And Now For Something Completely Different....."Pipeline" and "Walk Don't Run" (Stogie Band Videos)

Too much negativity lately.  Time for a music video break!

My band played at a party over the weekend. Rockin' Mama Lorraine is one of the best guitar players I have ever played with, and she rocks out on these two old Ventures tunes, "Pipeline" and "Walk Don't Run."

Terry Bishop and The Giant Unfolding Conspiracy

Every Bad Thing That Ever
Happened Is The Result 
of a Giant Unfolding Conspiracy

Terry Bishop, conspiracy theorist, has attacked me in the comments section of my post "The False Flag Kooks Are Out In Force Re The Boston Bombing."  Terry blogs at the Site "Hard Nox and Friends."

Terry apparently believes that world history and every daily mishap, lunatic murder and tragedy is the result of a Giant Unfolding Conspiracy (GUC).  Oklahoma City, Aurora, Sandy Hook, now Boston -- all part of the GUC that is threatening to turn us all into Eloi, food for Morlocks.  If you don't believe me, read this:  read his rant here.  Note that Terry doesn't refute a single point in my blog post (he can't).  The dead, the maimed and wounded at the Boston Marathon are real people, not actors.  They were injured by a real bomb, not harmless "flash powder."  Only the truly delusional could believe such "false flag" nonsense.

What the conspiracy peddlers prove, is only this:  there are crazy kooks on the right as well as the left.  The "truthers," no matter which conspiracy they are pushing, are a great example of a theory in search of facts -- they are in ruthless pursuit, not of truth, but of an agenda.  Since most people aren't nuts, the "truthers" do conservatism far more harm than good.

Worse, they dishonor the dead and injured, the victims of such tragedies, by providing cover for the evil that harmed them.  Shame on you, Terry Bishop, and any other blogger who supports you in this dishonorable pursuit.

Hear Interview of Bombing Victim Jeff Bauman on ViralRead

Jeff Bauman

Jeff Bauman, the young man who lost both legs below the knee in the Boston bombing, gave an interview to a radio personality.  A recording of the interview can be listened to here.  Jeff describes what it was like to be blown up and nearly killed, and how it all went down.

Jeff made eye contact with Bomber #1 as he dropped his bomb-containing bag and departed.  Five minutes later the bomb blew off the lower half of Jeff's legs, as well as killing three people and injuring over 200 more.

Carlos Arredondo, a civiian in a cowboy hat, saved Jeff's life by pinching off the artery in his right leg, preventing him from bleeding out.  Carlos commandeered a wheelchair and rolled Jeff to an ambulance.  Since the explosion, Jeff and Carlos have kept in touch on a daily basis.  Jeff was invited to come to a Red Sox game for a presentation to the fans, but said he would only do it if Carlos could come too.

Listen to the interview at the above link.  Jeff is an inspiring guy, and Carlos is no slouch either.

The False Flag Kooks Are Out In Force Re the Boston Bombing UPDATED

It's amazing to me how many Americans are just plain nuts, bonkers, delusional -- completely devoid of any common sense or attachment to reality.

The tinfoil hat brigades are already forming to denounce the Boston bombing as a "false flag" operation.  One kooky website claims that all the wounded were "actors," that no pressure cooker bombs were set off, it was only "flash powder."  The blood on the ground wasn't the right color red, or there wasn't enough of it.  The man with a bloody stump with a bone sticking out of the end was merely wearing a prosthetic device.  And why did they escort him away from the scene in a wheelchair instead of using a stretcher?  Hey kooks, why don't you ask him?  His name is Jeffrey Bauman and he is 27 years old.  He lost both legs in the blast.  The Concord Monitor reports on WHY Bauman didn't bleed to death:

Bauman, 27, was waiting at the finish line for his girlfriend to cross when the bombs exploded. [Carlos] Arredondo was watching from nearby bleachers, handing out American flags while he cheered on members of the National Guard and a suicide prevention group that were running in honor of his two deceased sons. When the bombing hit, adrenaline and instinct kicked in, and he immediately hopped the fence and ran toward the people on the ground.

