I’d be remiss if I didn’t pass on something I flaked on yesterday; my friend and longtime Northern Alliance Radio colleague King Banaian is running for the Minnesota House.

The Twitter account for the campaign will be @kingforhouse — please find it, follow it, and watch for more.  I feel like the Facebook fan page looks too plain tonight so we’ll get to that tomorrow.  And for those who have inquired about online donation, thank you so much.  We will get that up tomorrow as well, along with an address for those preferring the paper variety.

We might need to run a trip from the Cities up to St. Cloud for lit-dropping and campaigning one of these next weekends.

I’ll be passing on news from the Banaian campaign as it’s warranted.  It’d sure be nice to eject Haws from office.

D’ya suppose we can book Banaian on the NARN broadcast at the convention?

Old blogs never fade away.  They just die.

I read somewhere once upon a time that 95% of all blogs in existence have less than five entries, ever.  That’s close to my own personal average, actually; I’ve started close to a dozen different blogs over the years; a blog for NARN show prep, several special-issues blogs, and my favorite, “Scandalmanac”, a short-lived production during the Bush years that chronicled would-be “scandals” that the Dems tried to foist on the people (which, in retrospect, I wish I’d have not only carried on with but expanded; tracking Sarah Palin’s various “scandals” and their respective denouements would have been a fine public service, if only to contrast the productivity and fecklessness of the Democrat smear machine.

When most people stop blogging, they just…stop.

But Marty Andrade – an excellent writer, former talk show host (at KYCR and St. Cloud’s KNSI) and a conservative intellectual who in a less-imperfect world would be working full-time as a policy wonk, somewhere – has managed to neither die nor fade away, blog-wise. 

The story could have been familiar enough; Marty the writer’s life got more complicated (or so I surmised from his blog), so Marty Andrade the blog started, he thought, to suffer.

So Marty (writer and blog) seemingly repurposed themselves.  Marty Andrade morphed from a stream of original (and excellent) writing into a peripatetic stream of links to other peoples’ interesting stuff.

Like this:

Centuries later, lost Shakespeare ‘found’? – Yahoo! NewsQuote:”Some scholars believe Lewis Theobald’s “Double Falsehood,” first performed in London’s West End in December 1727, was based substantially on the Bard’s “Cardenio.” ”There is definitely Shakespearean DNA,” said English literature professor Brean Hammond, who has worked since 2002 to determine if “Double Falsehood” has Shakespearean roots. Arden Shakespeare, an authoritative publisher of the Bard’s works, has released an edition of the play edited by Hammond — a decision the publisher acknowledges is controversial.

Arden’s general editor, Shakespeare scholar Richard Proudfoot, agrees with Hammond and says there is no absolute way of knowing if “Double Falsehood” is based on Shakespeare’s work, but he argues it is a “sufficiently sustainable position” that it represents the play in some form”

Sorta like Instapundit with less “heh”ing and “Indeed”ing.

I’ve lately found myself visiting MA just to give my brain a random trivia jumpstart.  I like that kind of thing.

And so should you.  Make Marty Andrade a stop on your daily prowl about the Minnesota Organization of Bloggers.

Via Polimal, the Teachers Union is going to sit on its hands until it figures out who the winning (DFL) horse is going to be:

Education Minnesota president Tom Dooher said today the statewide education union won’t endorse a candidate for governor before the party conventions. The union’s political action committee isn’t scheduled to meet until May. He said they have no plans to meet before then. The DFL convention is set for April 23-25 and the Republicans will gather April 29 to May 1.

Amazing how that timing worked out, isn’t it?

EdMinn is, of course, a kingmaker in Minnesota politics, not only for their delegate count, but because of their deep, deep pockets.  Expect lots of ads this fall from EdMinn and its related “non-profits” showing children being tossed from schools into the street if Emmer or Seifert are elected.

Why no endorsement? Dooher says Education Minnesota says the candidate pool is deep this year and they are going through a “very exhaustive process” to make sure they endorse a candidate that will be a strong partner in moving education forward in the state.

In plain English:  the DFL convention doesn’t matter, and EdMinn is keeping its powder dry for the only contest that matters – the DFL primary race, which is sure to be a donnybrook, with four of the thirteen DFL candidates pledging to ignore the endorsement.

I’m not going to say that the most frustrating arguments are the ones where your opponent reduces your case to its most absurd extreme.

You:  I think it’d be fun to go to Burger King.

Opponent:  Why do you hate McDonald’s?

You get used to arguments like this if you have junior high kids, psychotic neighbors…

…and if you’re a conservative blogger.

Penigma, writing at Penigma, kinda goes there in a piece that eventually gets around to its real point, his thesis that government regulation had NOTHING to do with the meltdown of the financial system.

I said eventually.  He leads off by accusing me of sophistry, which is fine but incomplete (I got to sophistry after freshmanstry.  But then I proceeded to juniorstry and seniorstry), and more or less irrelevant – because unlike so much that goes on at SITD, it’s not about me.  It’s about my longtime blog associate Johnny Roosh:

JR apparently holds some sort of position in financial services, and has described himself as being a “financial planner.” We’ve asked a few times what licensure he holds (Series 7 would be pretty standard) – but he hasn’t answered.

Nor should he.  It’s nobody’s business.  I’ll vouch for Roosh’s credentials as a financial planner – he’s got golf clubs, even!

