Wow.  I haven't blogged anything in almost a decade.

Santas Go on Rampage

I don't like the commercialization of Christmas and Santa either, but that doesn't justify this Santarchy behavior. The real St. Nicholas is probably spinning in his grave...

WELLINGTON, New Zealand (Dec. 17) - A group of 40 people dressed in Santa Claus costumes, many of them drunk, rampaged through New Zealand's largest city, robbing stores and assaulting security guards, police said Sunday.The rampage, dubbed "Santarchy" by local newspapers, began early Saturday afternoon when the men, wearing ill-fitting Santa costumes, threw beer bottles and urinated on cars from an Auckland overpass, said Auckland Central Police spokeswoman Noreen
Hegarty.She said the men then rushed through a central city park, overturning garbage containers, throwing bottles at passing cars and spraying graffiti on buildings.One man climbed the mooring line of a cruise ship before being ordered down by the captain. Other Santas, objecting when the man was arrested, attacked security staff, Hegarty said.The remaining Santas entered a downtown convenience store and carried off beer and soft drinks."They came in, said 'Merry Christmas' and then helped themselves," store owner Changa Manakynda said.Alex Dyer, a spokesman for the group, said Santarchy was a worldwide movement designed to protest the commercialization of Christmas. Three people were arrested and charged with drunkenness and disorderly behavior.

Copyright 2005 The Associated Press

More Visual Deception in our Media

Now this is really twisted… on the part of her media comrades. Look at the long dark shadow on the grass beyond her. The shot of the graveyard was obviously a very late-day shot. Note the angle from the top of the gravestone to the end of the shadow and especially how much it angles toward the camera. Also, notice how dark the grass in that shadow is. It shows there is not a lot of ambient light around. But, now, look at the grass under the laces of her sneakers and along the edge of her body. Why is the grass there not as dark as the gravestone’s shadow? Is she transparent? If the long shadow of the gravestone is angled toward the camera, why is the shadow of the flowers at her head so short and angled away from the camera? If the light blocked by the gravestone darkens the grass as much as it appears, why are the flowers on it between the gravestone and the grass not equally shadowed? Compare the contrast between the sunlit and shadowed sides of the trees in the background. Why do the flowers at her head and at the gravestone not share that same difference in contrast? How can her face be so well lit?
The liberal license the media has taken to doctor photos bothers me. This sinks well below the level of their prior “selective editing” bias. In advertisement it’s one thing, but in news and political reporting it’s another. Pro or Con (such as ‘demonizing’ the eyes of Condoleezza Rice) this kind of thing should not be tolerated in the slightest in America. Although not state controlled, our left-controlled media has sunk to the journalistic ethics of Hitler and Stalin.

No Comment

The most foul, cruel, and bad-tempered rodent you ever set eyes on.

Follow. But! Follow only if ye be men of valor, for the entrance to this cave is guarded by a creature so foul, so cruel that no man yet has fought with it and lived! Bones of full fifty men lie strewn about its lair. So, brave knights, if you do doubt your courage or your strength, come no further, for death awaits you all with nasty, big, pointy teeth.

Our Honest Media Telling It Like It Is...

SEVERE FLOODING-OH MY!
WATER RUSHED IN-REALLY MOVING! OH MY!
TOUGH TO CONROL BOAT-REALLY DEEP WATER!...Oh?
BUSTED! (Tip: Never try to stage a fake shot LIVE, you never know who will walk by.)

Hurricane Relief Efforts in Congress

October 12, 2005 Katrina Fed Update:

The following laws have been enacted (Congress passed; President signed):

Appropriate $10 billion for the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s quickly dwindling disaster relief account and $500 million to replenish Defense Department operations and maintenance accounts.

Appropriate $51.8 billion in fiscal 2005 supplemental spending for disaster relief to areas affected by Hurricane Katrina. The bill would provide $50 billion for the Federal Emergency Management Agency, $1.4 billion for the Defense Department and $400 million for the Army Corps of Engineers.

Provide tax breaks to Hurricane Katrina victims, including provisions to waive penalties allowing hurricane victims access to their retirement funds, increase deductions for charitable donations by individuals and businesses and allow low-income workers to maintain benefits such as the Earned Income Tax Credit.

Give more flexibility for a Labor Department program that provides temporary disaster relief and training of up to six months to individuals who take part in projects that assist victims of a disaster. It would allow National Emergency Grant (NEG) program funds to be used for employment projects outside the Hurricane Katrina disaster area and expand fund eligibility to include individuals displaced by the hurricane who are currently unemployed and those who have no prior work history.

Allow the Education Department to waive the repayment requirement for any federal student grant assistance provided to students under Title IV of the Higher Education Act if their school attendance is interrupted because of the impact of a major disaster. To qualify for the waiver, students must have lived, worked, or attended schools in an area designated by the president as a major disaster.

Allow the Education Department to waive the repayment requirement for Pell Grant recipients whose school attendance is interrupted because of the impact of a disaster if students were living, working, or attending school in an area designated by the president to warrant major disaster assistance.

Provide vocational rehabilitation services to individuals with disabilities affected by Hurricane Katrina or Hurricane Rita. Give preference to affected states that contain an area, or that received a significant number of individuals who resided in an area, in which the President has declared that a major disaster exists.

Temporarily waive work requirements and time limits imposed under the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program for families displaced by Hurricane Katrina.

Congress has cleared and President should sign bills that would:

Provide $750 million for a program to loan money to local governments to maintain services such as police and fire protection in the aftermath of the hurricanes. (This money would come from previously appropriated funds which could not be used for this purpose without special approval. This money is loan, not a grant.)

