I’m simply stunned. After all, even Robert “The Kleagle” Byrd wouldn’t say something this stupidly bigoted. But Joe Biden did.

"I mean, you got the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy ... I mean, that's a storybook, man."

I

Suppose

He

May

Have

Missed

These

Folks.

And this one was particularly vile, even by the incredibly low standard already set by the jihadi pigs who infect much of the world.

EVIL Muslim terrorists were to kidnap a British soldier on UK streets and force him to plead with Tony Blair for his life in return for a pull-out of troops from Iraq, The Sun can reveal. The soldier would have been filmed begging the PM to withdraw from Iraq and Afghanistan in a sick propaganda stunt. Army sources said the target was a British Muslim soldier in his 20s. He would eventually be beheaded on film in a sick mirror of the torture and savage killing of British hostage Ken Bigley if Mr Blair refused. Senior security sources say the plot would have put the most unbearable blackmail pressure on the Premier to act. It would also have sent shockwaves through the entire British Armed Forces - putting the fear of God into every man and woman in uniform on or off duty. The fact that the arrests were made in Birmingham could suggest that soldiers recovering from wounds in military hospitals there might have been targeted.

This is simply one more area in which the government need not and ought not be involved in making the decision for consumers.

A California lawmaker wants to make his state the first to ban incandescent lightbulbs as part of California's groundbreaking initiatives to reduce energy use and greenhouse gases blamed for global warming.

The "How Many Legislators Does it Take to Change a Lightbulb Act" would ban incandescent lightbulbs by 2012 in favor of energy-saving compact fluorescent lightbulbs.

"Incandescent lightbulbs were first developed almost 125 years ago, and since that time they have undergone no major modifications," California Assemblyman Lloyd Levine said on Tuesday.

"Meanwhile, they remain incredibly inefficient, converting only about 5 percent of the energy they receive into light."

Levine is expected to introduce the legislation this week, his office said.
If passed, it would be another pioneering environmental effort in California, the most populous U.S. state. It became the first state to mandate cuts in greenhouse gas emissions, targeting a 25 percent reduction in emissions by 2020.

Compact fluorescent lightbulbs (CFLs) use about 25 percent of the energy of conventional lightbulbs.

Personally, I’m of the belief that a better name for the bill is the “”How Many Legislators Does It Take To Strip You Of Your Freedom Act”. And I say this as someone who made the choice to convert most of the lights in my home to the CFL bulbs that this act would mandate. I simply do not believe it is the place of the government to be making such choices on our behalf.
What next? The “Shut Off The Lights When You Leave The Room Act”?

What do you think of these numbers?

In a poll conducted five months ago, and broadcast on Britain's Channel 4 TV, nearly 25% of British Muslims said the July 7, 2005, terror bombings in London, which killed 52 innocent commuters, were justified. Another 30% said they would prefer to live under strict Islamic Sharia law rather than England's democratic system.

Now, one in four justifying terror may not be a majority, but it certainly isn't a "small fringe" either.

In other countries, the figures are no less unsettling. A survey published in December found that 44% of Nigerian Muslims believe suicide bombing attacks are "often" or "sometimes" acceptable. Only 28% said they were never justified.
According to the annual Pew Global Attitudes Survey, released in July 2006, "roughly one-in-seven Muslims in France, Spain and Great Britain feel that suicide bombings against civilian targets can at least sometimes be justified to defend Islam." The report also found that less than half of Jordan's Muslims believe terror attacks are never justified. In Egypt, only 45% of Muslims say terror is never justified.

Now you may argue that these views are not representative of Islam – but they are not the views of a tiny minority, either. Rather, such views are clearly those of a large minority of the Muslims in the world, and must therefore be grappled with as a part of a larger reality – one in which appeals to the more “high minded” views of Islam are likely to be ineffective given the more radical views of the jihadi pigs and their supporters.

Not gossiping about the day at work, not bitching about conditions, not even engaging in great debates about educational philosophy and policy -- a blogger/podcaster who is actually about TEACHING with his online work!

Fourth period on a midwinter Thursday, Christmas vacation a fading memory by now, and Lars Brownworth took his accustomed place in front of an American history class at the Stony Brook School here. He had been guiding these seniors through the Gilded Age lately, and for this session he planned to personify the era in the form of the oil tycoon John D. Rockefeller.

For 45 minutes, Mr. Brownworth deftly orchestrated lecture, discussion and archival photographs to evoke Rockefeller in both his rapacious capitalism and social conscience. When the bell rang, out shuffled the audience, a dozen teenagers who might or might not remember any of this material beyond the next exam. In its satisfactions and its limits, such was the life Mr. Brownworth, the son of teachers, had gladly chosen.

That night, though, Mr. Brownworth, 31, set to work in his own apartment, writing an essay about Alexius I Comnenus, the Byzantine emperor from 1081 to 1118. After revision and rehearsal, the text would become the script for the latest installment of Mr. Brownworth’s podcast. And if form held, something like 140,000 listeners from Afghanistan to White Plains would hear it.

In barely 18 months, Mr. Brownworth’s podcast, “12 Byzantine Rulers” (at http://www.anders.com/lectures/lars_brownworth/12_byzantine_rulers/), has become one of the phenomena of the podcasting world. A survey of 1,200 years of rather abstruse history, starting with Diocletian in 284 and finishing with Constantine XI Palaeologus in 1453, “12 Byzantine Rulers” routinely ranks in the top five educational podcasts on iTunes, and in the top 50 of all podcasts.

Now I particularly like Brownworth's humble reaction to all the attention -- and to his fan base. He never imagined that anyone else would listen when he started this little project, which was much more for himself and his own edification than for attaining a wide-scale audience. I'm hoping that there is eventually a book in the works, and that it has the sort of wild success that his efforts deserve. But perhaps most importantly in my book, I hope his work sparks a few young people to actually consider history as an avocation, as a field of study, and as a passion in life. For as I've said more than once -- if I can turn on even one student a year to the glories of the past (or, n my government classes, to the beauty of the US Constitution), my teaching those students who just want a grade and a credit has been worth it.