Ugh

Wed   16 Jan 2008   18:04 by Kevin McGehee 33° and "wintry mix" in Coweta County, GA 0 comments [War] [Get Offa My Lawn!] [Here's Your Sign] [Wackadoodle]

Other than noting that the case against him remains to be presented in a court of law, you will never see this blog defending anyone who’s thrown in with al Qaeda—regardless of which U.S. political party he may claim to identify with. A former congressman and delegate to the United Nations was indicted Wednesday as part of a terrorist fundraising ring that allegedly sent more than $130,000 to an al-Qaida and Taliban supporter who has threatened U.S. and international troops in Afghanistan. The former Republican congressman from Michigan, Mark Deli Siljander, was charged with money laundering, conspiracy and obstructing justice for allegedly lying about lobbying senators on behalf of an Islamic charity that authorities said was secretly sending funds to terrorists. A 42-count indictment, unsealed in U.S. District Court in Kansas City, Mo., accuses the Islamic American Relief Agency of paying Siljander $50,000 for the lobbying—money that turned out to be stolen from the U.S. Agency for International Development. Siljander, who served two terms in the U.S. House of Representatives, was appointed by President Reagan to serve as a U.S. delegate to the United Nations for one year in 1987. » Ex-Lawmaker Charged in Terror Conspiracy If they have evidence that he did in fact lobby the Senators, he is at the very least a slimeball and an idiot (for not vetting his client thoroughly, in light of 9/11). At worst… Do we still hang traitors? Update: FWIW, readers of this CQ post are raising questions about the indictment.

A Year? Try Four Months
Mon   31 Dec 2007   11:13 by Kevin McGehee 39° and fog in Coweta County, GA 3 comments [Get Offa My Lawn!] [Here's Your Sign]	Admittedly, he hasn’t actually decided to run… Buoyed by the still unsettled field, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg is growing increasingly enchanted with the idea of an independent presidential bid, and his aides are aggressively laying the groundwork for him to run. » Bloomberg Moves Closer to Running for President But when he does, I told you so last August.

Just the Finger for Our Nuclear Button

Fri   28 Dec 2007   12:22 by Kevin McGehee 54° and rain in Chattanooga, TN 0 comments [Get Offa My Lawn!] [Here's Your Sign] [Media Ochre]

If I were to call Mike Huckabee a jackass, the Jackass Anti-Defamation League would have a case against me. Republican Mike Huckabee took his presidential campaign for a quick pheasant-hunting expedition in Iowa on Wednesday, and at one point, a reporter asked why he hadn’t invited sporting enthusiast Dick Cheney along. “Because I want to survive all the way through this,“ Huckabee replied, in a chuckling dig at the vice president’s accidental shooting of a quail-hunting partner last year. Any good sportsman, though, couldn’t miss a distinctly Cheneyesque moment in the press accounts of the former Arkansas governor’s morning hunt: At one point, Huckabee’s party turned toward a cluster of reporters and cameramen and, when they kicked up a pheasant, fired shotgun blasts over the group’s heads. This, friends, is dangerously bad hunting form. » Huckabee’s muzzle control problem To put it mildly. Compared to that stunt, Hillary’s frosty press relations look like a torrid love affair. But wait, there’s more: One of the leading proponents of Reaganomics these days is an outfit calling itself “The Club for Growth.“ Founded by supporters of Reagan’s supply-side economics, Reaganites one and all, the group is currently headed by former Pennsylvania Congressman Pat Toomey, the conservative who came within an eyelash of upending liberal Republican Senator Arlen Specter in the 2004 Pennsylvania senatorial primary. The Club is famous for delving into the records of GOP candidates for not just the presidency but other offices as well, carefully combing the fine print of their speeches, programs and votes as office-holder or candidate and matching them to the Reagan ideal. Mike Huckabee, it seems, has supported any number of taxes while governor, and the Club has inevitably zeroed in on his economic beliefs. What disconcerts is Huckabee’s gut level response. Instead of either defending his record or admitting to a mistake or challenging the views of the Club he said this: “The Club for Greed, I call them. They hate that. Oh, they hate it. And I enjoy giggin’ them about it…“ Hello? Is the Republican Party seriously considering nominating a candidate whose instinctive response to criticism from Reaganites is to use the favorite code word of Reagan’s enemies? » Huckabee Attacking Reaganomics I’m drifting ever closer to putting the Huckster in the same “Republicans I would never vote for” category as Ted Stevens and John McCain.

Awww, Jeez!

Fri   21 Dec 2007   14:57 by Kevin McGehee 48° and cloudy in Coweta County, GA 4 comments [Get Offa My Lawn!] [Here's Your Sign]

There’s a particular kind of idiot roaming our world, the kind that concludes, based on one exception to the generally accepted set of facts in any given case, that the exception is correct and everything else is mistaken. He points to a spot north of the border, in the upcountry of the southeastern United States. In type so small many people would need a magnifying glass to read it, there’s a city in North Georgia called not Atlanta, but Atalanta. He cocks an eyebrow. “I don’t think that was a mistake.“ » Historic map raises questions about the naming of Atlanta ... or is it Atalanta? What? Against all of the maps that showed the name as Atlanta—including multiple examples contemporary to the foreign-made one he’s showing off—he’s going to believe ONE map made by Spanish-speakers who had never even been to the damned place? At least the article doesn’t suggest he thinks the “Atlanta” spelling is some kind of sinister conspiracy. Probably just an oversight.

