So, you're saying the mom of the videotaped little hissy-fit girl is a tad seedy?
Hard to believe.
It's good to have a working knowledge of canine body language.
Note the flattening of the ears and licking of the lips of the dog in this video.
He's saying, "I'm afraid! I want my space!"
Poor little guy.
Bonus anatomy knowledge:
The jaws of some dogs can encompass the entire human face.
I finally got a copy of the book I'm in. As everything was positive, it was fun seeing my name in the index and having two pages concerning my thoughts on the South and Southern music.
Did I like the book? No, I did not. Looking at the reviews, I see I'm not the only one.
My mini-review: It's more of the same "Evil Southerners" crap- only this time it comes with a soundtrack.
The Fall of Saigon Marine Association website is packed with first-person accounts from the Marines stationed at the American Embassy in Saigon on April 29-30, 1975, during Operation Frequent Wind.
These are interesting tales from the men who were there, including the last Marine in Saigon, MSGT John Valdez. His account is straight-forward, but with no radio contact and it having been hours since the last helicopter arrival, they had resigned themselves to the same fate of the defenders of the Alamo.
The Marines of Frequent Wind behaved bravely in a very bad situation. Good job, guys.
Even though Sergeant Hasan Akbar has been given the death sentence for his grenade attack on fellow soldiers, it doesn't look likely he'll be executed. There hasn't been an execution at Leavenworth's death row in 44 years.
Michelle Malkin has more on Hasan's victims.
I'm looking to buy a new vacuum cleaner and I need advice.
Just kidding.
There is a war on, after all.
The Fort Myers News Press has someone blogging his family's going without television for a week. Check it out, it's as good as Lileks. The only difference is there're two boys playing the role of "Gnat", and there's a wife who is chronicled as actually interacting with her family. Good stuff!
UPDATE:
They have finished their TV-less week and the husband is now happily back to channel-surfing, watching each channel for no more than a minute and a half.
It's hard to believe, but it's been six months since Lilly came home with me.
I knew the first few months would be rough as we got things worked out in the household, and it has been. Everybody has had to make adjustments. But I also knew things would eventually work out, and they have.
My first concern was all her physical problems. These have finally been resolved after lots of trial and error and a dozen visits to the vet. She's very much a big, healthy, glossy German Shepherd from the waist up. I'm thinking about getting her a wheelchair, the dirtbike version, for her to use outside on our walks. It's going to have to have a handbrake I can set in emergencies, or she'll use it as her Panzer to invade Poland. She's just as strong-willed as she is strong.
Then it was on to her emotional problems. My vet's response to my request for an appraisal of her personality was "She's a good dog who needs training." Getting her training, I asked her behavioralist what was stronger in her nature- her will for power or her will to serve. He shook his head at me, patted my hand and said, "You don't have to worry about that. This dog wants to serve." This was my inexperience speaking as I dealt with my first non-passive dog.
So, I work on her training every day. As I type this, I have treats in my pocket and a clicker next to my computer.
For all my worries about her, Mr. Cracker summed up her nature best. His grandmother asked him the other day how the new dog was doing. He said, "She's a happy girl."
She is.
When the credits roll for this flick(a), I don't guess we'll be seeing the American Humane Association's's disclaimer about "No animals were harmed during the making of this motion picture."
Come to think of it, there were some movies I've seen where that was the best line.
Marc at With Cheese wants a life like an album cover. He didn't ask for suggestions, but he's going to get some.
This, btw, is not the album-cover life I'd choose for myself.
As a boy, Ace used to have a recurrent dream where his life started out being like this album cover, but somehow ended like this one.
He'd wake up both excited and confused.
Although repeatedly billed as a missing "Florida" girl, or a missing "Bradenton" girl, our latest Amber alert was actually for a missing 12-year-old Mexican illegal alien. Margarita Aguilar-Lopez was taken by her illegal alien brothers' young illegal alien friend. Thankfully, she's been found safe, in South Carolina. It's unknown at this point whether she went willingly.
In court it's going to go worse for the man that he took the girl over the state line. As for that big line between the US and Mexico, he'll be dropped on the other side of it upon release from prison; but unless citizens stay active at the border, there's not much to stop him from coming back.
The brothers did not attend the news conference announcing her safe retrieval and were described as being indifferent to her disappearance.
