Pretty Petulant Party, Pal
— Geoff

The compromising, principled, cups-overflowing-with-the-cream-of-human-goodness Democratic members of the House displayed their unwavering commitment to national security in yesterday's vote on renewal of the Patriot Act. That vote, 277-148, failed to reach the 2/3 majority it required for renewal. Funny thing, though - last year it passed pretty easily. What was the difference?

In 2010, of the Democrats who voted, 62.5% voted "Aye." But in 2011, only 35.4% voted in favor of renewal. [...for Republicans, those numbers are 93.9% and 88.6%, respectively.]

Boy do they get pissy when they have a bad election year.

Posted by: Geoff at 04:40 AM | Comments (129)
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Top Headline Comments 2-9-11
— Gabriel Malor

Today, we were kidnapped by hill folk never to be seen again. It was the best day ever.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 02:48 AM | Comments (164)
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David Cameron: My Predecessor Was An Active Party In The Deal To Release The Lockerbie Bomber
— Dave in Texas

The Prime Minister came armed with a report from Cabinet Secretary O'Donnell which admitted Labour did "all it could" to make this happen. (video at the Telegraph link)

The report not only confirmed the “slop-out” claim—it included the text of formerly secret documents which described the discussion of a deal—but also came to the same conclusion that V.F. did—that overall, in Sir Gus’s words, the previous U.K. Labour government “did all it could” to secure Megrahi’s release, and that this was a “policy” derived from a strong “underlying desire.” That underlying desire, not mentioned by Cameron, was to appease Libya and thereby ease the path for British commercial interests.

While Cameron is careful to say it was a Scottish Government decision to release Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, he pushes home the "complicity" point, reading from the Cabinet Secretary's report that the British Government was a) actively involved in "facilitating an appeal", "facilitating contact", and a "game-plan", and b) that these facts were insufficiently explained in previous accounts to Parliament.

The "slop-out" claim refers to a quid pro quo, an allegation the report aims at Scottish First Minister Salmond, saying he suggested "a change to British law in order to stem the flood of expensive legal actions which Scotland was then facing from former prisoners who had been forced to use “slop-out” buckets instead of toilets in their cells.", was a way of making it easier to release Megrahi.

Salmond claims that's a bunch of crap (see what I did there?), and that Megrahi was released on purely humanitarian grounds because he was dying of cancer.

For a long time. It's a slow, slow moving cancer. If I have to have cancer, I want this one.

Purple Avenger explained this to me because I am not as smart as he is: "The Brits were sucking the Colonel's dick over some oil/trade deal. This was the Quid Pro for the Colonel's Quo. Of course, they got played like a Steinway if they really believed this clown was actually sick and dying. I suspect they actually knew what was going on though and decided to go along with the fiction so they could execute their realpolitik deal."

He knows more about Brits than I do, I can't even understand them when they talk except the "yeah?" at the end of every sentence.

via Slublog

Posted by: Dave in Texas at 06:05 PM | Comments (68)
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Overnight Open Thread
— Maetenloch

The Average Face of Women Across the World

Researchers have long known that the more average a person's face is the more attractive they are. And that if you average a set of faces, the composite is often more attractive than any single face.

This is probably why areas with a mixture of ethnic groups IMO tend to produce more than their fair share of beautiful people. The genetic mixing tends to result in a real-life form of averaging and balances out extreme facial features so facial proportions tend toward certain key values.

Researchers found that women in the photos were perceived at their most beautiful when the space between the pupils was just under half (46%, to be exact) of the width of her face from ear to ear. Another measurement crucial to the perception of beauty: when the distance between the womanÂ’s eyes and mouth was jut over a third (36%) of the overall length of her face from chin to hairline.

So congrats to all you beautiful hawt human mongrels!

And to test out our various theories of beauty here are the average faces of women from countries around the world.

And oh yeah the linked article also contains some tips on negotiating. more...

Posted by: Maetenloch at 06:01 PM | Comments (520)
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Obama Admin Admits There Was No Electronic Problem Causing Toyota Sudden Acceleration
— Gabriel Malor

Months ago I wrote that the Obama Administration was sitting on an NHTSA report that would conclusively exonerate Toyota from charges that the electronics in its cars was causing them to suddenly accelerate. The Administration had almost no other choice but to delay in the face of weeks of statements by Administration officials and Democratic congressmen excoriating the automaker. (Overlawyered also covered the suppression charge and the NYTimes' participation in the attack on Toyota.)

Lo-and-behold, now that the election is over and Democrats can get no more camera time on the issue the report finally comes out.

