More than half of Iraqi localities will be generally managing their own security and government by the end of the year, a senior general at the Pentagon predicted Monday. But Iraq's new military and police forces remain short on the training and equipment the Americans say they need to keep the entire country secure, according to figures provided by the military.

A recent review by American and Iraqi officials has led to a decision to increase the size of the Iraqi police and border patrol, but many of the new officers have yet to be recruited, trained or equipped.

Still, generals believe that more than half of Iraq - in terms of land area as well as population - will be under what the Pentagon calls "local control" - defined as a locality assuming management over its own security and government, with limited or no oversight from U.S. forces. Only places that are deemed both fairly safe and sufficiently rebuilt will be turned over to Iraqi authorities.

Secretary of State Colin L. Powell and Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld have raised sharp complaints in recent days that Iran is providing support for the insurgency in Iraq, expressing concerns over what they say are Iran's attempt to shape Iraq's future.

Pentagon, State Department and military officials, describing intelligence reports that are fueling those concerns, say money, weapons and even a small number of fighters are flowing over the border from Iran to assist Shiite insurgents commanded by Moktada al-Sadr, a rebel cleric. But there is no consensus on the exact scale of Iranian activities.

What liberal media?

Another gender gap has appeared, this time on a poll testing men's and women's knowledge of issues in the presidential campaign. On the eight-question quiz administered to 1,845 adults, men were more likely on every question to give the right answer.

The biggest gender gap was on the question asking which candidate supported moving American troops from Europe and South Korea to other places. Sixty percent of the men correctly identified President Bush, versus 43 percent of the women. There were also double-digit gaps on questions about Social Security and taxes.

The smallest gap, 54 percent versus 49 percent, was on a question asking which candidate wants to allow drugs to be imported from Canada (Senator John Kerry).

When people ask me why the Iranian people so hate the regime, I begin telling them stories like these, because no list of adjectives, no amount of statistics on social misery, child prostitution, unemployment, corruption of the elite, or drug addiction can convey the horror of this murderous tyranny. If a mullah is caught committing an act that would automatically lead to the death penalty for an ordinary citizen, the problem is "fixed" by a sex-change operation on his partner. But even the son of a counselor to the president can be "vanished" without any accountability.

Can you imagine these creatures with atomic bombs? And yet the U.N. issues yet another "deadline" for the end of November, the European Union preens itself on its avoidance of conflict, even with evil, the president speaks bravely but does nothing to support freedom in Iran, and his challenger lets it be known that, if elected, he will offer the mullahs the same misguided nuclear deal that has already failed in North Korea.

New Yorkers are at least four times as likely to be punched to death than to be killed with an assault-style rifle, unpublished state crime statistics show.

The eye-opening figures — obtained by The Post from the state Division of Criminal Justice Services — reveal that New Yorkers are also at least twice as likely to be clubbed to death than shot dead by an attacker wielding one of the semi-automatic rifles previously covered by a federal government ban that expired last week.

The most recent statewide statistics — murder-by-weapon-type figures from 2002 — also show that New Yorkers are at least five times as likely to be stabbed to death with a knife than they are to be shot with an assault rifle.

Of 893 murders committed two years ago, just 22 — or slightly over 2 percent — were carried out using some form of rifle, including assault-rifles, the figures show.

Go read Female Trouble.

I started to do excerpts but couldn't pull the essence without quoting nearly the whole article. However, I absolutely must post this quote:

Let’s start with “Heinz.” By retaining her dead husband’s name—there is no genteel way to put this—she is publicly, subliminally cuckolding Kerry with the power of another man—a dead Republican man, at that.

John Kerry's lead in New York is down to single digits. The Empire State, among the bluest of the Blue States from Election 2000, is still in the Kerry column for our Electoral College projections, but the raw numbers are stunning.

Confirming findings found in other recent polls, Rasmussen Reports shows John Kerry leading George Bush by merely five percentage points, 49% to 44%. Four years ago, Al Gore defeated Bush to carry New York by a 25 point margin. Our last New York survey found Kerry up by 19 points.

President Bush on Monday received the endorsement of New York's Conservative Party....

Such a move allowed Ronald Reagan to carry the state in 1980....

"I think we can give him 300,000 to 500,000 votes and hopefully do what we did in 1980 and provide the margin of victory," Long said.

Madhav Khandekar has been studying weather patterns for 47 years, mostly for Environment Canada, and his conclusion is that it's the perception that has changed. More people and global television mean that freak events are less likely to escape detection, and do more damage because of the higher value of what's in their path. The weather itself isn't getting any worse.

ABC News deserves praise for sticking the knife into CBS on this one. Now, ABC, please go find out if the F in the John F. Kerry campaign stands for FORGER.

Young said he dreams about combat every night, and his wounds remind him of what happened – especially on long runs or while doing pull-ups. The pain makes him wonder whether he should stay in the Marines when his hitch ends in December.

If he does leave, Young has a Purple Heart and a chunk of bullet cut out of his back for souvenirs. He has also been nominated for another award based on his actions that day, according to a Marine Corps spokesman.

