Thinking Right

By Mid-South Philosopher

November 3, 2007 8:06 AM | Link to this

Good morning, Jim,

While the possibility of activist judges misinterpreting the Georgia Supreme Court’s decision in the Genarlow Wilson case and applying their reasoning to a myriad number of cases that may not merit such judicial intervention is real, the decision, in my judgment, was the correct one in that case.

Much has been made by my conservative friends of the fact that when the Georgia General Assembly repealed the stupid and idiotic law under which Wilson was convicted, it failed to make any provisions for those, like Wilson, who were convicted under the illogical provisions of the flawed legislation. The gnawing question is “why did they fail to do this.”

One of two things must be true. Either the members of that august body, whose combined intelligence quotient would not add up to a good S.A.T. score, overlooked this matter; or they simply didn’t care about those who had already experienced the injustice of this bad law.

Now, before my conservative friends go off on me that I am a flaming liberal, if the girl involved in this matter was my daughter or (as is more realistic) my granddaughter, Genarlow Wilson would have been in for a mid-south a* whupping…old and fat and out of shape as I am! However, I doubt it would have ever come to that, because no 15 year old of mine would have been in that situation and therein, *lies the rub.

While activist judges, liberal and conservative alike, are a royal pain in the posterior, what throbs my hemorrhoids even more are inept, unlearned, and emotion catering legislators who never passed a ninth grade course in civic and yet have the audacity to purpose to govern the rest of us.

By Kaiser

November 3, 2007 8:20 AM | Link to this

Therein lies the rub? Isn’t that how Gnarlow got in trouble in the first place? Midsouth is out of control. I’m trying to read Wooten’s column, and Midsouth is blogging manifestos. Are you ready for this? He’s out of control!

By Redneck Convert

November 3, 2007 8:30 AM | Link to this

Well, I’m 100% with Wooten on this one. If the law decides you should get life in prison for stealing a ball point pen then that’s what you should get. If the law says you should get the Death Penalty for breaking into a house, then the courts need to stay out of it and let the guvmint put the juice to the guy.

Anyway, our fine Republican legislaters know what us rednecks want, not the courts. We don’t have to settle for a year in prison if we can get ten or twenty for a crime. But no, the courts have got to go constitution-this and constitution-that. They keep bringing up this cruel and unusual punishment bunk. Well, it ain’t cruel and unusual if us rednecks decide it ain’t. A court should have nothing to do with it. Sometimes I think we would be better off without courts except to sentence somebody to the Death Penalty.

If it wasn’t for the courts we would still be keeping Those People in their place. They wouldn’t be going to school with our fine Christian white kids and making us look around for private white Christian schools to keep our kids from mixing with them and learning all kind of librul thinking.

Course, I got to admit if it wasn’t for the Supreme Court we wouldn’t have My President in office today. If it wasn’t for them judges we would be stuck with the librul Gore because he got a million votes or so more than My President. Now that’s the kind of judicial activism I like.

So if we are going to have judges deciding things and not legislaters, let’s make sure they decide in favor of godly white conservatives. If they decide in favor of the libruls and Those People, well, that’s judicial activism of the wrong kind. I say let us rednecks elect all the judges and throw the ones that don’t do what we want out of office. Just keep the constitution out of the decisions. The thing is 200 years old anyway and the people that wrote it never imagined the day that one of Those People would be doing You Know What on tape with a girl and making us rednecks cringe about it.

If My President can sort of decide on his own that the constitution don’t have much to do with certain things, like holding people in prison without trial, then the judges can too. I say catch this Wilson guy and put him back in prison to serve the full ten years.

Well, its a dull day here at the trailer. My Dawgs ain’t going to be on TV on account of scheduling some little girls school that nobody wants to see for their game today. And with the drought we can’t even water down a hillside and go 4-wheeling without the cops showing up. Have a good weekend everybody.

By Mid-South Philosopher

November 3, 2007 8:31 AM | Link to this

I’ll take my medication, Kaiser. It should settle me down in a little while.

Now, explain to me why a legislative body, which (supposedly) was trying to correct an error in previously passed legislation, would deliberately make no provision for (at the very least) some judicial review of the cases of people who might have been convicted under the flawed legislation.

Was it ineptness or unconcern?

By Curious Observer

November 3, 2007 8:38 AM | Link to this

So, before a court makes a decision, it should first decide whether that decision is likely to have a bearing on previous cases. That’s more important than whether a state action adheres to the consitution. No need to complicate things. Right, Wooten?

By Larry

November 3, 2007 8:47 AM | Link to this

Mr. Wooten – this isn’t a violation of checks and balances, it is precisely the purpose for which they exist. The General Assembly’s action was more than breathtakingly stupid, it was unconstitutional. It is actually your notion that the judicial branch should be powerless to make constitutional determinations that would nullify the separation of power by granting the legislative branch complete, unchecked authority.

Characterizing the law change as a sentence reduction is inaccurate; it was much closer to decriminalization. As such, the president is more than welcome.

“Cruel and unusual” contests have always existed and this decision is inapplicable to any case where the original crime still exists as a crime.

By DoubleDot

November 3, 2007 8:52 AM | Link to this

This is why you need PR bards to broker your bromides.

By Glenn

November 3, 2007 8:57 AM | Link to this

Political Foreskin:

Ignorance is briss.

By Jim Wooten

November 3, 2007 9:01 AM | Link to this

When judges are legislatures, legislatures should be judges.

By Glenn

November 3, 2007 9:03 AM | Link to this

When courthouses are congressmen, congressmen should be courthouses.

By Jim Wooten

November 3, 2007 9:05 AM | Link to this

When legislatures are judges, judges should report to Human Resources.

By DoubleDot

November 3, 2007 9:06 AM | Link to this

Mid south, it cant be determined if it’s apathy or arrogance. For every decision, there is an appeal.

Activism is seen only in the eyes of the losing side.

By DoubleDot

November 3, 2007 9:20 AM | Link to this

Remember, it’s always their activism, never our activism. We dont use activism, they do. We stay within constitutional limits; they legislate from the bench.

They vs We (benjamin franklin)

By Glenn

November 3, 2007 9:30 AM | Link to this

Colon: your 9:20 is a characteristically snide misrepresentation of Mid-South, whose final paragraph nails it nicely. And not only do I continue to admire Justice Thomas for “his clear thinking and exposition”, now I admire also Larry @ 9:27 for his.

Does anyone here believe that Capricious Culpepper Disorder will spread unchecked by the higher courts?

By Craig

November 3, 2007 9:33 AM | Link to this

The inconsistency of Mr. Wooten and his right wing friends is breathtaking. “Judicial activism”, if they rule against something you believe in. “Rule of law”, if they install a President.

Anyway, thanks Redneck - your comments help make the silliness here worthwhile.

By jbmlaw

November 3, 2007 9:39 AM | Link to this

Good morning all. I respectfully disagree with my friend Midsouth, for whom I hold the highest admiration.

The core flaw in the Wilson case, sparking all of the kerfuffle, is that the governor failed to use his power of pardon to cure a minor injustice. (A 10 year sentence strikes me as not particular egregious for one who actively participates in the manufacture of pornography with minors, so the injustice is minor, not major. The problem is he was not tried for the more serious crime.) By all reports the thug was offered a sentence reasonably commensurate with his horrible behavior that evening, but decided to roll the dice. So I have little sympathy for the devil.

Nevertheless, it is the duty of the executive to cure judicial wrongs. When a court sets out to do justice by ignoring the plain language of the legislature, it destablizes the entire system. When a judges makes the law more arbitrary, it does not make it better or stronger. It has the effect of destroying all precedent, all established standards within the law. Courts now believe, correctly, that they are charged to determine whether any statute should exist, regardless of legislative directives. By usurping the executive’s power of pardon, in its manufacture of a new definition of “cruel and unusual”, the Georgia Supreme Court has abolished its own legitimacy.

As all three branches hold the power to determine the Constitutionality of any act - that is not vested soley with the Supreme Court - it is reasonably possible that a legislature could find that funding the Supreme Court is cruel and unusual to the people of Georgia. The executive could determine that enforcing ruilngs of the Supreme Court is cruel and unusual to the people of Georgia. “Activism” has no end.

By Glenn

November 3, 2007 9:45 AM | Link to this

Craig, how about, “judicial activism”, if they rule against something you believe in*, and “rule of law”, if they find the candidate you hate the winner?

*Wasn’t Uncle Thomas recently quoted on the discipline of trying to sequester one’s own opinion in favor of what the law requires? Did he say this, or did he say what you would like for him to have said?

By jm

November 3, 2007 9:51 AM | Link to this

jbmlaw@9:39 - I would like to go even further back. Why was he even tried as an adult? Trying a juvenile as an adult should be reserved for the most egregious of crimes. Consensual oral sex between two teenagers does not fall into that category.

By Dusty

November 3, 2007 9:56 AM | Link to this

Let me get this straight.

A law was passed by legislation to put away child molestors for ten years. That is the constitutional authority of the legislature.

A 17 year old sex predator was arrested for sex with a 15 year old. He goes to jail to serve 10 years because he “broke the law”.

The law was changed by legislation reducing the sentence time for child molestors. It was NOT to be retroactive.

On appeal, the already convicted 17 year old in jail was released because an elected judge decided it was “cruel and unusual” punishment.

According to the Georgia Constitution, only the legislature can make/change laws. Why then is this judge not disbarred for making unlawful decisions?

I am not an attorney so I am trying to understand the legality when… what is written as law is not “carried out”. If this fracture of the law is OK, then we need not bother with “laws”. Another name for that is anarchy, is it not?

By Dusty

November 3, 2007 10:06 AM | Link to this

Craig @9:33

Of course you agree with your compatriot RedNeck who is a flaming liberal disguised as a humorous ignorant backwoods local.

It is so “cute” to throw off on Southerners but has become so trite that few try it anymore. RedNeck, as you know, uses it to cover his pure Democratic persona.

Yep, I laugh sometimes, at his pure rejection of truth. But that, as always with liberals, is their usual laughable modus operandi.

By Curious Observer

November 3, 2007 10:08 AM | Link to this

As all three branches hold the power to determine the Constitutionality of any act - that is not vested soley with the Supreme Court …

Gee, jbmlaw, I need to read the constitution again. I can’t recall any provision in it that empowers Congress and the executive branch to make a final determination of the constitutionality of an action. On the other hand, it explicitly empowers the judicial branch to do so.

Maybe that fancy law school you went to is onto something. Woodrow Wilson, was it?

By Glenn

November 3, 2007 10:09 AM | Link to this

Dusty, are you sure you’re not an attorney?

By jbmlaw

November 3, 2007 10:10 AM | Link to this

Dear jm @ 9:51, you touch on another issue that bothers me. In Georgia a 17-year old is an adult, for the purposes of the criminal justice system. The jbmlaw rule of life is that 18 is closer to the magic age. 95% of kids are solid and have their heads screwed on straight at 18 (and an additional 4% routinely don’t have that wiring until 25.) I think the 17 year old percentage is substantially less than 95%. My unofficial perception is that since under-18s do stupid things in greater numbers than 18s, the prosecutors are able to prove how well they protect the public by inflating conviction rates.

By jbmlaw

November 3, 2007 10:16 AM | Link to this

Dear Curious @ 10:08, I know reading is an effort for you, so let me focus your efforts, to save you a lot of searching. (1) Read the oath of office for the executives and legislators. (2) Then read the powers of the Courts. In the former you will find what you seek, and in the latter you will not.