“There were so many people on the floor, so many serious injuries in the legs. It was unbelievable, people were everywhere,” Arredondo said.

When he saw the extent of Bauman’s injuries and the rapid loss of blood, he knew Bauman needed his help the most. He ripped up a sweater and used it to try to stop the bleeding from Bauman’s legs and immediately got the attention of a woman with a wheelchair. He placed Bauman in the chair and began pushing, but the fabric he used as bandages kept getting caught in the wheels. Arredondo took matters into his own hands, literally, throwing off the fabric and pinching closed an artery on Bauman’s right leg – the image of humanitarianism seen around the world.

“The picture that you see, that’s what it is and that how it happened, you know,” he said. “I was just trying to help him in every way I could, and thank God he gave me the opportunity to help this beautiful young man.”

When they finally reached an ambulance, Arredondo asked for Bauman’s name. “Jeff,” he managed to say, then spelled out his last name for Arredondo.

Carlos Arredondo, in Cowboy Hat, Saved Jeff Bauman's Life

The conspiracy crowd are unlikely to believe any of this, however.  Never mind the bits of shrapnel, the little girl who was perforated with numerous nails, the several other people who lost limbs, the four dead, including an eight year old boy.  Never mind the bbs all over the street, the dozens of injured with shrapnel, nails and bbs embedded in their bodies.  It was all a big put-on.

The people who believe this atrocity was somehow faked, are nuts.  They deserve our contempt.

See some of these kook sites here and here.

Meanwhile, check out a list of some of the bombing victims who lost limbs or their lives, here.  Yeah, these folks were all actors in the massive conspiracy, don'tcha know.  Flash powder my ass.

P.S.  Carlos Arredondo is a hero.  God bless him.

Religious Motive Cited in Boston Bombings: What Did I Tell You?

What did I tell you in my last post?

Actually, it was a no-brainer except for the millions of Americans who are in denial as to the irredeemably violent nature of Islam

Read it here.

Why the Boston Bombers Did It (Hint: It's In the Koran)

Mohammed Would Approve

To anyone who has studied Islam's teachings, history and the example of Mohammed, the "Why" of the Boston atrocity is no mystery.

Fourteen hundred years ago, Mohammed's followers made the Second Pledge of Aqaba, in which they pledged to commit unending war on all mankind, until the whole world was Muslim, dead or slaves.  As reported in the Haddith:

Ishaq:208 "When Allah gave permission to his Apostle to fight, the second Aqaba contained conditions involving war which were not in the first act of submission. Now we bound ourselves to war against all mankind for Allah and His Apostle. He promised us a reward in Paradise for faithful service. We pledged ourselves to war in complete obedience to Muhammad no matter how evil the circumstances."

Well now, mass murder of innocents in the Bostom bombing is indeed "evil circumstances."  So we see that unending violence is not an exaggeration, nor a slander against the Islamic faith.  Mohammed's admonition for unending war, terror and slaughter is well documented in Islamic holy texts.  The Boston bombers were merely following the commands of their prophet, as have thousands of other terrorists before them.

Here is a great reference on the violent admonitions of Mohammed, found in the website The Religion of Peace.  The site introduces the violent Koranic verses with this introduction:

Question:Does the Quran really contain dozens of verses promoting violence?

Summary Answer:The Quran contains at least 109 verses that call Muslims to war with nonbelievers for the sake of Islamic rule.  Some are quite graphic, with commands to chop off heads and fingers and kill infidels wherever they may be hiding.  Muslims who do not join the fight are called 'hypocrites' and warned that Allah will send them to Hell if they do not join the slaughter. Unlike nearly all of the Old Testament verses of violence, the verses of violence in the Quran are mostly open-ended, meaning that they are not restrained by the historical context of the surrounding text.  They are part of the eternal, unchanging word of Allah, and just as relevant or subjective as anything else in the Quran. Most of today's Muslims exercise a personal choice to interpret their holy book's many calls to violence according to what their own moral preconceptions find justifiable.  Apologists cater to their preferences with tenuous arguments that gloss over historical fact and generally do not stand up to scrutiny.  Still, it is important to note that the problem is not bad people, but bad ideology. Unfortunately, there are very few verses of tolerance and peace to abrogate or even balance out the many that call for nonbelievers to be fought and subdued until they either accept humiliation, convert to Islam, or are killed.  Muhammad's own martial legacy - and that of his companions - along with the remarkable stress on violence found in the Quran have produced a trail of blood and tears across world history.

