Regardless of our political affiliations or beliefs, we're all plagued by certain scourges of the computer world (besides message board trolls). I wouldn't wish a hard-drive-destroying virus on my worst Liberal opponent... well, not my second-worst, anyway. Having worked with computers since the days of stone knives and bearskins (technologically speaking), I've found there are a few ways you can protect your system without being charged an arm and a leg, even if you're not a computer wizard yourself. The four main types of problems most computer users face are viruses, spyware, spam and hackers.

Viruses are pieces of software that, like their biological namesake, infect a system and attempt to propagate. Most viruses spread by attaching themselves to programs that must be run in order to activate their instructions. One of the best anti-virus programs I've found is AVG Antivirus, a product from an Eastern European company called Grisoft. Thanks to the fall of the Soviet Union, Grisoft has opened offices all over the world to help distribute their product with capitalistic zeal. Fortunately, they offer a free version to home users.

Caution: Before installing a new antivirus program, make sure you a) disconnect from the internet and b) uninstall your previous antivirus product completely. Otherwise, the conflict between programs may slow down your system.

A good way to check your system for viruses is to boot from a clean disk, since many viruses hide in the MBR (master boot record) and cannot be cleaned while the PC's operating system is in use. However, Trend Micro has a free version of their antivirus program HouseCall on the web that can check your PC for hidden viruses.

Cookies are useful bits of code that keep track of your preferences and login status, so you don't have to go through the personalisation process every time you visit the same web site. Spyware, however, is a form of malignant cookie that sends reports back to its distributor. Have you ever surfed the web looking for, say, a new toaster, only to get dozens of emails offering you a new toaster the very next day? Spyware is responsible for tracking your websurfing habits to help unscrupulous companies target you for advertising. Luckily, the nice folks at Lavasoft offer a free version of their product, Ad-Aware Personal, for home use. Their website can be viewed in thirteen languages, to satisfy even the most multiculturally-aware Liberal.

While on the subject of email, spam is perhaps the most annoying and most common feature of modern internet use. Although it can be slightly complicated to set up, Mailgate offers a free version of Spam Weasel for home users. With the help of the Spam Weasel Crash Dummy's Guide, anyone can use the program to set up a virtual proxy that can block most spam. This program, however, requires some maintenance, as spammers deliberately misspell various keywords in increasingly inventive ways so as to slide past such filters. You can even configure the program to block things besides standard spam, such as hate mail from various Liberal groups (although it's often so entertaining, I don't see why anyone would want to).

Hackers may attempt to gain access to your PC remotely. While you may not have your passwords, bank account information and credit cards numbers saved in a convenient text file right on your desktop, there is still information on your PC you might not want hackers to have. Addresses, email lists and pictures from that night in the hot tub are all fair game. What's worse, hackers gaining control of your PC might use it to hack another computer... and the attempt might be traced to you if they get caught trying to bring down Wall Street. While the latest versions of my favorite firewall programs, Tiny Personal Firewall and Zone Alarm, are no longer free for home users, SoftPerfect still offers a free version of their software for users on a tight budget.

Whoever you are, and whatever you believe, you should be able to use the internet without fear. None of these free programs are as protective as the retail versions -- after all, "you get what you pay for" is as good a piece of capitalist advice as "let the buyer beware." However, for the average user, they should provide a safety net... in the literal sense of the word.

Perhaps you're wondering what the Appalachian Fruit Laboratory in Kearneysville WV wants to do with $3,638,000 of your hard-earned tax dollars. Maybe you want to know why animal waste management in Bowling Green KY costs the federal government $2,300,000. (What are those animals eating -- too much of that Appalachian Fruit?) Possibly you just want to know why $100,000 of the money you send to the IRS is going to teach Iowans who want to plant trees in the Trees Forever Program about the injuries snow can do to those trees. I'm more concerned with the damage pork-barrel projects like these are doing to my budget. I'm afraid to say that out loud, however... someone might convince a politician to give him my tax money to study it.

