The Cool Blue Blog

Daily Dish

Cedar and NeoCons Perhaps more stunning than elections in Iraq and Afghanistan are the elections that are taking place in Lebanon. Here, in the location of what was the only truly occupied land in the Middle East, the popular, non-violent uprising kicked out the occupying nation, prepared for Democratic elections, and then began the process. The first of three elections took place on Sunday in Beirut where

The son of murdered former premier Rafiq Hariri scored a clean sweep in the Beirut round of Lebanon's elections, the first in three decades held free of the grip of neighbouring Syria, officials said on Monday.

According to observers, the polling was "open and transparent" which is already an improvement over any election held during the Syrian occupation.

In using the US as a model for success, it must be recognized that political freedom is only part of the solution. The other part is economic freedom. Some may ask "why should Arabs use the US as a model?" Glad you asked.

The reason is that the US is precisely the place where Arabs have the most freedom and prosperity.

People of Arab descent living in the United States are doing far better than   the average American. That is the surprising conclusion drawn from data collected   by the U.S. Census Bureau in 2000 and released last March. The census found   that U.S. residents who report having Arab ancestors are better educated and   wealthier than average Americans.

Whereas 24 percent of Americans hold college degrees, 41 percent of Arab Americans   are college graduates. The median income for an Arab family living in the United   States is $52,300—4.6 percent higher than other American families—and   more than half of all Arab Americans own their home. Forty-two percent of people   of Arab descent in the United States work as managers or professionals, while   the same is true for only 34 percent of the general U.S. population. For many,   this success has come on quickly: Although about 50 percent of Arab Americans   were born in the United States, nearly half of those born abroad did not arrive   until the 1990s.

That immigrants do better than their compatriots back home is of course no   surprise. What is far less common is for immigrants to perform that much better   than the average population of their adopted home. This fact should prompt important   debates that transcend how Arab immigrants are faring in the United States.

Europe, it might be noted also has political freedom, but their economic freedom is significantly curtailed by high taxes due to the "Welfare State". Additionally, unlike in the US, Muslim and Arab immigrants are not integrated into society because there are no work requirements in the welfare state. As a result

...how does one explain why Arab   immigrants in Europe are worse off than those in the United States? Why are   leaders of Arab communities in France warning that social and racial tensions   are in danger of creating a “social and political atom bomb”? Sure,   France may be an extreme case, but the situation of Arabs in the rest of Europe   is hardly better. In general, Muslims living in Europe—of which Arabs   constitute a significant proportion—are poorer, less educated, and in   worse health than the rest of the population. In the Netherlands, the unemployment   rate for ethnic Moroccans is 22 percent, roughly four times the rate for the   country as a whole. In Britain, the Muslim population has the highest unemployment   rate of all religious groups. The failure of Arabs in Europe is particularly   worrisome given that 10 of the states or entities along Europe’s eastern   and southern borders are home to nearly 250 million Muslims—most of them   Arabs—with a birthrate more than double that of Europeans.

Clearly, political freedom is not enough. But it is just as clear that those who believe Arabs and Muslims in general are not capable of navigating the sophisticated political and economic waters of free societies are demonstrably wrong.

Arabs and Muslims as well as Christians in the Middle East are seizing the opportunities afforded by the fall and rebuilding of Iraq. Lebanon is just the most recent example of these oppressed peoples reaching for the golden ring. As opposition leader, and former anti-American Walid Jumblatt noted

"It's strange for me to say it, but this process of change has started because of the American invasion of Iraq," explains Jumblatt. "I was cynical about Iraq. But when I saw the Iraqi people voting three weeks ago, 8 million of them, it was the start of a new Arab world." Jumblatt says this spark of democratic revolt is spreading. "The Syrian people, the Egyptian people, all say that something is changing. The Berlin Wall has fallen. We can see it."

But the "neo-cons" who always believed in them, never doubted they could and would do it if given the chance. Over two years ago, The Washington Post profiled Paul Wolfowitz and remarked

Wolfowitz's fervent belief in what he calls "the power of the democratic idea" -- and its applicability to a part of the world better known for authoritarian regimes, many of them closely allied to Washington -- has won him both admirers and detractors.

To his supporters, Wolfowitz is a visionary thinker, a tough-minded intellectual with a streak of idealism. While emphasizing that he was not alone in calling for the United States to confront Hussein, they credit him with helping to devise a daring strategy for the Iraqi leader's overthrow that will reshape the politics of the Middle East in a way that will be hugely beneficial for the United States.

