Since Oregon’s own special little guy Peter DeFazio is making headlines by calling people “little pointy-headed neocon[s] with grand ideas about the future of transportation” with “bizarre, neocon view[s] of transportation, ” I thought I’d post up this fairly succinct explanation of basic neoconservative ideas.
It’s not long, it’s not detailed, and it’s not difficult reading. So if you’re one of those people who’s surprised when I tell you that the definition of “neocon” isn’t synonymous with “Nazi”, “Republican”, “imperialist warmonger”, or “someone I disagree with”, then maybe it’s time to take a couple of minutes and read that article. Heck, you might even come away knowing more about “the neocons” than Peter DeFazio who, by any definition, is a bit of a wanker.
Last Fall, an emotionally-charged anonymous letter to the editor to the student newspaper at Lewis & Clark, The Pioneer Log, had several female students calling “rape.” (more…)
The zany lefty union-funded group “Our Oregon” is getting an uncomfortable amount of coddling from Oregon Executive offices. Our Oregon is known for, among other things, being union thugs who run campaigns to create a bunch of tomfoolery in areas where petitioners are trying to get signatures. An example of a such person is Jeanne Berg of Oregon, who was hired to block petitioning in Oklahoma by libertarian activist Paul Jacob, who was arrested last week on charges of conspiracy to defraud the state, which was caused by the state’s vague description of “resident.” (see www.freepauljacob.com for more info).
Berg’s understudy is Patty Wentz, a former reporter of the Willamette Week who went on to take charge of Our Oregon, and who was recently hired as Governor Kulongoski’s interim spokeswomen while his press secretary has a baby. My point to all this comes from this report by Richard Leonetti. He discovered that Our Oregon did not file any campaign contribution and expenditure reports with Secretary of State Bill Bradbury.
Oregon law clearly requires that any person or entity that accepts money (“contributions”) to be used in a political campaign must register as a political committee (ORS 260.005(16)). The law also requires every political committee active in a general election to file at least 3 contribution and expenditure reports in every election year (ORS 260.073). Apparently, “Our Oregon” disregarded the law, never registered, and never reported its contributions.
Leonetti filed a formal complaint in January, 2007, but no action has been taken and Leonetti predicts that Bradbury is ready to let Our Oregon off the hook. If Our Oregon is allowed to get away with this, it will set a precedent for this loophole where anyone can form a non-profit, collect unrecorded contributions from unknown donors, and then shuttle that money into candidates or measure campaigns under the name of the non-profit.
NW Natural is the first company to launch a program to trap methane gas from cow manure, leading the way in cutting down greenhouse gasses.
“Under the program, the company’s natural gas customers can pay extra, and the money would be used to help develop systems to trap methane gas from cow manure. The trapped gas could be converted to energy and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.”
There are an estimated 120,000 cows on Oregon’s 350 dairy farms producing roughly 14.4 million pounds of cow dung a day. The next step is to get the cows to stop farting.
Someone left a dead newborn deer dressed up as a baby in a basket outside of a downtown theater. The outfit included a bib that read, “You think I’m cute? You should see my aunt.”
Eeesh. It seems like the stress of the city might be getting to someone. Also, this morbid stunt sounds like something right up Nice Pete’s alley.
I’ve never really liked David Wu and, let’s face it folks, this speech is reason enough why. You know, it wouldn’t have scored a single point in Congress and Super Congress events at any number of high school debate tournaments in which I participated. That’s pretty damn sad for a guy who’s been in the House as long as I can remember.
Congratulations to the Oregon State Men’s Baseball team on their victory in the 2006 College World Series. Way to go guys, NCAA Div 1 Baseball Champions.
Step one: follow link. Step two: observe argument that Insurgent violates “harassment” clause of Student Conduct Code:
Harassment is prohibited at the University based on race, gender, religion and other characteristics if it involves “specifically insulting another person in his or her immediate presence with abusive words or gestures when a reasonable person would expect that such act would cause emotional distress or provoke a violent response,” according to the code.
Step three: regard text within bold tags. Step four: go about your day, leaving the Insurgent unmolested, because there is no fucking way that they have violated this portion of the Student Conduct Code.
Meanwhile, Senator (and law student) Wally Hicks provides a quote that’s either sinister or hilarious, depending on your tastes:
With Roberts, Scalia, Thomas, and Alito on the bench, I would hesitate to assume anything right now with regard to obscenity… Obscenity is always arguable to some degree or another.
Get it? They’re conservatives! So of course they’ll be on board for this idiotic fishing expedition! Make no mistake, it is in the best interests of nobody for the ASUO to start selectively enforcing a nebulously-defined obscenity standard. Even if Hicks is correct that the Insurgent could be judged “obscene” – and I don’t think he is, or at least I hope he isn’t – this would set an incredibly bad precedent for the University.
I wrote this post’s headline as a joke, but now it’s making me wonder: it would be amusing for someone to file a grievance asserting that the Insurgent actually is guilty of treason. I’m starting to think it would receive serious consideration, particularly once someone explains to Dallas Brown that organizing a public execution might get him on the news.
And here I thought Oregon’s new “we’re for dreamers” slogan was pretty lame.
If this is the best that Washington can do, imagine the list of rejected slogans, starting with “WA’s UUUUUUP!!!!!!!!”
Interestingly enough, a quick look at the official Washington tourism site and doing a search for “SayWA” reveals a lot of broken links. The main page also no longer mentions “SayWA,” which it did a day ago. It took public outcry to make the geniuses that thought of it realize it was f***ing stupid? You’d think they would have assembled a focus group or two.