By getalife

November 3, 2007 10:16 AM | Link to this

A wingnut talking about the rule of law and the Constitution is rich.

Waterboarding is illegal along with all the other laws w has broken.

Get real and talk about your water problem.

Geez.

By Glenn

November 3, 2007 10:16 AM | Link to this

jbm, I keep looking for the word “final” in your analysis. Am I missing something, or is the word an import? How would Conscientious Objector’s straw man argument hold without the imported concept?

By DoubleDot

November 3, 2007 10:18 AM | Link to this

Glenn, Dusty must be an attourney. Did you read how exparte her prima facie writs are? Real pro se voir dire!

real nit-writ.

By jbmlaw

November 3, 2007 10:19 AM | Link to this

Dear Glenn @ 10:16, Marbury v Madison. Only the court proclaims itself the final arbiter.

By jbmlaw

November 3, 2007 10:24 AM | Link to this

Dear getalife @ 10:16, actually you swerve into the heart of the issue. Congress has repeatedly refused to make waterboarding illegal.

By Glenn

November 3, 2007 10:26 AM | Link to this

Hi getalife. Which water problem? Georgia’s drought, or Mukasey’s waterboarding problem?

And who passed a law against waterboarding? I thought Congress had ducked that one.

By Glenn

November 3, 2007 10:33 AM | Link to this

jbm @ 10:19, thanks for the cite. I’ve studied Con. law in three universities. My point was that you hadn’t raised the issue of finality; rather, it was imputed to you, to make yours “a right strawy epistle”. Because of your professional standing and evidently irksome reasonableness, your screen persona is often hijacked by those who would rather misquote you as having said something lame enough for them to refute. In my view you’re inordinately patient with this gadflying.

By getalife

November 3, 2007 10:34 AM | Link to this

PF,

The writer strike starts Monday so you can be a scab writer.

Others,

Our Congress is broken. They don’t write laws anymore, they write immunity or amnesty for breaking the law.

Get real, our government is broken and Edwards and Paul are the only ones talking about it.

By jbmlaw

November 3, 2007 10:36 AM | Link to this

Dear Glenn @ various times, your well-framed questions, coupled with my trenchant criticism of the court, highlight the historic political tensions among the branches of government. The ancient “gentlemen’s agreement” has several elements.

(1) Legislative acts have a presumption of constitutionality, and are not voided by the courts except under the most egregious circumstances.

(2) Legislative acts are not to micromanage the executive branch, else the executive is free to ignore. The legislature is act like a corporate “board of directors” to guide and advise the executive. The executive receives wide deference, as he is the only one elected by the entire population.

(3) In addition to the day-to-day management power, the executive has all short-term emergency powers “necessary” without regard to legislative acts. Absent true emergency, the executive is bound to act within the contraints enacted by Congress. Thus the true definition of “high crimes and misdemeanors.”

(4) The executive is bound to enforce court adjudications, except for court injection into political disputes.

(5) The court has full authority to adjudicate disputes, but is to remain apolitical.

Thus Marbury v Madison reflects a significant portion of the gentlemen’s agreement. However, when Andrew Jackson was ordered by the court to do something he believed improper, he told the world that the court can enforce it own edicts. There is a limit to they deference any branch owes the other, and I think the Wilson court breached the line.

By Dusty

November 3, 2007 10:40 AM | Link to this

DoubleDot@10:18,

I fear you are the Don’t Know PoFo, the Dire Squire of the Blog Empire. Your nutty nitwrits of nuisance notoriety are numerous and numbing. Please refrain from your repertoire of irreparable rowdiness.

By jbmlaw

November 3, 2007 10:42 AM | Link to this

Dear Glenn @ 10:33, apologies for my misunderstanding. I mis-thought you solicited a short treatise on jurisprudence.

Note that the “finality” issue you raise exists only with our leftist friends, whom I have previously argued are members of a personality cult. “Who speaks” has more meaning to them than “what is said.” That is perverse, of course. My bar memberships do not make me any smarter than anybody on the blog. On the other hand, I think a lot of my arguments are better than many we see - humility is not one of my strong points. It is not who I am that makes my arguments worthwhile - it is the content I proffer.

By getalife

November 3, 2007 10:43 AM | Link to this

ambulance chaser,

Why in the world would a gop write this bill?

“The American Freedom Agenda Act would bar the use of evidence obtained through torture; require that federal intelligence gathering is conducted in accordance with the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA); create a mechanism for challenging presidential signing statements; repeal the Military Commissions Act, which, among other things, denies habeas corpus to certain detainees; prohibit kidnapping, detentions, and torture abroad; protect journalists who publish information received from the executive branch; and ensure that secret evidence is not used to designate individuals or organizations with a presence in the U.S. as foreign terrorists.”

By DoubleDot

November 3, 2007 10:45 AM | Link to this

The PKK situation is shaping up to be the key to Iraq’s future. Turkey wont back down. PKK wont back down.

Rice appeared twice in different parts of Turkey trying to stop any Turkish incursions into Iraq. In a related story, there were two bigfoot sightings in Turkey in the region where Rice visited. Was it bigfoot, or just a mangy sec of state? That woman is ugly. Ugly Yeti.

She so ugly, her momma took her back to the halloween store twice trying to return the mask she thought her daughter has stolen.

By getalife

November 3, 2007 10:49 AM | Link to this

The DOJ official was waterboarded intentionally and said it was torture

They fired him.

Anyhoo, w vetoed the water bill to rebuild the gulf coast and the wingnuts are fuming down here.

I told them their billions were stolen in Iraq. You get what you vote for and they will not vote gop. This state is turning blue.

Bwa.

By Vinny

November 3, 2007 10:53 AM | Link to this

If you want to see cruel and unusual punishment, see the tape of what that boy Genarlow was doing to that girl.

By getalife

November 3, 2007 10:57 AM | Link to this

Vitter is saying they have enough Senators to overide this veto and they may.

To be fair, diaper boy may save the water bill and he will be reelected if he does.

I think the House will override too but the fact remains w is stealing the billions Ike warned us about, to cut domestic spending.

Now if want more of this agenda, vote gop. If not vote dem and you may stop WWIII and a draft.

By Glenn

November 3, 2007 10:58 AM | Link to this

jbm, don’t bother with the cross-dressers. They can’t help themselves. Like Winona Ryder and Sen. Craig, they’re addicted to the frisson, and in any event can’t stand upright on their own. They prefer to “argue to the man”, except when the man’s or woman’s particulars actually are relevant, in which case qualifications are ruled out of court.

They’re just practicing for when they have to take up positions of actual responsibility come the next green administration.

By Glenn

November 3, 2007 11:07 AM | Link to this

getalife, what’s your take on the water bill? What should’ve been done to it/with it?

By jbmlaw

November 3, 2007 11:10 AM | Link to this

Dear getalife @ 10:43, I perceive you are not quoting the preamble to any particular legislation, but more likely a journalism school grad’s interpretation. I sounds like something that might be offered by the senior senator from Pennsylvania Nevertheless, portions are meritorious:

“bar the use of evidence obtained through torture” I agree, but of course this has always been the law in the US. It would only inhibit people like the Clintons, who think we should prosecute terrorists instead of kill them on the ground.

“require that federal intelligence gathering is conducted in accordance with the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA)” I think I disagree. I don’t know the content of FISA, but this is micromanaging. If, for example, “intelligence gathering” is defined without providing for “secret tips called in” our executive would thus be unable to retain the information. I think all agree that would be stupid, and would wish the executive to ignore such an intrusion on his inherent authority.

“create a mechanism for challenging presidential signing statements.” I disagree again, micromanagement. This is an attempt to inject the judiciary into a political dispute.

“repeal the Military Commissions Act.” I disagree, the Military Commission Act serves too may useful purposes.

“prohibit kidnapping, detentions, and torture abroad” I disagree. We do not want American courts adjudicating acts in China or the Sudan.

“protect journalists who publish information received from the executive branch” Why not just put them on pension? The only time you have a problem here is when you have a runaway special prosecutor. I would prefer to see abolition of the concept of special prosecutors.

“ensure that secret evidence is not used to designate individuals or organizations with a presence in the U.S. as foreign terrorists.” What a moonbat idea! Before we start monitoring the activities of potential terrorists, we present our suspicions in open court.

By Dusty

November 3, 2007 11:18 AM | Link to this

jbmlaw@ 10:42

May I disagree with you a bit? You wrote”Your bar memberships do not make me any smarter than anybody on the blog.”

Not smarter? Law school may not endow anyone with genius abilities but they do give an indication of innate intelligence.

Your “content” confirms the excellence of that indication. Also the fact that you seem to use your abilities for the “good of mankind” is admirable. My compliments!

PS..Glad to hear that your ensign has moved to the more pleasant Norfolk. Best wishes always for him.

By jbmlaw

November 3, 2007 11:22 AM | Link to this

Dear Glenn @ 10:33, I neglected to express my appreciation for the compliment, thanks.

By getalife

November 3, 2007 11:24 AM | Link to this

Glenn,

Well w vetoed it , said it was full of pork but never did the same when the gop were the majority.

The gulf towns voted for a tax increase to start restoring the coast, counting on the feds to follow thru with their promise of billions.

Needless to say, they are pi-ssed at w.

They hope the overide will happen and it should.

By jbmlaw

November 3, 2007 11:31 AM | Link to this

Dear Dusty @11:18, thanks for your good thoughts on the Ensign. We are proud of him. Otherwise thanks for the kind words, but I think I stand by my core argument. Most of the kids who go to law school are pretty bright, but the same is true of med school and any other post-grad program. I think I am simply rejecting “credential” as a basis for blind acceptance (or rejection) of argument. I think there is much truth, unfortunately, to Glenn’s argument on this issue.

By Dusty

November 3, 2007 11:33 AM | Link to this

getalife@11:24

I see you are angry because you didn’t get more handouts for Louisiana. How many MORE billions do you think are necessary?

The President was quite correct in stopping the unlimited flow of taxpayer dollars to your state. It was OK to get your state on “its feet”, but it is time for Louisiana to start “walking” on its own.

“Bush did it” and he was correct in doing so.

By getalife

November 3, 2007 11:42 AM | Link to this

Well fake law,

Your logic tells me you would be a traitor and support king george in our revolution.

But we knew already you are a good little german who supports king george.

Like Leahy shouted on the Senate floor, “Mr. President, we are a democracy!”

Geez, It was Ron Paul who write that Freedom Act because he is a true patriot like Leahy.

By Glenn

November 3, 2007 11:43 AM | Link to this

jbm, a particularly nice stiletto job, even for a lawyer. Gather from getalife that it’s a gloss on a Pauline Platform Plank (PPP, or “prank” for short).

Amen to your rejection of credentialism, which is the horse plop on the wagon wheel of the decrepit stagecoach of education, humma humma humma. As a God-given writer would explain it…

For greatness is only the drayhorse that coaxes

The built cart out; and where we go is reason.

But genius is an enormous littleness, a trickling

Of heart that covers alike the hare and the hunter…

Have you wondered why all the windows in heaven were broken?

Have you seen the homeless in the open grave of God’s hand?

Do you want to acquaint the larks with the fatuous music of war?

There is the muffled step in the snow, the stranger;

The cripled wren; the nun; the dancer; the Jesus-wing

Over the walkers in the village; and there are

Many desperate arms about us and the things we know.

