Mark A. Kilmer (the weblog)

My wife and I again stayed home on New Years Eve. I’m three things which Teddy Kennedy has never been simultaneously: happy, sober, and home with my wife.

And we wish you all the happiest of New Years.

Stefan Stefarsky of Sound Politics out of Seattle tells us

The voter file, which I obtained earlier today, contains the names of only 895,660 voters recorded as voting on Nov. 2, a significant discrepancy from its hand recount certified total of 899,199.

The Elections Office informed me that they’re still doing “quality control” and adding in the names of some of the absentee voters. Even that wouldn’t explain the entire discrepancy, as there appear to be discrepancies with the polling place and provisional vote counts as well. I’ve asked the Elections Office for further clarification and will convey their explanation as soon as I recieve one.

Also, they have not yet released the full precinct canvass for the manual recount, as they did for the first count and the machine recount.

Oh, they found ballots aplenty, but it was not 3,539 of them which were allowed by the courts.

Hindrocket at PowerLine quotes from the Seattle Times:

The latest questions about King County came after the elections office released on Wednesday a list of all registered voters in the county, broken down by those who voted and those who didn’t. The Republican Party, among other groups, had requested the information as part of its investigation of voting irregularities.

Conservative blogger Stefan Sharkansky pointed out the discrepancy Wednesday, and by yesterday it was Topic A among Rossi backers and Republican Party officials.

Party Chairman Chris Vance said it could be the “smoking gun” needed to overturn the election.

They sent out ballots for deceased Dems, Hindrocket notes, whom they depict as merely “inactive.”

Oh, either something is broken and was allowed to operate anyway in the case of a contested election, or this is pure fraud. Given the anti-Bush/anti-GOP attitudes we saw last election, the latter is almost obvious.

Matt Margolis at Blogs for Bush notes:

3,539 more votes than registered voters in King County… Meanwhile, Gregoire was just certified the winner. Isn’t that convenient?

The MSM has embraced Christine Gregoire’s “victory,” and the rest will be muted: “Get over it, Bush won, you should be satisfied.” And CBSNews will air a piece of the women’s gubernatorial revolution.

Where’s Michael Moore with his gawdforsaken cameras?

[Note: After 16 months on Blogger and a week on WP, I’ve finally gotten trackback to work – knock on wood – and this will be my first attempt at two.]

Fifteen years ago, the door was slamming shut on the Soviet communism, Dr. Madsen Pirie at the Adam Smith Institute Blog out of the U.K.

At a New Year whose celebrations are muted by tragedy, it is well to reflect that people can improve the world by their actions. It is a vastly better place than it had been because of the events of 15 years ago. Millions more people can find personal fulfillment and express themselves by the choices in their lives. They were stirring and thrilling times.

Speaking for myself, I see another region of the world standing two steps away from the market and its concomitant democratic system. The world was made a better place indeed after President Reagan and Prime Minister Thatcher helped to throttle the Soviet empire. On this day, President Bush and Prime Minister Blair are standing on the throat of a more cowardly but no less evil system.

God bless you, and Happy New Year.

In 2003, 32-year-old conservative Republican Bobby Jindall ran for governor of Lousiana. “I think his age will be… a factor,” said Lousiana Dem strategist Donna Brazile. It was. State a.g. Kathleen Blanco now lives in the mansion in Baton Rouge.

Betsy Newmark today (Friday) looks at now-Congressman Jindal and an Investor’s Business Daily editorial observing that the MSM celebrates Illinois’ Barack Obama while pushing Jindal aside.

Like Betsy, I’m looking forward to seeing Congressman Jindal in action. His resume (see the Ramesh Ponnuru piece linked in the first paragraph) astounds, especially when his achievements are listed next to his age at the time.

We know Obama can… well, campaign.

It seems La Shawn Barber has a “fan.” Someone thinks so highly of her as to open an attack-blog in her honor: “La Shawn Barber Exposed.”

La Shawn is very good at what she does, and this could breed hatred on the one end and envy on the other. Neither is something with which one should want to live, so we’re looking at someone very small, who knows they are and vents through a malignation.

This dynamic fascinates me, in that it could turn out to be blogosphere-wide or limited to LaShawn alone. Anyone can snag a blogspot account.

And it’s easy to be clinical when I’m not the one attacked. I’m with you, LaShawn.