The site then lists some of the most important of these verses, like Ibn Ishaq/Hisham 327: - “Allah said, ‘A prophet must slaughter before collecting captives. A slaughtered enemy is driven from the land. Muhammad, you craved the desires of this world, its goods and the ransom captives would bring. But Allah desires killing them to manifest the religion.’”  Read them all.

UPDATE:  Here are the words of modern Muslim leaders, who describe a Muslim's duty to kill unbelievers, including women and children:

From Iraq:

“There is no doubt that Allah commanded us to strike the Kuffar (unbelievers), kill them, and fight them by all means necessary to achieve the goal. The servants of Allah who perform Jihad to elevate the word (laws) of Allah, are permitted to use any and all means necessary to strike the active unbeliever combatants for the purpose of killing them, snatch their souls from their body, cleanse the earth from their abomination, and lift their trial and persecution of the servants of Allah. The goal must be pursued even if the means to accomplish it affect both the intended active fighters and unintended passive ones such as women, children and any other passive category specified by our jurisprudence.”

Statement by the head of Jama'at al-Tawid wal-Jihad ("Group for Monotheism and Jihad"), a Sunni terrorist known for bloody massacres, including 86 Shiites at a mosque.

And no, this cretin is not describing active combatants, like the U.S. military, but all unbelievers, because there are NO non-combatants in Islam's holy war against humanity.  This statement is from a Chechyan Muslim, where the Bostom bombers hail from:

“I ask you to step up Jihad against enemies of Allah... Destroy Allah's enemies wherever you have them, wherever your hands reach you may open a front... When there is a total war, there are no more civilian objects or civilian population."

Doku Umarov, a leader who has taken personal responsibility for dozens of terror attacks in which many civilians were left dead.

The "Religion of Peace" is anything but.  Bookmark these pages for future reference.

Comparative Religions (Photoshop)

This Is Your Brain On Islam: Alcohol Forbidden, Mass Murder Okay

Drudge quotes the dead terrorist:

Tamerlan says he doesn't drink or smoke anymore: "God said no alcohol." A muslim, he says: "There are no values anymore," and worries that "people can't control themselves."

God says no alcohol, but mass murder is okay.

This is your brain on Islam.

UPDATE:  Second perp ("white hat" guy) captured and in custody.  He was hiding in a boat stored in a citizen's backyard.  He appears seriously injured and was taken to a hospital.

Surprise, Surprise! Boston Marathon Bombers are Radical Muslims! Who Would've Guessed?

One Down, One to Go

A lot has happened since early this morning.  The two marathon bombers were brothers, radical muslims, and managed to murder a MIT campus policeman as he sat in his car.  They attempted to rob a 7-11 convenience store, then kidnapped a man and his Mercedes, forcing him to withdraw cash from several ATMs.  They let him go but kept his car.

The police closed in on these perps and a gunfight ensued, with one policeman wounded and one terrorist (the black hat guy) shot dead.  The white hat terrorist has so far eluded police and is on the run.  The black hat terrorist was twenty-six-year-old Tamerlan Tsarnaev.  The white hat perp is his brother, 19 year old Dzhokhar Tsarnaev.

The two terrorists were brothers from Chechnya.  Unfortunately for them, the modern world is one with a thousand eyes, in the form of surveillance, cell phone and digital cameras, and police were able to identify the perps within 24 hours of their crime.

FBI Releases Photos of Suspects in Boston Marathon Bombing

The FBI has released photos of two suspects in the Boston Marathon bombing.  Both are young men, seen carrying backpacks in the vicinity of the blasts, just minutes before the bombs went off.