[Kenneth Patchen]

By Glenn

November 3, 2007 11:49 AM | Link to this

getalife, sincerely hope that W didn’t leave LA hanging out to dry, as it were. Will look into it. Maybe Dusty’s right about the thing being morbidly porcine, but certainly you’re right that such a thing never bothered the DC hawgs before.

By Curious Observer

November 3, 2007 11:53 AM | Link to this

Hey, getalife, should we start writing fulsome praise for one another, as the wingnuts on this blog do? I’m sure it makes them feel correct.

By getalife

November 3, 2007 11:56 AM | Link to this

crusty the clown,

You did not have to type that, we know in your ignorant, gullible mind, w never did anything wrong.

The fact is he promised that money to your ilk down here to rebuild but the outed CIA agent told us, he is not a man of his word.

Yet, you keep swallowing his lies like a good little german. Your ilk down here have come to realize, w is a disaster catching up with the rest of the country.

The gop position is more war with corporate welfare, no domestic spending ,WWIII and a draft.

Good luck with that loser.

The dems

By anonymous

November 3, 2007 11:58 AM | Link to this

Young Mr. Wilson was a minor participating in a consensual sex act with another minor. He was charged and convicted of child molestation. Why wasn’t the young female charged with child molestation since she engaged in a sex act with a minor?

By getalife

November 3, 2007 12:00 PM | Link to this

Curious Observer,

Great point, you are correct, nailed it.

By jbmlaw

November 3, 2007 12:12 PM | Link to this

Dear anonymous @ 11:58, the custom in law, rightly or wrongly, when there is a criminal act involving two minors of significantly disparate maturity, is that the older is charged only, as an implicit misleader.

By jbmlaw

November 3, 2007 12:15 PM | Link to this

Dear Curious @ 11:53, you would have a fundamental problem, in that leftists despise all. Until you guys find some joy in your own heart, you will be unable to truly appreciate others.

By jbmlaw

November 3, 2007 12:24 PM | Link to this

Dear anonymous @ 11:58, I should also have pointed out, as observed earlier by our friend jm @ 9:51, Wilson was not a minor. A 17 year old is not a minor under the criminal law of Georgia. I think you and I would agree that age definition is a terrible law.

By getalife

November 3, 2007 12:25 PM | Link to this

Please, wingnuts have to hate to be happy.

MARTIAL LAW IN PAKISTAN.

Geez.

By Dusty

November 3, 2007 12:47 PM | Link to this

jbmlaw@12:25

Indeed, “age definition is a terrible law”. When 12 and 13 year old girls get pregnant,(as Shar & Deegee have mentioned in previous blogs) would that be considered an adult condition if it were just fun and not forced and by someone of their choice?

Someone has to set limits. Strange limits though. I see in other suggestions. as for S-chip, twenty five year old citizens are now CHILDREN.

But as always, how do you set (define) age limits without naming them?If you say “conditions” who then decides the condition? Do “age limits” become the loophole of the law?

By Curious Observer

November 3, 2007 12:48 PM | Link to this

Getalife, I find your point brilliantly argued. You are unquestionably correct about everything. Allow me to point out your logical superiority. It’s unfortunate that our friends on the right haven’t enough respect for one another to concede.

By Dusty

November 3, 2007 1:06 PM | Link to this

Curious Observer @12:48

“What a tangled web you weave, when first you practice to deceive.”

Sorry, honey, but we like our own honest weavings better than your tangled ones.

In any case, run home to mommy and she will give you a hug to make you feel better.

By getalife

November 3, 2007 1:48 PM | Link to this

Curious Observer,

It is great to finally read some outstanding intellectual honesty.

Your fact based posts are well above mine but our friends on the right or good little germans, if you will, can never counter your brilliant arguments.

I humbly yield you this blog.

By Craig

November 3, 2007 1:48 PM | Link to this

Glenn said “hate”?

The fallback position of many wingnuts - anyone who disagrees with Bush “hates” him.

Did you “hate” President Clinton, Glenn? Actually I doubt it, although I would guess you disagreed with many of his policies.

By jm

November 3, 2007 1:51 PM | Link to this

dusty@12:47 - the 25 year old limit for schip eligibility is not that unusual. Many traditional employer sponsored insurance plans will cover a child through early and mid-20s. The assumption being that the child is attending higher education and has yet to enter the work force full-time.

A possible modification to the schip would be to require enrollment in higher education to continue to be eligible for schip coverage.

By Craig

November 3, 2007 1:51 PM | Link to this

And yeah Dusty I could read Redneck Convert all day - he skewers the oh so obvious silliness of the right wing - and makes it seem easy.

By Dusty

November 3, 2007 2:25 PM | Link to this

Craig@1:51

I don’t doubt that you could read Redneck all day long. He’s right at your level. Passe’ country boy and joker politician.

But…if you want a good laugh look at the Democratic led Congress. The approval level is somewhere around 11% approval! Wow! This Congress may become the only SUBPRIME-below zero in history. Just let Democrats run it and it’s Halloween all over.

Unfortunately, they are SUPPOSED to be leaders. Another laugh!!

By Dan

November 3, 2007 2:38 PM | Link to this

Judicial activism blows.

By Crack

November 3, 2007 2:50 PM | Link to this

Dan, that was the blog of the day. Child molesters running free in our streets is the worse-case scenario dreaded by constitutionalists everywhere.

But what really worries me is that what if the legislature passes the legalization of medical marijuana and the judges overthrow it and have everyone involved arrested, sent to rehab, and imprisoned for ten years?

By TW

November 3, 2007 2:54 PM | Link to this

Outside of the Kroger this AM, there was a group of elderly people collecting canned foods for the ‘needy’. In an attempt to reach across the aisle, I told the blue hair in the walker that those supposed ‘needy’ were nothing more than free loaders who didn’t want to work, and besides that, they were probably illegal anyway.

The trouble with my effort at coming together with my brothers on the right is that I now feel like crap about what I said. Is there anybody on this blog who can tell me how to push through the weakness I am experiencing?

By Dan

November 3, 2007 2:58 PM | Link to this

Wow, Crack, until you mentioned the medical weed angle, I didn’t really appreciate how dangerous judicial activism could be. You are very insightful, sir. What other laws that our great assembly passes could possibly be overturned? How about the 1.6 gallon per flush law? What if the judges overturn that? Do you realize that Charmins now has the quadruple roll? aw, I dont even want to think about it.

By getalife

November 3, 2007 3:02 PM | Link to this

TW,

dusty can answer your question.

Crack,

Dodd is your man if want legal weed or move to Cali.

Lost a Watch in Men’s Room? Call Larry Craig’s Office

Geez.

By deegee

November 3, 2007 3:31 PM | Link to this

I don’t see how a sane individual can’t see the difference between child molestation and two teenagers of sound mind getting it on. If the van’s a rockin, don’t come a knockin. Would that get you ten years today? Who, except Dusty didn’t steam up the windows in the old man’s car on Saturday night? You folks act like Gennarlow Wilson was the first teenager that every got a BJ. Teenage sex has been around since the dawn of puberty. The problem now is that everyone wants to win the legal lotto and cash in for the rest of their life.

By getalife

November 3, 2007 3:42 PM | Link to this

Hey dusty,

I found your so called “mafia”

The dems love rudy and Ron Paul.

By Crack

November 3, 2007 4:11 PM | Link to this

Activist judges are poison to our constitution. They overturn fairly won laws and make up their own. Like, suppose the general assembly passed a no fat chicks law. Okay? Wouldn’t that be great? Well, then suppose some activist judge overturned it and let the fat chicks back in. Imagine the damage that could do to prurient interests?

By Dan

November 3, 2007 4:19 PM | Link to this

Crack, you named yourself right. No judge, activist or not, would EVER overturn a no fat chicks law.

you know it, I know it, the american people know it.

By Dusty

November 3, 2007 4:34 PM | Link to this

TW@2:54

You need true confession. Try water boarding. They say it works. Might keep you from acting like a jerk.

Crack@ 2:50

Don’t worry. Just tell the jail medics you have glaucoma and need the proper “meds”. You can relax for ten years.

deegee@3:31

Some people are taught NOT to be promiscuous and some are not. That accounts for a lot of things.

getalife@3:42

You know all about the “mafia” being from Sicily and all. Tell us about it. Oh yeah, many years ago Guiliani hired a guy for homeland security and fired him for bad connections (mafia?) a week later. Did you know the guy? Your family?

By getalife

November 3, 2007 4:39 PM | Link to this

Read the Times story I posted to answer your stupid questions.

Did you know he married his cousin?

No wonder you like him.

His kids don’t.

Bwa.

By Luckoduh

November 3, 2007 4:44 PM | Link to this

Look at “News”weak gush and slobber:

{{{{On Tuesday, at the eighth presidential debate among Democrats, front-runner Sen. Hillary Clinton came under withering fire from her top rivals, Sen. Barack Obama and former Sen. John Edwards. But the attacks didn’t appear to do much damage, with her lead for the party’s nomination unchanged, according to the latest NEWSWEEK poll. Almost exactly a year before election day, Clinton is also the favorite to win the White House—if only by a very small margin.}}}}

Withering attacks? You mean the simple questions they asked that “she” sputtered non answers at?

And considering that The Pig is running against two major league lightweights, does holding a lead against them really say that much?

This is going to be easy.

~~~~~~

{{{{“She” unites Republicans everywhere in furious opposition as no other Democrat does. John Edwards, correct for once, told Clinton in last week’s Democratic presidential debate that Republicans “keep bringing you up” not because “she’s” a strong candidate but because “they may actually want to run against you.” That’s exactly what Republicans want. They think “she’s” highly beatable.}}}}

SHhhhhhh, dammit.

~~~~~~~

Great, now the other one of them has gone berserk:

{{{{“Breathtakingly” misleading. That’s what former president Bill Clinton called a question Tim Russert asked his wife at this week’s Democratic presidential candidates’ debate. And boy was he mad.}}}}

{{{{“The implication was that in the last few weeks since she’d been a candidate, I had endeavored to cover up records involving her. You agree with that? That’s what people thought when they heard that question,” Clinton said.}}}}

Uh, so where are the records at?

Duh.

