August 15, 2005

New Blog Carnival Showcase

Yay, it's time for the New Blog Carnival Showcase! Hooray!

This is the showcase that showcases (hence the name) new blogs (again, that's where the name comes from). Any blog that's less than 3 months old is eligible for participation. No other criteria apply for this carnival! If you see a blog that's young, please do direct them to the Showcase Carnival.

First up in the New Blog Showcase is:

Below the Beltway

For the carnival, he submits a post about Catholics and the Boston Globe. The title shows where he's going with this one with "Catholics Need Not Apply." Good details and supporting links.

He has a relatively short blogroll, but he's included in the Life, Liberty, and Property Group, so I might be a little biased to favor this blog...

Anyway, head on over, read the blog, and drop him some comments. You remember when you started out and were just dying to know that SOMEONE was reading your blog, right? I know, I feel that way many days, too...so get over there and drop some comments!

Elie's Expositions

He's from New Jersey and trying, I imagine with incredible difficulty that I cannot possibly conceive, to come to grips with the death of his 18-year old son. I just absolutely cannot imagine that kind of pain. The article he sends to feature in this showcase is "As He Was," introducing his former son.

There's also plenty of other posts mixed in, like neat baseball questions and some of my favorites, logic questions! Yay!

So if you want some varied reading on all sorts of different topic, some of which are truly very personal, please be sure to head on over and read. I'm quite sure he will appreciate the comments, as you did when you started blogging.

Also, if you're interested in hosting the carnival in the future, drop us a line at the showcase email (showcase.carnival@gmail.com). It's real easy, you get links, and it's often a lot of fun exploring new blogs. Thanks for reading!

(This post also to be found in the Ubercarnival listings).

Posted by: Ogre at 10:28 AM | Comments (7) | Add Comment | Trackbacks (Suck)

NC Legislature On Break

The North Carolina Legislature in on a temporary break. They've adjourned after approving a horrible budget weeks late. However, before they left, the question of a state lottery was left unanswered.

The North Carolina House passed a lottery bill. The Senate did not. The Senate was scheduled to vote on the issue on Saturday. However, since the vote was going to come out different than the Dictator of the Senate wanted, so he simply canceled the vote.

That is how the Democrats in the North Carolina Senate operate -- if the vote will not go the way the "leaders" want, they simply delay the vote. What will happen now during the week-long break, is the dictators will use their power and their "discretionary funds" to attempt to strong-arm and bribe Senators until they get the votes they need.

All the Senate Republicans and 5 Senate Democrats are so far still standing strong in their opposition to state-sponsored monopolistic gambling (aka lottery). However, it is highly likely that if just one Senator can be strong-armed or bribed (with taxpayer cash), there will be a very quick vote, likely at night, without debate, to slip the lottery through.

If you're interested in freedom and small government in North Carolina, watch the Senate very carefully when they return in a week.

Posted by: Ogre at 05:00 AM | Comments (4) | Add Comment | Trackbacks (Suck)

August 14, 2005

New Neighbor #26

This week's new neighbor is a special one. This week I'd like to introduce a neighbor who is quite well-known. If you've been blogging for more than a few days, and if you've ever looked at the Ecosystem, I'm sure you've heard or seen this neighbor.

This blog often flirts with top-ten status, and is never far from the top 10. It currently averages 935 daily visits and has almost 2,000 unique links to the blog. This week's neighbor is the source of this neighbor feature and the maintainer of that Evangelical Blogroll over in the sidebar. Please say hello to

The Evangelical Outpost

The blog is updated daily and has good stuff all the time. He's got a neat, regular feature called "Yak Shaving Razor," where there's all sort of odd and fun tips on... well, all sorts of different things from Google and Firefox hacks to rules for arguments.

I think one of his favorite types of posts are the "Outtakes." These are well-thought out details, facts, and opinions on items of the day. There's tons of links for important data and information.

If you have heard of this blog, but never been there, head on over and have a read this afternoon. You should be reading this one daily!

Posted by: Ogre at 05:01 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment | Trackbacks (Suck)

250 MPG Automobiles?

That sounds great! Sign me up! I want one yesterday! Oh, but there's a few details...

The news story linked above talks about people making hybrid cars that get 250mpg. Some of my good readers might think I'd be opposed to such a thing, since I am an "evil" conservative. Quite the contrary, I'd LOVE to have one of those things. I drive about 15,000 miles a year. I'd be happy with getting 250mpg -- if that were actually possible.

These cars are in a category called "plug-in" hybrid cars. They're like the hybrids you might see on the road now (if you live near rich people), but they have more batteries and you plug them in at night in your garage. There's a few problems, however. The extra batteries only work for the first 30 miles or so. They're not cost-efficient. And now the big secret -- "Set America Free" wants $12,000,000,000.00 in tax money to pay for them.

