Global Warming? Never Heard of It

Now that the hurricane season is nearly over (tomorrow is last day) and it is the second year in a row that predictions have been vastly over projected, you would think claims of global warming being the cause of the 2005 season would be re-evaluated, right? Well, you would be wrong. In this entire article trying to explain why the season was slower than predicted, not once are the words 'global warming' even mentioned in any sort of mea culpa. However, I can see the article now had the season met expectations or exceeded, all blame and reasons would have been because of global warming. Don't worry though, whenever we have the next "bad" season, whether that be next year or 10 years from now, they will be ready to lay it all out again however it may be global coolings fault next time.

Heartfelt Love

Being this is my blog and I can write about whatever I want, I'll take this opportunity to do a little praising God for an awesome girlfriend! Mimi has taken such great care of me while I'm here. She has sent me almost weekly care packages and things I've needed like a jacket due to not anticipating it getting this cold. In the last package she sent me was included the handmade puzzle above. She never ceases to amaze me with her creativity! As I mentioned in my Thanksgiving post of things I'm thankful, I am so thankful to have her in my life and just wanted to share that with my blog world again =)

The World According to the NYTimes

Welcome to the bizzaro world of the NYTimes. It is a world where only bad news about President Bush is printed, but none of the good news. Case in point the recent Australian election. In order to show that the whole world is rebuking the President, they point out that this is just the latest also pointing to political changes in Spain and England. However, they completely ignore the elections in France, Germany and Canada, all three of which have elected stronger supporters.

They also don't even report accurately on the election, plenty of which had absolutely nothing to do with Bush or America or Iraq. They make the claim that the new PM will remove Australia's 500 troops. However, the truth is they are only talking about removing the 500 combat troops currently here, not all the troops as the report says. And they wonder why they are accused of liberal bias!

Move Over Earth...Now Man Is Destroying the Whole Universe

According to a new study, global warming is nothing compared to the damage humans may have caused to the whole universe just by looking in the sky. Yes, you read that right, astronomers are shortening the life of the universe simply by looking at it. Man, we puny little humans sure are powerful. Not only can we change the climate of the entire planet, we can also destroy the entire universe! Can anyone say Tower of Babel?

History Lesson for the Dems

As is usually the case, the Dems (well...at least the two frontrunners for nomination for President) are taking their cues from the MSM's shift that the good news in Iraq can no longer be ignored. Now that things are starting to turn around in Iraq, they realize they have to shift their focus or risk being seen as weak. They are now slowly starting to lessen their shrieks of "the war is lost" and changing to criticising the political changes on the ground for not happening fast enough. Don't worry though they aren't giving the President any credit for the surge actually working to make a more secure nation in order to now allow the government of Iraq to focus on governance issues.

So, let's give the Dems a little lesson in history. How long did it take the revolutionary forces to defeat the British, stand up a stable government and elect a President?

First shot was fired in April 1775 and the Treaty of Paris was officially signed in January 1784, ending the war. The final draft of the Constitution was signed September 1787 and officially ratified in July 1788. The first Presidential election was held in February 1789 and in April 1789, George Washington was sworn in as the first President of the United States of America.

By my count that is nearly 9 years of war, then over 4 years before a central government was fully stood up, and then almost another year before the first election. That is a total of 14 years from first shot fired to first President. By those numbers, Iraq is well ahead of pace as it hasn't even been 5 years yet since the first shots were fired and they already have a constitution and a President despite still being in the middle of a fight for their lives. They also have received no help from the Dems, but in fact the Dems' actions have helped the enemy over and over as I've discussed before due to the enemy using the words and actions of the Dems in their propaganda to keep the Iraqis in fear thus slowing progress on all levels.

When this war is won and Iraq has a stable government, both of which can happen if things are kept in their proper perspective, the Dems will try as hard as they can to take some credit, but they will get none!