I don't know much about Tim Kaine, the Democratic candidate for governor of Virginia, but one thing about him I do know: he considers a high-pitched voice to be the sign of a weak, ineffectual leader. In truth, he's pretty much monomaniacal on the issue.
Don't even whisper the name Paul Lynde around this guy.
UPDATE:
In Instablogese the above post would read: "Salt Lick has some thoughts."
Lightning has struck twice for Gordon Lightfoot as yet another maritime mishap leads to songwriting gold. With chilling lyrics like the following, I expect Lightfoot to win multiple Juno awards for this effort:
The first floor called in, we’ve got water coming in
And our red Berber carpet’s a smartin’
The crew said not to dread, put the luggage on the bed
Go to Lido cause bingo’s a startin’
While it is true that every Canadian musician receives multiple Juno awards, to be fair, the category "Instrumental Album - Group - Kids Playing The Triangle" is pretty competitive.
(Via Blame Bush.)
Here's Duane working on his slide during the Aretha Franklin sessions.
Wail on, Skydog!
Offended by a new unauthorized biography of Steve Jobs published by John Riley and Sons, Apple Computer Inc. will remove all Riley books from their 104 stores.
They'll replace Riley's famous "Zoo" series of computer books with copies of Macs for Dummies, The Complete Idiot's Guide to Macs, The Simpleton Takes a Crack at Macs, The Flaming Retard Gawps at Mac, and The Employee Making Eye-Contact with Me in the Elevator Will Get a Pinkslip on His Desk by the End of the Day's Guide to Macs.
David Carpenter, an applicant for the Florida Highway Patrol, blew his chances after he lead the FHP on a high-speed chase on his motorcycle, blazing it in the wrong direction through rush-hour traffic on the freeway, forcing them to track him via helicopter, and generally acting like a fool.
They followed him to his apartment complex, but didn't know if the man they now saw washing his car was the right guy. His dog gave him up- when the dog moved aside the verticals to bark at them, the troopers saw the motorcycle inside the room.
They told the now-arrested man not to bother showing up for his physical.
They don't call it "God's country" for nothing:
(Thanks, Gmac.)
It's kind of late in the game, but Mr. Clinton finally has the father he always wanted:
Family and friends who say the improbable love fest between George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton is totally genuine still can't refrain from occasionally rolling their eyes.
Barbara Bush, the 41st president's tart-tongued wife, calls them the Odd Couple. Florida Gov. Jeb Bush now refers to the Democrat who ended his father's political career as "Bro."
A close friend of the Bush family spoke for many partisans on both sides of the political divide last week by musing, "It's a good development for the country - but it sure is a strange development. I'm a little speechless."
And President George W. Bush, who created this tag-team mismatch by naming his immediate predecessors joint envoys for U.S. tsunami relief efforts, brought down the house at Washington's A-list Gridiron Club dinner last month by mentioning Clinton's recent surgery.
"When he woke up he was surrounded by his loved ones: Hillary, Chelsea and my Dad," Bush deadpanned.
It's a sweet story- don't pick at it; just enjoy it.
---
The emerging warm friendship between the Oscar and Felix of American politics, who now call themselves Bill and George and have even begun telephoning one another for advice, is that rarest of commodities: a good-news story amid the partisan rancor of an increasingly polarized capital city."I'm enjoying the relationship, and to be honest with you I didn't think I would," Bush recently told the New York Daily News.
Once bitter political foes with minimal regard for each other, the 80-year-old Bush and 58-year-old Clinton have forged surprisingly close ties, a who-would-have-thought development helped along by a parallel thaw between Clinton and the current President Bush.
"This is definitely for real," a top aide to one of the exes said. "We thought the relationship would come to an end with the tsunami. It certainly didn't."
That's an understatement. Clinton has rearranged a busy West Coast schedule to appear with the elder Bush in Houston next month, and more joint events are in the works. The two talk regularly, and their staffs are in almost daily contact. They've golfed together, sat side by side at the Super Bowl, and cut TV spots appealing for tsunami contributions.
The News also has learned that Clinton will speak at the Bush library at Texas A&M University this fall. A reciprocal visit to the Clinton library will surely follow, and last week Clinton told The News he's looking forward to golfing with Bush in Maine this summer.