Look, I'm 100% for finding ways to make it so I don't have to pay more for more gasoline. But if you spend $12 billion of my tax money, I'm not saving any money! It's COSTING me money! That's just plain wrong.

When an inventor finds a way (despite horrible, onerous, heavy-handed, draconian, often punitive government regulations) to make a hybrid or hybrid plug-in at a cost that compares with current cars, and with the ability to make trips like today's cars, that's when it will work.

We don't need government to do it -- government can do very little right, let's not ask them to design our next generation of transportation! Let the free market be dominated by free people. When we figure out how to do it, we will.

I want my 250mpg car -- I just don't want government to research it, build it, or buy it for me.

Posted by: Ogre at 01:58 PM | Comments (18) | Add Comment | Trackbacks (Suck)

1 You really are an evil conservative ogre aren't you? Not wanting to pay TWELVE BILLION DOLLARS to research these new cars that of course will help us on the way to "paradise" on earth. Didn't you hear, once they (the government) is done with this, they will release the cancer cure they already have, or didn't you get the memo? Damn that evil Glennnnn(how many "n's" is it now), intercepting our mail, I just got mine and my check from Rove wasn't there, so I'm sure I just bought one of those "n's". Good to be back where I can read the blogs again, that 80 hour week last week nearly killed me!

Posted by: Smoke Eater at August 15, 2005 12:25 AM (WJO7V)

2 Heh! Thanks for stopping by, Smoke Eater!

And yes, I got the memo, but I'm trying to help keep the cure for cancer hidden because I'm also in the pocket of "Big Pharmaceuticals," too!

Posted by: Ogre at August 15, 2005 05:40 AM (L0IGK)

3 Ogre - unfortunately people don't understand conservation of energy. If you plug it in, THAT power has to come from somewhere. Heinlein had the term TANSTAAFL...

Is a 250mpg vehicle (non-hybrid) possible? Maybe - but it won't be gas, it'll be a diesel, and it'll be very small and very light (i.e. very dangerous in a crash), with a top speed around 40mph, and will accelerate 0-40 in about 60 seconds with the pedal to the metal. Cargo capacity would be about one bag of groceries. Tires would have to look more like bicycle tires pumped to 100psi to reduce rolling resistance (i.e. they would wear out VERY fast). Brakes would have to be light and flimsy to cut down on weight - they too would wear fast. MPG on any sort of slope would plunge dramatically. All of these hi-mileage schemes rely on using VERY tall terminal gear ratios which fall apart climbing hills where they have to down shift. Be great in FL where the highest geographical feature in the whole state is a 200' tall mound of garbage ;->

What I just described would be a death machine that would never be allowed on the highways.

Detroit certainly can do better than the mundane drek they're hawking these days, but I suspect the top end for a (non-hybrid) vehicle that could pass safety crash tests and all the other govt mandates is somewhere in the 75-80mpg range and that would be a real small single passenger diesel.

Posted by: tony at August 15, 2005 06:36 AM (eHsXE)

4 Interesting and good points, tony!

The people supporting plug-ins do admit the power requirement for recharging, but they claim that's much cleaner and much cheaper than refined gasoline (and they're likely right there).

Right now there are some people claiming they have 250mpg cars right now -- they're modified hybrids with massive amounts of battery power from plug-ins. So I'm sure they do meet current highway standards, but you're absolutely right on the flat ground vs hills. The current folks also admit it only works for the first 30 miles or so because after that the batteries run out of fuel and the car has to switch back to gasoline power.

All of your points are valid -- and that's why current manufacturers simply say that with today's technology, it's simply not cost efficient -- and the eco-terrorists admit as much by claiming they need $12 billion in government funding to make the cars!

Again, I would absolutely LOVE to have my car get 250mpg -- but I don't want government to do it, and therefore it's not going to happen any time soon.

Posted by: Ogre at August 15, 2005 07:10 AM (/k+l4)

5 Forget 250mpg, for a minute. I'd just like a NICE SIZED family sedan that I KNEW would give me 30 mpg. That's it. I don't need 250.

My husband has a smaller SUV, getting 22. His lease is up and since we've never really looked at family 4D sedans since we've been getting family cars the last 8 years, I figured we should go that route as gas is so daggum expensive. He was cool with the switch (he has a sports car he tinkers with on the side to feed his male need for speed)... until we realized that sedans get the same crappy mileage as his SUV or my mini-van. Why bother? It pisses me off. After all these years we still can't get a decent family sedan that won't kill us all in a crash that gets 30 mpg?