But how much of a stretch was it really? I mean, the power of the democratic idea inspired us. And when we were successful, it inspired others, like France. And more than two centuries later, America is still the model for freedom and prosperity. Still the Shining City upon the Hill, whether or not people want to admit it.

To say that we could do it but Arabs and Muslims can not is, in its essence, a racist belief. Just like not holding Arab nations and organizations to account is racist because by making excuses,the underlying thought is that can't do any better.

"I have never seen so much loose thinking about democracy," countered Thomas Carothers, a scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace who has studied U.S. democracy-building efforts worldwide. "The idea that you can produce a democratic tidal wave throughout the Arab world is a dangerous fantasy."

Is that so...

Parade Podcasting Yesterday I photoblogged the Vergennes Memorial Day parade and while I was snapping photos, Bob Robinson was podcasting the event. Go listen, your humble Cool Blue One makes a cameo appearance.

Landmark The 1,000th reconstruction project was completed in Iraq. Did you know that? Do you ask why?

BAGHDAD,<> <>Iraq,<> <>May 31, 2005<> <>–<> <>The public spotlight recently shone on an unassuming, eight-classroom school in the town of Zakho, Iraq, and for good reason. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Gulf Region Division, responsible for oversight of reconstruction in Iraq, announced it had identified Betas School as its 1,000th completed reconstruction project.

The Betas School, located amid rolling hills on the outskirts of the town of Zahko, in the northernmost province of Dahuk, is home to headmaster Ibraheem Nuri, 60 students, and seven teachers.

But if you were to Senator Patty Murray of Washington state, we just catching up to all the wonderful things Osama bin Laden does. From Answers.com

In October 2002 Murray was one of only 23 senators to vote against the Iraq war resolution. In December 2002, Murray made the following controversial comments before a high school audience at Vancouver, Washington:

Osama bin Laden has been very, very effective being we've got to ask, why is this man so popular around the world?

Why are people so supportive of him in many countries? He has been in many countries that are riddled with poverty.

People don't have phones, no sewers, no roads, no schools, no health care, no facilities just to make sure their daily lives are OK.

He's been out in these countries for decades building roads, building schools, building infrastructure, building day care facilities, building health care facilities, and the people are extremely grateful. It made their lives better.

If OBL was busy doing all of this, why was Afghanistan such shit hole when we got there? But I really like the day-care facilities remark. You know, like mothers in Taliban Afghanistan dropped the kids off when they went to work at Taliban U. The only thing I know of that Osama built was terrorist training camps.

Of course, if Sen Murray had her way, the Betas Schools would not exist.

And they certainly wouldn't be teaching girls.

Home Town Parade

Hometown on Memorial Day. The weatherman threatened to rain on the largest Memorial Day parade in Vermont, and though clouds did fill the sky, it did not overwhelm. Nor did it rain.

My oldest daughter and her husband live along the parade route, just off Main St. We live about 6 six blocks from them, so we walked down to sit on her porch, what, in Brooklyn where I grew up, we would call a stoop.

We made our way down Maple St. Now if that ain't the quitessential home town street name I don't know what is. Maybe Elm St? School St? We got those too.

We were passing folks spreading their blankets, planting their chairs and coolers, corralling the kids. Houses along the route had been prepped and made ready for viewing as the people who lived in them made ready to view.

Vendors sold ballons for charity, in this case the Lions Club. Lions Clubs are everywhere aren't they? In every home town? They're here. And they're our neighbors too.

We arrive at my daughter's house and the generations are present. My daughter's mother-in-law lives here too and has her regular seat on the porch. Both her boys are here, their children. Two of my daughters are here, their children. Later they'll be a cook out. Just now we are gathered to watch the parade and visit among ourselves.

I wander, camera in hand.

Daily Dish

         We cherish, too, the poppy red
          That grows on fields where valor led;
          It seems to signal to the skies
          That blood of heroes never dies,
          But lends a luster to the red
          Of the flower that blooms above the dead
          In Flanders Fields.

         And now the Torch and Poppy Red
          We wear in honor of our dead.
          Fear not that ye have died for naught;
          We'll teach the lesson that ye wrought
          In Flanders Fields.

