It's over

It should come as no surprise to anyone that the Schindler family was denied access to see their daughter in her final hours.

New Blog Added to the Blogroll

I've added The Potbelly Stove to the blogroll this week.

The style looks a lot like this blog... but with a cool piece o' clipart at the title. I may have to change my look now...

... okay, I did it. Now I should say, "The Potbelly Stove looks like this blog used to look." It is authored by none other than my father. Go have a look.

UPDATE: Something odd seems to have happened to the template overnight. All the links were gone and my goofy profile was back. Huh.

Something else that worries me

Looking around suburbia, I can't help but note the proliferation of Starbuck's and Chipotle stores. Can it be long before rival gangs come to blows over available strip-mall store fronts?

(Sorry... just wanted to insert a post that was not about Terri Schiavo's cruel fate.)

"The time has come for dispassionate discharge of duty"

The words of Judge Stanley F. Birch, Jr:

"Any further action by our court or the district court would be improper," Judge Stanley F. Birch Jr. wrote. "While the members of her family and the members of Congress have acted in a way that is both fervent and sincere, the time has come for dispassionate discharge of duty."

It is the duty of the Court to see to it that Terri Schiavo dies? Why? Because Michael Schiavo--a man who has fathered two children by another woman since his wife's accident--said that she said that she didn't want to live "that way".

May I never find myself living in Florida or any other state covered by the 11th circuit.

NYPost bows to judicial overlords

Everyone go home! The courts have spoken! So declares the New York Post Editorial Board. "The time has come to let Terri Schiavo die with dignity - and in peace."

"Let" her die? Until one Friday afternoon nearly 2 weeks ago, Terri Schiavo wasn't dying of anything! With no documentary evidence in support of her supposed wish to "not live like that", and going only on the say-so of a husband who has shacked up with another woman and had two children by her, Judge George Greer and the rest of the Men In Black have sentenced this poor woman to death by dehydration.

Rich Galen on Judge Whittemore

Rich Galen logically lays out a potentially case for the Impeachment of Judge Whittemore over at Mullings.

I tend to agree with him regarding the Senate, though.

THC gets its door hinges

Today's update shows the doors in place. The interesting difference about the hinges? Dave makes them out of wood--"timbers" as they say Downunder.

Check it out... note that he still has at least one more surprise up his sleeve.

UPDATE: The WWA has created a links page for ease in watching the progress. You can get there from here: http://www.woodworking.org/hopechest.html

The people pictured in the cartoon on that page are (left to right): Larry "Uncle Fester" Norton, Gail O'Rourke and Alden Miller, all three frequent visitors to the "Infeed/Outfeed" forum.

Charles Krauthammer on the crux of the Schindler/Schiavo case

In Wednesday's Washington Post, Charles Krauthammer gets right to the heart of the Schindler/Schiavo case.

I disagree that Congressional action to give jurisdiction in the case to the Federal courts was a violation of the Separation of Powers. Indeed Article III, Clause 2 gives Congress explicit right to determine the jurisdiction of the Federal courts.

Still Krauthammer has a very clear and appealing solution.

Read the whole thing.

Tsunami Hope Chest continues to take shape

Meanwhile, over at the WWA, the Tsunami Hope Chest now has drawers. This post shows the back of the drawers, and a tease as to how the fronts look... all paper-jointed together. What's that? Have a look and see.

Dave didn't show the process of splitting the fronts back out again, but... it would have been a harrowing thing for me to do. (As I said earlier: "I am not worthy!")

TigerHawk chews up NYRB and spits it out

TigerHawk does a masterful job of fisking an article in New York Review of Books regarding the Dan Rather/TANG/fake-documents-but-we-swear-the-story-is-true affair.

Check it out here.

From the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks

From Larry King last night... Michael Schiavo:

KING: Have you had any contact with the family today? This is a sad day all the way around, Michael. We know of your dispute.

M. SCHIAVO: I've had no contact with them.

KING: No contact at all?

M. SCHIAVO: No.

KING: Do you understand how they feel?

M. SCHIAVO: Yes, I do. But this is not about them, it's about Terri. And I've also said that in court. We didn't know what Terri wanted, but this is what we want...

I knew it. I always get the creepiest feeling whenever I hear Mr. Schiavo speak. Perhaps this is why.

I'm sure he wishes he could take that one back.

(Hat tip to: The Happy Catholic, by way of The Anchoress and Hugh Hewitt)

Could this be the finest woodworker in the world?

