ABC News is reporting that the Democrat gubernatorial candidate Gregoire has won the recount with 130 votes. Throughout the recount King county has been finding hundreds of forgotten ballots that in the end tipped the race. (As we mentioned here, Dino won orignally with 261 votes. He also won the machine recount by 42 votes.)
Fortunately, the Republicans are not conceding — at least not yet. According the the Seatle Intelligencer :
“Gregoire has said “the election is over” and Republican Secretary of State Sam Reed agrees with her. He’ll certify the results Thursday. Before he does that, Rossi and the Republicans want county canvassing boards to reconsider rejected votes they say will help their cause.Gregoire is saying. . . .”
Sound Politics has been doing a suberb job covering this race. They’ve mentioned what I couldn’t help thinking; its one thing to have corruption in Ukraine, but in America we’d like to think a strong party machine couldn’t overturn elections.
According to Reuters:
“West-leaning opposition leader Viktor Yushchenko looks certain to become Ukraine’s next president, bringing with him the promise to end rampant graft and to reform the ex-Soviet state’s damaged economy. . . .“‘For 14 years we have been independent. Now we have become free,’ Yushchenko told supporters gathered overnight in Kiev’s Independence Square, site of more than two weeks of mass protests against November’s rigged election.
“‘The people proved their power. They rebelled against probably the most cynical regime in Eastern Europe.’
“With more than 99.45 percent of Sunday’s ballot counted, election officials said on Monday Yushchenko had a statistically unbeatable lead, with 52.15 percent against just under 44 percent for Moscow-backed Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovich.”
Hurrah!
I’ll be leaving for Florida for the holidays, so because of unavailable internet access, I’m afraid posting will be light to non-existent till January 1st. The Raccoon and the Falcon will also be away on hiatus.
If I can’t get a post out before Christmas, Merry Christmas! (Oh dear, I hope I haven’t offended anybody with my anachronistic greeting) Season’s Greetings!
Lifenews reports that Senator Brownback (R- KS) has said he will reintroduce, in the next session of congress, legislation that focuses on fetal pain.
The Unborn Child Pain Awareness Act (S.2466) is careful not to go into the realm of speculation, no further than anything made absolutely certain by science, but it requires doctors and those performing abortions on women further than twenty weeks to make them aware that:
The Congress of the United States has determined that at this stage of development, an unborn child has the physical structures necessary to experience pain. There is substantial evidence that by this point, unborn children draw away from surgical instruments in a manner which in an infant or an adult would be interpreted as a response to pain. Congress finds that there is substantial evidence that the process of being killed in an abortion will cause the unborn child pain, even though you receive a pain-reducing drug or drugs.
They are also to offer them the option of having anesthesia or other pain-reducing drugs administered directly to the child before the abortion takes place.
Many doctors have said they believe an unborn child is capable of feeling cruel, excruciating and horrific pain during late term abortion procedures, and according to an April Zogby poll, 77 % of Americans favor “laws requiring that women who are 20 weeks or more along in their pregnancy be given information about fetal pain before having an abortion.”
Cybercast News Service (CNS) has been covering the trail and conviction of pastors Danny Nalliah and Daniel Scott for vilifying Islam in Australia’s state of Victoria.
Daniel Scott is a Pakistani Christian who escaped Pakistan after being condemned to death for blasphemy. Ironically in Australia he was sued after giving a seminar for Christians on Islam and the Koran — and was convicted just this Friday.
He was convicted under a new hate-crime law Victoria’s Labour government had just passed — the Racial and Religious Tolerance Act.
We have enjoyed reading the many good quality European blogs as we follow the Ukrainian revolution. It is crucial to keep track of the state of things happening around the world. This is especially true for Europe, because they are usually a couple years ahead of us in moving to to the left.
Therefore it was very troubling to read in the Edge of England’s Sword that the Tories have decided to go along with a national ID card. According to Drake:
“The spin coming from the party leadership is that they have to do this because if the Tories opposed ID Cards they would look weak on Terrorism.”
Will the Republicans will be quick to travel this road too. . . .just to look tough on terrorism? The massive intelligence bill that Bush just signed has a lot of features that look awfully close, including national standards for driver’s license by 2006.