-Moina Belle Michael

Marine Lt. Col. David S. Greene

Lt. Col. David S. Greene 39, of Raleigh, N.C.; assigned to Marine Light Attack Helicopter Squadron 775, Marine Aircraft Group 16, 3rd Marine Air Wing, Marine Corps Air Station Miramar, Calif.; killed July 28 by enemy action in Anbar province, Iraq.

While Lt Col Greene is listed as being from Raleigh, those of us who worked with him know that he lived in Shelburne Vt at the time of his death. He was a co-worker of mine, in fact and we miss him, his leadership and his quiet good humor every day. We grieve for his family who were left behind.

Earlier this year, an episode of the Fox television series 24 dedicated an episode to Dave Greene. I recorded the show and gave it to his widow via a mutual friend. I don't know if she's seen it. I don't know if she ever will. But I am pretty sure she will keep it for the family because it is further validation of the hero he was.

He's more about Lt Col Greene:

High-ranking Marine officer killed in Iraq

Associated Press

RALEIGH, N.C. — A Marine Corps helicopter pilot was killed in Iraq when shots fired from the ground hit him while he was on a mission, the military said Thursday.

Lt. Col. David S. Greene, 39, was among the highest-ranking officers to die since the U.S.-led coalition invaded Iraq in March 2003.

The Pentagon listed his home town as Raleigh. Maj. Randy Parker, a spokesman for Greene’s Marine Corps Reserve training detachment in Johnstown, Pa., said Greene was a Raleigh native and listed it as his hometown, but that he lived in Shelburne, Vt.

Greene is survived by a wife and children in Vermont. A message left at his home was not immediately returned Thursday night.

Greene was activated in January and his Pennsylvania-based Marine Corps Reserve unit was assigned to Marine Light Attack Helicopter Squadron 775 of the Marine Aircraft Group 16, based at Marine Corps Air Station Miramar, Calif.

Greene piloted AH-1W Cobra helicopters.

“The aircraft he was flying in took ground fire” on Wednesday in Anbar province and Greene was hit, Parker said. “There’s no information with regards to what sort of action he was supporting. There’s no information with regards to whether there was an ambush.”

A co-pilot aboard the two-seat chopper landed the Cobra, Parker said.

“Lt. Col. Greene was an outstanding Marine officer,” Parker said. “He cared for his Marines deeply. And that pretty much does that trick for us.”

Daily Dish

Remembering Col. Austin Bay spoke to veterans gathered at the Travis County International Cemetery

A group of Hispanic vets tends the graves of indigent American veterans buried in the cemetery. The place is one of those plots of ground with a decidedly checkered past. In the 19th century it was a “paupers graveyard.” The county buried small pox victims at the site, and –according to one of the officers in Tejanos in Action– victims of a plague that struck in the early 20th century were buried there as well. I suspect the land served as “a Negro cemetery” and “a Mexican cemetery.”

Approximately twenty years ago Tejanos in Action started fixing up the cemetery and handling the burials of indigent veterans.

The mother of Lance-Corporal Nicholas  S. Perez was in attendance.

An honor guard from Tejanos in Action conducted the flag ceremony. A bugler played taps and the honor guard fired a 21-gun salute. Tejanos in Action commander Jose Montoya introduced me.

Read his speech.

What hath she wrought Back in February, Italian journalist and terrorist sympathizer Giuliana Sgrena was abducted by terrorists in Iraq. After a while, the Italian government decided to pay a ransom to effect her release, during which one of her rescuers was killed. She blamed everyone but herself for what happened, including American soldiers. It is clear that she lied about most of what happened during her escape, but we don't know what her involvement with the terrorists was during her captivity. We do know she spoke well of her captors, which is more than can be said about her feelings for Americans in uniform.

Upon her release, Al Jazeera broadcast a video in which Sgrena thanked her captors for having treated her well, and in which she stated that she was taken hostage because her kidnappers are determined to free their country from occupation.

The Italian government, after the affair was over, while never admitting to paying a ransom for her release nevertheless promised that they would never pay to ransom someone again.

THE Italian prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi, has promised President George W Bush that he will not pay more ransoms to free hostages in Iraq.

The Italian government has denied newspaper reports that $6m (£3.1m) was paid for the release of Giuliana Sgrena, who worked for the Communist daily Il Manifesto. But senior officials and intelligence sources have confirmed that money did change hands.

Not that Ms Sgrena cares, she's free, the terrorists have their million bucks, and it doesn't matter to her how many people were killed or sullied during the event.