One was wearing a white baseball cap turned backwards and carrying a white backpack slung over his right arm.  A white backpack was deposited near the finish line and later exploded.  One of the victims, who lost both legs in the ensuing blast, got a good look at the perp as he dropped the white backpack and departed.

The FBI has learned that at least one of the bombs was detonated using a remote control mechanism and battery from a hobby store, where such items are used to control toy cars or planes.

The devices used in the bombing have previously been described on Al Qaeda websites.  Though the perpetrators have not been identified as Muslim or Middle-eastern, it appears likely that they obtained their knowledge of this type of bomb from Al Qaeda sources.  It will be interesting to discover the perpetrators' motivation for this atrocity.  I see a slab and a drip line in the perps' future.  Too bad.  Such crimes would be so much better punished by an old-fashioned hanging or electric chair.  Call me a traditionalist.

Boston Bombing: Who Did It?

Whenever an atrocity occurs, like the bombing of the Boston Marathon yesterday, the left immediately blames it on the "far right" or on budget cuts, or something equally self-serving.  The right immediately suspects Muslim terrorists.  I am in the latter category, of course.

Nevertheless, nothing is definite without evidence and facts, and we should try to withhold judgment until we have some.  John Douglas, the FBI profiler whose books have recently caught my attention, talks about erroneous investigations and convictions.  These are generally caused by jumping to conclusions, developing a theory, and selectively looking for facts to fit that theory.  Douglas says that in any crime, you must step back, view the whole picture, and determine what is known and what is not known.  You first examine the facts and the evidence and formulate a theory based on those.

What we now know is this:
1.  Person or persons unknown planted makeshift bombs made from pressure cookers at the finish line of the Boston Marathon, and timed those bombs to explode when and where the crowd would be thickest.  This appears a deliberate attempt to kill and injure as many people as possible.

2. Recent events in the past decade have shown Muslim terrorists planting bombs (in London and Madrid) with the intention of killing or wounding civilians.  Such crimes seem to have no purpose other than murder for the sake of murder, or in the case of radical Muslims, for the sake of their violent ideology.  Douglas calls this type of crime a "group cause" crime, carried out for ideological or political reasons.  The Islamic reason is merely to follow the command of their prophet, i.e. to kill infidels and unbelievers.  It is a well-established fact, based on 14 centuries of experience, that Islam is a religion of mass murder that intends to spread itself through terror.

3.  A recent Al Qaeda magazine described how Muslim terrorists could make bombs out of pressure cookers, filled with shrapnel and a flammable liquid.  The article advised:

“The pressurized cooker is the most effective method,” the article said. “Glue shrapnel to the inside of the pressurized cooker then fill the cooker with inflammable material.” A small light bulb can be used as a detonator, it said.

“Place the device in a crowded area,” the article said. “Camouflage the device with something that would not hinder the shrapnel such as cardboard.”

It would appear a reasonable theory that the world's most violent and hateful religion has probably carried out yet another crime against humanity.  However, I will withhold conclusive judgment until more facts are in.  There is always the possibility that the crime was perpetrated by some extremist like Timothy McVeigh or some lunatic like Ted Kaczynski.  However, the odds are in favor of a Muslim perpetrator.

Famous Crime Cases, Murder, Evidence and Who-Dunnits

I saw my last tax client of the season last night at 8 PM.  He owed.  Told him he was underwithheld.

I left the office shortly after 9 PM and went home, had a cigar and read some more from my latest book interest, one by John Douglas, a famous FBI profiler and expert on crime scene investigation and murder.  Last week I read his latest book, "Law and Disorder," where he analyzes several recent murder cases and gives his opinion on the guilt or innocence of  those convicted of the crimes:  the West Memphis Three:  completely innocent, though they spent 20 years in prison, one of them, the alleged ringleader, on death row. They were recently released.  Others for whom the evidence indicates innocence are Cameron Todd Willingham, executed in Texas for arson and the death of his three children, and Amanda Knox.

