Tuesday - June 20, 2006

Racist!

_{Mike Lester—Rome News-Tribune (GA)}

A grand jury declined to indict Representative Cynthia McKinney yesterday in connection with a confrontation in which she admitted that she hit a Capitol Police officer who tried to stop her from entering a House office building. The incident occurred March 29 when McKinney, a Georgia Democrat , tried to enter a building without walking through a metal detector or wearing the lapel pin that identifies members of Congress. The guard did not recognize her as a member of Congress and asked her three times to stop. When she ignored him, he tried to stop her. McKinney then hit him. The next morning, she appeared on the House floor to apologize. (AP)

Police labor officials, angry over a federal grand jury’s refusal to indict Rep. Cynthia McKinney for assaulting a police officer, said Monday said they want the House ethics committee to review her conduct. And they said the grand jury’s decision last week sent the message that “it’s okay to hit a police officer.”

“We hope that members of Congress will review her actions in light of their rules within their own ethics committee,” Andrew Maybo, chairman of the U.S. Capitol Police Labor Committee, told reporters Monday at a news conference in Washington.

Maybo said the Fraternal Order of Police would send a letter later this week to the ethics committee suggesting that McKinney’s behavior violated an item in the chamber’s ethics manual that calls for members to “conduct (themselves) at all times in a manner which shall reflect creditably on the House of Representatives.”

A little known African American woman announced Thursday that she will try to unseat Georgia Democratic Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney, who has been mired in controversy since she struck a U.S. Capitol policeman in the chest with her closed fist. Catherine Davis, a human resources manager who has never held elected office, said she is running because McKinney’s “dismal legislative record and her outrageous behavior are an embarrassment to the hard-working folks in my district.” McKinney represents Georgia’s 4th Congressional District.

Davis is conservative. She favors a strict approach to immigration reform - the immediate securing of the borders and deportation of illegal residents, privatizing Social Security, Health Savings Accounts, school vouchers and the Fair Tax, which would eliminate the federal income tax and establish a federal sales tax.

McKinney was first elected to the U.S. House in 1992 to represent Georgia’s heavily Democratic 11th District. The district was redrawn by order of the U.S. Supreme Court in 1995 and McKinney was elected in the new, but still heavily Democratic 4th District in 1996. She lost her seat in 2002 when she was beaten in a Democratic primary, but when the winner then attempted a bid for the U.S. Senate in 2004, McKinney recaptured her old seat. Davis said she believes the district is ready for change after the controversy that has swirled around McKinney.

There is probably no more blatant example of a waste of oxygen than this woman. She is arrogant, racist and completely out of her mind.

Drunk with power, she cruises the halls of Congress, pandering to every camera she can find. Unfortunately, this is the kind of person the Democratic party sends to Washington over and over again.

I wish someone in Congress would stand up to these racists like McKinney and at the very least spank her for an ethics violation.

If any of us hit a policeman we’d be in deep kimchee by now. When this ditzy broad does it, she gets a pass. That’s not right.

   Monday - June 19, 2006

THE REVOLUTION BEGINS!

Oxymoron: “Russian Intelligence” ... and you thought the CIA was totally f**ked up? Guess again, comrade! According to the KGB and Pravda, there is a military coup taking place right here in America even as I speak. There are running gun battles in the halls of Congress. Special forces are gunning down Senators left and right. George Bush has assumed dictatorial powers. American democracy is dead. Long live Emperor Bush!

At least that’s the way Pravda sees it.

These Russkis crack me up at times. I have to go browse their pages every now and then to find some comic relief in the daily news. Sadly, our comics here in the US are just falling down on the job lately and our media are too busy taking themselves seriously. Pravda however, seems to still be stuck in the old Commie propaganda mode and their “reports” make the National Enquirer and Britains’s SUN look like pikers in comparison. I mean nobody but nobody can come up with this level of fiction like the comrades in the glorious revolution.

Go ahead! Read this marvelous work of journalism. I’ve only copied half of the full report here. You absolutely have to follow the links and go read the whole thing. I promise you’ll crack a rib and maybe even die laughing at the “bias” in the story. Dan Rather needs to go join Pravda. He would fit right in. I promise! Now start reading and don’t blame me if you end up on the floor laughing your ass off. Treasure this story in its entirety. Our media can only dream of this kind of biased reportage. Enjoy ... !