Now the question is what will happen to Italian aid worker Clementina Cantoni who was abducted in Afghanistan two weeks ago by terrorists. Yesterday, a video of her was released by her captors. They showed her in good health, except for the guns being pointed at her head.

"Although we are encouraged to see that Clementina is alive and in relatively good health, we are deeply concerned about her safety and her well-being," he said. "Once again, we join the people of Afghanistan in calling for the immediate and unconditional release of Clementina."

There can be only one reason for abducting her, keeping her in good health, and releasing a video of her: they want to ransom her.

And Italy has a history of paying ransom thanks to Giuliana.

What are the chances that Ms Sgrena will offer to exchange herself for Clementina? After all, it seems she has good relations with terrorists. And it would give her a chance to redeem herself.

Amnesty Required The "Human Rights" watchdog group Amnesty International has declared the U.S. prison camp at Guantanamo Bay the Gulag of our time.

The 308-page report accused the United States of shirking its responsibility to set the bar for human rights protections and said Washington has instead created a new lexicon for abuse and torture.

The US is held to higher standard as we should be. We as citizens demand it, and our self-respect requires it. But Amnesty International obviously has no standards by which to judge us or our actions.

We have created a new lexicon for abuse and torture? Gee, I thought Hitler's planned extermiations of Jews, homosexuals, gypsies and others would have set the standard for evil. But perhaps the Left, whose staple of stereotypes of "conservatives" includes that of holocaust deniers, are the deniers themselves.

Or perhaps Amnesty International is composed of people who are not literate enough to have read Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's The Gulag Archipelago: 1918-1956 and are unaware of Stalin's legacy of death and cruelty. Of course, any historian could inform them, but these folks probably get their history from Stalinist folk-lore, not from actual books.

One would think that what the Khymer Rouge did would be above anything Americans have ever conceived of doing, or Mao's cultural Revolution, but no, Gitmo sets the standard according to AI, which I note is also an acronym for Artificial Intelligence.

David Rivkin and Lee Casey writing for the National Review point out:

First and foremost, Amnesty’s report is emphatically not an honest assessment of American compliance with international law. Rather, it is an assessment of how well the United States complies with Amnesty International’s political and ideological agenda — equivalent to the grading of individual members of Congress by domestic advocacy groups. This is obvious from the report’s three fundamental measures of a good human-rights record, which are applied to every included state: (1) whether the death penalty has been retained; (2) whether the International Criminal Court treaty has been ratified; and (3) whether the U.N. Women’s Convention, and its Optional Protocol, has been ratified. All of these criteria involve controversial political issues where there is fundamental disagreement between right and left and — from Amnesty’s perspective — George Bush’s America fails on all counts. This, of course, is what you would expect, since the president is a conservative, elected by increasingly conservative American voters.

With respect to the war on terror, Amnesty’s principal complaint is that “[h]undreds of detainees continue to be held without charge or trial at the US naval base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.” This, of course, is the installation that Amnesty’s secretary general, Irene Khan, characterized as “the gulag of our times.” Khan is either profoundly ignorant of the actual gulag, where Communist regimes “re-educated” political dissidents through murderous hard labor, starvation diets, and exposure to the elements, or engaging in highly improvident hyperbole. It is most likely the latter. (As the Washington Post editorialized, the “modern equivalent” of the gulag can be found not at Guantanamo Bay, but in Castro’s Cuba, North Korea, China and, until recently, Saddam Hussein’s Iraq.) In a calmer moment, Khan might reflect that comparing American policies with which she disagrees to genuine atrocities committed by some of the most vicious and repressive regimes in history effectively trivializes the actions of those regimes.

While Cassandra of the Villianous Company blog (recently returned from a blog-vacation with renewed vigor) notices

-- According to a 2001 Amnesty International report, "victims of torture in Iraq are subjected to a wide range of forms of torture, including the gouging out of eyes, severe beatings and electric shocks... some victims have died as a result and many have been left with permanent physical and psychological damage."

-- Saddam has had approximately 40 of his own relatives murdered.

-- Allegations of prostitution used to intimidate opponents of the regime, have been used by the regime to justify the barbaric beheading of women.

-- Documented chemical attacks by the regime, from 1983 to 1988, resulted in some 30,000 Iraqi and Iranian deaths.

