This is going to stir some things up

Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer has announced the state will sue the federal government for its failure to secure the border and enforce immigration laws.

Brewer and Attorney General Tom Horne held a news conference Thursday to announce their fight in the face of a federal judge’s ruling that parts of SB1070, the state’s controversial immigration law, are unconstitutional.
Well, if the feds had been enforcing these laws, there wouldn't have been any need for 1070, so why not?


What? Hezbollah committed nasty crimes to raise money, and a Lebanese bank helped? Such a surprise, right?


Looks like that next-generation grenade launcher is working pretty well. Which means Obama & Co. will probably want to drop funding for it.


You might remember Algore jumping up and happily proclaiming the nasty winters are proof of globular warmering, and... increased heavy snowfalls are completely consistent with what they have been predicting as a consequence of man-made global warming,”, etc. Slight problem:
Unfortunately for Gore and others who have claimed that the snow this winter is a global warming byproduct, their own authorities have said climate change will result in less snow.

Both the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) have predicted warmer, less snowy winters.

A sampling:

• “Snow season length and snow depth are very likely to decrease in most of North America … except in the northernmost part of Canada where maximum snow depth is likely to increase (Christensen et al., 2007).” (EPA)
• “Decreases in snowcover and increases in winter rain on bare soil will likely lengthen the erosion season and enhance erosion intensity.” (EPA)
• “Rising temperatures have generally resulted in rain rather than snow in locations and seasons where climatological average temperatures for 1961 to 1990 were close to freezing (0 °C).” (EPA)
• “As temperatures rise, the likelihood of precipitation falling as rain rather than snow increases, especially in autumn and spring at the beginning and end of the snow season, and in areas where temperatures are near freezing. Such changes are observed in many places, especially over land in middle and high latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere, leading to increased rains but reduced snowpacks.” (IPCC)

Algore, you're so full of crap you should be rented out to stand in the fields to fertilize them.


Ah, the fierceness of the Hope! and Change!!
The Obama administration's Justice Department has asserted that the FBI can obtain telephone records of international calls made from the U.S. without any formal legal process or court oversight, according to a document obtained by McClatchy.

That assertion was revealed — perhaps inadvertently — by the department in its response to a McClatchy request for a copy of a secret Justice Department memo.
Kind of like how Gitmo is closed and all those civil trials for terrorists and illegal combatants and- oh, wait...


Heard about this the other day, I guess New York doesn't want people owning vacation homes and cabins in their lousy state:
A New York court ruled last month that all income earned by a New Canaan, Conn., couple is subject to New York state taxes because they own a summer home on Long Island they used only a few times a year. They have been hit with an additional tax bill of $1.06 million. [In re Barker, No. 822324 (NY Tax App. Jan. 13, 2011).] ....
...
[The judge] ruled that the couple's Long Island vacation home qualifies under the law as a permanent abode because it was suitable for living year-round—whether or not the couple actually stayed in the home wasn't relevant. Under the ruling, if an owner doesn't spend a single a day in a home it could still count toward a permanent residence.
Way to go, NY; I wonder how many people called a realtor to sell their property when they heard of this? And how many are doing it now?


On the Mexican Gun Lie, here's some information to use in dealing with anyone who brings it up. One of the key- maybe THE key- points:
This means that the 87 percent figure relates to the number of weapons submitted by the Mexican government to the ATF that could be successfully traced and not from the total number of weapons seized by Mexican authorities or even from the total number of weapons submitted to the ATF for tracing. In fact, the 3,480 guns positively traced to the United States equals less than 12 percent of the total arms seized in Mexico in 2008 and less than 48 percent of all those submitted by the Mexican government to the ATF for tracing. This means that almost 90 percent of the guns seized in Mexico in 2008 were not traced back to the United States.
Wonder how Japete will decide to spin this?


A take on the upset at Glenn Beck for daring to slander Piven by actually(gasp!) reading her words on the air:
This controversy might in principle have remained in the popular press, but it has in fact rather quickly become a topic of academic debate too. The Chronicle reported this week that Cary Nelson, president of the AAUP, issued a statement saying that Piven is the victim of “what nearly amounts to an American Fatwa,” from Beck’s “virulent attacks.” Nelson says, “Amid these relentless tirades, Professor Piven has herself begun to receive threats of violence.” And he concludes by calling for—what else?—civility: “We join others in strongly urging those who are critical of Professor Piven’s writings to advance their positions in ways that foster responsible criticism and debate.”

“Responsible criticism and debate.” These are the cynosures of academic discourse. Who would be opposed?

Actually, it would seem, quite a few, perhaps beginning with Cary Nelson himself, who, by invoking the idea of “an American Fatwa,” indulged in the kind of rhetoric that can hardly be called responsible or conducive to debate. If you imply that someone is seeking to kill his opponents, you have pretty much ruled out the grounds for a respectful airing of differences of opinion.
...
Higher education has no special immunity from the angri-culture. On the contrary, it is a privileged haunt for those who delight in scorn, derision, and wrathful dislike of mainstream American culture. We cite academic freedom as guaranteeing our right to be vitriolic.

I don’t know of any simple remedy for that, but I do think it comes across to most Americans as hypocrisy. To claim academic freedom as a protection of one’s own diatribes while crying “no fair” when someone aims a diatribe back at you requires a clownish degree of self-regard. Unfortunately, what most Americans will take from this affair is that higher education has an abundance of that particular quality.
No kidding.


Oh my. It's 55 outside, the third day after the last blizzard. And most of the snow is gone, and the bike wants exercise. I'm going to get the stuff 'round the house done and ride a bit. Without it being a trip to the intersection of Frostbite & Hypothermia.