Risking charges of massive cross-blog theft, I ran across an interesting comment concerning the Midland Development Corporation's slogan "A City That Works!" in the comments section on this post over at Fire Ant Gazette. Here is the comment:

"Wonder if Chicago knows we're using their slogan? Not to mention Stamford, CT...and Portland, OR...and Ypsilanti, MI...and Dallas, TX...and...well, you can google the phrase as well as me."

Odessa State Representative George E. "Buddy" West's win streak of winning the coveted George E. "Buddy" West Leadership Award is over. This year the winner will be Lorraine Perryman, former Odessa mayor and wife of Ray Perryman, hired gun to Chambers of Commerce statewide and the only economist known to the Midland Reporter-Telegram.

100,000 visitors a day...OK. But now he is just showing off.

Hold on Senor Walser – as much as I hate the idea of living in a Theocracy with the Most Reverend Edwards installed as Grand Mullah, I also have a problem with Seliger, or at least with his slogan, “A Person Like Yourself.”

Where does one place the emphasis in this gem? Is it on Person? To distinguish him from the rest of the animal kingdom (and the deities that Bishop Edwards continuously summons.) Or Yourself? Not you, but your Self. That idealized ego or being floating through your consciousness that you would be if only you could. He’s already there baby.

I’ve got his campaign theme song, it’s the old Tim Hardin tune that Rod Stewart made famous, “Someone like Yourself, makes it hard to live without…” He’ll be dancing to it on election night ala Tipper, Al, Hillary & Bill stepping out to that awful Fleetwood Mac tune, “Don’t Stop Yourself From Thinking About Tomorrow.”

A Google Bomb: Search on the phrase "miserable failure".

Not a Google Bomb: Search on the phrase "Kerry medals".

For the uniniated, a "push poll" is where a telemarketer for Candidiate A calls you on the phone, bluffs his way into making you believe that he is conducting a standard opinion poll and tries through questioning to determine if you are leaning towards or away from voting for his current employer, Candidate A (in this case Cardinal Edwards).

If this "pollster" determines through his questioning (remember, he has already misled the callee by representing himself as a true opinion poller) that you are leaning away from voting for Candidate A, he then begins to ask questions like "Would be more or less likely to vote for Candidate B if you knew that he... [inserts negative statement here]?"

It is a cheap trick that most people lacking Mr. Edwards, er, flexibility on truth telling and up-front honesty would disagree with.

But if Pliny's original post on Mr. Edwards' resemblance to a certain Mr. Clinton didn't get your attention the first time, perhaps the above line taken from the MR-T article will.

I guess it all depends on what the definition of "is" is.

Well, well, well. Isn't this a surprise:

ABCNEWS has obtained an extraordinary list that contains the names of prominent people around the world who supported Saddam Hussein's regime and were given oil contracts as a result.

Not. Actually, the surprise is that this is coming out through ABC/Disney. And that it took so long. I think this is a great take on the military's and the administration's priorities in Iraq: secure the country first, then work on file digging that will indict the Baathists. via Drudge.

Coming soon to a theatre near you: Spiderhole II.

Now comes Mr. Barry Horseman, who provides in real life the kind of ED-Think that usually only comes in the finest satire of Economic Development theory. Here is the, uh, money sentence from Mr. Horseman:

"After promptly and specifically reporting MDC expenses, readers had to get to the end of his [Stewart Doreen's] article -- and even then do the math themselves -- to understand that MDC-approved projects returned more than $5 million in new local wages and capital investment on a total investment of approximately $1 million in total program expenses. I think most people would find a 5-to-1 return on investment in 17 months very attractive, but Doreen appears more interested in costs than the return on investment. "

Under Mr. Horseman's theory of return on investment we could just have the taxpayers foot the bill for the entire salary of 10,000 new employees somewhere and then confidently point to this as no worse than a breakeven proposition.

I am used to this kind of thinking from our friend The Eurasian.....but Mr. Horseman is......wait for it......the Second Vice President of the Midland Development Corporation.

* People More Important Than You

Al Franken acquits himself well in not one, but two stories on the wires this morning.

From today's MyWestTexas.com:

NM oil, gas lease sale earns $1.9-million

A brief article covering last week's sale at the state land office in Santa Fe. Herein lies the danger of either: a. picking up a wire service article without any scrutiny or b. editing a wire service story and not really checking your work:

The state Land Office manages 13 acres of oil, gas and mineral rights.

