Dangerous pocket Knife

The following is from the latest "Bob Barr Update", it seems to be a case of the nanny state and political correctness gone mad.

Atlanta, GA – Former Georgia Congressman Bob Barr today blasted school officials in Cobb County, Georgia, a northwest suburb of Atlanta, for seeking to bring felony charges against a 12th grade student, Wilford Ray Chandler, Jr., for simply having a small Swiss Army knife in his car in a school parking lot at Wheeler High School.

"The student posed no threat to anyone, and he was not using the knife in any threatening manner," Barr noted, "in fact, he was not using the knife at all - it was simply in his car." "Trying to ruin a student's career before it even begins, by treating such an innocuous activity as having a Swiss Army pocketknife in a car, is nothing short of an unthinking, stupid, and vindictive exercise of government power,” Barr, a former federal prosecutor, said.

Barr said he hoped the county's prosecutors, including District Attorney Pat Head and Solicitor Barry Morgan, would quickly drop any charges against the student, and thereby "exercise the common sense and understanding that county school officials and police apparently lack, as evidenced by the unyielding and ridiculous 'zero tolerance' program and the unreasonable application of the policy to a student with no criminal record or intent and who exhibited nothing that could be remotely viewed by reasonable people as criminal behavior."

Barr, a former Member of Congress (1995-2003), also served previously as a US Attorney and with the Central Intelligence Agency. He is a lawyer and currently works with national organizations on issues related to privacy and national security.

This is how it was reported in 'Decatur DeKalb.'

According to an arrest warrant, Wilford Ray Chandler Jr. had a pocket knife with a 2.5-inch blade on Aug. 29, a violation of the school district's weapons policy.

Jay Dillon, a Cobb schools spokesman, said Chandler left the Wheeler campus about midday — a violation of the school's rules. When he came back onto the grounds, a school resource officer searched him and his car, which is standard operating procedure when a student leaves campus without permission.

The blade, described in the warrant as a "multipurpose-type pocket knife," was found in the center console of the car.

I would find it hard to think of a knife less likely to be used in violence than a swiss army knife, it is a novelty item with some possible minor uses, but pretty impractical. All those fancy odds and ends on it are of limited usefulness. Crocodile Dundee would not pull one of those out and say, "Knife, thats not a knife, this is a knife".

In any case, it could hardly qualify as an offensive weapon in his car in the car park.

While my school days were a long time ago, none of the boys would have been seen dead without a pocket knife, it was just a required accessory. The really flash guys had a pouch for it, and if you had one with a pair of tweezers and a 'pricker' (for removing splinters etc), then you were top of the heap. Nobody ever used them in a fight, thats what fists were for.

I can't imagine what the loonies who come up with these rules are thinking of.

“Chasing a Will o’ the Wisp while Ignoring a real Monster in the Sky”.

Images are of Asian pollution Click for full resolution.

By Viv Forbes

The Carbon Sense Coalition today called on the State and Federal Governments to stop wasting community resources on useless schemes for carbon trading and carbon sequestration and focus on some real world pollution crises.

The Chairman of “Carbon Sense”, Mr Viv Forbes, said that the government and media focus on carbon dioxide emissions was totally misdirected and counter productive.

“All it will do is delay the spread of coal powered electricity to many areas now desperate for clean invisible power. It will also give an enormous boost to the demand for uranium fuel, which the Premiers of our big mining states will not allow us to mine or use.”

“There is already a groundswell of opposition from well informed scientists and engineers to the whole basis of the Greenhouse Religion. Even the PM’s own backbench contains well informed sceptics, and the ranks of scientific sceptics are growing all over the world.”

“This irrational and hysterical focus on carbon dioxide is diverting attention and resources from real pollution which is altering local climate and affecting many areas of the world”.

“For example, the “Asian Brown Cloud”, a haze of pollution about 3 km thick and sometimes covering an area as big as Australia, is causing real human health and safety problems. At times this cloud drifts right across the Pacific Ocean and is noticed in America.”

“China now emits more sulphur dioxide (SO2) than anywhere else in the world. This chokes their people, causes acid rain and damages buildings. This brown haze is already affecting local climate and melting glaciers in China and the Himalayas. In Arctic areas, soot is covering snow and absorbing more heat from the sun. Soon the brown haze will obscure the sun in some polluted Asian cities.”