Now, Penigma does skirt close to a serious point, here.  I’ve bagged on anonymous bloggers.  But the problem is the ones that use their anonymity to take cheap, defamatory personal shots at other people while shielding themselves from consequences.  There are a few of them in the Twin Cities leftyblogging community; fearless about going after other people, but queasy about their blogging affecting their day jobs.  My answer has always been that nobody should write anything for which they’re not ready for the real consequences under their real name.  Roosh (and First Ringer, another SITD writer who stays under the radar for vocational reasons) meet that standard.  Otherwise I’d have never invited them to join SITD.

And as it happens, Roosh’s “anonymous” (but, I assure you, extant) credentials have no bearing on the issue in Penigma’s piece.

But since we’re on the subject, Penigma claims second-hand expertise on the subject at hand:

I can’t claim to be a great expert on financial services – I work in investment banking, dealing with large cash movement and the reasons for the appetite (or lack) of banks for deposits and the desires of brokers to make ’spread revenue’ with the cash they have on hand. But, I DO work with some people who are VERY experienced in financial services, people reasonably well-known on Wall Street.

Now, Roosh’s license as a financial planner doesn’t necessarily make him an expert on macroeconomics in and of itself; being literate about economics does.

But claiming to know all sorts of well-known people on Wall Street – Republicans, no less! – is another thing altogether.  So it’d be useful for Penigma to provide the names of these Wall Street sources, so that people can gauge their, and his, credibility.

Because so much of what they (via Penigma, natch) say beggars reason so completely.

I’m not sure he is properly licensed, and frequently he makes comments which belie the suspicion that he is not, for he, like our former pest troll KR, claims that it was governmental regulation which caused the recent econimic meltdown/catastrophe.

This takes us back to my first paragraph; Penigma has reduced Roosh’s argument (and mine, and King Banaian’s, and that of virtually every conservative with an interest in the issue) to an absurdly simple, and utterly misleading thesis, which Penigma helpfully reprises:

Yet, when you want to hate the government, you look for any excuse.

Never chalk up to “hate” what can be better explained by “reason”.

I don’t know a whole lot of people, outside of blog comments, who say that government regulation, alone and by itself, caused the meltdown.

But it’s a simple fact that behind each of the factors that Penigma cites that Penigma’s powerful but anonymous Wall Street friends cite for the meltdown, the hand of the Fed lurks.

2. People were overly incented to do deals – so they did bad deals when the good deals ran out.
Some of these kinds of deals were:
a. Many companies sold their bad debts off to other companies packaged up into deals with many parts, claiming they were good investments (i.e. derivatives)

Right.

And what incented companies to go for these deals?

The fact that government, via a series of initiatives during the Clinton and Bush administraitons – promised to underwrite the deals.

b. Other companies effectively sold their debt exposure (insurance against loss) telling the buyer they were good ideas to hold the risk (Credit Default Swaps).

And what was the initial impetus for these sales?

The government mandate, driven by Clinton/Bush-era legislation, for Fannie and Freddie to underwrite all this debt.

c. Still more companies bet long with what was supposed to be ‘low risk’ money – namely money market funds. When their bets failed, the underlying money fund collapsed.

Why was the money supposedly low-risk?  Because the government artificially lowered the risk.

d. Still MORE companies wrote mortgages with zero income to debt requirements, or wrote HELOCs with equity percentages above 100%, or agreed upon mortgages with HUGE balloon payments that they should have had zero expectation the customer would be able to pay when the interest rate or the balloon shot up.

And why did these companies change their policies?

Because the government mandated Fannie and Freddie assume the risk!

Second – Wall Street knows it full well too. You’d be hard pressed to find anyone worth a damn actually blame CRA

Well, perhaps among Penigma’s legions of powerful-yet-anonymous Republican friends on Wall Street.

Elsewhere?  Not so much.

Note to Penigma:  please provide the names and credentials of anyone laughing.

Audio, too.

I wonder if the 55 MPH speed limit, a product of his protracted era of malaise, wasn’t more of a factor in retrospect, of the quick demise of his executive branch career?

Meanwhile, over thirty years later, the government is relaxing in favor of allowing citizens to use their own judgment.

The 55 mph national speed limit enacted in 1973 in response to the first Arab oil embargo was justified as a means of conserving fuel. In 1987, the law was changed to allow speeds up to 65 mph. But the Republican Congress elected in 1994 did few things more popular than repealing the limit altogether in 1995.

Virginia will become the 34th state to boost interstate speed limits to 70 mph or higher. In big, empty states such as New Mexico, Idaho and Nevada, posted limits on rural interstates can be as high as 75 mph.

I have noticed when traveling longer distances that no matter what car I am driving, I tend to feel most comfortable just above 70 mph. The roads and our cars seem to be designed for that speed.

Left to their own devices, American drivers confronted with an open stretch of interstate highway tend to drive at about 70 miles per hour—whatever the legal speed limit happens to be.

But doesn’t speed kill?

both fatalities and fatality rates on U.S. highways are declining even as speed limits rise. The U.S. Department of Transportation last week reported that its latest estimate of highway deaths in 2009 is 33,963—the lowest number since the government began keeping these grim records in 1954. The fatality rate is estimated at 1.16 deaths per 100 million vehicle miles traveled.

