Posted 10:54 AM by Floyd

I read in the Oakland A's newsgroup that pitcher Ted Lilly's full name is Theodore Roosevelt Lilly. No one would think twice about this if Lilly were black -- I remember with fondness a high school running back who played against our school who was named Marcus Anthony -- but Lilly is, well, lily-white. There were a few mocking followups, but no explanation of where Lilly got this name.

Here is the explanation, in an ESPN article: Lilly is Theodore Roosevelt Lilly III. It was his grandfather who was named after Roosevelt:

``My great-grandfather rode with Theodore Roosevelt, admired him and respected him, worked for him, pretty much,'' Lilly said. ``He was a Rough Rider, and named my grandfather Theodore Roosevelt. That's how I got that name, from the admiration of being around him.

I picked up this link from the Elephants in Oakland blog. Elephants is a fun read, bombastic and opinionated; the layout is a wonderful, hideous, garish green and gold.

Posted 7:06 PM by Floyd

If only the United States acted nice and didn't invade "harmless" countries (where "harmless" is defined as "in a state of war with us due to treaty violations"). Then all the world would love and respect us. Then other countries would treat us as well as, say, Canada:

Right in the midst of the Bill Sampson controversy, after a Canadian citizen was tortured and sentenced to death in Saudi Arabia, dozens of MPs, Senators and other government VIPs gorged themselves on Saudi hospitality at a big reception last night - and they were bending over backwards to avoid offending their generous hosts. ...

And worst of all, shame on newly-appointed Liberal Senator Mac Harb for mocking - yes, mocking - his countryman's allegations of torture:

"Here is someone who has been charged with a murder and who has been very successful in making himself, of being, a victim. I think we have to look at both sides of the issue," Mr. Harb said at a reception hosted by Saudi Ambassador Mohammed Al-Hussaini to honour the oil kingdom's national day.

But wait, there's more proof of the superiority of being non-aligned and defenseless:

[Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister] Bill Graham says he believes Maher Arar, the Canadian citizen sent to his native Syria because of suspected links to Al-Qaida, will get a fair trial in Syria. Why? Because that's what the Syrians told him.

(Both links from Damian Penny's excellent blog.)

Posted 2:35 PM by Floyd

Tim Blair brings us a tale of activism committed by, and blogged by, microcephalics. Greenpeace activists had blocked a ship from delivering genetically modified corn to Veracruz. The Greenpeacers gloated as the ship turned tail and departed -- only to be foiled when the "less-than-honest" captain turned his ship around and redocked.

Be sure to visit Blair's comments for lots of mean-spirited mockery. Also check out EvilPundit's illustration of the Greenpeace vs. GM corn battle.

Posted 4:24 PM by Floyd

Oh my God! They killed Encyclopedia Brown!

Because of the long-standing mutual enmity between Meany and Brown, Meany was named among the suspects in The Case Of Encyclopedia Brown's Mangled Corpse. Meany denied the allegations.

"It's true that Detective Brown and I didn't see eye to eye, but I would never do something so downright dirty rotten as murder him," Meany said. "Besides, it's a matter of public record that, at the time the crime was committed, I was at the North Pole watching the penguins."

While no solid leads have surfaced, Kimball-Brown said she has a hunch that Brown knew his killer.

"The bitter irony is that Brown would have easily cracked a case like this one," Kimball-Brown said. "I just can't help but wonder: WHAT DID ENCYCLOPEDIA KNOW THAT WOULD HAVE HELPED HIM SOLVE HIS OWN MURDER?"

For the answer to this story, turn to page 76.

Posted 11:14 PM by Floyd

From Fresh Potatoes (Fresh Potatoes?) comes this great graphic, which shall be displayed permanently under my blogroll:

Posted 11:06 PM by Floyd

Just how stupid do I look? Here is an email I received recently:

Important notice

We have just charged your credit card for money laundry service in amount of $234.65 (because you are either child pornography webmaster or deal with dirty money, which require us to layndry them and then send to your checking account). If you feel this transaction was made by our mistake, please press "No".
If you confirm this transaction, please press "Yes" and fill in the form below.

Enter your credit card number here:

Enter your credit card expiration date:

I especially like the "No" option. "I do traffic in child pornography or other illicit activities, but I will not be requiring your services now."

Posted 9:37 PM by Floyd

The Sacramento Bee has decided to help out the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals by distracting attention from it; the Bee has just issued its own insane, ludicrous, and blood-pressure-tripling decision. Dan Weintraub, who has been following the recall campaign like Saul Panzer and who is presumably the only reason to pay attention to the Bee -- I doubt I will order a subscription to peruse their Style section -- has been muzzled.

Weintraub blogged that Cruz Bustamante would be an unknown were he not Latino. The head of the Latino caucus objected to the idea that Bustamante received special treatment due to his ethnicity, and made his unhappiness known to the Bee. So the Bee prohibited Weintraub from publishing unedited -- which for all practical purposes means that he may not operate a blog. I mean, he may have the same URL and the same layout, but if you have to ask "may I" and wait six hours to be published, you're not blogging.

Incredibly, Bee ombudsman Tony Marcano spent about twenty paragraphs patting himself and his paper on the back for the decision to put a leash on Weintraub. I quote two choice sentences:

That doesn't necessarily mean that Weintraub's blog should have been reworded, but an editor should at least have had the opportunity to question his conclusions.

What could possibly have been the purpose of "questioning his conclusions" but to intimate that Weintraub cannot say certain things because they might offend the politically powerful? Weintraub said that Bustamante benefited from being a Latino. Given that he belonged as an assemblyman to the Latino Political Caucus, and given that the head of said Latino Political Caucus had a hissy fit and complained to Weintraub's boss, is not Weintraub's opinion at least plausible?

If, like my wife, you are prone to occasional stomach upset, you may want to read this next bit with your hand firmly clamped over your mouth.

I hope that The Bee considers that its credibility is worth more than the cost of one full-time employee.

Hell, I would hope that The Bee considers its credibility worth more that than the cost of irritating a key member of the political establishment. Guess not.

Imagine if Weintraub had written something nasty about Schwarzenegger and a high muckity-muck in the California Republican party had protested that Weintraub needed an editor. The Bee would have written many columns about their heroic refusal to be censored. The amount of self-congratulation involved would probably have killed two or three innocent bystanders. Let's all repeat after me: "There is no liberal media bias."

Posted 10:58 AM by Floyd

Mark Steyn writes about General Wesley Clark's entry into the Democratic presidential race. Steyn is very good at dispensing with conventional wisdom and uncovering a hard-to-see point:

It is not going to work. All General Jello does is remind voters of what they dislike about the Dems on this war: their weaselly evasive oppositionism. All his military background does is keep military matters at the forefront of the campaign.