If they decide to stick with “SayWA” as their slogan, maybe we can change ours to outdo them. The new Oregon slogan could be “ORgasm.”
In regard to the Terry Schiavo case, Frist said on “Meet the Press”:
“Well, I’ll tell you what I learned from it, which is obvious. The American people don’t want you involved in these decisions.”
Most Americans, I imagine, don’t want the government to intrude on their private lives at all. The sooner Congress and the Executive realize that, the better off we’ll all be.
In the case of Shiavo, it boiled down to a dispute between private parties, and that’s what the courts are for. State courts. Rather than leave it alone, Republicans in Congress, led by Frist, stepped in. They not only used Shiavo to strengthen their ties with the pro-life momement, they also used her to railroad a private bill through Congress that gave power to the federal courts to take the case for review, despite the fact that it had already been decided by the Florida Supreme Court. Thankfully, the federal court system left it alone. At least part of the government occasionally understands its place.
Now Frist is finally starting to understand that his place isn’t in in the middle of private disputes and matters of state law. Why, it almost seems like he got around to reading the 10th amendment. Hopefully the rest of Congress, Republicans and Democrats alike, will also have this understanding.
We’ll see. After meeting the press, it’s usually back to business as usual in Congress.
Yes, that’s right kids: “Ignatio J. Peters’ ” dream of a transient-oriented advertising campaign has been realized. A 22-year old former Husky is now employing Seattle-area bums as walking advertisements. Devout readers of the Commentator will recall that the February 26, 2002 issue of the OC contained a commentary suggesting that transients would make good advertising devices:
Instead of sandwich boards, outfit the homeless with sweatshirts,
jackets, t-shirts, dresses, muumuus – any form of clothing,
really – emblazoned with advertising slogans and corporate logos
(“slogos,” if you will). Sandwich boards may be cheaper and
more direct, but the whole idea here is to benefit the homeless,
not the corporations. Realistically speaking, clothing is more
practical than plywood, and typically warmer on those chilly
nights out on the town (which, if you’re homeless, is every
night).
The corporations will pay for everything, from production to
distribution and, in return, they will have their “slogos” prominently
displayed wherever particular people congregate (of
course, in this case, “particular” means “homeless,” and “congregate”
means “lurk”).
Ben Rogovy, the entrepreneur behind the Seattle scheme, unfortunately hasn’t implemented step two of the plan yet:
Now that the homeless are clothed, how can we make sure
that they don’t just hide under their refrigerator boxes and
garbage bags? After all, what good is a billboard if it’s passed
out behind the Methodist church? In order to keep the transients
on their feet, we need to give them a reason to wander the city.
My plan is to establish checkpoints at various locations throughout
the city, stocked with beer and manned by corporate reps
with clipboards. The homeless would wander (stagger? meander?)
throughout the city like mice in a maze, moving from
checkpoint to checkpoint, drinking Pabst out of Dixie cups at
every stop. The homeless can’t just camp out at one or two
checkpoints, though. They have to keep moving. There
will be incentives (more beer, for example) for those industrious
vagabonds who manage to make it to all the checkpoints
in a given city, or for those who make the rounds in
the fastest time.
Hat-tip: former OC Managing Editor and contribution Brandon Oberlin
Republican state senators in Washington are sponsoring legislation to split the state in twain and create a 51st state composed of the lands east of the Cascades. Restrictions placed on land-use and other regulations are at the heart of the debate, but the controversy surrounding the close gubernatorial race only amplified the division between east and west.
The legislation isn’t being seriously considered, but it provides legislators and opportunity to discuss the subject. Moreover, it would also take a vote by Congress to approve a new state.
Heres a short break from the PFC fireworks.
The Idaho senate voted yesterday on a gay-marriage bill today that would change the law to only recognize a marriage between a man and a woman. Not surprising, but here is the kicker; it failed. According to all the reports I have heard through the local media, Idaho is the first state where a ban on gay marriage failed.
Now, I dont know if that exactly puts the state of Idaho on the cutting edge of the gay rights movement, but evidence seems to point to that end. I dont know about anyone else, but that scares the hell out of me to think that Idaho is more progressive than the other states in the nation.
The reason it failed is because, I believe, Idaho is quite libertarian, as evidenced by the large number of people in this state that have attempted to secede from the union. The biggest argument against the bill during the debates preceding the vote was the idea that the government shouldnt be passing laws that limit freedom. I also think the people pushing this bill really shot themselves in the foot by drafting a bill that was so strict when it came to the rights of married people. Under this new law, unmarried heterosexual couples would be denied many of the rights they currently enjoy. The people pushing this bill spent the majority of their time whining about the preservation of the family unit. Meanwhile there are a lot of washed-up musicians in the state who, regardless of their moral stance concerning homosexuality, want to get in on their girlfriends life insurance plan. Never mind the large number of people here who honestly dont care who or what their neighbor chooses to mate with. This is Idaho, for Gods sake, there isnt a lot to do around here besides find new and interesting things to fornicate with.
Now, to be fair, I dont think this decision is going to lead to an endless stream of gay couples coming to the state to be married. As far as I know, nobody in the state of Idaho is going to be marrying gay couples anytime soon. But, on the other hand, the fact that the bill failed means that the current law is open to interpretation.
That is all, I just thought I would bring this to the attention to all those people who bad-mouthed Idaho during my time in Eugene. Thats right, Tim, this state might be populated by a bunch of gun-toting rednecks, but they are gun-toting rednecks that respect the rights of the individual.
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