Those of you guys near a woman, or something "woman-ish," hold her close while you listen.

For my money, it doesn't get any better than this: more...

Posted by: Ace at 06:57 PM | Comments (27)
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We have all wondered why Ace is so obsessive about his anonymity. None of us buy his story that he's worried about a potential serious career as a *coughridiculouscough* screenwriter.

Nope. Not buying it. Something else is going on.

I'm thinking, Ace is worried about that knock on the door.

By KRISTIN M. HALL, Associated Press Writer

21 minutes ago

NASHVILLE, Tenn. - A convicted murderer who escaped from a Michigan psychiatric facility in 1976 was back behind bars Thursday after living most of his 30 years on the run as an otherwise law-abiding family man in Tennessee, authorities said.

Thomas Ball, 76, was arrested at his Nashville home Wednesday morning, Deputy U.S. Marshal Danny Shelton said.

Ball had been using the name Thomas Fry and had run a storage business near Nashville for years with a woman he called his wife, Shelton said. After she died last year, he turned to the government for financial help, and that led the marshals to his door.

"Maybe he never thought the knock would come, but it did yesterday," Shelton said Thursday.

Convict caught in Tenn. after 30 years

Ace, I'm thinking you should just keep moving around, like you've been doing.

Posted by: Ace at 06:44 PM | Comments (8)
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Well. Must have been Thursday. File the reports, stuff the grant request packets.

And discover a fluff ball.

They have dubbed this one HAT-P-1. Well, whoop-de-fuckin-do.

I'm calling it Androgynous PAT-1.

S'right. I still get some naming privileges, up here in the cosmos.

I swear I don't understand these goofballs anymore. Astronomy used to be a man's job. We were men. Manly men. Finding planets, comparing plates.

These goobers? Good grief. Get em a little liquored up, a couple of hookers winking at their horn-rimmed spectacles, and they are completely outta control.

They actually don't KNOW what it is, but emboldened by their hangovers, they guess it is a ball of hydrogen and helium.

Together at last.

Hydrogen and helium,
live together in equilibrium,
side by side on my Hubbell key-board
Oh Lord why can't we?

Posted by: Ace at 05:49 PM | Comments (18)
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One of the most liberal organizations on earth has the chutzpah to point out the obvious -- Hezbollah is guilty of war crimes. Let's give them credit for sticking to their priniciples.

by Phil Hazlewood

Thu Sep 14, 12:58 PM ET

LONDON (AFP) - The militant Shiite group Hezbollah committed war crimes in its deliberate targeting of civilians in the recent conflict with Israel, according to Amnesty International.

The London-based human rights group said the guerillas fired nearly 4,000 rockets into northern Israel, killing 43 civilians, seriously injuring 33 others and forcing hundreds of thousands to take refuge or flee.

About a quarter of all rockets -- some packed with thousands of metal ball bearings -- were fired directly into urban areas, it added in a nine-page document called "Under fire -- Hezbollah's attacks on northern Israel".

Even better, Amnesty International explicitly points out that this cannot be excused as collateral damage, or as retaliation for Israeli misdeeds.

"The scale of Hezbollah's attacks on Israeli cities, towns and villages, the indiscriminate nature of the weapons used and statements from the leadership confirming their intent to target civilians make it all too clear that Hezbollah violated the laws of war," said Amnesty's secretary-general Irene Khan.

"The fact that Israel has also committed serious violations in no way justifies violations by Hezbollah. Civilians must not be made to pay the price for unlawful conduct on either side."

I'm starting to like these guys. Kinda like the ACLU earned some cred with me when they defended those Nazi shitbags who were marching in Skokie.

Amnesty accuses Hezbollah of war crimes against Israelis

Posted by: Ace at 03:10 PM | Comments (22)
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From the National Journal: Republicans own the terrorism issue.

By Gwen Glazer

Updated: 1 hour, 53 minutes ago

WASHINGTON - Tuesday brought the last big wave of primaries, and some Democrats are riding high on big wins and strong national numbers. But a new poll may bring them back down by highlighting a nagging problem: Republicans' grip on security issues.

