My dear wife, the lovely Rosemary, is looking for work opportunities. She's a stay-at-home mom who's pretty desperately looking for something that'll allow her to stay at home during the evenings while I'm at work (I work third shift).

She's an excellent typist, proofreader, and quite competent writer.

Anyone know of anything she could do?

Please though, no "well you might want to try..." suggestions. We're looking for any really solid leads on work doing transcription or anything like that. Or really, any decent opportunity that will let her stay at home.

Researchers at U of M have developed a strain of mice that stay extremely lean despite a very-high-calorie diet and an activity pattern that causes most mice to become obese. The secret appears to be that they have an overabundance of a certain protein that makes it hard for the body to store fat.

These mice appear to be the complement to the famous Zucker rats, which grow obese on a caloric intake and activity pattern that would leave normal rats quite thin and healthy, apparently due to a deficiency in leptin.

How all this relates just yet with chickens and mice which grow obese due to viral infection is not clear.

My view is that in the next decade or so we're finally going to crack the nut on what it takes to really reverse obesity.

Watching people I once respected respond to my criticisms of Michael Moore by saying things like "oh yeah well why don't you condemn Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh's lies too?" has been instructive. I find myself wondering what kind of reaction I'd get if I went to one of these people, listened to them talk about Rush Limbaugh's dishonesty, and said, "You're just a partisan otherwise you'd attack Michael Moore and Molly Ivins too!"

Feh. If someone points out another person's mendacity, you don't equivocate. You say "you're right, that's bad, I hate when anyone of any stripe behaves that way."

Jeff Jarvis, an honorable man of the left, is disturbed by the extremism and the hate-rhetoric that's coming to dominate certain people's outlooks. My wife, meantime, notes that rabid left-wingers are turning violent again.

I continue to put a large portion of the blame for this on our perverse and unAmerican campaign finance "reforms" of recent years. These laws spit in on the first amendment, and have dramatically reduced accountability in political fundraising. They've made the parties, the Democratic Party in particular, vulnerable than ever to being dominated by extremist groups.

I think what we need is for sensible moderates and honorable leftists to start getting involved in Democratic Party politics. That means getting people registered as Democrats and trying to identify sensible and decent candidates in order to help promote them. I'd certainly like to see someone start such a movement. There used to be such a group, the DLC, but they've become dominated by the hard left. So it seems to me that someone needs to start such a group anew.

I really hope someone does. I think not just the Democratic Party but the country needs it.

By the way, if you haven't seen the live video of Spaceship One's first space flight yet, you should. You'll get to see her as she cuts loose from White Knight, lights her candle, and heads for the stratosphere. You'll also see her roll 90 degrees twice, which was one of the technical problems they had that has them retooling the craft. Then you'll see shots from space, and our astronaut hero letting some M&Ms loose to float around the cabin.

No sound, but very cool anyway.

Amusingly, it looks like Coca-Cola is a threat to national security.

These are the days of miracle and wonder.

Eric M. Johnson, a veteran of the Operation Iraqi Freedom, notes:

Iraq veterans often say they are confused by American news coverage, because their experience differs so greatly from what journalists report. Soldiers and Marines point to the slow, steady progress in almost all areas of Iraqi life and wonder why they don’t get much notice – or in many cases, any notice at all.

Part of the explanation is Rajiv Chandrasekaran, the Baghdad bureau chief for the Washington Post. He spent most of his career on the metro and technology beats, and has only four years of foreign reporting, two of which are in Iraq. The 31-year-old now runs a news operation that can literally change the world, heading a bureau that is the source for much of the news out of Iraq.

You should probably read the whole thing. Then contemplate that this more or less matches the experience of weblogs in general. We see countless weblogs run by soldiers who are working over there who are reporting that things are going extraordinarily well with some frustrations, and then we get "professional" press reports that do nothing but emphasize every negative thing and rarely note any of the good news. As Stan Coerr, another veteran of the current conflict, puts it:

Let there be no mistake, those of you who don't believe in this war: the Ba'ath regime were the Nazis of the second half of the 20th century. I saw what the murderous, brutal regime of Saddam Hussein wrought on that country through his party and their Fedayeen henchmen. They raped, murdered, tortured, extorted, and terrorized those in that country for 35 years. There are mass graves throughout Iraq only now being discovered. 1st Battalion, 5th Marines, out of Camp Pendleton, liberated a prison in Iraq populated entirely by children. The Ba'athists brutalized the weakest among them, and killed the strongest. I saw in the eyes of the people how a generation of fear reflects in the human soul.