_{P.S. Don’t tell anyone at DailyKOS or Democratic Underground or MoveOn.org about this story. They will take it as solid truth and then we’ll have to have a real coup just to shut them up and/or get rid of them.}

Russian Intelligence Says Constitutional
Crisis In The USA Takes Deadly Turn
_{June 6, 2006}

(PRAVDA)—Russian Intelligence Analysts are reporting that the ongoing constitutional crisis that has erupted in the United States has taken a decidedly deadly turn as counter-coup forces attempting to block access to the American capitol engaged in a brief gun battle with US Army Special Forces leaving at least 3 dead.

Of this currently unfolding event we can read as reported by England’s Times Online News Service in their article titled “US Capitol Sealed Off After Gunshots Heard,” and which says:

“Police sealed off part of Capitol Hill today after reports that gunshots had been heard in the garage of a House of Representatives office building. The shots were heard in the garage level of the Rayburn Building, which houses offices of members of the US House of Representatives. Bill Pickle, the Senate Sergeant at Arms, told Reuters: “We have been told by staff of shots fired and the smell of smoke in the lobby of the Rayburn House building .”

Russian Intelligence reports further state that the United States Army has activated for this event their 4th Psychological Operations Group / Task Organization and which was the US military unit that coordinated the mis/disinformation campaign during the events of September 11, 2001 to such great effect.

The causes behind this latest escalation between the coup and counter-coup forces in the United States stem from the American President’s attempt to wrest total control of his country from both its elected representatives and its judiciary, and as we can read as reported by Italy’s Bellaciao News Service in their article titled “Bush Asserting Powers Accrued By Hitler,” and which says:

“President Bush has used ‘signing statements’ hundreds of times to vitiate the meaning of statutes passed by Congress. In effect, Bush is vetoing the bills he signs into law by asserting unilateral authority as Commander In Chief to bypass or set aside the laws he signs. For example, Bush has asserted that he has the power to ignore the McCain Amendment Against Torture, to ignore the law that requires a warrant to spy on Americans, to ignore the prohibition against indefinite detention without charges or trial, and to ignore the Geneva Conventions to which the U. S. is signatory.”

In effect, Bush is asserting the same powers seized by Adolf Hitler in 1933. His Federalist Society apologists and Department of Justice appointees claim that President Bush has the same power to interpret the Constitution as the Supreme Court. An Alito Court is likely to agree with this false claim. Bush Justice Department official and Berkeley law professor John Yoo argues that no law can restrict the President in his role as Commander In Chief. Thus, once the president is at war - even a vague, open-ended “war on terror” - Bush’s Justice Department says the president is free to undertake any action in pursuit of war, including the torture of children and the indefinite detention of American citizens.

In a further bid this week to tighten their grip upon the United States, military leaders have announced that their nation’s judges no longer have oversight over their actions, and as we can read as reported by the Reuters News Service in their article titled “US Says Gov’t, Not Courts, Should Judge Spy Secrets,” and which says:

“The United States government, not any court, is the best judge of whether to keep programs such as its controversial effort to eavesdrop on citizens a secret, an assistant attorney general said on Wednesday. Peter Keisler, an assistant attorney general, and other U. S. officials made the claim in the latest filing to a lawsuit alleging that telecommunications firm AT&T illegally allowed the government to monitor phone conversations and e-mail communications.

“In cases such as this one, where the national security of the United States is implicated, it is well established that the executive branch is best positioned to judge the potential effects of disclosure of sensitive information on the nation’s security, they wrote in a filing on Wednesday evening.”

But perhaps the greatest threat to the American people surrounding these events was the military leaders of the United States launching an unprecedented raid upon their nation’s Capitol Building, and as we can read as reported by the Chicago Sun Times News Service in their article titled “Bush Woos Fiery Hastert With 45-Day Cooldown”, and which says:

“President Bush ordered a 45-day cooling off period Thursday between Congress and the Justice Department in a battle over a lawmaker’s seized documents, a bid to patch frayed relations between the White House and House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert.

Hastert, usually a Bush loyalist, on Thursday accused the Justice Department of trying to intimidate’him by leaking information to ABC News. The leak was prompted, he said, by his complaints about a weekend FBI raid of Rep. William Jefferson’s Capitol Hill office. The Louisiana Democrat is the target of an FBI corruption probe. The Sun-Times learned that Hastert confronted Bush with his concerns over the FBI raid during the president’s trip to Chicago on Monday to address the National Restaurant Association.”

