Month: September 2006

Four Years!?!?.

Isn’t that, like, 28 in Internet years?

The Carnival of the Vanities celebrates its 208^th incarnation at its new home, First Carnival. According to the opening paragraph:

Four years ago, something happened that was to change the face of blogging: CotV #1 appeared. The very first edition of the Carnival of the Vanities featured 15 participants. Of those, I’m aware of 9 who are still blogging.

That’s pretty amazing when you think about the ephemeral nature of most blogs.

Anyway, congratulations on the big 4.0!

Time’s Running Out!.

If you’re not already registered, you’ve got two days to do so, or your room rate will be much higher.

Click on the picture for all you need to know to join us at the Reno Rendezvous!

Stories the MSM Doesn’t Tell.

Perusing my archives I came across this post about 72 year-old Lena Haddix of Lawton, OK who volunteered for deployment as a civilian Department of Defense employee to the Middle East. That was in November of 2004. Now I find this story about Ms. Haddix:

DALLAS, Jan. 9, 2006 — Folks in Oklahoma are readjusting to an image not typically associated with the global war on terrorism, a 73-year old great-grandmother just back from Operation Iraqi Freedom.

Lena Haddix, a native of Lawton, has spent the last six months in full battle armor helping troops find snacks, shampoo and other American products at the Army & Air Force Exchange Service Post Exchange/Base Exchange in Camp Liberty, Iraq.

The personification of the Exchange’s motto of “We Go Where You Go,” Haddix recently returned from her second voluntary deployment to the Middle East as a store manager. After previously volunteering to work in Kuwait, Haddix decided her work wasn’t done and went back for a second tour of duty, this time to Baghdad, Iraq.

“I’m glad to do it for the soldiers,” said Haddix. She explained that troops came to expect her presence at the store and often called her mom.

“When the convoys would come back, the troops would stop by the store and shout, ‘Mom, we made it!’”

After being gone for almost a year, Haddix will return to the Fort Sill Post Exchange to continue to support troops and their families here at home.

“People like Lena are critical to the morale of our deployed troops,” said AAFES Chief of Contingency Planning Lt. Col. Steven Dean. “It is only through them that AAFES is able to deliver retail, fast food and telecommunication services that they would expect to find back home to a war zone.”

When asked about her time overseas and if she would consider going back, Haddix replied, “I’m thinking about it.”

AAFES currently operates more than 60 stores throughout Operations Enduring and Iraqi Freedom. Troops can find a variety of items from basic supplies including socks, personal care items and beverages to comfort items including televisions, DVD players and movies.

That is just too cool!

The American Dream is What, Again?.

In the previous piece I quoted someone on the topic of people “voting against their self-interest” in which that person said,

As it turns out, the American Dream is just that…

Kim du Toit has complained that Hollyweird doesn’t put out any movies he wants to see, but thanks to Carnaby from Carnaby Fudge I see there’s one coming out in December that addresses both topics, The Pursuit of Happyness. Watch the trailer (it’s Apple Quicktime, but worth it.)

I’ll be waiting for it to open. Like Carnaby said, now I like Will Smith even more.

It’s Primary Day in a lot of places, Arizona being one of them. For most people, this cartoon describes accurately what they’re voting for:

I can’t count the number of times I’ve heard someone on the Democrat side of the aisle complain that the poor and middle class votes Republican “against their own self-interest,”^* insisting by inference that not voting to “take his money and give it to you” is, well, undemocratic. Read the money quote from that link:

Why do so many poor and middle class people vote for Republicans against their own self-interest? Because if they aren’t rich now, 40% of them believe they will be soon. As it turns out, the American Dream is just that…

Yes, friends, the idea that you can earn your way to wealth is just a pipe-dream. Better that you vote someone into office so that they can steal appropriate just enough money for you from the already-wealthy to make you even more dependent on government. That’s how they define “self-interest.”

The concepts of sacrifice, delayed gratification, fairness, and just plain right have been inverted, twisted, and damned-near obliterated by the Left.

So, go to the polls today and vote, not for yourself, but for the future. Vote, if it’s available, for what’s right rather than what’s immediately gratifying. If thats not available, vote against those who would take from A and give to B, just to get B’s vote. But vote. You may not be able to stop the toboggan ride to hell, but you can at least try to throw out an anchor to slow it down.

