TailOverTeaKettle.com

A French newspaper is reporting that Usama bin Laden may have died of typhoid in Pakistan in August (Report: Bin Laden Dead, U.S., French Intelligence Officials Say Usama Death Report Unconfirmed). Of course, it’s not confirmed and sounds like a dubious report at best.

A U.S. intelligence official told FOX News that he has seen no evidence to suggest that Usama Bin Laden has died. “Don’t believe it,” the official said. “I would not give creedence to that report” that was leaked to the French newspaper.

Of course, we can always root that it turns out to be correct!

              

I’ve calmed myself down today, but there are some others who are still fighting mad:

• House of Eratosthenes is fired up today, and speculates that America may have ‘jumped the shark‘ when the courts started worrying about rules instead of seeking the truth.
• Independent Conservative wonders if the horrific dragging death of Luz Maria Franco-Fierros will be treated with the same scrutiny as the James Byrd case in 1998. An illegal immigrant from Mexico, Jose Luis Rubi-Nava, has been arrested for the crime. By the way, he was stopped for a traffic violation in Denver five months ago but not detained by police. According to CNN: “Police spokeswoman Virginia Quinones said the arresting officer suspected Rubi-Nava’s identification may have been forged, but she said the department was not responsible for verifying a suspect’s immigration status, and a new Colorado law directing police to cooperate with federal immigration officers was not yet in force.” Nice.
• Conservative Musings finds yet another reason to boycott Venezuela’s Citgo gas stations … a call from left-wing blog to buy Citgo to protest US policy!
• Right Wing Nation awards Wolf Blitzer the ‘Idiot of the Day’ Award. Of course, he’s not the only one that thinks that Iran ought to have nuclear weapons, Newsbusters reminds us that Ted Turner does too! Of course, since he personally ended the Cold War, he does have some credibility on this issue.
• Ankle Biting Pundits note that the alleged threat to Pakistan was relvealed to have come from, of all people, Richard Armitage! Also, they note: “The real irony here is most of Pakistan is just five minutes away from being in the Stone Age anyway.”

              

As this week ends, I woke up this morning just more than a little tired and disgusted. All of the news this week seemed so disappointing:

• The Pope talks about about Islam and violence. His remarks are met with… violence. The murder of a Catholic nun in Somalia. Rent-a-Crowds being formed to burn him in effigy. Christian church buildings burnt and vandalized. The irony of the situation was not lost on countless blog sites, but most casual observers just heard the story about the Pope making a ‘P.R. Blunder’. This situation is that this is not about ‘tolerance’ of other religions, but that there are a group of Islamic people who truely believe that those who do not convert, or speak ill of Islam (in their opinion) have automatically written their death sentance. Instead, we have the Pope continuing on his apology tour and more press releases from CAIR.
• In Congress, we had hand-wringing over the Detainee Bill. This may be the first and last time that Senators McCain, Warner, Graham will be referred to as “mavericks”, “rebellious”,and titans”. According to the press, there was Republican “infighting” and a “revolt”. But all of this over trying to clearly define the boundaries of acceptable behavior, so that we don’t later have people rushing around accusing everything as being torture. Meanwhile, Bush is being painted as someone who wants to torture people.
• At the UN this week we had a speech by George Bush. Of course, it appears to have fallen on deaf ears. Prior to the speech, France’s Ofuscator-in-Chief announced that France would ensure that the UN Security Council will remain toothless, despite all of it’s tough talk and demands on Iran with regards to their continuing nuclear development program. Then we were treated to anti-American bashing from Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez (he still smelling the sulfuric odor of the devil, Bush and shilling for Noam Chomsky), and Lebanese President Emile Lahoud (said Lahoud: “Obviously, this was a premeditated Israeli “sentence” to destroy my country and everything it stood for”). Coupled with the recent US public relations tour of former Iranian President Mohammad Khatami, and we have quite a sideshow. The only America-bashers that failed to turn up at the UN were Fidel Castro and Jimmy Carter. Sickening.
• The only bright spot in Abbas’ speech, that the coalition government of Palastine might recognize Israel, has been quickly retracted as Hamas (who’s organization is built around the singular goal of destroying Israel) unsurprisingly denounced it.
• There were insinuations by Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf that the only reason that Pakistan cooperated was that the US threatened to bomb Pakistan if we did not help them. Of course, he now can not clarify his remarks, because he has a pending book deal.

