A tipster who wants to remain anonymous clues me in on the following passage on FoxNews' site today:

The rumors are rampant up on MarthaÂ’s Vineyard: Caroline Kennedy is supposedly throwing an Obama fundraiser this weekend at her late motherÂ’s magnificent home in Gay Head.

This tidbit brought to you by Roger Freidman of the Fox411 column.

So, what do I call a tip that allows me to make jokes about Obama, the Kennedy's and Gay Head? A tip that just might lead to me finally being named Olbermann's "worst person in the world"?

Manna from Heaven.

Thanks anonymous tipster. I appreciate you reading Fox411 so I don't have to.

I would say to "keep them coming", but that may be pushing the Obama and Gay Head pun a little too far.

No?

OK. Keep them coming!

Posted by: Jack M. at 07:46 AM | Comments (21)
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Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 07:26 AM | Comments (14)
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They want to warn potential illegal immigrants about the dangers that await them in the land of plenty. The land of plenty of cheeseburgers and fried chicken.

If the Border Patrol Doesn't Get You, the Chicken and Burgers Will - Go Vegan.

I do not know the spanish word for vegan so I'll leave the translating to you morons.

"We think that Mexicans and other immigrants should be warned if they cross into the U.S. they are putting their health at risk by leaving behind a healthier, staple diet of corn tortillas, beans, rice, fruits and vegetables," said Lindsay Rajt, assistant manager of PETA's vegan campaigns.

Advertising plans include photographs of healthy, fit and trim Mexicans in their own country (I see a problem here) contrasted with fat Americans "gorging on meaty, fat- and cholesterol-packed American food."

But PETA is looking for the win-win.

Rajt said the rent money they'd pay would help offset the huge costs of the fencing — and the advertising message "might even be frightening enough to deter people from crossing into the U.S."

I have a suggestion,

more...

Posted by: Dave in Texas at 04:33 AM | Comments (66)
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Huhuhuhuh nnnnnyaaiiirgh uhn:

The U.S. Air Force is, for the first time, converting a fighter wing from manned (F-16) combat aircraft, to unmanned ones (the MQ-9 Reaper.) The conversion, for the 174th Fighter Wing, has been in the works for three years, and the last combat sorties in manned aircraft were flown last week, by members of the 174th serving in Iraq.

Uhn. Uhn uhn. Unnnnnhhhhh...

Oooohhhhchhhh...

Nnnyerrgghhh: Mmmmnnnoooohhhh.

Unnngh urrrrrr Arthur n Kratatoa.

Posted by: Ace at 03:48 PM | Comments (79)
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Ahem.

The media were huge on "reforming" campaign finance in the interests of good government and a truly democratic, truly informed politics.

Will they mount a new crusade to purge bias from their ranks? I'm pretty sure they will! *

* PS I'm a lunatic. Skyscraper police-robot genital vectors bugs bugs bugs.

Posted by: Ace at 03:43 PM | Comments (22)
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From plebian at DPUD:

In the wake of heavy criticism from certain recent stories which are perceived to have gone under-reported, the following style guide is proposed to help journalists decide which stories are worthy of coverage. [...]

The ten questions to determine newsworthiness:

1) Is the report being broadcast by other serious outlets?
(Note: Serious in this case denotes someone who is not affiliated with tabloid journalism, so-called "blogporting" on the Intertubes, or Fox News.)

2) Is the source of sound mind?
(Note: If allegations detail issues regarding a sitting President of the United States who is running for re-election, this can be assumed to be 'Yes,' because crazy people would never pit themselves against the President.)

Click over for all ten.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 02:45 PM | Comments (3)
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So where's the racism? Surely you know. But if you missed it, let Talking Points Memo explain it:

"We know he doesn't have much experience, and isn't ready to lead, but that doesn't mean he isn't dreamy," says the announcer, followed by footage of two women at rallies -- both of whom are white, mind you -- complimenting Obama's looks.

How long until "Barack, call me" ends up in a McCain paid TV ad?

That last bit about "Barack, call me" is a reference to another putatively "racist" ad, that one about Harold Ford's partying it up with Playboy Bunnies, which ended with an actress playing a Playboy Bunny saying "Harold, call me."

And.

She.

Was.

White.

I'm just curious -- if, hypothetically, the McCain camp begins showing black people going bananas over Obama, how soon will the left begin claiming that by showing black people McCain is attempting to underscore the fact that Obama is (half) black and attempting to sow racial animus that way?

