Update:  Making this a weekend OTA post.  I have to work Sunday, so likely I will not have much to post.

In personal news, I spent much of today guitar amd amp shopping.  I just had to share that.  Wee this blog in a few weeks to see what I bought.

Open Trackback Friday Weekend

Leave a trackback of your best post for others to read.   Also, look at the trackbacks below to see what others are saying. 

And for my non-bloggin friends…feel free to look around and put your 2 cents in my comments…or if the mood strikes, cue up the band and give us a showtune.

For an explanation of a trackback, go here or here.

If your blog does not support Trackbacks (blogger is still in the dark ages in this regard), check out Haloscan, which I used to use on my old blogger site, or you may also just use The Wizbang Standalone Pinger to do so.

Just include this post’s permalink (right the post title and copy the short cut) in your post and use the Trackback URL at the end of the post for your trackback.

For this weeks Stop the ACLU Blog Burst, I would like to tell you about a local case.

In this case, the issue is felons and voting rights.

Washington is one of many states that revoke the voting rights of felons.  The law in Washington allows for the eventual restoral of their voting rights, following their prison term, paying all fines and restitution, probation and parole.

In other words, satisfy the courts judgment first, and then you can vote.

Most of it is not really at issue.  The part that makes the ACLU see red is the aspect of the court ordered fines and restitution.  They contend this is an effective poll tax, whereby only the rich felons can vote, not the poor ones.  Since court ordered fines and or restitution can be large, it can take years for a felon to satisfy the court.  The felons argue that if they are making a good faith effort to make payments, they should be able to vote.

Once again, as a public service only, I am reporting another dissenting voice against Al Gore and his documentary.

The fact is, as I have maintained, the scientific community is not united in regards to Global Warming and Climate Change.  There remains decades of research to determine causation and effect, and to establish what we can do, if anything to deal with it.

What this movie should do is spur more discussions and encourage research.

Instead it is being used as political hay to build another anti administration/anti republican strawman.  Using this information to inflame imaginations and encourage panic is obviously unscientific and, in my opinion, shameful.

AP INCORRECTLY CLAIMS SCIENTISTS PRAISE GORE’S MOVIE

The June 27, 2006 Associated Press (AP) article titled “Scientists OK Gore’s Movie for Accuracy” by Seth Borenstein raises some serious questions about AP’s bias and methodology.

AP chose to ignore the scores of scientists who have harshly criticized the science presented in former Vice President Al Gore’s movie “An Inconvenient Truth.”

Today the Senate voted on and narrowly defeated the flag burning amendment to the US Constitution.

Flag-Burning Amendment Fails In Senate

constitutional amendment to ban flag desecration died in a Senate cliffhanger Tuesday, a single vote short of the support needed to send it to the states for ratification a week before Independence Day.

The 66-34 vote in favor of the amendment was one less than the two-thirds required. The House surpassed that threshold last year, 286-130.

Now right off the bat I am shocked.  There was much more support for it then I anticipated.  I excpected this to fail mostly on party lines, but instead it only failed by a single vote.  Obviously some Senators crossed the party lines somewhere. 

Voting "yes" were 52 Republicans and 14 Democrats.  I will post a roll call list below, but  notable (to me) were Sen Feinstein and Sen Reid who both voted yes.  I am not a big fan of Diane, so I am somewhat bemused by her vote.  Harry howver, I am just not a big fan.  Period.

Miami bomb plot suspects "entrapped," lawyers say

Seven men charged with conspiring to bomb the Sears Tower in Chicago and the FBI building in Miami were entrapped by a federal informant, lawyers for two of the suspects said on Monday.

Oh please. 

An indictment issued last week accused the men of pledging loyalty to Osama bin Laden’s al Qaeda and seeking the group’s support to "wage war" against the U.S. government.

The person they thought was an al Qaeda representative was actually an FBI informant, U.S. Justice Department officials said.

Albert Levin, the court-appointed attorney for suspect Patrick Abraham, said he believes his client was ensnared by the informant.

Sure…I bet it went like this:

• Suspect:  Are you with Al Qaeda?
• Agent:  Yep
• Suspect:  I wanna blow something UP, can you help me?
• Agent:  Sure, will you pledge your loyalty to Osama?
• Suspect:  You bet. (makes oath)
• Agent:  Congrats you are one of us now.  Praise Allah.
• Suspect:  Cool.  Can I have a bomb now?