And don't beieve that crap about the hybrids. We did our research. What they say they get and what they REALLY get are two different things. Pisses me off.

Posted by: Bou at August 15, 2005 08:08 AM (5JHEt)

6 And I think there is a huge demand that's waiting to be met there. There are a very large number of people who do want a large vehicle with good gas mileage -- I just think physics won't allow it.

When you take all the parts that go into making a safe car -- steel, airbags, crumple zones, emissions, etc., add enough glass to satisfy Donald Trump, then add features and comfort, the darn thing is heavy! It takes a lot of power to get something that big moving.

After 100 years, we still haven't found a truly more efficient way than the internal combustion engine. Having worked on cars (a lot) before, I know exactly how it is that explosions are turned into forces to drive the wheels -- the more weight, the more explosion power needed.

So if you want that mileage from a big car today, your only hope is to drive downhill...a lot.

Posted by: Ogre at August 15, 2005 09:49 AM (/k+l4)

7 Bou,

The car you want exists today - a 1.8L turbo-4 version of the VW Passat with a MANUAL tranny. I've got a 2000 model and it can do well over 40mpg on flat ground keeping it around 45mph. At 55-60mph it'll be in the 36mpg range. Hammering it (where the turbo starts to spin) drops you into the low/mid 20mpg range. Local start/stop driving with a lot of stop lights going to the grocery store and such at 35-40mph toppng out in 4th gear (the manual is a 5-speed, but I don't hit 5th locally) yields around 25mpg.

I run full-synth oil in mine and its MPG kept improving till it had maybe 80,000 miles on it. Now its leveled out now that the engine is *completely* broken in. Sweet engine for a gas job, and Passats do pretty well in the crash tests.

These days, its getting hard to find a new VW with a manual anymore in the USA though...

They are putting the TDI diesel in Passat now, *BUT* the damn fools ruined it by mating it with the Porsche Tiptronic ("gizmomatic") automatic tranny. I suppose it appeals to yuppies who don't know how to shift...

VW salesmen will say - "oh, but you can shift it" which is true - but there STILL is a torque converter in there that is going to hurt the MPG (I don't believe its a "lockup" type torque converter). I couldn't stand the thing...but I'm a purist too ;->

There are apparently manual TDI Passat's being sold in Germany and Canada though, but the waiting lists are LONG.

VW has always made superb manual transmissions (good for at least 200K), and wretched automatics.

If you can find a TDI diesel Jetta Wagon with a manual, it should yield around 50 mpg on the highway. I bought my mom a diesel Jetta a few years ago and its outstanding. I've had a number of the 4-banger VW diesels over the years and they're all in the 50mpg range.

Probably hard as hens teeth to find, but back around 1983/84 or so VW put the rabbit diesel engine in the Vanagon - only sold it in the US for a single year. Those had the aerodynamics of a barn, but still got about 32mpg under almost any conditions, and you can pack a LOT of stuff into a Vanagon.

Posted by: tony at August 15, 2005 10:17 AM (eHsXE)

8 Passat? How big is that thing? Isn't that really, really small?

And I can imagine the trouble with finding manuals trannys -- I love them, but they are getting harder and harder to find. I guess I'm dating myself when I say that I remember when the automatic transmissions used to be EXPENSIVE options on cars...

Posted by: Ogre at August 15, 2005 10:52 AM (/k+l4)

9 I just got back from a cross country trip, do you know how many hibreds I saw on the highway? 0.. that's as in none. I saw a couple in the cities I passed through, but they didn't seem to handle well to the hilly land of western Missouri.

You want to talk about gas mileage? I get 12 miles to the gallon in my truck. I love it. Sure it costs me more to drive it, but I have the power that I need to carry all of my re-enacting equipment around. I don't notice hills on the highways. There is no worrying about not having enough room for my family and being able to carry anything. I've never been worried about the price of gas and gas mileage on a vehicle. I've always been of the mind that if have to worry about the cost of operating and maintaining the vehicle, then you just can't afford it and need to get something different.

Posted by: Contagion at August 15, 2005 03:02 PM (Q5WxB)

10 Ah, another evil one.

That's one of my biggest complaints about hybrids -- power. A month ago I got a load of gravel. Can you picture a hybrid having the power to carry that to my house?

I won't even drive a 4-cylinder engine car -- not enough power for me. Why? Because that's how I like my cars. I prefer big-block V8s, but those are pretty hard to find today, so I'll settle for a powerful V6 with manual transmission. You notice all the selling points of hybrids never seen to mention horsepower?