Dayum, Bubba, no wonder it takes so many folks to staff the land office!

Something to getcha revved up on a cold (cool?) and windy Monday: Ann Coulter on last week's Iowa Caucuses:

Until Kerry won Iowa, Wesley Clark was viewed as the pre-eminent electable Democrat principally because he's a Republican. Howard Dean has already said he believes Clark is a fine fellow but truly a Republican. In response, Gen. Clark immediately put on a third sweater.

Sadly, it may turn out that Clark's whole raison d'etre is now gone. Never was so much money, media, chicanery, Gwyneth Paltrow, Madonna, conniving and Cabala deployed to promote a quote-unquote "electable" Democrat.

Coulter addresses the status of most of the candidates, from the media's "electability" point of view, which seems to change daily with the polls. (Now it looks like a Kerry/Edwards battle in New Hampshire with the only serious, possibly electable candidate, Lieberman, running fourth behind Dean.)

The Iowa caucus was just another one of the Democrats' ongoing public debates about how to fake out the American people. Fifty percent of Iowa Democrats participating in the caucus said they "strongly disapprove" of the war with Iraq and another 25 percent "somewhat disapprove."

But more important to Democrats than their pacifism was "electability." The entire Iowa electorate was committed to the proposition: How do we fool the neighbors? In the end, the caucus-goers chose a decorated war hero who voted in favor of the very war that 75 percent of them oppose. So much for the anti-war fever sweeping the country. The Democrats aren't even man enough to run a genuine coward for president.

RTWT.

From Drudge this morning:

"FLASHBACK: Kerry in 2000 claimed it is a matter of character that Bush avoided duty oversees by joining the Texas Air National Guard. No documents have been found to show he reported for duty as ordered in Alabama in 1972... 'Those of us who were in the military wonder how it is that someone who is supposedly serving on active duty, having taken that oath, can miss a whole year of service without even explaining where it went,' said Kerry."

Not awake this morning? Need an engine-starter? Try reading this nasty hit piece on Laura Bush by Jane Eisner. This is particulalry nasty:

"She's so gracious and likable, unobtrusive and modest, it seems almost blasphemous to judge her at all. Yet one of the disturbing revelations in Gerhart's otherwise flattering account of Laura Bush goes to the very heart of her own self-description. She is one indulgent mother.

The twin college-age girls have been busted for underage drinking, run their Secret Service detail ragged, and have partied hard in the presence of illegal substances. They never campaign, nor express any interest in or empathy for the nation's problems, even though the Bush family has a noble history of public service.

In this age of compassionate conservatism, Jenna and Barbara appear to be neither compassionate nor conservative, displaying no civic consciousness and little social reserve, especially when photographed falling down drunk.

'These girls have all of the noblesse, and none of the oblige,' writes Gerhart."

And what, exactly, is the model here? The sons that the gangster-like Joe Kennedy set loose on the country....the next several generations of which are noblessing their brains out at the expense of just about everyone in the country...especially the female half of the population?

Karenna Gore-Schiff? Please.

No doubt, Midland contains many who would not pass such a judgement on Laura Bush even after having actually, you know, met and gotten to know her. If you would like to give Ms. Eisner your views you can e-mail her at jeisner@phillynews.com.

From ScrappleFace:

"(2004-01-23) -- The U.S. military announced today that it will fill Saddam Hussein's spider hole with reams of paper printed with 12 years of United Nations Security Council resolutions and transcripts from U.N. meetings on what to do about Mr. Hussein's regime.

Soldiers from the U.S. 4th Infantry Division pulled the former dictator from the grave-like pit near Tikrit, Iraq, on December 13, definitively ending Mr. Hussein's 25-year reign of terror.

'It's a symbolic location,' said an unnamed spokesman for the 4th Infantry Division. 'We wanted to recognize the contribution of the United Nations and find some practical use for all of those discussions and resolutions.'