Ok, look.  I understand all the freedom of the press bleah bleah 1st Amendment justification BS, but there is a point where freeedom has a cost that is not worth it.  When that freedom endangers lives, I would consider it too costly.

In this case, a classified Pentagon briefing was plastered on the pages of the NY Slimes. 

The whole point of keeping these things a secret is that if the enemy (you know, the people in Iraq who are killing our troops) wants to know when we are leaving, so they can sit back, scale back and wait till we do and then overwhelm the remaining troops and obtain their objective.

Granted they could do that any way, but a time frame gives them a much better chance to solidify the plans for the best effectiveness.

It bears repeating how our culture has changed.   How little consideration the media has for the safety of the troops.

It pisses me off.

U.S. General in Iraq Outlines Troop Cuts

Today is my daughter’s sweet 16 birthday, so I will be rather occupied.  It happens to coincide with the warmest weekend in several months, so it should be a fun day. 

Feel free to open track this all weekend.  I will be back to blog later.

While you do so, here is a SCOTUS case round up, just for fun.

Enjoy your weekend! 

*****************************

List of Major High Court Cases

Some Supreme Court cases still to be decided and the issues involved:

GUANTANAMO TRIALS: Whether President Bush has overstepped his authority with military war-crimes trials for foreigners held at the U.S. prison camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

TEXAS REDISTRICTING: Whether to throw out all or part of a 2003 congressional map promoted by former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay.

INSANITY: Whether to strike down Arizona’s insanity defense law, in an appeal brought on behalf of a schizophrenic teenager who killed a police officer.

CAMPAIGN FINANCE: If Vermont and other states can limit how much money is contributed and spent in political campaigns.

Open Trackback Friday

Leave a trackback of your best post for others to read.   Also, look at the trackbacks below to see what others are saying. 

And for my non-bloggin friends…feel free to look around and put your 2 cents in my comments…or if the mood strikes, cue up the band and give us a showtune.

For an explanation of a trackback, go here or here.

If your blog does not support Trackbacks (blogger is still in the dark ages in this regard), check out Haloscan, which I used to use on my old blogGER site, or you may ALSO JUST use The Wizbang Standalone Pinger to do so.

Just include this post’s permalink (right the post title and copy the short cut) in your post and use the Trackback URL at the end of the post for your trackback.

TGIF Folks!!!

I will include a link round up and more odds and ends later.

Michelle Malkin and Sister Toldjah discuss the latest example of the MSM’s desire to print a story vs National Security.

Sister Toldjah also mentions the scandal of Kosola 101, where Markos Moulitsas Zúniga, aka Kos of “Daily Kos” liberal blog infamy, is involved in an alleged ‘pay for favoritism’ scheme.

Looks like he is now officially in violation of the UCMJ,  Article 87, Missing Movement.  He also faces more serious charges, if the military decides to hammer him on this, which frankly I hope they do.

I have no problem with a person having an aversion to war.  Fine, then stay out of the military.  Don’t make an oath, train, bond with your unit then bail when the path strats to look tough.  He could have filed for Conscientious Objector status and had his out, but he insisted on making this a political issue by attaching his complaint to the one war.  And I hope he rots in prison for it.

Eh?  Unfair am I?  Harsh maybe?  Too bad.  I have no respect for him, at all.  He violated his oath and his honor and his trust.

The latest, from KOMO TV:

War Objector Lt. Watada Refuses To Go To Iraq 

 An Army lieutenant who has said he’d rather go to prison than Iraq did not deploy with his unit when it left Thursday for the Middle East, Army officials said.

For those not paying attention, a long running battle in San Diego has forced the city to defend itself from a disgruntled athiest who is demanding the city remove a 29-foot cross at the Mount Soledad National War Memorial.

This is one of those cases where I have to wonder why the person at the center of this, Philip Paulson is really doing this.

This is a war memorial, and if you honestly do not expect some sign of religious imagery, then you are being foolish.  The cross has stood there since 1913 for crying out loud.  Why is it such a threat to this guy?  Is it really worth all the fuss he has poured into this?

Since 1989 every attempt the city has made to preserve this memorial, all of which are supported overwhelmingly by the community has ended in a court with a judge overturning them.  It sickens me frankly.

Here is the latest chapter.

9th Circuit Court denies stay in Mt. Soledad cross lawsuit; supporters remain hopeful