February 8, 2005 — WASHINGTON — President Bush’s job approval rating has bounced up to 57 percent and voters are much more upbeat about Iraq after the election there.
Bush’s job rating is now at its highest in over a year — and the Republican Party overall has a much better image than Democrats as Bush heads toward battles over the budget and Social Security, the CNN/USA Today poll found.
In an ominous sign for Democrats, Howard Dean — who’ll be the nation’s new top Democrat as party chairman — has a negative personal image with 38 percent of Americans while just 31 percent give him a thumbs-up. . . .
Overall the Democratic Party is taking a beating — the Republican Party’s rating is 56 percent favorable and 39 percent unfavorable for a net positive rating of 17 percentage points.
By contrast, the Democratic Party’s rating is 46 percent favorable and 47 percent unfavorable — a slightly negative net rating.
Those are certainly some sobering numbers for the left, and with Dean’s rise to the top likely to alienate a lot of moderate Democrats they’re only going to get worse. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Putting Dean on top is a mistake for Democrats.
The arrest of this woman makes no less than seven teachers who have been caught having sex with their students since the beginning of this year.
WKRN - A Warren County elementary teacher faces a maximum 100 years in prison if she’s convicted of having a sexual relationship with a 14-year-old boy.
Only news two was in Fentress County as 27-year-old Pamela Rogers Turner was arrested and charged with 15 counts of sexual battery by an authority figure and 13 counts of statutory rape. District Attorney General Dale Potter said that Turner, a physical education teacher and coach at Centertown Elementary, had an ongoing sexual relationship with a male student. Potter said that some of the incidents even took place at school and at the boy’s home, where the teacher reportedly lived a short while.
Seven teachers caught having sex with their students in a little over a month. This has to be some sort of trend, but I have no idea what’s causing it.
The indictment and mug shot are here.
(via Wizbang)
FORT STEWART, Ga. - Army soldiers are being issued new fatigues with easy-to-use Velcro openings and a redesigned camouflage pattern that can help conceal them as they move rapidly from desert to forest to city in places like Baghdad.
“It might give you the extra second you need, save your life maybe,” Sgt. Marcio Soares said Tuesday after trying on the new all-in-one camouflage uniform that is the first major redesign in Army fatigues since 1983.
Soares’ unit, the Georgia National Guard’s 48th Infantry Brigade, is the first to be issued the new fatigues as part of a $3.4 billion Army-wide makeover being phased in over the next three years.
The uniform will replace the standard forest camouflage — green, brown and black — and the desert camouflage — tan, brown and grey — now used by U.S. troops in Iraq.
Twenty-two changes were made to the uniforms, most notably the new camouflage pattern.
Instead of bold jigsaw swatches of colors, the new camouflage pattern uses muted shades of desert brown, urban gray and foliage green broken into one-centimeter segments. Black was eliminated completely because it catches the eye too easily.
Sounds like the troops themselves should be pretty happy with the new uniforms.
Public schools in Newton, Massachusetts, have some strange priorities for their math teachers (via The King of Fools).
Fox News - According to benchmarks for middle school education, the top objective for the district’s math teachers is to teach “respect for human differences.” The objective is for students to “live out the system-wide core value of ‘respect for human differences’ by demonstrating anti-racist/anti-bias behaviors.”
Priority No. 2 is where the basics come in, which is “problem solving and representation — students will build new mathematical knowledge as they use a variety of techniques to investigate and represent solutions to problems.”
The benchmarks, which could not be found on the district’s Web site, were faxed to FOXNews.com by Tom Mountain, a columnist for The Newton Tab who has followed the district’s education system and, specifically, the rise of the “antiracist” education agenda there. His Jan. 12 column on the topic received so much attention, he said, his e-mail inbox was flooded with over 200 responses.
I have no problem with schools setting aside some time to teach students about racial tolerance. Perhaps some instruction in a weekly home room class or something similar would be appropriate. That being said, there comes a time at which our educators must set aside some of these other goals and focus providing the students with the instruction they’re sent to school to receive.