Even if he gets out, and puts his degree in design engineering from Eastern Kentucky University to use, Young will never forget how he got to be a sniper, medic, ammunition supplier, weapons coach, and communications specialist – all on the same day.

Said Young: “I’d always wanted to be a Marine.”

Louisiana voters overwhelmingly approved a state constitutional amendment Saturday banning same-sex marriages and civil unions, one of up to 12 such measures on the ballot around the country this year.

With 99 percent of precincts reporting, the amendment was winning approval with 78 percent of the vote, and support for it was evident statewide. Only in New Orleans, home to a politically strong gay community, was the race relatively close, and even there the amendment was winning passage. Turnout statewide appeared to be about 27 percent of Louisiana's 2.8 million voters, somewhat low for a state election.

Christian conservatives had conducted an intense grassroots lobbying campaign for the amendment, which had been expected to pass easily. The civil rights group Forum for Equality had already promised legal action against it.

Attempts to fire up Broward County's black voters apparently failed last month with turnout sinking to its lowest of the past three primary elections in key minority precincts, according to a South Florida Sun-Sentinel analysis.

The desire among many conservative Cuban-Americans to sweep Martinez into office is likely to bring more middle-aged and elderly voters to the polls. That, in turn, is expected to shore up support for Bush, who in 2000 was supported by more than 80 percent of Cuban-American voters in Florida. Bush won the state by 537 votes.

"Having Mel Martinez out on the streets of Florida, trying to drum up votes, will definitely help President Bush in the eyes of older Cuban-American voters," said Miami pollster Sergio Bendixen.

The LA Times proclaims that Cheney's Draft Deferments Not Outside the Norm. Yes, this is a non-issue to most of the country so the LAT is only running it to appear "fair and balanced", but it's easy to imagine the howls of indignation that must have echoed in the offices and halls of the editorial offices as this one got approved.

Moveon.org is running yet another oh-my-god offensive ad "that includes the image of an American soldier sinking in desert sand as he tries to keep his rifle above his head." On Friday Bob Dole called the Kerry campaign to see if they would denounce the ad and ask Moveon.org to pull it, but there hasn't been any response just yet.

This kind of tactic cannot help but further alienate the veteran vote so it's no wonder that Kerry has been distancing himself from that tact lately. Yet incredibly, Kerry seems to have picked yet another really, really bad campaign strategy: the Iraq war is unwinnable and even though he plans to add 40,000 troops, none will be destined for Iraq because his only Iraq strategy will be to get us out as soon as possible:

Apart from a very few broad assertions, Kerry didn't offer evidence that we are in fact losing the war. Nor did he bother to explain a single thing he would do differently, now, on the ground in Iraq--because he's not interested in doing anything differently or better. He wants to get out.

Of course, this is only one part of Kerry's new shotgun approach to campaigning. He's also trying to paint Bush as a wimp and attacking his college experience of being a cheerleader. As if his campaign wasn't unfocused enough, Kerry is doing the "throw everything out and see if something sticks" approach to campaigning. (Pick a Message, Any Message urges the New York Times.)

Like the draft. That's right -- John Edwards and Max Cleland are both claiming that Bush will reinstate the draft. This is a preposterous notion and both Bush and Rumsfeld have said that they oppose it. In fact, Rumsfeld pioneered the all-volunteer army as a representive back in the 60s. Small wonder that Kerry is making scant progress in crucial states.

Turning to the "it's the economy, stupid" front, the market is starting to respond to the polls showing Bush is surging into the lead by surging with optimism:

The Bush tax cuts pushed down the income taxes on dividends from whatever your top tax rate was then to 15 percent. If George Bush wins the election, those cuts will remain. If John Kerry wins, he promises to roll back the tax reductions for people with an adjusted gross income of $200,000 or more. So perhaps all those polls showing Bush far ahead are a basic force behind the new optimism about the market.

NTU Policy Analyst Drew Johnson, who authored a study of nominee Kerry's plan, told the Washington Post that "despite Kerry's attempts to outflank Bush on the deficit issue and portray himself as the more fiscally responsible candidate, the data behind Kerry's rhetoric tell a different story. Enactment of Kerry's 'revised' spending agenda in its entirety would still mean higher taxes, a larger national debt, or both."

Speaking of Kerry messages, he's telling a new whopper on the campaign trail:

Until we reported it last month, John Kerry had frequently gone on the stump and exaggerated a New Hampshire woman’s story to make her health insurance situation appear worse than it really was. He has since stopped telling that fib. Alas, he found a new one.

At an August 27 event in Daly City, Calif., Kerry was introduced by a woman named Lori Guy. She said that after her employer cut her pay in 2000, she piled up huge credit card bills and was regularly charged late-payment fees. Kerry used her story to attack President Bush for not protecting the middle class. He then claimed he would prevent credit card companies from charging large fees.