As the Edge of England’s Sword points out, this is entirely against the concept of “ancient liberties” or liberties that have been accorded to English-speaking world for centuries. NO2ID, a website devoted to stopping the national ID writes:
“. . .No Common law country in the world has ever accepted the idea of a peacetime ID card. The Australian and New Zealand public have rejected similar proposals outright. Following widespread criticism, Canada abandoned its proposed biometric ID card system in early 2004. ID card proposals have always been rejected by the United States Congress.”
Other non-common law countries do have stringent identification and registration requirements. In the Netherlands, to give an example, whenever you move you have to register with the authorities in the town you have moved to.
By requiring citizens to carry or have an ID, the government is saying you need permission to exist. In America, like all the English-speaking world, we have always had that right. Fortunately bloggers like Drake, Paul of Voice of the Future and John of England Project aren’t giving up without a fight.
A Fistful of Euros has linked to some intriguing details about the poisoning of Yuschenko:
Tests have revealed that the chemical used to poison Ukrainian opposition leader Viktor Yushchenko was pure TCDD, the most harmful known dioxin. . . .Scientists say the poison could not have occurred naturally in his blood.
Blood samples taken in Vienna, where Mr Yushchenko was treated, were sent to the Dutch capital, Amsterdam, for further analysis.
“It is a single chemical, not a mix,” Prof Abraham Brouwer of the Free University in Amsterdam told the Associated Press.
“This tells us… there is no way it occurred naturally because it is so pure.”
He said there were some small signs which could reveal where it was made.
Initial tests had shown the level of poison in Mr Yushchenko’s blood was more than 6,000 times higher than normal - the second highest level ever recorded in humans.
This week, Google announced that they had signed an agreement with the University of Stanford and the University of Michigan to digitalize their complete libraries. Harvard University, University of Oxford, and the New York Public Library have also signed agreements with Google, but will only alow Google to publish parts of their collections.
Already within six months you should be able to use Google to search part of the contents of those libraries, and to be able to read their books that were published before 1923; for books published after that date, you will be shown just some “snippets” of the book, as well as links to where you can buy a copy. Completely digitalizing these libraries is expected to be finished in six years, with Google’s new (and secret) method of scanning. Probably though after that, they will sign agreements with more libraries though.
This will be an extension of the Google Print program, which you can already see a little bit how it works with some copyright books submitted by the publishers, for example, try typing Jules Verne, or Charles Dickens into Google.
TIME has just announced their person of the year 2004 — George W. Bush, our newly re-elected president.
From the magazine:
For sticking to his guns (literally and figuratively), for reshaping the rules of politics to fit his ten-gallon-hat leadership style and for persuading a majority of voters that he deserved to be in the White House for another four years. . .For sharpening the debate until the choices bled, for reframing reality to match his design, for gambling his fortunes-and ours-on his faith in the power of leadership, George W. Bush is TIME’s 2004 Person of the Year.
We offer our enthusiastic congratulations.
And congratulations also to Powerline, named ‘blog of the year’. Great job!
Update: For those wondering the why and wherefore of our congratulations, to this man hated by half the world:
He stuck to principle, and refused to shape his opinion by the daily polls.
He stuck to the message, and refused to be sidetracked by the pressures of the century’s most intense campaign.
He rose to his challenges and defended America in her hour of need; and continues to defend her, and works to make the world a more free place.
And now, in spite of determined opposition, undecided public opinion, and a radical special-interest lobby, he remains a stalwart defender of our nations most vulnerable– her unborn children.
May God continue to grant him courage, that he would always be ready to make whatever decision is morally right, regardless of its popularity.
I’m finally done with my last paper. I didn’t sleep for the last two nights, so now that school’s out, I’ve been getting some sleep. Sorry for the black-out on posting.
