Katrina and the Waves

There is a significant chance that much of New Orleans could get wiped out in the next 24 hours. We're talking third world disaster type damage and deaths. This could get very ugly.

UPDATE: 4:40 P.M. - Looks like gasoline is going to shoot up. I expect $3.00+ for the lowest grade tomorrow morning here in SoCal. This hurricane is going to screw with all of us.

Fantasy Football

I am in 2 ESPN leagues (1 cash), 4 Yahoo leagues, a Yahoo Pro Pick'em, a Yahoo College Pick'em, a Yahoo survival league and an offline cash league.

I'm going to be going nuts on Sundays this Fall.

UPDATE: I drafted my offline team tonight. There is no bench, and you can protect your players when you drop them for their bye week. (no one else can draft them before you have a chance to get them back the next week) The points are geared exclusively around touchdowns (no points for yardage) and you get more points the longer the scoring play. It was a 7 team league, and I drafted first, snake draft. My team follows:
QB: Marc Bulger
RB: L. Tomlinson
RB: B. Westbrook
WR: Randy Moss
WR: Terrel Owens
TE: A. Becht ( I had Antonio Gates until I was informed he was suspended for the first week, I'll have a chance to get him in week 2)
K: S.Janikowski
D: Carolina (pure defence, no special teams, and points scored against special teams and the offence don't count)

If there had been room, I had a chance to get Torry Holt also...he went in the fifth round.

I plan on winning this league.

Lack of posting

Things have been crazy at work, and I've been a little under the weather. I've even stopped doing Les Nessman for a while.

Visas? We Doan Need No Stinkin' Visas! Pt 3

Well this is disgusting. It is quite clear that not only is the Mexican government encouraging its poor to come to the United States illegally, it is teaching them how, and spending money to help them. They are literally publishing a how to manual, teaching them how to enter the U.S. illegally. Now comes word that they were paying for transportation to help move potential illegals to areas where it is easier to cross the border. When is our government going to stand up for our country? The Mexican government is openly helping its citizens violate our laws. In my opinion, all U.S. funds going to Mexico must be immediately embargoed until the Mexican government decides to behave responsibly.

Nature's Fireworks

We had some pretty impressive lightning storms last night. They woke me up around 3:30 A.M. I stayed awake, worrying about the power going out and nuking my alarm clock. I finally got about another hour of sleep before I got up in the morning. Hopefully this means that the oppressive heat is about to break.

San Bernardino - Fast Food Capital of the World

Not many people know that San Bernardino is the Fast Food capital of the world, but it is. First, the original, and still the greatest, fast food chain, McDonald's was founded here, on 14th & E streets. (sadly, the original building no longer exists, but there is a modest fast food museum there now) Early customers of McDonald's included the men who founded the fast food chains of: Taco Bell, Taco Tia, Del Taco, Naugles, Baker's and Der Weinerschnitzel. The man who operates the Sizzler chain, and has more Kentucky Fried Chicken francises than anyone else was also inspired by the original McDonald's. San Bernardino really should do more to develop and market this historical feature.

My new favorite football coach

Andy Reid of the Eagles has just become my new favorite football coach. Somebody has finally stood up to that prima donna crybaby Terrel Owens.

ANWR

The issue of drilling for oil in the Alaska National Wildlife Reserve is coming up again. The opposition for it is based on the idea that it will hurt the Alaskan ecosystem and harm wildlife. If I recall correctly, these were exactly the same arguements that were made to oppose drilling for oil in other parts of Alaska and against building the Alaskan oil pipeline. So why don't we simply take an unbiased look at how the ecosystems and wildlife of those areas has been effected. I really don't know for sure, but I have the sense that the pipeline has actually helped increase the number of caribou. One thing that leads me to believe that the ecosystems have not been hurt, and if anything helped, is that the opponents of ANWR aren't bringing up any horror stories of the Alaskan wilderness being destroyed by these earlier efforts.

Slippery Slope to Hell

I am strongly opposed to gay marriage. I think it greatly damages the institution of marriage. I consider marriage to be one of the foundations of civilization. I think the rapid rise in the number of divorces (at about 50% presently) is one of the symptoms of the decline of our civilization. I have always argued that one of the reasons to oppose gay marriage is the precedent it will set for other prohibited marriages. ( I should note that I do support a system of civil union for both heterosexual and homosexual committed relationships) The supporters of gay marriage have always denied that it would set a precedent. Well, I am sad to say I have been proven right. As this article shows, there is already a case, Muth v. Frank, that is attempting to argue that incestuous marriages between consenting adults should be legal. They are using the exact same language that the arguments in the gay marriage cases use. How long do you think it's going to be before a polygamist uses the language to argue that polygamy should be legal and protected? I predict the very next time a polygamist is arrested.

We started down this slippery slope forty years ago with the two Connecticut
birth control cases that first created a "right" to privacy. Along the way we have coarsened society, killed millions of babies and begun the destruction of the institution of marriage. It's not too late to go back. I hope.