“This pollution is caused by millions of cow dung cooking fires in India, coal cooking fires in China and North Korea, forest fires in Indonesia and millions of small obsolete and dirty wood, charcoal and coal stoves and furnaces all over Asia and Africa. Similar problems are obvious in places in South America.”

“The western world went through this pollution phase a century ago, and although improvements can still be made, we have banished the notorious smoke pollution of places like London, Manchester and Pittsburgh.”

“London smoke pollution was so bad that the city became known as “The Big Smoke”. Children developed rickets from the lack of sunshine, plants and animals died and lung disease was widespread. During its last and worst ever pollution event, “The Black Fog” of 1952, caused by a temperature inversion over London, visibility was reduced to less than a foot and 4,000 Londoners died from SO2 poisoning (50 in one small London park alone). This shock brought action - cooking and heating with open fires of wood and coal was banned in big cities. Clean electric power saved the forests and cleared the air.”

“The world’s worst pollution is caused by open air combustion of wood, dung and coal which produces not only the harmless greenhouse gases of water vapour and carbon dioxide, but also real pollutants such as soot, smoke, ash, dust and chemicals containing sulphur, chlorine, nitrogen, fluorine, and metals. In dilute quantities, these trace elements are not a problem, but when concentrated in city air, they can be toxic.”

“Ignoring this real monster threatening human health and the environment, the media and politicians are chasing the CO2 mirage.”

“Carbon dioxide puts the bubbles in your beer, the fizz in your soda water, the holes in your bread, the dry ice in your Esky and the gas in your fire extinguisher. It is colourless, odourless, and non-toxic and does not form polluting smog or acid rain. It encourages the growth of all plant life on land and in the oceans. The whole plant world breathes in CO2 during the growing season and releases much of it again when the leaves fall. It is the key recycler of organic matter for the whole food chain, including the human race.”

“Man’s emissions of CO2 are a miniscule factor in determining Earth’s temperature. But while are we are wasting time and money trying to catch and imprison this harmless Will o’ the Wisp, an ominous brown smelly choking cloud of real pollution is growing in our northern skies.”

“Removing most of the pollutants from combustion emissions is difficult but not impossible. Removing or burying all carbon dioxide emissions from the combustion of carbon fuels is an impossible dream. “Zero emissions” and “carbon sequestration” for key carbon fuels like coal, oil, gas and wood are nonsense goals, and their pursuit is diverting attention and truck loads of money from a worthy goal such as “Zero Pollution”.

“The western world has largely beaten its pollution with inventions such as the chimney, the stove, but most of all by a clean, silent, invisible energy called electricity, generated in clean, concentrated and remote power stations while delivering lighting, heating, cooling, cooking and motive power into the most humble home in the poorest suburb.”

“To fly over a clean modern coal-fired power station at say 10,000 m is to put it into perspective – a puny cooling tower or two emitting wisps of water vapour and a small amount of (invisible) carbon dioxide and which is dwarfed by any passing cloud, no matter how small.”


“This third world problem presents a real opportunity for Australian energy companies to make profits and clean up the environment by promoting clean non-polluting modern power stations burning high quality Australian coals. This will allow cow dung to be used for soil improvement and allow re-afforestation of areas denuded by centuries of scavenging for fire wood.”

“Invisible energy from coal has already banished most of the terrible pollution that affected cities such as London, Manchester and Pittsburgh, and allowed the regrowth of American forests.”

“The public has been misled on this issue by an unholy alliance of environmental scaremongers, funds-seeking academics, sensation-seeking media, vote-seeking politicians and profit-seeking vested interests.”

“Anyone with the real interests of ordinary Australians, Australian industry or the environment at heart would divert public attention and political action from the non-problem of carbon emissions and towards the world’s real pollution problems.”

“History shows that people cannot and will not live without energy in their homes. Unless we allow coal to supply clean silent invisible energy, they will continue to burn dung, wood, cardboard, trees, oil, charcoal or reject coal to get their warmth or cook their food.”

“Just one well designed, well scrubbed, modern Australian designed coal power plant running on natural fossil sunshine from the Sunshine State could provide the light, heating, cooling and entertainment silently and invisibly to the front door for about 3 million Asian homes, housing maybe 10 million people.”