Modern cars and light trucks have an average of 225 horsepower under the hood and sophisticated safety systems such as traction control. They are designed to cruise comfortably, safely and efficiently at between 65 and 70 mph—if not faster, particularly in the case of the autobahn-burners German luxury brands sell.

Anything above 75, I feel I almost have to be “too attentive” to the road and am unable to enjoy the ride.

Anything below that…I get bored.

How fast do you drive?

I take occasional issue with my fellow AM1280 host Bradlee Dean on some questions political and theological, even as I support his program, “Sons of Liberty”.  “Sons…” does for politics what his late, long-running show on AM980 The Believer did for religion; take it back to its original fundamentals; going back to Thomas Jefferson and James Madison on The Patriot more or less like referring to Luke and Saint Paul on The Believer. 

Neither program is/was for the faint of heart or the mushy of belief.  Like I said – I disagree with Dean on some things as strenuously as I agree with him on others.

But knowing Bradlee as I do – he’s a great guy, and I’ve had a lot of fun watching his kids grow up over the years during our mutual Saturday time slots – I got a kick out of Andy Birkey’s odd little swat at Dean in the Mindy yesterday (emphasis added):

You Can Run But You Cannot Hide, the front group for the punk rock ministry of Bradlee Dean…

“Front group?”

Now, perhaps Birkey was writing imprecisely.  But a “Front” usually implies some level of deception – like the Mob using a laundry as a front for a drug operation, for example, or someone setting up a potemkin news organization to serve as a campaign propaganda outlet.  That kind of thing.

Just between you (pl) and me, whatever Bradlee Dean is, he’s not especially reticent about who he is or what he or “You Can Run…” represents.

Back to Birkey:

… took his brand of fundamentalist Christianity to a DFL gubernatorial meet-and-greet several weeks ago…

Several weeks ago?

Then why cover it on a “news” site? 

Did Birkey just hear about it?  Or was it a slow news day at the Mindy?

Or did John Marty need to place a story showing how he was duking it out with all those teabagging fundies to make his gubernatorial campaign seem like less a relic from the nineties?

There was some other stuff, but I lost interest.  Sorry.

I’m an extremist.

No, really.  Janet Napolitano, Nick Coleman, scads of intellectually-incontinent leftybloggers and the Coffee Parties all say so.

Calling anyone to the right of Larry Pogemiller an “extremist” was a standard practice in Minnesota politics long before any non-poli-sci wonk ever heard of Saul Alinski.  For generations, anyone in Minnesota who stood outside the great DFL-and-”moderate”-GOP, “marching-boldly-toward-the-future-hand-in-hand toward the collective vision of our betters” ideal was called an extremist (provided they were on the right. And of course, bits and pieces of it have leaked out in the national culture; the idea that Rush Limbaugh listeners were a “vast right-wing conspiracy” responsible for the bombing of the Murragh building was the moment it all got really serious – the first time the (wife of a) sitting president had ever tied a perfectly legitimate free speech activity to mass-murder and terrorism.

Since then, trying to link anything – Second Amendment ctivistm, critizing free trade agreements, being a hardliner on immigration, being a pro-lifer or an uppity Libertarian or a tax protester, whatever – gets one called an “extremist” first, with questions not asked later.  Several non-profits – including the inexplicably-well-regarded Southern Poverty Law Center – make a cottage industry out of McCarthyizing all non-”progressive” thought by linking all of it to some form of fringe extremism or another.

It’s rubbish, of course.

But I figured – maybe it’s worth a look.

Maybe I am an extremist!

This is the first part of a seven-part series, coming out on alternate blogging days ’til it’s done.

Joe Bodell at MN “Progressive” Project, in the tradition of those great Americans Frank Burns and Dwight Schrute, wants to know; “did you go, or have you ever been, to a Tea Party?”

At what point does society recognize that an elected leader’s public speech has crossed the line into the territory of sedition?

About two seconds before it crosses into “witchcraft”.

Oh, give me a break.  It’s as serious as anything else in Bodell’s point.

Wikpedia’s definition:

{{facepalm}}

(Note:  When someone leads off an “argument” with a dictionary definition of a word, they are insulting you.  When they lead off the “argument” with a definition from Wikipedia, they are insulting themselves.  And you).

I digress…

Sedition is a term of law which refers to overt conduct, such as speech and organization, that is deemed by the legal authority as tending toward insurrection against the established order. Sedition often includes subversion of a constitution and incitement of discontent (or resistance) to lawful authority. Sedition may include any commotion, though not aimed at direct and open violence against the laws. Seditious words in writing are seditious libel. A seditionist is one who engages in or promotes the interests of sedition.

The answer is simple, Joe.  “Sedition” is a “crime” that gets trotted out to criminalize dissent, and bully people into compliance, acquiescence and silence.

For example, if I say “Keith Ellison is a brittle, vindictive little man who is more suited to teaching Grievance Studies at a community college than representing a great city like Minneapolis in Washington, and I urge you to vote against him”, and the “local authority” in Mr. Bodell’s Wikipedia reference (sknx) “deems” it to be rabble-rousing, and has perverted the laws to make “sedition” illegal, they could sic the goons on me.

Glad I could help.

Fortunately, our “local authority” is bound by the Constitution, whose First Amendment protects my right to have an opinion about Keith Ellison just as much as it does the right to make statues of the Virgin Mary out of dung, or Joe Bodell’s right to pass off McCarthyistic misapplications of archaic, authoritarian laws as “reasoning”.