Ted Kennedy’s son, Representative Patrick, says he’s opted not to challenge GOP Mod Squad Senator Linc Chafee for his Senate seat in ‘06. He said he’s worked long and hard to get a seat on the House Appropriations Committee, and now that he has it, he’s going nowhere.

Chafee, son of erstwhile Rhode Island Republican Senator John Chafee, has a bigger name in the Ocean/Plantation State that does Ted’s son.

If you’re curious, here’s some of Patrick’s baggage.

I don’t do predictions, but I trust Joe Carter at Evangelical Outpost, who posts his “Predicitons — 2005 Edition.”

Example:

Congress fails to pass an immigration reform bill. Hungry, job-less workers, with no discernable skills or ability to speak our language will continue to pour in from Canada.

And he has early prediction for the ‘06 midterms.

And I’m still jiggering trackback.
—–

The Anchoress also has predictions, which I learned because that trackback to EO worked. Mine didn’t.

The Washington Post today editorializes today against a House Republican majority that wants to rewrite the following rule:

“A member . . . officer or employee of the House shall conduct himself at all times in a manner that shall reflect creditably on the House.”

– Code of Official Conduct, Rule XXIII, Clause 1.

The paper’s complaint? That the House majority is seeking to use its power to require the Ethics Committee to prove “a specific subparagraph of a specific regulation that was breached.”

If that be the case, then the majority is making it so that for an ethical violation to be found, an ethical rule must have been violated. The paper would sooner the House use a more subjective, “know it when we sense it,” test. They cite the Canons of Judicial Ethics. They want an amorphous puddle of vagueness that can be used to smash any Congressman who doesn’t pass the smell test of the various editorial boards.

Their editorial mentions only Republicans accused of ethical violations: Newton Gingrich and Tom DeLay, painting the Hammer as a wanton ethics violator.

Nah. If an ethical rule is violated, there should be a sanction. If not rule was violated, but someone feels that someone should be charged with something, throw it out. Let them add rules if need be, but don’t try to enforce about a nebulous canon of something which cannot be phrased in the English language.

“Of cats, crime and corporate colossi.” Nikon Sevast at Spoonerized Alliterations notes a recently uncovered cororate practice at the world’s largest retailer of goods manufactured in the lao gai of the PRC, Walmart.

Oh, it’s all in fun!

Good morning!

Here are the rest of these awards, the ones with neither trophy nor cash prize.

There will be no ado whatsoever, so we need no concern ourselves for that which is further.

No doubt hall-of-fame pitcher Randy Johnson is a bit of ink away from pitching in the Bronx next year.

The Yankees gave up Brad “Admiral” Halsey, the inconclusive Javy Vasquez, and some other prospects. plus about $9-million to the Arizona Diamondbacks.

The Yanks lost to the Red Sox because they lacked the quality starting pitching to close the series; next year, their rotation will be Johnson, Mike Mussina, Carl Pavano, Jaret Wright, and Kevin Brown. If Brown starts punching walls again, he’s replaceable.

It’s over. Gimme the trophy.

In my ongoing quest to trackback, as the afternoon begins to look a lot like evening, I’ve found a good reaction to author Jane Smiley — also a “pundit” at the SLATE online teen fashion magazine — from Sunnye at GOPInsight.com.

In my ongoing quest to find a trackback which works, here’s a Tuesday post from Erick at Confessions of a Political Junkie. His mother switched from Heinz Ketchup to Hunts over JF’s noisy wife, who happens to bear the surname of her late husband John. (The apostrophe-Kerry was added only when necessary for the campaign.)

Ketchup is a thing unto itself, Erick argues, and one should leave the rest out of it.

The same could be said of almost anything. Why ruin your own day over a few unrelated lunatics?

Robert Hayes at Let’s Try Freedom notes that President Bush did not mention the United Nations in his Tsunami aid speech:

This is very interesting, and it may reflect an inflection point in the trajectory of US-UN relations. Although it is not diplomatic to say it, the UN does not work without the US. Indeed, one of the many sources of tooth-gnashing frustration for conservatives and some libertarians has been the continued lending of US prestige to the UN’s kleptocracy over the years.

This may reflect the end of that policy.

Like I wrote this morning:

President Bush announced Thursday that the U.S. would form a coalition with Australia, India, and Japan to coordinating incoming aid to the region and to help with future rebuilding efforts. That’s a coalition amongst willing nations, not a bloated plastic leviathan coughing up blood. The U.N. is not necessary.