The bottomless money trough in Washington DC is as full to the brim as ever, and so the Citizens Against Government Waste have released the 2005 edition of The Pig Book. Its pages detail all the myriad ways in which excess tax revenue is being misspent, in excruciating detail. Your tax dollars and mine are going to fund projects like Washington State's $250,000 appropriation for "asparagus technology." Is high-tech asparagus your cup of tea? Other examples of blatant waste are $11,450,000 for a Louisiana waterway that carries 0.1% of the nation's water traffic -- while getting 3.4% of all waterway funding -- and $3,973,000 for a multi-state research project on shrimp aquaculture which, according to the USDA, has already met its original objectives... scheduled to be completed in 1987.

Did you know that you donated $70,000 for the Paper Industry Hall of Fame in Appleton WI? Were you aware that you paid $25,000 to the Clark County School District of Nevada so that the students can study mariachi music? Do you like golf enough to pay $100,000 for the Tiger Woods Foundation in Los Alamitos CA? Woods probably makes that much in a relaxing afternoon while playing a game -- can't he fund his own foundation? Were you asked whether you wanted to give $775,000 to the Biltmore Hotel in Coral Gables FL, which charges customers $350 per night? On the Biltmore's website, taxpayers can see where their money is going. "Coming Spring of 2005, The Biltmore will introduce a brand new, 12,000 sq. ft. destination Spa on the seventh floor of the hotel. Featuring spectacular views of surrounding Coral Gables, the Biltmore Spa will offer a luxurious and sophisticated setting for state-of-the-art treatments and services." Your tax dollars at work! As far as I'm concerned, all this pork spending is a load of fertiliser. If only I could get some of the $1,700,000 you gave to Alaska's International Fertiliser Development Center for saying so.

How often do we hear Democrats crying that tax cuts hurt vital programs like education and Medicare? As long as politicians can spend taxpayer money on bloated pork projects, there's certainly no shortage of money in Washington DC -- and don't let anyone tell you differently. Why don't tax cuts come out of the trough first? No politician from any major party would vote to stop pork altogether -- that's how they buy votes from special interests, and garner good publicity in local papers back home to influence swing voters. No politician is immune -- the top state for pork-barrel projects in 2005 is Alaska, the Republican Senator of which (Ted Stevens) is also the Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman.

It seems there are only two ways to slow down the mad rush to spend all that excess tax money politicians control. A line-item veto would allow a single person -- the President -- to be held accountable for passing pork project costs on to the taxpayers. Not many Presidents would risk falling poll numbers to buy new buses for Disneyland transportation, as one California pork project does with $300,000 of your money.

In 1996, Congress passed the line-item veto, which President Clinton used 82 times in 1997 alone. However, the Supreme Court ruled 6-3 that the line-item veto was unconstitutional in 1998, putting pork back on the menu. Senator Bobby Byrd (D-WV) called the decision, "a great day for the US Constitution." Senator Byrd was named "The King of Pork" in honor of his "fiscal incontinence" by the CAGW in 1999, when he became the first Senator to amass a billion dollars in pork-barrel funding. Byrd has earned a lifetime rating of 17 from the CAGW, on a scale where 0 is considered hostile to taxpayers and 100 labels one a "Taxpayer Hero." As of last year, Senators Dick Durbin (D-IL) and Hillary Clinton (D-NY) tied for the dubious honor of "most taxpayer-hostile Senator," each with a lifetime rating of 7.

The best way, however, to stop the politicians from picking your pocket to buy votes in their home states is: more tax cuts! If they don't have your money in the first place, they can't waste it. And DC politicians obviously have too much money for their own good... or yours.

When some members of Congress violate the Constitution, how can we have any confidence in their leadership? Yet that is precisely the effect these unlawful filibusters of judicial nominees are having -- undermining confidence in the Senate. Instead of voting yes or no on President Bush's picks for certain federal judgeships, Democrats are refusing to allow a vote to even take place, using a Senate rule that no motion may come to a vote while still under discussion.

