The St. Jude Marathon is this Saturday. If you’re running low on eggnog, now is the time to stock up.

We know you can’t be subjected to the trouble of sitting in traffic, much less actually participate in an event that saves the lives of children, but for the love of Pete, plan ahead this time.

And if you do happen to run out of eggnog during the course of the event, please remember:

1. It’s nobody’s fault but your own

2. You can live without eggnog for three hours

3. Whining about a fundraiser for sick kids because of a personal, minor inconvenience is about as selfish, lame, ignorant and dishonorable as it gets

Bruce Fein is worried about the fate of our Republic:

American culture has degenerated since the Founding Fathers into a celebration of vice, ignorance, drivel and self-promotion. Money, beauty, sexual indulgence, athletics and fame are saluted as the summum bonum of existence. Exemplary are the wild enthusiasm for “American Idol,” obsession with the tawdry comings and goings of Britney Spears or Paris Hilton and the apotheosis of professional athletes who contribute nothing to preserving government of the people, by the people, for the people. It is inconceivable that a Washington, Madison or Jefferson or Lincoln could emerge from the contemporary culture.

Parents seldom read to children. Students seldom read from inspiration. A dwindling number make it a habit to peruse a serious daily newspaper. Not a single public official or figure in the United States could author paragraphs worthy of the Federalist Papers, Washington’s Farewell Address or Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address.

It’s a interesting rant, and worth reading in full, but false on at least three counts:

1. If contemporary culture were such a terrible, commanding force, it couldn’t provide critics alert to its own degradation. Thus, the rant is self-refuting.

2. It’s more than a gross over-generalization to say parents and students don’t read and that no single public figure is equipped to write prose of historic value. Those authors didn’t write such documents every day, or for every occasion; there’s a real sense in which crucial times demand and call out greatness.

3. Did the Founding Fathers perfectly mirror their own culture, or can we assume that figures such as Washington and Lincoln towered over their own contemporaries? Did every pioneer or frontiersman quote Shakespeare and Socrates? Is it fair to pluck the greatest men of history, and the greatest things they wrote, and compare them to the everyday comings and goings of the actors, athletes and pampered aristocrats of any given period?

Jason Middlekauf has a great answer.

AND: So does Matt Dabbs.

This Commercial Appeal story on the HUD homeless survey has everything… except for the results of the survey.

In honor of the only candidate who was campaigning in Iowa while I was there, here’s another in my series of fake bumper stickers. Word is that Joe Biden was actually staying in the same hotel, but I never saw him.

Ads heard while in Iowa: Obama, Giuliani and Romney
Signs seen displayed in yards: Paul, McCain, Obama, Clinton
Names mentioned by voters questioned: Biden, Romney and “not Clinton”

Previously:
Hunter/Thompson
Tancredo
Paul
Romney

Let me apologize on the front end for this one, because it’s really bad.

I’m talking really, really stupid and almost nonsensical.

That said, who can guess what the photo above stands for?

This photo of me with my dad’s Afghan hound was taken yesterday in his front yard.

Exactly two people who read this blog could possibly know the answer unless I give you the dog’s name, which is Shama.

So that’s your first clue. Two more below the fold, if you need em: (more…)

Some items of note:

The state of Oklahoma celebrated its 100th anniversary on Friday. It became the 46th state in 1907.

The road between Oklahoma City and Colorado Springs is incredibly flat, and wide open. This is a big country, in case you didn’t know, and lots less cluttered when you leave the cities. Even the sky is bigger out here.

Michael Brown, the former head of FEMA, has returned home to Colorado, where he now hosts a 3-hour weekend talk show on Denver’s Newsradio 850 KOA.

On Saturday, his subject was Thanksgiving, and the PC police in Seattle who want the holiday to be treated as a time of “mourning.” Bonus fun fact: Brown’s grandfather, named Charlie Brown (no joke), was a Cherokee Indian.

So how is he as a radio host? I’d have to say Brownie did a “heck of a job.”

For next time: a visual pun!

VV points to a post at The Nation that is critical of Fred Thompson’s plan to strengthen and expand the U.S. military:

What is unfortunate is that Republicans lack a candidate with the wisdom of a actual military commander like, say, Dwight Eisenhower.

Then, instead of proposing exponential expansions of the Pentagon budget, they would be saying, as Republican Eisenhower did: “Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children.”

Actually, what’s unfortunate is that the passage quoted above is one of those that the Left likes to swap back and forth, stripped from context, and without ever linking back to an original source (do a quick Google search if you don’t believe me).

The quote is from an Eisenhower speech known as the Chance for Peace Address, which was delivered in 1953 and was intended to send a message to the Soviet Union, which was gearing up for a cold war with the United States.

It’s clear the author hasn’t given much thought to the way history played out following this speech, or what role Ronald Reagan and his strong defense policies might have played along the way.

It’s also clear the author hasn’t considered the position held by any of those populations aided by such guns, warships and rockets, specifically those across Europe, the Middle East and Asia.

Eisenhower did not deliver this speech in the middle of World War II, when those munitions were being used to liberate France, rescue millions of Jews and defeat the armies of fascism on two fronts.

Nor would it have been delivered today, as these same forces are being used to liberate 50 million people and to wage war against Al Qaida and allied terrorist groups on two major fronts in the Middle East.

Unless, of course, it was intended for countries such as Iran, North Korea and China, just as the original encouraged the Soviet Union to stop their aggressive military buildup.

And, finally, it’s clear the author hasn’t familiarized himself with the entire speech, which also includes this warning to the Soviets, that their aggression had:

…instilled in the free nations - and let none doubt this - the unshakable conviction that, as long as there persists a threat to freedom, they must, at any cost, remain armed, strong, and ready for the risk of war.

Hmm, that sounds like Fred Thompson’s plan, doesn’t it?

Of course, we couldn’t have expected much more from the post’s author, John Nichols, who was last heard offering Memphis Mayor Willie Herenton as the future PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES.

U.S. Government foreign aid has returned to record highs under the current administration, following a steady downhill trend over the previous three decades, according to the USAID Greenbook on U.S. Overseas Loans and Grants.

According to the U.S. Dept of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), there was a 12% drop in the number of chronically homeless persons “living on the nation’s streets” between 2005 and 2006.

In the Memphis/Shelby County area there were:

• 1776 homeless individuals
• 194 homeless individuals who were unsheltered
• 113 chronically homeless individuals
• 39 chronically homeless individuals who were unsheltered

HUD awarded the area’s homeless agencies with a grand total of $4.6 million for the year, which works out to about $2,600 per homeless individual.

By the way, last year’s local report isn’t loading properly at the moment; otherwise, I would compare the Memphis/Shelby County trend to the national trend.

UPDATE: Are homeless stats cooked?