Set your VCR's...

Arthur Chrenkoff alerts us to a documentary scheduled to be broadcast this Sunday - September 11 - on The Discovery Channel.

It's called "The Flight That Fought Back" and it focuses on Flight 93, which crashed into a Pennsylvania field on 9/11. Chrenkoff has seen a sneak peek and not only recommends it but testifies that it is a "must see".

You simply cannot miss it. I never type in capitals to make a point, but you can take it that I am now. Extensively researched and drawing on some previously unpublished information, "The Flight That Fought Back" provides the most complete and comprehensive recreation of events onboard Flight 93. It's a stunning, immensely moving production.

The film, part re-enactment, part interview with family members, fleshes out the stories of those ordinary men and women who had found themselves in a situation that was far from ordinary, and who performed, too, in a way that was far from ordinary. Those onboard were a cross-section of America - young and old, all races and walks of life, everymen and everywomen - they were America. The sadness at so many lives interrupted and so much potential destroyed can only be mixed with the admiration for the spirit of the 33 passengers and 7 crew members, and the hope that springs from their sacrifice.

Spread the word!

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Looks like there'll soon be 200 fewer terrorists at Gitmo...

From the UK Guardian: Hunger Strikers Pledge To Die in Guantanamo

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Quantifying Poverty: The "Broken Yardstick"

Nicholas Eberstadt has on op-ed in the NYT that looks at the outdated way the Federal Govt. defines "poverty rate". The untold story, of course, is the fact that the Johnson Administration began the so-called "War on Poverty" in 1965 and, forty years and $3 Billion later, Poverty won. An objective analysis of these policies shows what an utter failure they have been.

The Census Bureau's lastest poverty rate estimates released on Aug. 30 determined that the percentage of Americans living in poverty was 12.7% compared to 11.2% in 1974. The problem is that the standards being applied were created in 1974 and don't take into consideration changes in economic trends or standard of living. For example:

The unemployment rate is lower, and the percentage of adults with paying jobs is distinctly higher. Thirty years ago, the proportion of adults without a high school diploma was more than twice as high as today (39 percent versus 16 percent). And antipoverty spending is vastly higher today than in 1974, even after inflation adjustments.

In the face of such evidence, what do you call an indicator that stubbornly insists that the percentage of Americans below a fixed poverty threshold has increased? How about "a broken compass?"

Sometime late in July, I received the very Census form on which this study is based. It was very tedious to fill out for a family of five persons but, after several prodding phone calls from the Census Bureau, I managed to complete it and return it in time for the August 25th deadline. The questions were focused on employment, household income, and home ownership. Here are some of the questions that the form did not ask me:

- How many cars I owned
- What is my weekly/monthly grocery bill estimate and do I belong to any warehouse/wholesale outlets, like Costco or Sam's Club
- How much do I estimate that I spend on entertainment
- How many televisions do I own and do I subscribe to cable or pay TV service
- Do I own a DVD player
- Do I pay for special education services for my dependents
- Have I taken any vacations in the last year and what are the cost estimates for them

I could go on and on, but the bottom line is that the answers to such questions would go a long way to determining my standard of living. I define "poor" as being barely able to meet the minimum standard of living - food, shelter, clothing, etc.

As Eberstadt explains:

The poverty rate is out of step with all these other readings about deprivation in modern America because it was designed to measure the wrong thing. The poverty rate has always been derived from reported household income. (Exigency played a role here: at the start of the war on poverty 40 years ago, those income numbers were already available from the Census Bureau.) But a better gauge of a household's material deprivation is not what it earns, but what it spends. When we look at spending patterns, we immediately see a huge discrepancy between reported incomes and reported expenditures for low-income Americans.

Hey, I'm no Rockefeller (or Kerry or Kennedy for that matter) and I have to make hard choices all the time between what I want and what I really need. But I can personally attest to the fact that the gauge that the Federal Government uses to quantify "poverty rate" is - in the words of Eberstadt - the "single worst measure in our government's statistical arsenal".

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No New Posts Tonight...

Stomach bug or possibly (dum, dum...DUM!!!) food poisoning. I've had that before and it seems all too familiar. Hopefully a good night's sleep and a bucket of NyQuil will do the trick.

Update: 9/9/05 8:30am
Feeling better today. Still not 100%, but whatever it is it's subsiding. Thanks for the tip, Vic. Flat Coke has always been a part of my medicinal regimen! Works great for hangovers, too.

