Month: February 2013
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Hagel Will Be Confirmed, But The Hagel Battle Tells Us Much About The GOP
Chuck Hagel will be confirmed, but the campaign against him tells us much about the current state of Republican foreign policy
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Robot Cleans Your Tablet or Smartphone Screen
From the Department of Stuff I Really Don’t Need comes a robot that cleans the screen of your iPad. Mashable (“This Little Robot Cleans Your Tablet or Smartphone“): Touchscreen devices have gone a long way in the first couple of years, but one problem has stayed the same: dirty screens. No matter how much you…
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Should We Continue To Subsidize Rural Mail Delivery?
It may have made sense to subsidize rural mail delivery once, that may not longer be the case?
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Post Office To Eliminate Most Saturday Mail Delivery
The Saturday visit from your mail carrier is about to come to an end: WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. Postal Service will stop delivering mail on Saturdays but continue to deliver packages six days a week under a plan aimed at saving about $2 billion, the financially struggling agency says. In an announcement scheduled for…
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Dick Morris Out At Fox News Channel
Dick Morris’s positively horrible punditry over the past several election cycles has finally caught up with him: Fox News has decided not to renew its contract with political commentator and pollster Dick Morris, an industry official tells POLITICO’s Mike Allen. Morris, who was on contract with Fox News throughout the 2012 presidential campaign, had not appeared…
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Presidential Killing Powers Need Checks and Balances
“Killing Americans,” my latest for The National Interest, has posted.
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The Army’s Leadership Problem
Tim Kane continues his campaign against the US military’s antiquated personnel system.
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City Paints Handicapped Spot Around Car, Tows It
A Tel Aviv woman found her car towed and a handicapped parking space painted around where she’d left it.
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Plastic Bag Bans Have Unintended Consequences
Ramesh Ponnuru considers “The Disgusting Consequences of Plastic-Bag Bans.”
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A Baseball Recovered From A Civil War Battlefield
The image above is a hand-stitched baseball recovered from the scene of the Battle of Shiloh. Details: During the War Between the States, the game was played on the battlefields and even in wartime prison camps. Baseball was, after all, portable, and even amid the horrors of war, soldiers sometimes found opportunities to play on the vast open…
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Same-Sex Marriage Bill Passes in House of Commons
Via the BBC: Gay marriage: MPs back legislation The Commons voted in favour of the Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Bill, by 400 to 175, a majority of 225, at the end of a full day’s debate on the bill. Prime Minister David Cameron has described the move as "an important step forward" that strengthens society.…
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Obama: Let’s Delay The Sequester Cuts. Boehner: Let’s Not
President Obama just recently concluded a brief statement in the White House Press Briefing Room in which he called on Congress to once again kick the can down the road and delay the sequestration cuts now scheduled to kick in on March 1st: WASHINGTON — President Obama on Tuesday called on lawmakers to quickly pass…
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Guns and Self-Protection
Some musing on guns: who uses them, how, and why.
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Stay Classy, Brownie
On Super Bowl Sunday, former FEMA Director Michael Brown tweeted: Someone just told me there was fighting going on in the NOLA Superdome. #shocked — Michael D Brown (@MichaelBrownUSA) February 4, 2013 Given that one of the failings of the response to Katrina under Brown’s watch was the disaster that developed at the Superdome, seemingly…
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Traffic Costs Americans $121 Billion Annually
Americans waste $121 billion a year because of traffic congestion.
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Credit Card Scams
In “Managing Mom’s Money,” J.D. Roth relates various credit card scams that are difficult to avoid and impossible to get out of once in.
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The Army, Lord of the Rings, and DnD
I joined the Army so I could travel, fight, and go on adventures. Just like Bilbo and Frodo Baggins.
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Alabama Hostage Safe After FBI Kills Kidnapper with Help of Military Drone
A 5-year-old Alabama boy is safe after authorities killed his kidnapper.
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John McCain To Republicans: Don’t Filibuster Hagel
John McCain was among the most aggressive questioners during Chuck Hagel’s confirmation hearing last week, but he’s telling his fellow Republicans to let the nomination go to a full vote rather than filibustering: Sen. John McCain appears to have cleared the way Monday for Chuck Hagel to be the next secretary of defense. The Arizona…
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Tagg Romney Bows Out Of Senate Race
Tagg Romney announced today that he would not be a candidate for Senate in Massachusetts: Tagg Romney, son of former Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, said on Monday that he has decided against a run for Secretary of State John Kerry’s Senate seat in Massachusetts. His full statement, via the New York Daily News: “I have…
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Should Super Bowl Monday Be A National Holiday?
Does America deserve a day off today because we all stayed up late overindulging?
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Super Bowl Sets Viewership Record For Fourth Straight Year
Each Super Bowl broadcast since 2010 has set a new record for the total number of viewers and Super Bowl XLVII was no exception: (Reuters) – The close Super Bowl contest between the Baltimore Ravens and the San Francisco 49ers scored the highest rating share in history for the game, based on Nielsen’s top U.S.…
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Mahmoud Ahmadinejad: Space Cadet
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad wants to go into space: Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has volunteered to become the first person sent into space by his country’s fledgling space programme. “I’m ready to be the first Iranian to be sacrificed by the scientists of my country and go into space,” he is quoted by state media as saying.…
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Samantha Power to Spend More Time with Family
Samantha Power is leaving the Obama administration to spend more time with her family. No, really.
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Romney For Senate?