U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan welcomed the action, saying, 'The United Nations has always filled the void in geostrategic diplomacy left by empire-building unilateralists.' "

This article on Midland in December's American Spectator makes for an interesting read. The article sort of makes Midland sound like one big bible camp....something I don't really agree with. And just how many more times do we need to endure this kind of an intro to any article about Midland?:

"With few trees (Notrees, Texas, is not far from Midland) and no mountains to obstruct a view of it, the sky dominates the desert—and the mindset of Midlanders. They call Midland the 'land of the high sky' and the 'tall city.' The town's motto is, 'The sky is the limit.' "

In way it reminds of the Jessica McClure episode and how Midland banded together and made a rescue happen. It was all too easy to point to this rescue as a uniquely Midland thing. The fact is any town placed in that same situation would have shown the same compassion and resolve to do everything necessary to get that little girl out of the well. That is human nature. That is what is wonderful about communities.

Midland is not special because we were able to show any unique Midland quality in Jessica McClure's rescue. Midland is special because when called on to employ and display those wonderful human qualities that exist in countless other towns across the entire world, the town came through with flying colors.

But isn't that even better news?

The most maddening thing about this story is not that the rover is likely dying, but that we actually allowed our government to spend over 400 million bucks on it. Sigh.

Peter Orvetti said it best:

"Many Americans and scientists may shudder at the thought of terminating funding of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. Who but the government can afford to fund space exploration? If we cut off NASA, won't we be cutting off our ladder to the stars?

Not at all. For, despite the storybook history lessons of Columbus and Magellan setting sail to find "new worlds" for their government sponsors, the primary motivation for exploration has always been profit. Free-market space exploration will almost certainly lead to scientifically and medically useful permanent outposts in space faster than NASA ever could.

Even the first space efforts were privately paid: The first liquid-fuel rocket, on which NASA would later base its program, was launched in 1926 by Robert Goddard. For the next decade, he was funded principally by the private Guggenheim Foundation.

For awhile, it looked like people might soon be zooming through space as casually as they journey today around the world via commercial jets. Then the government stepped in."

From mywesttexas.com:

"On 01/22/04, William Andrew Glasscock, Jr., who is also known as Andy Glasscock, age 52, of Midland, Texas, was arrested. Glasscock has been charged with the sexual exploitation of children in violation of Title 18, United States Codes, Section 2251, and related violations. Glasscock faces from fifteen to twenty years imprisonment if convicted of the charges.

This arrest is based on investigation conducted by the Odessa Police Department and the Texas Rangers in addition to the FBI. In federal law, the sexual exploitation of children refers to the creation of images or photographs of children engaged in sexual conduct.

Glasscock has also been charged with the illegal storage of explosives based upon an investigation by the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF)."

Wow.

A pithy outro eludes me.

At least that's what I gathered by looking at the top Yahoo! searches of 2003:

1. KaZaA
2. Harry Potter
3. American Idol
4. Britney Spears
5. 50 Cent
6. Eminem
7. WWE
8. Paris Hilton
9. NASCAR
10. Christina Aguilera

God help us.

Newsflash:

"George W. Bush rigged the 2000 election so that The Jews and oil companies could oppress welfare recipients."

Latest headline from the NewYawk Times? The Washington Post?? MoveOn.org??? Naaaah, I made it up myself using the George W. Bush Conspiracy Generator, one of the cleverest, funniest sites I've seen in a while. Very nice work! Kudos to Jennifer Fulwiler.

Well, well, well. It seems our new airport is not financially viable. What a surprise. Any guesses on who's gonna have to pay the price for this mistake?

"...higher security costs and lower enplanement numbers have caused the city to dip into the passenger facility charge reserve account to make quarterly payments and pay off the debt service on the new terminal building... 'We are falling $13,000 to $15,000 short each month,' Esterly said."

Look for higher charges and taxes in the months to come. It seems that yet another attempt to turn us into a "mini-Dallas" is failing. I won't say we told ya so. Awe, who am I kidding? Sure I will.

WE TOLD YA SO.

This is the body of an e-mail that was sent to me wanting to sell me cheap software:

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the polls have closed and we’re headed for a run-off in the State Senate race. Weeks of debates, commercials & interviews and not one candidate has come forward with a legislative plan for anything. Nothing. We know they all go to church, are members of the NRA, are pro-life, and will fix the budget crisis by “cutting waste.” I propose that if none of the run-off candidates reveal anything more specific than “cutting waste” by run-off date then we at JW start a write-in campaign for someone who can make a difference in this race and still have a chance to win. My gut feeling is Jimmy Swaggert but we’d have to convince him to move from Baton Rouge. Any ideas for a local guy?