Or Michele Bachmann’s right to get a crowd whipped up against Joe Bodell’s government:

Just this past weekend, Michele Bachmann spoke at a Tea Party rally in St. Paul, saying

“But mark my words, the American people aren’t gonna take this lying down,” Bachmann later said. “We aren’t gonna play their game, we’re not gonna pay their taxes. They want us to pay for this? Because we don’t have to. We don’t have to. We don’t have to follow a bill that isn’t law. That’s not the American way, and that’s not what we’re going to do.”

After which she told people to go into the woods with Grampa’s Garand and start shooting revenooers?

Well, no.  The Representative was calling people to “resist” at the ballot box and at Tea Parties and Town Hall meetings (assuming we haven’t seen the last of them) and on the phones.

Which is still legal, by Joe Bodell’s leave.

An MPP reader happened to be in the neighborhood of that rally, and noted that there appeared to be many more Wisconsin license plates nearby than one normally sees in St. Paul.

(Huh?  First – does Joe Bodell ever spend time in Saint Paul?  Second – and I repeat; huh?)

Curious. In any case, I’m fairly certain that if Congress passes a bill…and the President signs it (despite those same Republicans playing footsie with the crazies who fervently believe him not to be a natural-born American citizen), the bill. becomes. law.

(And goodness knows one must not play footsie with people with bizarre fringe views, must one?  Because having fringies and other lunatics show up at ones’ party sure destroys ones’ credibility, doesn’t it?)

Anyone care to disagree?

I’d raise my hand here, but I’m afraid Joe Bodell will call the State Patrol or something.

OK, Joe, it’s fairly simple.  If a bill. becomes. law, I get to work to change it, in the Legislature, and/or by changing the legislature.

But if it walks like a duck and talks like a seditionist, at what point do we call the damned thing one thoroughly seditionist waterfowl?

It’s simple, Joe.  You can call it “sedition”.  You can even call together a group – call it the “Minnesota Anti-American Activities Project” hearings, if you’d like – and have them declare it anything you want.  Call it sedition, or witchcraft for that matter. And the rest of us will do what Americans do whenever people do that kind of thing.  Laugh at it, and maybe come up with a snappy term for trying to criminalize dissent.  “Bodellism”, perhaps?

Nah.

It just seems like that invoking a term that was last used as an authoritarian and not-very-constitutional infringement on civil liberty in 1918 is something you do when you don’t have a very good factual argument.

Riding to work was a huge rush yesterday morning – especially racing down Cathedral Hill with a brisk tailwind!

Riding home from work, on the other hand, was a character-building ordeal, plodding up Cathedral Hill into a howling headwind.

Note to self:  Figure out how to get the wind to shift during the day.

Mission clock is at T minus 60.

If you missed the MOB Winter Party last Saturday night at Ol’ Mexico, I feel sorry for ya. 

We drew about 80 people, which is up there with the totals we drew at the legendary MOB parties three and four years ago.  It didn’t seem as crowded; we had the party room at Ol’ Mex to ourselves, which left a little more elbow room that Keegans’ serpentine main room (although I’m thinking having the Summer Party at Keegans’, with cigar patio back in commission, sounds just fine to me).

As to who showed?  Well, pretty much the usual who’s who of Twin Cities blogging: Chad and Brian from Fraters Libertas (along with Mrs. Elder and the three Mini-Elders), King Banaian from SCSU Scholars, Ed Morrissey (who came bearing, um, Canadian cigars – thanks, Ed!), our NARN producers Tommy and Jon, Doug Bass, John “Policy Guy” LaPlante, the Night Writer, Reverend Mother and Tiger Lily, Joe “Learned Foot” Tucci, David Strom and Margaret Martin, Nachmann from Loyal Opposition, Jessica from the late Pianomomsicle, Katie Kieffer from KatieKieffer.com, Swiftee from the late Restraining Order, Toni Backdahl from the MN Tea Party, Derek Brigham and “Lassie” and Guy Collins from Freedom Dogs, Robin from A Girl’s Gotta Vent, Sheila Kihne and Laura Hemler and their husbands, Jamie Delton (Legislative candidate in St. Paul as well as proprietor of Delton Digest), Teresa Collett (candidate for the Fourth District Congressional seat), Mr. and Mrs. D from Mister Dilettante, Andy Aplikowski from Residual Forces…

…and I’m not gonna pretend I can remember too many more!  But there was a first; we had a table of five people show up who’d heard about the party at the “Kill the Bill” rally at the Capitol earlier in the day.  They knew nothing about blogs, but figured it’d be a fun party to crash.  Thanks!

If you wrote about the party, leave a link in the comment section!

Anyway – stay tuned for the MOB Summer Party, coming up right around State Fair time.

Bike out:  Check.

Tires topped up:  Check.

Bag/Backpack for hauling my crap to work:  D’oh.

Last minute trip to WalMart?  Check.

Mission clock is at T minus thirty minutes.

Al Franken is at -6 on the “passion index”, according to Rasmussen via the Strib:

A new Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of likely voters in Minnesota finds that 50 percent of voters in the state approve of the job Senator Al Franken is doing, including 25 percent who strongly approve. That’s unchanged from surveys in November and January. On the other side of the ledger, 46 percent disapprove, 31 percent strongly.