Sad story. Except, the San Jose Mercury News interviewed Guy after the event. Her tale is not so sad after all. She told the paper that she is still with the same company, and after several raises makes more money than ever before. Since all of this happened within the span of the last four years, her real story is that during the Bush administration she went from being heavily in debt to being in the best finanical shape of her life. Funny that John Kerry never mentioned that.

The press, of course, will stay as partisan as ever but CBS seems determined to destroy whatever credibility mainstream media has in this country. But the stories they don't cover are just as important. Like the crying three-year-old who had a Bush sign ripped from her tiny hands:

Sophia broke into tears, and the image of the child resting on her father's shoulders with a torn Bush sign in her hands was caught in Associated Press photographs.

How about the unprovoked attack on a Bush supporter, caught on tape but not shown on national news. And did anyone see footage of the anti-Kerry rally in D.C. arranged for and attended by Vietnam-era veterans? How about reports of some of the good things that are happening in Iraq? (Like Iraqi Airways resuming flights for the first time in 14 years.)

The fringe press is a little different. Fox is finally picking up on the fact that Kerry might have violated the Uniform Code of Military Justice when he met with foriegn leaders while still a commissioned officer of the U.S. Navy. I won't hold my breath waiting to hear about this from Ra^ther's lips.

Finally, don't you just love this headline from a paper in Arizona: Kerry Comrade Stumps as Senator Trails in Polls. Not friend. Not colleague. "Comrade", with all the communist-loving, anti-American inuendo that comes with it. How terribly appropriate.

Cross posted to TN4W.

That's right, it seems that people that participate in the conversations over at FreeRepublic.com are both conservative and involved in the political process. Who knew?!

The LAT is rumored to be preparing to do some hard-hitting investigative journalism that will expose for the first time that posters to Democrat Underground are (1) liberals and (2) involved in the political process. What a coup that will be!

Back in the real world, the New York Post actually does investigative journalism (well, they quote PoliticalMoneyLine.com who actually did the investigation) and finds that Dan Ra^ther's news staff almost exclusively contributes to Democrats:

• CBS News-ers have donated $17,050 to federal candidates and political action committees since 1982. Of that amount:
  • $10,800 was for Democrats and the DNC
  • $3,500 went to Lenora Fulani's wacky New Alliance Party
  • Only $2,750 went to the GOP
• The biggest individual recipient was Fulani, who received $3,500 from a CBS News staffer back in the 1980s.
• The second highest was Sen. Hillary Clinton, who took in $2,250 from three CBS News employees.
• Among the CBS contributors:
  • The late Charles Kuralt, who gave $1,000 to Harvey Gantt for Senate in 1996
  • David Garfinkle of "60 Minutes," who gave $1,000 to Bill Bradley's presidential campaign
  • "60 Minutes" correspondent Steve Kroft, who gave $300 to Ham Fish, Jr.'s race for Congress in 1994.

So there you have both sides of the story: a private citizen that is a conservative that challenges the memos as obvious forgeries and a once-respected news organization that has a duty to report the news fairly yet employs only partisans of the liberal persuasions.

Where does the outrage belong?

An inventory of Kerry's mounting list of athletic malaprops includes:

• Kerry identifying Eddie Yost as his favorite Boston Red Sox player of all time when, in fact, Yost never played for the Red Sox.
• Kerry professing to being a big fan of Red Sox star Manny Ortez. The player does not exist. Kerry apparently merged the names of Sox outfielder Manny Ramirez and first baseman David Ortiz, whose combined skills admittedly would be impressive.
• Kerry ill-advisedly discussing the Buckeyes -- Ohio State University's team -- while in the territory of the archival Michigan Wolverines.
• Kerry misidentifying Lambeau Field in another battleground state, Wisconsin, as Lambert Field. He apparently erroneously believed the home of the Green Bay Packers was named after Steelers hall--of-fame linebacker Jack Lambert.

The miscue provided vice comedian Dick Cheney with some fresh material. Cheney quipped during a recent Wisconsin campaign stop that "next (Kerry) will think that (former Packers coach) Vince Lombardi is a foreign leader."

Of course, this gives us yet another reason not to like the flip-flopping French-speaking supercilious munster and two lawyers are taking advantage:

Two Washington-based lawyers supporting President Bush’s re-election have registered an advocacy group, Football Fans for Truth, as a Section 527 organization allowed to accept unlimited political donations. They plan to publicize Kerry’s recent sports misstatements such as his reference to the home of the Green Bay Packers as “Lambert Field” instead of Lambeau Field....

Lawyers Jeff Larroca and Dino Panagopoulos, both members of the law firm Ballard Spahr Andrews & Ingersoll, said in a conference call Wednesday they have no plans to raise large amounts of cash.

Instead, they hope to get free publicity from sports talk radio and other media.

Kerry is well aware that he has stumbled in the eyes of the American "regular Joe". His campaign staff, not wanting Kerry to go the way of Dan Ra^ther, is trying to deal with widespread criticism of their candidate from popular bloggers like Wizbang and Slings and Arrows.

