Oil for food bananas
An article in The Guardian quotes Hugo at the inaguration of the PDV Caribe bribery blackmail agreement,

Chavez said the Venezuelan state oil company had created a new affiliate called PDV Caribe to coordinate the project, and that Venezuela would be willing to accept goods such as bananas or sugar for a portion of payments.

As the divine Celia would have said, ¡Azúca!

Prior to the PDV Caribe agreement signing, Fidel had paid a short visit to Caracas -- short enough there are no photos (no photos of those two narcisstic media adicts?), and nobody tried to kill him. Not that Fidel doesn't have reason for his paranoia. Fidel would be welcome in the Hamptons (via Babalu), at least on some clueless fool's back, especially if he brings fresh cigars. I predict that Hugo, too, will soon be on a t-shirt in the Hamptons, at the rate he's going, but no cigar so far.

In case there's any doubt that the PDV Caribe deal is nothing other than bribery and blackmail, Trinidad and Tobago, which are more than self-sufficient in oil, weren't signing (hat tip to Daniel and VCrisis).

Update Babalu has a nice round-up on the PDV.

Hillary's next meme will be the budget deficit
SmadaNek overheard something in Washington. Don't miss SmadaNek's numbers:

The national debt ($7.78 trillion) amounts to about 66% of national production ($11.7 trillion). This could be compared to a family with an annual income of $50,000 holding a mortgage for about $76,000. The total monthly payment on a $76,000 mortgage (30-yr fixed @ 5.375%) would be $425.58, or $5,106.96 annual -- 6.7% of the balance, 10% of gross income.

I'm more worried about trade wars with China, and property rights than the budget deficit.

As for Social Security, I kissed that one good-bye a long time ago. There isn't going to be any.

Pondering private schools before the concert starts
Live 8 will be playing this weekend at a big city near you (in our location, Philadelphia), and then Bob Geldorf and Bono will be speaking at the upcoming G8 Summit. I hope they find time to read this article: Give Africa a private schooling.

In Africa, as here, parents want choice in schooling.

Bob Geldof and Bono rave about how an extra 1m-plus children are now enrolled in primary school in Kenya. All these children, the accepted wisdom goes, have been saved by the benevolence of the international community — which must give $7 to $8 billion (£3.8 to £4.4 billion) per year more so that other countries can emulate Kenya’s success.

The accepted wisdom is wrong. It ignores the remarkable reality that the poor in Africa have not been waiting, helplessly, for the munificence of pop stars and western chancellors to ensure that their children get a decent education. Private schools for the poor have emerged in huge numbers in some of the most impoverished slums and villages in Africa. They cater for a majority of poor children and outperform government schools, for a fraction of the cost.

The results are replicated in not only Kenya, but Ghana and Nigeria too.

Not that the "public" schools were free to begin with,

The final rub was that “free” primary education was not only poor quality, it was also not “free”. Perhaps to keep slum children out — certainly the headmistress from Olympic, where the chancellor visited, was candid that she objected to the “dirty, smelly and uncouth” slum children in her smart school — state schools insist that parents purchase two sets of uniforms before the term starts, including shoes — prohibitively expensive to parents from the slums. One parent told me: “I prefer to pay school fees and forget the uniform.”

Samizdata and Hispalibertas explore the subject. The Gantelope blog deals with school choice in our country.

Update: Welcome, Betsy's Page readers!

Well, that's one way of getting a Super Bowl ring . . .
but it only works if you're Vladimir.
I bet Kim Jung Il wishes he'd thought of it.

Ireland, France, and competitiveness
Thomas Freedman's The End of the Rainbow

How Ireland went from the sick man of Europe to the rich man in less than a generation is an amazing story. It tells you a lot about Europe today: all the innovation is happening on the periphery by those countries embracing globalization in their own ways - Ireland, Britain, Scandinavia and Eastern Europe - while those following the French-German social model are suffering high unemployment and low growth.

Ireland's innovation is economic and social:

Ireland's advice is very simple: Make high school and college education free; make your corporate taxes low, simple and transparent; actively seek out global companies; open your economy to competition; speak English; keep your fiscal house in order; and build a consensus around the whole package with labor and management - then hang in there, because there will be bumps in the road - and you, too, can become one of the richest countries in Europe.

France's is techonological. But, which makes a country more competitive?

France specializes in huge-scale engineering projects that showcase technology and can only be financed by the taxpayer -- and not only the French taxpayer, but the taxpayers of other, richer countries:
The Concorde, which is now a museum piece, but there might be a son of Concorde in the making.
The Eurotunnel, a.k.a. the chunnel, which is broke to the tune of 6.4billion ($11.5bn; 9.6bn euros).
The bullet trains, which are great.
The Millau Viaduct, financed with EU funds, which presents security issues in this age of terrorism.
The Airbus A380, which is facing delivery delays of six months, even when it wasn't scheduled to go into service for another two years.

Now the ITER fusion reactor is going to France. The BBC has a Q&A: Nuclear fusion reactor page on the project, which is financed by the EU, the US, Japan, Russia, China and South Korea. Australia had opted out of the project

Last year The Economist stated,

On the face of it, that sounds impressive. But even if this trend continues, it will take, according to a report compiled last year by Britain's Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology, until 2043 for fusion to become commercially viable. This forecast is even worse than the traditional 30-year horizon. A doubling every 1.8 years would lead to something like a 4m-fold improvement in performance over four decades. That sounds impressive but, in fact, it shows just how primitive existing fusion technology is. And the analogy with Moore's law is specious for another reason. Even the most primitive computer chips were useful, and found a market. Commercially, fusion is just money down the drain until a reactor that is powerful and reliable enough can be built.

And so fusion advocates are reduced to the last refuge of the desperate engineer—spin-offs. No doubt these would come. Reactors of the ITER design, known as tokamaks (from the Russian for “toroidal magnetic chamber”), look like giant, hollow doughnuts. They work by heating special isotopes of hydrogen contained in the hollow of the doughnut to the point where the electrons and atomic nuclei in the gas part company to create an electrically conducting mixture called a plasma. Further heating speeds the nuclei up to the point where, if they collide, they merge and release the binding energy that will eventually, so the plan goes, be harnessed to make electricity.

Some spin-offs may come from a better understanding of high-temperature plasmas, though they are hard to predict. More plausible spin-offs would be in the field of superconductivity. The electromagnets needed to “confine” the hydrogen while it is heated to fusion temperatures will rely on superconducting wire to feed electricity to them. Superconductivity (which employs a combination of special materials and low temperatures to achieve resistance-free electrical transmission) is another “nearly” technology which has been promising more than it has delivered for many decades. But it is a lot more “nearly” than fusion, and a concerted, technically demanding push in this area might, just, bring it to the point where it could break out of the specialist applications to which it is now confined and contribute to, say, long-distance power transmission.

Whether these spin-offs would justify the price-tag, though, is questionable. If they are worth pursuing, it would surely be better to invest in projects focused on them, rather than hoping they will magically emerge from something else. All in all, ITER seems more boondoggle than boon. Governments should spend their research money on other things.

Last evening's France2 broadcast optimistically said that Cadarache (the ITER's location) would be the "center of the world", while shedding some light on just how big a gamble this is:

• the ITER would take 10 years to build, and 20 years of experiements, before it could be decided if any of the technology would be of commercial value.
• The project will not generate electricity; instead it will need massive amounts of energy to heat up.
• It will generate the same amount of nuclear waste as an existing nuclear reactor, but the waste would be shorter-lived.
• The Greens aren't happy about it,as you can read in this article by the Spanish Communist Party (via Hispalibertas), and Greenpeace's press release.

Here in Princeton the local fusion reactor was dismantled after decades of experiments. I hope, for France's sakes, they have better luck.

Speaking about the Millau Viaduct, Jacques Chirac said it represented "A modern France, an enterprising, successful France, a France which invests in its future." As for the economy, maybe France should be taking a look at the enterprising, successful modern Ireland, and how Ireland invests in its future.

Also posted at Blogger News Network.