The big news yesterday was Cornell’s assessment that a large minority of Americans support the curtailment of Muslim’s civil liberties. They also found that among more ‘highly religious’ people were more oppressive in this respect. (Frankly I would be very suprised if Cornell found out anything good about ‘religious’ people. And I wonder, does ‘highly religious’ = Christian, or do they mean all religious people — Christian, Muslim, . . . )
Both Power Line and Sean Gleeson do a good job of analysing this report. They both remark that although the headline sounds exciting, when the actual data is scrutinized the results are hardly newsworthy. Hindrocket writes:
“The Cornell report is available here. The report is odd in that it nowhere discloses the exact questions that were asked. Still, it is easy to see how misleading the report the AP coverage are.
“The Cornell survey sought to address, among other issues, “possible restrictions on civil liberties of Muslim Americans.” The fundamental problem with the report, and press coverage of the report, is that most of the questions asked had nothing to do with restricting civil liberties. The actual results obtained by the Cornell researchers are shown below:
Statement:
“‘All Muslim Americans should be required to register their whereabouts with the federal government.” Agree: 27% (Again, the survey report is surprisingly unprofessional, as there is no breakdown of the percentage who disagreed, as opposed to expressing no opinion.)
“Mosques should be closely monitored and surveilled by U.S. law enforcement agencies.” Agree: 26%
“‘U.S. government agencies should profile citizens as potential threats based on being Muslim or having Middle Eastern heritage.’ Agree: 22%
“‘Muslim civic and volunteer organizations should be infiltrated by undercover law enforcement agents to keep watch on their activities and fundraising.’ Agree: 29%
“Of the four measures suggested above, only one–registering Muslims’ whereabouts with the federal government–would constitute a “restriction on the civil liberties of Muslim Americans.” It would, I think, be unconstitutional. But the other three are not infringements of civil liberties at all.”
Update: Curious fact: According to Ryan Horn (Cornell conservative alum) both authors of this report, James Shanahan and Eric C. Nisbet are registered Democrats.
The President of France, Jacques Chirac, unveiled the Millau bridge yesterday. It is the largest bridge in the world, and is quite a spectacular site! It stretches over 2,460 meters, and the tallest pillar is 336 meters, 36 meters higher then the Eiffel Tower. The building was constructed from a government contract with the Eiffage group. This contract allows Eiffage to charge a toll for motorists on the road for the next 75 years, instead of having the government pay them.
According to the Boston Globe, as well as a few other gay news sources, several companies, including IBM Corp, the Boston Medical Center, and the New York Times Co., are removing benefits for unmarried homosexual partners:
“If you’re a same-sex domestic partner, you now have the same option heterosexuals have, so we have to apply the same rules to you,” said Larry Emerson, Baystate’s vice president of human resources.
This seems very fair to me, if homosexuals can get “married”, like heterosexuals, why must they still have the extra privilege of having benefits for unmarried partners? Should they have more privileges then heterosexuals, who would not get benefits for their partners unless they got married? It seems to make sense to me, and I congratulate these companies for making such a wise decision. But it seems like to the homosexuals of Massachusetts it is horribly unfair — the GLAD (Gay & Lesbian Advocates & Defenders) staff attorney has been quoted as saying:
“There are layers of discrimination, this is a civil rights battle, and it’s going to take a matter of time but we are taking steps forward.”
This is not a matter of “civil rights” at all, it is complete fairness! It is just a matter of these companies/organizations standing up and deciding NOT to discriminate. If they offer extra benefits to unmarried gays, they would be discriminating against unmarried heterosexual people!
Blog Joel News has posted a link to a whole array of pictures from Ukraine. . . Here are just a few; follow the link to see the enlarged versions.
Hi there! Like my hat?
I’m dreaming of an orange Christmas. . . .
A little orange doesn’t hurt, heh?
We keep peace and order; don’t mess with us.
This is interesting. A sociology lecturer in the University of Louisville (Louisville, Kentucky) threatened to kill conservatives. According to the Louisville Patriot the lecturer said:
It was the religious zealots who say they are voting on morals. I think we should all buy AK-47s and shoot them all! That’s what I would suggest, if it were allowed.”
The university president has said it “is unacceptable” and it is “not an issue of academic freedom”.
Not an issue of academic freedom? It’s not an issue of academic freedom to fire the lecturer for his comments, but what about for the students? If I was a conservative in his class, I might be a little intimidated. He might not be ‘allowed’ to kill conservatives, but he probably can give them whatever grade he wants.