Posted by: Ogre at August 15, 2005 04:44 PM (L0IGK)

11 Tony-

I have three kids. Boys. I don't think a Passat will do it, although I'd go to manual in a heartbeat. I tried to get my mini-van in manual, but that was a no-go. They don't sell 'em that way.

Ogre... you did date yourself. ;-) I remember when automatic was an extra and my Dad used to gripe that he had to pay the extra cash because Mom couldn't drive one. (I can and prefer manual.)

That's the problem the hybrid industry is having today. They have those who think people want high mpg warring within the company with the marketing people who know people want 'pep'. So they're not meeting anyone's needs. Frickin' decision by community crap. So they've upped the power and are now getting less MPG. Why bother.

Contagion- Hybrids are big down here. Other than 'canes, we don't get the nasty weather down here, which may be why you don't see so many hybrids up there.

It's just frustrating. I don't even need a LARGE sedan. I'm not talking a caddie. But I can't have a small one either. My boys are growing and I don't need to feel like a family of sardines. Thankfully we stopped at 3 kids or I'd be driving a bus the rest of my life. Blech.

Posted by: Bou at August 16, 2005 07:57 AM (5JHEt)

12 I do think Florida is a good market for them BECAUSE it's flat!

And sure, get me a 400-hp, 250mpg hybrid. And I'll take that NOW, please.

Hey Bou, maybe you can get a Passat and cut a rumble seat in the rear section in place of the trunk. Oh crap, I think I'm REALLY dating myself now...

Posted by: Ogre at August 16, 2005 08:58 AM (/k+l4)

13 Passat isn't all that small Ogre - its mechanically identical to the Audi A6 but costs about $12,000 less than an A6.

With the back seat folded down I can carry 10' lengths of conduit or lumber with nothing hanging out the windows. The back seat will hold about 20 concrete blocks comfortably, and the trunk is huge.

Posted by: tony at August 16, 2005 03:57 PM (eHsXE)

14 Rumble seats! Holy crap! You're older than I am! ;-)

I'll look around to see what we have on the street down here as far as the Passat. I just don't think it'll hack it with 3 soon to be grown boys in the back. But hey, I'm open to suggestions!

Posted by: Bou at August 16, 2005 04:35 PM (5JHEt)

15 They're boys, they fit anywhere!

Posted by: Ogre at August 16, 2005 05:41 PM (L0IGK)

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Sunday Funnies

This out of state traveler was on the side of the road, hitchhiking on a real dark night in the middle of a thunderstorm. Time passed slowly and no cars went by. It was raining so hard he could hardly see his hand in front of his face. Suddenly he saw a car moving slowly, approaching and appearing ghost like in the rain. It slowly and silently crept toward him and stopped.

Wanting a ride real bad the guy jumped in the car and closed the door; only then did he realize that there was nobody behind the wheel, and no sound of an engine to be heard over the rain.

Again the car crept slowly forward and the guy was terrified, too scared to think of jumping out and running.

The guy saw that the car was approaching a sharp curve and, still too scared to jump out, he started to pray and began begging for his life; he was sure the ghost car would go off the road and into a nearby lake and he would surely drown!

But just before the curve a shadowy figure appeared at the driver's window and a hand reached in and turned the steering wheel, guiding the car safely around the bend. Then, just as silently, the hand disappeared through the window and the hitchhiker was alone again!

Paralyzed with fear, the guy watched the hand reappear every time they reached a curve. Finally the guy, scared to near death, had all he could take and jumped out of the car and ran and ran, into town, into Willmar. Wet and in shock, he went into a bar and voice quavering, ordered two shots of whiskey, then told everybody about his supernatural experience.

A silence enveloped and everybody got goose bumps when they realized the guy was telling the truth (and was not just some drunk).

About half an hour later two soaking wet locals walked into the bar and one says to the other, "Look Ole, ders dat idiot what rode in our car when we wuz pushin it in the rain."

(HT And Rightly So).

Posted by: Ogre at 08:03 AM | Comments (3) | Add Comment | Trackbacks (Suck)

August 13, 2005

ACLU Mail Campaign

Have you heard about the Stop the ACLU's mailing campaign to get more members? If you haven't, head on over to the Stop the ACLU site and read all about it.

I know some of my readers support the ACLU due to some of the good things that the ACLU does. My response to that is that it is similar to saying we should let off the person who tortures and murders children because they volunteer at the soup kitchen on Friday nights. The ACLU is based on changing this country into a communist utopia. They do very little good, the do vast amounts of damage to freedom and the American Way, and they often do it with taxpayer money.

That's wrong. They should be stopped. If you want to help, head on over to Stop the ACLU and volunteer to send a few letters -- you don't even have to write them, just agree to send some.