"They really have been having a great time together," Sen. Hillary Clinton told The News.
Aides and friends to both admit being confounded by the relationship. Except for graduating from Yale and sharing a secret fondness for ribald humor, there is little in their DNA to suggest such chumminess.
A former Clinton assistant thinks their membership in the country's most exclusive all-male club is at the core of the thaw. "This is a fraternity even more exclusive than Skull and Bones," the aide noted, referring to the mysterious Yale society that counts both Presidents Bush among its members.
It's a sign of their mutual affection that the elder Bush has resorted to what he usually derides as "psychobabble" to try to explain the relationship.
"Maybe I'm the father he never had," Bush recently speculated, referring to the fact that Clinton's father died in an automobile accident before the future president was born.
Advisers to both men scoff at cynics who allege the relationship is politically motivated, yet concede that the former leaders - as well as President Bush and Hillary Clinton - benefit from their detente.
"They're trying to move Hillary to the center for 2008, and this helps de-demonize her and her husband," a longtime Bush confidant said.
Similarly, a veteran of the Clinton White House argued that reaching out to Clinton helps the current President Bush by softening the perception his policies have divided the country.
"It gives Clinton back some legitimacy," the source said, "but Bush knows Clinton is still popular and has a lot of international goodwill that can be helpful to Bush. It's good all-around PR."
Several sources say this mutual-inoculation society began building below the political radar last June, when the younger Bush - who ended every 2000 campaign speech by vowing to restore dignity to a scandal-tarnished Oval Office - made extremely gracious remarks when Clinton's portrait was unveiled at the White House.
More recently, the elder Bush has told friends he appreciates that Clinton refrained from blasting his son's Social Security reform plan and strongly supported U.S.-backed elections in Iraq.
By all accounts, the friendship blossomed on their whirlwind March visit to Asian nations hammered by the tsunami. Clinton insisted the octogenarian Bush take the stateroom, with its full-sized bed, on their 757 government jet.
Touched by Clinton's deference, Bush stretched out while Clinton slept on the floor - on a comfy Tempur-Pedic mattress Bush brought along for his younger predecessor.
"President Bush's energy and stamina really impressed me during our travels together," Clinton reminisced to The News. "Thanks to my own health problems, I was the tired one after a long day of work! Now that I've had my surgery, maybe I stand a better chance of being able to keep up with him."
Since the Asian trip, the two former leaders of the free world have often seemed joined at the hip. Only the most rabid Bush and Clinton haters could object.
"Here we are in one of the ugliest times in American politics, and something good like this happens," a former senior government official said. "It sends an awfully positive signal."
Ken Gosline, an Amityville police officer who was on the scene investigating the multiple murders that spawned the book and movies, says the real horror never made it to the screen; and what did is, surprise, a whole lot of nonsense.
There's another anniversary today. It's a sad one, but in the end it was the catalyst that got us to get our act together. 25 years ago today, Operation Eagle Claw put paid to the limp, lame, soft-spoken-but-no-stick-holding presidency of James Earl Carter.
We'd had as much of Jimmy Carter, and of defeat, as we could possibly bear.
This month marks the 30th anniversary of Operation Babylift, the airlifting of almost 3,000 orphaned children out of Vietnam before the fall. It was a bright spot in the abbreviated presidency of Gerald Ford, and I remember being very proud of his decision to do this.
Also, this week, the 30th anniversary of Pan-Am executive Al Topping's shoe-horning of every Vietnamese Pan-Am employee and their family members onto the last plane out of Saigon. He covered the irregular procedure by writing that he was adopting them all. That's a good boss.
In the latest in the Sun-Sentinel's investigation of FEMA fraud, it turns out that FEMA's "first line of accountability", its inspectors, include an amazing high number of convicted criminals:
Government inspectors entrusted to enter disaster victims' homes and verify damage claims include criminals with records for embezzlement, drug dealing and robbery, a South Florida Sun-Sentinel investigation has found.
Federal officials have pointed to the inspectors as their primary defense against accusations of widespread fraud for their payout of more than $31 million in Hurricane Frances disaster aid in Miami-Dade -- a county spared hurricane-force winds.
In other words, criminals were inspecting the homes of liars, and idiots were signing the checks.
Be sure to check out the rest of the series: "Cashing in on Disaster." This is Pulitzer material.