Fortunately, the university has withdrawn it’s contract with the lecturer for at least the upcoming spring semester.
The Center for Disease Control (CDC) has released a report on teenage pregnancy and sexual activity with some encouraging news. Comparing sexual activity since 1995, they found that:
“While 55 percent of teenage boys in that age range say they were sexually active in 1995, only 46 percent say they were in 2002. Compared to a similar review in 1995, teenagers are putting off having sex and the average age of the first time has risen.”
The teenage birth rate has also gone down.
Equally curious was the number one reason young people gave for not having sex — “that it was ‘against religion or morals’”. The second most important reason was that they didn’t “want to get (a female) pregnant”.
You can view the fact sheet here.
This week Antony Flew (famed British philosopher and atheist) decided that naturalistic atheism was, well unreasonable. According to Evangelical Outpost which has done a great post on the subject:
“At age 81, after decades of insisting belief is a mistake, Anthony Flew has concluded that some sort of intelligence or first cause must have created the universe. A super-intelligence is the only good explanation for the origin of life and the complexity of nature. . .”
Dr. Hsu, a geologist at the Geological Institute in Zurich and former president of International Association of Sedimentologists once said, “We have had enought of the Darwinian fallacy. It is time we cry, “The emperor has no clothes.”
We salute the intellectual integrity of Antony Flew for simply following “the evidence, wherever it lead”. When will other scientists also face the facts?
Update: In the Agora is calling into question whether Flew really changed his mind. According to yesterday’s bulletin of Rationalist International Flew still believes in a closed universe.
The Rationalist quotes a statement that Flew made a year ago titled, “Sorry to Disappoint, but I’m Still an Atheist!”
Doctors in Austria confirmed today beyond a doubt what had been suspected all along — Viktor Yushchenko, leader of the Ukrainian opposition, was poisoned by dioxins.
Yushchenko himself spoke to reporters earlier this week, and said he was recovering and optimistic over the upcoming vote. He said he believed the motive of his poisoners was political, and their aim : “Naturally, to kill me.”
Paul Musgrave In the Agora has mentioned the natural cycle of the blogosphere:
Because of the close connections between the academic calendar and the available energy of a sizeable number of bloggers, you may notice a slight slowdown affecting ITA and numerous other non-professional blogs.
I’m afriad you’ll find the same cycle here. I’ll be posting very sporadically if at all till the end of next week. (I had a big final yesterday, and still have two finals and a paper to write.)The Raccoon will still be posting as usual however.
. . . of democracy in Ukraine.
We always have supported democracy in the Ukraine, ever since we were founded, but now I found a nice ribbon, so that everybody can see:-) Many thanks to Inga Muste, of KDE-LOOK.org for the picture!
After seeing a comparison of how Yuschenko looked before and after “some mysterious happening”, I was certain that he must have been poisoned! I actually thought it was not disputed till I read over at A fistful of Euros, and Le Sabot Post-Moderne, that he was not officially poisoned though, the doctors had not made any official statement, and were looking into other possible diseases he might naturally have contracted that would give the same symptoms. Now, however they officially have stated that he was poisoned in an assassination attempt. The picture that The Times printed in their article, shows much less difference between how he used to look, and how he looks now, then our picture does, this may be because he has already started to recover, or possibly just because our picture (via AP) has more of a close-up view of his face.
UPDATE:(12:25 EST):
45 Minutes ago, AP published an article saying…
Zimpfer rejected as “entirely untrue” a story in Wednesday editions of the London daily, The Times, which quoted Dr. Nikolai Korpan — the Rudolfinerhaus physician who oversaw Yushchenko’s treatment — as saying that the candidate had been poisoned and the intention was to kill the candidate.
Korpan also was quoted as denying making the remarks.
“The suspicion of poisoning has until now neither been confirmed or excluded,” Korpan said, according to the Austria Press Agency. He could not be reached for further comment.
Things are getting extremely confusing!
