Moe Lane

Gladiator

It was doing so well… and then they stopped showing us the war. I kept waiting for them to come back to it…

Rep Jesse Jackson Jr (D-IL) – already under a federal probe for his possible connections with former Illinois Democratic Governor Rod Blagojevich – is now dealing with questions about payments from his campaign to his wife Sandra Jackson:

Jesse Jackson Jr. Pays Campaign Funds to Chicago Alderman Wife

May 21 (Bloomberg) — Representative Jesse Jackson Jr.’s congressional campaign organization has paid his wife at least $247,500 since 2001, including at least $95,000 after Sandra Jackson joined the Chicago City Council two years ago, according to federal election records.

Jackson’s political committee also gave at least $298,927 in cash and in-kind contributions to Sandra Jackson’s campaign fund, which bankrolled her races for a city council seat that pays more than $100,000 per year and an unpaid position on the Cook County Democratic Committee.

Sandra Jackson, known as Sandi, received the $95,000 for political consulting after pledging during her campaign to give “my full attention” to the alderman’s post.

I would normally be nodding agreement with CREW spokesperson Melanie Sloan when she points out that this mostly shows ‘the scandal in Washington often is what’s legal,’ except for this one little bit.
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Remember that previous post on SCIENCE!?

Well, here you go. See how this:

At a collective Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft booth at the 2009 BIO in Atlanta, the researchers are presenting a computer model of the overall system, along with the three fundamental sub-modules. The first module prepares the tissue samples and isolates the two cell types; the second proliferates them. The finished skin models are built up and cultivated in the third, and then packed by a robot.

The researchers still have a lot of meticulous work ahead before the machine will be finished. The difference between success and failure often depends on details, such as the quality of the skin pieces, processing times of enzymes, and liquid viscosities. Furthermore, the cell cultures must be monitored throughout the entire manufacturing process in order to provide optimal process control and to allow timely detection of any contamination with fungi or bacteria. The skin factory is expected to be finished in two years. “Our goal is a monthly production of 5,000 skin models with perfect quality, and a unit price under 34 euros. These are levels that are attractive for industry,” Saxler continues.

…turns to this.

Thanks to advances in biotechnology, German researchers can now rapidly mass produce swatches of real human skin. At 34 Euros per unit, this manufactured skin is so cheap you might soon find it for sale next to bandages in the pharmacy.

Not that the io9/Gizmodo article is really inaccurate; merely that it nearly caused an entirely different – and overly enthusiastic – article to be written. Way of the world and the Internet, I guess.

Moe Lane

Very, very sad:

CREW learned today that the Obama administration is opposing our request that the Supreme Court reconsider the dismissal of the lawsuit, Wilson v. Libby, et al. In that case, the district court had dismissed the claims of Joe and Valerie Wilson against former Vice President Dick Cheney, Karl Rove, Scooter Libby and Richard Armitage for their gross violations of the Wilsons’ constitutional rights.

Agreeing with the Bush administration, the Obama Justice Department argues the Wilsons have no legitimate grounds to sue. It is surprising that the first time the Obama administration has been required to take a public position on this matter, the administration is so closely aligning itself with the Bush administration’s views.

They may even cry.

Via Protein Wisdom: CREW’s site is apparently being hammered right now, but I think that this is the full text. At any rate, this should only come as a surprise to those people who bought into the agitprop that there was any point whatsoever to le affaire Plame past getting the Democratic base profitably riled up about the GOP. Which, admittedly, apparently includes most of the left-blogosphere.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to RedState.

I got emailed this by a colleague, and from what I hear… yeah, pretty much.

It also apparently happens a lot with engineering, too.

See also here.

Credit where credit is due: this is a nice piece of reporting on Dodd by the Huffington Post. The title (“Dodd Dinner With Online Payday Lenders Transforms Into Fundraiser“) explains a bit already, but the background is this: there’s a lobbying group called the Online Lenders Alliance.  Fair enough.  They’re throwing a conference this week. So far, so good.  There’s a bunch of people from Congress involved or speaking, on both sides of the aisle.  Fine*.  Senator Dodd was one of the scheduled Senators for the event, except when asked about it first his staff, then Dodd himself flatly denied that he was there on OLA’s behalf at all; it was an independent fundraising dinner.  Nothing unusu… wait, what?

Inside the restaurant, Dodd staffers said the dinner, which was not open to press, was not even sponsored by the Online Lenders Alliance.

