
On the bright side, during low season this could double as a car barn for the B&O Railroad.
...Virtue, morality, and religion. This is the armor, my friend, and this alone that renders us invincible. These are the tactics we should study. If we lose these, we are conquered, fallen indeed... Patrick Henry (1736-1799) US Founding Father
Mondale: Clinton best-suited for presidency
Hillary Clinton is not only the Democrat most likely to win the 2008 presidential election, but the candidate with the best chance of bringing about real change, according to former Vice President Walter Mondale, who endorsed Clinton Sunday in Iowa.
Thinking about Oscar Biscet
As I said in a recent column, conservatives are down on President Bush,
blaming him for everything under the sun, picking at him. Sure, he’s made
mistakes. But he also has greatness in him. And this was a great act. In
bestowing the Presidential Medal of Freedom on Oscar Biscet — an
all-but-forgotten and all-but-helpless man in a Cuban dungeon — George Bush has done an incredibly large-hearted and important thing.
The Word "Racist" Is Racist
FIRE lifted one of these rocks by exposing a thought control program imposed in the dormitories at University of Delaware. As part of "Life Diversity Facilitation
Training," RAs are force-fed definitions like this:
A RACIST: A racist is one who is both privileged and socialized on
the basis of race by a white supremacist (racist) system. The term applies to
all white people (i.e., people of European descent) living in the United States,
regardless of class, gender, religion, culture or sexuality. By this definition,
people of color cannot be racists, because as peoples within the U.S. system,
they do not have the power to back up their prejudices, hostilities, or acts of
discrimination.
...
The word "racist," as used by liberals, is nothing more than a racial
epithet employed to denigrate Caucasians.
It is directly analogous to the word "nigger."


Senators warn Bush has no authority on Iran
Thirty US senators wrote to President George W. Bush
Thursday, warning he had no authority to launch military action
against Iran, and expressing concern about the administration's
"provocative" rhetoric.
The senators, 29 Democrats and one independent, urged the
resolution of disputes with the Islamic Republic through diplomacy.
"We wish to emphasize that no congressional authority exists for
unilateral military action against Iran," the letter signed by senators
including presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Joseph Biden said.
The letter warned that a resolution passed by the Senate in
September, calling for the designation of Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps as a terrorist group, should not be used as a pretext for war.
It hit out at "provocative statements and actions" by the administration on Iran, after Bush last month warned Tehran must be barred from nuclear weapons to avoid the prospect of "World War III."
"These comments are counterproductive and undermine efforts to
resolve tensions with Iran through diplomacy," the letter, coordinated by
Virginia Senator Jim Webb, said.
Republican Senator Chuck Hagel, a fierce critic of the
administration's policies, sent his own letter this week to Bush, reportedly
calling on him to open direct talks with Tehran.
His staff confirmed the letter had been sent, but declined to
release a copy.
Creator(s):Turner, A. A. (Austin Augustus), ca. 1831-1866 -- PhotographerEven Pelosi is disappointed in Congress
Hours after touting the Democratic-controlled Congress' achievements at
a ceremony on the Capitol steps Thursday, Pelosi confessed that she would give
the legislative body low marks if a pollster asked her.
...
Not surprisingly, Pelosi said President Bush and his Republican allies
are mostly to blame. She noted that Bush has vetoed Democratic-led efforts to
wind down the war, expand a children's health program and broaden stem cell
research.
The brokenhearted father of a Marine killed in Iraq won a long-shot
legal fight today after a federal jury in Baltimore awarded him nearly $11
million in a verdict against members of a Kansas church who hoisted anti-gay
placards at his son’s Westminster funeral.
The jury’s announcement 24 hours after deliberations first began
was met with tears and hugs from the family and supporters of Lance Cpl. Matthew
Snyder, whose March 2006 funeral was protested by members of the Westboro
Baptist Church with signs including “Thank God for dead soldiers.”
Snyder’s father, Albert, won on every count of his complaint, as
well as $2.9 million for compensatory damages and $8 million for punitive
damages.
Marx's erupting skin may have influenced writings
Karl Marx, who complained of excruciating boils, actually suffered
from a chronic skin disease with known psychological effects that may well have
influenced his writings, a British expert said on Tuesday.
Sam Shuster, professor of dermatology at the University of East
Anglia, believes the revolutionary thinker had hidradenitis suppurativa (HS) in
which the apocrine sweat glands -- found mainly in the armpits and groin --
become blocked and inflamed.
"In addition to reducing his ability to work, which contributed to
his depressing poverty, hidradenitis greatly reduced his self-esteem," said
Shuster, who published his findings in the British Journal of
Dermatology.
"This explains his self-loathing and alienation, a response
reflected by the alienation Marx developed in his writing."
While HS is linked to boil-like lumps, the painful condition also
causes more widespread infection, swelling, skin thickening and
scarring.
It could also explain a number of Marx's other complaints, not
previously linked, such as joint pain and a painful eye condition which often
stopped him working.
Shuster based his diagnosis on an analysis of Marx's extensive
correspondence, in which he wrote to friends about his health and described his
skin lesions as "curs" and "swine."
"The bourgeoisie will remember my carbuncles until their dying
day," Marx told Friedrich Engels in a letter from 1867.
Marx, who died in 1883, was one of the most influential
philosophers of the 19th century and his radical writings formed the basis of
modern communism.
U.S. diplomats vent over forced Iraq duty
Several hundred U.S. diplomats vented anger and frustration Wednesday
about the State Department's decision to force foreign service officers to take
jobs in Iraq, with some likening it to a "potential death sentence."
...
"It's one thing if someone believes in what's going on over there and
volunteers, but it's another thing to send someone over there on a forced assignment," Croddy said. "I'm sorry, but basically that's a potential death sentence and you know it. Who will raise our children if we are dead or
seriously wounded?"
His remarks were met with loud and sustained applause from the
approximately 300 diplomats at the meeting. (emp. mine)
Kucinich: Time to question Bush's mental health
Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D. Ohio) suggested today that President Bush's
comment about a nuclear Iran precipitating "World War III" is a sign of mental
instability.
"I seriously believe we have to start asking questions about his mental
health,"
...
"There's a lot of people who need care. He might be one of them. If
there isn't something wrong with him, then there's something wrong with us.
This, to me, is a very serious question."
Rep. Kucinich: "I'm from the universal-health-care wing of the Democratic
party. I'm from the Roe v. Wade-litmus-test wing of the Democratic party. I'm
from the abolish-the-death-penalty wing of the Democratic party ... I'm from the
gun-control wing of the Democratic party." (Tom Curry, "Kucinich Spices Up
The Race," MSNBC.com, 7/14/03)
Rep. Kucinich: "We prepare for war so grandly; let us prepare for peace
grandly by looking fearlessly and deep into the hearts of those who wish us
harm, and find that spark of recognition that connects us to a common humanity
and from that draw a flicker of hope to enkindle the warm glow of peace." (Rep.
Dennis Kucinich, Congressional Record, 7/20/06, p. H5494)
Democratic presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich has seen a UFO,
writes Shirley MacLaine in her new book, "Sage-Ing While Age-Ing."
Kucinich, she writes on page143-144 of the book, "had a close sighting
over my home in Graham, Washington, when I lived there. Dennis found his
encounter extremely moving. The smell of roses drew him out to my balcony where, when he looked up, he saw a gigantic triangular craft, silent, and observing him. It hovered, soundless, for ten minutes or so, and sped away with a speed he
couldn't comprehend. He said he felt a connection in his heart and heard
directions in his mind."