"A moderate by definition is one of three things; somebody who sits around and waits for a majority to form and then joins it, a conservative who is pro-choice, or a liberal."
-- Rush Limbaugh, June 5, 2001
Prisoner Suing OR Dept. of Corrections Director... ...& 16 other state prison officials for ignoring what he calls his severe case of gender-identity disorder. According to a civil-rights lawsuit filed Nov. 21 at U.S. District Court in Portland, 27-year-old Jorey Lee Brewis—aka Rebekah Katherine—was so troubled that he cut out his testicles in his cell and mutilated them. (Willamette Week)
Republican State Rep. Tom Butler Resigns for Duty As Missionary. The Butlers had planned to fulfill their missionary duty in Latin America, but Darlene Butler became the first person in Oregon stricken with West Nile virus. Tom Butler is in the middle of his fifth term in the Legislature. (SJ)
Without Money, Panel Says Portland Traffic Will Worsen. The Joint Policy Advisory Committee on Transportation passed a transportation plan Thursday morning that forecasts $9.07 billion in spending through 2035, though at least $16.12 billion is needed to fight congestion growth. "We're in big trouble," said Rex Burkholder, chairman of JPACT. "We have a lot to do." (Oregonian)
Mapes On Politics: Gov. K. Plays In Presidential Politics. "If everybody read the newspaper as closely as Gov. Ted Kulongoski, my industry would still be going great guns. He's an avid web surfer as well and, to no one's surprise, he's been closely watching this great soap opera of a presidential race." (Oregonian) [Yup. Without enough liberals to read the Oregonian it wouldn't survive.]
King Bong. Paul Stanford is Oregon's "Drug Czar." Now he's under attack. the 47-year-old Portlander is now running the largest chain of medical-marijuana clinics in the nation. (Willamette Week)
Chicago, IL: Mayor Daley's Son Had Secret Deal? Mayor signed pacts, but spokeswoman says he didn’t know his son was an owner of a sewer-inspection business that did city work. Patrick Daley invested in Municipal Sewer Services in June 2003, along with Robert Vanecko, a nephew of the mayor... The pair cashed out their small investment about a year later, as federal investigators (Chicago Sun-Times)
NJ Legislature Ends Death Penalty. Gov. Jon Corzine says he will sign the bill into law, which would make the state the first to repeal capital punishment since 1965. (LA Times)
PA: Philadelphia Boy Scots to Lose Historic Building for Not Accepting Homosexuality. A US Supreme Court decision in 2000 said the Boy Scouts were a private organization who had the right to bar anyone they chose from their ranks. But the city of Philadelphia has a policy that no organization that "discriminates" may receive public subsidies and City Council is backing Diaz's interpretation of the law. Diaz, an open and practicing homosexual, told a local radio interviewer he would begin looking for a new tenant for the building immediately.
"Stop Rudy!" Campaign Begins In NH; Picketing, Leafleting, and More. ...Rudy cancelled the Catholic Church's St. Patrick's Day parade because parade leaders would not let homosexual floats in the parade. Federal Court gave back the permit. -- Rudy marched in obscene homosexual parades in NYC that included pedophiles... (earnedmedia.org)
Huckabee Faces Whoop-dee-do Over Bible's "Place for Women." (NY Post) [Most likely everyone is taking what he said out of context. Scripture has instructions to husbands also & they are more strict than what is told to women. Also, the Bible's meaning of the word "submit" is being misconstrued. This will be a test for Huckabee to hold his ground and address the [willful] misunderstanding of what he, and Scripture, said.]
Japan Deadlock Over U.S. Warships. Opposition MPs, who control the upper house, are blocking the bill, which would allow Japan to refuel US warships involved in conflict in Afghanistan. But Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda is determined to secure a renewal for the mandate of the refuelling mission. Analysts say the stand-off may damage Japan's security alliance with the US.