The filibuster, as it's called, has been used by both sides for over a century and a half to delay votes while opinions are changed by argument and deal-making. Its original intent was somewhat more noble: to make sure all sides had their say during a debate. It was also supposed to mean that the subject at hand was actually being discussed, in an effort to convince some of the majority to change their minds. In reality, filibusters have included Senators reading phone books and even the Bible while simply holding the floor in the effort to prevent a vote from taking place. Senator Huey Long (D-LA) famously regaled the Senate with Shakespeare readings and favorite recipes in the 1930's (your grandpa's tax dollars at work).

This rule created reverse pressure on those doing the talking, since no further Senate business could be transacted while a filibuster was in effect. The only way to end it is to get three-fifths (originally two-thirds) of the Senators to vote, called a cloture vote. In theory, as Senate business piled up, Senators would eventually feel the pressure to vote to allow the process of voting to continue. All a Senator has to do now is announce that a vote will be filibustered, and the Senate moves on to other business. It effectively gives any Senator the power to force any measure to take 60 votes to pass instead of 51, just by saying so.

That's all well and good for bills and motions, since the Constitution deliberately left the Senate free to write its own rules of operation. In general, the less the Senate does, the better off we all are, anyway. The Constitution specifically calls upon the Senate to perform certain functions, however. Using the Senate "house rules" to play political games with those duties subverts the purpose behind calling for Senate participation in the first place. The Senate's role in Presidential nominees to federal courts is one of those functions.

He shall have power, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, to make treaties, provided two thirds of the Senators present concur; and he shall nominate, and by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, shall appoint ambassadors, other public ministers and consuls, judges of the Supreme Court, and all other officers of the United States, whose appointments are not herein otherwise provided for, and which shall be established by law: but the Congress may by law vest the appointment of such inferior officers, as they think proper, in the President alone, in the courts of law, or in the heads of departments.
- Constitution of the United States, Article II, Section 2

The "advice and consent of the Senate" is being withheld by the actions of the Democrat minority. The Senate is not being allowed to vote either for or against some of the President's judicial nominees, by a fake filibuster during which no one is speaking, and while other business comes and goes on the Senate floor. While the Republicans are trying to end this abuse of the filibuster, the Democrats are clinging to their obstructionist ways with all their waning might. Opponents of the proposed rule change, which would prevent judicial nominations being filibustered as though they were common bills or motions, call it the "nuclear option." Its supporters refer to it as the "constitutional option." The nicknames alone pretty much summarise the arguments from each side.

Democrats and Liberals are trying to confuse regular filibusters with unconstitutional ones in the minds of the public, suggesting that all filibusters are in danger of being halted. One television commercial "defending the filibuster" shows a clip from Frank Capra's 1939 movie, "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington." The clip is supposed to remind us how the brave, idealistic and honest Smith used a filibuster to convince the heartless politicians to do the right thing, until he collapsed from exhaustion. Can we afford to let the time-honored tradition of the filibuster be destroyed, the ad asks? In fact, this sort of truth-twisting provides more evidence for the theory that Liberals believe that movies are more realistic than real life -- or that the public can't tell the difference. They don't seem to realise that we're not fooled by their Hollywood depictions of reality anymore... not when we can turn to CSPAN to see the real Senate in "action." The commercial, by the way, neglects to mention that the fictional Mr. Smith was filibustering a bill, not a judicial nominee.

It doesn't matter who sits in the White House, or who holds a majority in the Senate -- violations of the Constitution by those sworn to uphold it cannot be allowed to stand unchallenged. If Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-TN) thinks he has the necessary votes to stop unconstitutional filibusters, he ought to do so without further hesitation. If not, perhaps those who don't want the Constitution violated ought to contact their Senators and tell them to stop these unlawful filibusters.

The sound of the choir's perfect voices faded. A lone bell began to toll. The plain wooden coffin was carried slowly up the steps. The crowd, millions strong, began to cheer even as they wept. And perhaps two billion people watched around the globe...
 
Began to cheer?
 