So in an effort to appear more sports-minded, Kerry has had a soccer ball surgically attached to his head and vowed to keep it there throughout the campaign -- even during the debates.

Of course, when he issued his orders he thought that this was a football. His confusion probably comes from the fact that underneath the Brooks Brothers suits and superficial exterior he is, after all, French.

Hat tip to Blom Blog for the link to Football Fans for Truth.

Presidential hairdo: Madison Long, 6, of Rochester, Minnesota, is a young Bush supporter. She wore her hair braids in the shape of a "W" made by her mother using a bent clothes hanger for a campaign visit by US President George W. Bush.

Only three posts so far but it should be required by law to carry a blood-pressure alert warning message. Click through and you'll see what I mean.

Hat tip to Advised by Wolves.

Maj. Buczak spent the greater part of last year in Iraq and he had a message: this election is about leadership and there is only one man to vote for. His story tells why he feels that way.

Jeff graduated from West Point in 1987 and went on to a successful career in the elite forces. Airborne qualified and Ranger trained, Jeff served with an Airborne Infantry (paratrooper) unit in Panama and later commanded a company in the 101^st Airborne Air Assault Division. He finished his active career assigned to Special Operations Command.

The major related how proud he was to be in the service back when it accomplished good things, like removing Manuel Noriega from power in Panama and putting him a jail cell (where he still resides today) as part of Operation Just Cause.

But then something happened: there was a change in leadership under the new administration in the 90s and it affected the entire military machine, from the top down. Moral began to decline, equipment was no longer a priority: our fighting force was no longer operating at its peak efficiency.

The situation came to a head during the third undertaking in Somalia -- Operation Continue Hope. Although Maj. Buczak was not assigned there, his comrades did and the story they told was not one to be proud of: the mission was murky, our soldiers did not receive the equipment and supplies that they needed, but worst of all, our nose was bloodied and we ran. The bottom line was that those men died for absolutely nothing: their lives were thrown away. They fought bravely and well, but because of decisions made at the top of the chain their lives were wasted.

Military moral was seemingly irreparably damaged and continued to deteriorate. After a stint in Bosnia Jeff decided to end his active service and did so in '97, although he stayed in the reserves.

A little over a year ago he got a letter asking if he would return to active status. He threw it away. A while letter he got a call, asking the same question. Jeff had every excuse not to go -- he had gained 30 pounds, his wife had recently given birth to their second child, he had recently moved to Memphis and had a new job, he had a bum knee -- the list goes on. But he thought about it and came to the conclusion that the right thing to do would be to salute and charge up the hill. His country needed him and Maj. Buczak responded.

Predictably, Jeff was sent to Iraq. He was a Civil Affairs officer assigned to work with the 1^st Marine Division. Their mission was to perform reconstruction by restoring government and basic services in the region in and around Nasaria.

Jeff said that after the initial fighting in Nasaria, the mostly Shiite population welcomed them with open arms. He would go out with 2 Humvees and 8 or 9 people to visit the villages. When they pulled into town the local guards would pull out their AKs and voluntarily pull guard duty to protect them.

When the people were asked what they thought of the Americans being there they said they didn't like it -- but were terrified that we would leave. Americans were occupiers, but we brought order and stability that would disintegrate if we left.

After a time Jeff was transferred to Bakuba, a place where the Sunni, Shiite and Kurd sections of the country all come together. Even here, in this very troubled place, the average Iraqi felt the same way about the American presence. Others wanted to return to the way it used to be: these were mainly leftovers from the old regime who had lost their power and privileged status.

Every time a unit left the gate there was a possibility that something would happen. There were roadside bombs where a chunk of curb had been taken out, a mold made of the hole, a bomb fashioned to fit the hole, then the bomb was set and new concrete poured to hide it. This was a multi-stage process resulting in a IED that was almost impossible to detect. American patrols took losses.

Inside the compound it was different. There were occasional mortar attacks and drive-by shootings (only the drive-by was done with an RPG, Jeff said with a wry grin), but on the whole it was fairly safe.

Jeff spent some time talking about the Iraqi National Guard, which is made up of some of the toughest and bravest individuals on the planet. The major said that he would be willing to fight side-by-side these men (high praise coming from one of our military elite). These, he said, are true patriots. In spite of attacks on them as they wait in line to sign up or as they walk around town they continue to enlist. They are the same as patriots in this country -- willing to give their all to bring freedom to their country. After all, would you do any less if you had to fight for freedom in America? Why would they be any different, especially after two decades of brutal oppression under Saddam and his sons?

Do not believe that the Iraqi people do not want freedom: they thirst for freedom. The farmer just wants to be able to grow his crops, the goat herder just wants to raise his herd, the businessman just wants to send his kids to a good school. These people are not unlike us.

But the people that worked with the Americans were known in the town and had to go home every night to their neighborhoods. People get shot just because they work with Americans (Jeff personally knew an Iraqi woman who was shot in the face because she worked in the compound), yet they are willing to take that chance because they know they are working for something better -- a free Iraq.