Not Mitt, one of his many sons: Tagg Romney is considering a run in the special Senate election now that Scott Brown has opted out, the Truth Squad has learned. Calls for Romney, 42, to join in the short campaign to replace Secretary of State John F. Kerry have increased since the Herald first reported…
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Conservative Media Its Own Worst Enemy
Conservatives complaining about biased coverage from the liberal media should instead look in the mirror.
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Remains Of Richard III Found Beneath British Parking Lot
Archaeologists have confirmed that bones found underneath a parking lot in Great Britain are the remains of one of England’s most infamous monarchs: LEICESTER, England — In one of Britain’s most dramatic modern archaeological finds, researchers here announced on Monday that skeletal remains found under a parking lot in this English Midlands city were those…
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Fidel Votes
Via the BBC: Fidel Castro votes in Cuba election. The interesting thing about this is just that Fidel is out about: Fidel Castro has voted in Cuba’s parliamentary elections, the first time the frail ex-leader has been seen in public for several months. State TV showed the 86-year-old voting at a polling station where he…
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Fox News Calls NRA Claim ‘Ridiculous’
Fox News Sunday host Chris Wallace called a controversial NRA claim “ridiculous.”
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Do We Need Affirmative Action for Boys?
Christina Hoff Summers argues that America needs to fix the way we educate boys.
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Playing Football Takes Up 11 Minutes Of Average NFL Game
As we all settle down in a few hours to watch the Super Bowl, The Wall Street Journal tells us that we’ll be watching a lot of television but very little football: According to a Wall Street Journal study of four recent broadcasts, and similar estimates by researchers, the average amount of time the ball is…
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Does All-Volunteer Military Break the Social Compact?
Andrew Bacevich bemoans the social impact of the all-volunteer force.
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Nate Silver Picks 49ers To Win Super Bowl
Nate Silver has taken the system he used to accurately call a second straight Presidential election in a row to pick the San Francisco 49ers to win tonight’s game: It is the case, however, that the better defensive team has usually won the Super Bowl — and done so far more consistently than offensive juggernauts. The Web…
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Hagel Gets Republican Support
Nebraska Senator Mike Johanns announced yesterday that he would support Chuck Hagel’s nomination for Secretary of Defense: Sen. Mike Johanns said Saturday he will support the nomination of former Sen. Chuck Hagel — a fellow Nebraska Republican — to be secretary of defense. “Chuck earned this endorsement,” Johanns told the Lincoln Journal Star. Asked to confirm the…
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Another Republican Passes On Running For John Kerry’s Seat
Just days after Scott Brown announced that he would not be running in the Special Election to fill John Kerry’s Senate seat, another Republican has made the same choice: Richard Tisei, one of the Republicans’ best hopes for the now-longshot Massachusetts Senate special election after Scott Brown took a pass, announced Saturday night that he…
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America Cramped By Defensiveness?
Is America’s focus on defense weakening the country?
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30 Second Super Bowl Commercial Costs $3.8 Million
At nearly $4 million for a 30 second spot, advertising on the Super Bowl is a bargain.
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Social Media Fail (Applebee’s Edition)
See the whole thing at R. L. Stollar’s blog: Applebee’s Overnight Social Media Meltdown: A Photo Essay (h/t: Robert Farley). For those unfamiliar with the context: Waitress fired after posting pastor’s no tip receipt online.
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Socialism Watch
Via the BBC: Dow at five-year high on jobs data The main US share index closed at a five-year high on Friday, buoyed by official data showing that the economy added more jobs than previously estimated at the end of last year. The Dow Jones finished up 1.1% or 149 points to 14,010, the first…
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More Iranians Tech News
Via the BBC: Qaher F313: Iran unveils home-made ‘stealth’ fighter Iran has unveiled a new home-made combat aircraft, which officials say can evade radar. The single-seat Qaher F313 (Dominant F313) is the latest design produced by Iran’s military since it launched the Azarakhsh (Lightning), in 2007. […] The ceremony was timed to coincide with the…
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Toomer Corner Oaks Being Cut Down
Auburn’s famed Toomer’s Corner Oaks will be cut down, an acknowledgment that they’ll never be healthy again after an idiot Alabama fan poisoned them.
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Fake Space Monkey?
Via The Times: Iran’s space monkey triumph exposed as a fake. Propaganda used to be easier to pull off… Iran responds (via Fox News): Iran official: Photo shows wrong primate, but the space monkey still flew.
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Another Immigration Graph
From the same source as the previous post: It is worth noting that much of the current debate on immigration is based on perceptions built during a time of a bulge in immigration, rather than on the long-term trends, nor the current situations. Along those lines, in fact: Net Migration from Mexico Falls to Zero—and…
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Immigration Trends
In looking for some data for a previous post, I came across the following from the Pew Hispanic Center: The graph is interesting for a variety of reasons, but let’s stick to the most obvious for this brief post: it shows that the great magnet to the US is, not surprisingly, jobs. When there is…
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White House Releases Photo Of Obama Shooting Skeet
So, this happened: The White House, succumbing to skeptics, releases a photo Saturday of President Barack Obama skeet shooting. The president told The New Republic in a recent interview that he goes skeet shooting “all the time.” Doubters of the claim quickly asked for photos, a request the White House denied earlier this week. The image released…
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Further Evidence Limbaugh Should be Ignored on Immigration
Really, more evidence he should be ignored in general.
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Obama May Move Into Temporary Oval Office
They’re planning some renovation work at the White House that may result in the President temporarily moving into a different Oval Office: In preparation for a major, two-year renovation of the West Wing, the government is undertaking extensive work to complete a new executive office for President Obama at the south end of the adjacent…