- Believe it or not, there’s even more of this silliness at PRAVDA! Da, comrade ...

Mister Congeniality

Cancelling AO-HELL

How many of you use AOL (a.k.a. “AO-HELL")? If you do, I don’t want to know about it, OK? Only idiots use AO-HELL ... and people who just don’t know better. I have to admit I signed up for the service several years ago when I was in transit between jobs and needed a dial-up connection during the move. It took me one month to get moved and get hooked back up to broadband again. It took two months to get AO-HELL to close the account and, most importantly, leave my credit card alone. F**KING JERKS!

This is a recorded session with a “helpful” AO-HELL representative by a guy who wanted to cancel his account. Pay attention to what happens and learn from this poor slob’s mistake. Listen as the cunning AOL-Qaeda representative tries every trick in the book to keep the schmuck from cancelling. Listen and learn ...

<sub>As seen on Break.com

(-- Hat Tip to Dave Barry for digging this one up - and for enduring the agony of AO-HELL himself in the process --)</sub>

Sleepless In Jericho

There are so many things wrong with this incident that I have been unable to comment on it for the last week.  How could this little girl dupe her parents into getting her a passport? Whatever possessed her to take money from a stranger in a war zone, purchase a plane ticket and go to meet him? She is only 16, which is the age of consent in Michigan and he is either 20 or 25, depending on which news source you read. Nobody is sure.

Fortunately, the girl was tracked down by US authorities in Jordan and shipped home. Now, poor Abdullah is crying himself to sleep because his “soulmate” didn’t appear. This AP report paints him as a jilted lover, not a sexual predator. Maybe. Regardless, he had no business enticing Katherine to run away and come help him raise goats for the rest of her life.

If I were Katherine’s father, I’m afraid there would be some stern punishment in store for her and I ain’t talking about taking her iPod away. By the time I got through with her, I’d probably have worn out three or four belts and the young girl wouldn’t be able to sit down for a month. Cruel? No, sometimes when a child acts like their brains are up their butt you need to communicate directly with the problem.

As for this MySpace.com crap, shut ‘em down. These chat rooms and meeting web sites have caused more trouble than they are worth. They have become nothing less than on-line crackhouses. Until we can figure out a way to protect minors completely on-line somebody needs to provide strict monitoring of these web sites. And somebody needs to give a stern lecture to Katherine’s parents about actually being parents instead of witless jerks. Period.

Palestinian Anguishes Over MySpace Romance
_{June 19, 2006, 11:22 AM EDT}

JERICHO, West Bank (AP)—The Palestinian man who befriended a 16-year-old Michigan girl through the MySpace.com Web site and invited her to join him in Jericho said he is heartbroken by U.S. authorities’ decision to send her back home.

Abdullah Jimzawi, 20, told The Associated Press that his love for Katherine Lester, of Gilford, Mich., was pure and they planned to marry. The music buff, who spends at least 10 hours a day on the Internet, decried attempts to portray him as an Internet predator.

“We love the same things, the same songs and we have similar dreams. I fell in love with her because she is innocent and goodhearted. We found ourselves as soul mates,” he told the AP on Sunday at his family’s comfortable house.

Jericho, a town of 17,000, is largely immune from the violence and mayhem plaguing the rest of the West Bank. Jimzawi, a high school dropout with close-cropped hair, a two-day beard and large, dark eyes, said Katherine was willing to convert to Islam and that the pair remain in close contact, speaking to each other at least five hours a day via Internet phone calls.

MySpace.com is a social networking Web site whose enormous popularity with teenagers has raised concerns among U.S. authorities, with scattered accounts of sexual predators targeting minors they meet on the site. Jimzawi works in his father’s business delivering goods to minimarkets and has never gotten into trouble.

Earlier this month, Katherine boarded a flight to Israel after slipping out of her mother’s house. At a stopover in Amman, Jordan, U.S. authorities seized her passport and sent her back home.

Had Katherine made it to Jericho, Jimzawi said, she would have slept in his sister’s bedroom, not his. He said he would have walked with her through the tree-lined streets of Jericho, and his family would have celebrated her 17th birthday together on June 21. “When I realized she wasn’t coming I felt my whole world collapse,” he said. “My tears didn’t stop and I couldn’t sleep for three days.”