A federal investigation into the recall of Toyota vehicles found no electronic flaws to explain sudden, unintentional acceleration, according to a report released Tuesday by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

The latest report came after a 10-month investigation into whether faulty electronics were responsible for the unintentional high-speed acceleration problem. But the investigation found no evidence for any causes for the unintended acceleration beyond sticking accelerator pedals and floor mat entrapment, though officials said they would consider steps to prevent drivers from pushing wrong the pedal.

At one point, Transportation Secretary LaHood even announced that Toyota owners should return their cars to the dealers and demand refunds. Congressional Democrats were dragging Toyota executives to inquisitorial committee hearings all for an imaginary problem. Oops.

Toyota issued several recalls to secure floor mats and adjust sticky brake pedals but the claim that some electronic goblin was causing their cars to accelerate out of control formed the heart of the inquisition. Ultimately, Toyota was forced to pay more than $48 million in fees because of the recalls and Toyota was the only full-line automaker in 2010 to post lower sales.

Remember, this was completely predictable. It happened before. A few incidents get blown completely out of proportion by giddy lawmakers and credulous media and then every person in a fender-bender uses the "it just got away from me" excuse.

File this one under "politicized science."

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 02:22 PM | Comments (308)
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Oooh: House Voting To Block Funding for ObamaCare Next Week
— Ace

Alas, the Senate, the Senate; but still.

I don't understand something -- does the House need to affirmatively "block" funding, or can they just do this passively by simply not appropriating funds for it?

And if the Senate insists on such funds, but the House holds firm... I guess a government shutdown?

Posted by: Ace at 02:06 PM | Comments (89)
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Obama's Trap for the GOP: "Allowing" the GOP to "Fix" His Horrific Health Care Disaster
— Ace

It's a trap! ObamaCare is such a disaster it's almost, almost, criminal to let it stand as is. But the GOP needs to be firm on this: either it stays in whole or goes in whole.

Herein lies the true genius of Obama's strategy. There is almost no individual provision of Obamacare that most Republicans would vote against repealing. So all the president and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid have to do is pick the least objectionable Republican repeal bills, tweak them slightly and have endangered Democrats introduce them as their own - and watch each one pass with overwhelming GOP support. That is precisely what Democrats did with the 1099 repeal. Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.), a vulnerable incumbent, stole legislation sponsored by Republican Mike Johanns and changed a few words, which helped the measure pass it with 81 votes on the Senate floor. Stabenow can now claim that she led a bipartisan effort that protected small businesses in her state from an odious provision of Obamacare.

Democrats will do this again and again in the months ahead. With each vote, they will strengthen their chances of holding onto the Senate in 2012 and set back the GOP's hopes for full repeal in 2013. The president's strategy is clear: Save the Democrat-controlled Senate. Save his reelection prospects. Save Obamacare. The only question is: Will Republicans help him do it?

Some Republicans are willing to so help him. Including, alas, Sean Duffy.

Duffy said that the GOP leadership could only get him to vote for the bill repealing health reform by vowing that Repubicans would ultimately put forth their own proposal to replace it:

I don't believe that we should ... just do a straight-up repeal. My position during the campaign and today is, let's reform the reform or repeal and replace. And so, I wasn't gonna vote for it. But I went and spoke to the leadership, and I got a commitment that we were going to bring forward our ideas on this replacement bill.

Sequence is important here. Any Republican plan offered before ObamaCare is repealed will be picked to death. The repeal must come first.

This is a similar situation to the recall of Gray Davis -- first he gets recalled, then a replacement is selected. If these votes happen simultaneously, the first vote is not an up or down referendum on Gray Davis but instead a multicandidate election between Gray Davis and his top challengers -- a vote he could have won.

Similarly, we don't want a vote of ObamaCare versus the Republican alternative. We need up or down on ObamaCare first, and only then a reset of the health care debate. The ObamaCare repeal effort must be kept on the level of ObamaCare versus the entire universe of all possible alternative plans, a vote it will fail, easily, not ObamaCare versus one single alternative plan (which it just might win).

Posted by: Ace at 12:11 PM | Comments (196)
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Live Action, the Left, and a Modest Proposal
— Slublog

Recently, a group called "Live Action" has been releasing videos of their recent visits to Planned Parenthood offices. In the videos, the filmmakers pretend to be workers who are running a prostitution ring involving underaged girls. In the videos, the filmmakers ask the Planned Parenthood employees for advice on how to avoid getting in trouble if they needed to engage the services of that organization. Incredibly, they are given the advice they need.

In an odd and somewhat disjointed article at Slate, David Weigel argues that so far, the reaction to the videos has fizzled and credits fast reaction by the left:

The LiveAction videos aren't so powerful. Planned Parenthood has fired one of the accidental stars of the videos, but only two state attorneys general have made noise about investigating Planned Parenthood, in New Jersey and Virginia. But coverage of the videos has focused more on the career of LiveAction's Lila Rose—profiles never fail to mention that she's an aspiring actress—and less on what's in the videos.