This is going to be easy.

~~~~~~~

{{{{Indeed, on every relevant measure, the shape of the Petraeus curve is profoundly encouraging. It is not only the number of coalition deaths and injuries that has fallen sharply (October was the best month for 18 months and the second-best in almost four years), but the number of fatalities among Iraqi civilians has also tumbled similarly. This process started outside Baghdad but now even the capital itself has a sense of being much less violent and more viable. As we report today, something akin to a normal nightlife is beginning to re-emerge in the city. As the pace of reconstruction quickens, the prospects for economic recovery will be enhanced yet further. With oil at record high prices, Iraq should be an extremely prosperous nation and in a position to start planning for its future with confidence.}}}}

By TW

November 3, 2007 4:46 PM | Link to this

Dusty - I will add name calling to my next reach across the aisle assignment. You are a wonderful role model for the GOP in me that is trying to get out.

This ‘waterboarding’ of which you speak - I, like Mukasay, have no idea the nature of this animal. Does it involve men’s rooms at airports?

By getalife

November 3, 2007 4:55 PM | Link to this

duh,

Check out sniveling cowards

“I see black people”.

Hey, at least they will man up and debate Billiam the snowman on CNN.

Bwa.

By getalife

November 3, 2007 5:05 PM | Link to this

Good for President Clinton.

Timmah was outed as cheney’s tool in the libby trial.

Run rudy, that will unite your party .

“With oil at record high prices, Iraq should be an extremely prosperous nation and in a position to start planning for its future with confidence.”

Yes, so will Iran.

Idiot.

By Captain Freedom

November 3, 2007 5:13 PM | Link to this

Waterboarding. Like Sister Dusty,THE Captain finds himself laughing quietly to himself every time he hears the word, or contemplates the practice being used on some swarthy Islamopinkecofascist. (Well, Dusty lets fly that flinty cackle of hers, followed by that productive hack of expectoration we all know so well. But, THE Captain digresses.)

Yes, waterboarding. It has a quaint, frat boy prankishness about it, like water balloons lofted from an upper story window. Or like setting a feces-filled paper bag alight on a neighbor’s doorstep. Or those halcyon days when we would haze the pledges with electrodes attached to their genitalia and rubber hoses humorously lashed across the soles of their feet.

Leave it to the libfaeries to try to make an issue out of these schoolboy antics. It is so stupid, but saying a liberal idea is stupid is just wasting breath, because when a liberal looks up “stupid” in the dictionary, it just says “yeah, you, liberal stupid person” and snorts derisively as it (the dictionary) wins the argument through superior logic and rhetoric.

Because, aside from its inherent harmlessness, these little games like waterboarding and tazing and hanging-upside-down-in-stress-position are the only effective means we have for fighting the Islamofascist Terror Hordes. Because those people have no sense of humor, these playful japes and jest drive them to near-insanity as they scream aloud from the suffering our humor causes them.

And THE Captain is here to tell you…if there was a nuclear bomb strapped to your daughter who was buried alive with only 4 hours of oxygen and her lifeless (albeit vaporized) body would be used for the sexual servicing of aspirant suiciders, you pansy libs would sing a different tune about the jocular application of waterboarding to Ahmed and Omar.

So thank you, Dusty @ 4:34, for brightening THE Captain’s day with your reminder that in Our Nation, under Our Leader, waterboarding has become a topic of humor, and no longer is something that might induce, oh, I dunno, something like shame.

By Captain Freedom

November 3, 2007 5:25 PM | Link to this

THE Captain does not wish to let pass an opprotunity to offer kudos to Mr Wooten for today’s column. It is true that judicial activism has indeed brought our nation to its current sorry pass, a state of affairs that is only recently being rectified by Our Leader’s blithe disregard for such quaint notions as rule of law and human decency.

But THE Captain takes heart at the wonderful news coming from Our Friend And Stalwart Ally in Islamabad. It seems that some judges there mistakenly believed that their job was to apply some set of abstract principles to the realities of the current situation as regards their presidential election. In response, President for Life Musharraf has disbanded the Supreme Court, deactivated the constitution, and mobilized the military. THE Captain’s buttons are bursting with pride, and a sensation of wood emergent tingles his loins at the prospect of a Fearless and Godly Leader invoking martial law for the people’s own good.

For it seems that in Pakistan, the Supreme Court is not locked up by a cabal of Right Thinking True Believers who can be relied upon to apply abstract principles in the way Our Leader wishes (that is to say, properly), and thus must be “held for their own safety” while enjoying some pleasant games of testicular electrode bingo.

Yet, while we can rest easily today, who knows what kinds of miscreants might populate our Supreme Court in the future. Thus, it is comforting to know that there is an alternative to allowing the so-called “rule of law” to run amok. Yeah, I’m talking to you Justices Breyer and Ginsburg. Those could be your nuts in the vice, if you catch THE Capatin’s drift.

(Actually, Justice Ginsburg poses a problem as a non-penus person. exactly where does one attach electrodes to a person who has no apparent genetalia? Dusty, where would you attach electrodes to yourself if you were looking for a good laugh?)

Martial Law. It may, someday, be the Right Thing to do.

It is a great day

By RW-(the original)

November 3, 2007 5:27 PM | Link to this

Saad al-Azawi, his wife and four children are among them. They fled to Syria six months ago, leaving behind what had become one of the capital’s more dangerous districts—west Baghdad’s largely Sunni Khadra region.

You moonbat(ic)s® better get your surrender accomplished soon or you’re going to have to deal with an American victory.

By getalife

November 3, 2007 5:40 PM | Link to this

What did we win RW?

By Captain Freedom

November 3, 2007 5:41 PM | Link to this

RW,

THE Captain shares your enthusiasm at the return of these faceless people whose lives we are improving through Our Leader’s efforts.

Alas, THE Captain is saddened to think how many of these returning Patriots are in fact aspirant suiciders and terrists that Our Troops (and Blackwater employees) will be forced to kill to make Iraq safe for democracy.

Perhaps we should just kill them all and let Allah sort it out? Will they all get 70 virgins in heaven? Ha ha ha, right Dusty? Nothing like a good massacre-slash-Allah-slash-virgin joke to tickle the old funny bone.

By Dusty

November 3, 2007 5:43 PM | Link to this

Well,

I see the Captain has given us the expose on his favorite brands of torture for Islamists or anybody that needs it. Please do not let him talk to any blue haired ladies like TW who “aint got no respeck”.

The Cap’n might loose control over those enticing blue haired gentle women. We can’t have that although the Cap’n closely resembles them. The Cap’n might go into one of his err..rr “flights of nature” and he might lose control of his walker. Then his keepers start complaining.

For TW…

TW,gentleman, sir, I don’t have the faintest idea about what “goes on” in men’s rooms. Since you don’t seem to know either, you must use the ladies room. Ah well, if you gotta go, you gotta go.

getalife,

How’s your mafia family? Are you still keeping that collection of Post Office pictures?

By Glenn

November 3, 2007 5:50 PM | Link to this

Craig @ 1:48,

I don’t think I’ve used the word “hate” or referred to people as Bush haters, so I don’t get the reason for your post. But then I’ve just returned to Cobb from Gainesville, so perhaps one of these cross-dressers was playing the role of messianic worldsaver in my name while I was gone.

In answer, I’ve never hated Clinton. Hard criminal to hate, don’t you agree?

By TW

November 3, 2007 5:52 PM | Link to this

Dusty – that’s weak. Try these. ‘No Child Left Behind (except for the black ones that drop out)? HA! That’s a good one. Or how about, ‘your doin a heck of a job, Brownie (them people in New Orleans needed a bath, anyway!) HA! That’s a good one, too. How about this one – ‘sorry we bombed you to kingdom come and killed all your family, but it turns out there weren’t no WMDs! Oops! HAHAHAHAHA! Now, that’s funny, Dusty! HAHAHAHAHA…my side is killing me…HAHAHAHAHAHA…

By Luckoduh

November 3, 2007 5:56 PM | Link to this

{{{{By getalife November 3, 2007 5:05 PM “With oil at record high prices, Iraq should be an extremely prosperous nation and in a position to start planning for its future with confidence.” Yes, so will Iran.}}}}

al-Gitmo: The only thing Iran is going to “get” is pockmarked with bomb craters.

I hope they come to their senses before that madman George Bush loses his cool.

He is nobody to be messing with.

Just ask al Qaeda, bwahahahaha.

By Glenn

November 3, 2007 5:58 PM | Link to this

jbm & Dusty @ 1:51,

Modify SCHIP? Modify? Ever heard the saying, “Never amend a bad bill”?

P.S. jbm, tomorrow will put in a word for Ens. S-C to some Scottish intercessors who undoubtedly have more pull than we in his house have.

By getalife

November 3, 2007 5:58 PM | Link to this

Well, there was a Texas mafia but there is only two left.

After Edwards said he would investigate big oil, he should not take ride in a convertible in Dallas.

By @@

November 3, 2007 5:58 PM | Link to this

Should judges allow themselves to be influenced by public outrage? It would appear not.

I saw this one coming from a mile away.

You’ve got to think like a criminal to know their intent. Convict Law 101 —keep your eyes and ears open. Keep the news on 24/7 and the doors of injustice will open sooner or later.

Thanks for bringing these things to our attention Jim otherwise some would be left to celebrate their victory without knowing the…

unintended consequences…

live and learn.

By getalife

November 3, 2007 6:05 PM | Link to this

Well duh, it will be great when he is gone to get cheaper gas prices.

Where the hell is obl?

Geez.

By jm

November 3, 2007 6:10 PM | Link to this

The funny thing, if Wilson had gotten the 15 year old pregnant (meaning intercourse) he would have been charged with a much lighter sentence (if at all). Moral of the story boys and girls, if you have the need for sex, good old fashioned intercourse is the way to go.

By Glenn

November 3, 2007 6:11 PM | Link to this

Gen. Paul Tibbets died yesterday morning at 92. He led the first American bombing run over the English Channel, often served as Ike’s personal pilot, was widely considered the best U.S. flier of WWII (getalife’s favorite war), commanded the aircraft that dropped the first atomic bomb, and served in the Air Force for decades. He had more fruit salad than your grandmother’s picnic. Because he knew that anti-war demonstrators would make good on threats to desecrate his grave, thereby causing distress to his family, he’d asked that he be cremated, his cremains scattered over the English Channel. Markers are maintained at Arlington National Cemetery, near the Tomb of the Unknowns, in honor of those who should have been, but were not, buried there. A U.S. Army honor guard keeps watch over the Tomb at all times, of course. Pending permission of his surviving family, Tibbets’s should be the next marker to be installed in that hallowed place.

By catlady

November 3, 2007 6:21 PM | Link to this

Can we even THINK of waterboarding in a drought? I mean, is that even legal with our water restrictions in place? I guess if we go to Texas, or some other state that has too much water…..

By Luckoduh

November 4, 2007 8:07 AM | Link to this

The bottom editorial of the day, this was a dog the first ten times Queen Pinko published it:

{{{{No matter the war, America mustn’t stoop to terror, torture- By failing to honor our own vaunted ideals, we’ve lost the respect of much of the world. Over the past six years, a litany of sordid policies and practices have sullied our image, blah, blah, blah- Urinal}}}}

Oh, please:

{{{{Meanwhile, English-speaking Germans in American uniforms during the Battle of the Bulge had slipped through U.S. lines, hoping to create chaos. Some were caught and at least 18 executed as spies.}}}}

The “Greatest Generation” wasn’t so great, huh?

~~~~~~

A week later, here’s the group think message that Team Klintoon finally formed, dutifully passed along by the Atlanta Urinal a.k.a. Shrillary Cheer Leading Squad, imagine the meetings that must have been held:

{{{{Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.) said Friday her status as the Democratic front-runner —- not her gender —- has led her male primary rivals to intensify their criticism of her. “I don’t think they’re piling on because I’m a woman. I think they’re piling on because I’m winning,” Clinton said in New Hampshire. “I anticipate it’s going to get even hotter, and if you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen. I’m very much at home in the kitchen.”-Urinal}}}}

Uh, still no word on driver’s licenses for illegals, yes or no?

This is going to be easy.

~~~~~~

{{{{Hillary’s vulnerability is especially interesting now that the Democrats running against her seem determined to take off their gloves and go after the front runner. The Marquis of Queensbury rules that have restrained them seem to have fallen by the wayside and a tag team of Obama, Edwards, and Dodd appears ready to deconstruct her bit by bit.}}}}

Like a couple of children pulling the wings off of a stupid fly.

This should be fun.