You should probably read his whole piece too.

Frank J. notes that the top-grossing documentary of all-time is Jackass: The Movie, if we're going by the standard of what makes something a "documentary" these days.

Seems appropriate.

In the meantime, Resurrection Song feels that Michael Moore now represents the center of the Democratic Party. Sad if so, although I hope that's just hyperbole.

The folks over at American Rage have picked Dean's World as one of the best weblogs of 2004. I'm pleased to acknowledge the honor, especially in looking at the weblogs which were similarly honored.

Lately I've noticed that Dean's World rarely rates a mention from most sources when it comes to politically-oriented weblogs (with the exception of The Watcher's Council). Which is okay, since I don't do this to win awards anyway. I write what I want when I want, and we're only about 40% politics anyway. Still, I'd be a liar if I didn't say it's nice to be noticed. Thanks guys.

I have to wonder about the title of these guys' site though. "American Rage?" When I look at most of the folks they list, "rage" hardly seems like the best descriptor for them. Sure I lose my temper now and then, but "rage" doesn't seem the best description for most of the weblogs they hold up for praise.

Hmm.

Man, it's like the '70s all over again: and attempted airplane hijacking was thwarted today on a flight from Munich to Istanbul.

No one was hurt, fortunately.

Well, let it never be said that the American Left's very own Leni Riefenstahl isn't generous: he says he doesn't care if people pirate copies of his movies. My guess is that it's because he's already a multimillionaire and doesn't really care if he hurts distributors or movie theater owners.

While watching the pirate copy of what may turn out to be the crypto-fascist Left's very own "Triumph of the Will," (i.e. the pseudo-"documentary" movie that drives them into power based on deception and hatred), you might as well check out the new Fahrenheit Facts weblog, devoted to documenting the many outright fabrications and falsehoods in the movie.

(Both links via Bryan on his weblog.)

One of the blogosphere's best-kept secrets is back. Check out the latest from Tony Woodlief.

One of the odder treatments for Multiple Sclerosis is bee venom. That's right the poison from bee stings. Some MS patients swear that it reduces their symptoms an their pain. Methods for using it include actually keeping hives of bees and regularly capcturing a bee and forcing it to sting you, to companies which sell the venom in injectible form.

This treatment's been around for years and never taken seriously. It always bugs me when people refuse to take alternative medicine treatments seriously though; if a therapy is unresearched it may be junk but it might work, and if enough people say something works that, to me, is usually justification for at least doing some basic research on it. So I'm pleased to note that researchers are now looking at bee venom as a treatment for MS. Preliminary findings are, well, preliminary, but they do look promising.

Republicans have talked a good game about supporting the concept of federalism and the 10th amendment to the Bill of Rights in recent years, i.e. letting the states decide contentious social issues for themselves and keeping the Federal government out of it.

I support this concept. Have for a long time. Death penalty, gun registration, abortion, speed limits, school vouchers, and so on are all issues that can be dealt with most appropriately at the state level. That way you as a citizen have an easier time having your voice heard when you want an issue changed, and if you just can't persuade your fellow citizens to see things your way, you can move to a state that's more to your liking.

Franklin Roosevelt himself once noted that the great thing about the federal system was that the states could serve as hothouses for experiments in new laws and government programs. The lessons learned in one state would be instructive to the others, or to any proposed Federal programs.

What I find most interesting, however, is that certain people talk a good game about federalism, then do a 180 when it comes to issues like medical marijuana.

Frankly, I've long thought people who oppose medical marijuana are simply cruel and heartless. Still, if the issue's that contentious, you'd think that it's the perfect sort of issue to be decided at the state level. What in the entire Constitution gives the feds authority to outlaw pot--for any reason? Regulating its commerce across state lines, sure, banning its importation, maybe. But outright banning it? I don't think so.