There are plenty of reasons for this. Media Matters and other liberal groups pounced as soon as the video went up. Media Matters welcomed the videos with a "refresher course on Andrew Breitbart's dishonest tactics" and the screaming headline "HOAX VIDEO EXPOSED." The hoax? Planned Parenthood had already warned the FBI about the sting. Subsequent Media Matters reports alleged that audio in the tapes had been spliced and mashed to make stuff up. Within 72 hours, the group put together a conference call for Planned Parenthood leaders to speak out about Rose and a joint letter to members of Congress from 26 progressive groups.

Weigel goes on to say that the goal of this defense is to prevent another movement like the one that led to the defunding of ACORN. The left's reaction is a telling one: they seem more concerned with a potential loss of federal funds than they are with the fact that their ideological ally may have been giving advice to pimps and prostitutes.

After facing some criticism of his article on Twitter, Weigel wrote a blog post in which he argued that the Planned Parenthood video was oversold.

What I notice is that the actors are rather guarded about what they're doing -- they describe it as "sex work" in quiet tones, doubtlessly because they are not getting far out of the reception room -- and try to get as much detail about non-abortion services as they can. This was what happened in Falls Church, too, where the "pimp" got confirmation that girls didn't need ID for non-abortion services, but "some things have to be reported" if an underaged girl is brought in and tries to get an abortion. This isn't "complicity with sex abusers." (That's a fun phrase, by the way -- what's a law that requires parental consent even for a woman raped by her father? Is that complicity with sex abuse?)

But we have to back up. The objection of some conservatives is not just to abortion -- it's to any family planning activity supported by taxpayers. Keep unspooling this and it's really not that compelling.

First of all, let's deal with Weigel's snarky little parenthetical about the "fun phrase" that is "complicity with sex abusers." In the United States, 22 states require one or both parents to consent to an abortion, 11 require one or both parents be notified and 2 require both consent and notification before an elective abortion can occur. Parental consent is not some fringe concept worthy of snide mockery - it is law in a number of states and comparing the complexity of that issue with giving advice to those engaged in illegal activity is not a serious argument. Of the states that require parental consent, only three require the permission of both parents. In all of the other states, only one parent is required. So such "complicity," as Weigel argues, is rather unlikely. I'm not sure whether this was an intentional obfuscation, or just a thoughtless aside, but there are some political debates that do not lend themselves well to snark. This is one of them.

Weigel then attempts to argue that the videos are "not that compelling" in part because the Planned Parenthood offices did call the FBI. This argument is rather easily dealt with by Stephen Gutowski at Eyeblast. I would add this: even if Planned Parenthood workers were informing the FBI of the visits by people they thought were sex workers, that does not make the giving of such advice more acceptable. All of the sound and fury of the left's pushback against these videos ignores (or perhaps is intended to cover up) the fact that when faced with the choice of helping a potential sex worker those who seek to exploit minors or kicking them out of the office and reporting them to the police, Planned Parenthood workers helped them on a number of occasions. (Thanks to a sharp-eyed reader for suggesting the edit.)

Planned Parenthood currently receives millions in federal funding. Here's a modest proposal for the liberal groups defending the organization: if you're against the removal of that funding, can we agree to pressure Congress to make that funding contingent upon new training for all PP workers? Training that requires them, if asked for advice on criminal activity, to refuse to give such advice? Is that too much to ask, or is the evidence that such a provision is required not "compelling" enough?

Update - In the comments, JR offers another reason this story should be more "compelling" to the national media:

This isn't about training, this is about being MANDATORY REPORTERS when it comes to potential child abuse.

ALL states consider the age of consent at 16, below that it's illegal. And there is absolutely no question whatsoever that a child involved in the sex trade is legally being abused, regardless of whether or not she gives consent, or over the age of 16.

Licensed healthcare providers are MANDATORY REPORTERS. Meaning that they themselves can be prosecuted or lose their licenses if they do not report this stuff. Being one myself, the law is pretty clear.

It's also pretty clear that state, local and the federal government is looking the other way. DEMAND enforcement of current laws, people. Report all of those people to their licensing boards and do it across the nation. I"m not joking. Start with the joke of a nurse practitioner in that film. I want her license to practice yanked, and her sanctioned and fined.

This isn't about abortion, contraception or 'family planning'. This is about supporting the exploitation of children.

All 50 states have some form of mandatory reporting law. If you live in one of the states 'featured' in these videos, perhaps a letter to your state's attorney general's office would be a good idea.

Update II - Some great thoughts on this story at POWIP.

Posted by: Slublog at 10:45 AM | Comments (148)
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$53 Billion for High Speed Rail
— Ace

Wait, it wasn't a joke? I swear, it sounded like a joke.