Murtha Math

Try as hard as I can, I just cannot figure out where John Murtha is coming from. I realize he is a decorated war veteran but his recent comments and actions only serve to convince me he is suffering from some form of dementia or early senility. First he says, pull the troops out now, then he says we need to change direction in Iraq, then he gets in a cat-fight with Nancy Pelosi over who will be House Speaker “when” the Democrats win in November, now he says we can pull all our troops out and station them in Okinawa.

WTF?

I can’t figure this one out at all. How will having the troops 5,000 miles away help the Iraq people? Doesn’t he realize we gave Okinawa back to Japan years ago and have scaled back our presence on that tiny island? Congressman Murtha is becoming more and more like the Angry Left that now controls the Democratic Party. This is why we need term limits, folks. We could also probably use an annual mental examination of every member of Congress to determine if they are rational or not. After all, we don’t need to leave the lunatics in charge do we ... ?

Murtha’s Fuzzy Math
_{June 19, 2006 9:40AM ET}

Congressman John Murtha continues to make a fool of himself by suggesting we can effectively fight the terrorist insurgency in Iraq by “redeploying” our troops to a military base in Japan. Here’s what he told Tim Russert yesterday in the course of arguing that we don’t need a presence in Iraq to conduct the sort of quick-strike missions like the one that killed Abu Musab al-Zarqawi:

REP. MURTHA: So--and we don’t have to be right there. We can go to Okinawa. We, we don’t have--we can redeploy there almost instantly. So that’s not--that’s, that’s a fallacy. That, that’s just a statement to rial [sic] up people to support a failed policy wrapped in illusion.

MR. RUSSERT: But it’d be tough to have a timely response from Okinawa.

REP. MURTHA: Well, it--you know, they--when I say Okinawa, I, I’m saying troops in Okinawa. When I say a timely response, you know, our fighters can fly from Okinawa very quickly.

They can? The two 500-lb bombs that killed Zarqawi were dropped by F-16 fighter aircraft. According to the U.S. military: In an air-to-surface role, the F-16 can fly more than 500 miles (860 kilometers), deliver its weapons with superior accuracy, defend itself against enemy aircraft, and return to its starting point. Okinawa is 4,899 miles from Baghdad. Do the math.

Murtha also continued to play fast and loose with certain poll data points. He once again said “80 percent of the Iraqis want us out of there” a claim which many people questioned and which was eventually sourced by the liberal Think Progress to a single poll question from March 2006 contained in this report put out by the Brookings Institution. The question is worded “do you approve the government endorsing a timeline for U.S. withdrawal.” Not to be a stickler, but Iraqis endorsing a “timeline for withdrawal” is not quite the same as saying they “want us out of there.”

Another example: Murtha stated flatly to Russert yesterday, “The public is two-to-one against what we’re doing, and they want a change in direction.” That was news to me, because I distinctly remember the latest NBC/WSJ poll results on the question of whether Iraq was worth it or not: 40% said ‘yes,’ 52% said ‘no.’ Same thing with the most recent CNN poll (54% said the Iraq war was a mistake, 42% said it was not) and the latest USA Today/Gallup poll (51% say mistake, 46% not). You do not need an advanced degree in mathematics to know these numbers aren’t even close to two-to-one.

So where did Murtha get his “2-1” ratio? It looks like he cherry picked it from the latest CBS News poll in which 33% responded the war in Iraq was “worth it” and 62% said it was “not worth it.” As you can see, however, the CBS numbers are by far the worst of the entire batch of polls - which is no doubt why Murtha chose to cite them. Ironically, the next question on the CBS survey asks the following: “Looking back, do you think the United States did the right thing in taking military action against Iraq, or should the U.S. have stayed out?” Forty-four percent said we did the right thing, 51% said we should have stayed out.

Congressman Murtha is free to spin the absurd notion of pulling out of Iraq as a simple “change of direction” as he did yesterday, but at least he could do it without misstatements and mischaracterizations.

Here We Go Again

Kim Jung Il is one sick, insane madman. He is racheting up the saber-rattling another notch with a new missile that is capable of reaching the US. Japan is worried and has already issued a warning about any missile overflight. The NOKO’s also reportedly have nukes. It’s enough to make you tear your hair out.