Pakistani UN Human Rights Envoy Urges U.S. NOT To Send Monitors to Upcoming Election. She, Hina Jilani, was addressing a congressional hearing, in D.C. on the political crisis in Pakistan. (BBC) [Is she merely anti-Musharraf & proBhutto?] Jilani's sister Asma Jehangir is also critical of the government. The UN envoy was responding to questions asked by Democratic lawmakers Sheila Jackson Lee and Jim Moran who wanted her advice on the wisdom of going to Pakistan as part of a congressional delegation to monitor the election process. [Now, do you get the picture?]
Condoleeza Praises Putin Choice. The U.S. Secretary of State said, though, that Russia was not giving political opposition a fair chance in elections. (Pravda, Russia's version of what she said.)
Israeli Columnist: Condi Hangs a "No Jews Allowed" Sign. Condoleezza Rice has got some nerve. First, the US Secretary of State had the hutzpa to compare Israel's treatment of Palestinians to that meted out to US blacks during the bad old days of the segregationist South. Speaking at a private session at the close of the Annapolis conference, America's top diplomat said that having grown up "as a black child in the South, being told she could not use certain water fountains or eat in certain restaurants, she also understood the feelings and emotions of the Palestinians."
Izlamization On the Chesapeake. "...What is, however, already known is that Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice allowed unprecedented acts of diplomatic humiliation against Israel resulting in a form of dhimmi, second class, status of Israel, the Jewish State. She enabled acts of Islamization here in our own country...So as not to “offend” the Saudi delegation, she, as reported in the French AFP news service, acquiesced to their demand that the Israeli negotiators not be allowed to enter the same door to the hall...Condi Rice demoted principal guests to second class status. This is not the American way. It is, however, the way of Islamism, where Western countries begin turning over centuries’ of enshrined values and habits so as to accommodate Seventh Century Islamic demands and attitudes toward those they consider inferior or infidels...Further snubbing took place at Condi’s conclave, according to David Warren of the Ottowa Citizen. Aside from turning off their ear pieces when the Israeli delegate spoke, the Saudis refused to shake hands with the Israelis...he set no ground rules for propriety and American-style fair play. She has become like so many governing elites in the West who are so sensitive to Arab demands against their own humiliation but absolutely indifferent when Moslems humiliate those of us in the West. (Rabbi Aryeh Spero, Frontpage Magazine)
Treaty On Running European Union Is Signed; "Treaty Of Lisbon." The treaty was signed in the Jerónimos Monastery while a choir sang Beethoven’s “Ode to Joy.” It will take effect after being ratified by all 27 countries in the European Union, a process that should be completed by 2009 — if Ireland agrees. (NY Times)
EU, Eyes On Kosovo, To Offer Serbia Fast Track. European Union leaders, worried that Kosovo's push for independence could trigger instability in the Balkans, were set to offer Serbia a fast-track route to joining the bloc at a summit on Friday. (Reuters)
Annapolis Conference: Hitler's Kind of Peace! The disastrous Annapolis “peace” conference—whose aftershocks will be felt for some time—point to an obvious historical parallel. It is hard for me to read about the Annapolis “peace” conference and not think about the relationship between Adolf Hitler and Neville Chamberlain before World War II. (The Trumpet, editorial)
Putin's Hold On Russia. FOR AMERICAN liberals who like to compare the rise of authoritarianism in Vladimir Putin's Russia to the "imperial presidency" of George W. Bush, this month's political events in Russia - the rigged "elections"... (Boston Globe Opinion)
Vietna-to-China Road to Be Built. Vietnam will get a $1.1bn (£542m) loan from the Asian Development Bank (ADB) to build a highway linking its capital Hanoi with mainland China. (BBC)
Pakistan: Fraud Claims Cloud Vote. A flawed election could dash Western hopes for a stable government committed to battling Islamic extremism. (NY Post)
Fatah Official Detained In Gaza. About 30 men seized Omar al-Ghoul at his Gaza home early on Friday, accusing him of collaborating with Israel, his family said. (BBC)
No. 10 Downing St., Dismisses EU Treaty "Fuss." The controversy over Gordon Brown's late arrival for an EU treaty signing ceremony has been dismissed by Downing Street as a "fuss over nothing". (BBC)
Sen. Smith, Senators Claim Oversight System Needed To Avoid "Elder Abuse." A report by the committee and a study conducted by [the very liberal] AARP and the [very liberal] American Bar Assn., also to be released today, set out a blueprint for making model practices now used by a few pioneering jurisdictions the norm nationwide. (LA Times) [And this will require what gov't give-away program & tax expenses to accomplish? "Womb to tomb" to the inch degree.]