Dean's World will be switching to a new hosting provider on Saturday night. There may be a brief confusing period for a day or two where in some of you will still see the old Dean's World and some will see the new one because of the way that internet domain names work--when there's a switch, some people get the new location information sooner than others.

You'll know you're seeing the new Dean's World when you see that the format of the blog has changed somewhat (we're going to a three-column layout) and when you find that you have to register for an account before you can leave comments.

Yes, we're going to start requing registration before you're allowed to comment. Sorry about that, but we've had too many jerks and trolls and spammers to keep things open anymore. The good news will be that I think the signal-to-noise ratio in the comments will improve significantly once we implement that.

Bill Hobbs has an interesting suggestion: if you want to see Michael Moore's hatemongering propaganda movie "Fahrenheit 911" but don't want to put money in his pocket--money that will eventually wind up in the hands of the hate-groups that are destroying the Democratic Party like "MoveOn.org"--you could buy a ticket to a different movie, and walk in to Fahrenheit 911 instead.

It's an interesting thought. Personally I wouldn't do that. Since enough honorable, decent people of the left and right have pointed out the string of clear and undeniable falsehoods and intentional deceptions in Moore's work, both in this movie and previous efforts, I would have no more interest in seeing it than I would in reading one of Ann Coulter's trash books where she calls everyone who disagrees with her a traitor and a fool. No thank you.

I must say that Michael Moore's latest movie has done one thing for me: it's separated out honorable, honest Democrats from the people who defend the indefensible simply because it's politically useful to them. It's made me lose respect for some people I once had respect for, but it's always good to know where people really stand.

Nathan would like people to know that his Brain Fertilizer weblog is on forced hiatus. He's been deployed by the Air Force again and is stationed in a place where access to his site's been blocked.

He says he'll be back in 2-3 weeks.

My 6.5 year old son just sent his virst Instant Message, and his first email. All in the same day.

And he sent both of them to me.

Don't you wish you were me? I know I do!

If you haven't been absorbed into the Gmail-worshipping collective, soon you will be. Resistance is futile. And amazingly, Michele has an easy and cheap way for you to get your own Gmail account, and for a good cause to boot. How can you say no?

Josh Claybourn tells the story succinctly.

It doesn't sound like much. Yet, I've been using email for more than 20 years, and this is the best mail app I've ever worked with. Period.

I can't wait until they release client software for this thing.

Have you checked out Lucifer's Condiments yet?

They're wacky, weird, and insightful, all at once.

They killed the reservist.

I'm sure it's all because of Abu Ghraib.

I must say that this is the coolest crop circle I've ever seen.

The folks who got up in the middle of the night to do that sure are ambitious. I can imagine better things to do with my time, but then, I'm more sedentary than some.

My buddy Val's having his one-year blogiversary today, and says all sorts of nice things about his blogfather. I blush, but I'm proud. :-)

Glittering Eye is attempting a Taxonomy of positions on the War on Terror, and he has a further expansion here. Good luck to him.

My own take: I do not care who is in charge, Democrat or Republican. I do not care which party holds the Congress, Democrat or Republican. If Bush wins I will support him, as I always have. If Kerry wins, I will support him as best I can, with cogent, specific criticisms and always under the assumption that he is doing his very best for the nation even if I sometimes think I'd do things differently if I were in charge. I will assume I don't know everything, and that he's doing his best and, even if I campaign against him, will assume that he is an honorable man, and that he is not a "liar" simply because I might sometimes disagree wtih him.

And when I want him to do something differently, I will be very specific about what I think that is. For that's what patriots do in times of war.

And what do I want? An expansion of human rights around the world, of democracy around the world, and of freedom around the world. I believe an activist, interventionist foreign policy is at this point in human history the only way to accomplish that--and that if we don't do it, far more people will die in America, in the West, and in the world in general than they will otherwise.

If so, Kevin has a question: What kind of book person are you?

Go let him know.

Our friend Leslie, who used to be at 3375537.com has moved to new digs at TypePad. Update your blogrolls!