~~~~~~~

{{{{We walked into a nicely democratic cavil. One of the parties to this debate, New York state Sen. Bill Larkin, quotes the organization 9/11 Families for a Secure America: “The driver’s license is the basic identification document for nearly everyone in America. When the terrorists needed places to claim as a residence, they used their licenses as ‘ID’ for signing their leases. When they opened the bank accounts that they used to place the financing for the conspiracy, they used their licenses as ID. When they rented cars, rented motel rooms, when they paid tuition for their flying lessons, they used their licenses to ‘identify’ themselves.”}}}}

Why do the democrats have such zeal to destroy the well worn traditions and protections in place that have kept Americans safe for so long?

Do they hate us and only love their political party?

Giving a driver’s license to illegals is a vote getting scheme, pure and simple, doesn’t it bother you to place the safety of your family below the needs of the party?

Sick.

~~~~~~~

This is what democrats do when they are in charge:

{{{{In April, they added $2.4 billion in mandatory milk subsidies to a national security spending bill. Now, even if “moo juice” was critical to the nation’s security, there’s no reason to subsidize it. Anyone who’s been in a dairy aisle recently knows milk prices have jumped.}}}}

{{{{The average price of a gallon of whole milk was $3.83 last month, up 50 cents since January and 66 cents from a year ago. CNN explains that “Experts blame the price spike on milk shortages in Europe and Australia.” Well, if there’s a shortage, why are we paying farmers to make it? Their natural quest for profits should be all the encouragement they need to pump out as much milk as possible.}}}}

Just imagine the kickbacks they must be getting, from your tax dollars.

~~~~~~~

Closed minded bigotry coming from those that pat themselves on the back for “open mindedness:”

{{{{David Horowitz gets booed off the stage at Emory University}}}}

These “elite” liberals hate jews more than al Qaeda does.

~~~~~~

I shouldn’t do this but I can’t help it:

{{{{McCain touts military experience-Urinal}}}}

So if we ever fight a war where we plan on getting everybody shot out of the sky, taken prisoner and then beaten to a pulp for 7 years, we could make no better choice for prez than McCain.

Herein lies the dangers of putting too much weight on military “experience,” even after the libs ran a candidate that shot an fleeing unarmed villager in the back, compiled a litany of scratches and self inflicted cuts that somehow warranted purple hearts and used these to cut and run from the battlefield after 6 weeks or so, only to surface in the United States falsely accusing the troops of being barbarians.

Pray tell, y’all, which country do we want to make war on where these scenarios would be beneficial to us?

Actually, if you want to know the truth, this is a fall back position for those that don’t have a position.

What ever happened to running on ideas?

~~~~~~

{{{{When he and his family joined the flood of Iraqi refugees to Syria the streets were empty by early afternoon, when all shops were tightly shuttered. Now the stores stay open until 10 p.m. and the U.S. military working with the neighborhood council is handing out $2,000 grants to shop owners who had closed their business. The money goes to those who agree to reopen or first-time businessmen.}}}}

{{{{Al-Azawi said he’s trying to get one of the grants to open a poultry and egg shop that his brother would run.}}}}

{{{{“In Khadra, about 15 families have returned from Syria. I’ve called friends and family still there and told them it’s safe to come home,” he said.}}}}