Smith Praises McConnell's "Spectacular Job." "...the story is a pretty interesting glimpse of McConnell, who says he would like to be making deals instead of warring with the Democrats. But as writers Jim VandeHei and John F. Harris point out, McConnell's ready resort to the veto may come back to bite the Republicans in the next election." (Jeff Mapes, Oregonian)
Paying Taxes Triggers Happy Area In Brain? "People's reward areas, mid-brain area's signaled people had some degree of satisfaction when that happened," shows Mayr. And these professors say there's a link between those that enjoy giving to charity and in some cases giving to taxes. (KVAL TV) [Drop your brains and believe. College professors have spoken.]
Gabriel Will Call OR Home. Custody - A settlement with his Mexican grandmother allows a Toledo couple to keep the boy, ending an emotional tug of war. (Oregonian)
Ashland: "The Green Team." "We're facing a global climate crisis, and anything we do is going to slow it down. For us, it wasn't just good business, it's good citizenship." (Ashland Daily Tidings) [Environmental-whacko busy-bodies, self-appointed, self-righteous & anti-business.]
Sal Peralta and Travis Diskin Seek to Eliminate Kicker Checks to Corporations. Introducing ballot initiative. Claim bulk of $$ went to out-or-state companies. (SJ) [So what. Their businesses are in OR. Make locating their businesses in OR attractive, not punitive.] Lawmakers and Gov. Ted Kulongoski spoke of eliminating corporate kickers in the 2007 legislative session. However, a deal was struck with business leaders to cancel most of the 2007 corporate kickers and put $319 million instead into the new Oregon Rainy Day Fund. "That's fine, but it's not the long-term solution that Oregonians need," Peralta said. [Anti-business]
Esmeralda Bermudez, Oregonian Writes Pro-illegal Immigration Sympathy Piece. "Bracelet Women Scrape By: An immigration raid forces single-mothers to work together." "Along the way, the women found that even within their group, a rift was forming over money because some of the women had concealed that they had other means of support." 4-page sympathetic article.
S. Renee Mitchell, Oregonian: I'm Not Buying TriMet's Smoke & Mirrors. "In short, before it considers ending the popular Fareless Square, TriMet needs to catch up on all the safety measures it should have put in place 20 years or more ago. Unless those more relevant improvements are solidly in place, troublemakers will not just stop terrorizing our transit system for want of a $2.05 fare." [She's wrong. It's time for this giveaway to go. However, Trimet needs to take more responsibility for what has been a very long-time problem.]