Posted by: Ogre at 10:00 PM | Comments (7) | Add Comment | Trackbacks (Suck)

Appeasing Terrorists Doesn't Work

Once again, terrorists prove, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that when you attempt to appease them and give them what they ask for peacefully, the only result is that they claim victory and want to kill more people. Keep this in mind, any of my gentle readers who claim that leaving Iraq will suddenly end world terrorism.

In this case, the terrorist group Hamas has declared that despite Israel backing away from their own land and giving some of Israel's land to terrorists, Hamas will continue attacking and killing Israelis at every chance.

For decades, Hamas and other Palestinian terrorists have claimed that they simply want "their land" back from Israel. For those not familiar with that area of the world, there never has been a country called "Palestine," nor have there ever been any lands that they "owned." They just want land, and they only want to take it from Israel so they can destroy Israel.

Over decades, many wars have been fought, and deals attempted. Each time the Palestinians continued to claim that they simply wanted their own land. The Palestinians would not let Israeli's into their lands, despite Israel allowing Palestinians in theirs.

So now, with great fanfare, Israel agrees to completely pull out of an area of land, including destroying homes that belong to Israelis, and agrees to give this land to the Palestinians, as they have claimed to want so far. The only result is that the terrorists groups of Hamas and Palestine have agreed they will continue to attack and kill innocent people.

Terrorists kill people. That's what they do. The Palestinian terrorists and Hamas will not stop being terrorists until Israel has been destroyed. Islamic and muslim terrorists will not stop killing until America has been destroyed. That's what they do.

Posted by: Ogre at 08:26 AM | Comments (7) | Add Comment | Trackbacks (Suck)

August 12, 2005

Blog War Anniversary

It's the anniversary of the declaration of blog war by IMAO and The Alliance.

If you're not familiar with The Alliance, you can read this. If you want to know more about the war, head over here. If you want to know about Harvey, go here (tip: you don't want to know about Harvey).

So there will be no truthful stories lies about evil Glennn this week, as we honor a moment of silence (yes, we're honoring a moment, what's wrong with that?) and the anniversary of the blog war.

Posted by: Ogre at 07:00 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment | Trackbacks (Suck)

Programming Note

It's August.

Oh, sorry, did you already realize that? Apparently, I did not. There was no new blog layout for August, and it's mainly that I just didn't notice that August was here!

Actually, I've been working on quite the layout, and it's coming along very nicely. It's going to be a bit different (again), but navigation-wise, not so much layout-wise. It's about 80% done, so another week or so, and it should appear.

That is all.

Posted by: Ogre at 05:09 PM | Comments (6) | Add Comment | Trackbacks (Suck)

1 The wood in the particular post and the steel wall in the main blog drives me nuts.

Posted by: vw bug at August 12, 2005 07:04 PM (yJkEY)

2 Sorry about that, it's part of the conversion process. I'm experimenting with making the permalink post pages completely integrated with the main page so there's no difference. The new design is going to have that wood design as a background, so it sort of slipped in during testing. Don't worry, you'll get to see lots of wood design soon!

Posted by: Ogre at August 12, 2005 07:08 PM (L0IGK)

3 Whoo hooo, Change! I love change!!!

Let's see what Harvey thinks. It'll probably drive him out of his tree.

Posted by: Bou at August 13, 2005 11:29 PM (5JHEt)

4 It will certainly drive Harvey nuts because he'll have to click to read things. It's the idea we discussed a month or so ago (the book), and it's looking really good so far...just a couple more things to get working!

Posted by: Ogre at August 14, 2005 08:44 AM (L0IGK)

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I won?

Hey, I won a caption contest! And I won a prize? How cool is that? Most caption contests I enter, besides me just leaving some lame entry, don't give prizes. But this contest had a prize, and *I* won it. F.U.N. fun!

My prize? Here it is:

Jealous yet?

Posted by: Ogre at 04:48 PM | Comments (5) | Add Comment | Trackbacks (Suck)

1 Definitely silly! ;-)

Posted by: VW Bug at August 12, 2005 07:01 PM (yJkEY)

2 Aha! You're jealous!

Posted by: Ogre at August 12, 2005 07:06 PM (L0IGK)

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Stand!

Stand
In the end you'll still be you
One that's done all the things you set out to do
Stand
There's a cross for you to bear
Things to go through if you're going anywhere
Stand
For the things you know are right
It's the truth that the truth makes them so uptight
Stand
All the things you want are real
You have you to complete and there is no deal
Stand. stand, stand
Stand. stand, stand
Stand
You've been sitting much too long
There's a permanent crease in your right and wrong
Stand
There's a midget standing tall
And the giant beside him about to fall
Stand. stand, stand
Stand. stand, stand
Stand
They will try to make you crawl
And they know what you're saying makes sense and all
Stand
Don't you know that you are free
Well at least in your mind if you want to be

Everybody
Stand, stand, stand

*****************

Thank you, Sly and the Family Stone.