Why do people believe in religion? I refer to the real believers, not the dabblers and dilettantes who espouse the popular religion du jour. Some of these fly-by-nights change "faith" more often than I rearrange my furniture, and sometimes with less reason (like, for instance, the bike path dispute that sparked Howard Dean's conversion). Most Liberals keep telling us that religion is all about fear and hatred, but that's what makes them tick; that's the lens through which they view everyone else. I saw no evidence of either fear or hatred from the people celebrating John Paul's life and mourning his death this past week -- just the opposite. The love and esteem in which the Pope was so widely held was simply amazing. The number of believers willing to endure what amounted to a pilgrimage to Rome for his funeral was staggering. Who knew, in this day and age, that so many would be so willing to show their faith? Non-religious people around the world wondered, What do they possibly get out of it?

Religion, it seems, gives the believer two things that secularism can't: the hope that there's more to life than what we can see and touch, and the chance to be a part of it. The idea that there's something after death is central to all major religions. The farewell to Pope John Paul II brought out all of the best the Catholic faith has to offer for the entire world to see, in a spectacle lasting over a week. But John Paul was more than just a leader of Catholics -- he was a religious leader in the true sense of the word. Under his guidance, the various divisions of Christianity came closer together than anytime in the last thousand years. The solemn pageantry and unapologetic public display of faith is something that hasn't been seen since... well, since the last Pope died (two of them!) in 1978. And I don't recall representatives of so many countries and religions, including Iranian theocrats, attending those funerals.

Oddly enough, the once stodgy and boring Church has become something new and different to many young people. A generation of creeping secularism has left many with nowhere to turn for moral guidance and principles. Popular hedonistic philosophies like, "if it feels good, do it," and "he who dies with the most toys, wins," become deeply unsatisfying once you pass your teen years. Anyone mature enough to consider his own mortality wonders whether there just might be something more than the physical life. The secularist answer to this question has usually been, "No! Nothing! Shut up and enjoy yourself! Don't waste time!" Could it be that Leftist suppression of religion and morality over the last quarter century might be the main reason Pope John Paul II held such appeal for so many of the world's youth?

Many seemed surprised at the sheer number of people who turned out around the world to mark the passing of the Pope. The real surprise would be if this event doesn't mark the beginning of a low-key religious resurgence, especially among young Europeans disillusioned with the bleakness of secularism. With all the "glories" of demi-Socialism -- including soaring unemployment rates (especially in France and Germany) and the near-death of family life in some places (like Scandinavia) -- Europeans have become mired in a sort of moral quagmire of their own. Ennui has become the national disease of the European Union.

If John Paul's death actually helps rescue the next generation from their secular decline, perhaps he deserves the title of "Saint" so many want conferred on him by his Church.

There's something admirable and inspiring about a person who says, "These are the principles and morals by which I will live my life," and then proceeds to do so, right to the very end. Someone like that serves as an example for all of us. Such a person was Pope John Paul II. He learned about dignity and the value of life early, and fought to advance those principles right until the moment he died.

Pope John Paul II, born Karol Wojtyla, was a man with a steadfast belief in a set of solid moral values in a world where morality is frowned upon and values shift with the wind. He studied for the priesthood in secret during the Nazi occupation of his native Poland, while he performed with an underground theater group. (Before entering the Church, he wanted to be an actor.) He began his work as a religious leader under the disapproving atheism of Communist rule, becoming an auxiliary bishop in Krakow in 1958. He was made a cardinal in 1967, and elected to the Papacy in 1978.

The growing cult of death won a victory in the battle to devalue life with the judicial murder of Terri Schiavo. Sentenced to die on hearsay alone, for no crime greater than being brain-damaged and voiceless, Terri slowly starved to death while nutrition and water were withheld from her by court order. Every attempt to reverse the court's decision or alter Terri's state-sanctioned fate was blocked by the judicial system, a system that has lost any right to use the word "justice."

For decades, the pro-death secularist Liberals have been whittling away at the respect for life we once held. They have openly supported anti-life policies, from abortions without parental notification to late-term abortions of viable babies to the "right to die" of people who aren't actually dying. Now, with the death of Terri Schiavo, they have turned the judiciary into a vehicle for killing off the unwanted as well as the unborn. We have been taught to accept death as an easy solution, not an inevitability to be put off as long as possible. Adversity is not something to be faced with courage. Death is merely a "choice," like whether to order chicken or veal.

