Things are busy here. Well, it's not really that things are busy so much as my diverticulitis is flaring up again.

Most of my blogging will probably come at night. I'll post when I can, but this is going to be a light couple of days as far as blogging.

Posted by: Ace at 10:35 AM | Comments (3)
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The "taking the lead" part is probably just as ephemeral as Edwards' bounce. Still, it's good to see that that has evaporated.

Meanwhile, consumer confidence hits six-month high.

Update: Marist has it Kerry by one.

Posted by: Ace at 10:31 AM | Comments (2)
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Current Status: "BRONCHIAL BUMMER"

Diagnosis: Cause of affliction undisclosed. It may be an after-effect of his feeling "ill" regarding the "hatred and fear" of gays driving the anti-gay-"marriage" debate. Further tests, and further information from Andrew, required.

Prognosis: His condition has deteriorated "ill" to "bummer" in just two days. I sincerely hope they're able to stabilize him. CSD (chronic solipsism disorder) is a progressive and often untreatable illness.

We do have cause for hope, however: Andrew is a fighter.

Fight, Andrew. Fight with all your intellect and spirit. Fight, so that we may soon hear happy reports about your beagles.

Posted by: Ace at 10:07 PM | Comments (25)
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The New York Times actually reports that Bush seems to have been telling the truth about Niger/Uranium (well, they say he "might" have told the truth).

They do so in an article without prominent placement. Even on the International page front, it's buried low on the page. (Can you find it?)

And they did this all on a Saturday. The least-read day of the week.

Don't expect to see them mention this story again. They've deliberately buried it, but now they can say they've "covered it."

Posted by: Ace at 03:38 PM | Comments (3)
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As you are all well aware, not a moment goes by that I don't wonder myself, "Gosh, how is Andrew Sullivan's emotional and/or physical state at this very moment?"

Luckily for all of us, he keeps us constantly informed.

As I know each of you are similarly fixated on Andrew Sullivan's hour-by-hour emotional and physical status, I'll be instituting this new feature to keep you abreast of how Mr. Sullivan is feeling at any particular moment.

CURRENT STATUS: "ill"

DIAGNOSIS: Illness appears brought on by "fear of gays":

"Reading how the GOP hopes to use fear of gays to rev up their base across the country really makes me feel ill."

This is terrible news indeed. I hope we won't have to wait long to hear that Andrew is feeling better.

I'm confident, however, that the wait will not be long at all.

Oh, by the way. Completely, utterly unrelated, but here's a good SAT word you can impress your friends with:

Main Entry: so·lip·sism
Pronunciation: 'sO-l&p-"si-z&m, 'sä-
Function: noun
Etymology: Latin solus alone + ipse self
: a theory holding that the self can know nothing but its own modifications and that the self is the only existent thing
so·lip·sist /'sO-l&p-sist, 'sä-l&p-, s&-'lip-/ noun
so·lip·sis·tic /"sO-l&p-'sis-tik, "sä-/ adjective
so·lip·sis·ti·cal·ly /-ti-k(&-)lE/ adverb

Posted by: Ace at 08:56 PM | Comments (11)
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Registration required:

THE US will mount a concerted attempt to overturn the regime in Iran if President Bush is elected for a second term.

It would work strenuously to foment a revolt against the ruling theocracy by Iran’s “hugely dissatisfied” population, a senior official has told The Times.

The United States would not use military force, as in Iraq, but “if Bush is re-elected there will be much more intervention in the internal affairs of Iran”, declared the official, who is determined that there should be no let-up in the Administration’s War on Terror.

To what extent the official, known to be hawkish, was speaking for the White House was unclear, but his remarks are nevertheless likely to cause alarm in Europe. He hinted at a possible military strike against IranÂ’s nuclear facilities, saying that there was a window of opportunity for destroying IranÂ’s main nuclear complex at Bushehr next year that would close if Russia delivered crucial fuel rods.

Posted by: Ace at 06:59 PM | Comments (13)
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Scan down.

The suit is frivolous, and without any plausible legal basis. Obviously.

We can draw two conclusions from this stunt:

1) The Left, long accustomed to having a monopoly on the dissemination (and suppression) of information, has been driven batshit crazy by the idea of a single cable news network they don't control;

and

2) These are fundamentally unserious people, engaging in silly media stunts more suited to radio shock jocks than political organizations, all while there's a global war of terrorism on.

Posted by: Ace at 06:53 PM | Comments (26)
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You're in this with us, Frenchie, no matter how much that might bother you.

Posted by: Ace at 12:23 PM | Comments (12)
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Michelle Malkin has updates on the story; she's confirmed through sources that most of the story is true.

People seem to be focusing on whether these were actual terrorists participating in a "dry run."