I have never been so proud to be an American, and a part of an alliance that includes Australia, the UK, and many other great nations, as I am today. A mighty blow has been struck for freedom, for human rights, for democracy, for the Iraqi people and against Islamo-Fascism.

And compared to the reconstruction of Germany after World War II, our accomplishments are all the more stunning. Even moreso when you look at the amazing accomplishments of the occupational government before the turnover of sovereignty.

I have a little sadness about the bitter, small-minded partisans who do everything they can to find ways to crap all over this amazing day in history. After all, their partisanship exceeds their patriotism, and that's always sad. But such tiny, cynical voices are increasingly being drowned out by the tide of history. Knowing that makes me even happier.

This is a great day for western civilization--and a great day for the human race.

Athena notes how her generation has been defined in recent years.

I think mine has been in many ways too, but hers especially.

A while back I asked for volunteers to help take over webmastering duties on the Operation Give web page. I had a guy who said he could do it but he vanished like smoke on me.

Is anyone up for taking over the webmastering on this site for us? We need someone who's very serious about it. It shouldn't require a ton of time but we need someone who's committed to doing it. We're still shipping toys over there on a regular basis so we need someone who'll really help!

Looks like I blew it. I thought I could get passes into the Democratic National Convention but it turns out I can't; I missed the official deadline and no one seems to know a way to get passes anyway.

I did just get off the phone with the Republicans and they think they can work with us, so those of you who thought you'd like to attend the RNC for us, stay tuned and I'll be getting back to you.

Sorry for the screwup on my part. Although if anyone's got an "in" with the DNC please let me know. Dean's World currently bounces between #11 and #20 on a daily basis in the ecosystem and got 1,605,718 hits last month, 1,423,392 so far in June, and we intend to take this seriously and not as a hack job or joke.

Mark Firestone notes that the U.N. apparently doesn't take its first-ever conference on anti-Semitism seriously. Unfortunate.

The transfer of power to the new provisional government in Iraq has been accomplished two days early. Neat move, and sends a message to both the terrrorists and the never-say-a-good-word critics that we mean what we say and say what we mean.

Very exciting.

The Mayo Clinic notes that fatty liver disease, caused by chronic obesity, has begun to exceed Hepatitis C as a cause of liver damage, and notes further research on how obesity can cause irreversible liver damage.

Yet another sign of why obesity--which is only about 50 pounds overweight by the way--is not particularly funny, but it actually life-threatening.

I must say, after a few days of working with Gmail, I'm thinking about dumping my deanesmay.com address, my copy of Thunderbird, and just start using Gmail for everything.

Man it really is good. It wasn't that obvious at first but the more I use it the more I like it.

The bastards are holding a Marine hostage.

Jeff's covering the story, as is Command Post.

Burt Rutan notes that malfunctions in the first private space flight mean that there's a lot of work yet to do before private space flight becomes routine.

It doesn't take away from their achievement either. It was a few years after Kitty Hawk before airplanes became a commercial success too.

So, it looks like we know who will be in the next beheading video.

I for one don't intend to link the video this time.

You may remember when I mentioned how peanuts always contain aflatoxin in at least small amounts, making all peanut products moderately carcinogenic. There's been no way to get rid of it--until now.

A company has come up with a clever anti-aflatoxin pesticide that involves growing a non-Aflatoxin-producing mold that competes with the mold that creates the poison. They claim to be able to reduce the toxin by at least 70%, and as high as 98% with repeat applications.

That's pretty neat, although of course it doesn't get rid of 100% of the poison. But it's going to do a lot of good for peanut farmers, that's for sure.

Uhm. Wow.

I'm.... speechless.

(Via Sondra.)

And so, another Guest Blogger stint comes to an end and I say "Strychnine" -- which is "Good-bye," in any language.

Do visit us at our regular blog The Moderate Voice during the week for the same kind of crap...I mean posts...that I've done here for the past two days.

You see find them here and here.

Islam-related turmoil may be causing population shifts in two parts of the world:

(1)There are conflicting reports but at least some indicate western workers may be wavering in what has been called their determination not to be intimidated by Al Qaeda terrorists.

(2)And many French Jews could be leaving France due to increasing problems there.