Posted by: Ogre at 03:00 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment | Trackbacks (Suck)

NC Lottery Not Quite There

Amazingly, there is actually still a chance that the North Carolina Lottery will NOT actually appear this year! That, my good readers, is good news. As a proponent of Constitutional, small government, I oppose the lottery primarily because it's just another way for the state to steal money (and I don't care that it's "voluntary"). Heck, if you support the lottery, tell me why *I* can't run one myself?

Anyway, the NC House passed the lottery by one vote, but there are 5 Democrats in the Senate that are holding up the lottery! All Republicans in the Senate oppose the lottery, and with the 5 Democrats, there is enough opposition to actually stop it -- there's supposed to be a vote later today to see if the Democrats have been strong-armed or bribed with enough cash from the Senate "leaders" to change their minds.

The Senate leader, Marc Basnight, is very annoyed -- at the Republicans! He was counting on "as many as 4" Republican votes for the Senate. So it appears he wanted to offer some cover for his pals in his own party by getting some Republicans. Sorry, Mr. Basnight, the Republicans really do not want a state-sponsored gambling arena in this state.

It will be interesting to see how this one turns out in the end -- especially since the budget (finally) passed doesn't include income from a lottery...

Posted by: Ogre at 11:00 AM | Comments (6) | Add Comment | Trackbacks (Suck)

100% of NC Democrats give tax dollars to federal criminals

I only wish the headline for this story was sarcasm or even remotely falsified or exaggerated. Unfortunately, it is not. 100% of elected Democrats in Raleigh voted to take the hard-earned money of North Carolina citizens and give it to admitted criminals.

In this case, ALL the Democrats voted to give in-state tuition to illegal immigrants in North Carolina. So if you are from Virginia and want to go to school in North Carolina, you are punished because you are not from Mexico. If, when you sign up to attend a state school, you claim you are from Mexico, the state will give you tens of thousands of dollars to attend school -- and you thought we had a problem with immigration before.

If you don't understand how this is giving money to immigrants, I'll explain. You see, when residents of North Carolina go to school at a North Carolina school, the state takes tax money and gives it to the school to pay for a portion of that education. If you are an out-of-state student (but now, NOT out of country), you have to pay for your entire education.

This makes a little sense, as the taxpayers of North Carolina are paying for a portion of other residents' education -- normally, it's the lower income people that are subsidizing the middle- and upper- class, but that's a story for another day.

Now, with support of 100% of the Democrats in Raleigh, the tax dollars of citizens of North Carolina will also be used to pay for illegal immigrants. So, if you're looking to attend a North Carolina state school, DO NOT tell them you're from another state -- just say you're from Canada or Mexico, and you will pay less.

My suggestion? Hey, INS -- time to request student records from the state schools every fall -- you'll get free admissions of illegal aliens -- deport them!

This IS what the Democrat Party stands for in North Carolina. Are you still happy voting for Democrats?

Posted by: Ogre at 09:00 AM | Comments (3) | Add Comment | Trackbacks (Suck)

North Carolina Budget

Subtitle: How to really, really waste $17 billion in dishonest and irresponsible ways.

If you live in North Carolina and feel like being ill this morning, feel free to look at the 364-page North Carolina Budget that's headed to the governor. You don't have to look far to see how fiscally reckless NC Democrats are:

$2 billion for higher education. Don't we have private colleges in North Carolina? Yes, lots of them. Why is government competing with them? Why is government providing ANY college education? That's not their job at all.

$2.5 billion for the Division of Medical Assistance. If you cannot afford anything remotely associated with medicine, feel free to come to North Carolina -- we give it to you free. That's one of many reasons why so many illegal immigrants come to North Carolina -- 100% free health care for them, provided for by the Democrats of the Legislature, paid for by the hard-working people of North Carolina.

Department of Justice: $77 million. Do you see where the Democrats' priority lies? It's not with punishing criminals. Heck, they're rewarding criminals!

There's more, and it's lots worse. How about some spending items?

Highway Fund Transfer: $16 million. That's $16 million that the people of North Carolina paid into a fund to build roads. The General Assembly takes at least $16 million a year from this fund to pay for whatever they feel like. That's irresponsible at best, blatant lying at worst.

Sales tax increase: $417 million.
Sales tax on candy: $9.8 million.
Sales tax on cable tv: $10.9 million.
Increase tobacco tax: $118 million.
Increase income tax: $39.8 million.
Expand death tax: $115 million.

