Moe Lane

American Pie, Don McLean

Madonna covered this, by the way: (more…)

That’s the title of this entry from the site Explain This Image, and… yeah. Some weird stuff there. Some NSFW stuff there, too.

Turns out that even after you go through the regular bureaucratic hell that is the average DMV, some people will still reflexively smile for the camera*.

Can’t have that!

Via Reason Hit & Run. I’d say more, except that I took a header on some water on the floor about a half hour ago, and the left side of my body hurts like nobody’s business**. Nothing broken, but it’s going to be a fun bruise or three tomorrow.

Moe Lane

*(Checking) Goodness gracious, I’m one of them!

**If you’re feeling bad for me and want to cheer me up… I dunno. Buy Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: The Classic Regency Romance – Now with Ultraviolent Zombie Mayhem!, or something. If you want to mock my pain as you think that I have mocked yours… buy Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: The Classic Regency Romance – Now with Ultraviolent Zombie Mayhem!, or something. That’ll show me.

Crossposted to RedState.

Amazing what a little fiscal intransigence can do:

The Illinois House overwhelmingly rejected a temporary income tax increase Sunday, moving the state closer to massive spending cuts that critics called a “doomsday” budget.

The House’s Democratic leaders didn’t even try to pass a larger, permanent increase that was approved by the state Senate a day earlier. Lawmakers said there was little support for that plan during private Democratic discussions.

Instead, the House considered a measure that would have bumped the state’s 3 percent personal tax rate to 4.5 percent for two years. House Majority Leader Barbara Flynn Currie, D-Chicago, said it would have produced about $4.5 billion for a state government drowning in red ink.

The Senate version is described here: essentially, while the Illinois Senate apparently was willing to ignore Republican objections (the truly strange term system that the Illinois state Senate has may have something to do with that), the Illinois House was apparently a little less happy with ending up ratifying significant tax hikes, particularly since the GOP was making no secret about the fact that it wasn’t involved in the process of making this budget in the first place. At least, that’s about the only reason that I can see for having a legislature that’s nearly 2-to-1 Democrat/GOP go so thoroughly the other way on this vote.  At any rate, the Illinois Republicans are indicating that they’re willing to participate in the future budget negotiations.  Assuming that the Democrats are willing to let them, that is.

No rush.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to RedState.

Shocking as it sounds, we’re replacing Shatnerquake with Naomi Novik’s Victory of Eagles, which has finally come out in paperback. It’s the latest in the Temeraire series, so read the other books first.

Kevin Holtsberry’s The Right Reads is a site that you should be perusing, particularly if you are a conservative who is interested in books generally.

I could pad that sentence out more, but really: that’s the message.

Crossposted to RedState.

Senator Lindsey Graham goes there:

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., told “FOX News Sunday” he wasn’t buying President Obama’s attempt to walk back his Supreme Court nominee’s controversial statement from 2001. Obama said Friday that given the chance Sotomayor would have “restated” that comment, and that she was merely trying to express how her experiences give her perspective on others’ hardships.

“She didn’t say that at all,” Graham countered Sunday, suggesting Sotomayor’s statement raises questions about her objectivity.

“What she said is that based on her life experiences is that she thought a Latina woman, somebody with her background, would be a better judge than a guy like me — a white guy from South Carolina,” Graham said. “It is troubling, and it’s inappropriate and I hope she’ll apologize.”

(more…)

Maybe Ed Morrissey is even more of a brazen optimist than I am. Having this President openly acknowledge that Gitmo serves a useful purpose and should be retained would be like having the Pope come out and declare ex cathedra that Hell was actually a pretty cool vacation spot, down to the likely reaction of certain members of the base.

Which is not to say that Gitmo is going to close. People just need to… forget that Gitmo was supposed to close, that’s all.

Moe Lane

PS: I get the impression that the Uighurs are turning into one of those convenient complications for this administration.

Crossposted to RedState.

From earlier this week, in response to Ted Olson’s surprise move to attempt to resolve federal marriage policy via judicial fiat (via the Corner):

Gay groups say federal marriage suit premature

SAN FRANCISCO – A coalition of gay-rights groups said Wednesday that a federal same-sex marriage lawsuit brought by two high-profile lawyers is premature and they’d rather work through state legislatures and voters to win wedding rights.

Now they decide this.  Full disclosure: I support the extension of marriage benefits to same-sex couples, via the legislative process. (more…)

Going through the news, here are some specific contributions to what CBS calls a “global effort” to clamp down on piracy in Somalia:

• India: “An Indian warship patrolling the seas near the lawless African country responded to a distress call Thursday from the Liberian-registered merchant vessel MV Maud, which said eight armed people on a skiff were approaching it at high speed, the navy said. The ship and a helicopter with marine commandos made their way toward the ship, where they saw two people attempting to board it, the navy said in a statement.”
• Australia: “An Australian warship will join international efforts to combat pirates operating from Somalia, the government said in Friday. Australia will send a frigate and maritime patrol aircraft currently on Persian Gulf security duties to join anti-piracy operations in and near the Gulf of Aden, Defence Minister Joel Fitzgibbon said in a statement.”
• Canada: “Canadian Forces boarding parties detained and searched two suspected pirate skiffs about 90 kilometres off the coast of Yemen, uncovering a large cache of automatic weapons, ammunition and rocket-propelled grenade launchers with warheads. Cmdr. Craig Baines, the captain of the Winnipeg, said the weapons seizures marked a very successful day for the Canadian frigate, which has been a constant thorn in the side of the Somali pirates that hunt merchant vessels in this, one of the world’s busiest shipping corridors.”
• The United States of America: We’re making a movie.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to RedState.

Alanis Morissette – All I Really Want

All I Really Want, Alanis Morissette

Yeah, yeah, but Jagged Little Pill was still a decent album.

Anything* can get to be that way, after a while.

Via TrogloPundit.

Moe Lane

*I was going to link something along the lines of “Except for blowing stuff up for government safety agencies,” which I understand is a job that is made of awesome; only I got distracted by this.

Sparkler Bomb Blows Up Dryer If you think sparklers cannot be dangerous watch this video clip. They tape a bunch of sparklers together and use them to blow up an old dryer.