Mr Forbes called on government and opposition to cease political grandstanding on the Greenhouse issue, where carbon taxes and carbon emissions trading will adversely affect most Australians, and focus on goals that will really benefit all of Australia and the environment.

“Do we wait for the re-appearance of rickets and lung disease before acting?


Viv Forbes
Chairman
The Carbon Sense Coalition
MS 23
Rosewood Qld
0754 640 533
info@carbon-sense.com

Disclosure of Interest:
Viv Forbes earns income from three carbon emitting industries, coal, cattle and sheep. He also uses cement, steel and electricity, buys diesel for his tractor and petrol for his car. He uses trains and occasionally boards an aeroplane. He eats carbon based foods, pays taxes and uses government services funded by taxes on the carbon industries. All of these industries and services will be harmed by carbon taxes or emissions trading. Like the great majority of Australians, he has a big vested interest in the outcome of this historic debate.

(More information on The Carbon Sense Coalition can be found on our web site at www.carbon-sense.com.)

“Carbon Sense” has responded to the Energy Policy proposals for Queensland “Climate Smart 2005”. It is entitled: “Look before you Leap”.

In it, The Carbon Sense Coalition accuses the Queensland Government of proposing draconian policies which will have no effect whatsoever on global temperature, but will, if pursued, do tremendous damage to most Queenslanders.

(The full text of “Look Before you Leap” can be downloaded from:

http://carbon-sense.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/06/look.pdf

"Michigan Republican Chairman Saul Anuzis calls on Ron Paul Libertarians to Stay in the GOP"

From Eric Dondero over at Mainstream Libertarian.

8/29/7 -- With the race for US President on the GOP side becoming more and more solidified for frontrunners Rudy Giuliani, Mitt Romney and Fred Thompson, MI GOP Chairman Saul Anuzis made an appeal last night to Ron Paul supporters to stay within the GOP and support the eventual Nominee.

Anuzis was a guest on the Blog Talk Radio show "Libertarian Politics Live" hosted by Eric Dondero, and Co-Hosted by Andre Traversa. At the end of the half hour interview Anuzis said:

"I've been very involved in the conservative libertarian side of the Party... If you don't get involved, don't want to get involved you're not going to make a difference... throwing bombs from the outside it's not going to help. It's important to have people who are passionate about the issues involved. I mean take a look at a mainstream libertarian group like the Cato Institute. Cato has had an enormous influence... In Michigan we have the Macinac Center which is also libertarian... libertarian conservative.

They're important, but activists need to also get involved and get their hands dirty and not just jump in because Ron Paul is running and then jump out again... Their credibility is shot."

During the half hour interview Anuzis also discussed Michigan politics, GOP outreach efforts to minorities in the State, and the prospective run of Ted Nugent for Governor as a Republican for 2010.

Listen to the entire interview here!

Eric Dondero is a US Navy Veteran, former Libertarian Party National Committeeman, Founder of the Republican Liberty Caucus and fmr. Senior Aide to US Congressman Ron Paul R-TX. He is now a national Republican Political Consultant based in Houston, Texas.

The 'Blue Dog' Moment

Some time ago I read an article which suggested that the Libertarian Party might be better off aligning itself with the Democrats. I can't remember where it was - when something is patently ridiculous you don't plug it in the memory banks. If the reason was fiscal responsibility the following link should shatter that idea.

I'll get you started by quoting in part this article from the Wall St Journal.


The 'Blue Dog' Moment
So far, they're spending like other Democrats.

Monday, August 27, 2007 12:01 a.m. EDT

A high-stakes budget showdown is shaping up this fall between President Bush and Congressional Democrats. The debate will also be a moment of truth for the so-called "blue dog" Democrats: the 48 self-described fiscal conservatives in the House Democratic Caucus.

The bone of contention is the $22 billion in domestic spending that Democrats passed in their budget resolution above what Mr. Bush requested in his own budget. The Democratic spending plan would increase non-defense expenditures by 6.5% next year--more than double the inflation rate. The White House is threatening vetoes if Democrats pass spending bills above Mr. Bush's limit, which could possibly lead to a government shutdown. Republicans have already lined up the necessary House votes to sustain any spending veto.