It is true that they had more reliable electricity and water under Saddam, but they still say that things are better now. Ask them why and they will tell you, "Now we have hope."

Hope of a free Iraq. Hope of being prosperous like their neighbors in Kuwait. Hope of being free to live life without the fear of saying the wrong thing or being in the wrong place and suddenly earning Saddam's disfavor.

Jeff said that the amount of ordinance over there was "mind-boggling". But the discipline of our troops is amazing, even among truck drivers who rarely get to the range. We go to great lengths not to kill civilians -- but the Iraqi and foreign insurgents don't care.

But we are making a difference: the guys we train have a different attitude. Jeff related how he saw fistfight between an Iraqi army soldier (who we trained) and an Iraqi policeman (who we didn't train) because soldier thought that the cop was being too careless with his weapon.

We are teaching more than just procedure and tactics.

The American soldiers are incredible. Every day they put on their flak vests and go outside the compound on missions. It's Russian roulette, but they get out there and get it done.

Jeff told a story of one young American soldier who drove a Humvee on a particular logistics mission to pick up supplies from a nearby airfield. They asked for volunteers and she put her hand up. She was killed driving the truck that day; she was 19-years-old and she won't be going home. The next morning they said that anyone who didn't want to go out on a mission that day would be excused. No one stayed. "We're all going out," was the expressed sentiment. When they asked for a volunteer to drive on the next supply mission, all hands went up in the air.

The moral exhibited by these troops, Jeff said, was "awe-inspiring". He came from elite-type units and it was the first time he worked this closely with regular troops, but he found them to be tough as nails and having astonishing bravery.

Although this is not reflected in the news, working with these men and women made him proud to be an American and proud to be a soldier.

"We have it," Jeff said. "We are in control of the field. Yes, we are getting hit and taking losses, but the worst thing would be to cut and run, and abandoning those people would be wrong -- the next thing will be worse."

It is true that whatever government is finally established in Iraq will almost certainly not be an American-style democracy, but they will have freedom. There are people who have a vested interest in keeping Iraq in the Stone Age and we must stop them.

Jeff said that there were a lot of issues in this campaign, including what happened 30 years ago. He briefly went off track to say that as far as his reserve records go, he is still assigned to New York even though he has lived in Tennessee for two years (when he wasn't in Iraq) because they can't get the paperwork straight. It's not that they are inefficient or ineffective; they are working with the major to keep him on the rolls while they find an appropriate unit down here (similar to how it appears that the Texas Air Guard was working with G. W. Bush). If he misses a drill for some reason or another he makes up for it when he can and everything is done verbally. His point was that from his perspective, Lt. Bush wasn't getting any more "special privileges" than Maj. Buczak or 100's or so other Reservist and Guardsmen get when they relocate.

But that, he stressed, doesn't really matter. There is one overriding issue that this election hinges upon: leadership.

We must have a president that has the backbone to stand behind the troops. We must have a president that has the resolve to honor the commitment we made to the people of Iraq and signed in blood. To back away from that commitment would be a shameful day for this country.

President Bush can be depended upon to honor our promise to the Iraqi people for a free Iraq. President Bush can be depended on to show the resolve necessary to see us through difficult times.

President Bush must be reelected.

Great harm has been done to us. We have suffered great loss. And in our grief and anger we have found our mission and our moment. Freedom and fear are at war. The advance of human freedom -- the great achievement of our time, and the great hope of every time -- now depends on us. Our nation -- this generation -- will lift a dark threat of violence from our people and our future. We will rally the world to this cause by our efforts, by our courage. We will not tire, we will not falter, and we will not fail.
-- President George W. Bush, Address to a Joint Session of Congress and the American People, September 2002.

Cross posted at TN4W.

When four Frenchmen returned home after more than two years in the Guantanamo netherworld, they expected some questions, followed by freedom and an apology.

Instead, they've been locked up for six weeks and are facing charges that their attorneys say mirror the vague legal world of detainees in the U.S. military detention facility in Cuba.

French officials' response to the detainees' return has been far more forceful than those of other European countries, and it has human rights advocates fearing the fight against terror could erode of civil liberties.

The charges they face stem from a law passed after a series of Algerian terrorist bombings on the Paris Metro in 1995, he said. The bombings killed 10 and injured 200.

"The law implies not terrorism, but the potential for terrorism," he said. "Get a tapped phone call from someone who associates with terrorists, or stand outside the wrong mosque at the wrong time, and it applies. The government position is that while they're in jail, they cannot be out doing wrong."

"Most of my work these days is defending Muslims from terror charges," he added. "These are not good times for Muslims in France."

Hard work in Pennsylvania is paying off -- the latest ABC poll shows Bush in a virtual tie with Kerry.

Now SurveyUSA [whom I am not familiar with and cannot vouch for] places Bush ahead of Kerry by 4 points in New Jersey.