Posted by: Gary at 09:26 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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The Letter The President Should Send To Cindy Sheehan...

Mac Owens over at NRO writes:

Even some Republicans thought the president should have met with her again. I disagree. President Bush has met with the families of fallen soldiers to an extent that exceeds that of his predecessors. But perhaps he should write her. I suggest a letter along the following lines:

Dear Mrs. Sheehan:
I have been shown reports confirming that your son, Casey, died bravely on the field of battle in Iraq.
I feel how weak and fruitless must be any word of mine which should attempt to beguile you from the grief of a loss so overwhelming. But I cannot refrain from tendering you the consolation that may be found in the thanks of the Republic he died to save.
I pray that our Heavenly Father may assuage the anguish of your bereavement, and leave you only the cherished memory of the loved and lost, and the solemn pride that must be yours to have laid so costly a sacrifice upon the altar of freedom.
Yours, very sincerely and respectfully,
George W. Bush

Of course, this is a paraphrase of Lincoln’s letter to Mrs. Lydia Bixby of Massachusetts, whom Lincoln believed to have lost five sons in the war that still raged in 1864 (it was actually two — as if the number matters). When Lincoln sent this letter, he had no idea that Mrs. Bixby was a Confederate sympathizer — in other words, that she favored the cause of those who killed her sons. I believe that even if Lincoln had known, he would have sent it anyway.

Unlike Lincoln in the case of Mrs. Bixby, President Bush knows that Mrs. Sheehan sympathizes with her sonÂ’s killers. She has expressed her sympathies publicly on more than one occasion. But the president should send such a letter anyway. Maybe it could shame Cindy Sheehan into separating her political agenda from her sonÂ’s honorable sacrifice and enable her to grant Casey Sheehan the dignity and respect that his sacrifice deserves.

Maybe it would. But more likely as not Sheehan and her handlers would call a press conference and call the President a "coward" for not expressing these words to her face. They probably have a plan in place for just such a scenario.

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Go To Hell...

Too bad there are only nine levels...

h/t: My Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy via Sadie

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Enough of this politics stuff...let's talk some football!!

Hector Vex has his NFL season predictions up and, while I think he has his head up his ass about Eli Manning and the Giants, his analysis is head and shoulders above the kind of standard idiotic garbage you'll get from those ESPN pinheads.

Go check it out here.

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The Next Justice...Go Female?

Let me state right upfront that I am in no way suggesting that there should be some sort of quota for female justices on the Supreme Court, unlike sorta-Republican Arlen Specter who recently said "Two women, I think, are a minimum".

But let's face it, if you take the top ten choices that Bush could make it's pretty hard to force rank them - male and female - and while opinions vary among Conservatives on "best qualified" it isn't by a whole heckuva lot. I'll admit I'm a little embarrassed at being so wrong on my last prediction. But if anything, my reasons for picking Brown are all the more relevant today.

The Dems are going to ramp up the attack on the next nominee for two reasons: 1) they couldn't succeed with Roberts and 2) now that this nomination will be seen as the replacement for O'Connor, for them another true Conservative will be more than unacceptable - it will be the apocalypse.

My top three choices would be Edith Jones of the 5th Circuit Appeal Court, Janice Rogers Brown, recently appointed to the DC Circuit Court and Priscilla Owen who sits with Jones on the 5th Circuit Court. All three are undesputably conservative and originalist in their judicial philosophy and can be counted on to reverse the tide of judicial activism that is making law from the bench where it fails in the legislature - which is the only way Liberals can get their agenda enacted.

Unlike the filibusters and hearings for the Circuit Court nominees that most Americans pay zero attention too, the Supreme Court nominee hearings will be televised as big news. How bad is it going to look to the average American when you have these Democrats on the Judiciary Committee who are mostly middle-aged white men - like Leahy, Kennedy, Schumer and Durbin - beating up on a girl?

There are plenty of male choices for this nomination. But I say the smart political move is appointing an outstanding Conservative woman justice. But then, what do I know?

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Quote of the Day...

Ted Kennedy on Hurricane Katrina:

"What the American people have seen is this incredible disparity in which those people who had cars and money got out and those people who were impoverished died."