A Canadian singer tried to wing "The Star-Spangled Banner." That was a mistake.
As they say, one day she'll laugh about it:
Friday night was certainly one to forget for Caroline Marcil of Montreal.
The singer was slated to perform the national anthems prior to the United States' 5-4 exhibition hockey win over Canada. However, she sang neither after twice failing to complete the Star Spangled Banner when she seemingly forgot the words.
After apologizing to the crowd, Marcil left the ice and headed back towards the dressing room - to a smattering of boos from the Quebec Coliseum crowd of 7,166 - presumably to get the words.
But when the young woman returned to the ice, the carpet slipped out from underneath her, causing Marcil to fall hard. After lying motionless on the ice for a few seconds, she left on her own and television replays showed a despondent Marcil being consoled in the hallway adjacent to the ice surface.
To add insult to injury, since it was a cappella, she couldn't even blame the drummer.
Has it been 35 years already? Don't you miss the days when a fat, really smelly hippie could be a national celebrity?
Ira Einhorn, the Unicorn Killer.
Sometimes you just gotta get out on the town and pound a few.
Jaeesha's having a hissy and she doesn't like to be cuffed.
I salute all our educators.
Wouldn't you cross the street to avoid passing this guy? If you live in N. Ft. Myers you might have the opportunity, as Frank the molester has been paroled to your area.
I'm a short little guy with short little eyes.
UPDATE:
Ocala's down one of theirs- a suicide found clutching one of the flyers the neighbors put up.
I think everybody's just so damn fed up with this mess.
They'll be doing lifetime probation and tracking devices on predators, but if you have to monitor them forever, they ought to just stay in prison.
I hear North Brother Island is available. Typhoid Mary found the accomodations there to be satisfactory.
Here's more proof that the most dangerous man in a child's life is mommy's new boyfriend.
The mother in this story has her own version of family tradition going: the baby of boyfriend A is beaten half to death by boyfriend B. The baby of boyfriend B is beaten to death by boyfriend C. The kids would probably have preferred she make pancakes every Saturday and leave it at that.
The mother's relatives are shocked that boyfriend C, an unemployed ex-con with a long history of violent crime, could do such a thing.
Although she did her part to bring about the child's death, you know she isn't going to see the inside of a jail. It's a pity, as at least it would stop her from breeding for a while.
While it was gauche for Sen. Richard Durbin to crack an assassination joke at the dedication of the Lincoln museum, it doesn't have anything to do with what political party anybody's a member of. Let's be honest: who hasn't cracked a joke about the Lincoln assassination? How can the line "Besides that, Mrs. Lincoln, how was the play?" not make you smile? Am I to believe none of you would ever make a gunshot noise in the Hall of Presidents at Disney as Lincoln stands up?
(My cousin got Kennedy and Garfield too, but forgot about McKinley.)
Durbin's comments were tacky and out of place, but I see no partisan slam. Let's wait and get mad about something else.
Matt at Overtaken By Events offers a thought-provoking post on bloggers sucking up.
He recommends restraint, as not to appear so obvious about it.
I say what the heck, what's the long-term harm in a little ebullient obsequiousness? Later on you can always hang out on street corners blowing winos until you get your self-respect back.
Here's Duane with the Allman Joys in Pensacola backing up a cute little local trio called the Sandpipers.
That audience is pretty groovy, no?
Wail on, Skydog!
That new Microsoft blogging software is just a little too helpful.
And sneaky. How the heck did it get my pic?
UPDATE:
Clippy the Microsoft Office Paperclip: The E! True Hollywood Story.
(Via Paulie.)
Here's Randall, a recently-released child molester with a N. Ft. Myers zipcode. His release flyer notes the following:
Scars, Marks, Tattoos: Scar Head:Old Scars From Bolts/Fx Neck; Scar Left Foot:Old Incision From Toe Reattachment; Tattoo Left Arm:Stan; Tattoo Left Chest:Jennifer; Tattoo Right Arm:Stan.
Call me crazy, but I think that in the Big House he was the bitch of some guy named "Stan."
Will he be a dream?...mmmm. Or a dud?...ewww.
(Via Michelle.)
UPDATE:
It's Joseph Ratzinger. He has chosen the name Benedict XVI.
UPDATE:
Hah. The new Pope is striking fear into the hearts of worldly Christians everywhere.