I remember back to my school experience in both Alaska and North Dakota. It seems like we spent a lot of class time engaged in “appreciating” or “become aware” of one hot-topic issue or another. I remember my fifth grade class making posters, handing out ribbons and attending an assembly all during “AIDS Awareness Week.” I didn’t think much of it at the time (I pretty much just did what my teachers told me) but looking back I wonder just how beneficial it is for a bunch of 10 and 11-year-olds to be listening to lectures about the threat of AIDS. Seems to me like that time would have been better spent engaged in learning how to multiply fractions or something (especially seeing as how that’s still something I can’t do to this day).
I think we get carried away with a lot of this sort of non-sense and forget what the real objective should be for our schools.
I don’t think there is anything at all unpatriotic about a young man opposing a war and declining to enlist. But a young man (and this applies to W. and Cheney too) who mouths off strongly about the desirability of a war is a coward and a hypocrite if he does not go to fight it.
Is this a valid criticism?
Personally I don’t think it is, but its one we hear a lot from the left. If we were to apply this sort of thinking to other areas of U.S. foreign policy one would be a “hypocrite” if they supported the government’s decision to send personnel to assist in tsunami aid in southeast Asia but did not travel there themselves to help out.
And just to be perfectly clear, I’m one of Mr. Cole’s “coward and hypocrites” as I have been a strong supporter of the war since the beginning but do not, and have not ever, served in the military.
Update:
More here.
(via Oliver Willis)
Young Pundit linked with Can You Support The War And Not Fight In The War?
For the heck of it, here’s a photo of the model from the GoDaddy.com Super Bowl commercial.
Her name is Candice Michelle. Her official website is here. Fair warning: she’s fairly scantily clad through most of it. She is also, apparently, quite the wrestler.
More photos here and here, but she’s nude in most of them. Don’t click if you’re offended by that sort of thing.
The Reader recounts the experience of photojournalist Warren Wimmer’s attempts to photograph Anish Kapoor’s sculpture, Cloud Gate (more commonly known as “the Bean”). When Wimmer set up his tripod and camera to shoot the sculpture, security guards stopped him, demanding that they show him a permit. Wimmer protested, replying that it’s absurd that one needs to pay for a permit to photograph public art in a city-owned park.
Ben Joravsky, the author of the Reader article, attempted to contact park officials for an explanation and received a response from Karen Ryan, press director for the park’s project director:
“The copyrights for the enhancements in Millennium Park are owned by the artist who created them. As such, anyone reproducing the works, especially for commercial purposes, needs the permission of that artist.”
I’m no lawyer, but how in the world are they enforcing this copyright? Aren’t the taxpayers, in effect, the owners of the sculpture? Can the artist prevent the owners of his work from taking pictures of it? If an architect copyrighted the design of your house could he or she prevent you from photographing your own house?
If I were a citizen of Chicago I’d be very upset with the city over this. Not only because the idea of a copyrighted public sculpture is patently absurd but also because the city must now expend tax dollars on additional security to protect that patent.
You can see a photo of the sculpture in question right here.
(via Boing Boing)
The “do not admit list” wasn’t the only thing that had people in Fargo upset after President Bush’s recent visit.
Fargo Forum - A Secret Service agent was sent home after getting drunk at a bar the night before President Bush appeared in Fargo on Thursday, police said Monday.
Authorities were initially called to the Fargo Holiday Inn at Interstate 29 and 13th Avenue South after a gas mask was left behind at the bar.
About the time officers arrived, someone set off two fire alarms at the hotel, Fargo Lt. Tod Dahle said. Police suspect the agent set the alarm off.
“It was some very odd behavior,” Dahle said.
Special Agent John Kirkwood of the Secret Service in Minneapolis declined comment.
The gas mask apparently fell out of a duffel bag the agent had accidentally left at the bar, Dahle said.
“Security was obviously concerned that someone had a gas mask … with the president coming the next day,” he said.
A hotel guest believed that someone matching the agent’s description was setting off the fire alarms, Dahle said.