This seems borderline irrelevant to me. For my part, I actually doubt that these were actual terrorists. I'm nowhere near certain of that; I just doubt it, based on simple probablility. Of all Syrians behaving strangely on a plane, only a small fraction will actually be terrorists.

But that's not really the point. The point is that these men were in fact behaving strangely enough to alarm the captain, the crew, and most passengers on the plane, and nothing was done about it.

The article mentions the claim that there were sky-marshals aboard. Fine-- but they didn't do anything. Now, I think that the sky-marshals themselves shouldn't actually act until there's clear reason to act -- they'd like to keep their identities hidden, for deterrent value and tactical surprise -- but I don't see why the plane's crew didn't have a word with the men and tell them firmly that they must remain in their seats, and only move about the cabin with the permission and escort of a stewardress.

And why wasn't that bathroom searched after each man had visited it?

It seems to me that the entire air-crew was somewhat alert to the threat of a hijacking. But that's not really the most likely threat anymore. I suggest that hijacking a plane would be very difficult indeed in 2004. But assembling a bomb in a bathroom, with small parts smuggled aboard by a troop of men, would not be very difficult at all.

Especially since no one on this plane apparently took any steps at all to disrupt these men's movements and actions.

Suppose these men weren't terrorists, as seems most likely. Fine. It seems they were acting more suspiciously than genuine terrorists would be likely to act (some take this fact as evidence they weren't terrorists).

If an aircrew isn't going to take any steps to insure security when a bunch of Syrian Muslims, who aren't terrorists, behave strangely on a plane, I think we can safely say that they also won't take any steps when a bunch of foreign Muslim men, who are terrorists, behave slightly less strangely (but still suspiciously).

If this is the current state of on-board airplane security, I think we need to all brace for a series of horrific bombings this summer and fall.

This is political correctness run amok. I don't want to make life uncomfortable for peaceable Muslims. I don't want to "humiliate" them. But there must be a limit to our regard for their feelings. A little humiliation is a rather small concern compared to the very lives of 200-400 innocent human beings.

What the hell: Let the government announce pre-determined penalties which it will pay to those unjustly detained or arrested or searched under suspicion of terrorism. And let the government pay these amounts out, after proof in a quasi-judicial hearing of innocence. Set the amounts from $5,000-25,000 depending on the obtrusiveness of the actions taken.

And then start searching such people, and restricting the movements of people "behaving strangely" and in concert.

If they're found to be innocent-- if the worries were unfounded -- give them $5,000 or so to ease their "humiliation."

But we cannot continue under the current system, where airlines refuse to take prudent steps because our society is determined to punish them -- through lawsuits and even possible civil rights prosecutions by the state -- for taking such prudent actions.

Update: KevinK objects:

If it's worth $5000.00 to $25,000.00 to act a little strange on a flight and arouse suspicion, then welcome to the screwy skies.

First of all, let me say I high-balled it there. Maybe $500 - $5,000 (the latter for borderline malicious measures) would be more reasonable.

But I wasn't talking about some automatic "I behave screwy, you subject me to heightened scrutiny, you pay me" regime, which would admittedly be, um, idiotic.

The money would only be paid out based on a showing of a negligent, malicious, and/or unreasonable degree of scrutiny.

I'm offering this in its positive form -- we'll pay x amount for such an unreasonable detaining. I think this is the best way to sell it politically.

And, as most "best ways to sell it politically" tend to be, it's a little disingenuous.

I'm being coy about the negative formulation-- you can't sue for millions based upon such a detainment. You'd be restricted to small-bore payouts, and only upon proof of some degree of unreasonable behavior by the airline or TSA.

Airline security measures would be immunized against most suits, except for proof of an extremely unreasonable search/questioning/detaining/"humiliation", and such suits would have to be certified as being likely to succeed on the merits by some sort of panel.

A bit like Bush's proposed HMO reforms.

The idea is that you'd limit the payoffs to persons so "humiliated." They could get small amounts upon some showing of unreasonableness, but they would be precluded from suing for jackpot-type awards unless there was some seriously egregious, malicious conduct by the airline.

Basically it would be a partial insulation against suits based on racial profiling. Which is for the best.

Posted by: Ace at 10:50 AM | Comments (16)
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Sadly, the budget deficit just isn't coming in as high as anticipated.

Kerry might be facing a deficit of $100 billion in the deficit he's counting on.

And, as a little bonus, Gallup finds the public's sentiment about the economy improves across the board. Finally, a majority of Americans (51%) say the economy is "getting better."

Thanks to Qur'an Blog for the latter tidbit.

HeyZeus wants to know where the cowbell is. Okay. Here's some audio cowbell, with special additional cowbell and other sound bits added by Blaster.

Posted by: Ace at 09:00 AM | Comments (10)
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