Der Parson's rant

Hamas TV Kills Off Mickey Mouse Double - MSN TV News

"Farfour was martyred while defending his land," said Sara, the teen presenter. He was killed "by the killers of children," she added.

"Dude, I totally thought weed was legalized in New Mexico."
-- Charles Barnes, 24, to police at a Border Patrol checkpoint, when 67 marijuana plants were found in his trunk

Bushism of the Day - By Jacob Weisberg - Slate Magazine: "'Amnesty means that you've got to pay a price for having been here illegally, and this bill does that.'—discussing an immigration reform bill, Washington, D.C., June 26, 2007"

Really? You would think the President of the United States could get his hands on a dictonary

from wiktionary

Pronunciation
* IPA: /ˈæm.nɪ.sti/
Noun
amnesty (uncountable)

1. Forgetfulness; cessation of remembrance of wrong; oblivion.
2. An act of the sovereign power granting oblivion, or a general pardon, for a past offense, as to subjects concerned in an insurrection.

Cyanide & Happiness @ Explosm.net

Well wouldn't this just suck, big time,
Cars crushed in street racing crackdown - Yahoo! News

The cars the teens had so meticulously souped up and tricked out were crushed Wednesday as part of a crackdown on illegal street racing in Southern California.

Cyanide & Happiness @ Explosm.net

For some reason this struck me as funny.

Journal Gazette | 06/15/2007 | Allen courts’ cell-phone ban still puzzling visitors

If you have not figured out by now cell-phones and such aren't allowed in Fort Wayne court houses, your probably shouldn't be allowed to own one.

"People are also told of the option of storing it in a service cart outside the main courthouse for $2 to $4 depending on the length of time. But many people are still stashing their phones in the bushes outside the main courthouse, Gull said."

I'm going to go downtown and search the bushes, I could use a new cell phone.

This is pretty funny.

Hot Chicks with Douchebags

If that is what it takes to get your picture with a hot chick, I might have to make some style changes.

It's just one of those days.

This just in from CNN.com
Iran moves to execute porn stars - CNN.com:

"• People involved in adult films are 'corrupter of the world,' Iran's parliament says
• Producers, directors, cameramen and actors could face the death penalty
• Distributors and producers of pornographic Web sites could also face death
• The vote follows the leaking of a sex tape allegedly involving an Iranian actress"

Apparently the law is being made because of this Zahra Amir Ebrahimi, Iranian soap opera actress.

My question is, can Bush appoint Paris Hilton to be Iranian Ambassador? Maybe a few other porn stars. I would imagine the Iranians would surrender all hopes of nuclear bombs if we sent Ron Jeremy as a negotiator.

A Sobering Poll

Even if you don't believe in the war, you have to admire these people. 120 degrees and they have to wear a 25-pound flak jacket and another 30 pound of essential equipment on their backs. Here we get upset if the A/C isn't cranked to the max 24 hours a day.

WorldBlog : Soldiers' voices behind the search

(clipped from the artical) "I heard one say, 'I am sick of this sh**. I hope I get IEDed tonight, then I can go back home.'

Despite such sentiments, it was clear the men we came across were determined to go out of their way to find their missing comrades. "We have to do it, other stuff we might, you know, complain about, but this – it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter how far they have us go, we have got to find them," one soldier said."

(another clip)
"Determination surpasses complaints
It's only natural that under these conditions there would be a certain degree of complaining, a number of voices expressed how they couldn't wait to get out. There was resentment toward the Bush administration; especially it seemed, since the extension of the mission. "I wish Bush could see us now and what we do, then he would realize how hard it is," said one soldier."

I play a lot of Lord Of the Rings Online. I used to play World of Warcraft but got tired of all the kids and crap going on, I tried out the LOTRO free bata and got hooked. I figure what the heck, a little free advertising...

House passes post-shooting rampage gun bill - Yahoo! News

Wow!! Congress actually does something useful? Better mark this on the calander. Now who wants to bet on the Senate or Bush finding some reason to kill it? Actually I'm pretty amazed the NRA actually approved of it.

Remember it's BBQ Ribfest time again down at Headwaters park, June 14-17.

EBBQ RIBFEST

I hope to go down there Saturday and get some good BBQ ribs... yum yum!!!!

John Ridley: Missing White Girl Syndrome Ends Here - Media on The Huffington Post: "Stepha Henry"

If you don't believe him do a simple google search for both names.

Stepha Henry, 58,400 results
Kelsey Smith 1,020,000 results

Gas prices to go down? I'll believe it when I see it.

Gasoline: How low prices�will go - Jun. 12, 2007

I found this web comic thanks to AWB's site. It might not be the best drawing but I thought The Who referance was kind of funny.

Back to jail poor little rich bitch.

