Year: 2005

I followed this link at the suggestion of Glenn, but didn’t read the article because I couldn’t get over the awful web design. Jerry Pournelle is a well known writer for BYTE magazine. The guy has been using computers (probably) since the 60’s. You’d think he’d have time to learn HTML, or even Microsoft FrontPage for that matter. His site looks like it was designed in 1994, then retrofitted to look (sort-of) like a blog.

What’s with the floating dirigible? What does a blimp have to do with email?

The paragraph formatting with random size blank space between the various articles make the text incredibly hard to read. And look at the mess at the bottom of the page. Oh, and the PayPal buttons that show up arbitrarily here and there.

Yuck.

Jerry – 1 week, $500, and I can design a much more aesthetic website for you. Give me a call.

12–year-old girl hit with taser gun by Cincinnati Police.

A Cincinnati-area mother says her 12-year-old daughter was humiliated and eventually stunned with a taser gun by Cincinnati Police inside Burton Elementary School Wednesday.

Rakesha Thomas was taken to Children’s Hospital with taser injuries and arm and facial bruises. After the hospital visit the girl was taken to juvenile jail.

Mom Cynthia Harris says Rakesha argued with another student, refused to go to detention, talked back to administrators, and then after 30 minutes of arguing with police got stunned.

“They did it out in the public in the school where other kids came around. She (Rakesha) said they were laughing,” said Harris.

According to the 12-year-old’s account, once threatened with being stunned she begged the officers to take her to ISS but was told it was too late.

Cincinnati Police say they’re investigating whether the use of force was justified.

What? Did Rakesha pull a knife? Was she packin heat? Maybe she was pulling an iPod from her pocket and the police thought it was…uh…well…an iPod, OK a stolen iPod.

Yeah, I’m reachin here. But really. Why in the world would cops feel the need to taser a child? What kind of threat did she possess? There’s got to be more to this story…

Cheer up.

If you have 50 people reading your blog then you have more people in your “classroom” than most professors at Harvard. If you have 90 readers then you have more people in your “pews” than most pastors have in their churches every Sunday.

Capture the 5/150 principal.

Better late than never.

Unbelievable words from a social minister in the southern state of Baden-Wuertemberg, Germany.

“U.S. President George W. Bush should be “shot down” for his handling of the crisis in hurricane-struck New Orleans.”

Now, the good news is, a few German politicians called for the resignation of Andres Renner.

Opposition Social Democrat (SPD) politicians in the state called for his resignation, noting conservatives were quick to call for the resignation in 2002 of a former SPD national justice minister, Herta Daeubler-Gmelin, who according to press reports compared Bush to Hitler.

BUT…

Guess who hasn’t made a statement against Renner?

Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder.

*You laughed it off, the press chuckled, and everyone moved on.

Everyone except the *obsessed with Bush hatred Moonbats, who want to make it the hard news story of the day.

Yawn.

(*Warning – the sites linked here make heavy use of the “F” word.)

That’s what plagues MoveOn.org, so much in fact, that they are gladly making all the political hay they can muster out of the tragedy caused by Hurricane Katrina. Now that Cindy Sheehan is no longer their flavor of the month, the wacko P.A.C. have served up the Kool-Aid to a dozen or so refugees, put them on a plane to Washington D.C., and positioned them outside the White House to protest against Bush.

The sad fact is that MoveOn.org sees no shame in manipulating vulnerable hurricane survivors, already at the lowest point in their lives, and further victimizing these people by parading them in front of the world.

Selfish. Petty. Mean.

Desperate.

More at Michelle Malkin.

Gateway Pundit tipped me to Right Wing News who led me to this amazing story.

Hugh Hewitt interviewed FoxNews’ Major Garrett to discuss a story about the Red Cross being blocked from delivering supplies to the Superdome…

ON MONDAY AFTERNOON, IMMEDIATELY AFTER HURRICANE KATRINA PASSED!

Hugh Hewitt: You just broke a pretty big story. I was watching up on the corner television in my studio, and it’s headlined that the Red Cross was blocked from delivering supplies to the Superdome, Major Garrett. Tell us what you found out.

Major Garrett: Well, the Red Cross, Hugh, had pre-positioned a literal vanguard of trucks with water, food, blankets and hygiene items. They’re not really big into medical response items, but those are the three biggies that we saw people at the New Orleans Superdome, and the convention center, needing most acutely. And all of us in America, I think, reasonably asked ourselves, geez. You know, I watch hurricanes all the time. And I see correspondents standing among rubble and refugees and evacuaees. But I always either see that Red Cross or Salvation Army truck nearby. Why don’t I see that?

Hugh Hewitt: And the answer is?

Major Garrett: The answer is the Louisiana Department of Homeland Security, that is the state agency responsible for that state’s homeland security, told the Red Cross explicitly, you cannot come.

Why? Because local authorities didn’t want the Superdome or the Convention Center to become refugee magnets – they wanted those people to get out of New Orleans (and it would have worked had they used the buses).

Picture that for a moment – Red Cross trucks, with supplies (Food, Water, Personal Hygienic Products), standing by just after the hurricane calmed down ready to go in and care for refugees. But no, they were blocked by the locals — NOT by the federal government, and more importantly, NOT by George W. Bush.