Maybe Dick Durbin should read about child camel jockeys
Twenty-two child camel jockeys who returned from the United Arab Emirates last week are undergoing psychotherapy to help them deal with their traumatic experiences in the Gulf

The boys were evidently traumatised by the abject conditions under which they were kept by the camel and racetrack owners.

The boys were crowded into huts and slept on hard floors.
. . .
Shaukat recalls getting only a piece of bread and tea for breakfast and some rice with lentils for the rest of the day.
. . .
"My sheikh did not torture me," he says. "Of course, sometimes he would slap me or beat me if I stole something from him or made a mistake."

'Not scared'

Independent researchers, including documentary makers have, however, talked of severe torture methods that involved boys being hung from chains and flogged with camel whips.

Children fell off camels all the time, but if you didn't break a limb you just got up and continued.

All this is related to modern-time slavery: "The Child Protection and Welfare Bureau's assistant director, Zubair Ahmad Shad, tells the BBC news website that the practice of sending young children to the Gulf to work as camel jockeys was linked to human trafficking."

Delman on sale
Inspired by my guru, The Manolo, who linked to the Delman Flats on the Sale at Bluefly, I found the Delman shoes on the sale at the Sierra Trading Post.

I don't get any money for endorsing anything in this blog, but I've made several purchases at Sierra and have always been very pleased with their service and quality. And Delmans for $70? Can't beat that! The Talbots knock-offs were more expensive than that.

In other shoe news, Zoe in downtown Princeton has Prada shoes on sale, 50% off.

Shelby Foote, Historian and Novelist, Dies at 88
Mr. Foote wrote three of The Husband's favorite books. From the NYT obit

What began as a Random House proposal for a short account of the Civil War as its centennial approached turned into an opus. Writing in an ornate script with an old-style dip pen in his rambling magnolia-shaded house in Memphis, where the Footes had moved in 1953, he produced the 2,934-page, three-volume, 1.5 million-word military history, "The Civil War: A Narrative." At 500 to 600 words a day, with times out to visit battlefields on the anniversaries of the battles, it took him 20 years. The volumes appeared between 1958 and 1974.

Carrying readers from Fort Sumter to Appomattox, the work was greeted by most reviewers in the spirit of the New York Times Book Review contributor who called it "a remarkable achievement, prodigiously researched, vigorous, detailed, absorbing." Others used words like "monumental," "comprehensive," and "even-handed." In The New York Review of Books, C. Vann Woodward complimented the author on capturing the "intimacy of combat" with his "impressive narrative gifts and dramatic purposes."

The Civil War: A Narrative (3 Vol. Set), at Amazon.

Freestar Media wants to build on Justice Souter's land
and have their own reality show.

Hitchens in Iran
Hitchens ponders Iran's Persian soul in the context of the Islamic republic in his article, Mind over Mullahs

The Islamic republic actually counts all of its subjects as infants, and all of its bosses as their parents. It is based, in theory and in practice, on a Muslim concept known as velayat-e faqih, or "guardianship of the jurist." In its original phrasing, this can mean that the clergy assumes responsibility for orphans, for the insane, and for (aha!) abandoned or untenanted property. Here is the reason Ayatollah Khomeini became world-famous: in a treatise written while he was in exile in Najaf, in Iraq, in 1970, he argued that the velayat could and should be extended to the whole of society. A supreme religious authority should act as proxy father for everyone. His own charisma and bravery later convinced many people that Khomeini was entitled to claim the role of supreme leader (faqih) for himself.

But the theory has an obvious and lethal flaw, built into itself like a trapdoor.

A must-read.

Hugo promises plastic houses for the poor, anounces retirement
Chavez Promises Plastic Houses for Poor

Stepping through a model home with plastic walls built on the factory grounds, he touted it as an economical solution. He said such homes cost about 35 percent less than those built with cinderblocks.

I wonder how well they hold up in hurracaine-force winds?

And here's to his retirement,

"Save me one for around 2021," said Chavez, who has said he will retire around that year once his social "revolution" for the poor has made its mark.

Thank G-d for term limits in our country.

In further Hugo news, he's praising the Iranian vote. Too bad Jimmy Carter didn't visit Tehran.

Dr. Sowell weighs in on the SCOTUS
With Property rites,

What the latest Supreme Court decision does with verbal sleight-of-hand is change the Constitution's requirement of "public use" to a more expansive power to confiscate private property for whatever is called "public purpose" -- including turning that property over to some other private party.

asking,

What are legislatures for except to legislate? What is the separation of powers for except to keep legislative, executive and judicial powers separate?

When the 5 to 4 Supreme Court majority "rejected any literal requirement that condemned property be put into use for the general public" because of the "evolving needs of society," it violated the Constitutional separation of powers on which the American system of government is based.

When the Supreme Court majority referred to its "deference to legislative judgments" about the taking of property, it was as disingenuous as it was inconsistent. If Constitutional rights of individuals are to be waved aside because of "deference" to another branch of government, then the citizens may as well not have Constitutional rights.

What are these rights supposed to protect the citizens from, if not the government?

and "Mainstream" Judges

Judges who take an oath to uphold the Constitution do not take an oath to uphold liberal precedents. If liberal members of the Senate Judiciary Committee try to impose such a commitment on judicial nominees, we can only hope that others will have the sense and the guts to expose and oppose such tactics.

No policy litmus test -- "mainstream" or otherwise -- should be applied to any judicial nominee by either party, not if you want judges committed to the law, rather than to particular policy outcomes.

Sluggo ponders some Shore property. . .

Two attitudes
The well-publicized attitude, The Iraq Panic: Zarqawi's bombs hit their target in Washington

The not-so-well-publicized attitude: via Chrenkoff, Ulf Hjertstrom Ex-hostage hires bounty hunters

A HOSTAGE held alongside Australian Douglas Wood in Iraq has hired bounty hunters to track down his former captors, promising to eliminate them one by one.
. . .
"I invested about $50,000 so far and we will get them one by one."

How about the MSM, in between making soundbites for Al-Jazeera and supporting Zarqawi, try talking about Mr. Hjertstrom?

What "Latino Power"?
Via Real Clear Politics, Robert Suro of the Pew Hispanic Center realizes that

it should come as no surprise that when it comes to matters of policy -- on immigration, trade or bilingual education -- Latino voters have a different point of departure than non-voting Latinos.

and that

Hispanic political power is growing, just not as fast as one might expect from the population numbers. Moreover, as Latinos become a more prominent political presence, what we hear from them may not be what people expect.

I don't know what "people" expect (or, for that matter, who are the "people" Mr. Suro speaks about), but I know that, as a Hispanic woman, I don't vote for anyone just because
a. they are Hispanic
b. they support "the perceived economic interests of the largely working-class Latino voters", whoever those might be.

Additionally, I believe that
1. In-state tuition status for illegal aliens is wrong.
2. Immigrants have the duty to assimilate. The duty, as in moral obligation.
3. Bilingualism should go hand-in-hand with learning American values. Bilingualism as of itself is not acculturation.
4. The liberal mindset of the vicitimized minority is an empty premise.

Candidates trying to second-guess what an ethnic group will want will only become panderers, and I don't vote for panderers, thank you.

I vote for candidates who I believe best represent my goals as an individual, and, on the national sphere, will best defend the Constitution and our country.

Simple as that.

Castro was to sponsor them, so the Venzuelan cadets quit
Details at Babalu

Venezuela's anti-castro rebellion spreads
castro didn't show up in Caracas today, even though Hugo Chavez may have had the Popemobile all ready for him, along with military honors and perhaps the command of the army itself. He was supposed to come to sponsor the graduating military class on the anniversary of the great battle of Carabobo, which secured Venezuela's independence. castro didn't show at all. He must know how popular he is these days.

Venezuela's military cadets have resigned their commissions rather than hand over their nation's sovereignty to the foul barbudo.

Meanwhile, Venezuela's doctors have protested bitterly against castro's political incompetents, chosen for their castro loyalty in Havana rather than medical skills, but coming to professional hospitals in Caracas to rule the previously free, educated, Venezuelans.

Now, a group of veterans and unemployed people have gotten bolder: they marched into - into! - the Havana embassy in Caracas and protested the takeover of their once-vibrant country by castro's thugs. They didn't have a permit, they just did it anyway.