Once upon a time, before our judicial system decided that unborn children were "nonpersons" with no more right to live than a tapeworm, a judgment like that handed down by Judge Greer would have been impossible. If American culture still had the reverence for life it had just 40 years ago, mercy and reason would have tempered Greer's decision, instead of this soulless strictness about adhering to the letter of the law above all. It wouldn't and shouldn't have been merely a question of who had the right to kill Terri, but whether it was right to do so at all. The slow erosion of our values has coarsened us the to the point where many of us shrug off the deliberate killing of a helpless person by our courts as "probably for the best." This apathetic attitude persists despite the fact that the person in question was in no danger of dying, and had a family willing to care for her for the rest of her life.

In this struggle to weaken our sense of right and wrong, activist judges have taken upon themselves power they were never intended to have. Thomas Jefferson warned us that renegade judges could be a danger to liberty, though even he never imagined they would be a danger to life itself. "To consider the judges as the ultimate arbiters of all constitutional questions [is] a very dangerous doctrine indeed, and one that would place us under the despotism of an oligarchy," he wrote in 1820. Time and again we have seen laws written by the elected representatives of the people simply thrown out because they don't suit a particular judge's agenda. Many times judges have dictated to the legislature what laws they should write, as in the case of the Massachusetts Supreme Court ordering the legislature to write a law allowing gay marriage within six months.

Judges tend to support each other to preserve their collective power, as was shown by all the courts involved in the Schiavo case simply ruling that proper procedures were followed without actually looking at the facts and testimony, or calling for up-to-date tests. Even when the Congress of the United States, in a vain attempt to prevent Terri Schiavo's constitutional rights to due process from being violated by the Florida judiciary, passed a law requiring a de novo review of the case, Judge Whittemore of the US District court simply reviewed the procedures again, as had all the judges before him.

Jefferson cautioned that judges would be "constantly working underground to undermine the foundations of our confederated fabric." The respect our legal system once held for life, the mercy and protection our laws afforded the innocent and helpless were integral to that fabric, now picked apart by judicial activism. We may be a nation of laws, but we are no longer a nation of justice.

By the time you read this, Terri Schindler Schiavo will most likely be dead. Pro-death Liberals and Deathocrats will be dancing in the streets (figuratively speaking), celebrating their great victory over the religious right (and President Bush) in the judicially-sanctioned killing of a brain-damaged woman. The only thing missing will be the AK-47s, since most of the same Liberals are anti-gun. I wonder, though, about the implications of this event, and where it will take us next.

One result of Terri Schiavo's ordeal has been to prove the unassailable supremacy of the judiciary over the other two branches of government, at both the state and federal level. The legislative and executive branches are each, in theory, equal to the judiciary. On paper, each branch has checks and balances to prevent the other two from becoming too powerful. Many of those on the Right have had their warnings about the increasing power of judicial activists ignored for years. This case has proven beyond a reasonable doubt (to borrow a phrase) that the executive and legislative branches of government combined are powerless to affect decisions made by the judiciary.

Congress even passed a law requiring that the Schiavo case receive a fresh look at the federal level, since there were questions about violations of Terri's Constitutional rights. The Fifth Amendment to the US Constitution states, "No person shall be... deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law." The Fourteenth Amendment reinforces this at the state level, adding that no state shall "deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws." When the State takes a life, it is obligated to be as certain as possible of its findings -- and there are too many questions concerning the Schiavo case to simply ignore.

This law might have become a precedent for bringing other disputed cases to the federal courts. But the action of the federal court mirrored those of the Florida court system. Instead of actually reviewing the evidence and testimony, perhaps calling for new tests to determine Terri's true condition, US District Judge James Whittmore simply checked the original court records to see whether proper procedures had been followed. He adhered to the letter but not the intent of the law. In other words, the merits of the original case have never been reviewed, nor have the original medical findings... only the legal procedures. This despite the fact that Terri has never had a PET scan or MRI, nor a lawyer representing her. There is no way to regulate the power of the courts when no one has jurisdiction over them.