Good deal. That's his job.
"The heart of man is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: ~Who can know it?" Jer. 17:9.
As I got my hobblin' goblin peanut butter shot, AKA an immune-system-boosting gamma globulin injection, on the way out to Saudi, little did I know that at the same time some fool would be thinking the medics had just installed a computer chip in his buttcheek.
Hateful and stupid is a bad combination.
Michelle Malkin has the news round-up on the anniversary.
The Minuteman Project is looking like a grand success.
One thing I'm curious about: what's it to the ACLU if citizens monitor the border? Do they also find neighborhood crime watch groups alarming? Are they the Mexican Civil Liberties Union now? Also, at what point did the ACLU become a bunch of stupid dopers?
Nothing dispels the aura of law and integrity like sending 60's rejects to represent you.
Sobek Pundit releases the first image of the vessel wherein uber-feminist Andrea Dworkin will be having her eternal beauty sleep.
Go with Gaia, Andrea!
Read this book if you'd like to understand why the more someone presents a blog to me as "A-list", the less inclined I am to ever go there.
Or ask John Kerry what he gleaned about Southern culture during our recent election.
Weird and interesting reading in parts one and two of a continuing series on Charles Meade's doomsday cult in Lake City.
When I first got to my unit in 1990, there was a newspaper article taped up on a file cabinet about several members of the unit who some years earlier had gone AWOL to join this very cult.
This a nasty, violent bunch who are killing people's dogs and cats and scaring the hell out of the whole town.
For you single mothers who enjoyed the humorous Mommy Brings Home Strange Men, be sure to get the sequels: Mommy, How Come I'm Not Safe In My Own Bed?; Mommy, Why Is Dick More Important To You Than Your Kids?; and Mommy, After Your Sex Offender Boyfriend Murders Me, Will You Cry At My Funeral?
Rest in peace, Amanda Brown, Jetseta Gage, Sarah Lunde, and all the other little kids killed by what mommy dragged home.
At work I saw a young man with a big booger hanging out of his nose. I stared at it, repulsed, before at last realizing it was a nose stud. Then I started laughing because it still pretty much looked like a big booger.
I don't think this was the look he was going for.
The Waiter meets his share of these unfortunates, as well, but he usually finds a way to make a profit out of the encounter.
The latest awardees of the Carnegie heroism medal have been announced. Their stories make a welcome change from the usual tales of people behaving badly.
And since I'm fond of posting about heroic dogs, I'll balance it out with this article on two dogs who were quite naughty.
There is a book I once read that I'd like to find again if I could only remember the title. In it, the skeletons of dead people form armies and begin killing all the living.
One of the major characters is pregnant, the baby dies in the womb, and after a few days it becomes of those hateful things, with very unfortunate results for the mom.
Kind of like the baby in this commercial for Carl's Jr. hamburgers.
From that old Cheeto under the sofa cushion to Chicken Cordon Bleu: Shiloh and Lilly find life delicious.
This eulogy is so moving it brought tears to my eyes. It's really a celebration of the life of a uncompromising woman who lived her beliefs every day:
Andrea would pay for her purchases in Susan B. Anthony dollars, refusing any change offered. The exchange of coinage minted with the faces of men was just a another form of rape, like the metallic phalluses the men of the city installed on every block to taunt her. With every hydrant she passed, it felt like being raped a thousand times. Every parking meter was like being raped another thousand times. Lamposts, about three hundred times. Despite their inappropriate names, the mailboxes were actually vaginas, so she had no qualms with them until some MAN came along and thrust a letter inside one. Occasionally, she'd watch as a line of men formed to take turns gleefully violating the mailvagina, until a pimp in a mailMAN outfit would came along and start scooping offspring out its brutalized womb.
She was so very brave.
There will be several services for her. Her funeral and then, of course, sometime in the future, her Mormon baptism-by-proxy.
I hear tell the Primitive Baptists are going to start footwashing by proxy.
Then again, you probably have enough sense not to expend extreme emotion over harmless stuff. Have a nice treat instead.
Some green Jell-O, perhaps? Some people swear by it.
(Via My Pet Jawa.)
"Swedish government grants 421 US dollars to fight Marburg fever"
Here's Duane and Dickey listening while "Eat A Peach" gets mixed.
