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From an article in the British Independent, hat tip to Arts and Letters Daily:DHURNA Anglo-Indian Extorting payment from someone by sitting at their front door and staying there without food, threatening violence, until you get paid. SOKAIYA Japanese A man...

Name Of Chemical Released In Salem Investigation

At least the chemical poisoning incident was not caused by Phosgene, a military toxic gas. This was reported in the Argus as being the probable agent, but a different, but superficially related material was finally positively identified:

McCook County Emergency Management thinks it has identified the mysterious substance found in the four-plex last Friday. Test results from the South Dakota and Minnesota State Labs point to aluminum phosphide, a toxic chemical often used by farmers. The report also lists traces of the gas version of the chemical, called phosphine, which can be used as a fumigant.

This still leaves question as to the origin of the chemicals in an apartment building:

Authorities say aluminum phosphide is not a chemical that would normally be found inside of a home. But they also won't comment on if the chemical was put in the building to hurt those inside. "We're attempting to get results back on many many things until we get all that back we can't really say one way or the other," Gerlach said.

Wake up, NASA!

As noted before, this is an idea that we need to be moving with! It's really a MUCH superior method for doing the heavy lifiting into orbit.

This is a very interesting posting in its own right. Many of the comments are just as interesting. (Including an assortment of comments from moonbat half-cocked luddites and nay-sayers, which I suppose are interesting also in a pathological sense.)

The more time that passes since President Dubya announced his choice of Harriet Miers for the SCOTUS, the more concerns become apparent.

Firstly, the disturbance in the political force has been noted all the way on the other side of the pond:

Bush nomination for swing vote with Supreme Court infuriates supporters

President George W Bush nominated a trusted aide for the key seat on America's top court yesterday but the choice infuriated his supporters on the Right far more than his Democratic foes.

No s--t, Sherlock! As to why...read on!

Ann Coulter, in her inimitable style of invective, PREDICTED the probable type of appointment that might be expected from Bush, based on his political record:

BOB SHRUM WITH A GOOD CAUSE

Now Bush has Sandra Day O'Connor's seat to fill. For those conservatives confident that Bush won't betray them, let's review Bush's other ideas about what constitutes a good Republican....
In 2002, Bush backed liberal Richard Riordan in the Republican gubernatorial primary in California against conservative Bill Simon....
In 2004, Bush backed liberal Republican Arlen Specter over conservative Pat Toomey in the Republican Senate primary in Pennsylvania....
In 2004, Bush backed Mel Martinez for the open Senate seat in Florida and asked the magnificent Katherine Harris not to run against him, so she graciously bowed out. Martinez has since called on Bush to shut down Guantanamo. What's Spanish for "buyer's remorse"?...
This year, rumors have it that Bush is again discouraging the magnificent Harris not to run for the Senate....
Also this year, Bush is backing developmentally-disabled Lincoln Chafee over the only Republican in the race, Stephen Laffey, Harvard MBA and mayor of Cranston, RI....

As if that isn't enough to raise the hackles of a real conservative, that list doesn't even take into account the administrations domestic policy, which has acquiesced (when not actually promoting) a constant expansion of the role and power of the Federal government.

Most telling of all is Coulter's recap of the situation of the history of the GOP "establishment" (including the Bushes)with regards to the rise and eventual victory of Ronaldus Magnus. Check it out for yourself. HINT: The GOP establishmentarians were NOT very big on Reagan at all!

Her conclusion absolutely nails down the biggest difference between the gipper and the Dubya:

The secret to Reagan's greatness was he didn't need a bunch of high-priced Bob Shrums to tell him what Americans thought. He knew because of his work with General Electric, touring the country and meeting real Americans. Two months a year for eight years, Reagan would give up to 25 speeches a day at G.E. plants ? a "marination in middle America," as one G.E. man put it. Reagan himself said, "I always thought Hollywood had the wrong idea of the average American, and the G.E. tours proved I was right."

Because of these tours, Reagan knew ? as he calmly told fretful advisers after the Grenada invasion ? "You can always trust Americans." The G.E. tours completely immunized Reagan from the counsel of people like Karl Rove, who think the average American is a big-business man who just wants his taxes cut and doesn't care about honor, country, marriage or the unborn.

Michelle Malkin has a pointed and graphical MESSAGE TO THE WHITE HOUSE:

She goes on to note: "Guess it's too late." Indeed.

Just to ice the conservative s--t cake:
Democrats are relieved about Miers pick from Tim Chapman posting at Townhall.com, noting a positive reaction from the likes of Bob Beckel, Sen. Charlie "No-guns" Shumer, and Sen. "Dingy" Harry Reid. This as much as any of the above, makes the Chief think that we may be in a heap of trouble on this one!

On a more serious (if possible) note, Randy Barnett transplanted from The Volokh Conspiracy writes in the WSJ Opinion Journal based of Hamilton's writing in Federalist #76:

"To what purpose then require the co-operation of the Senate? I answer, that the necessity of their concurrence would have a powerful, though, in general, a silent operation. It would be an excellent check upon a spirit of favoritism in the President, and would tend greatly to prevent the appointment of unfit characters from State prejudice, from family connection, from personal attachment, or from a view to popularity. . . . He would be both ashamed and afraid to bring forward, for the most distinguished or lucrative stations, candidates who had no other merit than that of coming from the same State to which he particularly belonged, or of being in some way or other personally allied to him, or of possessing the necessary insignificance and pliancy to render them the obsequious instruments of his pleasure." (The italics are mine.)

You have to go read the piece - the Chief won't attempt to recap this, but it's sure worth a look. Also worth a look are posts here and here over across the line in Minnesnowta from Powerline - suffice it to say they aren't real impressed with this appointment either.

There's much more than this out there - Emperor Misha's Rottweiler is snarling, but Captain Ed, while not fully pleased seems to be cautiously optimistic. The Chief is trying to be also, but it's hard not to be pessimistic given the weight noted above. I hope Cap'n Ed is right, but fear he may not be. Again, time will tell.

Rush Limbaugh is not happy with Meirs: Now the Democrats are saying some favorable things about Harriet Miers right now led by Dingy Harry, the Senate leader. He likes her very much. It's almost like he'd like to marry her,...

Some folks seem to have enjoyed this post from yesterday, so I might do more of that sort of thing in the future. Many thanks to Todd Epp for what he had to say about it. (And I'll also take...

Howard Fineman:With George W. Bush?s presidency mired in the muck of hurricanes and doubts about the war, you?d think Democrats would be bursting with energy, eagerly expecting to regain power. But, in a roomful of well-connected Democrats the other night,...

Let's start with the worst. Abe rounds up some educational "zero tolerance" that ran amok in Omaha when a six year old showed up at school with a butter knife in his backpack. As Abe points out, this is always...

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