Judge orders Paris Hilton back to jail - Celebrity News - MSNBC.com

The guards are probably happy they will be able to spend more "quality" time with her.

What a lucky kid, I'm thinking of going on vacation and looking for diamonds.

Teen finds 2.93-carat diamond along path - Yahoo! News

Here's one for the "you got to be f'ing kinding me" file.

Paris Hilton Released From Jail Early - washingtonpost.com

Paris Hilton Released From Jail Early

By William Booth
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, June 7, 2007; 12:22 PM

LOS ANGELES -- She's out of the slammer.
Paris Hilton was released from county jail early Thursday because of an undisclosed medical condition and will serve the remainder of her sentence confined to her mansion in West Hollywood.

Libby sentenced to 30 months - Politics - MSNBC.com

Poor Libby, I wonder if his cell mate will call him "Scooter" or maybe "Screamer"

First they take away your right to make desicission on your own health, pretty soon they are taking away your right to protest. How long after that until they are killing thousands of people and then erasing it from the history books and blocking websites about it?

WorldBlog : A hushed chat in Tiananmen Square

Survivors recall bloody Tiananmen Square crackdown

I tried to link this story the other day and I guess the link didn't work for some, so here is the story from the LA times.


Publisher aims to teach kids right from left

A Torrance executive says he sees too many children's books with liberal views. His titles aim to tilt the shelves the other way.

By Stephanie Simon, Times Staff Writer
June 1, 2007

PUBLISHING executive Eric Jackson's first foray into children's books was a cartoon tale of two brothers and a lemonade stand.

Hoping to earn money for a swing set, young Tommy and Lou squeeze lemons until their little hands ache. But they are thwarted by broccoli-pushing, camera-hogging, Jesus-hating liberals who pile on taxes and regulations and drive the boys out of business.

The book, "Help! Mom! There Are Liberals Under My Bed!," came out two years ago. Jackson said it sold nearly 30,000 copies, which in the publishing world made it a bona fide hit. That success reinforced Jackson's view that the nation's bookshelves had tilted way too far left and that a correction was in order.

Kindergartners these days can leaf through a picture book promoting the virtues of medical marijuana. They can read a fairy tale about two princes who get married — to each other.

But where are the children's books denouncing affirmative action? The fairy tales promoting gun rights?

"You don't hear a lot of umbrage out there about conservative books being foisted onto kids," Jackson said. "There's a need in the market for books that show the other side of the equation."

Jackson's small independent start-up, World Ahead Publishing, staked its first claim on that market with the tale of the rapacious liberals and the lemonade stand, marketed under the imprint Kids Ahead.

Two other (far less successful) cartoon books followed, taking on Hollywood and "activist" judges.

Now, World Ahead is expanding into more sober-minded children's books — and is going head-to-head with Scholastic, the powerhouse of children's publishing.

Scholastic will be coming out in September with "The Down-to-Earth Guide to Global Warming," a 176-page call to action aimed at children ages 8 and up. World Ahead will counter with its own book intended to debunk global warming and discourage environmental activism.

Kicking back in his Torrance office on a recent afternoon, under a giant poster of Ronald Reagan, Jackson glanced at a news release touting the Scholastic book. The cover illustration shows a child sitting cross-legged in the grass, cradling Earth.

"It's just so — so — what's the word?" marketing director Judy Abarbanel asked.

"Nauseating," Jackson suggested.

*

CHILDREN, he complained, are bombarded with tree-hugger propaganda: SUVs are bad. ExxonMobil is worse. Polar bears are drowning. The planet needs saving, and fast.

Jackson's response: Stop stressing.

He doesn't buy the international scientific consensus that human activity — chiefly the burning of fossil fuels — is causing the planet to warm. President Bush on Thursday tempered his hesitation on the issue, urging global curbs on pollutants.

Jackson, however, remains a skeptic; he maintains that any government solution would be worse than the problem. So he gets alarmed at the thought of children petitioning Congress to ban Hummers.

"We want to teach them it's not freedom or the free market or business that's the enemy here," Jackson said.

The trick is putting those concepts in a format preteens will read. Over the winter, World Ahead sent out a request for proposals from prospective authors. On this sunny afternoon, over pizza, Jackson and his four employees have gathered to review the most promising manuscripts.

First up is a story about a boy named Jake who watches a dire film about global warming in school. Jake walks home cursing every SUV — until his best friend, Ben, sets him straight with a didactic lecture disguised as dialogue.

The story makes its point perfectly clear; at one point, Ben tells Jake, "There is NO conclusive evidence that humans are causing the Earth to heat up."

But Norman Book, vice president of World Ahead, had a few objections: "There's no plot, or narrative, or anything else," he said.

There was a murmur of assent. This one was a clunker.