The bad news gets worse for Democrats. In an election for president in NJ today, George W Bush defeats John Kerry in a state Kerry must win & which Democratic strategists had hoped to spend no money or time campaigning in, according to SurveyUSA poll of 734 likely NJ voters conducted 9/12 + 9/13 + 9/14.

There is only one Kinko's in Abilene, and it is 21 miles from the Baird, Tex., home of retired Texas National Guard officer Bill Burkett, who has been named by several news outlets as a possible source for the documents.

To play on Sen. Kerry’s “W” riff, this is a waste of money on the wrong message at the wrong time.

This video is poorly written and poorly produced. The heavy-handed “Fortunate Son” theme that plays throughout has all the finesse of the Swift boat ads without the tenuous veneer of credibility that group was able to eke out of the angry vets....

To add insult to ineptitude, this piece was sent to me by a Republican media professional gloating at this latest example of DNC tone deafness. “Play it with the sound off and it looks like a Bush ad!” he chortled.

Now, I hardly think people will log on the DNC website to look at this piece in mute mode, but he has a point. Unless you carefully follow the too-clever-by-half narration, this could be three minutes devoted to the reelection of George Bush. A new voiceover and they could post this on the Republican National Committee site.

Surely someone over at DNC headquarters must know that television is mostly about visuals.

The inept use of music that doesn’t seem to relate to the visuals, the tortured script and the cheesy delivery of the lines completely undermine the message of this ill-conceived, badly executed video hatchet job. It might as well have a flashing billboard reading “Warning! Bad Political Attack Ad to Follow” to open the piece.

Ken Charles, the program director of KPRC radio in Houston, told the Kerry Spot Wednesday evening that he has notified CBS Radio news that he will be switching to Fox News feed for their Friday evening news, instead of using the Dan Rather-anchored CBS feed.

"Dan has been doing the Friday 4 P.M. slot for about three or four years, and this is the first time Dan Rather has been the story," Charles said. "I have a problem with my news people being the story."

Charles said that his station is under contract with CBS, and that the move is unlikely to have a financial impact for CBS. The public-relations damage, however, could be significant.

"We're the number-seven market in the nation, and I would hope it would send a message to them about how serious this is," Charles said. "I announced at 5:10, and since then (about an hour and a half) we've gotten 150 e-mails from listeners, all supportive.

I particularly like the 150 emails, all supportive of the move to Fox.

Nice.

Oh, wait a minute. It's the BBC that stands accused.

Gotcha, didn't I. But really, wouldn't you have believed it if I had put in the New York Times? Or the Boston Globe? Or the LA Times?

I'm sure there's a lesson in there somewhere.

After years of Democrats demanding that the wealthy pay their "fair share," billionaire couple John and Teresa Kerry last year paid only 12% in income taxes. Apparently, Kerry, who rakes in just over $158,000 a year as a U.S. Senator, and his Heinz-heiress wife don't consider themselves "rich."

Americans for Tax Reform reported recently that though the Kerrys earn more than enough to be in the highest tax bracket, they found loopholes and write-offs in order to significantly decrease their taxes. In fact, they lowered their total tax rate to a level below that of most middle class Americans.

ATR also noted that "John Kerry has declined to pay a small, voluntary tax in his home state. The Massachusetts state income tax code contains a provision allowing payers to contribute an extra .6% of their income to benefit the commonwealth. Kerry has consistently failed to pay the extra money, which would have amounted to $687 dollars last year."

In a futuristic leap, the Klingon pages appear on DW's web site under the date "September 2379", and describe Germany and the radio station at the start of the 21st Century.

The Berlin Wall has fallen, the Cold War has ended and Klingons - once the sworn enemies of Star Trek hero Captain Kirk - are now accepted as allies in the new world order.

Where was Lt. Kerry during the 18 months from 1970 to 1972?

Did he attend the required drills and active duty that he agreed to? Was he AWOL or did he violate his agreed commitment on accepting a commission as an officer in the service of the United States.

Kerry was on active duty while getting arrested on May 31, 1971.

Hmmm, doesn't seem like he's sporting a regulation haircut there, does it?

So, for anyone still willing to consider that these documents are anything other than cheap, childish forgeries, I am offering $10,000 right now to anyone who can find for me a typewriter from 1972 that could have reasonably made those documents. Payment will be made in the form of a cashiers check to the first individual who can do this. The typewriter must be using the same proportionally spaced font as the CBS documents, the same curly-quotation marks, the same impossible superscripted "th"s, the same 13-point line spacing, and create a document that looks as much (or more) like the alleged forgeries than does a Microsoft Word document with default fonts and margins.

Oh wait, they won't -- because the chances of someone having one is less than the chance of me winning best looking bikini body at a Girls Gone Wild gala next spring break.

Smart, thorough, funny -- I think the Watcher is wise.

Remember that this was the man that was videotaped smoking crack while mayor of D.C.:

Barry was charged with three counts of felony perjury, 10 counts of misdemeanor drug possession, and one misdemeanor count of conspiracy to possess cocaine; however, he was convicted only of a single misdemeanor count of possessing cocaine in November 1989. He was acquitted on one possession charge and a mistrial was declared on the 12 remaining charges.