Does it set anyone else's teeth on edge that Cingular is able to make an all-cash offer to buy out another cellular carrier that has a market cap of $27 BILLION DOLLARS, yet our city fathers insist that the local taxpayers should subsidize them nonetheless?

News article: Ireland to propose EU-wide ban on paying for sex. First thought: why does Patricia Ireland care? Then I read the article. Oh, it's the country Ireland. Second thought: so County Cork, County Shamrock and County Other Green Stuff can vote themselves free sex when in Europe? What a deal! I read it again. Third thought: now I really don't understand, but can you imagine the votes a "free sex" campaign slogan would pull in? All I do understand is that if County Midland gets with this program, Venezia's is going to tank fast...no more need for hubby to take the little lady out for a romantic dinner!

UPDATE! Tuesday a.m., new link, hopefully of the undying variety.

Something to think about as the election season gets cranking with the Iowa caucuses: the Democrat Party has already bailed on 2004 and is working hard on 2008.

For the professionals -- the Clintons, the Gores, Bill Bradley and so on -- real power matters. To attain power, the professionals know they have to keep the amateurs committed without actually inviting them to the table.

Thus: Howard Dean.

The doctor and his supporters are the last in a string of no-hopers stretching back to Gene McCarthy and running though George McGovern, Walter Mondale, and Michael Dukakis.

Read the whole thing. From the American Spectator's Jay Currie.

Finally there is some actual reporting on ridership numbers and costs for the EZ Rider public transportation system.....from the Odessa-American.

The numbers are even more depressing than we had feared.

"In December, the first full month that riders were charged for rides, 15,000 riders or about 600 a day boarded the buses in the two cities. With an average of 50 cents a ride, the fare boxes are only ringing up $300 a day, [General Manager Ken] Smithson said."

"And regardless of income, he’s [Smithson] sold on the project."

"MOUTD was financed by $500,000 in state funds, a $1,272,169 commitment from the cities and a four-year grant of $3,548,200 from the Federal Transit Administration."

Should the MR-T ever realize that there is a story here, I would like to see published the ridership estimates in the initial report from the consulting firm that convinced (enough of) the council to give this project the green light. As low as these numbers are, how exactly are they matching up against their own prognostications?

UPDATE: The federal grant of $3,548,200 over four years reads like a fixed number as well as the $500,000 from the state. This leaves the $1,272,169 "commitment" from the cities. With $1,349,000 gone already just from the purchases of the buses (19 buses at $71,000/per) and only $300 per day from the fare boxes...what do you think the burn rate per month is on the theoretical remaining assets of the venture is? Bloody.

AND ANOTHER THING: How about this quote:

"The most popular request we’ve had is having a bus connect the two cities,” he said, adding that more than one 16-passenger El Dorado Aerotech 240 bus may be needed."

One of these days these rumors will turn out to be true. It will be very interesting to watch what happens after that.

I second the recommendation to read The Wall Street Journal's The Best of The Web, which is frequently one of the best things on the web itself. In addition to dealing with the Howard Dean/Ann Richards connection, in today's installment James Taranto explains how Cartoon Physics applies to Democrat Presidential Candidates and connects Al Gore's speech on "Global Warming" yesterday (in sub-zero New York City) to Monty Python's The Meaning of Life.

So remember, when you're feeling very small and insecure,
How amazingly unlikely is your birth,
And pray that there's intelligent life somewhere up in space,
'Cause there's bugger all down here on Earth

This is the best "BOTW" in a long time. RTWT. Stat.

From today's Opinion Journal Best of the Web:

"Howard Dean has won either formal endorsements or informal support from an impressive list of Democratic losers: George McGovern, Jimmy Carter, Tom Harkin, Bill Bradley, Al Gore, Carol Moseley Braun, and so forth. Yesterday he picked up the endorsement of Ann Richards, who served one term as Texas' governor.

Richards and Dean appeared together on last night's "Larry King Live," and Dean offered the following observation: "She knows better than anybody, the only way to beat George Bush is to stand up and say what you believe."

But how would she know this? Bush trounced her in 1994. Is Dean saying Richards didn't stand up and say what she believed? Or was he just born with a silver foot in his mouth?"

If this isn't a clear-enough warning about the dangers of VFR pilots wandering into IFR conditions, well then I just don't know what is.