-- Human Rights Watch estimates that Saddam's 1987-1988 campaign of terror against the Kurds killed at least 50,000 and possibly as many as 100,000 Kurds.

-- The Iraqi regime used chemical agents to include mustard gas and nerve agents in attacks against at least 40 Kurdish villages between 1987-1988. The largest was the attack on Halabja which resulted in approximately 5,000 deaths.

-- 2,000 Kurdish villages were destroyed during the campaign of terror.

-- Iraq's 13 million Shi'a Muslims, the majority of Iraq's population of approximately 22 million, face severe restrictions on their religious practice, including a ban on communal Friday prayer, and restriction on funeral processions.

-- According to Human Rights Watch, "senior Arab diplomats told the London-based Arabic daily newspaper al-Hayat in October [1991] that Iraqi leaders were privately acknowledging that 250,000 people were killed during the uprisings, with most of the casualties in the south."

Perhaps Amnesty International doesn't read their own reports.

It is simply another example of how the extreme, dare I say Stalinist, Left discredits itself and thereby makes itself irrelevent. No wonder that Democrats who want to be successful running for public office try to distance themselves from people like this.

Unfortunately, many people who will buy into such absurdities make up a significant part of the Democratic Party. So much so that Democrats have selected one of these as their National Chairman to appeal to that constituency.

So long as Democrats refuse to purge their ranks of such people, as was done in the 50's, they can expect to lose more political power, to the point where they become irrelevent.

If such is not the case already.

Marine Sgt. Jesse W. Strong

Marine Sgt. Jesse W. Strong 24, of Irasburg, Vt.; assigned to the 4th Combat Engineer Battalion, 4th Marine Division, Marine Corps Reserve, Lynchburg, Va.; killed Jan. 26 by enemy action in Anbar province, Iraq.

Vermont Marine killed in Iraq

By Wilson Ring
Associated Press

MONTPELIER, Vt. — A Vermont Marine has been killed in a roadside attack in Iraq, the family says.

Sgt. Jesse Strong, 24, was one of four Marines belonging to a reserve company stationed in Lynchburg, Va., to be killed Wednesday, officials said.

Strong’s mother, Vicki Strong, said Thursday the family was told that he had been killed by a roadside bomb.

Strong had just graduated from Liberty University in Lynchburg and had attended one semester of seminary before his unit was activated. He arrived in Iraq in August and had been due to come home in March, said Vicki Strong.

“He had a love for his family and for Vermont,” his mother said. “He missed Vermont terribly. He had a deep love for God and his country.

“He didn’t give his life in vain,” she said.

Jesse’s father, Nathan Strong, is the pastor of the Methodist Church in Albany, a tiny town near the Canadian border.

A reporter embedded with those troops, Jim Dolan of WABC in New York City, said the deaths came when insurgents ambushed a Marine convoy leaving the town of Haditha, northwest of Baghdad, hitting a vehicle with a rocket-propelled grenade.

Strong was the 14th service member with Vermont ties killed in action in Iraq. A 15th service member died of natural causes in Kuwait before entering Iraq.

Vicki Strong said her son had been home-schooled.

Town Clerk Debbie Geoffroy said Thursday morning that residents were just learning of Strong’s death.

“The whole town will know by tonight,” she said. “It’s going to be devastating.

“A lot of people will be very devastated by it,” she said.

“They are a wonderful family,” Whitcomb said. “The Strongs have been in the area for a number of generations.”

Strong was a member of Company C, 4th Combat Engineer Battalion. The battalion was based in Baltimore.

In Iraq, Company C was involved in the search for weapons caches, sweeping roads for explosives and building fighting positions, said C Company’s Capt. Jaime Wagner.

Wagner identified the dead as Strong, Cpl. Jonathan Bowling, 23, of Stuart, Va.; Cpl. Christopher Weaver, 24, of Fredericksburg, Va.; and Lance Cpl. Karl Linn, 20, of Chesterfield, Va..

“The Marine Corps is truly a band of brothers and we lost four brothers from this company,” Wagner said. “But we continue to do our jobs and continue to carry on as Marines.”

We honor his service and his life on Memorial Day and always.

Daily Dish

Memorials Honoring the fallen heros of past and present wars on Memorial Day is a thing that is not exclusive to service members present and retired, but there is no doubt that they, and the family members of the fallen, are the most sentive to this holiday weekend.