The Liberal advocacy of death for the unwanted and unfit has reached a new low with the Schiavo case. It's hard to understand their mania for death, until we consider the fact that they also believe the government should pay for all health care. Liberals have always advocated national health care (or socialised medicine) as the acme of medical guardianship, despite complaints of long waits and endless bureaucracy from countries that have it. It's not too hard to imagine a future in which national health care is a reality, and Liberals justify the deaths of unwanted children and adults who are disabled, deformed, mentally deficient or terminally ill on the grounds that they cost the government too much money to take care of.

In fact, we don't have to imagine it at all. The T-4 Euthanasia program ran along those very same lines in Nazi Germany. Under Phillipp Bouhler (head of the Fuehrer Chancellery) and Dr. Viktor Brack, Hitler's euthanasia program killed approximately 270,000 people. The original order, signed in 1939, gave them the power to "decide whether those who have -- as far as can be humanly determined -- incurable illnesses can, after the most careful evaluation, be granted a mercy death." Handicapped children were given lethal injections or starved to death. Other victims were gassed to death or simply shot.

How did the Nazis justify their wholesale murder of those they considered "unfit" to live? One propaganda poster showing a mental patient had a caption saying, "This person suffering from hereditary defects costs the people 60,000 Reichmarks during his lifetime. People, that is your money." Under the national health system of Nazi Germany, it was easy to justify killing the imperfect on the grounds that they cost the State money in the form of medical care -- money that could be better used for education, to alleviate poverty or to create jobs, some would argue.

That sort of thing could never happen today, could it? Consider the British case in which two doctors performed a late-term abortion on a baby whose only defect was that it had a cleft palate -- a condition that can be corrected by surgery. The CPS (Crown Prosecution Service) decided not to prosecute the case because the abortion was performed "in good faith" by doctors who believed the child would be handicapped for life. A handicapped child would have required government medical care to live or to have the condition corrected. When you've absorbed that, consider the Liberal support for abortion, euthanasia for the disabled and handicapped, the "right to die" movement, and now their celebration of the state-sanctioned starvation of a woman who had a below-standard "quality of life."

That's the direction in which we're headed, if something is not done to prevent it. The default position of the courts as well as doctors should always be to preserve innocent life without a good reason to end it. Hearsay evidence from a "husband" who violated his marriage vows and suddenly remembered the patient's wishes years after the fact should never be a good enough reason to take a life. Yet in this case, it was. What will come next?

Hat tip to HundredPercenter for the collection of DU posts about Terri.

Well, good for UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan! He wants to reform the UN, and it's about time. Some might argue that he's only doing it to distract attention from his role (and that of his son) in the massive Oil for Food scandal. For those who missed it, that's the one in which Saddam Hussein pocketed over $20 billion while his people starved and went without decent medical care, while Saddam used Iraq's oil to bribe France, China and Russia into opposing any action on the 17 resolutions demanding he turn over all his illegal weapons and materials. Some might say that Kofi's trying to distract from all the other scandals the UN has been involved in under his management, from 800,000 dead in Rwandan genocide to forced prostitution run by UN troops in Bosnia to child rape in the Congo and sex crimes all throughout Africa to... well, the list goes on and on.

There are even some who say that Kofi Annan genuinely wants to reform the UN for the right reasons, to make it relevant and important in today's world. Sure, that could happen. One step he intends to take is to adopt "a tough anti-terrorism treaty that would punish suicide bombers." Well, as head of an organisation that normally excuses suicide bombers and condemns their victims (since a majority of its membership is made up of countries that support terrorism), Kofi might have some trouble figuring out how to do that. As always, I am here to help. Here are some suggestions for how the UN might "get tough" on suicide bombers. Ready to take notes, Kofi?

1. Put them in jail. Only you'd better make sure it's a good jail, with very small bars like a window screen. Otherwise, the bits and pieces of your prisoners just might escape.

2. Also, you'd better be sure that the floors in your jail cells are watertight. In fact, maybe you should just put the suicide bombers in Tupperware containers.