Meanwhile, if you're a Cuban doctor in Cuba, you make $20 bucks a month. If you're a Cuban doctor in Venezuela, you make $100 to $200 a month, which means,

This $200 a month per smock in turn was undercutting Venezuela's real doctors, same as industrial dumping, and putting those Venezuelan professionals out of business.

I know of at least two Venezuelan doctors (graduates of US medical schools) that have moved to the USA recently.

So please, don't talk to me about Fidel's (and Hugo's) "free" health system.

I wasn't going to read South Park Conservatives,
but Liesl Schillinger talked me into it,

Obviously, Anderson knows his audience: this book isn't intended for readers of The Times and The Economist and watchers of CNN. It's for the people who are sick and tired of mainstream media and are fans of the blogs and right-wing commentators he cites so abundantly.

Hmm.
Reader of the Times (both NY and London)? Check.
Subscriber to The Economist? Check.
Watcher of CNN? Check.
Sick and tired of mainstream media? Check.
Fan of the blogs? Check.

Liesl also states,

Perhaps the argument clinic of the Monty Python Tories can light the way.

Monty Python fan? Check.

I so love it when some New Yorker art editor writing at the NYT Book Review uses neat little boxes to categorize people! It's like being back in high school, only without the homework. The only little box Liesl didn't include is that of minority, which, as a Puerto Rican, I'd qualify.

Next stop, Amazon

Speaking of the NYT book review, Kathy has said it all on another book . . .

Time for the Carnival!

at Riehl World View, gathered by Mr. Snitch!

Islamists have proved adept at winning liberal exemption from criticism
states Victor Davis Hanson,

It is no accident that the Protocols of the Elders of Zion and Mein Kampf are still popular sellers among zealots in some capitals of the Arab world. Was our war on terror, then, going to be morally clear to even the most progressive utopian, since our enemies lacked liberal pretensions and the charisma of a Stalin, Ho, Che, or Fidel that so often duped the gullible?

Hardly.

Two factors explain the current growing hysteria over Iraq, and they transcend the complex nature of the war and even the depressing media reports from the battlefield. First is the strange doctrine of multiculturalism that has become one of our most dominant boutique ideologies of the last few decades, as the United States experienced unleveled prosperity, leisure — and guilt.

Hanson goes on,

Contrary to all recent popular wisdom, the war in Iraq is not a disaster, but nearing success. It has been costly and at times tragic, but a democracy is in place, accords are being hammered out with Sunni rejectionists, and the democratic reformist mindset is pulsating into Lebanon, Egypt, and the Gulf. This has only been possible because of the courage and efficacy of a much maligned military that, for the lapses of a small minority at Guantanamo Bay and Abu Ghraib, has been compared to Stalin and Hitler.

If President Bush were a liberal Democrat; if he were bombing a white Christian, politically clumsy fascist in the heart of Europe; if al Qaeda and its Islamist adherents were properly seen as eighth-century tormenters of humanists, women, homosexuals, non-Arabs, and non-Wahhabi believers; and if Iraq had become completely somnolent with the toppling of Saddam's statue, then the American people would have remained behind the effort to dismantle Islamic fundamentalism and create the foundations to ensure its permanent demise.

But once the suicide murdering and bombing from Iraq began to dominate the news, then this administration, for historical reasons largely beyond its own control, had a very small reservoir of good will. The Islamists proved to be more adept in the public relations of winning liberal exemption from criticism than did the administration itself, as one nude Iraqi on film or a crumpled Koran was always deemed far worse than daily beheadings and executions. Indeed, the terrorists were able to morph into downtrodden victims of a bullying, imperialistic America faster than George W. Bush was able to appear a reluctant progressive at war with the Dark Age values of our enemies.

And once that transformation was established, we were into a dangerous cycle of a conservative, tough-talking president intervening abroad to thwart the poorer of the third world — something that has never been an easy thing in recent American history, but now in our own age has become a propagandist's dream come true.

And don't miss Arthur's thirtieth installment of good news from Iraq.

Current French phobia: the Polish plumber
Behold:

I suppose Fabio must be quaking in his boots.

Hot?
Go chill out at Bergdorf's.

Enjoy the Sunday in June!

While you ponder Iran, let's mention Venezuela, too
Iran's used elections as a PR ploy for the theocracy, and they are going nuclear, too.

Not to be upstaged, Hugo wants to go nuclear, too, and with Iranian help: Venezuela dimisses jitters over nuclear programIn one of his "hey, look at me, I'm not saying what you think I'm saying" maneuvers, Hugo claims that

Venezuela will pursue plans to develop nuclear technology for its medical, industrial and oil sectors despite regional jitters over possible cooperation with Iran, the science minister said.

Hugo's repeating himself, of course.

At least Brazil's not playing along,

Chavez said in May that Venezuela and other Latin American countries such as Brazil and Argentina could develop nuclear energy as an alternative power source.

But Brazil said it would likely not cooperate with Venezuela on nuclear energy projects involving Iran. A Brazilian government official described possible Iranian involvement as "risky" and pointed to Brazil's energy projects with Argentina and the United States.

In further Hugo news, Cuba says someone, possibly Columbian, has been trying to kill him, and the Cuban website (is this a pattern?) also says that a Survey Ratifies Hugo Chavez´s Political Leadership. The survey didn't ask this guy, or the oil workers protesting against corruption and lost jobs who shut down oil production. The Cuban press didn't seem to have time to report that retired members of the Venezuelan armed forces protested the presence of Cuban "advisors" in the Venezuelan military, but at least Hugo's giving a pay raise to the soldiers that are (still) loyal to him.

Venezuela and Iran would have perfect synergy: both countries are led by ideologists that hate the USA and are adroit at manipulating elections; the mullahs have plundered their country and Hugo, not satisfied with all that oil money, has taken over the Central Bank's reserves; and now they both think they're the bomb. Or at least, want to be.

Update: Some Venezuelans are revolting

A brief post Iran, part 2
The mullahs hold an election, and insist on the invisible huge turnout, in order to justify their own legitimacy.
The election has candidates that only the mullahs have vetted. Over a 1,000 possible candidates were rejected.
The election goes well, with one candidate, supposedly for "reform", going to a second round with a "traditionalist".
Why would anyone be surprised, then, that the "traditionalist" won?

As the Beeb said, His victory means all the organs of the Iranian state are now in the hands of conservative hardliners. And in the guise of legitimacy, too.

For more on Iran, don't miss Editor: Myself blog (hat tip: BuzzMachine). Via Roger L. Simon, Michael Ledeen explains how What we’re seeing is a power struggle within the tyrannical elite

(Part 1 of A brief post on Iran here)

Maturity, the NYT, and the war
I've always, even as a child, believed that mature people dealt with what there is; i.e., a mature person deals with reality while an immature person squanders their energy and resources lamenting what there isn't/crying-whinning-complaining about what they don't like/wishing their time away. A mature person handles a situation realistically, and sets goals to see it through.

The NYTimes editors have a record of lamenting, complaining and wishing, rather than coping. Just this morning they've come up with this editorial, Three Things About Iraq, which they start with the statement, "To have the sober conversation about the war in Iraq that America badly needs, it is vital to acknowledge three facts. . . "

Tiger Hawk takes care of fisking two of the things, starting with, "The war has nothing to do with Sept. 11."

That there may have been no material connection between Saddam Hussein's government and September 11 hardly means that the war in Iraq has nothing to do with September 11. While there were definitely important reasons independant of September 11 to take Saddam down -- it was American policy to bring about the fall of his government even before George W. Bush came into office -- the invasion itself was directly related to our war on al Qaeda and its cognates. First, we needed to re-establish out credibility in the Arab world, which credibility was squandered by virtually every president since Jimmy Carter. This could only happen by brining the war into the heart of the Arab world and taking casualties killing jihadists. We are doing that every day. Second, we needed to put ourselves in a position to coerce the regimes most important to the war on Islamist jihad, including particularly Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia joined the fight only when it realized that we did not need its bases or its geography once we occupied Iraq. Third, we simply could not run the risk that an undeterrable and power crazy tyrant like Saddam Hussein might make common cause with al Qaeda.

