Senate Democrats who voted no on the John Roberts nomination for Chief Justice:

Akaka (D-HI)
Bayh (D-IN)
Biden (D-DE)
Boxer (D-CA)
Cantwell (D-WA)
Clinton (D-NY)
Corzine (D-NJ)
Dayton (D-MN)
Durbin (D-IL)
Feinstein (D-CA)
Harkin (D-IA)
Inouye (D-HI)
Kennedy (D-MA)
Kerry (D-MA)
Lautenberg (D-NJ)
Mikulski (D-MD)
Obama (D-IL)
Reed (D-RI)
Reid (D-NV)
Sarbanes (D-MD)
Schumer (D-NY)
Stabenow (D-MI)

I’m having a hard time picking my least favorite from that list, but Tom Harkin has the distinction of being the only Senator who voted against the trio of Condoleezza Rice, John Negroponte and now John Roberts.

I find Harkin particularly annoying given that, for my entire life, he has represented my native state of Iowa, which is now Bush Country.

UPDATE: Observe Barak Obama confess that he’s not part of the mainstream:

It’s this non-ideological lens through which much of the country viewed Judge Roberts’ confirmation hearings. A majority of folks, including a number of Democrats and Independents, don’t think that John Roberts is an ideologue bent on overturning every vestige of civil rights and civil liberties protections in our possession. Instead, they have good reason to believe he is a conservative judge who is (like it or not) within the mainstream of American jurisprudence, a judge appointed by a conservative president who could have done much worse (and probably, I fear, may do worse with the next nominee). While they hope Roberts doesn’t swing the court too sharply to the right, a majority of Americans think that the President should probably get the benefit of the doubt on a clearly qualified nominee.

A plausible argument can be made that too much is at stake here and now, in terms of privacy issues, civil rights, and civil liberties, to give John Roberts the benefit of the doubt. That certainly was the operating assumption of the advocacy groups involved in the nomination battle.

I shared enough of these concerns that I voted against Roberts on the floor this morning.

Fred Barnes provides backup for my hunch about Hillary’s chances in 2008.

Consider me a bear on ‘08.

Then again, I was a bear in ‘04, too.

But do we really think Hillary Clinton will be a worse candidate than John Kerry?

Others, such as Glen Dean and Will Franklin (see item 6), are more optimistic: she “has no chance.”

Update: Here’s Glenn Reynolds with another slice of the pie: “The GOP is at serious risk of losing a decisive chunk of its voters to a Perot-style movement.”

Let’s review:

1. Democrats will have a nominee they love, with universal name recognition, and with full backing by the liberal media and the public-education-brainwash-brigade.

2. Republicans will not have George W. Bush to unite the various factions of the party, and even he had a difficult time.

3. The #1 winning issue of terrorism will probably not be as potent for the Republicans in 2008.

4. Republicans will again be turned off by the inability of their own elected leaders to stand for conservative principles and show some backbone.

5. Jim Wallis and other religious liberals are doing their best to slander the religious right and drive Christians away from the Republican party and into the hands of socialist Democrats.

6. Etc., etc.

Goodby Butler Jeeves
though I never searched you at all
you had the grace to uphold yourself
while your search engine crawled

They bought you at InterActiveCorp
where they disregard your fame
they set you on a treadmill
and they made you change your name

and it seems to me, you searched the net
like a spider on its web
never knowing what to look for
until we typed it in
and I would have liked to have asked you
but I’m a Google kid
your logo burned out long before
your engine ever did…

The Minneapolis/St. Paul City Pages staff news blog, The Blotter, attempts to blame the Texas traffic jam and gasoline shortages in advance of Hurricane Rita on SUV ownership, linking to a study I posted on the subject as evidence to put the state in a bad light:

One root of the problem was evident in the aerial shots of clogged freeways: They were choked with trucks and SUVs that have massive gas tanks and get shitty mileage. The math is not so difficult…

Texas ranks number two in the country in total SUV registrations and in SUVs as a percentage of all vehicles, trailing only California. SUVs account for only about 7.5 percent of Texas registrations, but that figure does not count pick-up trucks, and does not begin to do justice to the parade of gas guzzlers that took to the freeways leaving Houston last week.