The reason, of course, is yet more proof of Berg’s Seventh Law; while the Dems routinely tell the world that John Kline, Michele Bachmann and Erik Paulsen went to Washington to promote an “extremist” partisan agenda, Al Franken – “progressive” author and failed “Air America” host – actually did get elected after running a campaign based purely and expressly on being an obstreporous, Kos-friendly extremist.

Meanwhile, Rasmussen found that 67 percent approve of how Senator Amy Klobuchar is performing, with 42 percent who approve strongly. The overall approval rating is a nine-point increase from November. Just 30 percent disapprove of Klobuchar, including 15 percent who strongly disapprove.

A-Klo, on the other hand, realizes the great political truth; that once you’re a Senator, politics is mostly about not losing.  Playing it safe.  Not making the dumb mistakes. Barring the uncontrollable (like Norm Coleman running against a media shooting star in a bad year for Republicans – twice!), being an empty skirt is a recipe for a long career in Washington.

I saw this news last week…:

After three days of turbulent meetings, the Texas Board of Education on Friday approved a social studies curriculum that will put a conservative stamp on history and economics textbooks, stressing the superiority of American capitalism, questioning the Founding Fathers’ commitment to a purely secular government and presenting Republican political philosophies in a more positive light.

…and thought “oh, great”.

Not that I don’t think some balance is in order.  After having kids and stepkids in one school or another for the past twenty years, there’s no question that the public education system is biased to the left, especially in whatever pass for “humanities” in the public schools.  History education in particular is a joke; I’ve spoken, exasperated, about this in the past; my kids have gone years where all they studies were slavery and civil rights.  Important, sure.  Episodes with big impact on many of the kids’ lives?  Absolutely.  The only things, practically, worth studying?  Hardly.

And on the occasions where other parts of history and current events were studied?  Yeah, pretty much “America last”; the few kids who are even exposed to the ideas of “liberalism” and “conservatism” seem, for some reason completely unknown to me – to come out of school with the idea that “conservatism is about the right to own slaves and the freedom to let old people freeze”.  Nothing new there.

So the idea of “balance” seems, on the surface, to be an improvement.

The problem is, I don’t want either side – any side, really – writing the history books “favorably” to themselves.  I’m not one of those people who ever thought teaching kids the dates and places and events was such a bad thing; tell kids what happened, and show them what other commentators – not textbook writers – have written about the events, and let them make up their own minds.

“But Mitch!  Kids are stupid! They don’t have what it takes to process all that information!”  So do you think they’re processing the pre-digested stuff that’s slanted one way or the other?  Hell, most history teachers haven’t processed most of what history actually means.

The big question with this Texas fracas is “how good an idea is it for committees of politicians, most of them pretty ignorant themselves, to be determining what goes into textbooks and curricula?”

Meanwhile back in my hometown of Jamestown, ND, they’re getting ready for more flooding, as the two reservoirs north of town fill to records.

Now, Jamestown is built at the confluence of the James River – the world’s longest non-commercially-navigable river – and Pipestem Creek.  Both rivers drain a huge basin in central North Dakota (and South Dakota as well) into the Missouri River.  Given their huge watershed, both rivers are fairly sensitive to fluctuations in water supply; in the eighties, during a very dry period, the James barely flowed.  On other other hand, before the James was dammed up in the ’50s, a wet season could leave Jamestown half-submerged. (The Pipestem also flooded, in 1969, leading to another dam in the seventies).  So in theory, Jamestown should be flood-proof – unless it’s been a very wet winter and both reservoirs are nearly full.

Suffice to say it’s been a very wet winter:

Jamestown and Stutsman County should prepare for the same combined releases as they did during the 2009 floods, according to the Army Corps of Engineers, which changed its forecast for the James River and Pipestem Creek Friday.

The corps’ had originally estimated releases of 1,800 cubic feet per second. The new forecast recommends building emergency levees to handle combined releases of 3,200 cfs from Jamestown and Pipestem reser-voirs — the same level the two dams released at the peaks of the 2009 flood.

1,800 to 3,200 cubic feet per second.  Bear in mind the usual combined release from both dams is about 30 cfs.

According to the corps, the 0.5 to 1.5 inches of precipitation received in the James River Basin this week changed the situation and now reservoir pool levels could exceed 1997 levels, according to the “most likely” forecasts. The upper range of forecasts indicate reservoir pool levels could reach the same levels as in 2009, said Col. Robert J. Ruch, Omaha district commander for the corps.

It’s going to be another flood-prone year throughout the upper Midwest.

“The wars of the future may be fought on the internet” – Johnny Roosh

As a boy growing up in the Soviet Union, Sergey Brin witnessed the consequences of censorship. Now the Google Inc. co-founder is drawing on that experience in shaping the company’s showdown with the Chinese government.

The internet may be many things, for better or worse, but one would have to backtrack history to the invention of the printing press to find an innovation that has done more for the free flow of information, expression and commerce.

China will never threaten America’s dominance unless and until its people enjoy the same freedoms of speech and enterprise that Americans do.

Meanwhile, back at the Neanderthal Ranch…

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez called for regulation of the Internet on Saturday while demanding authorities crack down on a critical news Web site that he accused of spreading false information.

…because after all Chavez is an expert on falsities.