One might well argue that these purposes for the war are inadequate, but there are many people outside the administration who have no particular partisan ax to gring -- me, for example -- who think they carry the day. For the Times to declare as a fact that the Iraq war has "nothing to do with September 11" is transportingly dishonest.

But let me add more more fact the NY Times appears to consider a simple side issue:

We are at war, and win we must.
Were the Times use its considerable resources to do all it can towards the goal of winning the war, it would show a great deal maturity.

The rest is just childish belly-aching.

More on Kelo vs City of New London, from Elighten NJ
From their post, All For The Greater Good:

Fast forward to the present and we find the constant erosion of property rights in the United States. People and their property are seen as little more than tax targets to be exploited for the “greater good”.

Look no further than income tax laws imposed; more for the purpose of wealth redistribution than to provide for the common protection of life and property of citizens. You don’t decide how to use the fruits of your labor; the “government” decides and demands to be paid first, to hell with your needs or wishes. All for the “greater good.”

The IRS has the power to investigate your personal activities and finances; without a search warrant the IRS has the right to search your property and financial records; and without a trial, the IRS has the right to seize your property. All for the “greater good.”

Find out how this erosion of the right to own private property relates to the Kelo decision by reading their post.

And while you're at it, bear in mind that nowhere in the Kelo decision does it say the property seized must be limited to real estate.

Supreme Court Rules Cities May Seize Homes for development
Yahoo News on the Kelo vs City of New London decision

Cities may bulldoze people's homes to make way for shopping malls or other private development, a divided Supreme Court ruled Thursday, giving local governments broad power to seize private property to generate tax revenue.

The Justices voting in favor of this ruling are John Paul Stevens, Anthony Kennedy, David Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and Stephen Breyer.

Last February I was saying it can happen anywhere. Could it happen here? Certainly. They way the local and state government have been spending money, it makes perfect sense that they'd raze down homes paying $10,000/yr in taxes to put up homes or businesses that pay a minimum of $50,000+/yr in taxes. Say, for instance, in the Witherspoon Street/Hospital neighborhood.

DynamoBuzz explains in NJ terms,

And what does this mean in New Jersey?? This state is full of wealthy land developers and business interests, from Donald Trump and George Norcross down to the local land developers. You know the names, just look in the Sunday real estate listings. All they need to do is go a local town planning board and propose some development project that has the net effect of increasing tax revenue. Like perhaps tear down three or four older ranch houses and replace them with townhouses. Or maybe a property with a motel that could instead have a hotel/conference center. Of course, these developers have already contributed thousands of dollars to the local politicians, and I'm sure the politicians will get even more if the land deal goes through. This is pay to play on steroids, state sponsored kick backs.

This ruling gives local governments unlimited power over your personal property.

The NJ blogss reaction:
Barista

In the biggest blow to those who would save the businesses in downtown Bloomfield from the wrecking ball, the Supreme Court today handed down its decision in Kelo v. New London -- and gave local governments the right to use eminent domain, even to make way for private business development.

This follows a NJ superior court decision in late May in favor of the township, and against the fighting merchants.

NJ Eminent Domain (emphasis mine)

In far too many instances, such as Long Branch and Asbury Park, the blight declarations go back ten years or more. This is an unconscionable burden to the property owners within the affected area. They cannot sell, except at a discount; they are reluctant to invest in their properties because of the fear of Eminent Domain; and many municipalities neglect to enforce their building codes once the areas have been determined to be blighted. This only exacerbates the impacts on the property owners.

We’ve had many inquiries today concerning what the property owner can do. The only answer is for the property owner to be vigilant regarding proposed municipal action and to participate in and contest the blight studies when they are presented to the municipal Planning Board. If the property owner sits on their rights and does not do this, they will have a very difficult time filing a Prerogative Writ suit contesting the municipal action.

Coffeegrounds:It's Official: A Home Is No Longer Your Castle
Jersey Style: New London About to Get a Whole Lot Newer
Mr. Snitch! New York's Sith-watch


The SCOTUS decision is wrong, and it makes me angry. As Mark Leon Goldberg put it,

Loose interpretations of a government's right of eminent domain is the sort of thing we expect in Harare -- not New London

(On the subject of Harare, see prior post. Zimbawe's not the only place where the goverment's killing property rights. Venezuela's headed that way, too).

Todd Zywicki at Volokh Conspiracy adds,

The potential for abuse in this ruling is obvious, and the fact that governments cannot be trusted to do the right thing is exactly the reason why the Michigan Supreme Court reversed Poletown earlier this year. And Justice Thomas hits the nail on the head when he observes that it won't be (and historically hasn't been) the rich and powerful who are finding their homes condemned and given to corporations, Wal-Mart, or simply someone who will build a bigger house and promise to pay more property taxes (as Will Wilkinson observes, "That is, if you have something somebody richer than you wants, watch out.").

The SCOTUS has spoken and there's not a darn thing you can do about it.

This is a bad decision.
More at SCOTUS blog.

Update: there are effectively no limits on the predations of local governments against private property.

Dr. Kratuhammer on free trade
Party Without Ideas

It's a no-brainer. If we have learned anything from the past 25 years in China, India, Chile and other centers of amazing economic growth, it is that open markets and free trade are the keys to pulling millions, indeed hundreds of millions, of people out of poverty. The Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) is a chance to do the same for desperately poor near-neighbors.
. . .
You would think, therefore, that Democrats would be for CAFTA. Not so. CAFTA is in great jeopardy because Democrats have turned against it. Whereas a decade ago under President Bill Clinton, 102 House Democrats supported the North American Free Trade Agreement, that number for CAFTA is down to 10 or less. In a closed-door meeting this month, reports Jonathan Weisman of The Post, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi put heavy-handed pressure on all congressional Democrats to observe party discipline in killing the treaty.

Arguing free trade is particularly tiresome because it is the only proposition in politics that is mathematically provable. It was proved by British economist David Ricardo in 1817 that even if one country is more efficient in producing two items, trade between two countries based on the relative efficiency of production is always beneficial to both countries.

Mathematics does not change, but calculations of political expediency do.

As Dr. K points out, "Eighty percent of goods from these countries are already entering the United States duty-free, so CAFTA would have a minimal impact on the United States. It would, however, have a dramatic impact on these six neighbor countries -- countries that Democrats used to care about. Or so they said."

Not to worry the Democrats, Hugo's working on his Bolivarian Alternative to any USA-initiated free trade agreements.

Hand out the t-shirt.

Fallaci's swan song is a battle cry
If you haven't read it yet, don't miss T. Varadarajan's interview of Oriana Fallaci. Ms Fallaci is dying of cancer.

Here's the text of her book Rage and Pride. The Force of Reason is avalable everywhere.

The horrible facts on Zimbawe
It is estimated that Mugabe has burned down the homes of more than 200,000 people.

Mr Mugabe has said the recent blitz on illegal houses, traders and vehicles is needed to "restore sanity" in urban areas overrun with criminals.

A few news stories shed light on the kind of "sanity" Mugabe wants:
Out in the cold: This time poor townsfolk are the butt of President Robert Mugabe's repression
What lies behind the Zimbabwe demolitions? The homes of some 200,000 Zimbabwean city dwellers have been demolished in the past three weeks, according to the United Nations.
UK urges African action on Mugabe
Zimbabwe Crackdown Condemned as Children Crushed


Lastly, Dick Durbin should reconsider his analogies: The Killing Fields of Zimbabwe

But controlling this population becomes easier all the time, as millions have fled over the past few years, over 3,000 people die every week of AIDS, and most college graduates, many of whom are activists, leave the country. The result has been an astonishing decline in the population, which is down to around 10 million from over 13 million a few years back. Not that the government minds. In August 2002, Didymus Mutasa, today the head of the secret police, said: "We would be better off with only six million people, with our own people who support the liberation struggle."