What right does Congress have to go around making laws just because they deem it necessary?
— Marion Barry

Memphis City Council member Rickey Peete was convicted of taking money for votes (that's called bribery -- can you say "bribery" children?) He got out of prison and ran for and won a council seat.

Of course it probably helped that he had the endorsement of the Memphis Police Association and the Afro American Police Association.

Politics is a lot of things -- dirty, disappointing, and sometimes repulsive. It is rarely dull.

Hypothetical situation: I move to a new site and everything is the same except for the trackback URL (not the archive URL -- these will be the same).

What is the trackback URL used for and will this be a problem?

So you have a cell phone with all those long distance minutes but you keep the home phone for (1) convenience of having extensions throughout the house and (2) it has to be hooked up to your TiVo to get the service. And how much is that home phone costing you each month?

Now comes Cellsocket:

Connect the Cellsocket to any standard telephone. Drop your cell phone into the Cellsocket, and start making and receiving phone calls from any desktop, cordless, or extension phone in your home or office using your wireless phone service!

In other news, a 14-year-old boy was found beaten to death in a school bathroom when a fight involving an "unknown number of students" was broken up. Police think the incident "could be gang-related."

[Gee, ya think? Idiots who blame the instrument rather than addressing the problem piss me off.]

For those who you who enjoy skewing polls in the right direction, Memphis TV station UPN 30 has a poll asking if the assault weapons ban should be extended or allowed to expire (I know -- they're a little late but it is UPN and it is in Memphis). Just look in the column on the left. It's currently running 46% for expiration and 53% for extension or "revamping".

Hat tip to Patriot Pat.

With his presidential campaign faltering, the last thing Sen. John Kerry needs is publicity linking him to a dubious lawsuit filed by one of his top financial backers that seems intended to silence a prominent Iranian pro-democracy organization. But unfortunately for the Democratic presidential nominee, that's what's coming his way.

Back in April, Hassan Nemazee, who has raised more than $100,000 for Mr. Kerry's campaign, filed a $10 million lawsuit in a Texas court charging the Student Movement Coordination Committee for Democracy in Iran (SMCCDI) and its coordinator, Aryo Pirouznia, with libeling him by suggesting he is a supporter of the Islamist regime in Iran. At the heart of the legal dispute is Mr. Nemazee's connection with groups such as the American-Iranian Council, an organization which has lobbied for a softer U.S. stance toward Iran. Now, according to Mr. Pirouznia, attorneys for Mr. Nemazee — who filed the suit nearly five months ago — want to delay depositions in the case until after the election because the publicity will hurt Mr. Kerry.

But in 1992 during a speech at Yale, his alma mater, Kerry said:

This shift in the civil rights agenda has directed most of our attention and much of our hope into one inherently limited and divisive program: affirmative action. The truth is that affirmative action has kept America thinking in racial terms.

Japan's 12th case of mad cow disease has been confirmed in Kumamoto Prefecture. The discovery is the first case of the disease, formally known as bovine spongiform encephalopathy, discovered since March, and the first cow from the Kyushu region to be confirmed as having mad cow disease.

Columnist David Hill thinks that part of the problem may be that Kerry has focused so much of his campaign image on "the war" that it worries women. But he thinks it goes beyond that: Bush may be doing some of the same things that Reagan did to win the female vote:

I’m thinking that Bush has developed some qualities that Ronald Reagan once used to garner strong female support. These characteristics were eloquently outlined last June by Michelle Easton of the Clare Booth Luce Policy Institute in an editorial tribute titled “Why Women Loved Reagan.” Easton identifies three key factors:

First, she pointed to Reagan’s appointment of women to high-level positions.

Similarly, George Bush has given top assignments to such likable and visible women as Condoleezza Rice, Karen Hughes, Christine Todd Whitman and Elaine Chao. We saw many of these women in prominent roles during the convention.

Second, Easton cited Reagan’s respectful and loving relationship with his wife Nancy. The incumbent first couple exhibits some of the same chemistry. Laura Bush made her presence particularly felt during August, when Kerry was losing ground to her husband....

Finally, Easton said, “Reagan made women laugh — often by laughing at himself.” In the past month, we have seen more Bush humor, especially of the self-deprecating kind.

Over and over, I have heard ordinary people repeat his line from the GOP convention: “I knew I had problems with the English language when Arnold Schwarzenegger started correcting me.”

Like Laura Bush, women everywhere are finding reasons to love George Bush.

Last July, it was reported that Kerry was setting up "SWAT teams of specially trained lawyers" to swoop in wherever the results of the ballot counting could be challenged and a recount demanded.

Now the Kerry camp has asked the FEC to clarify some issues regarding raising money to cover the costs of these challenges and subsequent recount watching.

It is being reported that Syria tested chemical weapons on civilians in Sudan's troubled western Darfur region in June and killed dozens of people.