Mary Jo Kopechne was unavailable for comment.

h/t: Best of the Web (2nd Item down)

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New MoveOn.org Ad Would Be Funny If It Weren't So Sad...

A new anti-John Roberts ad featuring images of Katrina's aftermath, is being released by (WeJustCan't)MoveOn.org.

What exactly is the connection? That's what most people will wonder. But the organization insists that this association is justified.

The ad suggests that the plight of the mostly African-American evacuees in New Orleans showed that poverty remains a serious problem among minorities, said Ben Brandzel, the group's advocacy director. In a mix of judicial and racial politics, the ad then suggests that minorities could suffer if the Senate confirms Roberts.

"The connection is obvious," Brandzel said. "The images after Hurricane Katrina show we still live in a society where significant racial inequities exist. We believe John Roberts' record on civil rights ... is clearly not the direction our country needs to head now."

What exactly is it about John Roberts that makes his record on civil rights so objectionable?

Duh, he's a white male of course! And he's a Conservative! And Bush picked him! He must be against civil rights...right?

The only thing worse than the slanderous insinuation that Roberts is a racist - based on absolutely nothing but MoveOn's hatred of Bush - is the disgusting exploitation of this terrible tragedy for their pathetic political agenda.

If the whole subject matter wasn't so sad, this could actually be fodder for a Saturday Night Live skit. Keep it up guys. That loud snapping sound you hear is called a backlash - and it's coming back at ya.

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Tolkien Geek Update

Fellowship of the Ring, Book One, Chapter Four is posted.

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U.N. Corruption Stinks To High Heaven...

So says the official report on the "Oil for Food" Scandal. The report, released today, documents a pattern of lies, greed and unethical behavior (not to mention aiding and abedding a blood-thirsty dictator's oppression over Iraq's citizens) and names names - including one Kofi Annan.

Having had his complete mismanagement identified as a major cause of the scandal, the Secretary-General had this to say:

"The findings of today's report must be deeply embarrassing to all of us," Annan told the Security Council Wednesday. "None of us — member states, secretariat … can be proud of what it has found. Who among us can now claim that U.N. management is not a problem or is not in need of reform?"

No need to worry about reform, Kofi. There's a certain John Bolton that would like to sit down with you and discuss some serious changes that need to come to Turtle Bay.

Fear the 'Stache!!

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What has really changed...

WaPo reporter Dan Balz laments the country's lack of unity in the aftermath of Katrina, but comes to the wrong conclusion. Balz's theory is that Bush "the divider" has changed since the country was united by 9/11. WRONG. The big change that has taken place is with the Left in general and the Democrats in particular.

Since the end of 2001, Bush has remained steady and consistent in both his policies and his outlook. If anything he's one of the most predictable Presidents in U.S. history. A huge majority of Americans (91% at one point) approved of him then. But many over the last four years have decended into bitter partisan attacks on the President - attacks fueled by the increasingly angry Left.

Patrick Ruffini hits the fallacy of Balz's assumptions right on the head:

Balz doesn't examine the profound change in the Democratic Party that comes closest to explaining the sharply disparate reactions to the two disasters. Four years ago, Daily Kos was barely a glimmer in our eye, Joe Lieberman was a frontrunner for the 2004 nomination, Howard Dean was still considered a "moderate", the DLC was still ascendant, the words "liberal" and "lefty" were almost never spoken in polite conversation, The New Republic represented the mainsteam of Democratic thinking inside the Beltway and you wouldn't think twice about calling David Corn and The Nation "far-left." As I've documented, the party's vitriolic reaction to Katrina was shaped on the blogs. Had those blogs been around on 9/11, we would have seen the same response, with immediate cries of "Bush knew."

Just look up at that quote in the Ex-Donkey banner. Those words have never been more true than they are today. Which is why Democrats keep losing elections. And based on the growing strength of that party's apoplectic Left-wing grassroots - it's only going to get worse for them.

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CNNUSATODAYGALLUP Poll: Only 13% Blame Bush...

Well, the moonbats must be feeling a little glum this morning. Drudge is reporting that a new poll shows that of all the people or institutions that are to blame for the aftermath of Katrina, a mere 13% said "George W. Bush".

Honestly, the number should be more like zero. But the poll is not of registered voters, just "adults" - which means that Bush-haters could just as easily be over-sampled as undersampled. I'd bet you dollars to munchkins that if you asked that same 13% "Did George W. Bush lie about his reasons to go to war in Iraq?" they'd ALL say "Hell, yes."