These are your North Carolina Democrats in action. They are truly irresponsible. There's tons more that's worse. Good luck changing the assembly members, because they make the rules on who you are allowed to elect, and if you elect someone they don't like, they simply vote to throw out the vote of the people. There is no Democracy and very little freedom left in the state of North Carolina.

Posted by: Ogre at 07:56 AM | Comments (3) | Add Comment | Trackbacks (Suck)

Money Does Not Equal Free Speech

At least, according to the North Carolina Legislature. Now I'm pretty sure there was a US Supreme Court decision that ruled that money DOES equal free speech, but I can't cite that one. I'll see if any of my lawyer readers know about that one.

In this case, the legislature has decided that in a judicial race, if any one candidate decides to take "public funding"* for their election, then all other candidates, EVEN ONES WHO DO NOT TAKE PUBLIC FUNDING, have to adhere to all the rules of the public funding candidate.

So when one judge decided to take public funding and agreed to all the rules of the public funding game, the other candidate, who did NOT take public funding and did NOT agree to said game rules, was no longer permitted to accept ANY donations to their election in the last 21 days of the election cycle.

That's wrong. The General Assembly passed the law, and they plan to defend it -- as a judge (who won the race, despite the horrible, unconstitutional rules) and a group that tried to donate funds are suing to change the rules. I truly hope they win and I am actually permitted to give money to any candidate I want.

* Public funding is crap. I should not have one single dollar of my forced collections of taxes used to promote the election of someone I disagree with. I don't care about the benefits of it, it's plain wrong to force me to support a candidate -- and public funding does just that.

Posted by: Ogre at 04:56 AM | Comments (9) | Add Comment | Trackbacks (Suck)

1 I don't recall exactly, unless it is the Teamsters case that permitted union members to hold back that portion of their dues that was slated for the DNC.

Posted by: Oddybobo at August 12, 2005 08:53 AM (6Gm0j)

2 And you call yourself a supreme court nominee...

Posted by: Ogre at August 12, 2005 08:59 AM (/k+l4)

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August 11, 2005

Islam is NOT peaceful

There's a long, very comprehensive, and very detailed list of the Top 10 Reasons why Islam is NOT the religion of peace over at American Thinker. It's a bit long, but very, very worth the read. People in the United States need to understand how and why Islam works or we will all die.

(H/T to Cao's Blog.)

Posted by: Ogre at 04:03 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment | Trackbacks (Suck)

ACLU Still Hates Christians

No matter what they might tell you, the ACLU really does hate Christians. You see, the root and primary purpose of the ACLU is communism. And communism cannot comprehend, nor exist alongside, Christianity. So the ACLU continues to attack it every chance it gets.

In this case, the ACLU is suing to try and force the Wiccan religion on people who do not want it. Some people want to pray to their Christian God, but the ACLU doesn't like that and wants to FORCE them to accept a Wiccan prayer. It's not about freedom of religion, it's about the ACLU FORCING you to accept, support, and even celebrate Wiccans.

In addition, the ACLU continues to use their own version of the Constitution, which somehow does not resemble the actual version of the U.S. Constitution. I guess their "living" version has been mutating with bacteria or something. The ACLU claims, "The First Amendment prohibits governments from having an official religion."

Well, that's not entirely true, now is it? The first amendment prohibits CONGRESS from making LAWS establishing a NATIONAL religion. As a matter of fact, if a STATE wanted to make an official religion, under the actual, real United States Constitution, they could!

So far in this case, the Constitution and freedom of religion is winning -- they 4th Circuit Court of Appeals agreed that people actually do have the freedom to pray to a Christian God and cannot be forced to change their own religion and worship a Wiccan god(s). The ACLU, using extorted taxpayer money, has said they will appeal to the US Supreme Court.

This has been a part of the weekly Stop the ACLU Blogburst.

Posted by: Ogre at 01:01 PM | Comments (7) | Add Comment | Trackbacks (Suck)

Click for Cathy

Chris Muir of Day By Day is asking for our help. His sister Cathy is being kept alive by treatments at the American Cancer Ablation Center in Gulf Shores, Alabama, and he's asking us to raise their visibility for PR purposes. They'll have an ad to be aired on CNN cancer special on August 14th and 20th, but he's asking for our help in doing more.

As often as you can for the next TEN DAYS, click on the banner (or links) and boost their visibility in search engines, and please steal the banner and/or put up a link at your sites as well.

From the Cancer Ablation Center site:

Located in Gulf Shores, Alabama, The American Cancer Ablation Center specializes in the treatment of cancer using thermal ablation.