UPDATE:(13:02 EST) (December 11 2004):
Ah, now I think it is finally certain that the Doctors have confirmed that he was poisoned, according to Foxnews:
“There is no doubt about the fact that Mr. Yushchenko’s disease has been caused by a case of poisoning by dioxin,” Zimpfer said.
Andy Guess, editor in chief of the Cornell Daily Sun has started a his own blog and has already posted some fascinating stuff on America’s problems with schools and racism. Head over here to check it out.
The monolithic nature of of universities has been commented on a lot over the last week, especially with George Will’s article in the Washington Post, and later this one in the Economist Powerline pointed to.
According to Will, a study of Cornell professors found 166 liberals and only six conservatives. (There’s only one registered Republican in the government department.) Not content to leave their political leanings at home, professors and administrators often enforce political correctness in a not too subtle ways. The sad thing is that as students hear only one side of the issues, they slowly become indoctrinated as their education progresses. This is nowhere seen so clearly as in a graph by Elizabeth Badame published a couple weeks ago in the Cornell Review. The results are based on this year’s mock election.
Last Monday, Katie Distler, one of the Cornell Daily Sun’s colunists, wrote a very nasty article on crisis pregnancy centers. Calling them “religious centers with an anti-choice agenda”, she declares:
“At these centers, women receive a variety of “counseling” which involves watching videos of aborted babies, very often against the woman’s will, promises of financial aid if they keep their baby and religious pamphlets that decry the termination of a pregnancy. A lot of the “facts” that are given to women at these centers about abortions are not only misleading, but many are just downright false. . . .”Some women have reported that they have felt “mentally raped” after leaving the center, which can result in depression, shame and guilt. If women fail to receive the proper care and counseling that they deserve, the threats to both their physical and mental health increase greatly.”
Mentally raped?
My favorite quote came near the end however:
“To be morally opposed to abortion is one thing. To impose those views on another human being and telling her that she cannot control what goes on in her own body is a completely different issue.”
Yeah, that’s the problem. We’re not only morally opposed to abortion, but we’re actually going to do something about it. Didn’t senator Kerry say something that faith without works is dead?
Fortunately, a pro-life student wrote a great response to Distler’s article in Friday’s edition of the Cornell Daily Sun:
” Katie Distler wrote a lovely denunciation of crisis pregnancy centers. The only difficulty is, the centers she describes — anti-abortion indoctrination centers for the mentally vulnerable — are strictly figements of her imagination.”The pregnancy center I volunteered at this summer — Birthright of Ithaca, down by the railroad tracks — is typical of those across the country. Sure, we are all pro-lifers. We are there because we believe passionately that there is a better way than abortion, that women in trouble — told there is only one way out — need to be given real options, so they can make choices they can live with. Policy is very strict — never to pretend to be anything other than we are, never to “lure” anyone in under the assumption we provide abortions, and never to show pictures of aborted babies.
“People come because they want what we have to offer.
“One young mother stuck out to me in particular. She came many times. Why? Wasn’t she scared to be in a place where people might force their opinions on her? No, she came because it was the only place, among the many agencies she received help from, where she felt she was cared about — as a person. And I understood, because I felt it too whenever I came to work — the completely unjudgmental, totally welcoming atmosphere. The world is a cold place sometimes, especially for women facing unwanted pregnancies. As a society, we need to support them. And I’m grateful that crisis pregnancy centers do just that.”
Andy Guess, editor in chief of The Cornell Daily Sun wrote a very positive article in the last issue of Current, reflecting on religion/conservatism on his campus. I was especially suprised by this, as his paper is considered by most Cornell conservatives to be extremley liberal. The editor in chief of the The Hilltop (Howard Univ.), talked about how liberal their Christian’s were, and that this semester all religous groups joined together for the one goal of defeating Bush. Both the editors of The Maneater (Univ. of Missouri), and The Vanderbilt Hustler (Vanderbilt Univ.), wrote very negatively of Christians on their campuses. Mr. Guess, however wrote a very fair, very balanced report on Christianity and conservativism at Cornell; he said in particular that conservative organizations were gaining more prominence and making themselves “disproportionately visible” especially in light of the fact that only 22% of students voted for Bush in the mock election.
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