The dinner “is not an OLA event,” OLA spokeswoman Lisa McGreevy said in a subsequent phone interview. But the OLA agenda lists a Dodd dinner — was there a mixup?

“I don’t think there was any mixup,” she said. “There is a fundraiser tonight for Senator Dodd.”

McGreevy added: “There may be some OLA people there.”

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Chatanooga Choo Choo, Glenn Miller

This song keeps showing up in alternate history novels. Not sure why.

This week, we switch out Invasion of the Body Snatchers for Batman Begins. Mostly because Gary Oldman’s Commissioner Gordon reminds me powerfully of my father as I wish to remember him.

That’s it. The movie could have been horrible and I still would treasure it for that.

[UPDATE]: Welcome, Instapundit readers. Have you seen the new V trailer? It’s going to amusingly infuriate a bunch of people at some point in the near future.

Short version: the DNC kept quiet about its fundraising for a reason; the NRSC & DSCC remain tied in their ability to bring in cash; the DCCC is underperforming; and that debt problem is still looming for the Democrats.

Comparison to last month:

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Yes, as in V – The Original TV Miniseries*. Both Ace of Spades and Allahpundit are busily cleaning their tasty, tasty beverage of choice off of their monitors right now: watch the trailer and you’ll see why.

Normally, I’d guess that this would be completely accidental – but what the heck, ABC hired Jake Tapper, so maybe there’s one of Sy Hersh’s stay-behind VRWC Resistance cells buried deep inside Programming. All I know is, this show will either never make it past episode 3, or be still playing four years from now as sort of like a reverse West Wing. Either way, I figure that some people are getting ready to go insane on the topic any moment now.

Moe Lane

PS: I don’t make Reptoid jokes, sorry. Reptoids stopped being fun when Ickes started babbling about the Jews.

*This seems to be the major fansite.

Crossposted to RedState.

Sunlight.  Disinfectant. Not that I am suggesting anything, of course.

You may remember from Sunday about how the Democrats were quietly planning to remove a somewhat… inconvenient… US Attorney from his position before he was through investigating a former North Carolina Democratic governor. Now, via Geraghty, via Kaus, we find out that nothing of the sort is going to happen.

Now.

U.S. Sen. Kay Hagan said today that the U.S. Attorney in Raleigh, George Holding, should stay on the job as top federal prosecutor until investigations of former Sen. John Edwards and former Gov. Mike Easley are completed.

Hagan said she has consulted with the White House on the process for replacing Holding — the decision on a replacement is ultimately up to President Barack Obama — and said it will go much slower.

“I don’t feel it’s in North Carolina’s best interest to replace someone who is investigating these two very high profile people,” said Hagan, a Democrat who plays a key role in the process because any replacement requires Senate confirmation. “I just think that with investigations going on, he ought to have the opportunity to complete the investigations.”

Well, I don’t know about you, but I’m happy to hear that neither the President nor Senator Hagan had any intention of shutting down a corruption investigation for crass political reasons. That’s such a relief, really.  And I’m sure that the fact that this was announced mere days after the rather pointed article in the local paper that brought this up got national attention had nothing to do with the switch in focus.  Of course not.  Complete coincidence.  Although I am curious: why did this Locke Clifford fellow leave the Governor’s replacement screening panel Tuesday? And why was he at former governor Easley’s house on the same day?

Golf game, perhaps?

Moe Lane

Crossposted to RedState.

(Via AoSHQ Headlines) I will now treat the news that Spain has decided to put its judges back under some semblance of control and respect for sovereignty:

Spain is moving to rein in its investigative judges from trying alleged crimes against humanity from around the world, a role that has led to high-profile cases against the governments of the U.S., China, Israel and others.

Under pressure from irate foreign governments, Spain’s Congress on Tuesday passed a resolution to limit the jurisdiction of the crusading judges to cases in which there is a clear Spanish connection — and no home-country investigation already under way.

…with all the respect for the organized antiwar movement’s position and dignity that either deserves.

Protesters were out there believing
That Garzon would end all their seething
With his witch-hunting of those
Lawyers writing out memos -
But now they’re stuck at ‘heavy breathing’.

Thanks, I’m here all week. Try the veal!

Moe Lane

PS: Or, heck, you could try this: War and Decision: Inside the Pentagon at the Dawn of the War on Terrorism

Crossposted to Moe Lane.