From ThisIsLondon.com:

"Best-selling author Olivia Goldsmith has died after her facelift went wrong.

She was best known for The First Wives Club which was turned into the 1996 hit film starring Goldie Hawn, Bette Midler and Diane Keaton as three friends who take their revenge on cheating husbands who dump them for younger women.

The 54-year-old writer, whose real name was Justine Rendal, had been in a deep coma for more than a week caused by a reaction to an anaesthetic while she was having plastic surgery."

Now that is a good dog!

Perhaps Kirk Edwards is shielding contributors from discovery....or perhaps his expenditure needs just far outstrip his public support, but according to this Texas Ethics Commission filing the Edwards campaign has spent (as of the filing) $151,000 and has only gathered about half that from supporters. The balance (so far) is $355,000 in personal money from Edwards.

He wants the Senate seat badly, yes?

Jeff Jarvis preaches....and boy am I in the choir on this one.

Here is a round-up of links by Instapundit concerning the vicious and evil Bush administration's attempts to turn over all of the oil on Mars to, you guessed it, Halliburton.

From the always, uh, reliable Joe Conason:

"Yes, the firm once headed by Vice President Dick Cheney -- fabled beneficiary of no-bid multibillion-dollar military contracts and high-priced provider of Kuwaiti oil -- is determined to drill on Mars and the moon. Surely this scheme has nothing to do with the Bush space initiative. But somehow, no matter what worthy motivations lie behind the president's policies, he and Cheney always appear to be shilling for their corporate clientele. . . .

Dreams about drilling on Mars date back several years at least. In 1998, a handful of top firms, including Halliburton, Shell and Schlumberger, showed up for a NASA "workshop" at Los Alamos, N.M., to discuss the prospects. Research seems to have intensified since 2001, with Halliburton and other firms engaged in proprietary research on such advanced technologies as laser-powered drills."

From a recent Letter to the Editor:

"Cheers for EZ RIDER, our new public transportation system. I have found the buses to be clean and comfortable and the drivers to be courteous and reliable.

In addition to the expected elderly and working people, young riders are beginning to use these buses. From their conversations, I gather they like their new freedom from having to depend on those with cars to drive them where they want to go.

My thanks to those in the City Council who had the foresight to vote for this needed service.

Gwen Cosman"

By now, I'm sure everyone has heard the heartbreaking story of Kimberly Turner, the 16 year-old Odessa student who was killed in a lunch-time auto accident last week near Permian High School. Somehow or another, Turner's Mustang got tangled up with an SUV driven by another teenager, which resulted in a total of 5 students being sent to the hospital with various severities of injury.

This sad situation has had me pondering some old questions over the course of the last week. Namely, I've begun to wonder whether the revenue being made by local restaurants justifies allowing thousands of teenagers to perform their daily mass exodus from Permian Basin campuses. Or as I like to call it, The Parade of Dumbasses.

If you live near a high school, you know exactly what I'm talking about. Lunchtime is like watching peacocks preen and pose, only it's hormone-charged kids in 3000-pound vehicles. They honk, wave, and hoot at one another. They rev their engines. They show-off their ability to do big, smoky burnouts. They race. Their sound systems cause Richter scales all over the planet to go haywire. They run stop signs. They tailgate one another. Basically, they do everything but pay attention to piloting their vehicles, and the entire, bizarre spectacle simply becomes an accident waiting to happen.

I can vividly remember a big movement to close Midland campuses in the late 80s when I, myself, was one of the strange high school creatures described herein. The closings never panned out, of course, which at the time I thought was a blessing from Heaven. But these days, I feel differently -- especially in light of seeing all the accidents and injuries that have happened around local high school campuses over the last 15 years.

There will never be enough police presence to control the behavior of so many teens during these noon-hour ran-tans, so is it time to once again consider the option of closing area high school campuses? (For those readers outside the Midland/Odessa area, a "closed" campus refers to a campus in which students are not allowed to leave during breaks or recesses.) More to the point, should a 16-year old even be allowed to drive a car? I'm a huge proponent of personal freedom, but should we continue to extend these adult freedoms to a group that is comprised mainly of minor children?

I'm anxious to hear opinions on this one. Feel free to fill up the comments section.

It's rather interesting that the find of an alleged stash of buried mustard gas in Iraq is being largely ignored by the media.