The blue dog Web site boasts that its mission is to "refocus Congress on balancing the budget and ridding taxpayers of the burden of debt." If a balanced budget is what they want, the best fiscal option would be to enact what is called a "continuing resolution" budget that would fund all programs at last year's level plus 1% or 2%. Along with rising tax revenues, this could cut the budget deficit roughly in half next year, to well under $100 billion. But Republicans can't do that on their own: they need the votes of these moderate Democrats.

Here's the rub: So far this year the blue dogs have been almost all bark when it comes to fiscal restraint and debt reduction. Thirty of the 48 have voted for every one of the non-defense spending bills their committee chairman have sent them. Speaker Nancy Pelosi is enforcing party discipline, and as a result 28 of the 48 blue dogs voted "no" on each of the 27 amendments that Republicans proposed to cut the costs of these bills. The 13 freshman Democrats who represent conservative districts--such as Heath Shuler (N.C.), Baron Hill (Ind.), Zack Space (Ohio), Nick Lampson (Texas)--have been a particular disappointment; back home these same blue dogs trumpet their "independent streak."

Geert Wilders

Pictures Left to right, Ehsan Jami, Geert Wilders, and Ayaan Hirsi Ali.

By Jim Fryar.

“According to Geert Wilders, one can roam the streets of Amsterdam stoned, belly full of space cakes, window-shopping hookers, en route to a monkey sex show and still be a model citizen.” Corrine Marshall. Huffington Post.

Well maybe not a model citizen, but that part may be the correspondents words not those of the subject, the article was after all rather disapproving. Apart from that the guy sounds quite reasonable, I don’t want to do any of those things but I don’t see any reason to prevent anyone who wishes to do so from doing it. After all it is none of my business.

I began researching this post on Geert Wilders, prominent Dutch Politician and leader of the Dutch Freedom Party (PVV). As I did it I found that while the old stuff is of interest, most of the later material consists of anti-Islamic rhetoric, which tends to point to the possibility of the man being just another extreme right-winger.

He appears to be committed to freedom of the individual. His political views (and so the ones of the PVV as well) are very similar to those of murdered populist politician, Pim Fortuyn and his List Pim Fortuyn. There are strong resemblances, certainly on socio-economic issues, to libertarianism.

Wilders wants to lower taxes, decrease most welfare, raise highway speed limits and cut state regulations by making it mandatory to scrap two legal rules for every new one to be instated.

Clearly he has adopted some of the persona of Pim Fortuyn but appears to fiscally conservative in addition to having a commitment to individual freedom. Like Pim Fortuyn, he has serious issues with Islam.

The reason for this seems to lie in growing radicalism among the Islamic community resulting in the perception that there is a quiet Islamic take-over of Holland by Islamic immigrants, aided and abetted by political correctness, with it’s ‘see no evil, hear no evil, even when it’s obvious’, ideals.

People generally have no objection to some inflow of immigrants, even those who are very different to themselves. This changes dramatically however if those immigrants do not seem to wish to fit in and particularly if they advocate changing the traditions and culture of the host country to suit their own.

Add violence to the mix and prevent people speaking out with racial vilification laws as well as passive censorship by the press, and you have the formulae for seething resentment. You then have to be asking for trouble to have the state actively encouraging this.

It is obvious that the government is engaging in social engineering against the wishes of the people.

The integration minister Vogelaar caused a stir when she said the Netherlands should in the future be home to a "Judeo-Christian-Islamic tradition.” A Dutch-Moroccan group praised her for her "courage," but other politicians objected, and Wilders said the minister should resign. In a recent opinion survey, 56 percent of Dutch adult respondents rejected Vogelaar's remark.

The Dutch are probably one of the most socially tolerant people in the world, closely followed by relatively liberal social values in much of Western Europe. Europe has generally welcomed migrants and refugees as part of that tolerance, however serious underlying problems have arisen through radical Islamic refusing to tolerate the culture of the host countries.

Theo van Gogh was murdered in Amsterdam on Tuesday, November 2. The 47-year-old film director and publicist was shot and stabbed several times by his assassin on the streets of the Dutch capital. Danish imam Ahmed Abu Laban, Palestinian by birth, has explained how 'Theo van Gogh provoked all Muslims by showing a naked woman.’