Blackfive writes

When Taps is played at dusk, it has a completely different meaning than when Taps is played during the day.  No soldier really wants to hear it played during daylight.  For when the bugle plays Taps in the daylight...that means a soldier has fallen...There is a belief among some that Taps is the clarion call to open the gates of heaven for the fallen warrior and letting them know to "Safely Rest"...

I have focused on just a few of the fallen over the last few years.  I've lost three good friends during the War on Terror.  And I write about the others to ensure that we don't forget their sacrifices - I do that for me as much as for anybody.

Greyhawk of Mudville Gazette offers this poem

Tending Distant Fires

Far from hearth and home, watching
Cold alone but not alone
On distant shore and only wanting
Safe return and little more

What tales we'll tell
When that time comes
When tales can be told

When things grim
Seem far away
When other fires go cold

Some distant sunset, vision fading
Memories remain
And tired eyes gaze 'pon folded flags
While distant drums beat their refrain

Saluting fallen friends whose names
And youth will never fade
Here's to those on other shores,
for them live well, the price is paid 

And fellow Vermont blogger Jeff Soyer has his own thoughts, and pictures to help us remember while Cathy Resmer of 802Online remembers Memorial Day with links in her post and from commenters.

Fleet Week Every year the Navy makes a port call to New York harbor and the Hudson River is host to a large collection of active duty warships. This year, over a dozen Navy and Coast Guard vessels are on station including CV67; the USS John F. Kennedy which last saw action in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom.

Fleet Week has a dual purpose: allow sailors to visit New York City and give the public a chance to meet their sailors.

This year, many of the sailors took the opportunity to visit the site where the World Trade Centers once stood.

Hundreds of troops here for Fleet Week took time off Friday to attend two events to commemorate the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks — one a very public show of strength, the other quiet and private.

Almost 300 members of the Marine Corps and the Coast Guard took part in the first event, a three-mile run around lower Manhattan followed by a wreath-laying ceremony beside the former World Trade Center site.

As they stood under a cloudless sky at the site of the terrorist strikes, the group let out a shout that reverberated across the 16-acre gap where the towers once stood.

"The Marine Corps likes to be loud when they do this, it's a pride thing," explained Sgt. John Hoellwarth, 24, of Antioch, Calif. "They want New York City to hear them."

The other event was held inside the gates of the site, where new buildings will soon rise.

A small group, including a woman who lost her sister in the attacks on the World Trade Center and an Army reservist who helped with the recovery effort, gathered inside the footprint of one of the towers to pray and thank members of the military for their sacrifices.

Which is important, because sometimes, to these service men and women, it seems more like a war on  the military instead of the terrorists.

Buy Pfizer Stock Viagra, the drug prescribed to improve one's sex life has been getting a boost in sales from some state governments: they're giving the drug to sex offenders. For free. Well actually, you're paying for it.

The four Kansas sex offenders who recently have received drugs like Viagra on the public's dime may soon lose some of their romantic vigor, thanks to the state.

Romantic vigor? This seems an odd choice of words to be applying to sex offenders.

Gov. Kathleen Sebelius has called for an immediate halt to the practice of using state Medicaid dollars to pay for erectile dysfunction drugs for convicted sex offenders. The controversy erupted nationally after New York state found that it had paid for 200 sex offenders to receive drugs like Viagra, Cialis and Levitra.

In Kansas, 14 of 3,150 registered sex offenders have received the drugs since 2000, at a cost of nearly $2,100. Four persons now on the list have received a prescription for sexual performance drugs this year.

And it's not just Kansas, Missouri is worse

Missouri found 26 instances when registered sex offenders received the drugs thanks to taxpayers. Officials there have also moved to end the practice.

Texas' AG is blaming the policy for helping perverts reoffend

Two of the nearly 200 registered sex offenders who received erectile dysfunction drugs through Medicaid committed additional sex crimes and five now are fugitives, including one from Harris County, according to state Attorney General Greg Abbott.

Both of the repeat offenders were from Bexar County. One man was arrested for aggravated sexual assault within two months of getting a prescription drug. Officials are searching for the five people who didn't report to authorities as required. Abbott did not give any additional information.

"These revelations show that giving sex-enhancing drugs like Viagra to a convicted sex offender is like giving a can of gasoline to an arsonist and then lighting the match," Abbott said, although he noted that he can't say for sure that Viagra had anything to do with the crimes they committed.