So on a whole, I have been finishing this week just feeling frustrated with the whole mess going on everywhere.

And this morning, I sat eating breakfast with a group of men with whom I regularly meet. Today we were discussing many topics in our lives. A one point a gentleman approached our table and stopped to say hello. He said that he had overheard one us talking about success and failure. He briefly told his story: about working his entire life, saving his money, raising his kids and sending them to college. Then just as he and his wife were reaching a point in their lives where they could think about comfort and travelling, she was diagnosed with cancer. The treatments wiped away the savings plan, and she eventually lost her fight this year.

He asked, “What is all you have at that point when this happens?” Not money nor success. “You have your faith and relationship with God, and the conviction in how you’ve raised your children.”

Isn’t that the truth!

These are dangerous times filled with dangerous people. There is much in this world that can be disappointing and depressing to see and hear. There are so many things that frustrate us that we wish that we could change.

But in the end, we have to have the right perspective about what it’s all about. I thank him for that reminder this morning.

              

Apparently the state of California has officially run out of better things to do today. According to Reuters, the state of California is filing lawsuits against auto manufacturers because of ‘global warming’:

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - California sued six of the world’s largest automakers over global warming on Wednesday, charging that greenhouse gases from their vehicles have caused billions of dollars in damages.

The lawsuit is the first of its kind to seek to hold manufacturers liable for the damages caused by their vehicles’ emissions, state Attorney General Bill Lockyer said.

It also comes less than a month after California lawmakers adopted the nation’s first global warming law mandating a cut in greenhouse gas emissions.

An automaker trade group called the global warming move a “nuisance suit.” Car manufacturers have also held up California state rules to force cuts in tailpipe emissions from cars and trucks with legal action of their own.

The lawsuit names General Motors Corp. (NYSE:GM - news), Ford Motor Co. (NYSE:F - news), Toyota Motor Corp. (7203.T), the Chrysler Motors Corp. U.S. arm of Germany’s DaimlerChrysler AG (DCXGn.DE) and the North American units of Japan’s Honda Motor Co. (7267.T) and Nissan Motor Co. Ltd. (7201.T).

“(California) just passed a new law to cut global warming emissions by 25 percent and that’s a good start and this lawsuit is a good next step,” said Dan Becker, director of the Sierra Club’s Global Warming Program.

Lockyer told Reuters he would seek “tens or hundreds of millions of dollars” from the automakers in the lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Northern California.

The lawsuit seeks monetary damages for past and ongoing contributions to global warming and asks that the companies be held liable for future monetary damages to California.

It noted that California is spending millions to deal with reduced snow pack, beach erosion, ozone pollution and the impact on endangered animals and fish.

“The injuries have caused the people to suffer billions of dollars in damages, including millions of dollars of funds expended to determine the extent, location and nature of future harm and to prepare for and mitigate those harms, and billions of dollars of current harm to the value of flood control infrastructure and natural resources,” it said.

Ford deferred comment to the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, which called the complaint a “nuisance suit” similar to one a New York court dismissed.

“Automakers will need time to review this legal complaint, however, a similar nuisance suit that was brought by attorneys- general against utilities was dismissed by a federal court in New York,” the industry group said in a statement.

Toyota declined to comment as the company evaluates the lawsuit. The other automakers had no immediate comment.

David Cole, chairman of the Center for Automotive Research, a nonprofit organization that provides public research and forecasts into the industry, said it would be tough for the industry to immediately meet demands from some critics.

Adoption of diesel engine emissions technology or gasoline- electric hybrids comes at great cost and improving gas mileage also likely means smaller lighter vehicles, trade-offs that are not attractive to consumers, he added.

“These are not free technologies, they are very expensive,” Cole said. “Most people are price sensitive.”

In the complaint, Lockyer charges that vehicle emissions have contributed significantly to global warming and have harmed the resources, infrastructure and environmental health of the most populous state in the United States.

Lockyer — a Democratic candidate for state treasurer in the November election — said the lawsuit states that under federal and state common law the automakers have created a public nuisance by producing “millions of vehicles that collectively emit massive quantities of carbon dioxide.”