It's happened again...and this time three Turkish citizens are dead meat (see post below about lessons of beheading). CNN just reported:

BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- Terrorists in Iraq claimed to have kidnapped three Turkish citizens and threatened to behead them if Turkey does not pull its companies out of Iraq, the Arabic-language television network Al-Jazeera reported Saturday.

Al-Jazeera broadcast a video showing three people seated, holding what appeared to be identification documents, while two armed masked men pointed guns at them. The network did not air any sound from the tape.

The report came just hours before President Bush was due in Turkey for a NATO summit.

According to Al-Jazeera, the video is from a group that calls itself Unification and Jihad. The group is believed to be linked to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the most wanted terrorist in Iraq who the coalition says is linked to al Qaeda.

The same group kidnapped and beheaded American Nicholas Berg and South Korean Kim Sun-Il when its demands were not met.

According to the text read by the Al-Jazeera anchor, the kidnappers called on the people of Iraq to denounce President Bush's visit to Turkey and to insist Turkish companies leave Iraq.

So clearly a)they are using the kidnappings and (certain) killings as a political tool to foment unrest when Bush arrives and b)this is timed so the three will have their heads chopped off shortly before (or on) the June 30th transfer of power to the new Iraqi government.

...with grosses like this. (Now, with all the $$ he'll make, can he afford to buy a razor that works?)

A blogger's high school friend is killed in Afghanistan and you can read about it here.

I can't get the photo of the fallen soldier's little boy (above link) out of my mind.

So now the blogger wants to do something about it as he shares his memories of him with us.

On the flap over the unrepentant (and quite proud of it) Veep's use of the f-word in an exchange with another Senator The Staunch Moderate (adult language in link) writes:

"Personally, I trust men more if they're willing to use strong language from time to time. Good for Cheney and Kerry."

THAT is consistency -- the same rule applied to both sides. We say: Bravo (or as the Veep and Kerry would say *&!^%A$@!$%!!").

It certainly sounds like it might have been a good idea....Because there more and more questions being raised.

(Note: The ONLY reason The Moderate Voice is not going to read BC's book is that he does NOT read 900 page autobiographies, even though he loves autobios and especially books written by politicos. He just got two considerably shorter books by political expert Larry Sabato on Amazon.com and will read them).

What we've learned from the beheadings so far.

The Moderate Voice is a former journalist (he even went through formal training at the Medill School of Journalism) so he was fascinated last night to hear some cable news outlets going on and on about President George Bush having a very tough and unfriendly news interview with an Irish reporter.

But since he worked in the news media, he learned long ago to try and find the PRIMARY SOURCE and read/hear/watch it himself...then decide. That means trying to bypass CNN, MSNBC and...yes...Fox News. So he found the 10 minute interview which you can watch here..

It downloaded very quickly and TMV watched it. And here's our reaction:

(1)What is the big deal about? Cable news networks here need to get a life.

(2)The reporter's mistake was jumping in very quickly with follow-up questions. Tough follow-ups are actually a reporter's job, no matter who the subject is. She did not try to overshout him but stopped once he indicated he was getting annoyed by her cutting him off. She let him give his full response.

(3)Bush wasn't used to immediate and tough follow-up quesetions because the U.S. press now stylistically tends to let interview subjects give their full response to a question during a press conference. Follow-ups sometimes (but not always) aren't asked. But the purpose of an interview is not to allow someone to give "a statement" but to extract information.

(4)The TV reporter doesn't come off like a bully. She's asking questions that many in her audience would like asked. She was doing her job. She was not a public relations person or a supporter. And Bush knows how to handle himself.

(5)The President comes off exceedingly well . He's clearly irked by her not letting him finish (increasingly so as it wears on) but he actually comes off BETTER than he's ever come off before. Why? Because he has challenging questions and is answering them. And his irritation at the reporter's style forces him to answer the questions with extra confidence and conviction.

TMV felt it was one of the best interviews Bush gave in years. If Bush had faced a journalist saying "So what do you think about terrorism?" who had not peppered him with challenging questions it would have been one more perfunctory talk with the press.

Our overall verdict: the reporter and the President did their jobs and both came off looking like pros. Sean Hannity or Michael Moore would not have looked as good or made GWB look as good.