Dave Shaw -- "Dave in Cairns" -- has been commissioned by the Woodworkers of America to build a wooden hope chest. The chest will be auctioned off and the proceeds will go toward tsunami relief. Here it is as of mid-March. Check this out!

To say "I am not worthy" would be an understatement. You can check out more of the beautiful work the Genius-From-Downunder does (furniture, too) at his site: http://www.australianwoodart.com/.

A further thought on Terri Schiavo and Living Wills

Yesterday I posted an article from National Review Online regarding the sub-par medical care that Terri Schiavo has received. Today, 2 hours before her slow death by dehydration begins, I want to urge you to consider carefully before making out a Living Will.

You may think that you wouldn't want to live a certain way. That is well and good, and certainly easy to say now that we are not living that way. Think carefully, though, about how you'd like to die. A combination of dehydration and starvation isn't on top of my list. I'm not sure I'd want to spend it with my lungs struggling for air the moment a ventilator is turned off, either.

Thought you knew all about Terri Schiavo?

Perhaps you've heard of the sad tale of Terri Schiavo and pigeon-holed the information as a tidy, little right-to-die case. If so, take a gander at this article published in the National Review Online.

The facts presented here are stunning, particularly that Terri had NEVER been given an MRI. Her diagnosis of "Persistive Vegetative State" is therefore HIGHLY suspect. (The article cites board-certified neurologists on this point.)
(Anyone who has seen the video, the way she lights up when her parents came into the room, can see that PVS is bogus on its face.)

Right now the Florida legislature is working on a law that would prevent people who don't have a living will from being abused and neglected like Terri Schiavo has. Hopefully it will go into effect before she starves/dehydrates.

Starves.

Think of that for a moment. If we were withholding food and water from detainees at GTMO, the world would be up in arms. If deathrow inmates were starved to death, "CRUEL" and "UNUSUAL" would be all over the news, 24-7. Yet here is an innocent woman doomed to be starved, starting Friday afternoon. Perhaps she will be given a final meal? I'm not sure what the logic of these court rulings is. Maybe Judge Greer had a tee time or something? Yank the feeding tube--used because Terri is unable to swallow--then hit the links!

Would that Michael Schiavo and Judge Greer could be confined to that hospice room with Terri to watch the suffering they've demanded first-hand.

At any rate, if you truly believe in your heart of hearts that you wouldn't want to be fed via a feeding tube, put it in a Living Will!

Good sounds

(ht: 6moons Audio)

Check this out! Juicy Music is truly a cottage industry. The proprietor is no newcomer to the audio biz, though, having first founded Paragon back in the 1970s.

The names are, as 6Moons reviewer Steve Marsh put it, a little on the granola side, but I dig 'em. The BlueBerry tube preamp is my kind of wonky-looking gear! The wooden cabinet makes me all nostalgic for my old Scott 388 receiver: the centerpiece of My First Stereo as a youngster.

It also reminds me... gotta finish up the Pass balanced line stage soon.

Senator Vegas whines on the Capitol Steps

First, the link to Sen. Vegas's comments.

If you've never heard Sen. Vegas ("Harry Reid") speak, I suggest that your mind's inner ear hear a cross between Underdog, Droopy and Elmer Fudd... not that he makes his Rs into Ws... but the register of his voice is similar.

On to the fisking!

Remarks by Senator Harry Reid
Preserving Checks and Balances
U.S. Capitol Steps
Tuesday, March 15, 2005

It begins with a history lesson. Put another log on the fire, eh?

On a late September day in 1787, the Constitutional Convention finished its work. As Benjamin Franklin walked down the steps of Independence Hall, a Philadelphia woman named Elizabeth Powell stopped him and asked, “Well, Doctor, what have we got: a republic or a monarchy?”

He responded, “A republic. If you can keep it.”

For more than two centuries, we have kept our republic because Americans have understood that our liberty is protected by our laws and by a government of limited powers.

Snort... I wish the Democrats understood what limited government power was all about.

Our Constitution provides for checks and balances so that no one person in power – so that no one political party – can hold total control over the course of our nation.

Actually it is so that no single BRANCH of the government can dominate the other two. Given the state of the Judiciary since the Warren Supreme Court, though, it is probably a moot point. That's a story for another day, though.

But now, in order to break down the separation of powers and ram through their appointees to the judicial branch, President Bush and the Republican leadership want to eliminate a two-hundred-year-old American rule saying that every member of the Senate can rise to say their piece and speak on behalf of the people that sent them here.

It's Senate Rule XXII. It's been talked about a lot.