For those who remain in Zimbabwe, a Cambodian experiment awaits. Thousands of people made homeless in the government's clean-up campaign are being herded into reeducation camps and told they can have a housing plot if they swear allegiance to the party of President Robert Mugabe. Those who refuse are loaded onto trucks and dumped in remote rural areas where food is scarce. Human rights workers say they are deliberately being left to die in an effort by the Mugabe regime to exterminate opponents.
. . .
But Mugabe's grip on the country is tightening. With arms shipments from China, including heavy assault rifles, military vehicles, riot equipment, and tear gas, Mugabe isn't going anywhere. One opposition figure sounded a note of caution for those considering an uprising. "Remember these towns were built by white colonialists who were expecting insurrection and planned very effectively to counter it," she told a local newspaper. Perhaps the saddest part of the arms sales to Mugabe is that South Africa, which suffered under the kind of apartheid that Mugabe is inflicting upon his opponents, is supplying important spare parts for helicopters that will be used to suppress any significant local uprising.

(Mark Steyn notices that Mugabe's been desecrating the Koran by tearing down mosques, but Mugabe's an equal opportunity desecrator -- he tears down anything he wants to).

Where's the UN? UN official met Mugabe, says he welcomes food aid.

In praise of good manners
Today it's Deroy Murdock's turn (more details in his article),

1) We can hear you now. Even if your party cannot understand your cellular call, those around you often cannot escape your every word. What you ate for lunch and where you are standing right now is far less interesting to them than to you, so restrain your voice. Or better yet, stay off your phone when surrounded by others.
2) Excellent venues to disable cell phones include restaurants, theaters, and funerals, the last four of which I attended were interrupted by mobile phones. Also, there is nothing quite like being in a restroom while a stranger screams his life story into a handheld device.
3) Except for Dionne Warwick, we are not psychic. So, use your car's turn signals.
4) Push in your seat when leaving tables in restaurants, libraries, and conference rooms.
5) Before exiting a bathroom, close the toilet — lid and all. Leaving the lid or seat up makes the next guest contemplate whether you stood or sat during your visit. Spare him or her that imagery.
6) It remains civilized to hold open the door for someone who is walking a few steps behind you.
7) "Please" and "thank you" are not vulgarities. Use them generously, especially around children.
8) "RSVP" means, "Tell those who have invited you to an event whether you will attend." They will welcome your "yes" or regret but appreciate your "no." Not replying leaves them perplexed, unclear of how many guests to anticipate, and miffed if you eventually arrive unexpectedly.
9) Thank you notes, e-mails, and phone calls are appropriate when someone has given you a present, meal, or significant favor. Not even acknowledging a Christmas gift, in contrast, is particularly boorish.
10) Always leave your phone number with your phone messages.
11) Control your kids. It's not cute to let children run amuck on airplanes, kick the backs of people's seats, and holler uncontrollably. Teach your children to restrain themselves in public rather than terrorize grown-ups.
12) Trash cans are there for a reason.

As for item 8, RSVP, I really mean it -- in the last 4 years, every time I've had a party or dinner I've ended up calling a few people at the last moment. Please, do tell your host/hostess if you can make it or not. If you can't make it, you don't even need to come up with an excuse, just saying you can't make it is sufficient with me.

Woman loses 10 pounds on a McDonald's diet, makes a documentary
The documentary is Me & Mickey D; the woman is Soso Whaley, who

• lost a total of 28 pounds
• lowered her cholesterol from from 237 to 197, a drop of 40 points
• ate everything on the single item menu at least once during the course of the 30 days

How did she do it? With moderate exercise, making healthy choices, and staying at around 2,000 calories a day.

Kathryn Jean Lopez for NRO interviews Ms Whaley, and asks

NRO: Besides the obvious, Super-Size-Me-is-wrong/be responsible/McDonald's-can't-make-you-fat,-only-the-choices-you-make-can message, what is the overall point of your documentary?

Whaley: Simply to encourage people to take more responsibility for their own lives and to appreciate the concept of freedom of choice that we have in the U.S. I also hope to inspire people to get out and move around more. Forget about "exercising," just get out there and celebrate your life by staying busy and productive. "Eat to live, don't live to eat." — Moliere

Time to ignore the nutty nutrition guidelines, and start serving some good sense with the meals.

Not as many crazies
Paul McHugh , professor of psychiatry at Johns Hopkins University in his article A Nation of Crazy People? Overestimating mental illness in America discusses the results of recent studies that cost $20 million to the taxpayer, and supposedly showed that "55 percent of Americans suffer from mental illness in their lifetime". Dr. McHugh asks,

But this simply raises the question, Why would anyone dream that an inventory of psychic aches and pains would reliably identify mental impairments and distinguish them from the kinds of mental distresses that are part of every person's life?

McHugh considers alternatives,

They might, for example, start following people over time, as cohorts with particular life circumstances: They might consider the long-term performance of children with particular classroom-identified dispositions or children exposed to various forms of deprivation or trauma early in life, seeking to discover how these people manage the hurdles they face and which vulnerabilities to mental problems and which resiliencies they manifest in later life. Epidemiologists should attend to studies where patients with particular characteristics--such as temperament, upbringing, or stress--are compared with nonpatients with similar characteristics (so called case-control studies) testing whether these characteristics provoke, protect against, or are incidental to the patients' mental unrest or illness. They should enhance cross-cultural knowledge of how mental impairment, as opposed to mental distress, is expressed by people of differing cultures and exactly what measures help to prevent or treat the case examples.

And that tax-funded $20 million would be better spent.

Chirac looks impotent after EU summit defeat
Reuters's Timothy Heritage explains:

Two crushing failures over Europe have left French President Jacques Chirac looking impotent two years before the end of his presidency, his popularity in freefall and the economy offering no respite.

The European Union's failure to agree a long-term budget on Friday was a defeat for Chirac, who lost a bruising battle with British Prime Minister Tony Blair three weeks after French voters snubbed him by rejecting the EU's constitution on May 29.

Chirac, 72, also has little to encourage him on the economy. The big CGT union plans nationwide protests on Tuesday over pay, conditions and 10.2 percent unemployment, and economists doubt the government will attain its growth target this year.

Opposition politicians and political commentators are increasingly talking about a "fin de regne" -- the end of Chirac's reign, or grip on power, after 10 years as president.

Of course, Jacques will blame Tony: Chirac says Blair's 'intransigence' ruined EU summit. While the Financial Times says Chirac in need of de Gaulle's fortitude, a few days ago Newspapers across Europe have little good to say about France's choice of prime minister, and now the Jerusalem Post asks, Why de Villepin, of all people?. The Post's not kind to Dom (emphasis mine):

After the rejection of the European Constitution in France earlier this month, President Jacques Chirac could have either resigned or changed his government. Of course resigning was out of the question because Chirac would then have lost his immunity and most probably ended up in jail on corruption charges. Instead, he fired Premier Raffarin and replaced him with the most anti-American politician in his party: Dominique de Villepin.

In order to assess Chirac's choice, one has to closely study de Villepin's history. Indeed, his real name Dominique Marie Francois Rene Galouzeau de Villepin already defines for most people his main trait: obnoxiousness.
. . .
Lastly, when he was asked, just after the beginning of the Iraq war, who he wanted to win the war, he flatly answered: "I don't know." In light of this, de Villepin cannot be viewed as just a friend disagreeing with another friend, but rather as someone siding with our enemy. His constant obsession with a multipolar world, a counterweight to US power, and France's grandeur and prestige in the world are part of the Gallic tradition.

Regarding foreign affairs, Chirac and de Villepin are two sides of the same coin. And the Arab press, especially the daily Al Hayat, rejoiced over the nomination of the "courageous knight" who stood tall against America.

Jacques found time to compliment HAL in the Paris Air Show. Mind you, not that HAL, but the Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) display. That was last week.

Things are heating up in France, alright, including the temperatures. The other day France2 news talked about the 2003 heat wave, where 15,000 people died of heat and neglect. They showed one older woman, sitting in her apartment, where it was 90oF, receiving one of those little battery-powered fans we give kids for birthday party favors. It doesn't bide well. The 2003 catastrophe became a political one as well for the center-right government of French President Jacques Chirac, accused of responding too slowly to the crisis.

This week, in typical Jacques fashion, Chirac says France not gendarme of Africa, wants that paragon of transparency and order, the UN, to intercede in the Western Sahara in behalf of France, and calls for tax on air tickets to aid Africa. As if.