UPDATE:
--Watch the interview for yourself, then read this. Is this an accurate description of what you saw? It may be in the eye of the beholder.
--Apparently the White House, though, was VERY offended because it cancelled an interview with Laura Bush that had been slated for the same Irish news company.

He'll be the most famous -- and richest -- blogger on the Internet. Wait: doesn't he own the Internet?

(Hey, let's send him his first message here: Do you want to exchange links with Dean's World and The Moderate Voice?)

But they love this guy with the matinee idol looks even more...

Michelle Malking has a pretty good piece making the case that failure to racially profile Arabs causes violation of more people's rights than profiling them would, and creates a security risk.

Well she makes a good point, but I think she misses an even more important point. The truth is that not all Arabs "look Arabic." One of the men who was behind the first World Trade Center attacks, back in the 1990s, had pale skin, red hair, and freckles--and just such an Arabic gentleman runs a liquor store a few miles down the road from me. Furthermore, we know that there is an international web of loosely-cooperating terrorist groups; the IRA, the PLO, and any number of Central and South American groups have contacts and ties with each other, and sometimes even train together.

That being the case, it is entirely possible for terrorist groups to employ females and people of non-obviously Arab extraction to bomb airplanes. Concentrating our efforts to look at people based on superficial ethnicity might be effective in a short-term, emergency situation, but I must say that long-term we need something much better than that. Otherwise we just create a pretty obvious security hole that would be easy to exploit.

It would also be easy to get false identities for "Arab looking" people, giving them Italian or Hispanic names, and therefore making them less likely to be picked up by the computers as someone who needs to be looked at.

Besides, does Michelle honestly think it would be impossible to find a Norwegian-looking grandmother who hates America enough to be part of violence against it?

Boi From Troy has decided to start a Digital Brown Shirts Alliance. He means it sardonically, of course. But I'd caution him to note that some people will take him seriously.

Peak Talk, meanwhile, decries the growing polarization in the country's politics.

I remain of the opinion that the Democrats have become so rage- and hate-filled not because of anything this administration has done, but because they fear that if they lose this election, it will signal a sea change in American politics, and the Democratic Party will have to reconstruct itself from the top down. Thus they'll throw every rage-bomb they can, and even speak well of and defend inexcusably dishonest hate-merchants because they think it will help them drive up the base in November.

Honestly, I'm waiting for one of them to say "extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice."

Georgia Senator Zell Miller, the Republicans' favorite Democrat, will be speaking at the GOP convention. And it's being described in news stories (and on web logs) as something of a coup.

Miller has assumed a role in recent months akin to the late Governor John Connelly of Texas, who switched from being a Democrat to a Republican under President Richard Nixon. Only in this case Miller, who is retiring from the Senate, is not actually switching parties. In a larger sense, his status reflects the exodus over the years of many conservative Democrats to the GOP fold. Only in this case he hasn't formally left.

According to news reports, Miller will give his speech on Wednesday night of the four-day August convention in NYC. The Bush campaign's proud annoucement is expected Monday.

Needless to say, Democrats aren't exactly pleased:

Bobby Kahn, the chairman of the Georgia Democratic Party, said he wasn't surprised.


"Maybe I'll switch to the Republican Party so I can speak at the Democratic Convention and bash Bush," Kahn said. "It makes about as much sense."


Kahn was a top aide to Democratic Gov. Roy Barnes, who appointed Miller to the Senate following the death of Miller's predecessor, Republican Sen. Paul Coverdell.


"I advocated his appointment," Kahn said of Miller. "He said he would be independent and he was for a while, but he hasn't been lately. He's been in lockstep with the Republicans and I don't know what's happened to him. It's really kind of sad."

Actually, the Republicans needn't be so elated and the Democrats needn't fret so much.

Miller isn't going to change significant poll numbers on this race, nor will any of his comments lambasting his party be a big revelation (but they will liven the convention up). He has had a high profile for a while now with his criticism of his party and various Democrats via his lively book, plus appearances on radio and cable talk shows.

HOWEVER, his appearance will underscrore how the Democratic party's center has sh