You can't show white women, you can't show blacks at all. Apparently the only politically correct Obama supporter to show is a white man, a cohort that does exist, of course, but is hardly his base.

But if we do, say, show an obvious stoner college kid in a P-Funk t-shirt singing Obama's praises -- why, that will also be racist because it's associating Obama with pot smoking, thus painting him as one of those hop-headed jazz Negros who are corrupting the morals of German society.

I have a compromise -- let's show all of Obama's women supporters, both black and white, but with one of those blue-dots over their faces (the kind they use to disguise rape victims at trial) in order to hide their race and thus avoid the racism charge.

I'm sure TPM wouldn't have a problem with that.

PS: Is anyone else becoming rather annoyed at the left's insistence that white conservative men do nothing but sit around all goddamned day worrying that some black guy is going to take our womenfolk away from us?

PPS: Oh, I know! If only white men are allowed to be shown supporting Obama in McCain ads, how about we cut commercials of John Edwards endorsing him?

No? Ah, yes: Then we'd be stirring up racial stereotypes about black men being promiscuous (and having sex with white women, yet again).

How come Obama's allowed to show all the white women he likes fawning over him but when we do it it's racist?

More: Polls & Racism: Polls are discussed generally in the beginning of the post: at the end is a link to a Politico dweeb whining that Obama isn't winning enough and that must be due to racsim.

Liberal politicians have not managed to get over 50% of the vote since... well, who, Carter? Why is it such a surprise that Obama is more or less where Kerry and Gore were always stuck, somewhere between 42 and 49% of the vote?

I think that this whining is based on the liberals' frequent excuse that it's not their message that is frequently rejected by the public (and only accepted by the public when it's sufficiently disguised, a la Clinton), but only their messengers, and that the GOP only wins because of the superficial charm, likability, and normal-guy-ness of their candidates.

If only we had some "normal guys" running, we'd win every election, liberals think.

So here's Obama. Not only is he charming and likable, they think, but he's a "normal guy" -- and on top of that, a "normal guy" who is also the The One Chosen by GOD HIMSELF to Deliver the World from Its Iniquities Into a Period of Peace, Plenty, and Love. Now, that's some kind of super-duper normal guy!

Well, the problem is that a lot of people don't think Obama is especially likable or normal -- some of us think he's an effete, ineffectual, elitist prick, actually -- and that you can't play both the Normal Guy Everyman and Bastard Son of God Himself at the same time.

And besides, the liberals are wrong. The public is repeatedly rejecting their message and not merely their messenger So even if Barack was the nicest sweetest unassuming humble great normal guy who ever lived, there'd still be that problem that he's not just a liberal, but a liberal leaning left-liberal/radical.

Posted by: Ace at 02:12 PM | Comments (63)
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The good news: the proposed drive would work pretty much like it does (assumedly) in Star Trek...

... with "warp generators" sealing the ship in a gravity bubble and expanding space behind a ship and collapsing space in front of it. Thereby not actually moving matter faster than the speed of light, but moving space itself faster than the speed of light. Matter can't go faster than the speed of light, but space can, and apparently did before, soon after the Big Bang.

The bad news: Even this is impossible. Because the energy required to warp space like this would be equal to converting the entire mass of Jupiter directly into energy.

So, for now, I'm putting my eggs in the Star Wars "hyperspace" basket. (Where ships slip from "realspace" into "hyperspace" and then drop back out of it when they approach their "realspace" destination.)

Via Hot Air.

Posted by: Ace at 01:46 PM | Comments (55)
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President Bush is holding a press conference in the Rose Garden about the conflict in Georgia. We'll see if he says anything new.

His previous statement calling for an end to the fighting and for international mediation is here.

And here is John McCain's most recent condemnation of Russian aggression, in which he intimates that Russia should be kicked out of the G8.

Yes, it's just words, but words matter.

More: It was a very short statement from the President.

President Bush acknowledges that Russia's claims to be merely protecting South Ossetians are spurious. His solution remains the same as on Saturday: an end to violence and a return to the status quo ante. He does not back that up with any threat of diplomatic or military action.

Of most interest to me is that the President confirms reports that the Tbilisi airport has come under attack. The destruction of the airport will strand foreigners in Georgia and make it difficult to send humanitarian aid or other supplies to the conflict zone.

Wannabe-President Obama is expected to make his own statement shortly.

And more: Well crap. As interesting as it is to contrast McCain and Obama's statements on Georgia, President Bush was the only man who could actually have done anything about it. From that statement it appears that he does not intend to get involved.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 01:20 PM | Comments (32)
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The FBI either needs to put up or confess its conclusions about Ivins are merely a best guess.