This is perhaps the most significant breakthrough in Iraq since Saddam's capture, yet it is being swept under the rug by liberal and conservative news entities alike. What the hell is the deal?

I don't care how 'old' the mustard gas is or that it may have been left over from the Iran-Iraq war. The simple fact is that Iraq was in possession of WMDs after maintaining so defiantly for so very long that it no longer had any. Where there's smoke, there's fire, folks. My guess is that more chemical contraband will be found in the weeks and months to come.

Let's just hope that, being the apparently trivial matter it is, someone remembers to report on it.

"Dear Jimbo: Tell Mr. Pickens I'll be his huckleberry. Please let him know that if I'm elected to represent the 31st District, the only water he'll leave the Panhandle with will be the urine I leave on his pant leg."

Monday, January 12th, 2004, 8:24AM, corner of Andrews Highway and Illinois: Observed EZ Rider bus with three passengers.

Boy, do I feel better.

More Up To Date-ness from your crack blogging staff at Jessica's Well: the latest on (drumroll, please)...Jose Padilla!

Just to keep everyone up-to-date.

First, let me stipulate that I know that bus transit systems are not supposed to make money and, further, that ridership probably builds over time. But having said that, I am now on a streak of having seen ten MT Rider buses in a row with zero riders. Yesterday, my string was broken (or was it?) by spotting a single passenger transferring between two buses at the corner of Neely and Midkiff. So while I did, in fact, observe an actual bus passenger he was not at the time on either bus.

Can I get a ruling here from the judges?

This may be nothing, but I saw an article on mywesttexas.com a few minutes ago, claiming that MPD Chief John Urby had begun the process by which to fire Andy Glasscock, the Midland police officer whose latest antics (the alleged sexual assault of a Greenwood woman) landed him in jail. Glasscock has been in trouble before. You may remember that he was demoted from sergeant to patrol officer several years ago for bad conduct.

Glasscock's finest moment as a cop came during the 58 hours he spent at the now-legendary well whose name is immortalized by this blog.

Strangely, the article is now gone. Removed, it would seem. Like I said, it may be nothing, but I've never seen KWES remove an article from their website under these circumstances. Anyone know anything?

UPDATE (by Site Admin): Jeff, the Admin at mywesttexas.com is not sure why it became unavailable and is investigating the problem. In the mean time, he says you can get it here.

For those of you interested in mathematics, a Russian researcher named Grigori Perelman may have solved the 100 year-old Poincare Conjecture. In a nutshell, the conjecture seeks to explain the geometry of 3D space using 2D mathematical operations.

Although many have tried to tackle the problem in years past, Perleman's work is the only effort that has been able to stand up against any appreciable amount of scrutiny. The jury's still out, but the scientific community seems positive:

"This is arguably the most famous unsolved problem in math and has been for some time," said Bruce Kleiner, a University of Michigan math professor reviewing Mr. Perelman's work.

Mr. Perelman's work has advanced the furthest without falling apart, and there is optimism that it will ultimately hold up.

"I don't think there's been a single example of a proof that has gotten this much attention and has withstood the scrutiny as it has so far," Dr. Kleiner said.

Not since Princeton University researcher Andrew Wiles cracked the 350-year-old Fermat's Last Theorem a decade ago has the math world been so consumed with one problem.

Although not a useful finding for the everyday math user, cracking the Poincare Conjecture could lead to a better understanding of the cosmos.

James Lileks discovers that Winter is optional.

The real question remains, what kind of local economy should we be building? Should it be based solely on federal dollars? Should new housing development be unfettered because it creates jobs in the short term? Should the exclusive goal of our economic development efforts be to lure big new companies with tax breaks and other incentives, no matter what the cost or risk?

The latest from Midland's ED Big Thinkers? No. This is from a column written by a city councilman for the Albuquerque Journal's January 7 edition...read it last night in a New Mexico bar. Most cities are faced with challenges that are similar to Midland's. Real quality of life and the perceived attitude of the city seem to be the trump cards in the game. Some of what is said in this article is typical local politico blather:

We agree on the need for a broad-based community dialogue to generate new and better economic development ideas for the future.

...but at least this city councilman is asking some of the right questions, especially regarding funding sources and where the money ends up. I wish Albuquerque luck in its pursuit of the answers as much as I wish Midland would ask the questions in the first place.