Vice Cretin Joe Biden, who seems like a developmentally-stunted oldster who just really needs to be kept in a sanitarium with a really cool model train kit, is of course pushing for it.

Biden, who estimated he has ridden Amtrak between Washington and his home in Wilmington, Delaware, some 7,900 times, made a strong pitch for rail transportation to enable the United States to compete and lead internationally.

"This is about seizing the future," he said...

Ben notes that Obama was willing to consider up to $775 million (with an m) in cuts to his budget. With one hand he giveth, with the other he bankrupteth.

I'm not anti-train so much as I'm anti-Amtrak.

U.S. taxpayers spent about $32 subsidizing the cost of the typical Amtrak passenger in 2008, about four times the rail operator's estimate, according to a private study.

Amtrak operates a nationwide rail network, serving more than 500 destinations in 46 states. Forty-one of Amtrak's 44 routes lost money in 2008, said the study by Subsidyscope, an arm of the Pew Charitable Trusts.

...

Leading the list was the train traveling between New Orleans and Los Angeles — the Sunset Limited — which lost $462 per passenger. Taxpayers subsidize the losses to keep the passenger train service running.

That's a high price to pay, year after year, for a nostalgia act.

You know who hates all this? Reason magazine, which attacks government rail with vitriol and facts but mostly facts every other month. In California, a lot of money has been spent on high speed rail products that are simply phantoms.

The project is a high-decibel example of the magical thinking that takes hold when people talk about trains. A few years ago, when the rail bonds were being debated, I participated in the quaint ritual of an editorial board meeting at the Los Angeles Times in which we debated how to “weigh in” on this critical issue. While I, the team’s only mass transit rider, had the handicap of knowing what I was talking about, I was nonetheless pleased at the group’s readiness to acknowledge that the high-speed rail project offered only anemic ridership levels, endless subsidies, and a strong likelihood of never happening. But in the end, of course, we ran with an editorial titled “Believe in the Bullet Train.” The piece complained that “critics…base their arguments on the past, not the future.”

The bullet train also exemplifies the arrogance and Bourbon high-handedness with which grand plans get made. Several times the California High Speed Rail Authority has been caught mapping out bullet train alignments and then failing to notify homeowners whose properties would be slated for seizure via eminent domain. The current plan would have the 220-mile-per-hour train running through well-populated residential areas. It also pits the Authority against Union Pacific over track resources, meaning the bullet train would essentially replace freight—the one genre of rail transport that remains viable and important to the economy—with a passenger rail project that has no hope of ever becoming sustainable.

Finally, the bullet train is a case study in the immortality of a bad idea. While the train itself may never become a reality, sheer political will makes the train project impossible to kill. “The project has been fighting every year to stay alive,” says Elizabeth Alexis, co-founder of Californians Advocating Responsible Rail Design, a watchdog group that supports a rail project in principle but is critical of the Authority. “So they did what they had to do to stay alive, because that’s better than being dead.”

After 14 years of no life signs, how can you tell the difference? Amtrak used to try and lure riders with the slogan “There’s Something About a Train That’s Magic.” In reality, we know that magical trains exist only in cartoons.

I like that part about the train supposedly going 220 miles per hour through the hearts of residential neighborhoods. Yeah, not going to happen; even if it were built it would be forbidden, by law, from going over 70 mph.

But let's pretend. Because that's all America is now, starshine and unicorn glow.

Posted by: Ace at 10:15 AM | Comments (220)
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Critics of Capticalism Find Criticizing Capitalism To Be A Pretty Lucrative Capitalist Venture
— Ace

But apparently only ThoughtWorkers are allowed to profit from their production.

That Gore profited enormously from eco-companies that capitalized on his own global-warming hype, that Arianna Huffington sold her website for $315 million, and that Michael Moore is suing to receive receipts beyond his $20 million take for his anti-Iraq/Bush mythodrama remind us why Barack Obama was the largest recipient of BP and Goldman Sachs campaign money, and indeed of Wall Street cash in history, after being the first presidential candidate to reject the public financing in the general campaign. Does “spread the wealth” rhetoric serve as some sort of pass on overweening desire for lots of cash and nice things?

Meanwhile, Keith Olbermann has become a co-owner and "Chief News Officer" of Al Gore's current TV.

Keith Olbermann is one of the only liberals liberals will -- begrudgingly -- admit might flout their newfound love of "civility" and "moderation of rhetoric;" why then is he profiting from this, from a former liberal VP and presidential candidate?

I just saw a BloggingHeads where Robert Wright was demanding that Glenn Beck be fired -- he urged social penalties (exclusion from polite company, firings from jobs) for those who served up red-hot rhetoric.

Okay, Robert Wright: Where's the social penalty for Keith Olbermann?

Posted by: Ace at 08:47 AM | Comments (205)
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