No wonder the UK's Sun says He's Jacques the wrecker.

The runaway bride's get-rich-quick wedding planner checklist:
Announce the engagement.
Send engagement notice, with a photograph, to the local newspaper.
Select wedding date.
Organize guest list as follows:1) must invite, 2) should invite, 3) nice to invite, then invite all 800 of them.
Select and reserve ceremony site.
Select and reserve the officiant.
Select and order bridal gown and headpiece.
Determine color scheme.
Select maid of honor, best man, and 15 bridesmaids and ushers.
Obtain passport, visa(s), birth certificate, if needed for marriage license or honeymoon. Read up on Matthew McConaughey.
A few days before the wedding: cash cell phone rebate check and empty old bank account.
Run off to Austin TX, but end up in Albuquerque NM via Las Vegas.
Get an agent and a lawyer.
Schedule court date(s) after being "found". Start court-ordered mental health treatment, and begin paying sherrif office for expenses incurred.
Get Katie to pay you $500,000 for interview.
Sign $500,000 book deal.
Postpone wedding date to coincide with TV movie's premiere.

ALso posted at Blogger News Network

Update From the Anchoress: Another story on a missing for 16 days soon-to-be-bride, who might be getting ten times that $500,000:

Some engaging tidbits

So here's what I'm hearing about that relationship.

A source VERY close to the deal is saying there's a contract.

It's worth $5 million.

It's for five years.

There will be no sex.

The deal was sealed June 7.

That's what I'm hearing.

The missing Holmes went to a meeting on April 11. The first link says, "The next time anyone heard from Holmes was on April 27, when she appeared in public as Cruise's girlfriend and love of his life" (enough time to coordinate their calendars for the upcoming public appearances, and to get her new clothes); the second link says, "The deal was sealed June 7."

Sounds to me like a reasonable enough amount of time to put together a pre-nup.

And nobody had to go to Albuquerque, either.

The parking-building-built-on-the-stream's cup runneth over
Those of you loyal (and hardy) enough to have visited this blog since last year would know that the downtown parking building is built smack in the middle of a stream, Harry's Brook. The building itself looks like it was built on a giant French drain.

Now the front-page story in the Packet tells us,

The company also is expected to present a solution for the water that remains in the basement of the Spring Street garage, because the borough will not allow work to begin on Building C — the proposed five-story, mixed-use building on the site of the Tulane Street parking lot — until the garage's basement is available.

And why is the garage's basement not available, you may ask?

Six feet of flooding. Seventy-two inches of H2O.

Yup, 6' of water covering the basement, which has 80 parking spaces.

Can't say I didn't see that coming.

(For what it's worth, the water can't just be pumped out since it'd bring pollutants to Harry's Brook.)

In related news,
The Packet's editor's had it up to here with the pergola.

Boy Scout found
Brennan Hawkins is back with his family.

He's earned his wilderness survival badge, but I expect his orienteering badge will need a little more work.

There's a Carnival of Classiness
at Will Franklin's, and he's included TBHB! Thank you Will.

And thank you Kathy for the linky love, too.

Slavery watch: Saudis Import Slaves to America
Daniel Pipes writes about it, (check out the links at his site)

Why is this problem so acute for affluent Saudis? Four reasons come to mind. Although slavery was abolished in the kingdom in 1962, the practice still flourishes there. Ranking Saudi religious authorities endorse slavery; for example, Sheikh Saleh Al-Fawzan insisted recently that "Slavery is a part of Islam" and whoever wants it abolished is "an infidel."

The U.S. State Department knows about the forced servitude in Saudi households and laws exist to combat this scourge but, as Mr. Mowbray argues, it "refuses to take measures to combat it." Finally, Saudis know they can get away with nearly any misbehavior. Their embassy provides funds, letters of support, lawyers, retroactive diplomatic immunity, former U.S. ambassadors as troubleshooters, and even aircraft out of the country; it also keeps pesky witnesses away.

A commenter at Mr. Pipes's site states,

Quran not only allows slavery and sex with captured women and slave girls (4.3, 4.24, 23.6, 33.50, 70.30), it says Allah may even pardon those who forced their slave girls to sell their bodies.

Quran 24.33: Force not your slave-girls to whoredom that ye may seek enjoyment of the life of the world, if they would preserve their chastity. And if one force them, then (unto them), after their compulsion, lo! Allah will be Forgiving, Merciful.

As Mark Steyn mentioned, the Quran's handled with white gloves

For example, camp guards are under instructions to handle copies of the Koran only when wearing gloves. The reason for this is that the detainees regard infidels as “unclean”. Fair enough, each to his own. But it’s one thing for the Islamists to think infidels are unclean, quite another for the infidels to agree with them. Far from being tortured, the prisoners are being handled literally with kid gloves (or simulated kid-effect gloves). The US military hand each jihadi his complimentary copy of the Koran as delicately as white-gloved butlers bringing His Lordship The Times of London.

Time to take off the white gloves, folks.

Alan Bromley proposes some "Terms of Internment".

Superb blogs, this week
The Cotillion is hosted by Fistful of Fortnights, A Mom and her blog, and Crystal Clear.

Enlighten NJ has the Carnival of the New Jersey Bloggers # 5

It's an honor to be in such company!

Regulation over common sense
Tony Blair speaks,

To make sure Britain doesn't eventually pass its own Sarbanes-Oxley, Blair lays out some simple guidelines. "Instead of the 'something must be done' cry that goes up every time there is a problem or a 'scandal,'" he says, "we will reflect first and regulate only after reflection."

Even more critically, Blair says he wants to start to roll back the regulatory state, especially in the European Union. Britain is about to assume the rotating presidency of the EU, so Blair will be in a position to act. He says he'll work to make sure cost assessments are finished before any new regulations are put into place, and that he'll speak with business leaders before changing any regulations.

"We also need a far more rational, balanced and intelligent debate as to how 'risk' is debated. Not every 'scandal' requires a regulatory response," he says, sensibly.

Let's hope he acts on his words.

The revolution rolls right along: Property rights a thing of the past in Venezuela
as Venezuela 'seizes' more ranches

The Venezuelan government has said it will confiscate a further two ranches owned by a subsidiary of UK firm Vestey as part of its land reform programme.

It is planning to hand the farms to poor workers under a law enabling the state to confiscate land declared idle or without historic ownership titles.

Meanwhile, El Nuevo Herald continues to investigate PDVSA. Via Venezuela’s PDVSA Investigated for Making Double Payment in the Millions. Hugo's revolution rolls right along.

On a different country, but a very interesting article, Bolivia: an 'indigenous revolution'? Some Westerners view recent Latin American protests through rose-tinted spectacles, by Josie Appleton brings up an interesting point,

Whence comes Western radicals' starry-eyed account of the Bolivian protests? Less from Bolivia, perhaps, than from their own backyard. The habit of looking for revolution overseas has long been a tendency on the Left. Disillusioned with their own working class, they often went searching for a readymade revolution in the mountains of Nicaragua or Bolivia. Today, with domestic politics less attractive than ever, they chase more keenly after far-off uprisings.

It always helps if there is a nice cultural myth to go with it, such as Sandino in the case of Nicaragua or Tupac Katari in the case of Bolivia. This gives the movement a romantic, and inevitable, feel to it. It's not just about the nitty gritty of political struggle, but about a spirit repressed over centuries rising again. Then there's the fact that it's not your country, so if it all goes wrong you can just get the next plane out. It's possible to pursue the fantasy of revolution, avoiding any uncomfortable realities.

However, some of those lining up with today's Bolivian protests are not just disillusioned with politics at home - they've never really tried it. People who might skirt around their local estate because it's too rough will nonetheless happily march alongside Bolivian peasants in opposition to US policy. Theirs is a middle-class anti-Westernism, a suspicion of big business and big development. It's a fantasy of return to a simpler, cleaner life, away from the mess of burgers and MTV. The call to 'restore the Inca nation' strikes a chord.