Cracks Found In Four F-15s from Klamath Falls Military Base. An inspection of the nation's fleet of F-15 fighter jets, about 400 planes in all, found eight in recent weeks with potentially disabling structural cracks. Four of them are based in Klamath Falls. (Oregonian)
Bend: Mexicans Revel In Celebration of the Virgin Of Guadalupe. Our Lady of Guadalupe is said to have appeared to Juan Diego in 1531 on a hill in Tepeyac, north of what is now downtown Mexico City...Speaking in Spanish, Medina explained that although he woke up earlier than usual Wednesday, it was important for him to participate in the celebration. (Bend Bulletin)
Portland: Overtime Spending Keeps Rising for Police. Budget - The bureau copes with 58 vacancies and more retirements than recruits...devoting nearly 6 percent of the budget to fill patrol shifts because of staff vacancies or to backfill for officers pulled off the street for annual training. (Oregonian)
Multnomah: County Chair, Ted Wheeler, Asks Sheriff Giusto to Give up Jail Control. Public hearing - The Multnomah County board supports a voluntary transfer of authority to county commissioners... But such a deal would hinge on Giusto agreeing to give up control of the largest jail system in the state, as well as 85 percent of his employees. Giusto expressed doubts about relinquishing so much of the authority granted him as an independent elected official. "I'm willing to look at that option," Giusto said after the meeting. "I'm not there yet," he added later. (Oregonian)
My advice to you would be, pick the person you think would be best to lead the country, regardless whether that person can win or not... Rush Limbaugh to caller from Germany asking how she should vote in the primary. 12-12-07
Illegals Foes Reject Nod to Huckabee. Minuteman co-founder James Gilchrist's endorsement of presidential candidate Mike Huckabee has spurred a backlash among illegal-immigration opponents who say the former Arkansas governor is soft on immigration enforcement. (WA Times)
Time Mag. Asking "Is America the Villain In Bali?" "For Al Gore, it was time to utter a new inconvenient truth that diplomatic niceties precluded others from telling: "My own country, the United States, is principally responsible for obstructing progress here," he told a packed audience at the U.N. climate change summit in Bali. 'We all know that.'" [The "truth" is inconvenient? How about socialist, anti-capitalist, anti-property rights, environmental-whacko lies engineered to fighten people over nothing. How about keeping businesses in courts for years on end irregardless of how cruel and expensive it is. How about forcing property-owners to relinguish their land for wildlife that IS NOT truly endangered. How about not even being allowed to kill certain wildlife for self-defense without big brother pseudo-scrutiny. The truth may be disliked, but it is never as inconvenient as lies. Gore is a liar.]
Ticker-Shock: 170,000 Owe Kickers to State. If you haven't received your refund check, chances are OR Tax collectors called first dibs on it. The "detickered" keeping state phones busy. (Oregonian)
Fed Judge Rips Latest Plan to Help Salmon. Says doesn't do enough for Salmon & may be worse than plans he's already rejected...he also made clear that he might have to do for salmon what the federal government will not...Redden hinted in his letter that he is also skeptical of the government's salmon science, saying he may appoint his own panel of independent scientists to advise him on measures to help salmon. (Oregonian) [It's an anti-Bush, pro-environmental whacko decision; again. Drink the Kool-aid or else the courts will force it down your throat.]
Voter-Roll Complaint Has Simple Explanation? ...asked for an audit and a “comprehensive review of election errors to fully verify that our election system is correct and credible.” (Democrat Herald)
Betsy Hammond, Oregonian Headline Claims Full-day Kindergarten Runs Afoul of State Law. [It has NOT been determined to be against the law. Attorneys have rendered their opinions. Period. This is another news article which is bordering on opinion & clearly sympathetic with the socialist view.]"Until the matter gets settled, in court or by the 2008 Legislature, state officials are cautioning districts not to cut children from class or issue refunds to parents, said Gene Evans, communications director for the Oregon Department of Education. In Corvallis, where a parent complaint prompted the state's legal review, district officials will issue tuition refunds. The complaint there, brought by parents Rich and Denise Bjarnason, targeted the district's policy of making low-income families pay kindergarten tuition."
Austin: TX DOT Issues Formal Request for Proposals from Two Developers. Continuing its high priority effort to develop a 650-mile interstate quality highway from south Texas to northeast Texas, the Texas Department of Transportation has issued a formal request for proposals from two private developer teams (Rudy Giuliani law-firm represented CINTRA among them) for detailed plans on how to finance, design, construct, operate and maintain I-69/TTC. (Go to 2nd article) (Reed Construction Data)
British Gov't Unveiling 10-Year Vision for Schools. Wider services for parents. The plan, to be announced on Tuesday by Mr Balls, will mark a further move towards schools becoming centres for family welfare services as well as teaching pupils. (BBC)
Salem: Bilingual Ed Director Returns. Q: How many languages do you serve? -- A: We have 27 different languages. The Russian population -- we have 180 students and we can hear our Russian parents asking when are you going to start with us. Part of the plan is to look and analyze the Russian population and come up with a plan for them for next year. Chinese is another project, because of the heavy commerce that's going on back and forth. (SJ)
Portland Tells EPA the Water's Fine. Portland wants a variance from the feds so it won't have to make safety changes to its open reservoirs. (Oregonian)
Negotiating the Klamath. If you doubt its razor edge, think of the Klamath River Basin where the water divides the people -- fishermen from farmers, Native Americans from the dam owners, conservationists from one another. (Oregonian)[Fishermen & farmers have a common enemy who uses them against each other; environmental whackos with a lot of $$ for lawsuits. They shouldn't let the environmental extremists divide and conquer them. They should unite against such well funded extremists & demand legitimate science be applied.]
