Fortenberry on Iraq

We admire Rep. Jeff Fortenberry, our congressman from Lincoln, for not singing onto on the House's "non-binding" resolution in favor of losing the war in Iraq. The Lincoln Journal Star criticized Fortenberry for not going along with it, and today they published his statement to the House as his rebuttal:

Madam Speaker, this is a pivotal moment for our nation and a very grave and solemn policy debate. We cannot afford to allow the ups and downs of the daily news cycle to set the course for our deliberations. The stakes in Iraq are too high.

During last year’s debate on Iraq, I emphasized that this war is different from the wars of the past — there is no front, no lines of demarcation, no clear enemy in distinct uniforms. This is a war “that invades tranquil space and time without warning, carried out by those who hide among civilian populations, seeking to exploit the vulnerable for ruthless ideological purposes. … We have never before waged a war in an age of globalization, in an age when technology eviscerates the concept of distance, magnifies our losses, trivializes our accomplishments, and places our adversaries in a far better position to leverage our freedoms — particularly freedom of speech — against us.” These are the complexities.

Madam Speaker, I submit that our choices now stand to determine not only the future of the Middle East but the very future of civilization. We can point fingers, blame each other, or we can think constructively together.

So what are our choices?

The National Intelligence Estimate categorically rejects an arbitrary or precipitous U.S. troop withdrawal. The result would be horrific chaos, a humanitarian disaster, destabilizing the entire Middle East, emboldening the geo-political aims of Iran and leading to a much less peaceful world.

It's a good speech, and you should read the rest of it.

Like He Needs Any Help with That

Hugo "Fidel" Chavez is premptively blaming the US for the results of his policies on the Venezuelan economy. Because nationalizing everything in sight, squashing all dissent, and central economic planning has promoted prosperity and freedom whereever it has been tried before. The Irish Times carries this AP report:

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has claimed that the US government is planning to sabotage the oil-producing country's economy.

Mr Chavez, speaking yesterday on his TV talk show, predicted that "one of the fiercest battle fronts" was coming ahead as Washington readied to destroy Venezuela economically.

He said that recent comments by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice accusing him of "destroying" his country's economy meant that "the imperialist plan of the moment" had turned to economic sabotage.

It's kind of like the Dixie Chicks blaming others for destroying their careers. Watch for Phase 2 of the Castro Model. Soon the root cause of all problems will change from "the US is trading with us" to "the US is not trading with us."

Not the Sandmonkey

An Egyptian blogger, Abdelkareem Suleiman, was sentenced to 4 years in Egyptian prison for "insulting" Islam and "defaming" Mubarak. This article from the Daily Telegraph gave me a shock, reporting that this was Sandmonkey:

An Egyptian who enraged his government with outspoken views on Islam and politics expressed in his internet diary was jailed yesterday amid an international outcry.

The 22-year-old former law student, whose own father has disowned him and called for his execution under Islamic law, was sentenced to four years by a court in Alexandria.

The convictions resulting from the views published on his weblog, sandmonkey, included counts for "spreading information disruptive of public order and damaging to the country's reputation"; "incitement to hate Islam" and "defaming the President of the Republic".

Fortunately, the real Sandmonkey is free and still blogging. Apparently somewhere along the line someone in the Telegraph got things a little garbled. Poor Suleiman, however, is in for a very rough time, and may not even live to serve out his sentence, according to comments on Sandmonkey's post.

Mubarak: Let your people go.

Nuts and Bolts

I have taken the plunge and upgraded my Blogger account to the new version, albeit with some trepidation. It seems to be a oneway door, and even though reports from the other side were favorable, I wasn't sure I was ready. No turning back now...

So far I haven't switched to the new template system, which is supposedly the best part, although I did try it on a test blog. Essentially all the customization I've done to the original template breaks at that point.

One aspect of this site, largely invisible, is that I have gone to quite a bit of trouble to make it compliant with standards for web pages (specifically, "XHTML 1.0 Transitional"). Although Google as a search engine supposedly much prefers compliant sites, the unmodified Blogger templates were riddled with non-compliant code. Go figure.

Just changing my account from Old Blogger to New Blogger, the main page went from zero validation errors to 21. The shift to the new template code will mean hundreds of errors even before any of my customizations are restored. I'm no expert at this, so this could take awhile. The best way to do it would be to regain compliance before adding the customizations back in. However, I don't want to wait to get them back, and just redoing them all will already be time-consuming.

So at some point in the near future DLMSY may get a new, not necessarily improved, look that will continue to evolve.

Pat Sajak, Blogger

Back in the old days when we used to watch Wheel of Fortune, we always thought Pat Sajak seemed like a guy who would be fun to meet. Despite the fame he had garnered through the show, he never seemed to take himself (or the show for that matter) overly seriously.

That basic good sense is also evident in his blog, Sajak Says, He currently has on the main page two thoughtful posts on the Global Warming hysteria now sweeping the world. Unfortunately, there seems to be no way to get a permanent link to these until they reach the blog archives. So if they are no longer on the main page, scroll to the bottom and click on the Archived Articles link.

The two titles are "Is it Just Me, or is it Warm in Here?" and "Global Warming: What Are You Willing to Do?" Here's a sample from the second post:

However, there’s another level on which I have trouble with those who are the true believers. Why aren’t they doing more to stop it? I don’t mean offering ideas for regulations to tell the rest of us what to do; I mean what are they doing personally. If I’m driving an SUV or living in a big house, they can accuse me of callous disregard for the problem, but at least the callousness is based on my non-belief. What about them? Why are they still driving that big car or living in that big house? In fact, why are they driving at all? Why haven’t they moved into a minimalist home within walking distance of their office? Talk about callous!

Imagine being absolutely certain we are the verge of a man-made catastrophe and not doing everything within your power to help reverse it. Anyone who truly believes it and still uses anything more than the lowest-wattage single bulb or drives one mile more than absolutely necessary is nothing short of a monster! A skeptic’s actions can be blamed on ignorance; a believer’s can only be chalked up to a shocking disregard for his children’s futures.

It's nice to find someone in the entertainment business who isn't a moonbat.