Police sent an investigative report to the Cass County state’s attorney for possible prosecution, said Dahle, who characterized setting off fire alarms as terrorizing.
“It’s sort of the equivalent of yelling fire in a theater,” he said.
No charges have been filed.
As Dakota Pundit points out, what happens in Fargo…stays in Fargo.
RAMALLAH, West Bank — Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice’s motorcade drove past Yasser Arafat’s glass-enclosed tomb Monday, one more snub to the late Palestinian leader who had been largely ignored by the Bush administration.
Excellent work, Sec. Rice.
(via Six Meat Buffet)
San Francisco Chronicle - Former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean has officially become the last man standing in the race to chair the Democratic National Committee — a development heralded by many Democrats as the start of an aggressive drive to rebuild the party, and win elections, from the grass roots up.
Dean became the sole candidate for the Democratic National Committee chair Monday, when former Rep. Tim Roemer of Indiana — an antiabortion rights moderate originally urged into the race by House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco — withdrew. Roemer urged party unity but was quoted in USA Today as saying that his views on abortion represented “a radioactive anvil around my neck.'’
“They threw a couple kitchen sinks and then some at us with phone banks and mailings and efforts to derail the candidacy just based on that one issue,'’ he said.
The latest turn of events has Democrats downplaying the importance of abortion — and pondering the role of Dean as their party’s next high-profile leader.
Antibabortion rights…talk about “framing the debate.” They base their statement on the assumption that killing your unborn child is a “right.” For most people, that’s a rather large leap of faith.
Anyway, I called this four days ago. As I said then, Dean represents the spittle-flecked, chest-beating, anti-everything-any-Republican-says portion of the party. How are the Democrats ever going to nominate a strong national candidate, who will appeal to voters in all parts of the country, when they’ve put the lunatics in charge of the asylum?
Dean’s far-left brand of liberal politics isn’t going to win the Democrat party many voters in the middle of the country, and that’s exactly who Democrats are supposed to be after.
(via Wizbang)
Hmm…
Washington Post - With his 2006 budget, President Bush delivered Congress a tall order, asking for at least six significant governmental reorganizations and an unprecedented five-year freeze in domestic spending to get control of the federal budget deficit.
Under the president’s proposal, lawmakers would have to scrap much of the farm law they passed in 2002 to realize the $8.2 billion in cuts Bush expects from farm subsidies over 10 years. The federal student loan program would need to be restructured to find $10.7 billion over the next decade.
Bush hopes major changes to Medicaid, the federal health plan for the poor, will shave $45 billion from the program through 2015. He is counting on significant changes to the federal program that ensures private-sector pensions for a 10-year savings of $31 billion. A proposal to consolidate and then cut 18 community development programs from five Cabinet agencies would need a legislative response as well as a reorganization of congressional jurisdictions.
Separate legislation would probably be needed to eliminate federal subsidies for Amtrak, and Bush is counting on leases from oil exploration in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge — but Congress, again, would have to oblige. And all of that would have to be enacted this year, as lawmakers debate the most broad revision of Social Security since the program’s inception.
“That is a lot of apple to bake,” said former representative Charles W. Stenholm (D-Tex.), a budget expert.
A lot of apple indeed. I’m guessing the President doesn’t even get most of what he’s looking for with this budget. So many of these projects were initiated by one legislator or another looking to please certain special interest groups. They will fight hard against any cuts to their pet projects lest they face the wrath of said special interests. Given that reality, I think the President will grade his budget a success if he can get even part of the cuts he’s asking for.
Meanwhile, the left will no doubt continue to castigate the President over his spending habits even as he tries to push meaningful cuts in federal spending through congress. Which is to be expected, I suppose. When it comes to President Bush there’s simply no pleasing these people.
Update:
This from the L.A. Times:
LONDON (Reuters) - A Welsh rugby fan cut off his own testicles to celebrate Wales beating England at rugby, the Daily Mirror reported Tuesday.
