Happens to everybody sooner or later.
And look, its not like he's the first guy to say this kind of thing.

Larry Shirley, a city councilman in Charleston, S.C., raised eyebrows when asked about a store robbery carried out by a group of children. Noting that stray animals are picked up and spayed, he said mothers should also "be spayed" if they can't take care of their children.

Shirley said he realizes that can't be done, but that he only wanted to "start the dialogue." Shirley said he's sorry if anyone was offended by his remarks last week. And, he added, if people don't want a dialogue, he'll keep quiet.

Nice recovery, Larry. That ought to put this whole thing behind you.
And, of course, the kicker:

The Charleston Post and Courier said it got more than 100 e-mails from across the nation, most supporting Shirley.

Posted by: LauraW. at 09:10 AM | Comments (27)
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If I have learned anything in life from Robert Plant (and, really, who among us hasn't?) it's that when life squeezes your lemons 'til the juice runs down your leg you should collect it and make lemonade.

So, in that spirit, I offer the following proposition (heh): Let's use the AOL Fornigate instant messaging controversy as an opportunity to make the English language a little classier.

How you ask? By replacing the crude innuendo "I'd hit it" with the much more upscale and technologically sophisticated comment "I'd IM it".

I mean, isn't the former comment getting just a bit tired? It doesn't even have shock appeal anymore. Hell, they use it in TV ads to market hand-held PSP's to kids for crying out loud.

But if you start using the phrase "I'd IM it", you are making a much more 21st century statement! You are, in effect, saying that "not only do I have a blackberry in my pocket but I'm glad to see you too!"

And chicks dig affluence. And power. And what makes more of a statement that you possess both of those qualities than your ability to seemlessly use complicated and expensive telecommunications technology to woo the love of your life.

Or the love of your morning, afternoon, evening, or roll call vote. Don't bog me down with details.

So that's what I'm going to start saying. Who's with me?

Just let me know in the comments. If you IM me with your answer, I'll get creeped out.

Posted by: Ace at 03:07 AM | Comments (30)
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Heh.

Yes, the pun in the title is deliberate.

For those of you too lazy to click the link, there is currently a story on Drudge in which Iran's Supreme Leader, Sayyid Ali Khameini, has declared that masturbation during the Ramadan holiday is a forbidden act which renders any fasting invalid.

Here is the question posed to him, and the answer he provided:

Khameini, who is Iran's most powerful political and religious figure, was asked on his website : "If somebody masturbates during the
month of Ramadan but without any discharge, is his fasting invalidated?"

"If he do not intend masturbation and discharging semen and nothing is discharged, his fasting is correct even though he has done a ḥarām (forbidden) act. But, if he intends masturbation or he knows that he usually discharges semen by this process and semen really comes out, it is a ḥaram intentional breaking fasting," the Iranian leader said, posting the reply on his website.

I get the feeling that this question was posed to him by a so-calledmoderate muslim. After all, did you check out the layers of nuance provided?

In any event, we here at AoSHQ are nothing if not sensitive to these sorts of pressing issues. In fact, some here know them inside and out. You might even say, these are issues that they are as familiar with as the back of their hand.

Not me, mind you. I'm just reporting here.

Anyway, in a show of outreach to those in the Islamic world who are having great difficulties remaining masters of their caliphate, I will post the world's greatest cure for masturbatory desire after the jump.

If you need it, click on it. Otherwise, feel free to go on to the next post. I'm just trying to do my bit for world peace by relieving Middle East....umm...tensions, after all. more...

Posted by: Ace at 07:29 PM | Comments (37)
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He was 18 at the time. Correction: HotAir notes he was 17 during some conversations, 18 during others.

This doesn't make it right. It does, however, turn it from a case of the criminal to a case of the strongly socially disapproved. It's a firing offense (or, here, a resigning offense), to be sure, but not a criminal offense-- but boy, did the MSM present it as the latter.

Does this mean Mark Foley isn't a scumbag? No, he still is, and he's still an embarrassment to the party. However, the page in question's age has now crept slightly closer to the age of Monica Lewinsky, whose affair with a sitting president, we're told in no uncertain terms, was no one's business but their own.

PoliPundit notes, now that ABCNews has already flooded the zone with erroneous information, that the "boy" here was actually a "young man."