But the Incas can't show the way forward, as most of the Bolivian protesters seem all too aware. If we were to draw a lesson from events in Bolivia, it might be that there is the will, but not yet the way. Today's political situation provides new opportunities, but activists find it difficult to make the most of them. The failure of political vocabulary afflicts Bolivian ex-miners just as much as it does political movements in the West. All of us - Bolivians and British alike - need to grapple with that problem over the coming years. Western leftists would do better to face up to the reality of politics today, than to fix their misty-eyed gaze on the Andes.

Or anywhere else.

Following up on the in-state tuition status for illegal aliens story,
Elighten NJ fisks the NYT's cornball tale of the Navarros.

Is Batman Republican?
We went to see Batman Begins yesterday, and it turned out to be a good choice for Father's Day, since one of its themes is a son living up to his father's memory.

The movie starts with young Bruce Wayne losing his parents to a murderer (not the Joker) right outside the opera, where a bat-like scene in Faust (no relation to me!) spooked him. Wallowing in self-blame, an older Bruce drops out of Princeton -- where I assume he was in the Engineering school because of his interest in materials science and how things work -- and joins a Bhutanese crime gang, which promptly lands him in the kind of prison that gives Dick Durbin nightmares. Bruce is saved by Liam Neeson, and becomes the Karate Kid to Liam's Jedi training. I could swear I saw Samuel L. Jackson do a cameo as a jedi ninja.

As the plot progresses, a question does arise: Is Batman Republican?

The clues are many:

• Bruce owns a gun, and, as Batman, carries weapons
• Bruce beat Ah Ghul, which Liam consistently pronounces as AlGore.
• The Wayne family carries a tradition of privately financing public projects, such as an extensive elevated city rail system
• Fox likes Batman
• Bruce believes in creating private wealth, and makes his butler Alfred (played by the magnificent Michael Caine) rich
• Like Giuliani, Bruce/Batman's a law and order guy and wants the mob out of the big city
• Batman won't be handling criminals with kid gloves. His gloves are armored, and made for fighting.
• Bruce/Batman certainly believes in private initiatives, particularly when it comes to dealing with crime and public corruption.

However, the two most telling clues are:

• After making a lot of money at Halliburton Wayne Industries, Bruce went to serve his country city
• Batman believed the bad guys had WMDs, and fought them

The movie has a lot in its favor, particularly the British actors Michael Caine, Gary Oldman and Tom Wilkinson. The Arthurian Quest subtext is nice, as Batman is known as the Dark Knight. Christian Bale does well and looks great within and without the Batman suit. He honors Michael Keanton's whispering Batman and even looks like him once he dons the suit. The film is enjoyable enough that you consider as homage things that would be called derivate of other films, such as the already-mentioned Karate Kid, Star Wars' Jedis, Spiderman2's elevated trains, and James Bond's gadget man Q, because the story is built nicely around these.

Car enthusiasts will love the Maserati-Hummer-tank Batmobile. As Gary Oldman's character said, "I want one!" Correction Commenter Tom With A Dream clarifies Gary's line was "I gotta get me one of those!"

Now, about Katie Holmes's penchant for men hiding behind beards masks . . .

In-state tuition status for illegal aliens
The Trenton Democrats want to grant in-state tuition status to illegal immigrants.

Last Tuesday Enlighten NJ pointed out that NJ spends $1.5 billion annually educating the children of illegal immigrants, and asked,

Why do we allow illegal aliens to live in New Jersey in the first place and why do we seek to reward illegal behavior with goods and services, at taxpayer expense, to those that have no rightful claim? Whether New Jersey was rolling in dough or facing bankruptcy, as it is now, why should illegal aliens be given anything besides a one-way ticket back to their home country?

Yesterday the NY Times had the article For Illegal Immigrants, a Harsh Lesson:

Currently, about 60,000 high school students who have spent nearly their entire lives in the United States are considered illegal immigrants, according to the Urban Institute, a research organization in Washington. And because 56 percent of them are from low-income families, the cost of college is out of reach.

One solution is embodied in the In-State Tuition Act, first introduced in the New Jersey Legislature in 2003, which would allow illegal immigrants like Mr. Navarro to attend public colleges at in-state tuition rates. Without legal status, these students, who currently number about 28,000, are charged out-of-state rates that are prohibitively expensive for most of their struggling families.

To qualify for in-state status, according to the legislation, students would have to prove that they had attended a New Jersey high school for at least four years and planned to apply for citizenship.

Well, play me the world's smallest violin. Throughout their entire schooling, those children, whose families are breaking immigration law, have benefited from one of the most expensive public schools systems in the world (emphasis mine):

The issue is particularly pressing in New Jersey, which has the fifth-largest immigrant population in the nation. Some migration studies say that as many as 500,000 residents are illegal immigrants, although the real numbers are hard to determine because these immigrants live largely in the shadows for fear of deportation. They often shuttle among low-wage jobs as cooks, construction workers and janitors. Their children tend to attend low-performing schools and drop out early to help their families scratch out a living.

Even so, their children are integrated in the public schools, which by law are not allowed to question a family's immigration status.

What the NYT article doesn't consider is the following,
Student A, illegally in this country would get reduced rates for college tuition, and would qualify for financial aid on top of that discount.
Student B, here legally but a native of the same country as student A, was raised from the age of 3 in NJ but her family recently had to move to Pennsylvania due to the high NJ taxes, which subsidize students like A. Her parents work in NJ but the family lives outside NJ just across the Delaware and commute daily. Student B wouldn't qualify for in-state tuition status.

And State Senator Ronald Rice is saying, "We are who we are and cannot say no to students just because of where they were born". Why not, Senator?

" . . . They stole our eyes!"
Hans Bricks has a post on the latest propaganda TV station, Telesur, one of Hugo's expensive projects. Hans quotes Telesur's new director general, Aram Aharonian,

In the centuries since the Spaniards invaded the New World, Aharonian continues, Latin Americans have been "trained to see ourselves with foreign eyes…. Now, 513 years later, we are recovering the possibility of seeing ourselves with our eyes."

Having been born and raised in Puerto Rico, as a descendant of Spaniards I was subjected from early in my life to the blame game. If I had $5 for every time I heard the Spaniards pointedly being blamed for whatever, I'd be living in the mythical $2.2 million house Forbes was writing about.

The Spaniards (Spain relinquished Puerto Rico in 1898, so we're talking old blames here) were blamed for everything: poverty, ignorance, slavery, drunken Catholic priests, obnoxious nuns, traditional architecture, and on and on, down the weather and the high cost of airplane fare to the Mother Land, Spain. At the same time, everything Spanish, from little girls taking flamenco lessons, boys forced to learn to play the mandolin (thank goodness nobody was made to learn the bagpipe!), to annual visits by the Juan Sebastián Elcano tall ship and the singing Chavales de España, were immensely popular. Anybody who claimed Spanish ancestry would belong to the Casa de España. At Christmas time the children playing shepherds at the Nativity were dressed in traditional Spanish shepherd costume, not in Middle Eastern style. Everybody, including -- and starting with -- the Spain-blamers, who could put together (i.e., borrow) enough money would travel to Spain and come back loaded with souvenirs and stories of good times, wonderful places and great food. Spain was the second country of choice for those wanting to attend college outside the island.

It begs to ask, why did they want to go to Spain, if it was to be blamed for everything?

Of course the blame game wasn't limited to the Spaniards. The USA -- and of especially, that bête noir of Marxists, the CIA -- was to be blamed for everything, too. The difference was that Spain didn't have much of an international presence in foreign affairs, but the USA did. As a result, there are more Puerto Ricans living in the mainland USA than in the island.

Looks like Aharonian's an expert at the game. At least this is the first time I heard the Spaniards blamed for "taking our eyes". The question is, will the blame game play in the South American equivalent of Paducah to support a TV station? And what will it mean to the tourism and immigration industries?

Happy father's day!

Dan Rhiel's going to be on Fox tonight
Fox News Channel, Saturday, 9PM EDT.
Go to his blog and wish him good luck.

What It Costs to Live Well: Northeast
Forbes has an article that tells you.

We tabulated the annual costs for a family of four [the "Fictionals"]with one child in a private college and one in eighth grade and attending a private school. If your kids aren't college-age yet, this gives you a chance to plan ahead. Our fictional clan has two houses--one in a nice neighborhood and one in the country or at the beach.