OPD Changing to Redefine Itself. (SJ) [Don't hold your breathe for anything meaningful. It is the same people who have always been morally and socially out of touch.]
Jeff Mapes, Oregonian: Gordon Smith & the Udall Connection. Smith, connected to the Udall family from his mother, and his two cousins have a common great grandfather, David King Udall, a Mormon pioneer sent to settle Arizona. This Udall had two wives, one of whom became a Democrat and one a Republican - and those partisan differences carry until today. [They are ALL liberals]
TriMet Wants No More Free Rides. Say attracts problem riders. "This is a warning to the fare evaders and cheats," Hansen told the City Club. "Your free ride on TriMet is about to end." (Oregonian) [Free rides always have attracted the wrong elements of society. It's called socialism. It stinks. It's never really been a free ride in more ways than one.]
Oregonian Interprets Smith's Unfavorable Rating as What Is Needed to Win. "But a closer look at the numbers could offer Smith encouraging news as well. Although he is supported mainly by Republicans, he also received positive ratings from 38 percent of Democrats and negative ratings from 27 percent. Those are the kinds of numbers a Republican needs to win statewide in Oregon." -- A Smith spokesman, R.C. Hammond, said the relatively low approval ratings for Smith and Wyden reflect overall dissatisfaction with Washington, D.C., politics. (Oregonian) [So, low ratings aren't Smith or Wyden's fault? It's the other guys? Handy logic.]
Lawyers Warn Kindergarten Fees May Be Illegal? Courtney said another option would be to use taxpayer money to fund full-day kindergartens, but he doesn't know where that money could be found. (Oregonian) [Here we go again. How long did they have to rack their brains to decide how to make it appear excusable to raise even more taxes for education? Look for a major pro-tax campaign in 2008 with possibly no Republicans, with the courage, to oppose it.]
Multnomah County: Education Union Rally Marks First Week of Strike. Both sides have accused the other of poor conduct. The district says strikers intercepted children on their way to class and tried to influence their opinions about the dispute. Union members -- who deny inappropriate behavior -- have blamed the district for postponing negotiations and said students are not being properly supervised. The union wants 30-hour educational assistants to be considered full-time employees, which would increase the district's contribution for insurance benefits to those workers and lower employees' share. (Oregonian)
Farm Bill Moves Forward Under Bipartisan Agreement. ... a few Republicans up for reelection next year voted for cloture in the pre-Thanksgiving vote, including Sens. Norm Coleman (Minn.) and Gordon Smith (Ore.). The impasse came about because Republicans wanted to offer several amendments that Democrats charged were not relevant to farm policy, such as measures related to the estate tax and driver’s licenses for illegal immigrants. Republicans objected that they were being cut out of the process. (The Hill) [If conservative Republicans could succeed in passing sensible estate tax legislation, perhaps some of those baby boomers (mentioned in article below) would have more incentive to leave inheritances to their offspring.]
Well-off Baby Boomers Likely to Favor Comfortable Lifestyles Over Leaving Wealth to Heirs. (St Louis Today) [Might the expected coming failure of social security programs be one reason? Knowing inheritance taxes not guaranteed to end permanently? The gov't has been determined to discourage leaving inheritances via taxes. Conservatives who have championed ending such taxes have been villianized as evil. Part of what has been socially inherited is the "me generation" from the sixties which championed "looking out for me" first. "Live for today" and 60's "instant gratification" social inheritance has likely contributed to this change. The end result is contributing to future generations depending more on gov't. which is the intent of such taxes, isn't it?]