It All Depends on What the Meaning of ‘Attack’ Is

Wed   19 Dec 2007   9:10 by Kevin McGehee 39° and cloudy in Coweta County, GA 2 comments [Here's Your Sign]

When Howard Dean complained recently about Republicans overheating the immigration debate, his top piece of evidence was their use of “outrageous phrases like ‘illegal aliens.‘“ But the chairman of the Democratic National Committee might have turned his anger on his own party, including Sen. Barack Obama, who used the phrase twice in the Democrats’ CNN debate last month. [...] Stacie Paxton, a spokeswoman for Mr. Dean, said the difference is Democrats don’t mean to use the phrase as an attack. » Semantics of immigration have candidates on guard Good old Howlin’ Howard. I see that he’s managed to infect the entire DNC staff.

Tar, Feathers, Rail.

Mon   17 Dec 2007   15:31 by Kevin McGehee 47° and fair in Coweta County, GA 0 comments [Here's Your Sign]

The Daily Princetonian: Francisco Nava ‘09 has admitted to fabricating an alleged assault on him that he said occurred Friday evening and to sending threatening emails to himself, other members of the Anscombe Society and prominent conservative politics professor Robert George, today while being interviewed by Princeton Township Police. “He fabricated the story,“ Det. Sgt. Ernie Silagyi said. » Nava ‘09 admits to fabricating assault, threatening e-mails Could he possibly have believed he could get away with this? How many times have people on the other side of the political divide pulled crap like this and gotten caught? (If you don’t know the answer—which is plenty—you haven’t been paying attention.)

They Can’t Blame Republicans Anymore?

Thu   13 Dec 2007   11:56 by Kevin McGehee 72° and partly cloudy in Coweta County, GA 0 comments [Here's Your Sign]

When Democrats took control of Congress in January, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) pledged to jointly push an ambitious agenda to counter 12 years of Republican control. Now, as Congress struggles to adjourn for Christmas, relations between House Democrats and their colleagues in the Senate have devolved into finger-pointing. House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Charles B. Rangel (D-N.Y.) accuses Senate Democratic leaders of developing “Stockholm syndrome,“ showing sympathy to their Republican captors by caving in on legislation to provide middle-class tax cuts paid for with tax increases on the super-rich, tying war funding to troop withdrawal timelines, and mandating renewable energy quotas. If Republicans want to filibuster a bill, Rangel said, Reid should keep the bill on the Senate floor and force the Republicans to talk it to death. Reid, in turn, has taken to the Senate floor to criticize what he called the speaker’s “iron hand” style of governance. Democrats in each chamber are now blaming their colleagues in the other for the mess in which they find themselves. The predicament caused the majority party yesterday surrender to President Bush on domestic spending levels, drop a cherished renewable-energy mandate and move toward leaving a raft of high-profile legislation, from addressing the mortgage crisis to providing middle-class tax relief, undone or incomplete. “If there’s going to be a filibuster, let’s hear the damn filibuster,“ Rangel fumed. “Let’s fight this damned thing out.“ » Democrats Blaming Each Other For Failures 2006 wasn’t such a bad thing after all—now even the Democrats realize the reason why they’d lost control of Congress in 1994 wasn’t Republican dirty tricks, it was their own incompetence and dishonesty.

Darwin Award Nominees, another ongoing series

Thu   6 Dec 2007   11:43 by Kevin McGehee 48° and partly cloudy in Coweta County, GA 0 comments [Our Times] [Here's Your Sign]

A pedestrian apparently absorbed in a cell phone call was struck and killed by an Amtrak train in San Leandro today after he walked around a lowered crossing gate and onto the tracks, authorities said. [...] Crew members aboard the Sacramento-bound train told authorities they saw the victim talking on the cell phone before he was struck, Graham said. The warning lights and gates at the crossing were functioning properly, she added. » Man talking on cell phone killed by train in San Leandro I’m sad for his family and friends—especially for whoever he was on the phone with—but, seriously…

Another Darwin Award Nominee

Tue   13 Nov 2007   17:14 by Kevin McGehee 73° and mostly cloudy in Coweta County, GA 0 comments [Yee-haw!] [Here's Your Sign]

A Florida man police said was breaking into cars at Miccosukee Resort and Gaming was attacked and killed by a 9-foot alligator while trying to run from police. Investigators said officers responded to reports of car break-ins at a Miccosukee Indian Reservation parking lot located at 500 S.W. 177th Ave. in Miami. One of the men was quickly captured by officers during the incident last week but the other robbery suspect tried to elude officer by jumping into a large pond behind the facility, according to a WJXT-TV report. During the swim, police said, an alligator attacked and killed the man. He was apparently bitten on the head several times. The victim’s body was recovered at the bottom of the pond about a day after the reported break-ins. » Fleeing Robbery Suspect Eaten By Alligator Sad story—the alligator died too. H/t Dan Collins.

Stupid Cop Tricks—an Ongoing Series

Fri   9 Nov 2007   8:10 by Kevin McGehee 28° and sunny in Coweta County, GA 0 comments [Here's Your Sign]

Southbound traffic on I-75 was clogged for more than five miles and exit ramps were blocked as police walked from car to car, searching for a bank robber who traded a demand note for cash at a Wachovia Bank branch near Smyrna on Thursday afternoon. The robber never showed a gun and officials weren’t saying how much money he grabbed. But there in the bag was a GPS transmitter that allowed lawmen to track him to the interstate. Police shut the southbound lanes of I-75 near Moore’s Mill Road in Fulton County while they searched car-to-car. The tedious exercise didn’t turn up the suspect but it rankled motorists—some of whom questioned the Cobb police department’s decision to halt traffic on a major Atlanta freeway. » Bank robber search stops rush hour in its tracks Apparently they never heard the saying about looking for a needle in a haystack. Update, Tuesday morning: The suspect has turned himself in. I wonder if his grandparents shamed him over how, if he hadn’t robbed that bank, all those commuters wouldn’t have been inconvenienced.

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