This could be a temporary reaction to Jan Egeland’s or it could be another step in the direction the President seemed to want to take after the U.N. twice failed to come through for the Iraqis.

Dave J. at Left Coast Conservative has a Washington State fact we should all recognizes:

King County elections officials said 55,177 ballots were enhanced and 4,902 were duplicated.

Kind of puts things in perspective, no?

Chris at LegalXXX had a pretty kewl idea: he went to the TTLB ecosystem and linked to six blogs rated near the bottom, each with something worthwhile to say.

As I’ve said, the blogosphere is a big place and worthy minds are found throughout.

(with apologies to Brian for borrowing his word without asking)

Sean Hackbarth at The American Mind relates that several years ago, AT&T removed itself from the wireless game by selling its wireless division, purchased by SBC Cingular. Now, AT&T wants a piece of wireless again, so it’s AT&T Mobile via Sprint.

I’d love to make eight figures for doing stuff like that.

From Aaron Brazell from Techno Sailor:

“Tsunami” has now been decreed by the CFEONOCET (Coalition for Equal Opportunity Naming of Common Everyday Things) to be politically incorrect as it incorrectly labels the wave and limits it to a particular dialect and race.

The proper terminology is “Enlarged Water Event” and should be used in place of “tsunami” in all future press releases, blog entries and journalism, both written and spoken.

Got that?

Over his own notation – “This is the sorriest, most pathetic bunch of losers I have ever seen.” — Matt Margolis posts at Blogs for Bush posts an excerpt from a Boston Globe story:

The election is long over. A new year is starting, and even most of the more ardent liberals are moving on. But in Louisburg Square this week, one determined group isn’t quite ready to let go. About a half dozen supporters of John Kerry are holding vigil in front of his house, still hoping for a Kerry presidency.

The little knot of demonstrators, calling themselves the Coalition Against Election Fraud, stood shivering in the cold yesterday, hoisting signs and pressing fliers into the hands of bewildered passersby. Taxi drivers, neighbors digging cars out of the snow, and Beacon Hill residents who happened to be strolling by were subjected to earnest pleas to join the cause.

‘’Who knows? Maybe we’ll overturn the election,” said Sheila Parks, a vigil organizer.

I have to wonder if these folks are serious, or if they just want some brief notoriety, perhaps from their failed candidate himself or his family.

I suppose its possible that JF had six true believers.

Good morning!

Tentatively, the trackback problem has been solved. Also yesterday, I’ve taken care of the ping problem. If this is the case, I will post the solution later so that future generations of Wordpress users can look to be as an example of a man who knew what he was doing.

Even if I don’t, per se.

Please excuse this note. It is a temporary trackback test.

The AFTER-WORD is the note below, and this is the note to which I purpose to extend a trackback.

And here’s a prayer.

There was an episode of CSI Miami this year where a large tidal wave hit Miami and helped some thieves, who had rigged a bank’s store of gold bars with flotation devices in anticipation, were able to float the loot out to sea. The main crook, who had killed all the sub-crooks, rescued the money at sea only to be surrounded by boats and helicopters, with Horatio standing on the deck of the lead ship looking kewl.

I thought the concept silly at the time, but now I can’t really speak. Steven Taylor has the latest stats:

The death toll in the tsunami disaster soared past 100,000 today - and is set to climb higher.

[…]
The UN said there were now strong grounds to believe that the toll in the Sumatran province of Aceh, the worst affected area, would be as high as 80,000. The number dead has now climbed in every country affected, including:

# Thailand: 1,700 confirmed dead, including 43 British tourists.

# Indonesia: more than 42,000 confirmed dead.

# India: nearly 7,000 dead, and many coastal areas including parts of Kerala still to be searched.

# Sri Lanka: 22,500 are confirmed dead and there are fears for hundreds of independent British travellers on the east coast.

Those are sourced HERE, and it’s just going to get worse.

I used Steven’s post because he had an earlier post which was quite good dealing with the Tsunami warning system. You really ought to read that one.

Here’s a factoid.

Could a tsunami strike the Jersey Shore? Yes.

Who’s going to script the Hollywood movie?

AP reporter Seth Hettena plundered the personal storage web site of the wife of a Navy SEAL. He published nine photographs of the SEALS apprehending Saddam Hussein in December of 2003, revealing their identities, compromising their security, and invading their privacy.

They are suing.

And to think these same people will go to prison without revealing the identity of Valerie Plame.