So as I mentioned yesterday, this pathetic "blame Bush" drumbeat being pounded by the Left has fallen on deaf ears. It's nothing more than Bush-haters preaching to the choir.

UPDATE: Here's the CNN story.

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Jane no longer Fond-a the idea of an anti-war bus tour...

Roger Friedman of FoxNews is reporting that Hanoi Jane is deciding against following through on her plans to conduct an anti-war tour in a vegetable-oil fueled bus next March.

Her reasoning? She doesn't want to distract from the upcoming Cindy Sheehan anti-war bus tour. Umm...yeah, right. More likely she's decided that Sheehan's lack of popular success (outside of moonbat circles) is an indication of the negative effect such a tour might have on her future career plans.

She had a moderate success recently with the film "Monster-In-Law", but that was before she began reverting to her treasonous ways. If she expects any similar successes, she'd best keep her trap shut. Fonda says her agents are currently looking at scripts for a new film.

Of course, she's still going to appear with British Quisling George Galloway in two weeks. Maybe no one will notice.

For the whole lowdown on Jane Fonda's long history of anti-American and pro-Communist activities (most of which the average person doesn't know about), I suggest you get a cup of coffee and go here. It's not pretty.

Posted by: Gary at 09:10 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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Tolkien Geek Update

Fellowship of the Ring, Book One, Chapter Three is posted.

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A Fatwa has been issued!

The Jawa Report: Festival of the Fatwas: Celebrate mu.nu edition

Thanks, Rusty!

Along with three other Mu.Nu folks - It's the Festival fo the Fatwas - Celebrate Mu.Nu edition.

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Bush's Wise Move...

Frustrated by their inability to kill the Roberts nomination, the Left decided it would make a little noise and retreat - keeping their powder dry for the next retirement which was expected to be Rehnquist, sooner or later. All that changed last week. As Jed Babbin points out in the American Spectator Online, Bush's decision to elevate the nomination of Roberts to that of Chief Justice is a move that will force the hand of all the Democrat Senators who were hoping to stay quiet on the sidelines.

By elevating the Roberts nomination to the chief justice's job, the president has made the Roberts fight one the libs must win, and they won't. Roberts will be confirmed (probably not in time for the first day of the court's session next month), but soon after that. And when the president nominates another conservative to replace O'Connor, the libs will be fighting for their political lives.

There will be little or no room for them to maneuver around their core constituencies. The NARALs, the PFAWs, and the rest will be shrieking for a filibuster because they realize that with Roberts, Thomas, and a third young conservative (Thomas is only 57), President Bush will be able to stock the Roberts Court with enough conservatives to clearly deprive the libs of their last hold on American government. Their hysteria will be palpable, their rhetoric confused and destructive. There will be a filibuster, unless the president does what they want and nominates a liberal. Which he won't do.

No Democrat -- not even Slippary Hillary -- will be able to hide. Anyone who wants the allegiance of the hard-core left, and any Democrat who expects to gain the presidency must have it, won't be able to take a tempered position. Every one of them will be flushed from cover and revealed as the doctrinaire hyperliberals they really are.

I wonder how this will effect Kos' sooper sekret plan to make the members of the DLC "radioactive", which he announced on August 22. Incidentally, that "two weeks" is now up.

Fasten your seatbelts!

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You can just bet this'll happen...

Atlanta's most famous Libertarian Talk Radio Personality, Neil Boortz, makes a prediction that, I'm sorry to say, I agree will come true:

Hurricane Katrina was a natural disaster, no matter how hard the media tries to make it look like a man-made, or Bush-made one. 9/11 was an attack on our country by a foreign force, not an intense low pressure area. But mark my words ... before one more week is over you will hear demands that the victims of Katrina get huge government payoffs just like the victims of 9/11; and anyone who dares to disagree will be labeled a racist.

Sadly, I think it's inevitable.

Posted by: Gary at 12:00 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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Quote of the Day...

"Cindy Sheehan is yesterday's news; she couldn't attract a camera crew this morning if she stripped down to her step-ins for a march on Prairie Chapel Ranch." - Wesley Pruden

Read the rest of Pruden's Washington Times column on the Left's feeble attempt to play "gotcha" on the President.

Posted by: Gary at 11:34 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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