What progress we are making.  In the Middle Ages they would have burned me.  Now they are content with burning my books. ~Sigmund Freud, 1933

…SITD wasn’t the first to take notice, but we smelled this a mile away.

A federal safety investigation of the Toyota Prius that was involved in a dramatic incident on a California highway last week found a particular pattern of wear on the car’s brakes that raises questions about the driver’s version of the event, three people familiar with the investigation said.

On Monday James Sikes, 61 years old, called 911 and told the operator his blue 2008 Toyota Prius had sped up to more than 90 miles per hour on its own on Interstate 8 near San Diego. He eventually brought the vehicle to a stop after a California Highway patrolman pulled alongside Mr. Sikes and offered help.

During and after the incident, Mr. Sikes said he was using heavy pressure on his brake pedal at high speeds.

But the investigation of the vehicle, carried out jointly by safety officials from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and Toyota engineers, didn’t find signs the brakes had been applied at full force at high speeds over a sustained period of time, the three people familiar with the investigation said.

Multiple sites (ex. Fox News, courtesy Bill C.) are reporting Mr. Sikes is in financial trouble and my have simply been looking to get out of his obligations on the Toyota Prius.

Today on the show, I’ll spend a chunk of the first hour talking about the GOP gubernatorial race.

I’ll be heavily referencing two excellent blog posts from this past week, both of which appeared in True North: “Why I’m Supporting Tom Emmer” by Craig “Captain Fishsticks” Westover, and “A Closer Look At Voting Records” by regular SITD commenter Master of None.

Tune in after 1PM, on the air at AM1280 or online at the Patriot’s web site!

Tea Party?  Coffee Party?  Pfft.  It’s time for the granddaddy of them all, the original Minnesota beer party!

Don’t forget tonight’s the Minnesota Organization of Bloggers’ Winter Party.  We’ll be at Ol’ Mexico in Roseville from 7 until we’re done.

Ol’ Mex is on Lexington just a block or so north of Larpenteur in Roseville.

You don’t have to be conservative (the MOB is non-partisan) or even care about politics (not all MOB blogs are political, and it’s almost but not quite bad form to talk politics there).  You just have to love hanging out with fun people, with good food and drinks, and lots of stuff to talk about.

Hope to see y’all there!

Today, the Northern Alliance Radio Network brings you the best in Minnesota conservatism from 9AM-3PM.

• Volume I “The First Team” -  Brian and John or some combination thereof kick off from 11-1.  Highlight of the day?  Karl Rove will be on!
• Volume II “The Headliner” – Ed is going to be at the “Kill Bill” Rally at the Capitol, but he’ll be racing back for Hour 2.  I’ll be talking with Randy Gilbert, State Auditor candidate, and discussing the MN governor’s race – and that’s before Ed even gets there!.
• The King Banaian Show! – King is on from 9-11 on AM1570, Business Radio for the Twin Cities!  We’re broadening the franchise; two stations, now!

(All times Central)

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(SCENE:  At the Oceanaire – a tony seafood restaurant in Downtown Minneapolis.   Representative Paul Thissen, Senator Tom “Baby Got” Bakk and Speaker of the House Margaret Anderson-Kelliher are sitting at a table with five empty chairs.  Anderson-Kelliher, bored, drums her fingers on the table.  Thissen checks his watch, and Bakk rock nervously in their seats. )

(Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak enters the room)

THISSEN, BAKK and ANDERSON-KELLIHER, SIMULTANEOUSLY:  Hello, Mayor Rybak.

RYBAK:  Hey, Margaret!

(BAKK and THISSEN, deflated, go back to gnawing on toothpicks)

RYBAK:  Thanks for calling the meeting, Margaret.  What’s up?

ANDERSON-KELLIHER:  I’d like to lay out some ground rules and strategy for the campaign.

(SEN. MARK DAYTON walks into restaurant).

RYBAK: That’s a great idea.  (Notices DAYTON).  Hey, Mark!

DAYTON:  Aaaaaaagh!   (DAYTON dives to floor, rapidly low-crawls to the table, furtively sits in chair).

THISSEN:  What’s the matter, Mark?

ANDERSON-KELLIHER - Shut up, er…

THISSEN: Paul…

ANDERSON-KELLIHER: …whatever.  (Turns to DAYTON)  What’s the matter, Mark?

DAYTON:  (Affixing a lobster bib) Er, nothing.  Why?

ANDERSON-KELLIHER:  Just curious.  (Looks at menu, as former Senator MATT ENTENZA, with wife LOIS QUAM, enter the restaurant.

BAKK: “Hey, Matt…”

ANDERSON-KELLIHER:  I said SHUT UP!

BAKK: You told Paul to shut…

ANDERSON-KELLIHER:  Don’t care!  (turns to ENTENZA) How are you today, Matt?

ENTENZA: I’m doing…

QUAM: (A little too effusive) He’s doing just fine, Margaret!  (ENTENZA abruptly stops).

ANDERSON-KELLIHER: Ah, excellent!

(A loud belch issues from outside the entrance.  Rep. TOM RUKAVINA walks in, pounding his chest.  He shakes out another mild belch). 

THISSEN:  Hey, Tom…(Trails off as ANDERSON-KELLIHER stares him down; THISSEN looks bash fully at his menu).

