* Other than the fact that there is no such thing as a “suburb of Phoenix,” (I found that out almost the hard way), and wondering why Bristol Palin wants to go to school at ASU, now the country’s largest undergrad school at 67k students, and in the climactic polar opposite of her upbringing (she might actually melt when she starts school this coming August), what gets me about this story is why she’s using some of her dancing money to buy so far away from campus. Maricopa, Arizona (strangely enough, it’s NOT in Maricopa County), is about a 35-40 minute drive to ASU even in good traffic, and probably an hour or more in bad traffic, and traffic will be bad more often that part of Pinal County and adjoining parts of the East Valley in Maricopa County have grown since last I was in the valley. (Which is probably duh, because there is hardly a part of the valley that isn’t growing, so it’s just an inevitablity that you’ll visit the valley one year, and next year or two years later you go back and more and more empty desert is now developed.) I just get the feeling that she’s going to wish to hell (which is slightly cooler than the valley in August) she bought or rented closer to campus once she starts actually doing those commutes.
* I think Michael Bloomberg is that arrogant, but I want corroboration a little more credible than second-hand gossip from a cab driver before I actually think that Bloomberg is a graduate of the Leona Helmsley School of Public Relations.
* Admiral Yamamoto once made a similar observation.
* What we have here is a failure to cooperate. Which will lighten Brett Favre’s wallet to the tune of $50k. Though since he’s going to retire anyway, I don’t know what the league could do to him if he doesn’t fork over.
Irony of ironies — He has to pull something out of his back pocket because of something he pulled from a front-facing opening of his jeans.
* Funny, most of the American media reports don’t say anything about the “men” arrested. They do give us intricate details about the firearms and explosives and munitions seized, though.
The British media tell us a little more, including which countries’ passports these “men” held. But mostly, it’s all up to our common sense to fill in the rest of the details that are evidently too taboo for us to know for sure.
* FLOTUS’s anti-obesity program is running a contest for healthy school lunches, and recipes “will be judged on the following criteria: student involvement, nutrition, creativity and originality, ease of use in schools, and recipe presentation” for the sake of winning prizes.
What, no diversity?
* <HRC> “Long and fruitful relationship” with the black community? Where? </HRC>
* Dawn Clark Netsch is going to win in the long run. The state I’m about to move out of is going to try to borrow $15 billion to make the checks start clearing, and they say that an income tax hike is an inevitability in order to keep the state solvent for both its future expenses and servicing this new debt.
* I didn’t want Michael Steele to head the RNC for the same reason I didn’t want Barack H. Obama II running the executive branch of the American Federal government — Any criticism of either will be said to be “racist.”
To wit:
“Concern has been expressed among members of the Caucus that these two anti-Steele pledges/resolutions could be viewed as hateful toward Chairman Steele — regardless of what benign names they may be given,” Semanko wrote. “They are also considered arbitrary in that they, quite literally, purport to support anyone but Chairman Steele, without consideration of any particular candidate’s qualifications.”
To this, Bopp responded with seeming fury.
“Norm, are you some liberal professor at some liberal arts college enforcing their ‘hate speech’ prohibition?” he demanded of the Idaho GOP chairman. “Is our brand-spanking-new general counsel now the self-appointed speech police? Or were you asked by Chairman Steele to assume this role?”
Continuing, Bopp inferred that by “hateful” Semanko was alluding to perceptions about how the party was treating its first black national chairman.
“I know that liberals view any criticism of someone’s conduct to be ‘hateful,’ if the person happens to be black, etc,, but I was unaware that we at the RNC had adopted such a political speech code,” he wrote. “In my view, it is not ‘hateful’ to decide not to vote for Steele because one views his conduct in office to be detrimental to the interests of the Republican Party and the country, even though he happens to be black. To suggest otherwise is playing the race card, again, and it would seem that your considerable legal talents could better be used mounting a substantive defense of Steele, rather than trying to enforce some non-existent and destructive censorship regime on the RNC.”
Notice that one of Steele’s defenders here is Steele’s analogue for the state of Idaho. That state, as right wing as it is, has produced some real turkeys as Republican elected office holders: Dork Kempthorne and Raul Labrador, to name a few. Now, this clown from the Idaho RSC.
* The Emperor and No Clothes — My guess is that President Obama is sprouting a love handle that belies his male hood ornament image of several years ago.
* Like I have said before, Hal Turnergate told me everything I needed to know about Chris Christie, that we shouldn’t trust him further than any of us could throw him. Everything else, this included, is merely confirmation.
Christie’s commutation of Brian Aitken’s sentence had nothing to do with the 2nd Amendment, at least in a purist sense, it had to do with legal technicalities, and if it had anything to do with The 2nd, it was nothing more than triangulatory posturing to head off a Heller-style lawsuit. Note that it was a commutation, not a pardon, so the conviction stands until a court revokes it.
And some headlines.
5: Cuban media publishing translated Wikileaks cables
Don’t worry. It’ll take them a very long time to carve that many words into stone.
P-D: 153 bras taken from Chicago-area Victoria’s Secret
Meaning there are now 153 hot bras out there. Caveat emptor, ladies and transgendered gentlemen.
CNS: ‘Healthy Kids’ School-Lunch Recipe Competition Moves to Judging Phase
Since this is government work, I don’t foresee the first healthy lunch making it to public schools until the start of the 2014-15 school year.
CNS: Bill Clinton Told to Stay Out of Chicago Politics
I guess Chicago politics use a lot of young female interns.
CNS: National Guard Lists Protecting U.S.-Mexico Border as No. 2 Top Mission in 2010
I’m guessing #1 has something to do with Muslims, diversity or global warming.
