Month: October 2003

DoD undersecretary says our real enemy is Satan.

MSNBC has more on that last statement:

Click2Houston –

Discipline Decided In Student Inhaler Incident – Brandon Kivi was
expelled from

Caney Creek High School for sharing his inhaler last week with his
girlfriend. He does not intend to go back after Christmas when his
expulsion expires. [muth]
bq.
Kivi said the ordeal taught him the lesson of a lifetime.

“If I had this to do again, I would do the right thing and ask the
nurse before I do it, to keep out of trouble,” Kivi said.

Ferguson was not disciplined over the incident.

Both Kivi and Ferguson decided to withdraw from Caney Creek High
School to be home-schooled.

The families received calls of support from around the world after
their story was made public.
[End the War on Freedom]

The two and their parents made the right choice by opting for home schooling. Hopefully any other parents of students at that school who have potentially serious conditions requiring medication will follow their example.

Meanwhile, It Apparently Isn’t So Dangerous To Sit On Your Ass All Day Typing. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, these are the ten most dangerous jobs in America:

1. Timber Cutters
2. Fishers
3. Pilots and Navigators
4. Structural Metal Workers
5. Driver-Sales Workers
6. Roofers
7. Electrical Power Installers
8. Farm Occupations
9. Construction Workers
10. Truck Drivers

“Driver-sales workers” apparently means the people who fill vending machines and deliver pizzas. Tip them well. [Hit & Run]

Note that the Police, who are constantly demanding (and receiving) special treatment because of the alleged danger of their jobs, don’t even appear on the list.

Lemon Fresh Pledge?. The Supreme Court will decide whether the inclusion of the phrase “under God” in the teacher-led Pledge of Allegiance in public schools offends the First Amendment. History buffs will note that the expressly religious motivation of the 1954 law that added the phrase—Eisenhower said, upon signing the law, that it was meant to affirm “the transcendence of religious faith in America’s heritage and future” as well as “strengthen” the public’s “spiritual weapons”—contravenes the first and most elementary prong of the traditional Lemon Test: Laws must have a secular motive. [Hit & Run]

Hopefully they’ll actually enforce the First Amendment. Then maybe we can get rid of “in god we trust” from our money.

Recall War’s Over, But LAT Battle Rages On. On Sunday, Los Angeles Times Editor John Carroll responded, if rather testily, to some of the heavy (and occasionally foaming) criticism levied against the paper for its Schwarzengroping coverage. The main target of his wrath, though she went unnamed, was ex-Times firebrand Jill Stewart. Today Stewart fires back, in a column that includes juicy anonymous testimony from a Times staffer. For a sensible outside perspective, start with Jay Rosen. Between the three, you get an interesting picture of an influential newspaper’s inner workings. [Hit & Run]

Pentagonomics in Baghdad. Writes Bivens Calhoun: “The following is an excerpt from a letter that was sent to my family from an intelligence officer with the 1st AD in Baghdad: “‘Building this country back up is turning out to be a monumental task… [LewRockwell.com Blog]

Another example of how the Iraqis are being “liberated,” in this case from a free market.

Jewelry and Raids… [Baghdad Burning]

Apparently when US soldiers search Iraqi homes, they steal confiscate valuables. That’s disgusting, but not really surprising–after all, police in US cities do the same thing, only they call it “civil forfeiture.”

Campaign Launched to Regulate Arms Trade. For farmers in Uganda, AK-47 assault rifles are used instead of spears. In Somalia, weapons are so common that some children are named ‘Uzi’ or ‘AK.’ In countries such as Iraq, there is more than one gun per person.

These findings were included in a report released Thursday by Amnesty International, Oxfam and another group as they launched a campaign in more than 50 countries aimed at controlling what they call a dangerously unregulated global arms trade that routinely allows weapons to reach repressive governments, human rights abusers and criminals.

The report said the possession of increasingly lethal weapons is becoming an integral part of daily life in many parts of the world. It also said that the U.S.-led war on terror, launched after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in the United States, has ‘fueled weapons proliferation rather than focusing political will on controlling arms.’ [FirearmNews.com]

These so-called “human rights” groups are revealing their true agenda when they express dismay that ordinary Ugandan farmers own rifles. The Ugandan government, in case they’ve forgotten, murdered 300,000 unarmed Ugandan citizens.

“Don’t Send Our Sons to the Iraqi Hell”. That’s what they are chanting in Turkey, as polls show over two-thirds of the public oppose sending troops into the neighboring country. Thousands hit the streets to protest and police arrested some 60 Kurdish activists.

Still, that stabilizing influence of pre-emptive war should break out any day now. [Hit & Run]

The Turkish government wants to send troops Iraq in exchange for a multi-billion dollar bribe loan from the Feds. However, Turkey is a democracy, so if they go through with the deal they may well find themselves unemployed in the next election.

A NOTED HAWK GETS READY TO BAIL. Noted hawk Ralph Peters is very, very angry — as well he should be:

JUDAS drove a hard bargain compared to President Bush. At least the great betrayer got 30 pieces of silver. All Bush is going to get for delivering the Kurds unto their enemies will be 10,000 Turkish troops – who will act solely in Ankara’s interests, not in the interests of Washington or the people of Iraq.

Bush’s desire for Turkish forces is craven. Hoping to reduce U.S. troop commitments as an election looms,… [The Light of Reason]

This is hardly surprising. It’s been obvious from the beginning that the one thing that was absolutely certain about the conquest of Iraq was that the Kurds would lose the freedom they’d gained after the Gulf War.