ANDERSON-KELLIHER:  Excellent!  I believe that’s everyone…(counts noses)…except…

(Harps play in the hallway.  A little dry ice fog obscures the floor.  Sen. JOHN MARTY, hands clasped as if in prayer before him, moves across the floor as if floating, and lands like a hummingbird on the remaining chair.  A golden aura briefly suffuses the room, then vanishes).

ANDERSON-KELLIHER:  Hey, John.

MARTY:  May the blessing of my presence bring you peace.

ANDERSON-KELLIHER: Er, yeah.  I called you all here today because voters are having a hard time telling the difference between us.  For the good of the DFL race, it’d be best if we all come up with some sort of differentiation between us before the convention.

RYBAK:  Primary.

ANDERSON-KELLIHER:  Convention!

ENTENZA: Yeah, convention!.

QUAM:  Primary!

ENTENZA: Er, yeah.  Primary.

ANDERSON-KELLIHER:  Convention!

THISSEN:  Convention, just like Margaret says…

ANDERSON-KELLIHER:  For the last time, shut the **** up!  (ANDERSON-KELLIHER flings a salt-shaker at THISSEN, hitting him in the face.  He falls backward over his chair, and lies on the floor, motionless.  DAYTON dives for the ground).

ANDERSON-KELLIHER:  Like I said, convention.  So I’d like you all to think of things we can do to distinguish ourselves to the voters…

WAITRESS (Approaches with order pad in hand):  Hello, my name is Wendy, and I’ll be your…

ANDERSON-KELLIHER:  For the last ****** time, shut the **** up…

RYBAK: Er, Margaret?  She’s the waitress…

ANDERSON-KELLIHER:  Oh.  Go ahead, then.

WAITRESS:  Er, OK.  Any drink orders before we order dinner?”

ANDERSON-KELLIHER:  Boilermaker.

RYBAK: Appletini, please.  Extra tini.

BAKK:  I’ll have whatever Margaret is having.

THISSEN:  (Groans incomprehensibly)

RUKAVINA: Grain Belt Premium! 

ENTENZA:  I’ll take your house chablis…

QUAM:  He’ll take the house merlot, and so will I.

ENTENZA:  Er…yeah.

DAYTON:  A diet Pellegrini.

WAITRESS:  Sir, all Pelligrini is “Diet”.  It’s water…

DAYTON:  Two diet pellegrinis.

MARTY:  I shall have a glass of water.  But please bring it in gaseous form.

WAITRESS: Er…wait – you want a cup of steam?

MARTY:  As it is said, so shall it be poured.

WAITRESS:  Er, OK.  And would you all like to start a tab?

(All at table break up into uproarious laughter)

RUKAVINA:  Baby, you ain’t seen nothing.

(WAITRESS LEAVES)

ANDERSON-KELLIHER: OK.  I’d like everyone to say, for the record, what makes you different.  Paul?

THISSEN:  (Groans, puts hand on forehead).

ANDERSON-KELLIHER: OK.  Matt?

ENTENZA:  (Looks at QUAM)

QUAM:  He will raise taxes for a better Minnesota.

(ENTENZA nods enthusiastically).

RYBAK:  Well, I’ll raise taxes for a better Minnsesota, too.

BAKK:   Well, I won’t…

ANDERSON-KELLIHER: Yes, you will.

BAKK:  Yes, I will.

DAYTON:  I will raise taxes.  For a better Minnesota.  (Eyes door furtively).  I will.  I will.  I will.

ANDERSON-KELLIHER:  OK.  Not getting what I want here…

RUKAVINA:  I’ll raise taxes more for a better Minnesota!

ANDERSON-KELLIHER:  Better…

WAITRESS (Carrying tray of drinks):  OK, that’s two house Merlots,  a Grain Belt Premium, two Boilermakers, an Appletini, two “diet Pellegrinis” a cup of steam, and (looks at THISSEN) some smelling salts.

THISSEN:  (grunts painfullly)

WAITRESS:  That’ll be $77. 

ANDERSON-KELLIHER: No.

WAITRESS:  Er, maam?  I brought the drinks.  You need to pay up.

ANDERSON-KELLIHER:  Shut up.

WAITRESS:  Maam?  This isn’t funny.  You wanna leave me on the look for almost $80 worth of drinks?

ANDERSON-KELLIHER:  Shut up!

RUKAVINA:  Yeah.  Shut up!

WAITRESS:  I’m gonna call the police.

ANDERSON-KELLIHER:  (Stands at table)  Attention, everyone in the restaurant.  Please pay our drink tab!  It is for a better Minnesota!

(RUKAVINA, BAKK, RYBAK, QUAM, and ENTENZA applaud; DAYTON balances spoon on his finger; THISSEN groans)

MARTY:  As it is written, so shall it be done.  (MARTY disappears in a blinding flash of pure light).

And…scene.

I’m not sure what’s dumber; that besieged Danish “Mohammed” cartoonist Lars Vilks told a Swedish newspaper how he planned on dealing with killers who – according to some reports – American “Jihad Jane” was recruiting to try to assassinate him…:

The latest threat to Lars Vilks emerged yesterday when seven people were arrested in Ireland accused of plotting to kill the 63-year-old artist.

Mr Vilks responded by saying that he was ready for them. “If something happens, I know exactly what to do,” he said.

His home in southern Sweden now contains a barbed-wire sculpture that could electrocute potential intruders, a secure space to hide in and an axe which will allow him “to chop down” anyone breaking in through his windows.