OK, first there lawsuits brought by the various states against cigarette companies. These succeeded in large part because the states had very real health care expendatures for illness related to smoking. Of course, once they got their windfall payoff, the money was not sufficiently invested in health care… but that’s another story.

So if the state of California doesn’t actually consider this a nuisance suit, or a “press release” type of lawsuit, what exactly are they going to prove, really.

I have a sample response from each of the car companies: Unfortunately, this lawsuit has sensitized us to the ramifications of doing business in the state of California, and it leaves us no alternative but to stop selling our vehicles in that state. While we do not wish to make it difficult for the state’s 34 million residents to have affordable transportation, we can not subject ourselves to possible open-ended litigation such as this lawsuit. California residents will not be prohibited from purchasing vehicles from any dealerships in neighboring states, but will be asked to sign a waiver of responsibility indicating that they understand that they alone are responsible for any legal recourse should they operate the vehicle in their home state. Good day and good luck.

              

Following up last week’s enforcement delay issued by U.S. District Judge Harold Murphy, this time Fulton County Superior Court Judge T. Jackson Bedford Jr. ruled today that requiring a photo ID violates the constitutional rights of voters. Of course, this just means that the issue will move on to the Georgia Supreme Court, but certainly this makes it unlikely that it could be in place for the November election.

To summarize: First it was considered a ‘poll tax’. So provisions were made to have photo ID furnished for free.
Then it was that there was too little time to educate voters. So now time and money have been spent on that.
Then it was concern that too many people who are registered to vote might not have a photo ID.

But in the end, it comes down to whether or not we are prepared to do whatever it eventually takes: even to the extent of changing how voter registration works. Even if the state constitution were to be amended to specifically call out a photo ID (a silly, unnecessary step), I’m sure that it would not be the end of the road for those who seek to keep this requirement from being put in place.

              

President Bush is currently in the middle of delivering his speech to the UN General Assembly. But just to make sure that any threats Bush makes ring hollow, Jacques Chirac made sure it was known that France will not support sanctions against Iran over its failure to stop its uranium enrichment program. Said Jacques:

“I don’t believe in a solution without dialogue,” he said. He added pointedly that he had never noticed that sanctions had been effective.

You see - it will be much more effective “negotiations” if any economic threat is removed. Maybe he didn’t want the Iranians to feel like they were at a disadvantage during “dialogue” and “diplomacy” phases of this dance. Or maybe he just came around to the Russian and Chinese position, which is that there is more money to be made if they do not comply.

Wasn’t it just last month that Chirac said “Today I call on the Iranian authorities to choose the path of cooperation and confidence by carefully examining this offer and resuming their commitment to suspend activities related to the production of fissile materials.” And “There is room for dialogue and negotiation. We call on Iran’s spirit of responsibility to restore cooperation and confidence, failing which the Security Council will have no choice but to take up the issue.” Apparently “taking up the issue”, just doesn’t include taking any actions on it.

Or maybe France doesn’t have the stomach to take this up now. After all, they had to cough up 200 more troops to go as peacekeepers in Lebanon, and still have a lot of regulations to write to make sure those troops don’t unintentionally disarm any Hezbollah militia.

At least Mr. Chirac did get one thing right - rarely do economic sanctions levied by the UN singularly solve any problems. In fact, in Iraq they contributed to the problem when the pitiful corrupt UN Oil-for-Food program enriched Saddam and cronies.

But it certainly was a nice way to embolden Iran today.

There is always room for dialogue… right up until it’s too late!

UPDATE: Bryan @ Hot Air provides the definitve statement: “Only France could manage to lose a war in which it did not fight.”

              

WDUN is reporting that 30 suspected illegal immigrants have been arrested in an immigration sweep at Forsyth Curb Company in Cumming, GA.

“Twenty of these persons had alleged documents,” [Sheriff’s office spokeswoman Karleen Chalker] said. “To gain employment.”

She said those documents included social security cards, resident alien cards and permanent resident cards.

The other 10 suspects are facing immigration charges and were turned over to federal authorities. Chalker adds the remaining 20 suspects will likely face illegal immigration charges as well.

No word whether the 20 with some documentation are suspected of completely falsifying the documents or whether there is any identity theft involved with the paperwork.

              

EPSN says that Detroit Lions wide receiver Roy Williams wasn’t particularly focused on the team’s goals during last Sunday’s game against the Chicago Bears. According to their report:

The Lions’ Roy Williams apparently doesn’t play to win the game. He’d rather strike a pose.

