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Sorry, but our commenting software, Blogspeak, is down. Haloscan will be taking over comment software duties, so bear with us as the switch proceeds. In the meantime, if you can't wait, respond to our wild-eyed, crazy, right wing (and some left-wing) entries on your own site and e-mail us a link. We'll note it here.

Also, I've added Spacecraft to the right hand link list, a "Discussion of Spacecraft Design, Dynamics and Control, and News". A lot of news, too. With the new direction for NASA, it's even more relevant and always enjoyable to see what a true rocket scientist has to say.

JUST ONE GUY WITH ANGER ISSUES HELPING ANOTHER?

The press is reporting that Democrat Presidential candidate Howard Dean, as Vermont Governor, intervened "to help a wife abuser in a child-custody case". The abuser happened to be an old political crony, and "Dean filed an affidavit claiming [he] was 'a firm but gentle disciplinarian' and 'a wonderful parent.'"

Since Dean, like Clinton, is not a Republican, expect this revelation to have no effect whatsoever on his probable receipt of the NOW/Feminazi endorsement if he wins the nomination.

FROM THE EARTH TO THE MOON
Bush made his long awaited visionary Moon/Mars speech today. The AP science writer figured it was a good time to show his knowledge that Presidents are term-limited, as though maybe no President should propose anything that can't be finally finished, like a sitcom conflict, in the very near short term. Here's what "journalist" and civics buff Paul Recer had to say:

Bush said early financing would total $12 billion for exploration over the next five years, only $1 billion of it in new funds. That meant that even if he wins a second term in office, his successors in the Oval Office would be responsible for finding the rest of the money for a program likely to run into the hundreds of billions of dollars.

You don't say!

Coincidentally, the AP ran a poll yesterday that asked "Do you support President Bush's highly expensive proposal to send Americans on a dangerous mission to the Moon and to Mars the same year that seven Columbia astronauts got killed in a space mission, or should the money be spent to by you a shiny new car and some free 'scripts from CVS?" Of course, the folks weren't too keen on space exploration and scientific discovery when it might mean that they'd have to pay for grandpa's Lipitor out of their own pocketses.

But that shouldn't be a surprise, most of the short-sighted, self-indulgent prefer a raise in next week's paycheck to a little long-term research and development. And surely a little bling bling today is preferable to, say, college. We should take that $400 billion for free prescription drugs and plow it all into NASA, giving due funding to the Breakthrough Propulsion Physics Project and to the Mars goal. If grandma needs drugs, her kids should be writing her a check rather than buying the third season of Sex and the City.

Don't agree? Check out what the lefty over at Stinging Nettle has to say.

A DEMOCRAT PRESIDENT
Every election season, I go through the same exercise. I look at the Democratic candidates and try to imagine them as the big cheese, leader of the free world and the embodiment of my nation's strengths, hopes and dreams. I look for the positive and try to discover how I will be proud of this man as my president. In other words, I take a break from nitpicking and poopooing every proposal as either lame-brained or bullshit.

I haven't gotten far with the current Democratic crowd. Gut reaction is that Kucinich, Sharpton and Clark scare me, but I still believe that I can find something about each of the rest to be proud of. Maybe my gut can change on Clark, but I'm sure that my gut is right on Kucinich and Sharpton. Maybe a President Gephardt would find that economic conservative from his old days. Maybe President Dean would govern as a moderate and not as a left-wing demagogue. Maybe President Lieberman would -- well, that's not hard., I'm sure I could be proud of a President Lieberman.

I'm from North Carolina, so I've been thinking a lot about John Edwards. Is he a liberal? I don't know. Yes, we can point to his voting record, but as a freshman Senator, there's a certain amount of toeing the party line that he's had to do. And since Tom Daschle is drawing that line, of course anybody voting with his party most of the time will have a liberal voting record. Otherwise, the leadership would have marginalized him because loyalty to the leadership seems to be one of the prime values in Washington.

But Edwards is mostly portrayed in the press as a moderate, and I think that is how he wants to be protrayed. Now drop your cynicism and consider that maybe he wants to be a moderate because he believes he is a moderate -- which must mean that he sees others in his party that he knows are to his left. Is it possible that Edwards really is a moderate, mouthing certain leftist buzzwords to appeal to Democratic voters?

His campaign staff does not read like a who's who of national Democratic politics. Most have experience on the national level, but no one was the top dog on any previous campaign, so it is impossible to tell if they are typical DNC Democrats, if they are DLC Dems, or if they are non-ideological. The General Chairman is Raleigh lawyer Ed Turlington. And while we NOrth Carolina Republicans like to tell you how liberal our North Carolina Democrats are, they aren't liberal on the whole to the extent that the national party is. A liberal serving the far left their red meat would not be competitive in North Carolina in any normal year, and Edwards ran the center in 1998 here.

So, my hope for an Edwards presidency, if it comes to that, is that his Democratic party values truly were fashioned in North Carolina, where Democratic leaders have understood the importance of business (Terry Sanford was responsible for Research Triangle Park -- which liberals today would call "corporate welfare") and a strong national defense (former Congressman Walter Jones, Sr., for example) and that have been somewhat wary of the national party's liberal extremes (Bob Etheridge doesn't seem to be a pawn of Nancy Pelosi). And yes, I know there are plenty of examples and arguments to show some real, fantasyland style liberalism on his part and members of his campaign, but like I said, I'm trying to see the possibilities here.

WHY NOT ATTACK SAUDI ARABIA?
Some things written as comments to other posts should be read, so I'll post here this response from Jeff to the earlier question from John: When is the Saudi invasion, Colin?

I think the Saudis have a lot of things to answer for (Its stone age punishment of criminals and its inhuman treatment of women to begin with), however it is a completely different matter than the Iraq situation and I am sure you know that. The government is guilty of allowing extremist activities to occur because it is afraid of an islamic revolution. The rulers of Saudi Arabia are somewhat west-friendly (mostly because that's where they get their wealth and power through oil) but they must appear to be good Wahabis and anti-west. The alternative to this behavior would probably be the kind of genocidal acts that we KNOW Saddam has done. I don't think you would find half a million bodies buried in mass graves in Saudi Arabia. If you know of something like this, I would truly like hear about it.

If the Saudis are guilty of genocide; making war on its neighbors; using WMDs and continuing to research, build, and hide them; harboring terrorists like Abu Nidal; training terrorists to hijack airliners; Shooting Scud missiles into civilian populations in Israel; ignoring dozens of UN demands; shooting missiles at American Fighter Jets adhering to UN rules; committing torture and rape on an industrial scale; and planning and attempting to assassinate a former US President then, by God, let's take Saudi Arabia down. If not, I think it is a feeble attempt to equate Iraq and Saudi Arabia and other tactics are called for. Like Iran and North Korea, Saudi Arabia is begin dealt with in a different way than Iraq. This shows that, in fact, Bush isn't the wild cowboy moron the left wants to portray him as. The Libya [capitulation] shows that as well.

Excellent response.