I am now reading his book on famous crimes and the evidence for and against the suspects, e.g., Jack the Ripper, Lizzie Borden, Bruno Richard Hauptmann, executed in 1936 for the kidnapping and murder of the Lindbergh baby.  The evidence against Lizzie Borden, accused of hacking her parents to death in 1892, is compelling.  Though she was acquitted of the murder, she is the only person who had motive and opportunity to do the crime.  The jury refused to convict in the absence of any direct evidence, and I cannot disagree with their decision.  Her guilt was not established beyond a reasonable doubt.

The evidence against Hauptmann appears overwhelming, but there are still those who argue for his innocence all these years later.  Personally, I believe he was guilty as sin and deserving of his fate.  There was much direct evidence against him.   Douglas believes that Hauptmann was guilty, but had to have been assisted in the planning and carrying out of the crime.  Douglas would not have applied the death penalty.  I disagree.

However, whether you agree or disagree, Douglas's analysis of the facts and evidence of famous cases gives the reader much greater insight into these cases, even though it is impossible to draw any conclusions with certainty so many years later.  Now I am going to get another cup of coffee and read Douglas's dissection of the Zodiac murders in San Francisco during the 1970's.

Renewal of the Soul After Adversity

My Persimmon Tree Blossoming in Glorious Spring Renewal

My friend AOW (Always on Watch) makes a point of interspersing happy posts with all the negative political ones.  That's a good idea, lest we become cynical sourpusses, devoid of hope and optimism.

Well let's see, what can I be positive about?  Hmmm.

My persimmon tree's new buds and branches are exploding in a flurry of greenery and growth.  I wish my soul were like that:  able to renew itself with that kind of vigor and color.  Life could trim off my branches and leave me denuded and bare in winter, and in spring I would blossom all over again, filled with ambition, optimism and promise.

Well, the tax season ends in another week.  Yay!  Then its plucking my Rickenbacker bass guitar and groovin' like the really cool cat that I imagine myself to be.  Oh yeah.

I have some money in my pocket, not enough to buy a Bushmaster, but enough to keep me in cigars for a few weeks.

I now know more about income taxes than at any previous time in my long career.  I also found that clients like me.  I relate well to them.  I should be able to earn some dough after leaving Fleecem Tax, where they bill the suckers $400 an hour (I am leaving for two reasons:  low pay for me and absurd prices for clients.)

Today in Hollister, the sky is blue and cloudless; there's a gentle breeze wafting spring fragrances, and pollen, but my allergy medication is holding its own.

Well, that's all the positivity I can fake for today.  Come back tomorrow for continuing installments.

Mellow Fellow. That's Me. But for How Long?

I see that socialist and leftist scumbags are "celebrating in the streets" over the death of Margaret Thatcher.  Leftism is evil, but in banal way.  I am mildly disgusted, but no longer wish to machine-gun the whole lot of them.  Guess I am somewhat mellow following the death of my friend Lawrence Auster.  Nothing shocks me much anymore, and very little really pisses me off.

So wallow in your evil, your hatred, your profound ignorance, lefties.  It's what you do and who you are.

Margaret Thatcher, 1925 - 2013

A Great Lady:  Rest In Peace

The Scapegoat With a Thousand Faces: Musings on Justice, Memory, Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito.

NOTE:  the article below discusses how a former Nazi guard became a scapegoat for Holocaust crimes committed by one Ivan the Terrible.  My use of this guard, one John Demjanjuk, as an example, does not imply any sympathy for Nazis, nor any belief in Holocaust denial.  I am a strong supporter of Israel.  Do not read more into the discussion than is intended.

****

One of the best books I ever read on criminal justice was "Witness for the Defense" by Elizabeth Loftus.  She explains quite convincingly how memory can be polluted and distorted, and how eyewitness testimony is often suspect in any criminal trial.  Victims of a crime are often asked to view mugshots and later, line-ups of suspects to see if they can identify the perpetrator.  They see a face that looks entirely familiar, and finger that  suspect as the perpetrator.  Except that the suspect is not the perpetrator.  The witness has found the suspect's face very familiar because she first saw it when viewing mugshots.