Not “safe” for democrats, though, hehehehe.

~~~~~~

{{{{CAIRO, Egypt — Al Qaeda’s No. 2 Ayman al-Zawahri harshly criticized Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi in a new audio tape Saturday, accusing him of being an enemy of Islam and threatening a wave of attacks against the North African country because it improved relations with the United States.}}}}

Do I need to comment on 1) who the real haters and warmongers are, 2) the success of Condoleezza Rice’s State Department?

Can you not figure this out on your own?

By Craig

November 4, 2007 8:13 AM | Link to this

Glenn here’s what you said “the candidate you hate the winner”

‘Course it may or may not have been you.

But you will have to agree that one of the favorite themes of Wooten and his myrmidons here is that us libs all “hate” George Bush.

Makes it easy, I guess he thinks, to shut down the conversation.

By Glenn

November 4, 2007 8:41 AM | Link to this

Craig, good morning! You were right! I was wrong, both to have said it and then to have forgotten saying it. And I couldn’t agree with you more, and regret having been a part of it. Lots of things are hateful today, but our politicians are a crop of mostly and variously misguided patriots, like the bloggers here, and not hateful in the least.

It’s over. Let’s go.

By Carbon Footprint

November 4, 2007 8:46 AM | Link to this

Today, at 4pm, a showdown on the gridiron will take place. A shootout between top quarterbacks. Do not miss this.

By Carbon Footprint

November 4, 2007 8:52 AM | Link to this

Pats should win. I’ll be pleasantly surprised if The Pointer wins this game. It’s all up to the front linesmen.

By Craig

November 4, 2007 8:53 AM | Link to this

Haha - good one Glenn. Have a great Sunday.

By Glenn

November 4, 2007 9:03 AM | Link to this

Craig, incidentally I shook Mr. Clinton’s hand a couple of times (almost by accident), and it’s just as they say — he really is impossible not to like. Perhaps you’ve had the same experience. The first time I ran across him was in San Francisco in ‘98. He’d come out the side door of the St. Francis apres lunch contentedly working a toothpick, which he removed (temporarily) for the purpose of beaming and waving at the enthusiastic crowd — which consisted of yours truly and a confused French tourist I’d just shanghaied off the newsstand — all for the benefit of two lonely cameras from the local stations. I remember that the toothpick actually switched hands whilst he shook my right one with his. Large hands and handsome. Hands a man can be proud of, as indeed he quite obviously is. “What’re you doin’ slummin’ around here, Guvnor?” asks I, with an affectionate smile and a boyishly enthusiastic tone. “Good to SEE you again!” sez he. This would be the week that the Gennifer Flowers story broke. The week he was deeper in the doghouse than he’d ever hitherto been. The very day of the taping of Hillary’s and Bill’s fig-leaf interview with “60 Minutes”. Anybody in the skin-trade that is politics could see that he was the only heavyweight of the then Seven Dwarfs, but on that day he was the Seventh.

How can you not like a guy like that?

By Glenn

November 4, 2007 9:11 AM | Link to this

P.S. The toothpick finally went into the gutter as our candidate bowed into the limo. I remember this detail because I briefly considered retrieving this sliver of the true cross.

By Luckoduh

November 4, 2007 9:17 AM | Link to this

{{{{Republican strategists predict that the House Democrats’ tax plan will improve Republican chances of making gains in Congress and holding onto the presidency in 2008.}}}}

{{{{Republican officials said they have begun laying the groundwork to make the tax bill the target of a fierce campaign offensive. They say the plan, introduced by Rep. Charles B. Rangel, New York Democrat and chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, will raise tax rates on small businesses, self-employed Americans, investors and millions of two-earner married couples.}}}}

{{{{“It’s a tremendous opportunity for the Republicans. This is a gift from the gods. This is something Republicans could not have done for themselves,” said tax-cut crusader Grover Norquist, who hosted the meeting.}}}}

By Katie

November 4, 2007 9:44 AM | Link to this

Mr. Wooten wrote, Discipline, in this case, would have required the majority to respect expressed legislative intent.

If Jim Wooten and State Senator Eric Johnson had paid attention in their high school civics classes, then they’d understand that, under our system of checks and balances, courts are required to be loyal to the Constitution, not to Congress or state legislatures.

If our legislature passes a statute imposing a criminal penalty that is unconstitutional (i.e. cruel and unusual), then the court MUST find it as such. If that’s activism, then so be it.

By ray

November 4, 2007 10:12 AM | Link to this

how many innocent civilians will hillary have to kill to surpass bush in this category?

By getalife

November 4, 2007 10:15 AM | Link to this

Leave it to the gop to repeat the mistake and want to invade the wrong country again.

Pakistan is much bigger threat than Iran. Mushroom said the hell with that democracy crap. They have obl, al qaeda, training camps, money and nukes.

Of course the Saudis already attacked us on 9/11 but w will hold their hands and kiss their a-ss for their oil but wants war with Iran to drive up gas prices.

This GWOT stinks to high heaven.

By Carbon Footprint

November 4, 2007 10:15 AM | Link to this

Katie hits the long ball with that comment about checks and balances.

Besides, only the losing side of an appeal thinks the judge is actually an activist.

By Camus

November 4, 2007 10:17 AM | Link to this

Well, our friend and ally Pakistan seems to be embroiled in a sort of miltary coup. Despite Sec. Rice’s “stern warning” Musharraf had dismissed the Supreme Court and invalidated the current constitution to allow himself to retain power. The White House is not happy with this, but has painted itself into a corner and can really not do a damned thing about it.

Curious to hear what some of the more sober voices here might have to say about this. The US has been maneuvered into de facto support of a repressive military dictatorship, and the options to respond are apparently few. What should Bush do about this?

Musharraf’s move brings to mind the old joke: “With friends like these, who needs enemas?”

By Rick in Lawrenceville

November 4, 2007 10:24 AM | Link to this

Our elections are open to significant voter fraud. Boards of Elections across the country have not been checking the citizenship of voters. This is one of the essential requirements of voting in any local, state, or federal elections. Most Boards of Elections will readily admit that citizenship checks are not being done.

This opens up the possibility that voter fraud by non-citizens/illegal aliens could affect the outcomes of many political races across the country, especially with the number of close elections.

The following states currently grant or in the recent past have granted drivers licenses to illegal aliens:

(1) New Mexico (2) Maine (3) Hawaii (4) Michigan (5) Oregon (6) Utah, has issued a different type of license to illegal aliens after 2005 (7) Washington (8) Maryland (9) North Carolina until August, 2006 (10) Tennessee until May, 2007

Elections in these states are certainly open to fraud by illegal aliens since they possess government issued photo identification needed to cast a ballot at a polling center.

Elections in other states are at risk due to the reciprocity agreements between states to exchange drivers licenses between these states and those that do not “originally” grant these licenses to illegal aliens. These new drivers licenses are granted without citizenship checks.

Voters are signing affidavits affirming their US citizenship under penalty of perjury. However, significant numbers of illegal aliens have procured and presented false documents for employment purposes and to obtain other benefits given only to US citizens. This evidence suggests that the mere penalty of perjury will not deter non-citizens from falsely affirming their US citizenship for voting purposes. They have a large stake in the outcomes of local, state, and federal elections.

I ask what will be done to prevent voter fraud from non-citizens affecting the outcomes of our election processes?

By getalife

November 4, 2007 10:29 AM | Link to this

Mushroomcloud decided to not give up power. He disbanded their Supreme Court, shut down all communications, declared martial law and surrounded himself with troops. Like Burma, if you will.

Our State Dept. springs into action spewing they are disappointed like with Burma.

But the pos duncan hunter has a solution for the need of diplomats in Iraq:

Duncan Hunter (R-WTF?) says:

….”I said, ‘Let’s go over to Bethesda and Walter Reed (hospitals) and as we get these new – these soldiers and Marines who are embarking on new careers,” Hunter said, “let’s recruit them for the State Department; and let’s fire these guys that refuse to go, and we’ll give the State Department careers to these military guys.”

…..Hunter replied, “Exactly. And this would be great service for them. In Baghdad, in the State Department, the embassy, they know the lay of the land. They know the people, and they are professionals, and they are patriotic.”

OMG, this idiot want to send our wounded warriors back to Iraq as diplomats.

My goodness, talk about hating the troops. I think we should send the gop and all chickenhawk pos instead.

GEEZ!

By tony

November 4, 2007 10:35 AM | Link to this

activist judges its too funny.when the right doesnt get their way they are activist.when they install a president they are following the law. why do you people take this guy seriously, he isnt conservative. he is a hate monger disguised as a conservative like all the other pundits.rush hated the aclu but they were his best friend when he had his little drug problem.

By Redneck Convert

November 4, 2007 11:16 AM | Link to this

I swear, Sister Dusty is meaner than a half-blind rattlesnake shedding its skin and striking out at anything that moves. Calling me a flaming librul and such. If I live to be a hunderd, I’ll never figure women out. One minute you are going out with the skinniest, sweetest girl in the world and the next you are living with a Whopper with a frying pan or other weapon in her hand and yelling like a Saturday night drunk and screaming I WILL BE OBEYED! Anyway, I bet those boys Sister Dusty raised was beat to within a half inch of their life when they crossed her.

I guess the people on this blog decided on several things yesterday. The first is its judicial activism if a judge don’t support a law a godly Republican legisalature passes and its the Rule of Law if the judge says every law is A-OK. Unless its a law passed by Democrats and libruls.

I reckon people pretty well decided it ain’t torture if we don’t say it is. So its OK to pour water down somebodys nose and hook them up to electric wires on the Private Parts. Anyway, the constitution don’t apply to people that ain’t American citizens and that Geneva Convention, well, its just ridickulous. Anyway, if you are a godly American that votes Republican you got nothing to worry about. But if one day you feel a powerful shock down there and it ain’t caused by looking at a nekkid woman, well, I guess that’s God’s way of telling you you are a Trader or a towel head that needs to get your life straightened out and start Thinking Right.

Anyway, if furriners don’t like what we do, well, I guess we can ask how many A-bombs they have and come to realize it ain’t as many as we have.

I wish people here would leave Pakistan alone. The president there done exackly what My President had to do. If the constitution don’t support what you have to do to save your country from libruls and Terrists, well, you have to work around it. That’s just the way the world is.

Have a good day everybody.

By Captain Freedom

November 4, 2007 11:34 AM | Link to this

THE Captain has had His differences with the hygenically challenged Mr Redneck in the past, but the toothless hick’s cogent analysis of the Pakistan situation garners a rare and well-deserved Captain Freedom Kudo.

Slicing like Ockham’s Razor into the heart of the matter, our Hillbilly Hegel keenly apprehends the fact that Pervezert Musharraf has learned well the lessons of The Master, Our Leader Bush. When faced with a threat to his own power, which is inherently equivalent to the well-being of the entire nation, Pervezert saw clearly the need to discard such quaint institutions as an independent judiciary. And despite the public remonstrances of Condalezzy Rice, we can rest assured that Our Leader and His Dick in Charge are similing quietly to themselves as they see the handiwork of their protege in Pakistan. Emulation being the highest form of flattery and all that.

So, a Captain Kudo to you, Mr Redneck. For a slack-jawed yokel with a family tree that resembles a flat line, you are occasionally alright. Perhaps you can turn your enhanced powers of rational thinking to your persistent and unfortunate lack of personal cleanliness and that unwashed John Deere cap you wear everywhere, even to holy places like church and the Republican State Convention. I realize it is the uniform de riguer for most of my country cousins in True Belief, but would it kill you to try to behave as though a little civilization has touched your sad little world?

By Captain Freedom

November 4, 2007 11:58 AM | Link to this

The first thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers.

THE Captain feels emergent wood again, this time upon the following news from the Communist News Network:

Pakistan police on Sunday began a roundup of 1,500 lawyers, judges and political activists on a list of people to be arrested one day after Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf declared a state of emergency, police sources and witnesses said.

Who knew that Pervezert was such a Shakespeare aficianado? Our Leader is probably chafing to implement this forward step towards enhanced freedom and security. Our Leader just wishes He had thought of it first. Alas, Our Leader’s reading tastes tend not toward the Bard, but rather into the ouvre of Engelmann and Bruner, so He missed this helpful hint.

If THE Captain were jbmlaw (which he is not, so you id jacker sleuths just settle down), He would sleep with one eye open from now on. Nuff said.

By jbmlaw

November 4, 2007 12:07 PM | Link to this

Dear Captain @ 11:58, you call to mind the old joke, “what do you call 10,000 lawyers with feet in concrete at the bottom of the ocean?”

By Luckoduh

November 4, 2007 12:30 PM | Link to this

{{{{By getalife November 4, 2007 10:29 AM But the pos duncan hunter has a solution for the need of diplomats in Iraq:}}}}

I like this, just so the 6% Cry Baby Crowd can have something to whine about, they want to create a “Diplomatic Corps” where the “diplomats” never leave the country.

Unique, isn’t it?

By Luckoduh

November 4, 2007 12:41 PM | Link to this

Instead of using the Diplomatic Corps to show the face of America to the world and in particular, the people of Iraq, the democrats want to use them to show the world our as-sholes and elbows, go figure.

Is this the standard knee jerk response from Code Pinko, to cower in fear and if that doesn’t work, then cut and run?

Such bravery, what courage.

And these gutless wonders want to be in charge, hahaha, yeah, right.

By getalife

November 4, 2007 1:04 PM | Link to this

duh,

You like to run your ignorant mouth. Now is the time to man up coward and volunteer to be a diplomat.

By getalife

November 4, 2007 1:14 PM | Link to this

ambulance chaser,

A good start.

Good thing you are not in Pakistan huh?

You can be a diplomat like duh too.

By Tara

November 4, 2007 1:19 PM | Link to this

State Senator Johnson was right when he said, “This has never been about Genarlow Wilson…It has been about adherence to the rule of law.” And the U.S. Constitution is the highest form of law in our legal system.

To be specific, the Supremecy Clause in Article VI of the U.S. Constitution says, “This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.”

State judges are obligated to uphold our Constitution, even when state laws conflict with it. Therefore, the Georgia Supreme Court did the right thing by overturning a Georgia law mandating punishment that was both cruel and unusual.