House has passed bills that would:

Authorize the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) to waive several limitations on the rent voucher program known as Section 8 in order to assist displaced hurricane victims. Under the bill, HUD would be prevented from canceling contracts with government-subsidized apartment complexes that were damaged or destroyed by Katrina or Rita, and federal agencies would be required to compile an inventory of government property that could be used as emergency housing.

Allow the Agriculture Department to redirect money used to subsidize rural public housing that was damaged or destroyed by the hurricane to rental assistance for tenants.

Suspend a 15 percent cap on community development grants that could be spent to provide “public services” in hurricane-afflicted areas

Grant “special immigrant status,” which is permanent, to people who had visas pending when the storm hit. Those visas would otherwise be nullified because the place of employment was destroyed or the sponsor of the visa died. Grandparents of orphans who lost their parents in the storm would also receive special immigrant status. Those eligible for citizenship would be allowed to take their oath in any federal court if the court they filed in was destroyed. The bill also would extend a number of filing and re-entry deadlines, including an additional 180 days to file for an extension or change of status for those affected by the storm. It would provide relief for surviving spouses and children of citizens or legal permanent residents, and let foreign students with visas remain in the country until Feb. 1, 2006, so they can enroll in a new school.

Senate has passed bills that would

Allow states to forgive the principal on clean water loans in areas affected by Hurricane Katrina. Under the law, the federal government provides states with money to loan public water systems for improvements.

Allow the Federal Emergency Management Agency to pay for extra school supplies and new teachers in school systems that have taken in students evacuated because of Katrina.

Members of Congress have introduced legislation that would:

Create a “Gulf Coast Recovery and Disaster Preparation Agency,” that would centralize the planning and execution of rebuilding activities in the aftermath of hurricanes Katrina and Rita. The agency would be authorized for only three years, though the president could decide to extend its authority for an additional three years. Sponsored by the Republican chairman of the Senate Budget Committee (Judd Gregg) and a prominent Senate Democrat (Ted Kennedy). The director of the new agency would be appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate, and would be physically based in the Gulf Coast region. The director would submit an annual redevelopment budget to the president and have full budget authority over Gulf Coast rebuilding appropriations. Within the new agency, the bill would create a public-private redevelopment authority named the “Gulf Coast Revitalization Authority” to develop a comprehensive plan, in conjunction with local leaders, for the reconstruction of the region. The authority’s 19-member board would be composed of state and local officials, including the governors of Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Texas and the mayor of New Orleans, as well as leaders from the business and non-profit sectors in those states, and the new agency’s director.

Louisiana delegation is still pressing for wetlands restoration funding, waivers from new bankruptcy laws for hurricane victims, and additional restoration funding

Don’t Teethe and Drive!

An 18-month-old child started the family car and ran over three family members in a southern Polish village Saturday, police said.
"The child somehow started the car, whose keys had been left in the ignition, and it began reversing," police spokesman Adam Jachimczak said.
The child's mother, who tried to stop the car, and her four-year-old daughter, got run over by the vehicle which pinned the grandfather against the wall of a barn.
The four-year-old, who suffered the most serious injuries, was rushed to hospital together with her mother and grandfather who were also hurt, Jachimczak said.

Japanese woman calls cops over unreliable hitman

It goes on worldwide...

TOKYO (Reuters) - A Japanese woman called in the police after a hitman she paid to kill her lover's wife failed to carry out the job.
The 32-year-old Tokyo woman was arrested on Wednesday for incitement to murder, the Daily Yomiuri newspaper said on Friday.
The woman contacted a private detective through a Web site last November and paid him 1 million yen (4,991 pounds) in cash to murder her love rival, the paper said.
The 40-year-old detective accepted the money and suggested he could carry out the job by chasing the victim on a motorcycle and spraying her with a biological agent in a tunnel.
Police also arrested the private detective and found the alleged target safe and well, the paper said.

*sigh*

Katrina Attitudes: Citizen or Critic

Sigh... I started this as a comment on someone else’s blog, but I got so into it, I thought I would turn it into a post on my own:

Am I the only one not buying all the mud slung at President Bush over Katrina? Am I the only one who is fed up with all the petty garbage the media seeks out in the midst of a serious catastrophe? Why can’t reporters act like citizens of this country rather than just critics of it? Now is the time for the citizens and leaders of this country to come together, not be inflammatory and divisive with finger pointing and bogus accusations. This past weekend they had one reporter interviewing some guy somewhere who was complaining that they hadn’t had power since the storm and had yet to see anyone from the Government. I noticed in the background that they were on still dry ground, and all the buildings and surroundings looked fine where they were. Other then the loss of power, there was no visible damage to anything from Katrina. I just have to wonder how far inland that reporter had to go to seek out some area where the recovery effort was not focused and find some ignorant person to rant against the administration about it. That person probably had no idea how many people were far worse off than he. If he had power for his TV, I’m sure he would have kept his mouth shut in light of all the suffering of others.

The people in the poor areas that relied on the bus system and were left behind during the evacuation have nobody to blame but their Mayor, not the President. The Mayor didn’t even bother to have the city buses moved to high ground – full or empty – and now they are all swamped underwater.

The civil war is long over. The Federal government does not have the authority to invade a state. The White House sent a draft memorandum to the Governor to issue to turn over the authority over the recovery effort to the Feds. The Governor played partisan/ego politics with it and REFUSED to turn over authority. Since they would not declare martial law, the government was further constrained. Thus, as we all witnessed the recovery effort fell into chaos for days with no organized central coordination.

Finger pointing aside, some people not only tend to blame the current President for everything, but they think the Federal Government is infinite in size and scope. It is not and cannot possibly be. This disaster is one of the biggest in our history – if not THE biggest to date. Frankly we should all be amazed at how many people LIVED, not at how many died.

God, continue to Bless America, especially now.