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*America: Senator Dungheap stinks back?
In the United States Senate, the distinguished Senators ( gulp ) debated S.254 the Juvenile Justice Bill, with Orrin Hatch as the master of ceremonies and chief doormat. He got rather pissed off the other day at the way the Democrats were piling on the pork barrel amendments endlessly and he declared loudly and openly that they didn't want a " Juvenile Violent Crime Bill ", but they just wanted another political football to kick around. I mean the Democrat pork was more smokey and flavorful than a Sunday sausage breakfast. Hatch pointed out that they would have to adjourn for the summer, before all debate on their dozens of amendments was finished, and he knew that was what they really wanted.
Today ( May 18th 1999 ) they continued the debate with reduced time agreed upon by the Majority and Minority Leaders. You know, the Senate has really become a bunch of television talk show, pollaganda watching, weenies on these cave-ins to imaginary issues ( aka. gun control and juvenile crime ) stirred up by the media coverage of the Columbine High School massacre. Remember, dozens of laws, both state and federal, were broken by the two murderers and their " unwitting " accomplices. None of the laws being debated today would have been violated, including the " trigger lock with every handgun purchase " amendment which passed ( Why should someone locking a handgun inside a gunsafe have to put a trigger lock on it as well? ).
The Democrats were doing their sleazy version of a filibuster, as they continued to offer amendment after amendment to slow legislation process down ( so they could blame the Republicans later? ). Tom Harkin ( D ) was his slimey partisan self, but let us trivialize and ignore him ( it's real hard though, because of the smell ). So, the amendments just kept on coming, for instance, Paul Wellstone ( D ) offered one up that included in part to " authorize grant money for battered women programs ". Now that is really a big concern with a juvenile crime bill, isn't it? Contrast that with John Ashcroft ( R ) offering an amendment to " treat juveniles who use firearms in the commission of crimes as adults ". That sounds good to me. He even had a catchy sound bite, " Give adult time, to juveniles who committ adult crime ". Oh man, Patrick Leahy ( D ) and Dick Durbin ( D ) opposed this amendment on the little-used by Democrats grounds that it was an infringement on individual state's rights. Whoa, I was impressed.
They tabled that Wellstone thing like a hot potato(e), along with the Ashcroft one, as well.
*Still in America
Sheppard Smith of Fox News Channel interviewed Colin Powell, America's Promise, the Alliance for Youth. Though I normally dislike the way Smith inserts his opinion, rudely, into his interviews ( and on the network whose advertisements say " we report, you decide " no less ), but I wanted to hear what Powell had to say. He started off with a comment or two on how to deal with violence, like in Littleton with, " Help them ( kids ) get a good start in life ", mentioning the " Boy Scouts " as having a positive role to play and he thought that " parents should be responsible when they ( their own kids ) are outside school ". He finished that segment with a warning, " Don't pass off responsibility to the teachers ".
Smith then shifted the subject to the situation in Kosovo. Powell began, " When you have a campaign of only airpower, it leaves it up to your enemy to decide when it's over ". This was a theme he has embraced before. On whether or not we should pull out ( not whether or not we should have gone in ), he said, " I don't think we can cut our losses and get out of there ". On the viability of NATO's ( Clinton's ) puny plan in Yugoslavia, he was non-commital with, " I can't say whether it will or it won't ". When he was pressed for an opinion, he continued, " It is not time for us retired folks to take pot-shots ".
*New York City ( as opposed to America )
Hey man, did you see Harry Wu on Drudge May 15th? He was ultra cool. He said, " The government today in China, is really facing a crisis ". Oh, ya' think? Matt asked him about getting access to the Clinton White House to talk about human rights, at al., and Wu replied, " I have no money for donations, so they don't let me in the White House ". Pretty cool huh? Oh yeah, on that Johnny Chung helping him thing in China, Wu said, " I don't think he really want to do that ".
*Israel
Jerusalem, in particular, may be the first sticky point in Arafat's bid to get Israel to continue the Wye River surrender terms. Soon, Ehud Barak will get to show his true Israeli colors over the city of Jerusalem. He may give away all of the West Bank and Gaza Strip ( he couldn't really do that, could he? ), but he has pledged to keep Jerusalem unified and the capital of Israel. Today, it is being reported that ground is being broken and Israeli constructions in traditionally arab parts of Jerusalem are continuing.
A mad-dog Palestinian legislator, Ziyad Abu Ziyah, reportedly said of the renewed construction, " This is a terrorist act ". No way man, when some arab suicide bomber blows himself and an Israeli schoolbus up; now that is a terrorist act. It was additionally being reported that he accused Israel's hard-liners were trying to " sabotage Barak's policy of resuming the peace talks before they even started ". So what if they are, man. How many innocent Israelis have to die before they realize you guys can't be trusted? What really gets these arabs steamed is that both the areas in Jerusalem, Ras al-Amud and Har Homa, are in traditionally Arab East Jerusalem ( captured from Jordan in the 1967 Mideast War ). Israel may not be good at starting wars, but it sure is good at finishing them!
*Yugoslavia.
Think about it. Slobodan Milosevic is a insignificant lousy commie rat, but Bill Clinton has elevated him to almost God-like status in Serbia by his false villifications and NATO's relentless and illegal undeclared acts of war. Yes, and you the bleeding heart liberals have attempted to legitimize America's illegal bombing of a sovereign country, by villifying the nation's head of state. What would Eugene McCarthy have thought of all of you?
I mean open up the can of Planters...
- Bongo ( Bite me? )