Another Disappointing Loss Due to Mental Errors

Well, after last night's disappointing 50-48 triple overtime loss to Arkansas, LSU has lost it's chance to try for a national championship this season. Once again too many mental errors cost them the game. This time the culprits were once again unnecessary penalties like illegal formation removing a very critical touchdown, way too many errant passes by Matt Flynn, and not capitalizing on opportunities like recovering a fumble on the 20 and only scoring a field goal.

Still have two more games left, but when your hopes are so high with the very real chance of making it to the national championship game, the SEC Championship and only a New Year's bowl game doesn't quite have the same appeal. Hopefully they will finish strong with an SEC Championship win and Sugar Bowl win and then start building for next year. That won't be an easy road though as I'm sure now the players hopes are just as dashed and they will have to dig deep to not give up on the season.

Update: Thanks to Southpaw in the comments section for reminding me that I wanted to give some props to McFadden as he definitely proved he should be in the Heisman mix with his performance as he ran all over the Tigers, especially in the red zone which has been our Achilles heel all season.

Installment #11 - Great Iraq News FROM the MSM

Not to be out done by the NYTimes, the WashPost now has its own story of how much safer it is in Iraq with people returning by the 1000s daily. Of course, just like the NYTimes, they leave lots of room open to change back to negative on a dime and just barely give any credit to the surge. Once again, I'll take what I can get and keep hoping for more.

Multi-National Coalition Partners Making Equal Commitments

One of the big criticisms the anti-war crowd tries to frequently use is downplaying the role of the over 30 nations that have troops either currently serving or served at one time in Iraq by saying they are only sending a couple of soldiers for purely symbolic support but were not really committed to the cause.

The problem with this argument is that if they are comparing say the 50 Tongan marines (who btw are some of the most professional, courteous and squared away troops I've ever met) who are currently here on Camp Victory and other bases to the approximately 180K US military personnel that is not comparing the right numbers. What they need to compare is percentage of total military.

The US has over a million total in the military so there total commitment is around 20%. Tonga's total military is 250 personnel, so they also have committed around 20% of their forces. Then to take it a step further if you compare total number of US military personal in Iraq with total population available for service in the US the percentage is 0.3% which is also the exact same when compared to Tonga.

All this to say that when you actually compare apples to apples, to say that our allies are any less committed then we are just because of a small number of troops being here, that is completely false.

Get Uncomfortable: by Todd Phillips

Happy Thanksgiving From Camp Victory

In 33 years this was my first Thanksgiving away from home. Not only was I not home, I wasn't even in the US due to being in the giant sandbox. Thankfully though the military went all out to make our Thanksgiving here on Camp Victory as special as possible. Here is a little taste of our Thanksgiving dinner.

The Menu

Normally the servers are TCN's (Third Country Nationals), but today we were served by senior officers and senior NCOs (Non-Commissioned Officers). It was cool to be served turkey by a two star general =)

Following is a few pics of the decorations and food served sometimes both:

Can't have Thanksgiving without a cornucopia!

One of the decorations that caused many passerbys to ask why was there a Church for Thanksgiving. I guess they forget that the Pilgrims came for religious freedom and I also wonder who they think the Pilgrims were saying thanks to on the first thanksgiving!

I guess they were trying to help us feel like we were home b/c definitely nothing like this over here =)

Have no idea what a dragon has to do with Thanksgiving. Guess someone just wanted to show off their creative abilities.

While I was bummed to miss my first Thanksgiving at home, I still have plenty of things to be thankful for. Here is just a short list:

-Christ giving His life so that after I asked Him to come into my life and forgive my sins I can now spend eternity with Him in Heaven

-An awesome family that is so supportive of me and everything I do

-An absolutely amazing g/f that I love so much and can't wait to see in 22 days, 14 hours, 16 minutes and 32 seconds =)

-Living in a country that allows me to worship Christ without fear of persecution

-All the many military members who are here in Iraq and Afghanistan for their sacrifice for our freedoms

-Great friends who are always there when I need them

-Everyone who has and continues to pray for me while I'm here in the giant sandbox

-All my blog readers for putting up with all my ranting and raving =)

Hope everyone has a very blessed and Happy Thanksgiving!