Rubbish.

Texas only ranks number two in total SUV registrations because it is the second largest state in the U.S., but when factored as a percent of its population, Texas is actually well below average, ranking 31 of 51 (including Washington, D.C.).

Harding University’s student newspaper, The Bison, of which I am a former staff member, is now available online.

That may be old news (no pun intended), but it’s news to me.

A student’s take on the Ann Coulter uproar is here:

It is embarrassing that Harding invited, publicized, and finally un-invited Coulter. How could anyone schedule someone like her to speak without knowing what they were getting? I think it’s backpedaling, plain and simple, in the face of dissent by a few Harding bloggers, and it points to a growing trend.

It’s interesting that Dr. Mark Elrod also has an article in the Bison’s first issue (not available online), given that he was one of the leaders of the dissent. Commenting on a blog:

You guys need to use your power as constituents of the university to keep the pressure up on the administration about speakers and other one-sided approaches to education. I don’t think many of the faculty here on my side of the fence have much leverage. The administration aleady [sic] knows where I stand so there’s little point in beating my head against the ASI wall. Starting tomorrow though, I can get back to pushing back the veils of ignorance in my classroom.

The veils of ignorance…

If I knew a professor had referred to me as ignorant, I would drop that class like, well, like ASI dropped Ann Coulter from its already-publicized schedule of speakers.

There’s also a note in the Bison about the HU College Democrats getting organized:

The College Democrats is sponsored by Dr. Jack Shock, professor of communication. For more information, contact sophomore Will Brown at…

I can’t imagine a better sponsor for the club. During 1995 and 1996, Dr. Shock spent some time working on President Bill Clinton’s PR team, the same year Monica Lewinsky took an internship at the White House.

As a freshman planning to major in journalism starting that next fall, I unwittingly took his Into to Mass Communication.

I marvel at the layers of irony there.

Dr. Shock is a decent man whose charitable work was recently written up in the Daily Citizen, but incidentally, he’s also part of the reason why I never finished another art class after high school. As my advisor, Dr. Shock put together my first class schedule and failed to note that my art class (drawing 101, or whatever) was two hours long, double-scheduling my second hour, and ultimately causing me to drop it. Aside from the required Art Appreciation course, I never took art again.

Dr. Shock also helped put together the Clinton Presidential Library in Little Rock.

Sojourners, the “non-partisan,” socialist, Christian group led by Jim Wallis, is planning a march on Washington this weekend.

The major organizer of the weekend’s events is the United for Peace and Justice coalition. We anticipate UFPJ’s speakers and message will be consistent with the social and political vision Sojourners seeks to promote. We are encouraged that UFPJ is now including “faith-based organizing” as a part of its work. There are other organizations involved in the march and rally with whom Sojourners has serious political disagreements, and there will be some speakers whose messages we do not support. But we believe it is a time when Americans must come together for the broader purpose of showing our government that this war must end.

So, with which of the following groups does Sojourners have “serious political disagreements,” and which of them promote messages not supported by Sojourners?

(more…)

Houston blogger Will Franklin’s travel plans have hit a snag: “our so-stupid-it-is-ingenious contra-flow-to-Louisiana plan is looking a little less ingenious.”

He’s also posted an interesting little encounter with Mayor White.

I have three free tickets to see the NL wildcard-leading Houston Astros as they defeat the Chicago Cubs at Wrigley Field on Friday, Sept 23, 2005. The game begins at 2:20. I will overnight the tickets to you, if you pay for shipping. First come, first served. Leave a comment below or email me.

***

I also have six tickets to the Cubs’ last home game, vs. the Pirates, on Wednesday, Sept 28. The game starts at 1:20. Make me an offer.

***

UPDATE: Friday’s tickets have been claimed and shipped. Cool beans.

This is a blog post in which I complain about two of my favorite shows on television. That’s just so wasteful and pathetic that I’m ashamed of myself, so I’m hiding everything below the fold. But why should I be ashamed, you’re the one reading?!

(more…)

Look, it’s the Bible Nano, which holds up to 100 minutes of Holy Scripture:

Not to be confused with the iPod Nano: