Committees of Correspondence
Republican National Committee - Nightmare in the Senate - a flash animation about Daschles promises of treats which are really a trick to raise taxes. The GOP doesn't tell you that the video applies to them as well. Don't fall for the trick, vote Libertarian. [smith2004]
From Chuck Muth's News & Views:
"Now let's keep the same scenario but change the outcome. I am approached by the hungry man, as before, but this time, instead of agreeing to share my sandwich, I refuse to do so. Along comes a third man, who pulls out a gun, points it at my head, and forces me to hand over my sandwich to him, upon which he gives it to the hungry guy. What is the moral quality of the gunman's action? I think most people would consider him an unscrupulous thug who should be apprehended and punished. Yet when the government does precisely the same thing - forcibly seizing from some in order to give to others - the liberal insists the government is acting in a just and moral manner. This is clearly not true." -- Dinesh D'Souza
Renee Daniels-Mantle at smith2004 - Farewell to the West - an ode to America's disappearing ranchers from one ranching family who are giving it up. Free registration required. [smith2004]
Tonight, as the cows still call to the calves that will never come home, we also mourn. The rest of our country should mourn, too. Our home on the range is filled with discouraging words and the cloudy skies can't help. We are watching the last generation of ranchers ride off into the sunset.
Our people are no longer interested in using our country to produce our own food. We are interested in preserving wide-open space for generations who will eat at McDonalds and never wonder whether the "rancher" in Argentina who produced their hamburger used holistic resource management, humane shipping methods, or fenced off his riparian areas. We will never know enough to be outraged.
Diane R. Stepp at The Atlanta Journal-Constitution - Confederate flag backer has atypical views - H.K. Edgerton is traveling across the south with his confederate flag. Bravo! Mr. Edgerton's skin looks black to me, as if that should matter. [sierra]
Edgerton doesn't see the Confederate battle flag as a symbol of racial divisiveness, but one of a common heritage shared by blacks and whites. "We were family," he said. It was Northern reconstructionists, he said, that pitted blacks and whites against each other, he said.
"This is Dr. Martin Luther King's dream, that we would all sit down at the same table together," he said.
Nat Hentoff at Free Inquiry Magazine via Sierra Times - Citizens Resist War on the Bill of Rights - a report on modern-day Committees of Correspondence, organized in a number of cities across the country to protect people from the prying eyes of the f.b.i. Henrietta Bowman says: [sierra]
I would like to see at lot more towns telling the Feds where to get off. Every town needs a designated Liberty Tree.
Scott Bitterman at KeepAndBearArms.com - CARS vs. GUNS: The Liberals are Right - a simple table showing that treating guns like cars would actually be a pretty good deal for us gun owners. [kaba]
Steven Milloy at The New York Post -
The Fantasy of Gun Fingerprints 
- why pre-sale gun
"fingerprinting" doesn't work. [kaba]
Robert Meltzer at The Metro West Daily News - Value of armed citizens - pure gold. [kaba]
You are standing on a hilly piece of land in suburban Maryland not far from Washington, looking down at a crowded shopping mall surrounded by snarls of traffic. Through your binoculars, you see a man step out of a white van, pull a rifle with a scope from behind the seat and shoulder the weapon. Standing fifty feet behind him happens to be a civilian who also sees the sniper. The civilian watching the sniper also has something in his hand. Now, here's the question: would you prefer that the object be a cell phone, or that the civilian has a firearm and the ability to use it effectively?
...
It is time to rollback the absurd gun control laws that have had a perverse and adverse affect on the safety of American society. Unless we are prepared to live in a police state, where every tax dollar is spent to put a cop on every roof top, we must recognize that there is value to the armed citizen. Perhaps the armed citizen is all that stands between us and a life of constant fear.
Two Towers Protest is a web site dedicated to protesting the name of the second Lord of the Rings movie. Guess these folks never read the books, or if they did, neglected to read the copyright. The recent signatures on the petition mostly agree with me that this idea is insane or idiotic. I sent the following email, which bounced because "This address no longer accepts mail". Guess they got too many complaints. Or it's a hoax. Hehe. [smith2004]
Two Towers Protest Organization members,
Are you insane, or just incredibly stupid? J.R.R. Tolkein named the second volume of the Lord of the Rings Trilogy in 1954, 47 years before depraved criminals crashed airplanes into the World Trade Center towers. The movie's name matches the book's. It has nothing whatsoever to do with the pair of buildings formerly in New York City. Quit your childish nonsense.
-Bill St. Clair
bill@billstclair.com
David G. Savage and Arianne Aryanpur at The LA Times - Huge March Protests Bush Stance on Iraq - one mainstream report of last Saturday's rallies that doesn't downplay the numbers. [unknown]
More than 100,000 demonstrators marched around the White House on Saturday to protest, peacefully but loudly, President Bush's plan to use military force in Iraq.
...
The San Francisco rally drew an estimated 42,000 demonstrators in front of the newly gilded City Hall.