Installment #10 - Great Iraq News FROM the MSM

As any regular reader of my blog knows, I have no love lost for the MSM due to it's very liberal bent, especially in relations to reporting on the war; however, when they do get something right for a change, I'm more than glad to give them some credit in hopes that it continues.

If this isn't enough proof that things are turning around in Iraq then I don't know what it will take. The NYTimes has this article on the FRONT PAGE. Of course they still leave open that it can all go back to bad at any minute, only give one sentence of credit to the surge, give most credit to the courage of Iraqis, and still refuse to admit al Qaida is in Iraq, but I'll take what I can get.

Nail Is In The Coffin On Destroying Embryos for Research

Destroying embryos in order to make stem cells is now officially a dead issue. Two teams of scientist have discovered a way to take human skin cells and make them genetically identical to embryonic stem cells without having to make or destroy an embryo, without cloning, or without having to harvest a woman's eggs . Combing this incredible breakthrough with the Dolly cloner turning his back on the issue as well as I posted yesterday, destroying embryos is now completely unnecessary and totally unjustified as a means for any ethical research.

Fallen Soldier's Father Truly Honors His Son's Sacrifice

Cindy Sheehan needs to take notes on how one should truly honor their fallen son's sacrifice. Here is an incredibly heart warming story.

Hat Tip: CJ

Dolly Creator Shuns Cloning for Adult Stem Cells

In a huge reversal, according to this article, the scientist who created the cloned sheep, Dolly, 10 years ago is turning his back on cloning and embryonic stem cell research. He is instead going to focus his efforts on adult stem cells which have proven way more effective with no moral implications. Hopefully this will be a major turning point on this issue!

Installment #9: Great Iraq News

Due to Al Qaida's brutal torture tactics (and I'd guess it wasn't waterboarding) against the citizens and even those fighting coalition forces, more and more are turning to Coalition Forces to help. Check out this great article on how a former extremist led Coalition and Iraqi forces to a huge weapons cache that he himself helped hide.

Inaugural Camp Victory Water Bottle Raft Race

Today was the Inaugural Camp Victory Water Bottle Raft Race featuring Nancy and Dan. Follow the race below.

The Announcement

Nancy's Craft

Dan's Craft

The Crowd Gathers

Dan and Nancy With Their Crafts

Nancy Launches

Success!

Dan Launches

A Little Shaky at First But...Success

Nancy takes the early lead

Nancy's lead becomes insurmountable

The crowd cheering...actually they were waiting to see who would fall in...lol

Nancy makes it to halfway point and Dan abandons his paddle due to faulty design and goes with the dog paddle method hoping to make up ground

Nancy in the home stretch...Dan almost to halfway point

Dan makes it to halfway point...FINALLY =)

The Winner

The Loser...or as Dan preferred...the Silver Medalist

Fun times for all!

Advice and Consent Becomes Dictate and Mandate

Harry Reid is threatening to hold the Senate in session over the Thanksgiving recess in order to prevent the President from making recess appointments of judges and other vital administration positions that are being blocked by super majority requirements which is clearly unconstitutional. The reason he is giving is because the President won't agree to several Democratic appointments.

This is wrong on so many levels. First, the Democrats do not get to make appointments. That is the role of the President. Second, the President has full constitutional authority to make recess appointments. Third, the Senate won't actually be "in session." He is going to hold the session "open" by using procedural means to hold nonvoting sessions. That means that not a single Senator will have to be present and they can all enjoy their Thanksgiving break at home. If no Senator is present, isn't that the definition of being on recess?

I hope that if Reid tries this that the President will challenge it all the way to the Supreme Court if necessary as it is a very clear violation of the intent of the President's constitution authority. Here is another tactic that I'm not exactly sure how it would work procedurally but I think there could be another tactic the Repubs in the Senate could employ. I'll check with a friend of mine who knows all the Robert's Rules stuff and correct this if I'm wrong, but I think the Repubs could either force the Dems to stay with quorum calls or risk losing a vote to approve the appointments.