Another aspect of Loftus's writing is the scapegoat phenomenon.  People who have been victimized by criminals desire revenge.  I don't blame them, it is a very natural reaction to losing a loved one to murder, or from enduring pain and suffering.  However, we must understand the scapegoat phenomenon:  people desirous of revenge will often settle for a scapegoat, the punishment of someone who acts as proxy for the real criminal.  Victims need someone to blame, and it matters not that their target for hatred is innocent.  Scapegoats are borne of a strong psychological need to believe in their guilt, regardless of facts or evidence.

As a member of Sons of Confederate Veterans, I have long been interested in the American Civil War.  I became interested in the story of Andersonville Prison and its Confederate commander, Major Henry Wirz.  Wirz was arrested after the surrender of the Confederacy, given a sham trial by a military tribunal and hanged for crimes against humanity.  However, he was innocent, a mere scapegoat for the Northern conquerors.  I base this largely on the writings of people who were there, especially a Northern Lieutenant, one James Madison Page, who was a prisoner of war in Andersonville.  In his book, The True Story of Andersonville Prison, he wrote that Wirz was merely a scapegoat who was used "to draw the Northern rath to satiety."  No one cared if Wirz was actually guilty or not.  The grieving families of soldiers who died there needed closure, and the framing and execution of Wirz supplied that.  It also served to direct blame away from the Lincoln Administration, who could have saved many of the POWs but considered them expendable.

Loftus also discussed the trial in Israel of Ivan (John) Demjanjuk, a former Nazi prison camp guard who was accused of mass-murdering Nazi, Ivan the Terrible.   Demjanjuk immigrated to America after World War II, lived a quiet life as an auto worker, until accused by Nazi hunters of being Ivan the Terrible. When so accused, the USA stripped him of his citizenship and extradited him to stand trial in Israel.  Demjanjuk was not "Ivan the Terrible" and the evidence did not support this belief.  However, the Israelis wanted a scapegoat for the Holocaust crimes and Demjanjuk would do.  His Israeli defense attorneys were excoriated and hated for representing him.  Yoram Sheftel, the main attorney, received death threats and was the victim of an acid attack that nearly blinded him.  However, he believed in Demjanjuk's innocence and later wrote a book, The Demjanjuk Affair:  the Rise and Fall of a Show Trial.

Demjanjuk was convicted based on documents, some obviously forged, and the testimony of Treblinka survivors who identified him as Ivan the Terrible.  However, the prosecution was relying on memories four decades old, and a very old man who looked a lot different at his trial than he looked in 1943.  Elizabeth Loftus, an Israeli and an expert on memory, was asked to help defend Demjanjuk; she declined, due to the immense public pressure to convict Demjanjuk and ostracize anyone connected with his defense.

Demjanjuk, scapegoat, was sentenced to be hanged for crimes against humanity.  However, four years later, the Israeli Supreme Court overturned his sentence and freed him.

Demjanjuk was no angel, he had been a willing volunteer at Nazi concentration camps and a guard there.  That is undisputed.  He was later convicted in a German court for other war crimes and sentenced to five years in prison.  He died of old age at 91 while waiting for an appeal to be heard. However, his appointment as proxy for Ivan the Terrible illustrates well how the scapegoat phenomenon works:  if you can't get the actual perpetrator of the crime, a stand-in will do fine in placating the hatred of the victims and their families.

Amanda Knox is a new scapegoat, someone to blame and to hate for the murder of Meredith Kercher.  Kercher's family believes in Knox's guilt, not because of any evidence against her (there is none), but because of the scapegoat phenomenon.  They want someone to pay for the crime.  The actual perpetrator of Meredith's murder, a thug named Rudy Guede, is already in prison for "participating" in Meredith's death, sentenced to 16 years for his alleged supporting role.  However, his role was not a supporting role, the evidence is overwhelming that he alone killed Meredith when she surprised him in the act of burglary.  The Kerchers have their perp, a real one, who has been given a sentence far too light for the crime he committed.