WorldNetDaily offers up some fuel for the conspiracy buffs.

Thus spake Don Rumsfeld :

“I think all of us have a sense if we imagine the kind of world we would face if the people who bombed the mess hall in Mosul, or the people who did the bombing in Spain, or the people who attacked the United States in New York, shot down the plane over Pennsylvania and attacked the Pentagon, the people who cut off peoples’ heads on television to intimidate, to frighten – indeed the word ‘terrorized’ is just that. Its purpose is to terrorize, to alter behavior, to make people be something other than that which they want to be.”

A-HA! “Shot down the plane over Pennsylvania”! The WH says that he misspoke, but some folks “know” darn well that our government shot that plane from the skies. And kept this from leaking for three years.

Some people are serious about this stuff, and that’s kewl, but their minds are made up to the point that they would seize a lapsus linguae and call if proof. They might be right about the fate of the plane, but this is not proof.

[HT, Taegan Goddard]

The nation of Sri Lanka was devastated by the recent Tsunamis. The nation of Israel was prepared to set up a “medical facility comprised of specialist doctors, and to set up emergency, internal medicine and pediatric departments, as well as laboratory and X-ray facilities in the southern part of Sri Lanka. ”

Sri Lanka’s reply? “We don’t want no Jews. Just end us stuff.” So the Israeli humanitarian organization Latet “is filling a jumbo jet with 18 tons of supplies worth $50,000, at Sri Lanka’s request.”

What is inexplicable is certainly not that Israel is helping Sri Lanka despite the hatred it was shown. Civilized nations do that. What cannot be explained in civilized terms is that Sri Lanka refused to accept medical assistance from Israeli doctors because they were Jewish. Civilized nations do not do that.

Why do these nations not understand why the United States prefers to relate to Israel instead of the little nations with their trashy hatred?

[HT, Brian from Tomfoolery of the Highest Order.]

A Norwegian U.N. jockey, Undersecretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs Jan Egeland, told the world:

“We [western governments] were more generous when we were less rich, many of the rich countries. It is beyond me why we are so stingy. Actually foreign assistance for many countries now is 0.1 or 0.2 percent of gross national income. That is stingy.”

The mainstream media in the United States immediately tried to turn that into international excoriation of President Bush. Egeland did not single out the United States.

His comment was directed at Western governments, whom he feels should give away more of the nations’ wealth to the United Nations. He feels that giving one or two tenths of a percent of GDP for foreign assistance is stingy. He did not say that the United States’ $15-million pledge in this disaster was stingy. Again, the MSM portrayed it that way as a means to criticize the President and because they want the U.S. government to give more money to the U.N.

They blew this one.

I think Egeland’s actual statement, that wealthy countries should give away a proportional share of GDP, is wrong, especially coming from the U.N. I think the MSM is again criminal for turning this into European U.S.-bashing. This is the American mainstream media bashing the United States.

A: The American media called President Bush and the U.S. government stingy.

I’ve put the latest column by Doug Hagin, What 2005 Should be Like!, live on the web site of the Rightsided Newsletter. It’s a conservative’s wish list.

Read his column on the RSN site: HERE.

After the Ohio recount – demanded by the Greenies, the Libertarian Party, John Conyers, and Jesse Jackson — President Bush has won the State by 118, 457 votes. The recount cost the taxpayers of Ohio about $1-million – the Greens and Libertarians picked up a small percentage – and JF Kerry gained a piddling 285 votes. That’s 5,000 per uncovered vote – for Bush (449) vrs. for Kerry (734) – in an election that was 99.9995% accurate.

Here’s the headline from the New York Times online:

Ohio Recount Gives Smaller Margin to Bush

Hardly.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

And an AP story on the ABC News site is headlined:

Ohio Recount Ends, Shows Vote Closer

285 votes is, to use a vernacular, so not closer.

Lifted from Omar at Iraq the Model, just ‘cos I like it!

Jeff Jarvis at Buzz Machine writes about a post on Mohammed Ali Abtahi’s blog.
The post, which was translated to English by another Iranian blogger talks about some Iranian bloggers being subjected to psychological and physical torture.
If the information in this post is true, then I think we should pay more attention to the situation of bloggers under oppressive regimes such as the one in Iran.
I just want to add that if the story took place under Saddam’s regime, the torture would’ve been doubled or tripled. Maybe it was an advantage that I couldn’t blog at that time!