ABC News surveyed more than 850 registered voters and found that they preferred Democrats over Republicans to deal with the nation's big problems in general. Democrats were ahead by 6 points in the generic congressional matchup.

On terrorism issues, however, respondents veered right. Forty-eight percent said they trusted Republicans more than Democrats to handle the fight against terrorism. There was a 7-point difference between the two parties -- a big swing from the 8-point lead the Democrats held in ABC's measure just a month ago.

Time to 'fess up. I'm pretty much a wavering Republican who has landed in the same spot as the Commissar at Politburo Diktat. I think the invasion of Iraq was a mistake compounded by bungled execution. If you want to know why, the Commissar has already covered the subject. You can search his site for numerous excellent posts on what went wrong. I'm not going to get started here.

Still, it comes as no surprise that we Republicans own this issue, for the simple reason that the public correctly perceives that Republicans are serious about doing something. And that is precisely why I will continue to vote Republican. A flawed strategy, intelligence failures, tactical miscues at Tora Bora and so forth, all mean very little when you boil it down to a simple question:

Who has the guts to fight?

Do Democrats Have An Achilles Heel?

Posted by: Ace at 02:26 PM | Comments (100)
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With Ace on a single-handed crusade to make Elvis Costello relevant again, that seemed like the perfect title for this entry on gasoline prices. (It was either that or Pump it Up).

Why? Because National Review's John Hood says, citing this report, that gas prices are headed that way. And soon.

How far will gas fall?

Sayeth Mr. Hood:

"DonÂ’t fixate right now on the polls, which probably lack a useful model for predicting turnout in this odd election year, and instead focus on this number: $1.15

ThatÂ’s what some analysts are predicting that the average price of gasoline will fall to in the not-to-distant future, as marketers start trying to sell down excess inventories they built up amidst fears of a widening conflict in the Middle East or Nigeria and summer-storm damage to Gulf oil rigs. My view has long been that if gas prices for voters in competitive regions fall below $2, confidence in the overall economy will rise, as will approval for presidential and congressional handling of the economy.

$1.15 a gallon.

Clearly the Karl Rove Hurricane Machine and Bush's Neo-Con Military-Industrial Imperial Conquest Complex are to blame. Only by turning these two malevolent forces off, could gasoline fall so far, so fast in advance of an election!!!!111!11!

Joshua Micah Boutros-Boutros Hezekial Cougar-Mellancamp Olbermann Marshall questions the timing of this market downturn in 5...4....3....2...1.....

Posted by: Ace at 01:24 PM | Comments (20)
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In addition to listing the misrepresentations Armitage is making publicly (and may just have also made before the grand jury), Novak lays the wood into his source with this:

Mrs. Wilson’s name appeared in my column July 14, 2003, but it was not until Oct. 1 that I heard about it from Armitage. Washington lobbyist Kenneth Duberstein, Armitage’s close friend and political adviser, called me to say the deputy secretary feared he had ‘‘inadvertently’’ (the word Armitage used in last week’s interviews) disclosed Mrs. Wilson’s identity to me in July and was considering resignation. (Duberstein’s phone call was disclosed in the Isikoff-Corn book, which used Duberstein as a source. They reported Duberstein was responsible for arranging my unexpected interview with Armitage.)

Duberstein told me Armitage wanted to know whether he was my source. I did not reply because I was sure that Armitage knew he was the source. I believed he contacted me Oct. 1 because of news the weekend of Sept. 27-28 that the Justice Department was investigating the leak. I cannot credit Armitage’s current claim that he realized he was the source only when my Oct. 1 column revealed that the official who gave me the information was ‘‘no partisan gunslinger.’’

Armitage’s silence the next 2œ years caused intense pain for his colleagues in government and enabled partisan Democrats in Congress to falsely accuse Rove of being my primary source. When Armitage now says he was mute because of special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald’s request, that does not explain his silence three months between his claimed first realization that he was the source and Fitzgerald’s appointment on Dec. 30. Armitage’s tardy self-disclosure is tainted because it is deceptive.

Based on this new evidence, special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald has announced his intention to seek an indictment against Robert Novak.