And while it is exactly true that we have to be careful not to make the logical fallacy of non causa pro causa, it just makes sense that you do not need to help sex offenders increase their sex drive. Especially on the taxpayers dime who then has to pay to incarcerate them when they do reoffend.

I mean please, let's use some common sense.

Marine Lance Cpl. Jeffery S. Holmes

Marine Lance Cpl. Jeffery S. Holmes 20, of White River Junction, Vt.; assigned to 1st Battalion, 8th Marine Regiment, 2nd Marine Division, II Marine Expeditionary Force, Camp Lejeune, N.C.; killed Nov. 25 by enemy action in Anbar province, Iraq.

Marine from Hartford killed in Fallujah

Associated Press

HARTFORD, Vt. — A 20-year-old Marine from Hartford has been killed in fighting in the Iraqi city of Fallujah.

Jeffery Holmes was killed on Thanksgiving Day.

“Part of you is gone,” said his mother, Patti Holmes. “It can’t be replaced.”

The military said that two Marines were killed by insurgents Thursday while conducting house-clearing operations in Fallujah, a former-rebel stronghold.

Lt. Gen. John F. Sattler, commanding general of the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force, said the U.S. troops were ambushed Thursday by insurgents from inside a house as they entered it.

Jeffery Scott Holmes — a 2003 Hartford High School graduate — was one of those two, Patti and Scott Holmes said the Marines told them.

In addition to his parents, Jeffery Holmes is survived by a 17-year-old brother, Cory, who attends Hartford High School.He initially wanted to join the Air Force and fly fighter jets, his parents recalled. But, at 6-feet, 2-inches, he felt he was too tall to fly the jets, so he joined the Marines instead.

Holmes had been in Iraq since June, following completion of boot camp.

“He wanted to fight for his country. He’s always believed in it,” his mother said. “He always said if he dies over there (in Iraq), he died doing what he wanted to do.”

People who knew Holmes recalled his contagious sense of humor and easygoing spirit.

“He was a good-natured guy,” said Hartford High School football coach Mike Stone, who coached him four years.

Holmes was not among his best players, he said, but he had other gifts. “He was a pretty popular kid, happy-go-lucky kid. He was one of those kids you remember.”

We honor his service and his life on Memorial Day and always.

Army Sgt. Jamie A. Gray

Army Sgt. Jamie A. Gray 29, of Montpelier, Vt.; assigned to Headquarters, Headquarters Battery, 1st Battalion, 86th Field Artillery, Vermont Army National Guard, Williston, Vt.; killed June 7 2004 when his vehicle hit an improvised explosive device in Scania, Iraq.

A country boy who grew up in the hills of Vermont, Jamie Gray grew up learning to hunt, fish, snowmobile, and to give to others. "He loved protecting people. He was proud of what he did," said Sgt. 1st Class Dan Landry. Gray, 29, of East Montpelier, was killed June 7 by a roadside bomb in Iraq. He was a member of the Vermont National Guard in Williston, Vt. A car mechanic in civilian life, fellow soldiers remembered Gray as a man who was quick to help, quick to inspire and quick to lead. "I can't tell you how many vehicles he repaired for members of the National Guard and their families," said National Guard Staff Sgt. John Adams. Gray's commanding officer before he left for Iraq, Capt. Dana Tourangeau, said he hand-picked Gray to be in his unit because of his reputation. "He put a razor-sharp edge on the tip of the spear," Tourangeau said.

— Associated Press

We honor his service and his life on Memorial Day and always.

Fallen soldier 'loved protecting people'
By Nancy Remsen | Free Press Staff Writer

June 8, 2004

Sgt. Jamie Gray understood the risks he faced as a military police officer charged with protecting convoys on danger-filled roads in Iraq, a fellow Vermont National Guard member said Tuesday.

"He was not afraid at all," said Sgt. 1st Class Dan Landry, 39, of Colchester. 'We had talked many, many times of the danger.               He had said if something happened, he went out doing exactly what he wanted to do."

Daily Dish

The Convoluted Argument The Supreme Court of California has decided to hear a case brought by a lesbian couple against a country club wherein they claim that they were charged more for their membership than a married couple is charged. The plaintiffs are registered domestic partners under California's recently enacted Domestic Partnership law.

This law provides for the registrants

the ability to have custody of a partner’s child, access to family court, the right to make funeral arrangements and access to married student housing.

But they are not married, therefore they are not spouses.