This is extremely disturbing. I pray that investigation proves this not to be true.

Retiring House Democrats are feeling a cold draft from K Street as they seek post-congressional employment at lobbying firms, trade groups and corporations.

By contrast, K Street is aggressively courting GOP lawmakers who have announced their retirements, suggesting that the business community is confident the GOP will retain the Speaker’s gavel in January and that business wants to fortify its Republican Rolodexes.

From Jakarta to London, Cairo to Paris, Muslims have been calling radio talk shows, writing newspaper columns and firing off letters to the media condemning terrorist acts in the name of Islam.

These voices appear to be crying out against the hatred and intolerance of the West that remains widespread in some Muslim communities. In the wake of the recent attacks in Beslan and Jakarta, there has been a chorus of condemnation of extremism.

Sloppy enough, notes John Fund, author of the new book "Stealing Elections: How Voter Fraud Undermines Our Democracy," that at least eight of the 19 hijackers who attacked the World Trade Center and the Pentagon three years ago were registered to vote in either Virginia or Florida while they made their preparations for 9/11.

According to Fund:

Some of the sloppiness that makes fraud and foul-ups in election counts possible seems to be built into the system by design. The "Motor Voter Law," the first piece of legislation signed into law by President Clinton upon entering office, imposed fraud-friendly rules on the states by requiring driver’s license bureaus to register anyone applying for licenses, to offer mail-in registration with no identification needed, and to forbid government workers to challenge new registrants, while making it difficult to purge "deadwood" voters (those who have died or moved away).

Of course, if the dead couldn't vote then there would be very few Democrats in office.

The U.S. House of Representatives on Tuesday voted to support a Bush administration plan to allow the use of Mexican identification cards to open U.S. bank accounts.

The House voted 222 to 177 remove language in an $89.9 billion bill funding the Transportation and Treasury Departments aimed at preventing the use of the cards. The House has yet to vote on the overall bill.

Wouldn't it be easy to issue these people a picture ID with their green card? And if they don't have a green card, aren't they criminals?

Mexican officials insist the identification is safe. It was revamped in March of 2002 to include more safety features, which make it hard to forge.

They also say that applicants are screened by specially trained consular officers and the feeder documents proving Mexican nationality are checked with databases in Mexico.

Now you see it. Soon you won't. In a trend sure to be a relief to some and a disappointment to others, women will cover up instead of baring it all next season as the "slutwear" look comes to an end.

Demure designs have replaced scanty navel-baring looks on the catwalks of this week's semi-annual run of fashion shows, a reliable sign of what shoppers can expect to find in stores next spring.

"The slut is out now. She's dead," said Godfrey Deeny, senior fashion critic at Fashion Wire Daily.

• Early in the race he accused his opponent Barack Obama of having a slave-holder mentality and with the same disregard for human life as a terrorist.
• Last week he said that Jesus Christ wouldn't vote for Obama.
• Today he said that Catholics would be "sinning" if they voted for Obama because of his pro-choice position on abortion.

We have a future but we're not going be allowed to get to that future because a troll is sitting under the bridge saying I eat first.

Aw, c'mon, it'd be easier to track the comment sections if you'd underline. Some of us are color-blind, y'know.

I hear and obey. All links in the posts now have a gray dotted underline -- subtle enough that it doesn't break the flow of the text by a visual clue that there is something different there.

I would be pleased to hear any and all comments, both from those who are color-blind and those who are color-capable.

BTW, I haven't finished implementing this feature in any pages other than the front page, so please be patient. CSS is hard!

The idea for a simple but explicit billboard came to me (if such a thing were to come to pass I would want to replace the picture of an actual and probably very honorable Union general with a caricature of a carpetbagger):

What do you think, too inflammatory? Too subtle?

The latest Gallup poll measures how voters feel about the personal characteristics of the two major candidates, from issues like being a strong and decisive leader to caring about the needs of "people like you":

Voters were asked to rank which character issue was most important to them. Seemingly, the more important the issue to voters, the more Bush leads Kerry.

Clearly leadership matters to voters this year, perhaps more than in the past. If leadership is a threshold issue for voters -- either a candidate has it or he doesn't -- then Kerry may be in a good position on this dimension. As the Sept. 3-5 survey shows, a majority of Americans say both candidates have the leadership skills a president should have -- only Bush enjoys a slightly larger majority (59% vs. 51%). On the other hand, if it is a matter of degree, the fact that voters are nearly twice as likely to say the phrase "strong and decisive leader" applies more to Bush than to Kerry gives Bush a substantial edge.

Getting to know you,
Getting to feel grim and uneasy.
When I listen to you,
Getting to know what to say
Haven't you noticed
Suddenly I think you're a little cheesy
Because of all the distasteful and new
Things I'm learning about you
Day by day.
Getting to know you,
Getting to feel nervous and agitated.
When I listening to you,
Getting to know what to say
Haven't you noticed
Suddenly I'm frightened and nauseated
Because of all the scary and new
Things I'm learning about you
Day by day.