I thank Genarlow Wilson for fighting for his Constitutional rights and winning for all of us.

By Captain Freedom

November 4, 2007 1:26 PM | Link to this

THE Captain wishes to convey Pervezert Musharraf’s kudos to Mr Wooten for his position in the column atop this page. To wit:

“Judicial activism,” Musharraf said, had demoralized the security forces, hurt the fight against terrorism and slowed the spread of democracy. “Obstacles are being created in the way of democratic process,” he said, “I think for vested, personal interests, against the interest of the country.”

Indeed, as Mr Wooten pointed out, beware the unintended consequences of judicial “activism”. Our friend Musharraf was forced to declare martial law and dismantle the legal system because the legal system had become overly active.

Martial law. Invalidating the Constitution. Jailing the judges and lawyers. Silencing the press. Yes, Our Friend Musharraf has given us plenty to contemplate.

Some say “it can’t happen here”. THE Captain, along with Mr Wooten and others of True Belief, say this:

“It has already begun.”

Before, we dared not wish for such bold and overt action to secure Our Precious Freedoms. But perhaps the Golden Age of Freedom is nigh upon us.

Go wet your pants on that, you Bill of Rights hugging Islamunistoliberal pansies.

By Clint

November 4, 2007 1:39 PM | Link to this

Judicial review, the power to invalidate unconstitutional laws, was essential to the scheme of republican government established by our Constitution. The courts, declared James Madison, would provide “an impenetrable bulwark against every assumption of power in the executive and legislative” branches, and “will naturally be led to resist every encroachment of rights expressly stipulated for in the constitution by the declaration of rights.”

Advocates of judicial deference contend that courts are ill-equipped to second-guess legislative determinations. If legislators carefully pondered the merits and constitutionality of legislation, that argument might have merit. But our legislators rarely even read the complex bills they pass, which all too often are manipulated by outside interests. Judges, by contrast, carefully sift through competing evidence presented by both sides. And they should. Courts that merely rubber-stamp legislation or executive branch decisions out of bland, or blind, “deference” evade their essential constitutional role.

While judicial activism is the subject of spirited attack, the real problem is the opposite—judicial abdication of its core constitutional duty to protect individual rights. Among our governmental institutions, courts alone are designed to protect the individual against the tyranny of the majority — and against special interest groups with outsized influence.

As government expands, our freedom depends on the willingness of courts to rein in its excesses. For better or worse, the courts are the last line of defense against government running roughshod over individual liberty. When judges swear fidelity to the Constitution, they must be mindful of the danger of exceeding the proper confines of judicial power, but as well the even greater danger of abdicating it.

By Dusty

November 4, 2007 1:54 PM | Link to this

Well, let’s see.

Sweet thing that I am, I shall try to ignore THAT FLAMING LIBERAL REDNECK CONVERT. I will give him the Bad Citizens Award for mixing up politics, legislation, judges and such and then throwing in torture. I admit he’s seen plenty of judges in his time, what with the DUIs, riotous behavior and Saturday night fights. So now he’s an expert. Figures.

Come to think of it, was that not our FLAMING LIBERAL REDNECK CONVERT I saw on “Cops”? Yep, he was wrestling a 400lb. lady at the Democratic Headquarters Meeting and the cops carted him off. Sad case,’specially since it was Mrs. RedNeck. Sniff…

By Redneck Convert

November 4, 2007 1:58 PM | Link to this

Well, I thank this Captain Freedom for his kind words but I’ll have him know I take a bath oncet a month, weather I need it or not. It ain’t pleasant but I do it anyway just to be respeckable. And I keep my John Deere cap clean for special events. Other times, I wear my Caterpillar cap. Which I’ve wore for five years with nary a wash.

I’m all for locking up the lawyers. They clog up our courts and Congress and every place else and try to make big lies look like the soul of Truth. Take these lawyers that are defending this guy that kilt the judge and a bunch of other people. We all know he done it because we seen it on TV, but these lawyers are paid to make it look like he’s just a poor misunderstood kid that got framed. We need to hook them all up with electric wires to the Private Parts and run water over them while we turn on the juice. Even if we do have a water shortage. That goes for jbmlaw too.

The libruls will keep going courts-this and courts-that, but the only thing good to come out of a court is the Death Penalty.

And while I’m at it let me say I wish this Duh guy would go back on his truck route for the week. I’m tired of reading the books he posts and expecting me to make sense of it all. If he can’t keep it short we need to hook him up to some wires too. We could turn the juice on every time he thinks about writing a 2nd paragraph.

I guess the godly conservatives on this blog is still in church praying for poor people to go away so they can focus on the real important things. The preaching is probly running long. I can just see Wooten and Sister Dusty and jbmlaw and Van and all looking like they are paying attention and thinking about how hungry they are. Maybe hooking some wires to the preachers wouldn’t be such a bad idea neither.

By Dusty

November 4, 2007 2:20 PM | Link to this

Captain Freedom @1:26

I see that the good Captain of the Boy Scouts has come in from leading the troop but is still trying to tie knots. Indeed..let’s see..put Musharraff here and twist Bush in there and Voila! you have the square root of liberal propaganda, the Gordian knot of Democratic politics.

The knotty ol’ capitan even weaves in a bit of Wooten to show more appreciation of perfidia. Besides that, our troop leader can rub two sticks together and blame the whole flaming kerboodle on ….who else ????…Bush…did…it…!!!

Let us not forget that truism attributed to Native Americans which perfectly describes the Captain: “He speaks with a forked tongue.”

By Captain Freedom

November 4, 2007 2:28 PM | Link to this

Dusty,

After reading your latest post (if by post one means “simpleton inanity scrawled on the padded cell wall with fingers dipped on ones ow feces”) THE Captain says it must be nice to have a second language. Congratulations on your “bi-” lifestyle.

However, this blog is an English-only affaire des lettres. Perhaps you could try again. In English this time.

By Luckoduh

November 4, 2007 2:55 PM | Link to this

Kaptain Koward rides the, uh, rescue:

{{{{From the moment we realized wildfires would ravage Southern California, everyone from government officials to local newscasters instantly recalled a catastrophe that seared all our imaginations. Suddenly, a complex mission boiled down to a simple mantra: We must not repeat the mistakes of Hurricane Katrina.-John “Band Aid” Kerry}}}}

What’s this we crap, you got a mouse in your pocket?

New Orleans was a national disgrace, nothing more, nothing less, and San Diego wasn’t.

And the disgrace had nothing to do with government, it was a disgrace when healthy young men and women chose to loot instead of helping others, it was disgusting to see healthy young men pushing children and the elderly out of the way so that they could rescue themselves first, it was despicable to see healthy young men and women piled up at the Superdome doing nothing for themselves but whining.

And before you kowards come on about the government not being there, answer me this: Why the hell didn’t you evacuate when the government told you to?

Disgraceful, that’s why.

By @@

November 4, 2007 3:01 PM | Link to this

It’s gonna be interesting to watch how things unfold in Pakistan. For months Musharraf has been placing strategic leaders inside his military just in case he had to shed his uniform and lead Pakistan as a civilian.

So who’s on first to take Mush’s place?

The rise of Pakistan’s ‘quiet man’

Not a bad choice. Notice the prior relationship with Benazir Bhutto.

He’s fairly well-known in military circles here. As you probably know he was trained at Fort Leavenworth, in Kansas, at a time when there was close ties between the U.S. and Pakistani militaries. That generation of officers was trained in the United States before 1990, because after that we didn’t have a training program with Pakistan for nearly a decade, due to Pakistan’s development of nuclear weapons.

The feeling is here that he doesn’t bear any ill will towards the United States, and indeed may be the kind of general we would like to see in place. He’s apparently well liked within the military itself, which is important, although that might all go badly for Musharraf, if sometime in the future Kayani decides to act independently.

Word has it that Bhutto knew of Musharraf’s intentions before he declared Emergency Law and that she was out of the country intentionally knowing he would.

Could all of this have been an orchestrated effort on the part of Musharraf?

It remains to be seen but only on a need to know basis.

By Dusty

November 4, 2007 3:02 PM | Link to this

Captain Freedom @2:28

Your ploy of pleading ignorance is of little value. We know you are not ignorant, only dumb in the lack of honesty. It escapes you.

Nevermind the tripe about a second language. Your affaire des lettres is farcical French (your 2nd language) which you spout to impress us.

Back to your troop, dear Captain Freedom of the Boy Scouts. You belong with the mindset of childish incompetence, right down to the use of funny lil’ “bathroom words”. At least, children learn what is better as they mature, something you have never done.

By Carbon Footprint

November 4, 2007 3:24 PM | Link to this

Officer Tibbets, who dropped the big one on Hiroshima died this week. His family requested that people sending condolences, in lieu of flowers, should do mushrooms.

This brings up the old argument, “did we have to nuke the nips?”

Yes, because we nuked them once and they didn’t surrender. A demonstration bombing off of Tokyo harbor would have made a nice fireworks show, but they would not have surrendered. If they dont surrender when you drop one on their heads, then they dont surrender when you politely miss.

Thus, we HAD to nuke the nips. Elementary logic, dear watson.

By getalife

November 4, 2007 3:30 PM | Link to this

Please do not engage the Captain wingnuts, it is painful to read him crushing you.

Way over your ignorant heads.

Anyhoo, like Iran and Iraq cheney’s Pakistan intrusion into their government has backfired again. He has managed to increase the gas tax (outrageous gas prices, if you will) which was the goal in his energy meeting.

Today no other country on earth is arguably more dangerous than Pakistan. It has everything Osama bin Laden could ask for: political instability, a trusted network of radical Islamists, an abundance of angry young anti-Western recruits, secluded training areas, access to state-of-the-art electronic technology, regular air service to the West and security services that don’t always do what they’re supposed to do. (Unlike in Iraq or Afghanistan, there also aren’t thousands of American troops hunting down would-be terrorists.) Then there’s the country’s large and growing nuclear program. “If you were to look around the world for where Al Qaeda is going to find its bomb, it’s right in their backyard,” says Bruce Riedel, the former senior director for South Asia on the National Security Council.

The next attack here will come from there and lets hope mushroomcloud is guarding the nukes.

If cheney cared about his country, he would resign in disgrace.

Geez.

By getalife

November 4, 2007 4:03 PM | Link to this

On ABC this morning, Edwards said our government is corrupt.

Yes, it is broken and corrupt. It is hard for w to pimp a broken system of government.

Ron Paul is also correct on the failed foreign policy. So we have two politicians speaking the truth. The problem is they will not win the nominations.

Within this broken government, the ones with the cash and the media will win.

rudy has faux noise, the Clintons do not have the media but are the best choice for change with a broken government.

Whoever gets the job, good luck on fixing a broken government.

Geez, what a freakin mess.

By Glenn

November 4, 2007 4:11 PM | Link to this

Thank you for your accurate and elegantly clear summary of the great balancing act of judicial review. Your second paragraph gives me the willies a bit, even if it is unmentionably true that judges do more homework than legislators do, and sometimes do the legislators’ homework for them.

Citing this sad status quo as justification for adjudicatory liberality, however, is willisome for at least two reasons. First, the judge’s homework (or that of her clerks), though it should be balanced, can just as easily be thoroughly, exhaustively, punctiliously tendentious and as ideologically straightjacketed as is the AJC or the DNC or RNC.

Second, the sheer post-Holmesian pragmatics of your argument invites the misapplication of the argument as a multipurpose fig leaf with which to cover a multitude of judicial sins. Is our failing grade for legislative diligence impressionistic or positivistic? If the latter, by which quantifiable measures of shoddiness do we disqualify executive authority in favor of the bench?

Isn’t this goosing equally good for the gander? Shall we conduct time-motion studies of clerical attentions to each side of every argument? Should we apply modern methods of content analysis to judicial writ, to ascertain a bias quotient? The same is done to this newspaper, so why not to the courts as well? And let’s make the courts accountable for their BQ outcomes, with benchmarks for performance attached to fiscal carrots and sticks. Surely court fees don’t cover all the operating expenses, so there’s our lever of a full-throated push for long-past-due judicial excellence!

I’m pretty sure that Jim Wooten would endorse this program. He might even chip in a few slogans, just to get things rolling.

By itismeagain

November 4, 2007 4:45 PM | Link to this

How does one define “consensual oral sex” when the girl had been drinking and partaking of drugs. How would she have a clue what she was doing!!! You know the unspoken rule amongst the minorities … “don’t snitch!” Her mama ought to take her out behind the shed and give her an old fasion whup’ng.

By Glenn

November 4, 2007 4:48 PM | Link to this

Carbonizer,

Yep, all kinds of indicators that they were capable of withstanding unprecedented degrees of damage while remaining obstinate. Besides, the conventional alternatives were prospectively ghastly, for them as well as the Allies. And then there’s the Russian thing. That’s the one Bart Bernstein, who scotched & then botched the Enola Gay Show! at the Smithsonian, never will acknowledge: the indispensable opportunity to scare the hell out of the rapacious Soviets. “And in the nick of time, too.”

P.S. That last touch is a tastelessly decontextualized wrenching of Thoreau. Couldn’t resist. Wimp had it coming.

By Carbon Footprint

November 4, 2007 4:52 PM | Link to this

What a game, folks! Colts!

By Captain Freedom

November 4, 2007 5:08 PM | Link to this

THE Captain, who comes to praise the wingnuts, not to bury them, is encouraged at the steady rise to power of Gen Ashfaq Pervez Kiani over the Pakistani military. While a bit chagrined at the pervese Paki predeliction pace the popular name Pervez, THE Captain is happy to know that one who has been steeped in American culture will hold the military reins of power. (THE Captain thought they were all called Apu, but is willing to admit when He is mistaken.)

This has always worked so well for us. Recall fondly the US training and materiel supply of Ho Chi Minh and his merryband of anti-Jap raiders. Hearken back to our good friends the Taliban. Recall many of our stalwart comrades in democracy who hve been supported and trained by the US and inculcated our deepest values — men like Noriega; the Nicaraguan Contras; the right wing patriots of Guatemala, Chile, and Argentina; our staunch ally against the Iranian hordes and the terroristic Kurds in the 80s, Sodom Hussein; the fine, upstanding Christians of Saudi Arabia; and of course, our latest BFF, Pervezert Musharraf, defender of democracy and jailer of lawyers. (THE Captain loves that last part.)