Next up: a science-fiction tale about aliens who discover Earth in the future and find it in ruins. It turns out people have brought on this crisis by demonizing the wealthy, punishing energy producers and rejecting "greatness" — all in the name of combating global warming.

"It's like Earth is the way it would be if Al Gore had his way with it," Jackson said. But though he found the premise intriguing, he concluded the book wouldn't fly with his target market of third- through eighth-graders.

"It feels heavy-handed for kids. Heavy-handed for everyone," Jackson said. "I felt like I was reading Ayn Rand."

*

SPIKY-haired and baby-faced, Jackson, 31, founded World Ahead about two years ago, after stepping down as a director of marketing operations for PayPal. His first release, "Thank You, President Bush," established his political bent; it is a collection of essays from leading conservatives praising the administration.

Jackson continues to publish conservative political and economic books for adults, including his own "The PayPal Wars," which he jokingly described as "the greatest book ever written. Well, the second-greatest — there is the Bible."

When he turned his attention to global warming late last year, Jackson found that adults had plenty of options, including several books sharply skeptical of the scientific consensus. Children, on the other hand, did not.

Aside from a few high school research guides that offer opposing views, children's books tend to portray global warming as a serious threat. Among the titles: "Environmental Disaster Alert!" "Why Are the Ice Caps Melting?" And a picture book, published by the United Nations, about an Eskimo boy who talks to an imperiled polar bear.

Jackson sees such books as insidious left-wing propaganda. Many scientists, of course, would argue that there's nothing liberal or conservative about global warming; they see it as an incontrovertible fact, one that demands an immediate response. Conservative Christians with right-wing positions on most other social issues have teamed with liberals to push for global action.

Jackson, however, is out to promote government inaction. To that end, he turned to a manuscript proposal by Holly Fretwell, a Montana economist and senior research fellow at a think tank that advocates capitalism as the solution to environmental problems.

Fretwell's outline was a bit dense. Though Jackson has an economics degree from Stanford, he was boggled by a chapter titled "Ideas on the Environmental Kuznets Curve."

Still, he was pleased by the thesis: If global warming presents problems down the road, private companies and entrepreneurs will come up with fixes. Government intervention will only stifle this spirit of innovation.

*

BUT telling children not to worry doesn't have the same sizzle as offering them a menu of feel-good ways to save the planet. Plus, environmentalists have an irresistible mascot on their side: the cuddly polar bear, looking up balefully from a melting patch of ice.

As the mother of two young children, Fretwell knows the power of that image. "The bears, the penguins are very much tugging at my kids' hearts now," she said. "I've got a lot of thinking to do about how to get at those warm and fuzzies."

Finding an equally compelling symbol for unfettered capitalism won't be easy.

"I'm thinking we put the polar bear in a business suit," Jackson said. "Maybe he's taking a limo to work on Wall Street."

Fretwell's book — "The Sky's Not Falling! Why It's OK to Chill About Global Warming!" — will be released in September. That will put it on bookshelves at about the same time as the Scholastic book, which is co-written by Laurie David, a liberal activist and the producer of Al Gore's movie "An Inconvenient Truth."

Jackson plans an initial run of no more than 10,000 copies, about his financial break-even point. But he's hoping the book will catch the eye of a conservative talk-show host — Sean Hannity, maybe, or Rush Limbaugh — "and we'll sell out in the blink of an eye," he said.

If "The Sky's Not Falling!" takes off, Jackson hopes to launch a line of nonfiction books for children presenting a conservative take on other topics. In the meantime, he's overseeing final edits for "Joey Gonzalez, Great American," a bilingual story about a third-grader whose teacher tells him his last name is a sign that he's less capable.

"It's a little bit harder for minorities to learn," the teacher tells him. "Don't worry, Joey…. There's a special way to help minorities get ahead. It's called affirmative action."

Joey stands up to the teacher, telling her that his ancestors, Spanish explorers, "didn't come all the way over here to be minorities." They didn't need special help, and he doesn't either: "Great Americans don't cheat."

Jackson doesn't have children, but he suspects plenty of parents share his values. One day, he'd like to offer them a whole conservative library so they can put aside the picture books about socialist fish and gay penguins and snuggle up with a bedtime story about the right to bear arms.

*

stephanie.simon@latimes.com

Publisher aims to teach kids right from left - Los Angeles Times

Wow, talk about poisoning young impressionable minds. Nothing like teaching your kids to hate and be environmently reckless at the same time.

Remember the Smoking Ban starts today, June 1, 2007. Thank you City Councel for taking away another freedom of the buisness owner. Hopefully you guys can help them pay their bills and such now that your telling us how to run our buisnesses. Let's hope you get to work on those trans fats and that pesky free speech thing soon.