How could I like that, with its overtones of repression? Because some people have to wake up. What the U.S. is doing, in Iraq with Iraqis as well as elsewhere with others, is all about human rights. As quaint or hokey as that might sound to some, those some are most likely laboring under a dangerously false impression of their own intellects.

We’ve got the new column by Barbara J. Stock, Holidays that Offend Me, is now live on the web site of the Rightsided Newsletter. The title is sufficiently descriptive, and it can be read on the RSN site: HERE.

In the meantime, ‘t is our wedding anniversary. Time for me to get real romantic real quick.

They’ve recounted the votes in Ohio, JF Kerry picked up “about 300″ votes, and the President won the State by 118, 457.

The recount was done at the behest of the Libertarians and the Greenies with the support of the irascibleJohn Conyers (D-Michigan) As Ohio’s Port Clinton News Herald editorialized Tuesday, the recount “cost Ohio taxpayers something in the neighborhood of $1 million.”

The Lone Star Times blog looks at it and tells us that “the recount is over, and guess what? The process, which cost more than $5,000 per uncovered vote, revealed that the original count was 99.995% accurate.”

I noted this morning that U.N. Undersecretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs Jan Egeland, who is a Norwegian fellow, declared that the western world was “stingy” with its aid promised to countries savaged by the Tsunami disaster.

“If, actually, the foreign assistance of many countries now is 0.1 or 0.2 percent of the gross national income, I think that is stingy, really,” he said. “I don’t think that is very generous.”

He further argued that U.S. taxpayers wanted to pay more taxes so as to help the United Nations give disaster relief, and he feels that world governments are “stingy” in giving money to the U.N.

We [world governments] keep 99.8 percent [of GDP]to ourselves, on average. I don’t think that’s very generous,” he said.

Secretary of State Colin Powell today insisted that the U.S. is not stingy:

“The United States is not stingy. We are the greatest contributor to international relief efforts in the world,” Powell said.”

Let’s go back to the Norwegian guy. He has the internationalist mindset, in which the governments of the individual nations control that nation’s GDP. So his formulation that the U.S. government keeps 99.8-percent of U.S. GDP is incorrect, sloppy, and misguided. The people of the United States control the vast majority of our GDP; a government gets only an unfortunately increasing percentage to do with, on paper, what we direct it to do.

There is no place in that Norwegian fellow’s mind for private charity, ergo: He doesn’t get it.

The US government promptly upped it pledge by $20-million, giving the impression that the government will respond to any international criticism, but Secretary Powell noted of the Norwegian fellow’s whining: “I wish that comment hadn’t been made.”

…is at www.rightsided.org. We’ve still some heavy lifting, but with some help from the good folks at Blogspot, the archives will find their way there as well.

Take care, and I’ll see you there.

I’ve put the new column by Peter and Helen Evans, A Meaningful U.N. Resolution, live on my Rightsided Newsletter web site. They even have a few ideas for what kind of countries would belong to a legitimate world body.

Read the column on the RSN site: HERE.

We evidently may worry a little bit less about the effect of the recent earthquake (9.0 on Chuck Richter’s scale) on our Earth’s place in the Solar System.

Nikonsevast at Spoonerized Alliteration tells us that we need not worry about the recent Earthquake altering the Earth’s revolution on her axis: “[T]he concussion from president bush’s pontification canceled it out.”

He adds:

oddly, while the article was titled, “quake’s power = million atomic bombs?”, the subhead read, “like a bulldozer in sumatra”. sure, i can see how a million atomic bombs can seem an awful lot like a bulldozer when you’re right there.

But do they beep in reverse?

Yesterday, I used a news story to suggest that David Horowitz would sue for damages only against taxpayer-funded universities. In the comments, David from California reminded that Horowitz generally sues to have Constitutional principles applied. I responded by asking what was the principle for which he was fighting, given that CMU was a private school. I’ve found the answer:

“I’m going to sue San Francisco State, and we’re negotiating with Texas A&M,” Horowitz said. “If they insist on violating my First Amendment rights, I’ll sue, and we’ll win.”

Because The Tartan does not receive state money, Horowitz concedes he has no legal recourse against it. But he is taking his case for more intellectual freedom on college campuses to the state Legislature.

Horowitz, with his First Amendment lawsuits, is distracting from his greater cause: an Academic Bill of Rights which would ensure that professors could not be fired or denied promotions or tenure based on their religious or political beliefs. I’ll champion that cause.