Thermal Ablation is the destruction of cancer by extreme heat or freezing. The most common technique uses radio waves (microwaves) to generate heat. This technique is called radiofrequency ablation (RFA). The destruction of cancer by freezing is known as cryoablation.

Just a click and a link is all they ask. (From My Vast Right Wing Conspiracy.)

Posted by: Ogre at 10:02 AM | Comments (4) | Add Comment | Trackbacks (Suck)

Intelligent Design, Part 2

Yesterday I responded to a question from the Christian Views Symposium regarding intelligent design and schools. In the comments to that post, and on his own blog, Pixy Misa said:

ID simply isn't a theory in scientific terms. Evolution is. We can perform experiments in evolution, but in the main it is observational, like astronomy. It's still science

Posted by: Ogre at 08:01 AM | Comments (11) | Add Comment | Trackbacks (Suck)

1 Great job! I'd love to see a heated debate between you and Rightwingnuthouse. But I have one question, without evolution how do you explain Ogres.

Posted by: Jay at August 11, 2005 09:23 AM (2FcUc)

2 So, um, where is the evidence for ID? Your attack on evolution was decent but you didn't make a single statement to support any other theroy. Couldn't we take your arguement and conclude just about anything? "Evolution doesn't add up so life must always have been here" "there isn't enough evidence for evolution so Vishnu danced us into existance"

Posted by: clark at August 11, 2005 09:55 AM (hJ+03)

3 Jay, Ogres don't have to explain Ogres...

And Clark, I haven't gone into evidence for intelligent design in this post (I figured it was already too long for many people to read it). There is evidence for ID, including the idea of irreducible complexity, information theory, and a few others. I'll put all them in another post if you're interested (actually, I'll probably do it even if you're not interested, just because you asked.)

Thanks for stopping by!

Posted by: Ogre at August 11, 2005 10:01 AM (/k+l4)

4 Clark has a good comment. A deity creating everything ex nihilo can be used to explain anything. If everything's perfect, that's the way the deity created them. If everything's flawed (and men have nipples for no reason), that's the way the deity created them (or is that Satan's doing?) If fossils of homo erectus exist, the deity created the Earth with fossils in it. There's a problem with a theory if two entirely different and contradictory sets of observations lead to the same conclusion. This is essentially the same thing as saying that observation's don't matter.

Posted by: Karlo at August 11, 2005 12:20 PM (HoLw7)

5 I haven't listed the evidence for intelligent design yet, Karlo. I've just shown that evolution is a religion based on deeply-held religious beliefs and is simply not a valid scientific theory that can be supported with any evidence that has been observed. I'll get to the evidence for ID -- I'd like to get it up tomorrow, but it might not make it up until Saturday or Monday.

Posted by: Ogre at August 11, 2005 12:37 PM (/k+l4)

6 Back in February I posted on ID, not so much toward the evolution of man; rather on the aspects of celestial objects in the cosmos having been the result of ID.

http://tfsternsrantings.blogspot.com/2005/02/intelligent-design-or-coincidence_26.html

Posted by: TF Stern at August 11, 2005 01:49 PM (dz3wA)

7 Good stuff there, TF! Good stuff with excellent links and supporting. I've got some reading to do!

Posted by: Ogre at August 11, 2005 02:41 PM (L0IGK)

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Underpaid NC Judges?

I wonder how many of my good readers make more than $121,391 per year. I wonder how many would be able to live a decent life with that sort of salary. I bet that a good number of my good readers would be happy to take a job that paid that salary, wouldn't you? Well, apparently it's a pittance, according to the State Supreme Court Chief Justice.

Yes, he said that many "good" judges will be leaving the system because they are getting paid so poorly. They've asked for an increase in pay. He actually said, when asking for an increase of the $121,391 annual salary, "I'm just trying to get enough money to get the doors of our courthouses open."

They repeatedly claim that the judges do not make as much as lawyers, and that judges are going to "retire" and take jobs as lawyers. Go ahead, I say. There's no mention about how the so-called "average" salary of lawyers is determined, and if they factor in class-action lottery lawsuit awards into that average, of course.

Well sure, we're giving raises to legislative assistants, billions more to schools and administrators, tons more cash to social programs, tens of millions in personal spending accounts for government employees, so why not give more to every single person that even looks at government? Of course, we can't build roads, we can't hire enough police officers to enforce laws, and we can't find fiscal discipline in Raleigh, but very obviously, that is NOT what the Democrat North Carolina Legislature cares about.

Idiots. STOP SPENDING MY MONEY!

Posted by: Ogre at 05:03 AM | Comments (6) | Add Comment | Trackbacks (Suck)

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