Holy Cow.

Outside of Fox, where’s the rest of the MSM on this? Helloooooo CNN, MSNBC, NYT, WaPo…anyone home?

The whole interview is on Radio Blogger here, and video of Garrett’s work on Fox is with Ian Schwartz, here.

The Anchoress, who is just as shocked as I am on this, added this interesting comment:

Before anyone says this is all Republican Hooey, they should probably know this: A Red Cross official, Carol Miller, said on NPR’s Diane Rehm show this morning that the Red Cross was told not to provide aid at the Superdome by the Louisiana, not U.S., Department of Homeland Security. Audio here. (click link on left side of page; the comment is about 35:40 into the show.)

Captain Ed weighs in:

The Red Cross expected that either the local authorities would get the last of its citizens out of New Orleans or allow them to set up their relief provisions inside the city. To this day, the city and state have done neither, nor have they allowed the federal government to take control of the relief effort to make these decisions themselves. That means that the Red Cross personnel (and the relief provisions that FEMA helped them stage) have no way to reach those in the city anywhere, including the Superdome, the Convention Center, or any of the other shelters in New Orleans. Until Nagin and Blanco allow them to go to the victims or act to bring the victims out to them, the residents will not see any relief supplies except that dropped to them by air, a dicey proposition at best when facing toxic flood waters.

Lorie Byrd jumps into the discussion, as does The Right Place.

This is not the end of this story, for sure.

Related: Delusional, Dysfunctional, Divisive, and Defiant

I was drawn into this post over at Boing Boing; a report from a Serbian native named Jasmina Tesanovic in the Astrodome containing observations and an interview with a couple of evacuees. It started out interesting but after the first few paragraphs, I couldn’t believe the crap I was reading. Here’s the worst of it (and forget about any sense of context, that doesn’t seem to matter to Jasmina).

“Barbara Bush, the wicked grandma, gave an interview only yesterday, chuckling how poor people will abuse the hospitality in Texas and never go back home. Is THIS what she meant? Her cynical remark was not meant to be cynical; it was a threat, for Johnetta and Warnetta who want to rent a place and stay in Austin until somebody fixes their town PROPERLY.”

The wicked grandma? What the ?

“I’d better play the refugee after all, it is the safest place in this messy country I guess: not that I am far from that condition. I’ve been a refugee in my own country. This time I am refugee in somebody else’s country. I can tell the difference now.”

This messy country? If you don’t like it, leave.

“But then, they start playing the American national anthem, people stand straight and a big applause ends it. Is that their patriotism? Is this America?”

What? Are you amazed that these refugees can still be patriotic? Do you think that the people who are in the Astrodome are foreigners in a foreign land? Who are the volunteers around them? Oh, yeah – AMERICANS. Geez, this chick is really infuriating.

“What about the global warming that made all this happen, what about Iraq?”

Oh, there you go. The two identifiers. Environmentalist Wacko + Anti-(Iraq)War = MOONBAT. What else are you hiding?

“Everybody could tell this disaster was going to happen, why didn’t anybody do something about it? Corruption, racism, classism…. Bush is a spoiled rich kid and behaves as such….”

Ah, of course. Bush hater. Perfect.

“No, I say, he is a war criminal: all the money the world is giving now to US, money from the poorest countries in the world, may as well be used for the wars against the same countries that are giving the money. What a thought? You should secede… from Bush.”

I had no idea they taught Michael Moore-ism 101 in Serbia.

“Some military guys appear behind a neatly set desk. Next to them is a desk with a sign; We Support Our Troops, veterans. Well, good thing that troops are supporting those people here, if indeed they are.”

Riiiight – and those guys back in New Orleans wearing the fatigues, pulling the dead out of the water, rescuing the people from their homes, providing medicine, security…oh and pumping out the water, repairing the levee, etc. They can’t possibly be supporting anyone but themselves huh?

An anti-American “reporter” with a huge chip on her shoulder spewing trash in the great State of Texas. You certainly know freedom when you see it, Darling. Now go on back home to Serbia…

Blanco doesn’t agree with Nagin and has not yet “signed off” on his decision to force residents from New Orleans.

Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco seemed at odds with New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin Wednesday, hours after the mayor ordered the mandatory evacuation of the crippled Crescent City by force if necessary.

Nagin late Tuesday authorized law enforcement officers to force the evacuation of the estimated 10,000 residents who refuse to heed orders to leave.

But in a Wednesday interview with FOX News, Gov. Blanco said she had not signed off on the decision.

“The mayor certainly has ordered that but the governor, and that would be me, would have to enforce it or implement it. We are trying to determine whether there is an absolute justification for that,” she told FOX News.

“I think the most important thing driving that decision would be the possibility of disease. If indeed the disease problem is evident, is inevitable, we’ll have to move to the next stage,” she said.

Meanwhile, every other news report I see talks about how dangerous the standing water is in New Orleans. According to the CDC, 5 people have died from bacteria infections caused by the dirty, disease ridden H2O.

So, what’s it gonna take for you to “sign off” Governor? More deaths?

MORE: Mudville Gazette has more on the Nagin/Blanco relationship strain.

Related: Delusional, Dysfunctional, Divisive, and Defiant