…or that the press printed it.

Dear terrorist/stalkers/burglars; no boobytraps in my house.  Pinky swear.

The problem with gun control – one of the reasons that it’s finally stiffing with the American people – is that it burdens the law-abiding citizen for the crimes of society’s low-lifes.  It’s one of the reasons America is rejecting gun control; Real Americans can’t abiding punishing those who’ve done no wrong.

Hopefully that same impulse will swallow up this moronic idea:

Lawmakers working to craft a new comprehensive immigration bill have settled on a way to prevent employers from hiring illegal immigrants: a national biometric identification card all American workers would eventually be required to obtain.

Lawmakers working to craft a new comprehensive immigration bill are proposing a new national biometric ID card that would be required of all U.S. workers. WSJ’s Laura Meckler explains the proposal and the objections from privacy advocates.Under the potentially controversial plan still taking shape in the Senate, all legal U.S. workers, including citizens and immigrants, would be issued an ID card with embedded information, such as fingerprints, to tie the card to the worker.

In other words, force each individual American to validate him/herself, rather than deal with the real problems – open borders, and a socialist neighbor whose economy resembles what ours will

The ID card plan is one of several steps advocates of an immigration overhaul are taking to address concerns that have defeated similar bills in the past.http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/588e8cae-2d48-11df9c5b-00144feabdc0.html

Yet again, a cure that’s much worse than the disease.

Thriving businesses ship things.

They’re not:

The nascent US recovery could falter because businesses are still reluctant to invest in new equipment and technology, the head of global delivery and logistics company FedEx has warned.

“Business investment went up somewhat in the fourth quarter but is far below what it ought to be in a cyclical recovery like this,” Fred Smith, chairman and chief executive of FedEx, told the Financial Times.

FedEx has a decent record of predicting these things.  Which is the bad news.

Back when I wrote my “Secession Diaries” piece a few years ago, I joked about the militarization of the Federal bureaucracy:

The Prime Minister 1092 approved, presented the plan to Parliament, and within the month announced a plan to increase the Peace Force, and other military forces controlled by the Minister of Peace, to 150,000 men and women. Their weaponry was to be augented with stocks of former US Army weapons – tanks, artillery, etc – taken from depots around the USoC.

However, the powerful labor bloc in the Ministry of Labor worried about the concentration of so much power in the hands of the Ministry of Peace. They rammed through a measure allowing Labor to recruit and, if needed, draft 80,000 armed Labor Enforcement Police.

Suspicious of Labor and Peace, the Transport Ministry snuck in a measure allowing it to recruit or draft 75,000 National Highway Patrol, including a squadron of F-16 Tactical Traffic Control fighters.

Not wanting to be left out, the Ministry of Justice created a force of 45,000 Field Marshals. To prevent violence and terrorism in schools, the Ministry of Education was authorized to recruit/draft and train 50,000 Tactical School Patrols. The Customs Department followed suit with 35,000 Customs Patrol Inspectors, the National Endowment for the Humanities with 20,000 Special Museum Guards, the Ministry of Safety added 40,000 armed Emergency Workers, the Ministry of Housing with 20,000 Tactical Housing Inspectors, and even the Ministry of Sensitivity, which brought on 10,000 plainclothes Sensitivity Detectives.

Now, I thought I was exaggerating; I mean, the phenomenon swerved into the ridiculous during the Clinton years, but hyperbole is hyperbole.

Well, no. Hyperbole is reality.  The Department of Education is taking bids on some new equipment:

U.S. Department of Education (ED) intends to purchase twenty-seven (27) REMINGTON BRAND MODEL 870 POLICE 12/14P MOD GRWC XS4 KXCS SF. RAMAC #24587 GAUGE: 12 BARREL: 14″ – PARKERIZED CHOKE: MODIFIED SIGHTS: GHOST RING REAR WILSON COMBAT; FRONT – XS CONTOUR BEAD SIGHT STOCK: KNOXX REDUCE RECOIL ADJUSTABLE STOCK FORE-END: SPEEDFEED SPORT-SOLID – 14″ are designated as the only shotguns authorized for ED based on compatibility with ED existing shotgun inventory, certified armor and combat training and protocol, maintenance, and parts.

The required date of delivery is March 22, 2010.

Interested sources must submit detailed technical capabilities and any other information that demonstrates their ability to meet the requirements above, no later than March 12, 2010 at 12 PM, E.S.T. Any quotes must be submitted electronically to the attention of Holly.Le@ed.gov, Contract Specialist (Contract Operations Group), with a concurrent copy to xxxxxxx.xxxxx@xx.gov, Contracting Officer (Contract Operations Group)

So why does the DoE need riot guns?

Jokes about unruly kids are noted in advance.

To: Kevin Spacey

From: Mitch Berg, Fan

Re: Career Opportunities

Dear Mr. Spacey,

It’s been a long time since you lit up the small screen with your performance as Mel Profitt on Wise Guy (perhaps the most unjustly-obscure great TV show of all time).  Verbal Kint?  Even American Beauty?  Seems like forever.

So I know you’ve been working hard to get back out of the dinner theater circuit.  So no doubt your agent told you this would be a great idea.

Perhaps you need to shoot for The Usual Suspects II: Weekend At Keyser’s.

Just saying.

That is all.