Drug Dealers Change Marketing Techniques. A drug task force in south-central Illinois found fentanyl — which is intended for late-term cancer patients and people with chronic pain — being packaged as lollipops...(St Louis Today)
U.S. Supreme Court Enhances Power of Fed. District Judges. By 7 to 2, the court held that “the cocaine guidelines, like all other guidelines, are advisory only,” in the words of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who wrote for the majority. She cited a 2005 Supreme Court decision, United States v. Booker, that “mandatory guidelines” in federal cases gave judges too much fact-finding responsibility, and that the guidelines should be “advisory” instead...In fact, the sentencing commission recently issued new guidelines that will reduce the average sentence for cocaine possession to 8 years 10 months, from 10 years 1 month. The panel is to meet on Tuesday in Washington to consider whether the reduction should be made retroactive. If the answer is “yes,” some 19,000 prisoners could have their sentences reduced. Thomas & Alito were the dissenters. (NY Times)
GOP Hopefuls Temper Anti-Immigrant Talk. (JIM KUHNHENN, AP) [WHICH REPORTER GOT IT RIGHT? The AP or Reuters' reporter? It's all in who is writing the news, isn't it folks. Just take your pick of truth.]
Louisiana: Questions Raised about Democrat State Senator's Residency. Shepherd signed his name to documents submitted to his mortgage company, Jefferson Parish code enforcement and the clerk of court that he would keep the $450,000 home at 3701 Lake Michel Court as his primary residence. A Democrat, Shepherd overwhelmingly won re-election in October. Because no one raised questions over his residency, any action challenging his qualifications to sit in the office must now come from members of the same chamber -- an exceedingly rare occurrence. (Times Picaynne)
AP Publishes Sensational Headline about Huckabee Opinion On AIDs Patients. [Not until one goes further into article does it say that his past answers on the subject were way back before anyone knew whether or not AIDs was contagious. How many news stations will run away with this headline before the real story reaches American?]
[Far Left] Civic Groups Slam U.S. for "Abysmal" Record On Race. The U.S. Human Rights Network, which groups non-profit [far left] organizations, released its report to counter the findings of a U.S. government report in April to the U.N. Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD). (Reuters) [The U.S. must ALWAYS be the bad guy. Don't you forget it.]
U.S., Russia to Talk about Missile Defense. (AP) [Let's play pretend; Russia would not use a missile against us the second they thought they could get away it.] Washington submitted a package of documents to Moscow last month setting out compromise proposals it said were designed to soothe Russian concerns the planned U.S. missile defense shield threatens its national security. ["Sooth 'Russia's Concerns!? What about THEM worrying about their concerns to us? Are we also pretending Putin isn't behaving badly?]
CompUSA, Falling to Competition, to Shut Down after Holidays. the computer retailer that Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim owned since 2000, will shut its doors after 23 years, succumbing to competition from Best Buy Co. and Wal-Mart Stores Inc. Restructuring firm Gordon Brothers Group LLC bought the chain for an undisclosed sum and will sell or close its 103 stores after the U.S. holidays, CompUSA said yesterday. The 67- year-old Slim, Latin America's richest man, failed to turn around CompUSA after investing more than $1.5 billion in the chain over eight years. (Bloomberg)
State Dept.'s Chief Watchdog Resigns. In a brief public statement, the longtime corporate lawyer pointed to his recent battles with congressional Democrats and said they explained the reason for his departure. (LA Times)
Australians to Get Catholic Ads at Movies This Christmas. As well as being encouraged to enjoy the show, Australians going to the movies this festive season will be asked if they know about Jesus in the latest advertising campaign by the Catholic Church. (Reuters) [Wow. Can one imagine our own theaters daring to allow such religious free speech?]