All Kim wants is a payoff of some form or another. He has starved his people to build these blackmail weapons and he thinks the Bush administration will cave in like the Clinton administration did. That’s the problem with asshats like Kim. As soon as you pay them off once you establish a precedent and only encourage them to scream for more. This is Clinton’s “legacy” and we’ll be paying for it for a long time ....

North Koreans Said to Be Near a Missile Test
_{June 19, 2006}

WASHINGTON — North Korea appears to have completed fueling a long-range ballistic missile, American officials said Sunday, a move that greatly increases the probability that it will go ahead with its first important test launching in eight years. A senior American official said that intelligence from satellite photographs suggested that booster rockets had been loaded onto a launching pad, and liquid-fuel tanks fitted to a missile at a site on North Korea’s remote east coast.

While there have been steady reports in recent days about preparations for a test, fueling is regarded as a critical step as well as a probable bellwether of North Korea’s intentions. Siphoning the liquid fuel out of a missile is a complex undertaking. “Yes, looks like all systems are ‘go’ and fueling appears to be done,” said the official who discussed the matter only after being promised anonymity because he was addressing delicate diplomatic and intelligence issues. A second senior official, who declined to speak on the record for similar reasons, also indicated that the United States believed the missile had been fueled.

A launching would be a milestone in the North’s missile capacity and effectively scrap a moratorium on such tests declared by the North Koreans after their last test in 1998. Moreover, a launching would have enormous importance for American security because it would be North Korea’s first flight test of a new long-range missile that might eventually have the capacity to strike the United States.

- More on the story at the NY Times...

As if the missile test launch isn’t enough, Dear Leader is also threatening Armageddon and “wipe out US troops” and blah-blah-blah. I say we give the go-ahead to a few of those sub commanders just off the Korean coast. Kim has already laid waste the entire country with his sadistic methods. Nuking it will be a mercy killing. Besides, it will certainly quieten things down on the Korean peninsula for a long time ...

North Korea Threatens To ‘Wipe Out’ US Forces
_{6/19/2006 4:48:50}

PYONGYANG—North Korea yesterday threatened to “mercilessly wipe out” US forces in case of war during a national meeting to mark leader Kim Jong-Il’s 42 years’ work at the ruling party. The threat, in a ruling party report carried by the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), came as North Korea was reportedly preparing to test-fire a long-range missile despite strong protests from the United States and its allies.

Choe Thae Bok, a ranking Workers’ Party official, said Washington was “hell-bent on provocations of war of aggression” in the report to mark the 42nd anniversary of Kim’s start at the party, KCNA said. “If the enemies ignite a war eventually, the Korean army and people will mercilessly wipe out the aggressors and give vent to the deep-rooted grudge of the nation,” Choe was quoted as telling the meeting.

South Korea, which seeks to reconcile with N Korea after decades of hostility since the 1950-1953 Korean War, has urged Pyongyang to abandon any plans to test-fire the missile. But South Korea maintained its usual level of military alert yesterday despite the news reports about an imminent missile test launch. “The military is on the same level of alert as usual. There has been no upgrade in the military alert yet,” a defence ministry spokesman said.

- More insane saber-rattling here...

Know When To Fold ‘Em

_{Eric Devericks - The Seattle Times (WA)}

Beginning June 7, place a bet online in the state of Washington and you could receive the same sentence as a child molester.  Play poker online, you are in as much trouble as a repeat drunk driving offender. While this may sound like something out of a really unbelievable science fiction film, you might be shocked to realize we are talking reality here.

Effective June 7 it becomes a Class C felony to play poker online in the state of Washington.  Players will face a possible five-year sentence and/or a $10,000 fine and/or share a jail cell with Peter the Sex Perv.  That’s because the new law will put violators in the same category as child pornographers, repeat drunk drivers, drug dealers and identity thieves. Governor Christine Gregoire signed the bill into law in late March.  The bill covers all forms of online wagering including sports betting and internet poker.

Washington State isn’t exactly all about anti-gambling. Within its borders are 24 tribal casinos and 94 “house bank” cardrooms, which offer so-called “legalized poker”.

   Sunday - June 18, 2006

Net Neutrality

I have not been faced with such an odious choice since the Sixth Grade when I was faced with two ugly girls who both had crushes on me. This was long before I got old, overweight, long in the tooth and slightly gray-haired. I hope they both found husbands worthy of their devotion. Nevertheless, I am faced with a similar choice today and the two gals are extremely ugly ... in fact they’re both FUGLY. I’m referring to the current kerfuffle over “Net Neutrality”.