It gets a bit worse. It might be that the FBI's statements are garbled or not being understood, but this reading of their statements suggests that there was not one but sixteen flasks of RMR-1029 around the country, and that the FBI claims it has positively determined that the mailed anthrax came from Ivins' lab not based on "genetic fingerprinting" but based upon the supposed print defects in the envelopes the anthrax was mailed in:

As early as 2002 CDC and the government knew that the letter anthrax organisms were all from a specific strain (Ames) that is used in many biodefense laboratories. The problem with obtaining a genetic fingerprint of anthrax is that unlike most other microorganisms, Bacillus anthracis is remarkably stable, i.e., its genetic fingerprint doesn't change much from one generation to the next. What was needed was some distinguishing characteristic, like the distinctive marks on a bullet, that allow guns that otherwise look almost exactly alike to be distinguished. In 2002 CDC scientists published a paper that did identify the sameness of all the isolates from the attack and distinguished them from other virulent anthrax isolates (interestingly, out of 20 citations in that article, Ivins's name is on 3 of them). Was this technique sufficient in 2002 to provide the information the FBI says was only possible after scientific breakthroughs that didn't come until three years later? It's not clear. I looked at several papers on genotyping anthrax and it is clear that since 2005 techniques have been developed to allow high throughput of thousands of samples, something that might be necessary in a future event (we hope not) but wasn't needed in 2002. It sounds to me that the "new science" argument is mainly an excuse to explain what took the FBI so long.

But let's grant the case and even accept the FBI claim that the science allows them to trace all of the anthrax in the four letters (two to news media and two to political figures) back to a flask, designated RMR-1029, produced by Ivins and "in his custody." That's what was said at the press conference. Here's what the documents say:

Of the sixteen domestic government, commercial, and university laboratories that had virulent RMR- 1029 Ames strain Bacillus anthracis material in their inventory prior to the attacks, only one lab was located in Maryland or Virginia, where the relevant federal eagle envelopes were distributed and sold by the U.S. Postal Service: the USAMRID facility at Fort Detrick, MD. (Affidavit of Thomas F. Dellafera in support of request for search warrant)

This says there were sixteen such flasks around the country, not just the one in Ivins's laboratory. The FBI argument against Ivins requires additional evidence that the envelopes containing the anthrax were only sold in Maryland and Virginia...

More: This is written by a friend and colleague of Ivins, but that only makes him biased, not necessarily wrong.

As a scientist, however, I feel compelled to comment on what should have been the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s strongest link between Dr. Ivins and the terrible crime — deadly anthrax spores. In the summary of its findings, the F.B.I. states that investigators used four different genetic techniques to match the anthrax-laced attack letters to a unique DNA footprint of a single anthrax spore preparation in one flask that had been in Dr. Ivins’s custody.

Sounds reasonable. Yet the investigators present no details on the scientific methods they used to make this match or how they employed them. ThatÂ’s a problem, because without such detail it is hard to tell if they specifically ruled out a similar match between the anthrax in the letters and anthrax preparations with the same DNA footprint kept at a number of other labs around the country. The basic methods of genetic analysis are well known. Why not provide enough detail about their procedure to enable other scientists to tell whether they could actually single out Dr. IvinsÂ’s spore preparation as the culprit?

The investigators fail to address another underlying problem with their anthrax match: that Dr. Ivins was an investigator in the case before he was a suspect. After the anthrax attack, Dr. Ivins himself worked directly with the evidence. The F.B.I. asked Dr. Ivins to help them with the forensics in the case by analyzing the contents of suspicious letters. And he did so for years, until the authorities began to suspect that the anthrax spores used in the mailings might have originated from his lab.

Dr. Ivins, for instance, was asked to analyze the anthrax envelope that was sent to Mr. DaschleÂ’s office on Oct. 9, 2001. When his team analyzed the powder, they found it to be a startlingly refined weapons-grade anthrax spore preparation, the likes of which had never been seen before by personnel at Fort Detrick.

He goes on to argue that Ivins' role in the investigation might have caused cross-contamination of Ivins' anthrax and the mailed anthrax, which I think is unlikely, but whatever.

It is interesting that Ivins was part of the investigating team. If he was guilty, perhaps all that stuff about "startingly refined weapons-grade anthrax spore[s]" was bullshit he faked colleagues into believing to take suspicions away from himself.

Posted by: Ace at 12:58 PM | Comments (11)
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