The fact is that this President has a better record of having his judicial nominees approved than any President in the past twenty-five years. Only ten of 214 nominations have been turned down.

They haven't been turned down until they've had an up-or-down, simple-majority vote.

So it is clear that this attempt to strip away these important checks and balances is not about judges. It is about the desire for absolute power.

boogah-boogah! Is ya skeered?

Actually it is about the minority party about to be made redundant, and their clinging to their last bastion of security by their fingernails.

But our nation’s basic rules are there for the moments when the eyes of the powerful grow large and hungry; when their willfulness makes them determined to do whatever it takes to win, and prevail at whatever the cost.

Yikes... who writes this crap? Keep in mind the "Fudd/Droopy/Underdog" voice. Not that James Earl Jones could make this sound good.

I read this as: "The only place we can win for our Leftist agenda is in the courts... and you will have to pry it from our cold, dead hands." (Politically, not literally.)

Presidents and parties have grown drunk with power before. Two Presidents of my own party – Thomas Jefferson and Franklin Roosevelt – began their second terms of office with majorities in Congress and then tried to change the rules governing judges so that they could stack the court with those who would do their bidding. They were wrong to try to change our basic American rules – and Americans, and Senators of both parties, stood up to tell them so.

Senator Vegas goes 'bi-partisan'. Or is it 'maverick'? Since the courts are already stacked with judges who will do the bidding of the left... he sees no change necessary.

Today, another attempt is being considered to rewrite the rules so that those in power can get their way.

It would mean that the U.S. Senate becomes merely a rubber stamp for the Executive Branch.

Here he admits, in backhanded fashion, that the nominees his party considers so 'controversial' would have no problem whatsoever in getting 51+ votes... if only the votes were allowed to take place.

It would mean that one political party – be it Republicans today or Democrats tomorrow – gets to have all the say.

No, actually it means you'd have to work for a living, trying to persuade the majority on the merits. I'm thinking that "Well, People for the American Way says..." is not going to be a convincing reason to most Republicans.

It would mean that one man, sitting in the White House, has the practical ability to personally hand out lifetime jobs to judges whose rulings can last forever.

That is pretty much how it is written up in the Constitution, yeah. Although the courts themselves can be restructured.

That's not how America works.

Here, in America, the people rule – and all the people have a voice.

Duly noted.

We pledge allegiance to “one nation, under God, with liberty and justice for all.” Not liberty and justice for whoever may be in the majority of the moment. Liberty and justice for all. In America, everyone gets their say and their due.

Yep. Consider your piece said. By the way, did you get special dispensation from any of your Constituency Groups about using "under God"?

Today, we say to the American people: if you believe in liberty and in limited government, set aside your partisan views and oppose this arrogant abuse of power.

Okay. I agree. I oppose the Democrats' use of the filibuster to oppose the normal workings of the Constitution as laid forth in Article II, section 2, clause 2:

Clause 2: [The President] shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, to make Treaties, provided two thirds of the Senators present concur; and he shall nominate, and by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, Judges of the supreme Court, and all other Officers of the United States, whose Appointments are not herein otherwise provided for, and which shall be established by Law: but the Congress may by Law vest the Appointment of such inferior Officers, as they think proper, in the President alone, in the Courts of Law, or in the Heads of Departments.

There. I feel better. Back to Senator Vegas:

Our freedom as a people was purchased by soldiers and Senators, by those who fell for our country and those who rose to speak for it, even when they stood alone.

The courage of patriots has given us a republic. Now, it is our task – and our test – to show that we can keep it.

Feel better, Senator? Good. You've risen--albeit outside. You've spoken.

Now let's have an up-or-down vote on these eminently qualified judicial nominees! If they are so scary, they'd never get even 50 votes. Or is it that they are only scary to the people who fund and push your agenda?

Now that Dan Rather has more time on his hands...

He could work at the Nixon Library part time. I'm sure he'd LOVE that. (He could even split time between that and the George H. W. Bush Library in Houston.)

Or perhaps he could dole out the frequencies for Air Traffic Control! "United 623, it's one-one-seven-point-four-three. Courage!"

Will it be the Center for Concern?

Hat tip: Drudge

Dems name a building after defeated former leader.

Did you ever notice...

...that the Green Lantern looks a lot like Bill Lumbergh? Well, I admit I never did either. But someone over at IdiotWork evidently did.

Here it is in all its League of Justice meets Office Space glory. (Beware the profanity.) TPS. Hat tip to Jonah over at The Corner.