First, let me introduce the two “gals”. On one side we have Google, Microsoft, Yahoo, eBay, Disney, Amazon, and Apple. This group is known as the CBUI (Coalition of Broadband Users and Innovators). On the other side we have the Bell telephone companies, AT&T, Verizon, Comcast, Charter and all the major access providers. I shall refer to them heretofore as the APG (Access Providers Group).

Second, let me explain in simple terms what the two “gals” really want.

• The CBUI group wants “net neutrality” as they call it. This is a term that is confusing to a lot of people so The Skipper will try to explain it for you. The term is used to describe a socialist approach to the internet - one for all and all for one. Everybody has equal access to everything. The internet should be non-discriminatory and everyone gets an equal slice of the bandwidth pie. All internet packets are equal and no one should have to pay more for a particular type of content. The CBUI wants to keep the internet “neutral” by (are you ready for this?) getting Congress to pass laws regulating and mandating this one size fits all approach.


• The Access Providers Group is crying “foul” and saying that we need a more capitalistic approach to the internet. They want to charge different prices for different content being pushed across the pipes - and they want Congress to mind its own business and stay out of the internet. They say they need to be able to charge more for things like streaming video, high-definition movies and other similar content from companies like ... you guessed it ... the CBUI group. The APG says they need to let the internet function as a free market so they can offer different pricing models and can thereby afford to upgrade their pipes. The charges would be mainly paid by the content providers in the CBUI, thus their resistance.

Now, you may be asking yourself what this means to you. Let me add a little more background information first. Currently, even though we invented the darned internet ...

… the United States is 16th in the world in broadband use (behind Liechtenstein!) with East Timor catching up fast. The French may burn Citroëns, but they get 10 megabits for 10 euros--50 times your “fast” Internet access for half the price. That’s just not right.[1]

What the CBUI really fears though is that the APG folks will deny access to certain providers or just limit certain content, thereby depriving them of unfettered access to your home computer. The problem I have with this “fear” is that it just won’t wash in a free market. If Charter refuses to give me access to Disney’s latest movies, I’ll drop them like a hot potato and sign up with another access provider. That’s how a free market really works - we have a choice.

Consumers will consider some restrictions, such as a prohibition on the release of viruses on a broadband network, trivial and entirely acceptable. Other restrictions, such as a restriction on access to the website of a competitor or a specific advertiser, will be considered an intolerable restraint by many. But the important question here is whether any of this should be considered illegal discrimination and prohibited by law.

Must regulators adopt regulations governing the underlying infrastructure of broadband networks or the overall architecture of the Internet to ensure that “openness,” “neutrality,” and the “end-to-end” character of the Internet are preserved? And what would the impact of such regulations be in terms of the economic incentives for current and future broadband operators to innovate and invest in expensive new networks? Do the property rights of network owners come into play here? Do high-tech network operators even have property rights in this case?[2]

Are you sufficiently confused yet? I’ve worked in Information Technology for twenty-five years and have watched the network grow from ARPANET to the INTERNET (and Al Gore had absolutely nothing to do with it). My access speeds have gone from 300 bps to 3Mbps (bps - bits per second for those of you who aren’t geeks). Prices have gone down considerably. In 1982, I was paying Compuserve $6.95 per hour for a 300 bps dial-up connection - today I pay Charter Communications $43.00 per month for 3Mbps broadband.

So where does that leave us? Well, all I can do is give you my opinion. Personally, I’ll take the ugly APG “gal”. I have many reasons for taking their side in this: (1) the CBUI wants government to regulate “net neutrality” and I don’t like the government sticking its nose in business any more than it absolutely has to; (2) I believe the free market will keep the APG folks under control like it has done for the last twenty years as evidenced by the steep drop in access prices quoted above; (3) finally, the deciding factor for me is the fact that MOVEON.ORG is backing the CBUI group. So there! Here are links to the two opposing sides if you want more information ....

• The Access Providers: Hands Off The Internet website. (also see ad in right sidebar)


• The CBUI Official Web site.

References:

[1] The Weekly Standard: “Give Me Bandwidth”

[2] The Cato Institute: “Net Neutrality” - Digital Discrimination or Regulatory Gamesmanship in Cyberspace?