*Here’s some more wonderful “self-interest” quotes:

“Whenever a group of people will vote for a President, put a man in power and do that against their own self-interest, their economic self-interest…” begins Richard “Skip” Daly, business manager of the Laborers, Hod Carriers, Cement Workers and Miners Local Union 169 (Nevada), before stopping and rewording his thought. He tries again: “They voted for a Republican who’s got the biggest deficit spending ever; they voted against all of their self-interest. And the issue that came out in exit polling was ‘we voted on the moral values.’ What that says to me is, these people believe it’s more important than their family’s well-being that we don’t have abortion. And, to me, that is an intolerance that we have not experienced in this country since we put into insignificance the Ku Klux Klan.” – The Nation, 11/18/04

Yes, actually believing in something like morals is “undemocratic.”

Poor Republicans are working against their own self-interests. People in the military who vote Republican are working against their own self-interests. Gay people who vote Republican (apologies to Andrew Sullivan) are working against their own self-interest. Hell, unless you’re, say, the CEO of a large multinational corporation, voting Republican is against your self-interest.

That’s why I called it “ignorance.” 🙂 – “Deanocrat” in this comment thread.

Perhaps they’re voting for some value you just don’t have the capacity to grasp? And here’s another:

I am surprised at how ignorant and uniformed the public is regarding the estate tax. When my father passed away, there was about 200K left to be divided between my brother and me. My brother (who votes Republican, I think because of guns and because he’s now a father and thinks that is what fathers do….not that I understand that) was self-congratulatory about this, saying that because of Bush we wouldn’t have to pay the estate tax, etc. He had absolutely no concept of the difference in what the estate tax was versus the inheritance tax. When I explained the difference between the two and pointed out the estate tax limits, etc. he still seemed to think that Bush’s plan was a good one even though he will never benefit from it. Just another example of the middle class voting against their own self-interest. I guess my brother hasn’t figured out that lower taxes for the wealthy will eventually mean higher taxes (or reduced services, such as homeland security) for him and a huge burden of national debt for his children to pay off. – Posted by “ann” in this comment thread.

The concept of “it’s their money” just doesn’t reach the Left. Nope, it’s the GOVERNMENT’S money, to them. And they just don’t grasp how anyone could see it differently.

Via Instapundit:

Woman in a Wheelchair Shoots an Attacker

By ANAHAD O’CONNOR and SARAH GARLAND
Published: September 9, 2006

As muggings go, it began like many others. A 56-year-old woman was leaving her building in her wheelchair, her only company the small dog perched on her lap.

Her attacker came from behind, the police said, and there was no one else around. But this attempted robbery had an ending unlike many others. As it turns out, the would-be victim, Margaret Johnson, has a permit to carry a .357 handgun – and she carries it often.

No, she does not have a “permit to carry a .357 handgun” – read on.

The mugging ended seconds after it began, the police said, when Ms. Johnson pulled out her gun and shot her attacker in his arm. Last night, the man accused of the attempted mugging, Deron Johnson, 45, was in stable condition at Harlem Hospital Center with a gunshot wound to his elbow, the police said. He was under protective custody and is facing a robbery charge, the police said.

Ms. Johnson, who was treated at a local hospital and later released, said she suffered bruises to her neck and arm. “I’m tired, I’m really tired,” she said as she sat in her apartment last night, wearing a tan baseball cap and appearing rattled. “He tried to mug me, so I shot him.”

Friends and neighbors said they were not shocked to learn that the woman known to scoot around her building with her small dog had held her ground. Tio Frederick, 26, a lawyer and neighbor who has known Ms. Johnson for 20 years, called her amicable but tough and spunky. “I wouldn’t assume that if she got mugged she would let someone just take her stuff,” she said.

The encounter began about 3 p.m. on a sidewalk behind 470 Lenox Avenue in Harlem, the building where Ms. Johnson has lived for more than 20 years. The building has a doorman and many of its residents are professionals, but neighbors have recently complained about robberies.

Yesterday, as is often the case, friends said, Ms. Johnson had her small bichon with her, and was going to a nearby firing range.

There’s a firing range in Harlem? The closest one I could find to 470 Lenox Ave. was Seventh Regiment Rifle Club, 643 Park Ave., about 3.8 miles away according to Google Maps. That’s a long round-trip even in a powered chair. Hopefully she was going to get a taxi ride.

As she rolled out of the building, a man approached, and Ms. Johnson tried to say hello, said Lynell Bunce, 40, a friend who spoke with Ms. Johnson afterward. “She found him walking by, and she was going to say, ‘Good afternoon,'” Ms. Bunce said.