Wail on, Skydog!
As a lucky bonus, some kind readers from Vicksburg sent in another pic of the Duane Allman memorial there and the story behind it:
Being from Vicksburg, I am familiar with photo in question. I was born in 1978, but I can remember still seeing it when I was young, so I can tell you that DOT did let the carving stay up. By the mid-eighties, it was gone. It was popular back then to carve your name, your girlfriend's name, et cetera in to the embankments along interstate 20. It has kind of fallen out of favor now. I don't know if the Highway Patrol is cracking down or what. Anyway, that is the end of the story; you guys are interested in the beginning. It has been a while since I heard it, but I will do my best.
Four men were involved. There was also present the usual contingent of girlfriends/spouses to stand around and watch. I don't know how long it took. I do know that disaster was averted when someone realized that they were leaving out the second "M" in "remember." Therefore, when talking about the carving to people who know the story, you may hear it referred to as "Remeber Duane Allman."
A lot of people must have seen it. My father, who had no connection to Vicksburg at the time, but was attending Louisiana Tech University 100 miles due west on interstate 20, recalls seeing framed pictures of the carving being sold around campus. I know the story because I went to school with the children of one of the perpetrators, David R. I have a better picture in which you can see the "signature" on the carving. He likes to tell of how people over the years have tried to tell him that they were responsible for it. I will try to get the original or one of his descendants to make a post.
-Mark
Wow, this is so unbelievable! My husband and three of his friends did this carving on Feb. 3, 1973 (I had yet to meet my future husband, with whom I will be celebrating our 30th wedding anniversary on May 17). They had planned it out carefully, and then ran everytime they saw the highway patrol come by, and thank goodness, they went across the street and saw that they had left out that "m". "Remeber Duane Allman" just didn't have the right ring to it! So, they fixed it and there it stood, for about 10 years! Other people would claim to have done it, some even bragging about it to David, but he had the pictures and the proof! All of them, David, Dennis, Don (who ended up marrying my sister!), and Len are all still living in Vicksburg. The hill is pretty much gone now, but the memory still lives on, apparently!! A picture of it even made it into Rolling Stone!!! That was exciting, to say the least.
So, if you have any questions, you can email us. And thanks Mark, for sending the link to Erica! It has made my day!!!!!!!!!!!!
-Tricia
Thanks, y'all, for sharing your stories and clearing things up for us.
Olivia Newton John, Crocodile Dundee, and this guy.
Thanks a bunch, Australia.
The US Senate has been on FEMA's tail since January and will be opening hearings next month.
The funeral issue has pushed everybody over the edge, since it is clearly and simply understood by all that it is the job of the county medical examiner to say who has died of what. They are the sole authority.
The examiners say there were 123 hurricane-related deaths, yet FEMA doled out money for 315 funerals.
The helpful FEMA workers may have taken too much on themselves. The fact that they were not checked in their generosity by those higher up is the issue at hand.
Then there's that little deal with the $31 million bucks that went to Miami-Dade County although it suffered no hurricane conditions whatsoever.
There's not much new news on Marburg, but the magazine Nature has a good discussion on the situation so far.
It might be that the high mortality rate of this outbreak, as compared to previous ones, is due to a new strain of the virus. Marburg's cousin Ebola has numerous strains.
The theory that this outbreak was spread due to infected needles being used on children getting innoculations is horrific.
To make things worse, people are hiding sick family members from health workers- one reason being that they resent interference with their funeral rites, such as drinking the water used to wash the corpse.
You have to wonder why any of them are still on this planet with practices like that. They must have incredible immune systems.
There are grave concerns over FEMA's funeral spending spree:
Florida officially recorded 123 fatalities from last year's hurricanes, but the federal government has paid funeral expenses for at least 315 deaths, including those of a man who shot himself and a stroke victim hospitalized more than a week before the last storm hit.
In one case, a Federal Emergency Management Agency worker tried unsuccessfully to persuade a coroner to count among the hurricane casualties a "morbidly obese" heart patient who purportedly was "scared to death."
"If you were to call around to all the medical examiner offices, people would say, `No way did we have as many deaths as FEMA is saying,'" said Dr. Stephen Nelson, head of Florida's Medical Examiners Commission. "It's just an incredible number -- a difference of 192. This is the Free Funeral Payment Act."