The Bernardo Heights Country Club has a family membership package which the couple does not qualify for.

By granting family memberships only to married couples, the San Diego country club "chose criteria that same-sex couples could not possibly meet," said Jon Davidson, the couple's lawyer and legal director of the Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund.

Yeah, and that criteria would be you have to be married, which the couple clearly isn't. But is this discrimination? Clearly not, in my view, because the club did not bar the couple from joining the club, they simply didn't grant them the family discount.

The dispute centers on Birgit Koebke, 48, who pays the Bernardo Heights Country Club in San Diego about $500 a month in membership fees. Married members can have their children, grandchildren and spouses play golf for free.

Under club rules, Koebke must pay as much as $70 for her partner, Kendall French, 43, to play a round of golf, and French can only be Koebke's "guest' six times a year.

OK, fine. So what is this case really about? Last March, a San Francisco Superior Court judge ruled

California's ban on same-sex marriage unconstitutional..., saying it violates the "basic human right to marry a person of one's choice.''

The case was appealed and the ruling set aside until such time as the state Supreme Court reviews the decision. The case against Bernardo Heights Country Club, in my view, is an attempt set precedent for the pending case.

In the Superior Court ruling, Judge Kramer justified his ruling based on an equal protection argument which in my view is ridiculous.

So let's look at this;

1. Simply stating that marriage is a basic human right doesn't make it so. There is no right to marry either in the US Constitution or in the California Constitution which is why Judge's typically use the "equal protection" argument.
2. The equal protection argument is bogus because no individual is being discriminated against; no males may marry another male regardless of their sexual orientation. Simply because a hetero male would not likely want to marry another male is immaterial. The same is obviously true of females.
3. And the statement from Judge Kramer that the laws discriminate against the "basic human right to marry a person of one's choice" is a dangerous precedent. Does this mean that in the future a 50 year old male should be allowed to marry a 13 year old girl? How about a 13 year old boy? Should a brother be able to marry his sister? Should a father be able to marry his daughter?

In all of these cases a person could argue that the law is preventing them from marrying the person of their choice if such a standard were to be adopted.

This is why marriage is a union regulated by the civil authorities and this is why this issue needs to be resolved in the Legislatures across the country and not the courts. As a Federalist, I would be against any law or Constitutional Amendment that would force the states to either accept or ban Gay marriages.

I would also advocate that Judges should not makes laws, they should interpret them. Let the legislatures execute the will of the people in civil matters such as this and let them stand for election based on their positions on issues such as this.

Additionally I think that Gay "rights" advocates would be better served by trying to convince people of the correctness of their arguments and focus their attentions on getting the laws changed instead of trying to subvert the law through the courts. I truly believe that attempting subversion tends to place more roadblocks than it clears. I for instance would support efforts to change the law through legislation but will oppose any attempts to do it through the courts.

And I ain't the only one.

My advice for Birgit Koebke? Buy another membership.

Actionable Intelligence Wired magazine provides an example of the power of networks, even ad hoc networks, to allow people to act in ways that may be against conventional wisdom, but beneficial to their personal interests.

In this case, it saved lives.

For more than four years - steadily, seriously, and with the unsentimental rigor for which we love them - civil engineers have been studying the destruction of the World Trade Center towers, sifting the tragedy for its lessons. And it turns out that one of the lessons is: Disobey authority. In a connected world, ordinary people often have access to better information than officials do....

The report confirms a chilling fact that was widely covered in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks. After both buildings were burning, many calls to 911 resulted in advice to stay put and wait for rescue. Also, occupants of the towers had been trained to use the stairs, not the elevators, in case of evacuation.

Fortunately, this advice was mostly ignored. According to the engineers, use of elevators in the early phase of the evacuation, along with the decision to not stay put, saved roughly 2,500 lives. This disobedience had nothing to do with panic. The report documents how evacuees stopped to help the injured and assist the mobility-impaired, even to give emotional comfort. Not panic but what disaster experts call reasoned flight ruled the day.

In fact, the people inside the towers were better informed and far more knowledgeable than emergency operators far from the scene. While walking down the stairs, they answered their cell phones and glanced at their BlackBerries, learning from friends that there had been a terrorist attack and that the Pentagon had also been hit. News of what was happening passed by word of mouth, and fellow workers pressed hesitating colleagues to continue their exit.

So I guess, to autonomous, diverse and decentralized, I would add wired.