I heard on the radio this morning (KWEL, if you must know) that the City Council has approved the MDC's Economic Development proposal. I guess this is news, even if it falls squarely in the "dog bites man" category.

But this approval is just like the City Council's granting of the economic development adminsistration contract to the local Chamber. Regardless of the handwringing and posturing, from minute number one the idea that there could be any other outcome is completely ridiculous.

Looks like Mike Conaway is going to get his district.

Saw an advertisement on TV for a candidate for State Senate and learned that he will “protect the sanctity of the traditional family and the right to bear arms” is “pro-life” and will bring “prayer back into our classrooms.” And we all know that O’Connor , Rehnquist et al wouldn’t dream of making a ruling on these momentous issues without first consulting every State Senator in the USA, for fear of stepping on the wrong toes. I am not quite convinced though – he failed to mention that he would repeal Miranda rights but what the hell, it was only 30 seconds. Maybe he’ll pick up on it next time.

UPDATE: It is turning into a Photoshop Party here, here, and here.

From a site that should be on our blogroll (hint, hint, Ms. Admin), Mike of Cold Fury takes down a pointy-headed, elitist op-ed writer from the northwest. It is a tidy Fisking and well worth your time. Said writer is making the argument that the reason that G. W. Bush is so popular is that most of his supporters are just stupid:

It’s well past time that people confront this issue, no matter who’s offended. We are on the way to becoming a nation of imbeciles. I’m certain that a plethora of “George W. Bush” jokes is already being circulated in every capital of the world. We can stop this sapping of our national integrity but we must do it soon, lest the morons become the norm and those of us who use our brains for more than memorizing advertising jingles are ourselves ostracized from society.

Mike replies:

...But it’s actually great to have this stuff out in the open at last, and I do surely hope that every likely voter in America sees this. It tells you exactly where these precious, prissy elites stand regarding the rest of us. There are examples of this kind of “thinking” everywhere you care to look on the Left these days, and it’s one of the many reasons why the Left is finished, over, finito, done.

Read the whole thing. Nice job, Mike!

Taking a cue from reader Portia who writes:

"Jose Cuevas is one of the good guys. He should not be responsible for the MRT's lack of imagination or any real knowledge of Midland politics. The MRT guys just don't do the homework to learn, and they find it easy to "do their jobs" by just phoning Jose, again, and again, and again."

The Midland Reporter-Telegram Phone Call and Ink Saver!

Gary Ott has a good column today on visiting Los Alamos, New Mexico..."home" of the first atomic bombs.

From today's MR-T:

"Midland's Jose Cuevas has not decided whether he will challenge Mike Canon and Stephanie Sparkman for Midland's mayoral seat, although his "gut" appears to be saying no. "

From Debka:

"A Yemeni group, Ansar al-Haq (supporters of justice) claims that it shot down the Egyptian charter airliner bound for Paris that crashed into the Red Sea on Saturday minutes after take off from Sharm el-Sheikh, killing all 148 (most French) people on board. Egyptians say cause was mechanical fault. Yemeni group claims it was protesting French law regulating Muslim dress."

Why in the world would any extremist Muslim group terrorize the very people who so consistently enable them to conduct mayhem?

Ansar al-Haq attacking the French is like Bob Probert and Stan Jonathan taking their sticks to Don Cherry.

I, for one, am comforted by my Commander in Chief spending some of his very valuable time chopping cedar at his ranch. A Time mag photo essay, via Drudge and mentioned in NRO's The Corner.

Midland's Corporate Welfare Economic Development project is moving forward with its aim to turn public monies over to private firms. A question still un-asked by the MR-T (or at least un-answered) is what, exactly, comprises the $742,472 spent on "Administrative Investment".

OK, somebody enlighten me here. Why the $2 bills?

Let me begin by thanking Peter Jackson for bringing Tolkien's Lord of the Rings to the screen in the manner he did. It is jaw-dropping in its magnificence.

This is a post that should be classified under "Druthers". It is indisputable that although the movie was over three hours long it was still a smash, but given the necessity to keep a feature film as short as necessary I ask the readers here the simple question (my biases apparent here):

What "scene" in the book "Return of the King" would you have traded the minutes in the movie given over to the attempted burning and rescuing of Faramir for?

Use the Comments.