Democrats Continue to Put Troops in Harm's Way

Once again Democrats in the House have overstepped their Constitutional authority by trying to dictate to the President how he is to conduct the war by voting for a completely unconstitutional bill. They have once again tied funding to troop withdrawals and a specific timetable of when combat will end. They did this knowing it would not pass in the Senate and even if it did, that the President would veto it. It is already nearly 2 months into the fiscal year and they have still not passed a bill yet to fund the war, provide the necessary equipment to protect the troops, and troop raises. Now with this action, it is very likely the new funding that is extremely vital will not come until after the new year.

You have to give them one thing. Even after going 0-40 so far on bills to end the war unconstitutionally, they are nothing if not persistent. I guess they have to do something to make it appear to their very active anti-war base they are doing what they were elected to do. It's just too bad that they are more concerned with getting re-elected than they are in making sure the troops have the equipment they need to come home alive and the time they need to come home victorious.

God's Smuggler

I just finished a third book by Brother Andrew. It is actually his first book as I read them in reverse order, Secret Believers, Light Force and now God's Smuggler. As the previous two have, this book has challenged me on so many levels, the biggest of which for this one is my faith. He gives so many examples from his personal life of provisions and protection that can only be explained as God's supernatural intervention.

Brother Andrew earned the nickname, God's Smuggler, as he for many years smuggled Bibles into the former Soviet Union. Now, as he explains in the next two books, he has moved to the Muslim nations. I love the acronym he uses for Islam...I Sincerely Love All Muslims.

What Courage!!!

After flip flopping all over the place on the her position on ILLEGAL immigrants receiving a driver's license in NY, and then complaining about being attacked for her flip flopping, Hillary Clinton has finally decided on a firm position...she is against them. Oh...but I'm sure it has nothing to do with the fact that the NY governor just killed the issue because he couldn't get any support for them.

Leave Musharraf Alone...Warning...Coulter Alert!!!

I've been watching the news coming out of Pakistan and trying to decide how I feel about it and what my reaction should be. I read Coulter's weekly email this morning and it completely captured my feelings of how the US should react and handle the situation albeit not quite in the style I would have expressed it. So take a read but be forewarned...it is full on Coulter in all her liberal bashing glory.

Surge Success Report

Here is a great article in Human Events that chronicles the success of the surge. It is a must read that I'm sure will be totally ignored by the MSM.

Thank You!!!

Undisputed #1 Again!!!

Thanks to the Fighting Illini knocking off Ohio St. 28-21, LSU is once again ranked #1 after their blowout of LA Tech 58-10. While they started slow like always and still had some very sloppy plays, they were way too much for the Bulldogs.

Now of course I can already hear the complaints from the Kansas fans as to why they aren't even in the top 2 much less not #1 being they are undefeated and LSU, Oregon and Oklahoma each have one loss. All I have to say is try playing more than one ranked team in your first 10 games then let's talk. If they beat Missouri and then go to the Big 12 Championship game and beat Oklahoma (both very big ifs) then I'd give them props for the #2 slot above Oregon but still not #1 above LSU.

Here's why. If they win out, including the SEC Championship game, LSU will have played 7 top ranked teams (possibly 8 if Arkansas jumps up with a win next weekend), beating 6 (or 7) of them and losing in triple overtime to only 1 of them. Oregon has only played 3 and the PAC-10 doesn't have a championship game, so they have no more ranked teams on their schedule. Oklahoma has only played 2 with one more potential left in the Big 12 Championship game and their loss was to an unranked team. Kansas, as shown above, has only played one top 25 to date with two more potential ones down the road. West Virginia only has 2 so far with 1 left.

All that to say if LSU wins out there is no doubt that they should be the #1 team going into the Sugar Bowl due to strength of schedule alone.

Trying to Have It Both Ways

Only in Congress can such a completely insane idea can be born. The Dems are trying to push through the new S-CHIP program. In its original form, it provided health care for poor kids. Well, the new Dem version attempts to define as "kids" up to 21 years old and defines poor up to $90K annual income. Then how do they say they will pay for the billions of dollars needed to cover this new government handout...raise taxes on cigarettes. Hasn't it been the Dems who have for years been doing everything in their power to stop people from smoking??? Well to pay for this new socialized medicine precursor, they will need 22 million new smokers by the year 2013 in order to continue to pay for it. Only in Congress!!! But of course as always they don't plan to participate as they are trying to once again pass another law banning smoking in all Senate buildings.