On This Day In History

Paul McCartney Turns 64

James Paul McCartney was born to a working class family on 18 June, 1942, at Walton Hospital in Liverpool. His mother, Mary, had been a nursing sister at the hospital, and was given a bed in a private room for the birth. Sir Paul was baptised as a Roman Catholic, his mother’s faith, but religion did not play a strong part in his upbringing.

His father, Jim, was a gifted musician who played with a jazz band in the evening while holding down a day job as a cotton salesman. Both Sir Paul and his younger brother Michael received piano lessons during their early years, but neither kept up the instrument. The McCartneys moved several times during Sir Paul’s early life, but eventually settled in a terraced house in Liverpool’s Forthlin Road in 1955.

Just one year later, the family was struck by tragedy when Sir Paul’s mother died of breast cancer, aged 47. Her death had a huge impact on Sir Paul. He referred to her in the lyrics of Let It Be, singing: “When I find myself in times of trouble, mother Mary comes to me”. Soon after she passed away, Sir Paul asked his father to buy him a guitar, and the young musician learnt to play by imitating American R&B hits he heard on the radio.

In October 1957, Sir Paul auditioned for John Lennon’s band, The Quarrymen, at a church fair and was asked to join as the group’s third guitarist. The pair began writing songs together and several of their earliest hits were composed in the house on Forthlin Road, including Love Me Do and I Saw Her Standing There. It was also about this time that Sir Paul wrote When I’m 64, and the band are reported to have played it early concerts.

After decamping to West Germany to play a residency in the Indra Club in Hamburg, the band - now rechristened The Beatles - returned to Liverpool in 1960. It was at a gig in the Cavern nightclub that they were seen by Brian Epstein, who offered to become their manager. Epstein secured The Beatles an audition with Decca on New Year’s Day 1962, but the record company decided not to offer the band a contract.

However, the manager eventually persuaded producer George Martin to sign the group to Parlophone Records in May 1962. Beatlemania was not long coming. The group’s first single, Love Me Do, reached number four in October, and by August 1963 they spent seven weeks on top of the charts with She Loves You. By then, The Beatles were household names, with Sir Paul as the band’s main pin-up.

The rest, as they say, is history. Happy 64th Birthday, Sir Paul!

_{Biography Text Courtesy BBC: “The Seven Ages Of Paul McCartney”}

Father’s Day

_{Pat Bagley - Salt Lake Tribune}

   Saturday - June 17, 2006

Quote Of The Week

“A lot of pandering started going on, and you’d see soldiers and the American flag in every video. It became a sickening display of ultra-patriotism.

The entire country may disagree with me, but I don’t understand the necessity for patriotism.

Why do you have to be a patriot? About what? This land is our land? Why? You can like where you live and like your life, but as for loving the whole country… I don’t see why people care about patriotism.”

-- Natalie Maines of the Dixis Chicks, London - June 15, 2006

World Cup Update

Today is “WHUP THE WOPS” Day in World Cup play. The United States goes up against the Eye-ties who are heavy favorites. If the US loses, they’re out and Italy goes on to the next round. Ain’t going to happen, I says.

USA! USA! USA! USA! USA!

If you’re planning on winning in this heathen game the Euro-Peons play then you gotta play it like they play it - down and dirty, mean and nasty. Spain’s Luis Garcia (below right) demonstrates his famous “Nutcracker” move against some Ukraine player who is obviously in a great deal of pain and is probably screaming in agony, “Take the ball! No, not that ball!”. Now, that’s what I’m talking about, Team USA! Get out there and crack some dago nuts this afternoon. ABC coverage begins at 2:30pm ET.



Update I: Ghana beat the crap out of the Czechs so Group E is still in play even if the USA loses today.

Update II: The wops scored two goals in the first half. One for them and one for us. Stoopid wops! Halftime score: 1-1.

Update III: Tie .... 1-1. The worst referee in the world cut the US to nine men but they held on. Next stop: Ghana, on Thursday.

Mexican Election Nonsense

HA! You just thought politics and elections in America were weird. Wait until you see what’s going on “South Of The Border”. National elections are coming up in a few weeks and Mexican candidates are trying to raise the bar in the prestigious Howard Dean Political Insanity Contest.