I don't know Amanda Knox, don't know if she is a liberal (probably) or a conservative, a sexual libertine or a complete airhead.  Frankly, I don't care, as such personal aspects have nothing to do with her guilt or innocence in the murder of Meredith Kercher.

I see myself in this case as someone who is in ruthless pursuit of truth.  Others, the "guilters" like Ann Coulter, are in merely in a ruthless pursuit of an agenda.  They will have their scapegoat at all costs, including those of truth and justice.

Suspected Lesbian Ann Coulter Once Again Savages the Innocent

Suspected lesbian Ann Coulter has published another hate-text with the National Inquirer of the Internet, i.e. World Net Daily.  She is once again bashing Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito, two innocent college kids who were savaged by Italy's execrable system of justice.

I have refuted Coulter before on this topic, don't know that I will waste the time again.  It is safe to say, however, that I would kick her bony ass in any debate over the topic.  Like Mignini, the convicted-for-abuse prosecutor of Knox and Sollecito, Coulter is on a vendetta.  Having previously embarrassed herself with completely false factoids about the case, she could apologize and change course; being a soulless, egotistical phony, she would prefer to add to the misery of these innocent kids than admit she was wrong.  That, and to use them as a cudgel with which to beat Anderson Cooper and any other liberal who defends Knox and Sollecito.

I realized that there is something "off" about Ann  Coulter when I read one of her most recent books.  In that book she advanced the erroneous theory that Republicans have always been the champions of racial equality, whereas the Democrats have always been the champions of slavery and segregation.  What a load of bovine excrement.  The Republican Party's motto at the time of Lincoln was "The White People's Party," and the Republicans opposed slavery in the territories because they despised blacks and considered them inferior human beings.  They wanted the new territories off limits to blacks.  Various Republican states passed laws making it illegal for blacks to set foot in their states, both before and after the Civil War. As de Tocqueville pointed out, "there is more color prejudice North than South," which also translates to "blacks were treated better in the Democrat South than they were in the Republican North."

Now let's note one more thing:  why is super-Christian Ann Coulter still unmarried at age 51?  Is she a lesbian?  Is it because no man can stand her long enough to meet her at the alter?  Or is she just just having too much fun fornicating?  Inquiring minds want to know.  AND, those same minds want to illustrate how anyone can take a "fact" and draw extreme conclusions and inferences, like Coulter repetitively referring to Amanda Knox as "convicted murderer Amanda Knox."  One might better refer to her as "acquitted of bogus charges of murder by a corrupt prosecutor" Amanda Knox.

 From now on, perhaps I will refer to Ann Coulter as "suspected lesbian Ann Coulter" (apologies to lesbians).  One thing I will never refer to her as again is "conservative author" or "heroine of the right."  She has disgraced herself too many times.

April Creeps In On Little Cat Feet (Sorry, Carl Sandburg)

April 1st.  No April Fools shenanigans here, however.  Not in the mood.

I don't have much to say today, just wanted to post something following Larry Auster's passing, as a way of moving on.

A couple of white/gray pigeons are perched on my fence billing and cooing like lovebirds.  After our last harvest of persimmons in November, my wife trimmed the branches on our tree.  Today the formerly bare tree is filled with green buds.  Life returns with spring.

I want to get a birdhouse for my backyard and maybe a bird feeder too.  But where will I hang them?  On my persimmon tree?  No, don't want them birdies pecking holes in my persimmons.  On my lemon tree?  That doesn't seem right somehow.  I may need to get a birdhouse on a pole and plant that in my garden.

The next two weeks will be brutal as I finish out the tax season.  Looking forward to some time off, practicing my bass, maybe visiting Bro in Nevada.

Right now, though, I have hot tea to drink, a cigar to smoke and then I will read the second volume of my four volume set of Calvin and Hobbes, given to me for Christmas by my youngest son.  After that, I'll jump into bed and watch the latest recorded episode of "The Walking Dead."

Considering the exciting life I lead, it's amazing that I haven't died of a heart attack yet.