Yes, THE Captain is certain that this man is “one of ours” and can be relied upon without question. No need to halt the flow of aid to the good fellows. (Ten bil since 9/11.)

THis whole kerfuffle over a military-backed coup in Pakistan is really just more liberal whining. As the incredibly dense Luckoduh notes, just an opportunity for 6% Dead Ender whining.

Nothing to see here. Move along. The show’s over. Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.

Hey look over there, a picture of Paris Hilton’s unshaved vajayjay.

By Captain Freedom

November 4, 2007 5:12 PM | Link to this

A lawyer fell off of a cruise liner into water infested by sharks in a feeding frenzy. Miraculously, he swam ashore at a leisurely pace and arrived without a scratch.

Asked how he escaped certain death, the lawyer replied, “Professional courtesy.”

Thanks, THE Captain will be here all week. Feel the fear, Dusty and the rest of you simpleminded Islamoliberesbian America haters.

By Luckoduh

November 4, 2007 5:22 PM | Link to this

{{{{By Captain Freedom November 4, 2007 5:08 PM THis whole kerfuffle over a military-backed coup in Pakistan is really just more liberal whining. As the incredibly dense Luckoduh notes, just an opportunity for 6% Dead Ender whining.}}}}

O.K. so when did I say anything about Pakistan?

Are you trying to elicit a response, Captain Freakdumn?

Very well, it’s just further proof of why the Code Pinko way of doing things never works, instead of stomping Al Qaeda’s guts out, Mush appeased them and is hence paying the price for it, as we did on 9/11.

Step aside and let Bush and Cheney show you what needs to be done.

And I wouldn’t call the hysterics that I’ve witnessed over this “coup” “whining,” no you libs have turned up the heat and gone to full blown shrieking and wailing.

As usual.

By Clint

November 4, 2007 5:28 PM | Link to this

Glenn @4:11,

Excellent point! I humbly rescind the second paragraph of my 1:39 post.

Still, state and federal courts must not abdicate their obligation to serve as a check on legislative and executive branches by considering and ruling on the constitutionality of legislation.

By Glenn

November 4, 2007 5:29 PM | Link to this

Capt., what do you think of Churchill’s jest & jibe jive when he explained that he’d shake the hand of the Devil himself if it would help defeat Hitler? Was it not a good idea for Churchill and FDR to send avuncular Old Joe all that war materiel and all those provisions, at a time when Britain and the U.S. were strapped for funds with which to pay for social welfare?

By Captain Freedom

November 4, 2007 5:34 PM | Link to this

The spectacularly sui generis Luckoduh is of course correct that Musharraf’s actions this weekend are a direct result of neglecting to handle the al Quaeda threat as he so emptily promised when he accepted $10 billion dollars in military aid with which to do the job. And we thought Muslims did not like pork!!!

This liberal namby-pambyism by the Pantywaisted Pakistani Potentate led directly to the al Quaeda takeover of the Supreme Court that threatened to strip Our Friend of his God-given Power. Add to that the Hezbollah infiltration of the Pakistani Bar Association, and you have the kind of hell on earth that could only be created by a liberal and can only be corrected by a Godly, Right Thinking True Believer. Like Lick-o-doo.

By Carbon Footprint

November 4, 2007 5:47 PM | Link to this

TOUCHDOWN COLTS!!!! What a game. I LOVE THE COLTS!!!!

He got the touch. He got the touch. In for six. oh yeah!

By getalife

November 4, 2007 5:56 PM | Link to this

duh,

Your hero w cut and ran from obl to occupy Iraq and steal billions.

Would you call that appeasing obl?

By Glenn

November 4, 2007 6:03 PM | Link to this

O Lawd yes, Craig. And this is a fitting place to make your point. Seems to me that each branch — and in the Legislative, each house — is ludicrous in its own way, ripe for a cartoon caricature by Daumier or Hill, or Esquire or Punch. On the other hand, were I somehow to come before all the granite walls and marble columns and velvet drapes and the Olympian bench being glared at by the likes of J.P. Stevens in robes, I expect I’d wake up to the smell of strong ammonia.

By Glenn

November 4, 2007 6:18 PM | Link to this

Redneck,

I fer one do take seriously the allegations of American-made torture, and agree that if the allegations are not exaggerated in several ways, then the whole thing’s a disgrace unbecoming a great nation. That’s why I answered Dennis’ out-of-the-blue question head-on, as honestly as possible. It’s difficult for a civilian — one who’s never served in uniform or seen up close the psychologically torturous things that all combatants and embattled civilians must see — to second-guess frontline officers, especially intelligence officers who work in the dark. It seems to me preposterously callow and presumptuous for me to opine at all, which is why I had no ready answer when Dennis asked.

“Water down [the] nose”? Yes. It simply doesn’t disturb me that waterboarding evidently has been used under exigent circumstances and adult supervision. And no, I can’t see equating it to genital electrocution or mutilation or pliers and a blowtorch or whatever lurid image you may wish to conjure to achieve the effect of satire-by-exaggeration.

By “adult supervision” I of course mean administered by officers, those entrusted with a sworn office. Evidently our brass find it beneath military dignity and (high) standards of functionality to continue to authorize waterboarding, so that its use (by all but the spooks) was suspended. Which is not to suggest that they ever were avid for its use, as our enemies have been when our people fall into their hands.

Where’s Pelosi’s anti-waterboarding legislation? Can’t she ask counsel to rush the drafting, and plead with the Speaker to place it on the Floor calendar, maybe right up there near the top? Doesn’t she have the juice?

By Dusty

November 4, 2007 6:19 PM | Link to this

Ah the dear Captain,

The Captain zeros in on President Bush (as always) as the failure of the century because Pakistan is not as we want it.

But, of course, let us talk about BUSH and Musharraf and the money and the loses and the foolishness!!! Forget the cooperation we got in fighting in Afghanistan and the help.

We got help from them but we were not there to reform a country with a constitutional government. Pakistan was running its own government and we were not “reforming” them or colonizing them.

And now, we are not abetting the downward turn of events there. At present, we try to let them work it out with strong disapproval.

The Captain has used every word he can think of to incriminate the USA. We “educated” Musharraf. We “used” Pakistan. They took our money. And the Captain will insinuate that the USA under President Bush is responsible for all irresponsible actions in Pakistan.

I strongly disagree with such opinions as this. Why do some WANT to blame everything bad on the USA? Why talk diplomacy instead of war and then hate diplomatic action? I would hope that all this is not for political action but the instant accusations make me suspicious. I wish such political endeavors were not so obvious.

By Luckoduh

November 4, 2007 6:21 PM | Link to this

Oh good, the same liberals that lathered Arafat up with bundles of cash and let him lay in the Lincoln Bedroom, now are suggesting that we should have made war on Pakistan or maybe just ignored them?

I know, we could have given Mush the Nobel “peace” prize, after all, he’s a Jew hater too.

Now let’s see, the last several countries that Al Qaeda has nutted up on wound up routing them in short order, Ethiopia drove them from Somalia into the sea and the Sunnis in Iraq have eliminated that as-s in it’s entirety.

I pretty sure, strike that, I’m positive that Mush is fixing to crack the whip.

We could be seeing Has Bin’s corpse before long.

By Glenn

November 4, 2007 6:35 PM | Link to this

Why continue to light into Bush, who’s termed? If you’re looking fer perpetrators of some heavy damage to this country, try targeting educators. The public school ones, all of them. Immeasurably more damage, for many more years running, than even the most jaundiced analyst could conceive of W’s having done heretofore.

By John

November 5, 2007 9:33 AM | Link to this

Jim, I’m afraid that you are once again guilty of telling only part of the story. The case in Macon was a domestic case. The boyfriend battered his girlfriend and then left the home, taking her and her two kids with him. They went about three miles. He needed directions to get to the interstate. Once at the interstate, he dropped them off at a convenience store. He was convicted of assault and three counts of kidnapping. The judge wanted to see him do time, but the “kidnapping” of the kids carried a mandatory sentence of 25 years EACH. The judge felt that 50+ years for this crime was too much. Most people will agree.

By GaLiberal

November 5, 2007 11:18 AM | Link to this

Moron Jim said: On both the Georgia and the U.S. Supreme Court, the need is the same — to make certain that those chosen are not tempted to write opinions that do “violence to the fundamental constitutional principle of separation of powers,”

What Moron Jim didn’t tell you is that the legislatures are violating “the fundamental constitutional principle of separation of powers” by mandating judges impose draconian sentences without regard to mitigating or unique conditions. Judges are the ones that are supposed to impose the penalty not the legislatures. Judges are to balance the individual’s rights to freedom against society’s greater good. That’s called justice. What we have now with the legislatures imposing sentences as well is nothing short of state-provided revenge. In their rush to get re-elected, they passed a greatly flawed law that has caught many others than Wilson. When they revised the law, they failed to make it retroactive. Maybe they didn’t think about it because, hey he’s just another angry black male who’s better off locked up and kept away from decent white folks (which is most likely since they’re Rethuglicons). Whatever the reason, even the author of this backward draconian law said prosecutors were not to use it punish consentual sex. The Georgia Supreme Court did the right thing and used the tools available to them. I’m guessing the three dissenting judges couldn’t see that because their hoods were on backward.

It’s just too bad the Georgia Supreme court could not see the same disparate treatement of an 18-year old male serving 10 years for consentual sex with his 16-year girlfriend. It meets the same two-year differenc standard and it was consentual. The only difference here is that Wilson was a minor (17) just a few months shy of being an adult (18). What difference should a few months make in determining someone’s fate? Apparently, at least to the Georgia Supreme Court, it’s the difference between 10 years hard time and the sentence being “cruel and unusual punishment”.

When you vote Rethuglicon, you vote against your own best interests. And the three dissenting judges are living proof.

By Georgia legislators are criminals

November 5, 2007 2:08 PM | Link to this

The courts and especially the Supreme Court are just about the only thing left that is protecting the citizens of Georgia from the criminal legislature. Thankfully we have this slight control to keep those idiots from doing anything and everything they like. They still try to do it, but then they just have to be told later that they acted illegally.

The legislature has proven beyond any doubt that they will constantly legislate from an emotional, anti-factual basis. They will eagerly cater to the dumbmasses. One has to look no further than this state’s idiotic, counter-productive “sex offender” laws to see that. Georgia is near the bottom in so many categories (most notably education, of course) and our “sex offender” laws put us dead last again. It’s a sad joke that’s not funny.

Georgia needs to start cleaning house by getting rid of Senator Eric Johnson. He is a danger to the state. Unfortunately, even though Johnson intentionally possessed and used child pornography, no one will charge him with that crime. However, law enforcement is egregiously neglecting their duty by not at least executing search warrants on Johnson’s home and offices to ensure that he did not make copies of the child pornography of which he could still be in possession and even distributing. Apparently we aren’t really all that worried about protecting all children from some people.

By Jackie

November 5, 2007 2:41 PM | Link to this

It is strange that the so-called conservatives are ranting about judgesrendering decisions from the bench. Civics taught that our government was a three-legged stool; executive, legislative and judicial with each having equal amounts of power. If the legislature passes a law, or, the executive takes an action, the courts have a constitutional duty to interept the law to determine if it meets the constitutional test. How is this judicial activism? Proverbially, the conservatives want to have it their way, always. The problem with this approach is tha they can not determine what “their way” happens to be!!!! Mr. Wooten has fallen in love with Clarence Thomas, who has barely uttered a word since becoming a member of the court and who votes with Scillia after speaking with Scilla’s law clerk in 95% of the cases.

By Wayne

November 5, 2007 2:42 PM | Link to this

While I understand that you don’t like “activist” judges, how can you argue with the outcome of the Wilson case? If you are afraid it sets a precedent, don’t be, judges can rule on every case based upon its particular facts; that is a good thing. If you think that the Macon judge was wrong for releasing a kidnapper, first learn the specific facts of that case, then, if you still think it unjust, blame that judge, not the Supreme Court. The Wilson ruling is, in fact, limited to consensual sex between minors, despite your gloomy prediction, it does not affect every crime that has had the punishemnt reduced or to all child molesters. You are generalizing the ruling to place fear in the minds of Georgians and to cause them to improperly think that the Supreme Court is sofy on crime. The Georgia Supreme Court is contientous and just and looks at each case on its own merits, you are the one that takes dangerous broad strokes, Mr. Wooten.

Also, I agree that Eric Johnson is a danger to the State.

By Senator Eric Johnson isn't you

November 6, 2007 9:15 AM | Link to this

He’s better and more privileged. Or at least he thinks so. How else can it be explained that he thinks it is okay and necessary that he obtain and use child pornography when obviously the average citizen would be thrown in jail for around 20 years for doing the same thing?

Here’s the deal. Johnson knew that Genarlow Wilson was in jail for having consensual sex with his fellow classmate because he was 17 and she was 15. Johnson knew that Wilson was in jail only because the girl was a “child”. Johnson knew Wilson’s crime was called “Aggravated Child Molestation”. Despite all that, somehow Johnson “thought” it was appropriate to get a copy of the child pornography videotape of the sexual encounter between the classmates and watch it. Perhaps he even made copies of it and is watching it right now.

How in the hell did he decide that doing that was okay?!! I can only think of 3 justifications of why he might have done this and none of them are acceptable. But I do think they characterize what Johnson is about and they illustrate why voters should work like hell to get rid of him. Here are the 3 justifications that I think are possible and in the order of their likelihood:

1) Johnson believes he is above the law and is allowed to do many, many things that “normal” people are not allowed.

2) Johnson is not so bright.

3) Johnson just HAD to see the video. He thought about it and he HAD to have it. Johnson is one of Georgia’s legislators who rails against “sex offenders” often and time and time again he resorts to idiotic legislation to “crack down” on “them”. In the past, people like him have often been found out to have a perversion for children. There are quite a number of people like him.

We don’t need “leaders” who “think” like Johnson. That includes most of the Republican “leadership” in the legislature.