Instead of returning the greeting, the man looked away and walked past her without saying a word, Ms. Bunce said. Seconds later, Ms. Johnson felt an arm grab her violently from behind, tearing at her pocketbook and her necklace.

The man managed to get the necklace, but Ms. Johnson refused to let go of her pocketbook, the police said.

As the man choked her and struggled with her, Ms. Johnson pulled out her gun and fired a single shot.

The police said that Ms. Johnson did not have a criminal record and was not facing any charges. The permit she has for her gun allows her to have it in her home and to transport it to a range, which is what she was doing, they said.

She has a possession permit, not a carry permit, and she was transporting a loaded weapon. I’m not certain, but I believe that New York firearms law prohibits that. Let me cite the NYPD Web Page:

PREMISES LICENSE: IS A RESTRICTED TYPE OF LICENSE. It is issued for your RESIDENCE or BUSINESS. The Licensee may possess a handgun ONLY on the premises of the address indicated on the front of the license. Licensees may also transport their handguns and ammunition in SEPARATE LOCKED CONTAINERS, DIRECTLY to and from an authorized range, or hunting location. HANDGUNS MUST BE UNLOADED WHEN TRANSPORTING.

All emphasis is theirs. And quite emphatic they are, too. Ms. Johnson was not transporting her handgun, unloaded, in a locked container. Ms. Johnson was not transporting her ammunition in a separate locked container. Ms. Johnson was transporting her loaded .357 in a manner that put it easy-to-hand. Supposedly, she does so “often.” Ms. Johnson most definitely violated the law, but will the DA prosecute? Absolutely not. I think they learned their lesson there with Ronald Dixon. She’s an older black woman in a wheelchair who successfully defended herself against a career criminal. (I hate to be the one to say it, but as far as publicity goes the only PC box left unchecked on this one is “lesbian.”) No WAY are they going to do ANYTHING to put her in a position to point out how idiotic and anti-citizen New York’s gun laws are.

Though I’m certain that, after the hubbub dies down, her “premises permit” will be quietly revoked and her .357, which I’m sure was taken as evidence, will never be returned to her.

The man accused of attacking her, Mr. Johnson (no relation), was described by the authorities as a “robbery recidivist,” [Quelle surprise…] with nine previous arrests. He spent several years in prison for criminal sale of a controlled substance, and he was released in February 2003, according to Department of Correction Records.

Last night, Ms. Johnson was in no mood to celebrate what she did, friends said. Ms. Bunce, a longtime neighbor, said Ms. Johnson was frightened and threatened never to walk her dog again.

Wait… I thought she was “going to the gun range.” (Would you take your dog to the gun range? In New York City? Just asking.)

“She was very much the victim,” Ms. Bunce said. “She was scared for her life. She’s devastated.”

So, a resident of New York City, with a “premises permit” was supposedly on her way to the gun range when she was mugged, drew her (illegally) loaded firearm and defended herself from a much younger, physically fit, career criminal with a single shot from her .357 Magnum revolver, and the NEW YORK TIMES REPORTED IT!

I. Am. In. Shock.

And I’m quite certain you will never, ever hear about Ms. Johnson and her .357 in the pages of the New York Times again. I’m amazed she ever got there in the first place. After all, the perp didn’t take her gun away, and she wasn’t just another bloodstained chalk outline on the sidewalk.

UPDATE: Hell HAS frozen over! CNN picked up the story! Of course, with all the details stripped out.

Margaret Johnson, who lives in Harlem, has a permit for the weapon and does not face charges

That’s all you need to know, apparently.

One Step Forward, One GIANT LEAP Back…

So, Instapundit thinks that Femtroopers “will make the whole dressing-up-at-Star-Wars-conventions thing seem a lot cooler,” eh? I can certainly understand the impulse:

YOWSA!

Unfortunately, the whole “dressing-up-at-Star-Wars-conventions thing” is rendered eternally uncool – nearly to the point of self-immolation – at the sight of, well, (scroll down)….

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

THIS:

AAAAAGGGGHHHH!! My eyes! My eyes!

Whoever it is in that, that… suit, he/she/it ought to be burned at the stake! Kalashnikitty? OK. DARTHKITTY??? – SACRILEGE!!

If Only the NYT Published Rebuttals.

Denise of The Ten Ring delivers a world-class fisking to one of the NYT‘s screeching idiots. (They have so many…)

Go read.

“We have no means to do anything like that!”

The Geek has written a post that everyone needs to read.

Everyone.