The discrepancy is even greater because the families of some victims counted as storm casualties by the medical examiner said they received no help from FEMA, the South Florida Sun-Sentinel found in its continuing investigation of hurricane aid.
And, yes, FEMA paid for funerals of purported victims in Miami-Dade County, which was 100 miles south of Hurricane Frances, received no hurricane damage, and had no recorded hurricane deaths.
The Sun-Sentinel hit the mother lode with FEMA. The general nuttiness surrounding this fraud case, along with the staggering dollar amount, makes for fascinating reading.
Later, aboard Air Force One, Dubya's re-enacting of the hand-kissing scene made Condi's soda come out of her nose.
Now this is a good deal: HUD selling homes to disabled veterans for $1.00
Definitely better than a VA loan.
James Lileks says he doesn't want to live in Florida because:
Florida seems like some strange theme park alternately run by Walt Disney and Pennywhistle the Clown, but I’ve never been, so I can’t say.
That's cool. Who's Pennywhistle?
Too bad he didn't write it was a cross between Walt Disney and Pennywise, the homicidal maniac clown of the Stephen King novel, 'cause that would've been funny.
It's like I'm channeling James Thurber.
I'd write about my lawn mower, but we have a service that takes care of the lawn. Plus, mowers rate negative rat's ass, as far as I'm concerned.
So, I'm going to write about my cleaning ladies.
I think one of them was making fun of me today in Spanish.
I was asking her if the master bedroom was done, because if it were, I could shift the dogs from the back patio to there. Then she could work on the patio. This lady's English is pretty minimal and the conversation was problematic. We went in to look around- the shower curtain was flipped up, so she flipped it back down.
Later, I walked in on her laughing and talking to another cleaning lady about "la cortina." Hmm. Did she think I called her all the way into the bedroom to flip down a shower curtain?
It's kind of sinister. Hispansinister. Or I could be paranoid. Gringanoid.
I was trying to keep the dogs out of their hair, but, who knows, they might enjoy cleaning cheek by jowl with my perrititos.
I'll try it next time.
I'd hire Michelle Malkin to clean my house, but she'd probably mock me in Tagalog.
Philippe Junot must be congratulating himself on his lucky escape from Princess Caroline.
The outbreak of Marburg virus in Angola is growing at a great clip, with the new cases being found quicker than the old cases can die.
People are beginning to wonder if the virus hasn't done a little recombining with its fellow filovirus, Ebola. Angola was not formerly considered to be a hot zone for Marburg.
UPDATE:
This book rocks. There's nothing cooler than a scientist figuring out how to kill some little speck of something that had been killing us for a million years.
Concerned about the tasering of a man handcuffed to a hospital bed, Orlando resident Alice Gawronski wrote a letter to the editor in which she uncharitably characterized Sheriff Kevin Beary and his deputies as being so fat and out of shape that tasering was all the law enforcement they could manage.
The 5'10", 290 lb. Sheriff, conscientious to a fault, decided to respond to her concerns by looking up her address in the Department of Motor Vehicles and writing her a letter in kind.
Ms. Gawronski says she feels intimidated, and while it is illegal to access DMV records for non-law enforcement reasons, a spokesman for the Sheriff's Department states that as the Sheriff was only doing it in order to respond to a resident's concerns, it is perfectly legit.
I do believe the lawyers will be sorting this one out.
(Via the unintimidable Gmac, who, like Ms. Gawronski, should start blogging it.)
No Pope funeral for Jimmy Carter, badmouther of sitting presidents.
Duane and the guys working on an album.
Wail on, Skydog!
Speaking of fabulous war photos that didn't didn't nominated for a Pulitzer, this Fallujah Bridge pic is a fave of mine:
Another great Fallujah one.
The military has two funny branches and two unfunny ones. This Marine is crying out to be a GI:
In a blow to the perpetually adolescent career undergrad, Florida says, "Not on our dime."
Washington Post writer Paul Saffo finds the idea of DNA being used in the future as a type of identity card to be creepy.
That's not nearly as creepy, however, as what he reveals further on in his article- that artist Thomas Kinkade, the so-called "Painter of Light", mixes his "DNA" into the ink when he signs his paintings, calling it his "forgery-proof DNA Matrix signature."
