Open Threads

Here is the Nasa website for the Mars Rover, and you an check out some really cool panoramic pictures that they have assembled (in various sizes). If you really want a hoot, turn oin your AM radio and listen to the Coast to Coast guys speculating about the images.

BTW- I just love radio, and Coast to Coast is a lot of fun to listen to. Most of the topics and people are way out there (last night they were talking to time travelers), but for some reason I just think it is a great show. Plus, it has the best bumper music ever.

Mars RoverPost + Comments

The Paul O’Neill ‘tell-all’ book and interview has created some inspired thinking by the Calpundit:

BETTER DUCK AND COVER, PAUL….Former Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill isn’t finished with his, um, unkind remarks about George Bush, remarks that we all get to hear and see tomorrow on 60 Minutes. But then there’s this:

O’Neill, who was asked to resign because of his opposition to the tax cut, says he doesn’t think his tell-all account in this book will be attacked by his former employers as sour grapes. “I will be really disappointed if [the White House] reacts that way,” he tells Stahl. “I can’t imagine that I am going to be attacked for telling the truth.”

He’s got to be kidding. After all this time is he really that clueless about the kind of people he’s dealing with?

How did a naif like him get so rich, anyway?

Neat-O! In other words, everything O’Neill says is true, automatically, and any attempts by anyone in the administration to state otherwise is evidence of the ‘kind of people he’s dealing with.’

No mention of whether O’Neill’s ‘cluelessness’ is only towards the subjects Kevin knows best, or infects all of his perspectives.

I guess I should view this falling out in a new light:

In a nonstop round of interviews, George has been hit with scathing criticism. On NBC, Katie Couric asked him how it felt to be called a “turncoat” whose take on the President was “kind of creepy.” Over at CBS, Mark McEwen said the author was being called a “backstabber” and an “ingrate.” On CNN former Clinton adviser Mandy Grunwald noted that if the President hadn’t given George the “opportunity of a lifetime,” George might still be a Capitol Hill aide, not a “multimillion-dollar book writer and commentator” (inside the White House make that “commentraitor”). And James Carville says Washington has become The Truman Show, broadcasting Clinton’s private life in something approaching real time.

If I inhale the California ether and use the Calpundit’s standards- everything bad Stephanopoulos stated in the book is true, and that all of these attacks from the Clinton White House is evidence of the type of people we were dealing with.

Democrats.

Twisted LogicPost + Comments (31)

I expect the Luddites and anti-free-traders will seize on this info:

Investigators tentatively traced the first U.S. cow with mad cow disease to Canada, which could help determine the scope of the outbreak and might even limit the economic damage to the American beef industry.

Dr. Ron DeHaven, the Agriculture Department’s chief veterinarian, said on Saturday that Canadian officials provided records indicating the sick Holstein was in a herd of 74 cattle shipped from Alberta, Canada, into this country in August 2001 at Eastport, Idaho.

“These animals were all dairy cattle and entered the U.S. only about two or two-and-a-half years ago, so most of them are still likely alive,” DeHaven said.

It will also make the asshole Democratic candidates look rather foolish, as they really did try to blame the economic impact of this lone cow with “Mad Cow Disease” on Bush:

The former governor, whose state has a large dairy cow population, said the Bush administration failed to aggressively set up a tracking system that would allow the government to quickly track the origins of the sick cow, quarantine other animals it came in contact with and assure the marketplace the rest of the meat supply is safe.

“What we need in this country is instant traceability,” he said.

Dean said such a system should have been set up quickly after the mad cow scare that devastated the British beef industry in the mid- to late-1990s. The Bush administration was still devising its plan when the sick cow was slaughtered Dec. 9, and on Friday the government still hadn’t determine the infected animal’s origins.

“This just shows the complete lack of foresight by the Bush administration once again,” Dean said. “This is something that easily could be predicted and was predicted.”

Which is why the standards and procedures in place today that made sure that no bad beef went to the market, no one became ill from bad beef, and that insured that only one cow was infected- this was predictable. It really is like Tourette’s: B-B-B-Bush Sucks! B-B-Bush Bad!

I guess since Dean is already calling for a bailout of big beef, we know where he would stand on the farm bill and the airline bail-out.

Blame Canada!Post + Comments (24)

Christmas was fine, despite having the flu. I never got rid of that cough from about a month ago, and it just got worse and worse until I finally had a full-on cold. Really quite annoying. I shuffled arounf my parent’s house feeling miserable, while my father chased me with a lysol bottle yelling at me not to touch anything.

Christmas loot: Really nice set of samsonite luggage, a bunch of assorted jellies and mustards from Canada, LOTR Extended DVD’s for Fellowship and TT, a bunch of Steelers paraphrenalia, and other stuff. Best gift that I had no idea about: a copy of Terror in the Mind of God.

Christmas Wrap-UpPost + Comments

The news seems to get worse and worse by the minute in Iran. Up to 20,000 dead? Unimagineable, although it is hard to see how anyone could have survived this:

Just tragic. I also must admit that every time I hear a news report pointing out that the earthquake was a 6.7 on the Richter Scale, I find myself singing Beastie Boys lyrics for the next ten minutes.

Earthquake in IranPost + Comments (1)

As you have noticed, I have not been posting much the last few days. Don’t be alarmed (or excited, you tricksy Democrats)- I am not going anywhere, but I probably won’t post again until Boxing Day.

You are officially ordered to go spend some time with your family and have a Merry Christmas. My friends and I insist.

Merry Christmas, Happy Chanukah, Happy Holidays, or Whatever Blows Your TrumpetPost + Comments (10)