The chose Englewood NJ for their comparison. Their numbers may be a little off here in Princeton. Not to feel sorry for anyone, but that family's going to need more than $338,800, mostly because of local and state taxes.

Let's look at the numbers.

If, and only if, the employer's paying at least half of the medical coverage premiums and the family of four uses only those medical care providers fully covered by their plan, they don't have to cover a deductible (which usually runs $500/per person per year, for a total of $2,500/family), coinsurance and/or copays, then I can see their spending only $4,400/yr on health care; but you'd have to add to that the cost of eyeglasses (which most plans don't cover) if they need them, which can easily be $300-$400 per person -- as long as you don't get fancy. However, if they're self-employed, the medical insurance premiums alone will cost over $1,000/month, $12,000/yr at a minimum, plus deductibles/coinsurance/copays. For people over 50, the premiums are higher.

The Forbes article shows a measly 14.7%/yr in local taxes, including "various types of property, income, sales and auto taxes". A family living in a $2,200,000 house in either the Borough or the Township will be paying at least $50,000/yr in local real estate and school taxes. Since that's 14.7% of the family's estimated $338,000/yr income (and it doesn't count the taxes on the $1,200,000 Cape May vacation house), it looks like the folks at Forbes forgot to add the 8.97% state income tax. $338,000 x .0897 = $30,318.60
Since the Forbes tax amounts include "include various types of property, income, sales and auto taxes", and I'm only looking at real estate taxes on their primary home and state income tax, their numbers in this category are woefully short. Their tax bill would be closer to $100,000/yr, nearly a third of their annual income, not including federal taxes. At their income level they'd be likely subject to the dreaded Alternate Minimum Tax (correct me if I'm wrong), and can't use the usual real estate interest deductions on their Federal returns.

The Forbes study assumes the family of four has "one child in a private college and one in eighth grade and attending a private school." Looking at tuitions, the Englewood amount shown is $23,000; locally, the average private school tuition for 8th grade is closer to $18,000-$20,000. The Forbes study shows $30,300 for college, but if you look at Princeton University, that's $41,000/yr.

The Fictionals, as Forbes calls their family, at the very least would need to forgo the annual weekend trip to Paris and the new Beemer. They would be well advised to sell the Cape May vacation house. As the Forbes article puts it, "We are not talking about great riches".

Update While on the subject of taxation, Deroy Murdock proposes a The H.O.T. Tax, or Higher-rate Optional Tax.

A brief post on Iran
Brutality Still Reigns in Iran

In fact, three of the presidential candidates could be prosecuted for involvement in the assassination of Iranian dissidents inside and outside Iran.
. . .
Despite evidence of increasing human rights abuse, and the fact that the government cares about how such abuse is viewed by the outside world and by Iranians, Western pressure on the Iranian regime has weakened recently. Western representatives in Geneva decided, for example, not to call for a "special rapporteur" on human rights in Iran during the last meeting of the U.N. Commission on Human Rights. Officially, the reasoning was pragmatic: One U.S. diplomat explained that a rapporteur would get nowhere in Iran, since Iranian authorities would deny him a visa. But human rights activists in Geneva believe that the reluctance to investigate may be motivated by a desire to mute criticism of Iran while nuclear talks continue.

Contrast that with the Beeb's Iran's politicians get image savvy article. It's all done with mirrors, I guess.

As for the "elections", No Candidate Wins Majority in Iranian Presidential Election, Forcing a Second Round

Note to prospective robbers
Don't burst into a beauty shop hollering "Get down big momma"

Big momma might do just that. And things might get funky.

New Bad Hair Blog category: Men I used to think were handsome
Starting the list, Bruce Jenner

Krauthammer on assimilation
English spoken here: Cutting bilingual ed is the key to forcing immigrants to assimilate

The key to assimilation of course, is language. The real threat to the United States is not immigration per se, but bilingualism and, ultimately, biculturalism. Having grown up in Canada, where a language divide is a recurring source of friction and fracture, I can only wonder at those who want to duplicate that plague in the United States.

The good news is that the vogue for bilingual education is now waning. It has been abolished by referendum in California, Arizona and even Massachusetts.

As the results in California have shown with Hispanic children, it delays assimilation by perhaps a full generation. Those in "English immersion" have more than twice the rate of English proficiency of those in the "bilingual" system (being taught other subjects in Spanish while being gradually taught English).

By all means we should try to control immigration. Nonetheless, given our geography, our tolerant culture and the magnetic attraction of our economy, illegals will always be with us. Our first task, therefore, should be abolishing bilingual education everywhere, and requiring that our citizenship tests have strict standards for English language and American civics.

The way to prevent European-like immigration catastrophes is to turn every immigrant - and most surely his children - into an American. Who might one day grow up to be our next Zalmay Khalilzad [US Ambassador to Afghanistan].

I heartily agree with Dr. Krauthammer. Not only with his position on language, but also on civics, with an emphasis on values, as I said last March: But I do know that all children need structure, and that values are the foundation of that structure, here in the USA or anywhere in the world.

Who killed Paul Klebnikov?
Last year I posted on the Klebnikov murder:

The Russian authorities have described Mr. Klebnikov's death as a contract killing, and have said it appeared connected to his journalism. Some of those who were sources for his articles said they knew of no work that would have made him a target.

Let's see: There's the list of Russia's 100 richest people, which, according to Boris Berezovky "To publish this list is like sending a letter to the prosecutor's office". There's Mr. Klebnikov's second book, Conversation With a Barbarian, which dealt with organized crime in Russia's continuing war in Chechnya. The book, according to The Economist, "in which he made a passionate appeal to Europeans to defend Christian civilisation against Islamic extremism, can have earned him no friends in Chechnya". Let's not forget last year's Forbes cover article on Iran's Millionaire Mullahs: A looming nuclear threat to the rest of the world, Iran is robbing its own people of prosperity. But the men at the top are getting extremely rich". Additonally, the obituary at The Economist points out that

NTV, the last national television station to show any independence of spirit, has in effect been taken over by the state. Its programme “Freedom of Speech”, the only balanced political talk-show on Russian television, was given its final airing a few hours before Mr Klebnikov's killing. Neither has Russia become safer for journalists: 15 have now been killed since 2000. No one has been brought to book for any of their murders.

As The Economist puts it, "In short, the array of possible suspects in Mr Klebnikov's murder is long".

Now Russia prosecutor says Chechen militant ordered murder of Forbes editor

A Chechen rebel leader ordered the killing of the editor of the Russian edition of US business magazine Forbes, Russia's prosecutor general's office said, as cited by Interfax.

The prosecutor general's office named Chechen resident Khozh-Akhmed Nukhayev -- a key figure in Chechnya's underground militant government -- as the man who ordered the killing of American journalist Paul Klebnikov in July, 2004.

Nukhayev 'offered members of a criminal group a reward for the killing of

P Klebnikov', in retaliation for negative comments in Klebnikov's writings about the Chechen leader, Interfax quoted a prosecutor's office source as saying.

Oleg Panfilov, the director of the Center for Journalism in Extreme Situations, doubts that claim

Mr. Klebnikov's crusading reporting was believed to have disquieted many in Russia, making the list of those with motives a long one.

"The Chechen trace was one of the leading versions literally in the first hours after his death," Mr. Panfilov said in a telephone interview. "I immediately had doubts because all crimes are always blamed on Chechens, and I think what happened today is a continuation of what happened when Paul was killed."

He's not alone: Relatives of Late Forbes Editor Klebnikov Cast Doubt Over Chechen Involvement

However, there were other theories. Russian Forbes had made a list of the 100 richest people in Russia, and some businessmen put in the list could have been upset at the publicity. Another suspect was Russian fugitive tycoon Boris Berezovsky also due to a book Klebnikov wrote about him. Kalinin added that Klebnikov “was afraid and hid himself from” Berezovsky after having written that book, The history of Russia’s Plundering.

“Berezovsky was furious and said he would not let it lie. And Pavel, who knew his methods, understood those were not empty words.”

Calling Martin Cruz Smith, and Roger L. Simon . . .

Also posted at Blogger News Network.