Geoff Huish, 26, was so convinced England would win Saturday’s match he told fellow drinkers at a social club, “If Wales win I’ll cut my balls off,” the paper said.
Friends at the club in Caerphilly, south Wales, thought he was joking.
But after the game Huish went home, severed his testicles with a knife, and walked 200 yards back to the bar with the testicles to show the shocked drinkers what he had done.
Huish was taken to hospital where he remained in serious condition, the paper said.
Wow.
I’m not sure I’ll ever understand Europeans and their fascination with such a dull and boring game. But to each their own, I guess.
America gets a bad reputation for being sports-crazy, but we can’t match these soccer people for sheer obsession and deovtion.
Fargo Forum - The whodunit mystery surrounding the do-not-admit list for President Bush’s Fargo visit still hasn’t been solved, but clues uncovered Friday indicate a worker with the White House advance team may have been the culprit.
This comes just one day after spokesmen for the White House and North Dakota Gov. John Hoeven said the list was the result of “an overzealous volunteer.”
The list contained the names of 42 people who were not supposed to be given tickets to Bush’s speech Thursday. Thirty-three of them belong to the local progressive group Democracy for America.
The White House advance team was comprised of several people — some state and local volunteers; others White House staff people — who came to Fargo ahead of time to prepare for the event.
White House spokesman Jim Morrell said Friday the overzealous volunteer could “very well be” someone from the advance team, but he doesn’t know who it was.
The White House wasn’t aware the list was being created or distributed and regrets that it happened, Morrell said.
I’m guessing the person responsible for the list knew about the Democracy for America group’s plans to demonstrate at the Bush speaking event and decided to take pre-emptive action. In which case, “over zealous” would be an accurate term though given the way the left has conducted itself at other Bush speaking events of late I can’t say I entirely blame this person. Trying to silence the President through heckling and thuggery is no more supportive of the ideals of democracy than creating “do not admit” lists for Presidential speaking events.
Still, the move should have been checked out with a superior.
(via Oliver Willis)
Well folks, it would appear as though Woodward and Bernstein’s famous secret source in the Watergate scandal, “Deep Throat,” is very ill and may be dying soon. This pretty much blows some previous ideas about who it was out of the water.
I’ve never taken much to speculating about who this shadowy person is, but given what we know about the source’s illness and given that Supreme Court Chief Justice Rehnquist is the only Nixon-era person I know who is gravely ill, I’d have to say its him. I’d be willing to put money on it.
We’ll probably find out soon whether or not I’m right.
As a staunch “right winger” I have recently come to terms with the gay marriage debate. I no longer care whether or not those people are allowed to marry and would even go so far as to ask why we should even allow any government interaction in marital affairs.
But putting that issue aside for a moment, can I ask why the staunch supporters of persons right to do as they please in the privacy of their own homes are also typically against a property owner’s right to dictate what perfectly legal activities are performed on his or her property? I’m talking about smoking. Why are liberals so hell bent to protect personal freedoms in one instance and not the other?
We cannot have this issue both ways. You cannot rail against government interference with personal liberties in one instance and and then back it in another and expect people to take you seriously on both.
Charges against Paris Hilton for shoplifting her own movie and vandalising the store it was being sold in have been dropped.
Paris Hilton will not face any charges after allegedly stealing a copy of her sex video from a newsstand. Mind bogglingly, the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office dropped the case due to lack of evidence, despite a damn security tape showing Paris stealing the DVD and ripping up a poster advertising it. She originally faced charges of petty theft and vandalism. News-stand employee Jerry Castro said at the time, “She threw her eighty cents change at me and took the video and said, ‘I’m taking this and I’m not buying it.’”
It must be nice to be rich.
The Political Teen linked with Money Talks
WASHINGTON — Americans gave President Bush his highest approval rating in more than a year and showed cautious optimism about Iraq in a USA TODAY/CNN/Gallup Poll taken days after historic elections in Iraq.
In reversals from a month ago, majorities said that going to war in Iraq was not a mistake, that things are going well there and that it’s likely democracy will be established in Iraq.
