a part of free speech. ... The Minutemen are not a legitimate part of the debate on immigration."

Ah, the innocence of youth. Someone should tell them that when a group of people like the Minutemen arm themselves, they become a legitimate part of the debate.

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The Mets just won Game Two of the NLDS. Yesssssssssssss!

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A British police officer asks not to be posted to help guard the Israeli embassy in London becuase Israel is immoral. The Guardian, of course, applauds.

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Sukkot begins tomorrow night. Much more fun than Yom Kippur.

Hope everyone Jewish had an easy fast on Yom Kippur and that everyone who wasn't fasting is happy that they didn't have to fast.  We had the family over for the traditional break-the-fast meal.  I just wanted to pass along a few recipes that were big hits all around the table.

Noodle Kugel
Salmon, Dill and Cream Cheese Spread (I'll never buy this stuff in the supermarket again!)
An Awesome Quinoa Salad for the Days of Awe

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I just finished Babylon by Bus, an incredible story of two slackers who went to Baghdad just because they could and almost accidentally became representatives of the Coalition Provisional Authority.  This was a really quick, enjoyable read.  Their story is almost hard to believe, but every once in awhile I'd check their facts and stories on the internet and they were dead-on accurate.  It would be really interesting to get more insider views on what actually is going on over there.  Next on the list is Special Topics in Calamity Physics.

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Wow.  Colliding With Death at 37,000 Feet, and Living

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Here's to hoping that the Wal-Mart Supercenter in North Dallas follows through with it's plans to increase it's kosher food offerings.