Voodoo dolls, wild turkeys, peeing in their pants ....? All the more reason why we need to keep the MESS-cans out of America. We’ve already got our quota of political weirdos on the Left and in the Liberal madhouses in Kalifornicatia and Taxatwoshits.

Key quote in the story below: “he told supporters his rivals came to eat pigeon, but what they got was a fighting cock.” Aye, Caramba!

Hot Air, Wet Pants Spice Up Election Race
_{Fri Jun 16, 10:25 AM ET}

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - A squawking wild turkey as president, voodoo, a dancing grandpa pharmacist and a nervous criminal urinating in his pants on television—welcome to Mexico’s election race, as wacky as it is vitriolic. Full of colorful insults, blaring pop songs and nonsensical sparring, the campaign for the July 2 election has been based as much on personalities and petty point-scoring as policies.

Sick of weeks of mudslinging and silliness, voters have been sticking pins in voodoo dolls of the candidates, and the Federal Election Institute has axed some political ads as too slanderous to be aired. “It’s a very basic, very crude, very coarse, very clumsy election campaign,” commentator Guadalupe Loaeza told Reuters.

The battle for the presidency is the first since 71 years of one-party rule ended in 2000 and fierce competition between the three main parties has sparked flaming tensions. Probably the oddest campaign moment yet is a TV ad by third-place candidate Roberto Madrazo showing a criminal wetting his pants out of fear for Madrazo’s tough stance on crime.

“For me, it’s lacking in creativity. Vulgar. It’s resorting to something very childish,” said Loaeza. Among outlawed ads are spots by conservative Felipe Calderon calling his leftist arch-rival Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador a danger and linking him to Venezuela’s fiery leader Hugo Chavez. Calderon, a balding lawyer whose hairline is inked in on his campaign posters, is in a neck-and-neck race with Lopez Obrador, a crusader for the poor who dons floral garlands and tropical-style guayabera shirts.

In their latest spat, Lopez Obrador sent Calderon’s campaign office huge cardboard boxes he said contained documents proving Calderon awarded his brother-in-law lucrative contracts when energy minister. But Calderon said the boxes were a farce, empty but for a few meaningless papers. He said his rival was a liar, called him “Lopez Hablador” (Lopez Talker) and his aides “clowns.” Rhetoric has been harsh, reflecting a nation split between left and right that is still learning some of the rules of democracy.

“If the players persist in just insulting each other, they may win the contest but could not lead the country,” wrote columnist Javier Oliva in daily La Jornada. Lopez Obrador has laid into President Vicente Fox, who he says is illegally helping Calderon, dubbing him a “chachalaca”—a wild turkey known for its piercing squawk. “He acts like a chachalaca, he screeches like a chachalaca,” the leftist said, also accusing Fox of “verbal incontinence.”

Keeping with the bird theme, he told supporters after a heated election debate last week that his rivals “came to eat pigeon, but what they got was a fighting cock.” Amid all the madness, frustrated voters have lobbed plastic bottles, paper airplanes and inflated condoms at candidates and even offered one, Patricia Mercado, a puff of marijuana. Some of the most colorful campaigners cannot legally run because no political party will back them.

They include oddball magnate Victor Gonzalez, who has adopted the persona of his pharmacy chain’s rotund and grandfatherly mascot, “Dr Simi,” with fluffy white hair and mustache. Claiming more Mexican fans than Mickey Mouse, and fond of models in mini-skirts, Gonzalez hires people to wear spongy Dr Simi costumes and dance outside his pharmacies.

“I have money but I earned it honestly. I have women but I am single. The people love these things,” he said recently. Also seeking support is Zapatista rebel leader Subcomandante Marcos, who gave his first live TV interview in years in his trademark ski mask and smoking his pipe to call for the overthrow of the government, whoever wins.

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Not that very many people ever read this far down, but this blog was the creation of Allan Kelly and his friend Vilmar. Vilmar moved on to his own blog some time ago, and Allan ran this place alone until his sudden and unexpected death partway through 2006. We all miss him. A lot. Even though he is gone this site will always still be more than a little bit his. We who are left to carry on the BMEWS tradition owe him a great debt of gratitude, and we hope to be able to pay that back by following his last advice to us all:

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It's been a long strange trip without you Skipper, but thanks for pointing us in the right direction and giving us a swift kick in the behind to get us going. Keep lookin' down on us, will ya? Thanks.

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