Radar jumps on the fake blog story, and notes it seems connected to the Daily Kos, through a poster calling himself "WHIntern."

Dan Riehl points out that Kos has WHIntern's IP, and could break a little news if he wanted to. But of course he won't, because WHIntern is most likely a DNC hack or a gay liberal blogger.

As far as I can tell, the Passionate American put all this together first. At least that's where I first saw it. I didn't mention it (sorry), because he mentioned the name of the young man involved, which I thought was dicey.

But it's out there now, and there's hardly any point pretending anyone doesn't know the name, or can't quickly get it if they so choose.

Again, Mark Foley's behavior was, to harken back to the 90's, "simply reprehensible." However, that's hardly a reason to juice the story up further than the fact will support.

And... This is important, because without any clear criminality or anything approaching pedophilia, it limits what Denny Hastert could have reasonably been expected to do.

Posted by: Ace at 06:44 PM | Comments (79)
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In honor of Kim Il-Jong's threat to test a nuclear missile. more...

Posted by: Ace at 03:36 PM | Comments (26)
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Teutonic Tit-thieves Thwart Doc's Fees

BERLIN (Reuters) - A German plastic surgeon who was cheated out of payment by several women has given pictures of their enlarged breasts to police, in the hope the photos will help trace them.

"The women registered under fake names," Michael Koenig, a surgeon in Cologne, told Bild newspaper. "After the operations, which lasted about an hour, they just ran away."

Posted by: LauraW. at 01:41 PM | Comments (75)
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It's almost like we have a strong economy or something.

This is important:

The Dow's record-setting day on Tuesday wiped out records that had stood since Jan. 14, 2004. The broader market indicators are still lagging as they try to recover from the turmoil that began with the dot-com bust early in the decade.

Let's not forget the previous high in the Clinton Administration was fueled largely by absurd speculation and overinvestment in phatantasmal dot-com ventures. This current mark is much more realistic -- indeed, given the markets' skittishness, price levels are probably held lower than they might be in other periods of history.

Brit Hume said he thought there'd be more celebrating if the broader S&P index broke a record. Well, the S&P is a ways away from that, but it's moving in the right direction too:

Those indexes rose sharply Wednesday along with the Dow. The Standard & Poor's 500 index was up 16.11, or 1.20 percent, at 1,350.22 and the Nasdaq composite index rose 47.30, or 2.11 percent, to 2,290.95.

On Cavuto, analysts seemed to have a consensus opinion that 12,000 was easy, 13,000 was likely, and 14,000 was not entirely out of the question.

And, again: this is all a much more realistic level than occurred under Clinton. How many times did Greenspan have to say that an "irrational exuberance" was pushing stock prices ridiculously above their objective values?

Posted by: Ace at 01:35 PM | Comments (79)
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This barely deserves a link. But I'll link it as it involves women, so it can't be said it's "all gay, all the time." (Though it does involve the fashion industry, too...)

Criticism: Models are unhealthily thin. Unhealthy for they themselves, unhealthy for impressionable (i.e., "stupid") young girls to emulate. I won't bother evaluating the merits of this criticism, as it will turn into a brawl.

So, to respond to this, Gaultier puts (sorry, they are) very fat women on the catwalk.

Criticized for using size 0 waifs -- alleged to be unhealthy -- he responds with size 20 fat women, which is also an unhealthy weight.

Apparently there are no size 6-10 models available.

It's either one extreme or the other.

It's so tediously predictable, isn't it? Any idiotic stunt to get some attention. Always "shocking" us with their outrageousness.

Seems kind of a cruel joke at these women's expense, but hey, can't make an omlette without breaking a few eggs.

Posted by: Ace at 01:25 PM | Comments (133)
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The program goes on-- for now. Pending a decision on the merits.

Posted by: Ace at 01:15 PM | Comments (10)
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Claiming he's a "religious" man, he asks for forgiveness for the outrageous pictures, and the MSM refuses to ask who in the Democratic Party may have known about this disgusting behav--

Aw, crap. We really need some better dirt.

This dirt? Dreck. It barely rises to the level of dirt.

Please, someone forward me some really good dirt. I'll get it out there.

Posted by: Ace at 12:41 PM | Comments (23)
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