Williams’ celebration after his first catch of Sunday’s game against the Bears drew ire from the Chicago crowd and had Detroit Free Press columnist Mitch Albom scratching his head.

When Albom asked Williams why he celebrated a reception with his team already trailing by two scores, Williams responded, “I celebrate first downs all the time. I’m not gonna stop that. I’m an exciting player. If I do something exciting, I’m gonna show my actions.”

Albom responded, “But you were losing, 10-0.”

“What does that mean? … That means nothing to me. The score means nothing,” Williams told Albom.

It’s an easy story to believe if you watch the NFL for very long. First there was celebrating touchdowns, then the “sack dance”. Now players break into correographed gyrations for a three yard gain, or for making a tackle on a runner.

It’s silly, and takes away from the bigger picture. Knowing what you need to do next in your gameplan.

But lest one think that professional athletes are the only one striking a pose, oblivious to how the larger game is going… just think about all of the politians during this election cycle. One may be justified in saying that being a polititian is synonymous with being a “poser”.

But it seems that principles certainly take a back seat sometimes. Seizing on a moment (a political ‘first down” if you will) and posing and strutting for the ‘fans’. “Look at me!” It doesn’t even matter if they are behind in the score… it’s all about me!

Maybe it’s time to put your head down and just play hard. Do the right thing. There are still some “real fans” out there who like that kind of player best!

              

Unbelieveable - just when it looked to be a long legal battle, it’s being reported that Barton Corbin has entered a guilty plea in both murder cases; he stood accused of killing his wife just before Chrismas 2004 and an ex-girlfriend in 1990.

In both cases, the relationships fell apart, and the deaths were initially thought to be suicides.

Jury selection in the Gwinnett County case involving his wife Jennifer was just underway. I’m glad that we are going to be spared a long, involved ordeal.

It’s such a shame that all of this happened. While this is certainly good news for the families of the victims, who perhaps can start to have some sense of relief. But it will never be the same for their children, including a small boy who had to find his mother lying in a pool of blood. I pray that someday he will find peace as well.

UPDATE: Corrected typos. Additional reports have also come in that Corbin accepted a plea deal and will receive two life sentances, to be served concurrently. Dolly Hearn’s brother puts it best: “Sixteen years of silence. Sixteen years of pain.”

The case apparently broke open this week because Corbin’s friend, Richard Wilson, admitted to prosecutors that he gave the gun (which was eventually the murder weapon in Jennifer Corbin’s death) to Bart Corbin days before her death. Last week, Corbin’s lawyers were arguing that Wilson should not have to testify in the trial because he did not want to, and he was irrelevant to the case. An Alabama judge disagreed, and indicated he should be considered material witness for the prosecution. Although the trial did not actually get underway, it makes me sick to know that the defense lawyers tried their best to remove the lynchpin of the case.

UPDATE: I guess the Friends of Bart Corbin will have to be updated now. Perhaps they can atr least remove the statement: “An innocent man is being persecuted who is, himself, a victim. He needs our support and he needs our help. We ask that you encourage him as he goes through the excruciating pain that is being forced upon him and to help him.”

              

It seems that the lucrative business community producing fake ID’s for illegal immigrants has six fewer members after their indictment today.

The angle of producing fake Mexican driver’s licenses is an interesting one. With more push for people to “accept” these as valid identification, they are apparently in more demand.

Finding this kind of activity is very difficult, glad to at least have these guys out of commission.

From the WDUN report by Ken Stanford:

A raid in Forsyth County earlier this year leads to federal charges against six people in an alleged scheme to provide false identification papers to illegal immigrants.

The six - who were arrested in January - have been indicted by a federal grand jury.

The suspects were allegedly manufacturing fake green cards, Social Security cards, and fake Mexican driver’s licenses.

Randy Chartash of the U.S. Attorney’s office in Atlanta says its becoming easier and easier to produce such documents with the advent of sophisticated computer technology.

The six suspects were reportedly selling some of the fake I.D. cards for as much as $3,000 each.

Those named in the indictments are: Martin Calisto, 33; Jesus Delgadillo, 21; Oscar Garcia, 23; Julio Guazo, 30; Raul Ortiz, 30; and Maria Tolentino, 28.