Monday Night Football

Yeah it's back! Boo...it's a typical boring preseason game.

Gender Selection

I have written several times about the problem of gender selection, but up to now I have been concerned with China and India. It is commonly believed that there are over 100 million missing women because of gender selective abortion. There are millions more men in those countries than women, because of the common practice of aborting female babies. I can't see how these millions of extra men won't lead to armed conflict in the future. The best result would be the conflict occuring between the two. Unfortunately I see them instead attacking Russia and Pakistan respectively. Or the two could collude and attack Australia. If the depopulation of Africa continues I predict both of them will claim lands in Africa.

Now, the practice is coming to America. While I don't expect the same degree of selective abortion, even one is morally repugnant. The only bright side is the prospect of watching the feminists argue in favor of a woman's right to abort their daughter simply because she is female.

Multiculturalism

Read this article, and then tell me all cultures are equal. Not only is this bastard trading his daughter for political gain, he is bribing his opponent openly to get out of the race. These cultures are still mired in the barbarism of the dark ages, they are NOT equal.

The Final Frontier Pt. 4

Discovery is scheduled to land tomorrow. Here's hoping all goes well and everyone is safe.

Update: The landing has been postponed 24 hours at 2:04 A.M. my time.

Air America

I haven't posted about the scandal at Air America on purpose. Frankly that bunch of political hacks isn't worth the attention. But the fact that the mainstream media isn't covering this is. Can you imagine the coverage if it had been a conservative taking illegal loans from a charity that serves children and the elderly, causing it to lose $10 million in government funding and nearly driving it into bankruptcy?

Tucker Carlson has a regular panelist on his show who has a slot on Air America. As far as I know he hasn't asked her yet about this scandal. Why not? This has just jumped to number 1 on the list of evidence of bias in the mainstream media.

Hiroshima

Yesterday was the 60th anniversary of the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima. I was pleasantly surprised that no one made that big a deal out of it other than the History Channel. Which is exactly the way it should be. We shouldn't be proud of dropping the bomb, but it was nothing to be ashamed of either.

Strange New World

The new school year has just started out at work. We lost all three of our administrators last year. (2 retired, one got a new job) This means that we are having to adapt to a whole new staff. (as an aside, we got a new District Superintendent halfway through last year, and the new prinicipal is his guy) So far so good. I'm the Social Studies Dept chair, and I'm finding it a much harder job than in years past. Part of it is the fact that I am the only 7th grade Social Studies with any experience and one of the positions is filled by a sub, so I have to provide extra support. I am not too thrilled with my teaching assignment either. I have 5 classes, all Social Studies. I am not ELL trained, but I have 2 ELL classes this year. One is level 4/5's which isn't too bad. There are 30 students in that class. The other is a sheltered group of level 3's. There are only 21 students in this class, and it can only have a max of 30. These kids are much harder though. Their English skills are somewhat limited. Plus they have been tracked together for years, so they have a practised routine set up. I have a class of 30 in which ten of them are leadership students. This class should be OK and it's my last period. The other two classes are "normal" kids. One of these classes has 37 students in it. Basically they are the kids that are left over when you pull out the AVID students (who tend to be much more motivated), the special ed students, the ELL students and the Leadership kids. So basically they turn into dumping grounds for the unmotivated and the discipline problems

The Final Frontier pt. 3

Who knew about America's shameful racial past when it came to our space program? Go to this site and watch the movie. I'm glad I did. Another window on America's past has been opened for the bright light of truth to shine in.


(This one is really funny guys!)

Banditos

When this happened 90 years ago, we sent units of the U.S. Army to the border and into Mexico to deal with Pancho Villa and the bandits. The forces were lead by Gen Pershing. The expedition was not entirely successful due to limitations placed on it by Washington D.C., but it did set a precedent that we should now follow. Only this time we should simply wipe out the drug cartels and smuggling operations, most of which operate openly in Northen Mexico.

John Bolton Appointment

It has been announced that President Bush will appoint John Bolton as ambassador to the United Nations in a recess appointment. Good for him. The Democrats have refused to allow an up or down vote in the Senate because they know he won't kiss the U.N's ass. It's time to get tough with the UN, and John Bolton will do that.

Visas? We doan need no stinkin visas! Pt 2

Well. This is been brewing for a long time. It is looking more and more like immigration is going to be a, if not the, key issue in 2008. It is interesting to note that the political leaders of the black community are more intersted in cutting deals with those in favor of illegal immigration than they are in representing the true views of those they are supposed to represent. Things have been getting uglier and uglier in California between Blacks and Hispanics, and it is driven by illegal immigration and the increasing militancy of those who seek to impose Atzlan on the US Southwest.

King Fahd has died

This has been a long time coming. Things could get interesting in Saudia Arabia. There are two distinct factions in the Saudi royal family. One is pro-western and the other is pro-radical Islam. Throw in a growing minority in favor of replacing the system with a constitutional monarchy and shake. This is a very important time for Saudi Arabia.