There is a hilarious video up on YouTube called Do Your Part that I wanted to post on here, but for some reason I'm having issues with posting from YouTube, so check out it here on Mike's post on the same topic.

Biggest Scam in History

That is the conclusion made by the founder of the weather channel. What topic is he blasting...Manmande Global Warming. But then of course he has only been a meteorologist his whole life and hasn't won a Nobel Peace prize, so I'm sure he has no clue what he is talking about.

Installment #8 - Great Iraq News You Won't See in MSM

Muslims and Christians working together in Iraq??? I thought all Christians were being slaughtered??? Great article showing them working together of all things to raise a cross on top of a Church in Baghdad and grateful for the freedom provided by America! Now I know there has been persecution of Christians as the media has shown a little of, but here is just another sign of reconciliation as well that also needs to be shown.

Giuliani Scores Major Endorsement

While most endorsements are overrated, the endorsement of Pat Robertson for Rudy Giuliani is HUGE for his chances of earning the Republican nomination. It will help to shore up his weak right flank due to social issues. I'm sure there will still be many social conservatives who will not support him in the primary but will now be less apprehensive of supporting him in the general.

An example of an endorsement that carries very little weight is Brownback's endorsement of McCain. McCain's pro-life credentials were never in question, so this does nothing more than restate the obvious that McCain is the most pro-life candidate of the top-tier candidates.

Installment #7 - Great Iraq News You Won't Find in MSM

Thanks to a tip from an Iraqi citizen, US forces found a cache of over 150 future EFPs, Explosively Formed Penetrators, which are more deadly than normal IEDs. More and more tips are coming in every day as the citizens, who continue to tire of the brutality of the extremist, are seeing the results of turning them over to US forces. This is great news and continues to show the tide is turning in all areas of Iraq.

Ugly Win, But I'll Take It

It is never easy to get a road win in the SEC. Add the mental errors of 3 interceptions, 130 yards of penalties, a blocked punt, and punt returned for a touchdown, and it will be a long night. Thankfully, the one turnover that mattered the most was the fumble recovery by LSU that led to the final score to go ahead and win, 41-34. I'm still not sure if I'm happier that we beat Bama or Saban!

Now with BC's lost to Florida State, it won't be an issue. However, had they won out and LSU as well, there is no way they should have stayed on top. Last night's game was LSU's 6 game against a top 25 opponent, winning 5 and barely losing the 6th. BC has only played one team, VA Tech and barely beat them, while we blew out VT. We still have to go to the SEC Championship game against another top 25 team and as South Carolina found out last night, Arkansas, even though not ranked, isn't a cake walk with McFadden.

All that to say while the win was not pretty and we tried as hard as possible to give it away at times, I'll definitely take it! GEAUX TIGERS!!!

Installment #6 - Great Iraq News You Won't See in MSM

October had the fewest deaths in Iraq of military members in the last 20 months. We have more soldiers here than ever before, and they are engaging the enemy even more aggressively with the new surge strategy. Despite that deaths are down. Could it be the enemy is losing and we are winning?

Thin Skinned Are We?

Hillary Clinton FINALLY was asked some tough questions for a change on her many multiple positions on the same issue and now she is all upset at Russert for asking them. Is this the first chink in her iron-clad armor?

Previous Abortions Harmful to Future Babies

Another in a long line of studies is once again proving that abortions are not only deadly to that current unborn child, but they have major harmful effects on future children as well. According to this article in the Journal of Reproductive Medicine, 32% of "very preterm" births in the US are a result of a previous abortion. Preterm births have been linked to a strong cause to cerebral palsy. So, as you decide to make a "choice" remember your "choice" is effecting more than just that one life, and that doesn't even touch the damage both physically and psychologically they do to the mothers which has also been proven by study after study.