I don't know what DNA-laden product this Beetlejuice of Light is smearing on his canvases, but whatever it is...yuck.
My brother used to hock a lugie into his food if he had to leave his plate for a minute, but you don't see him bragging to the papers about his "DNA Matrix food-pilfering prevention device".
Today President Bush will be presenting the Medal of Honor to the family of Tampa soldier Paul Smith. His 11-year-old son David will stand in for his father.
This is the first CMH earned since Mogadishu, and it is a posthumous one. I'm proud of Sergeant Smith that he will take his place among the honored, but also sad for the loss of him. I'm looking forward to a happier awarding, when it will be placed around the neck of a soldier who did his all and lived to tell about it.
What do you know, it turns out the American public isn't in favor of starving incapacitated people to death after all.
Miami Herald Columnist Jim DeFede floats another in his series of air biscuits, that Terri Schiavo was trapped in her body and is at peace now that she's dead. As far as I can tell, we're all trapped in our bodies. Defede is trapped in a morbidly obese one, apparently from overdosing on "medical treatment" - but no one is trying to disconnect the feeding tube leading down from his ravenous maw.
And if Terri was the feel-nothing, know-nothing speed-bump that DeFede always claims she was, she was at peace when she was alive.
Yes, wish her well now that she's dead, Defede. You did all you could to get her there.
UPDATE 7/28/05
I wish you well in your new job, Jim!
I've been going through furniture catalogs all day. There are many pieces that need replacing since the arrival of a pointy-eared gremlin into the household.
As do I, she very much likes upholstered pieces that are skirted. Those upholstery tacks are tough to pull out- I had to use pliers and all my strength to get even the jaggedy half-remaining ones out. It's amazing how diligently she applies herself to her tasks during the day while I'm at work. On the average day she can remove about 25 large staples. That's a lot of tugging.
Yesterday evening was the first time I saw Lilly run in her sleep. Her stump was just a-pumpin'.
In her dreams she has four legs.
You can't look at a photo of the colorful and archaically-costumed Swiss Guards at the Vatican and not wonder about the history of the unit- or how these guys got such a sweet gig. If you're a Roman Catholic Swiss man who is a former member of the Swiss Armed Forces, under 30, and at least 5'8", send them your resume.
The Swiss Guard, the world's smallest and most colorful army, most definitely comes equipped with a church key.
I'm not Catholic, but I'd bet the AP captionist $100 this ain't a "cane". In fact, it looks exactly like the shepherd's staff that is part of the cardinal's liturgical vestments.
At least he didn't mention the guy's red beanie.
Jean-Claude Cardinal Turcotte gathers his thoughts as he leans on his cane during a memorial mass for Pope John Paul II Saturday, April 2, 2005, in Montreal, Canada. The Pope died Saturday at the age of 84. (AP Photo/CP, Paul Chiasson)
This Instapundit parody site is the funniest thing I've seen in quite a while. It's so true.
The only thing the author seems to have missed is having the pundit link back to his own earlier post as proof that he said something first, no matter what it is that is being said.
(Via Ace.)
UPDATE:
Speaking of funny, on one of the sharpest blogs in the land, Michael Shiavo's biggest fan speaks.
Pope John Paul II has passed away is still hanging in there, although his condition has worsened.
I'll always remember him for his stand with Lech Walesa and Solidarity. He gave the Poles courage to rise up against their oppressors.
He is a titan in the struggle against tyranny and will be greatly missed when he leaves us.
Michelle Malkin has more.
UPDATE:
The Pope has now indeed passed away. God rest his soul. He was both a good man and a great one.
Marburg continues unabated. All authorities can do is try to quarantine until it burns itself out. Angola has imposed travel restrictions: those who have visited the epicenter will not be allowed to leave the country until 21 days have passed. It's not exactly on the level of sacrifice of the villagers of Eyam, but it's the best that can be done in these times.
A health worker at the epicenter of the outbreak says the death toll is even higher than what is being officially reported.
While it's been my delight to every week share a new photo of Duane Allman with my readers, I feel it's time to move on to another musical genius.
It is with much pleasure I announce a new subject for our weekly pic, one whose photo-display series here promises to be of great duration.
Ladies and Gentlemen, I'm very proud to present the first of Florida Cracker's weekly pics of Andy Gibb:
Shriek on, Discodog!