At this point I have to ask ‘what the hell is wrong with images of naked ladies?’ If the women themselves have no problems with those images being shown, then it is no one else’s business. If somebody objects then they can stay away and deny the producer the financial benefit of their custom, of even criticize it or urge people not to attend, but to use violence is beyond the pail.

Wilders himself has been subjected to numerous death threats in the past. Ayaan Hirsi Ali another politician and an associate of Theo Van Gough has now left the Netherlands and lives in the US has also been threatened and went into hiding at the same time as Wilders, and the leader of a group of people who have left Islam, Ehsan Jami was recently beaten up by radicals.

It is natural that citizens of any country or region to resent outsiders coming in and holding them in sneering contempt, but when the new group feel that they have the right to abuse, assault, and even kill them out of the bigotry of their own culture, then you have a recipe for disaster and open warfare.

I am reminded here of the words of Groucho Marx; “Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong remedies."

The problem I have with Geert Wilders is that he appears to be seeking the populist option in seeking to create a division between the Dutch people and all Islamic people or may be seeing things this way, when really it is a matter of crime, not a race issue. It appears that a majority of Islamic immigrants are happy to live in harmony with the rest of the people, and the activities of Wilders is only likely to exacerbate the problems caused by a minority.

The solution in my opinion would be to enforce the law on any one who commits any crime and if they are immigrants, boot them back to whatever country they came from. If they are then persecuted in their own countries, then it is not the problem of the former host; they had their chance and abused the privilege.

The rest should then get the message.

New SUV?

Meet the MRAP or Mine Resistant Ambush Protected Vehicle.

Remember the Humvee, which when Big Arnie and a few others with more money than sense wanted them were released in the civilian Hummer version.

Just wait till this hits a road close to you as the Mrapper.

Zimbabwe

By Jim Fryar.

An unconfirmed report in “First Post” indicates that Mugabe is not as secure as we have been led to believe. In an article “Mugabe struggles to hold on to power”, by Moses Moyo (quoted in Part) he says that neither of the main factions support further rule by him: -

“The much-publicized endorsement in March of Mugabe as the Zanu-PF party's Presidential candidate for next year's elections never happened. Newly leaked minutes of the critical party meeting indicate that no endorsement was made - and observers believe that whoever is the next President of Zimbabwe it will not be Robert Mugabe.

The minutes of the meeting, held between 1pm and 4.35pm on March 30, at Zanu-PF headquarters in Harare, have been leaked by one of the two major factions struggling for power within the party.

This faction is led by retired army supremo Solomon Mujuru, whose wife, Joyce, is one of Zimbabwe's two vice-presidents”.

“Mujuru himself, a formidable character who can boast the support of the army, is not personally interested in the presidency.

At one time it was thought that he would support his wife Joyce in a bid for the top office. But it now appears that Simba Makoni, a former finance minister, is his choice. Makoni is a man with relatively clean hands - plus he is good-looking, charismatic, and highly popular within the party”.

So what is really going on there? I remember when the country was referred to as the ‘bread basket of Africa’, led by a man who was admired by every left winger in the world, supported by an army trained by democratic North Korea, what could go wrong?

After years of mismanagement and cronyism the country was still reasonably well off, propped up by a very efficient rural sector, and minerals, then in order to retain the support of the people a massive effort was put into seizure of large rural holdings to redistribute them to the landless supporters of the government.

Some of these have been appropriated by senior government officials while others have been reduced to subsistence farming, the upshot of which was a massive reduction in the gross national product, especially in food production. At the same time, huge expenditure was incurred by intervention in the Congolese civil war. Because of the violence associated with land takeovers and intimidating the opposition, the tourism industry also collapsed.

Because of the shortages, prices rose and the government went for the printing presses leading to runaway inflation. More money chasing fewer goods is one of the tried and true methods of achieving this. Inflation is now in the order of a whopping 5000%, and likely to increase. The government has promised to print more money to pay for its projects, so no lessons have been learned.

Price controls have now been imposed on many products with cuts of up to 50% demanded. As result many stores are virtually empty, and thousands of owners arrested for breaches.

Probably the only things keeping the population alive are a thriving black (free) market, and the millions of refugees (currently estimated at up to 3000 per day) who send food and foreign currency home to relatives.