Bush’s approval rating of 57% was his highest since he reached 59% in January 2004.
Its amazing what patience and a determination to do the right thing in the face of whithering criticism can accomplish, isn’t it?
(via Wizbang)
Democrat Senate Leader Harry Reid to Republicans: Stop criticizing my voting record.
WASHINGTON - Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid on Monday urged President Bush to stop the Republican National Committee from calling him an obstructionist and criticizing his Senate record, a tactic the GOP used to help defeat Reid’s predecessor.
Bush repeatedly has said he wants work with Democrats, most recently during his State of the Union speech last week, Reid noted in a speech on the Senate floor.
“Why didn’t he stand and tell the American people last Wednesday that one of the first items of business we were going to do in Washington is send out a hit piece on the Democratic leader?” Reid said.
The Republican committee plans to send a 13-page document to more than a million people — including in Reid’s home state of Nevada — analyzing and criticizing his votes and stances before he officially took over as Senate Democratic leader in January.
Republican Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., defeated Democratic leader Tom Daschle last year after the GOP painted Daschle as an “obstructionist” to Bush’s agenda and judicial nominees.
RNC spokesman Brian Jones said Reid is picking up where Daschle left off.
“Harry Reid right now is the leader of the party of ‘no,’” Jones said. “He is the party’s chief obstructionist, and we’re going to continue to talk about this in the months to come.”
This is the same sort of nonsense we heard out of John Kerry and his surrogates during the election.
I wouldn’t classify a critique on Reid’s voting record a “hit piece.” After all, if you can’t criticize a politician’s voting record what can you criticize? If Reid wants to avoid the obstructionist label he had better prove he is in the Senate to work with Republicans, not impede everything they do out of blind partisanship.
Truth. Quante-fied. linked with Harry Reid Pity Party
What do Cuba, Zimbabwe and Saudi Arabia have in common? Roger Simon knows…
They are three of the five members of the panel to decide which complaints shall be heard this Spring by the UN Human Rights Commission!
Cuba currently imprisons political dissidents and journalists who try to report non-government-approved stories. Zimbabwe is run by a racist tyrant in Robert Mugabe who sits in his splendid palaces while his people starve in the streets. Saudi Arabia, of course, is guilty of oppressing women and other human rights offenses common to Islamic rule.
Yet somehow these three countries, who’s current regimes are guilty of some of the worst type of human rights violations, will be calling the shots for the UN’s Human Rights Commission.
Talk about putting the lunatics in charge of the asylum.
Hmm…
LAWYERS acting for J K Rowling are heading for a legal battle with the US army over a training manual that features characters similar to those in the Harry Potter books and films.
They are examining whether the publication, which has been distributed to soldiers at US army bases around the world, breaches copyright rules. Harry Potter’s intellectual property is owned by the author and the images are owned by the film company Warner Bros.
The magazine, The Preventive Maintenance Monthly, includes a cartoon character called Topper, a boy wizard, who attends Mogmarts school of magic. Harry Potter, Rowling’s boy wizard creation, attends the Hogwarts school of magic.
In the magazine, army officials are given a lesson from Professor Rumbledoore and his staff, a name strikingly similar to Rowling’s Professor Dumbledore. Other characters in the magazine include professors McDonagal and Snappy, and a Miss Ranger. The Harry Potter books feature professors McGonagall and Snape and Hermione Granger.
“We have shared the information about this magazine with Warner Bros and I am sure that I will speak again with them shortly,” said Neil Blair, Rowling’s lawyer.
The Army is using Harry Potter-like characters to…teach preventive maintenance?
Crazy.
[Submitted to Wizbang’s 10 Spot]
Wow, you’ve said it before, and now you’re saying it again?
But. . . but isn’t *everybody* saying that picking Dean is a bad choice?
What was that? Markos “Not Daphne” Zuniga thinks Dean is a *good* choice?
I’m so confused here. Who do I vote for Rob?
;-)
Cheers,
Dave at Garfield Ridge
P.S. It’s gonna be a long year, eh?