Posted by: Ace at 01:22 PM | Comments (8)
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Okay, I liked posting that Radioactive video yesterday I decided to keep this up.

If you don't like it, well, they're all tucked beyond the jump. And, since I spent like three hours tracking these down and thinking up themes and commonalities to link them, well, I'm going to have at least a week or so of these.

I'm kind of going for semi-obscure. Not really obscure like a hidden track on an Aztec Camera import EP, but more... forgotten. You heard these once, but they don't play them anymore, even on VH-1's eight million I Love the Eighties shows.

Of course, the "theme" thing means I have to sometimes go with a not-really-forgotten-at-all or absurdly-obscure song once in a while.

Oh-- and they're not necessarily all good. That "theme" thing sometimes requires, well, a bit of latitude on quality.

Ah, well.

No Billy Squier today. But I'm getting to that. A lot of that. He just happens to have songs that I need to compete a bunch of sets.
more...

Posted by: Ace at 12:31 PM | Comments (22)
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The duece you say. Read about the reform not yet passed (this is not Obama-Coburn, already cleared through Congress) and ask: "What earthly reason, apart from plain corruption or disonesty, would motivate someone to oppose this common-sense reform?"

Under the proposed change, all committee reports for appropriations bills, authorization bills or tax bills will be required to contain a list of all the earmarks in the legislation along with the names of the member who requested the earmark. Also, conference reports will be required to contain the same list with additions from the conference. Members who find a particular earmark inappropriate or egregious will have the freedom to highlight that project.

The House Rules Committee is holding a committee markup on the rule change tomorrow and a vote has been scheduled for Thursday. The vote will be close.

Appropriators (of course) have problems with the legislation. As many as 15 appropriators could oppose the measure as it is currently written. There is hope of winning some Democratic votes though. The place to look for Democrat votes will be amongst the 35 moderates — a remnant of the blue dogs — who voted for line item veto powers for the President. But these votes will not come easy.

Democratic Leadership will be reluctant to allow GOP leadership a “win” on an issue that is an intra-party problem (appropriators vs. rest of party) — especially because the issue is crucial to the fiscal conservative base who is considering what kind of mood to be in come November. As such, there may be significant pressure from Democratic leadership to scuttle GOP attempts to make this new rule.

Also read there about Rahm Emmanuel's attempt to slip in a rules change which, while superficially unobjectionable, seems designed to scuttle the difficult negotiations at the eleventh hour under the pretext of just wanting "more reform."

You can wait for "more reform" until the next session, Rahm, and you know it.

Instapundit has a list of Congressmen who need to be lobbied -- by their constituents. If you're a constituent, dial the number and ask to speak to the person who ostensibly represents you.

Squeeze 'em 'til their pips squeak.

Meanwhile... Obama-Coburn passes and only awaits the President's signature.

They've issued a statement thanking you.

“This landmark transparency legislation will reduce wasteful spending by empowering every American to be a citizen investigator capable of holding the government accountable for spending decisions,” Coburn and Obama said. “The bloggers, commentators and citizens who tirelessly pushed for this transparency legislation deserve full credit for its enactment.”

Thanks to Deep Stoat for the last bit.

Posted by: Ace at 12:09 PM | Comments (4)
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Nevada has a "using technology to lure children" statute, basically designed to get on-line predators who try to meet up with under-age kids and molest them. The statute reads in pertinent part:

1. . . . [A] person shall not knowingly contact or communicate with or attempt to contact or communicate with a child who is less than 16 years of age and who is at least 5 years younger than the person with the intent to persuade, lure or transport the child away from his home or from any location known to his parent or guardian or other person legally responsible for the child to a place other than where the child is located, for any purpose:

(a) Without the express consent of the parent or guardian or other person legally responsible for the child; and

(b) With the intent to avoid the consent of the parent or guardian or other person legally responsible for the child.

Today the Nevada Supremes upheld the dismissal of an indictment against Anthony John Colosimo, a Reno resident, who thought the 41-year-old cop he was chatting with was a 14-year-old girl named "Sammi." more...

Posted by: Ace at 11:36 AM | Comments (32)
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