3. Stop giving their leaders Nobel Peace Prizes and treating them like rock stars. Terrorists, it seems, don't usually speak English very well, so maybe they don't realise that blowing stuff up isn't peaceful.

4. Always close UN offices and leave the country when suicide bombers attack. It makes them feel ashamed... and that's worse than death.

5. Make them purchase round-trip tickets on buses and planes, even though they intend to blow them up somewhere en route. The companies can use the extra cash to replace the blown-up vehicles, giving another suicide bomber his or her chance at Paradise.

6. Give countries that support and sponsor terrorism seats on the UN Security Council, just like Syria. That shows the suicide bombers that you respect them... which is all they really want (besides the death of every American and Israeli, of course).

7. Condemn the United States for not doing enough on its own. Although this won't actually punish any suicide bombers, it will make them feel better. Also, this is more or less standard operating procedure for UN resolutions, so what the heck.

8. Condemn the United States for acting on its own, too. This will also have no effect other than to make the terrorists and the countries that support them feel better, but it's also de rigueur for UN resolutions these days. Besides, France won't like it if these two condemnations aren't included.

9. Oh, while you're condemning things, condemn Israel for continuing to exist in defiance of world opinion. Everybody would like that, except the United States (the spoilsports). After all, there probably wouldn't be any suicide bombers if it weren't for Israel, right? Who created that country, anyway?

10. Oh, right, this is about getting tough on suicide bombers. Well, maybe you can get the mainstream media to call them "terrorists" once in a while, instead of militants, insurgents, revolutionaries, rebels, kidnappers or freedom fighters. That'll teach them a lesson they'll never forget as long as they live.

Hope this helps, Kofi! Let me know if you need any more suggestions.

A Florida court has sentenced a woman to death by starvation. She didn't get a trial. She didn't get a lawyer. No one knows what crime she has committed. Yet Terri Schiavo has been condemned to a cruel death by slow starvation, for no good reason that I can discern. Although those who argue for her death repeatedly refer to "extraordinary measures" and "extensive medical procedures" meant to keep her alive, it's difficult to see how a simple nutrient tube qualifies as either of these two things. The inability to swallow solid food is not a reason for a death sentence in any civilised country of which I'm aware, nor is being mentally disabled.

Convicted mass-murderers get seemingly endless appeals on the public dime. When the sentence is finally carried out, the justice system goes to great lengths to ensure that the death is as quick and painless as possible. If convicted murderers aren't sentenced to starve to death, why has that sentence been passed on a woman whose only crime was to get sick?

In 1990, Terri Schiavo collapsed of heart failure, probably caused by a potassium imbalance. She suffered brain damage as a result of lack of oxygen. Unable to eat, she receives nutrients through a feeding tube. Michael Schiavo, her husband and legal guardian, first petitioned to have the tube removed in 1998. Two years later, Judge Greer of Florida's Sixth Judicial Circuit Court decided that Terri would have chosen to have the tube removed, because Michael claimed that she once told him so. Why it took him so long to remember this has yet to be explained.

A friend of Terri's testified that she once told Terri a cruel joke about a woman who fell into a coma after mixing drugs and alcohol. "What is the state vegetable of New Jersey?" the friend asked Terri. The punchline was, "Karen Ann Quinlan." Terri didn't find the joke about the fight to take Quinlan off life support funny. "How did they know she would want this?" she asked. This testimony was seemingly ignored, while her husband's insistence that Terri, a Roman Catholic like her parents, would not want to be kept alive using any artificial means was taken as fact. Judge Greer referred to Michael Schiavo's hearsay -- and that's what it amounts to -- as "clear and convincing evidence" that Terri would rather die than take food through a tube.

Terri Schiavo's condition is nothing like Karen Ann Quinlan's. Despite the picture painted by advocates for her death, Terri is not a vegetable, nor is she in a coma. She's not dying -- or wouldn't be, if she was being fed. She's merely brain-damaged in a way no one yet understands, yet she is responsive to various stimuli. Her eyes track motion, she responds to the sight of her family members, and she even laughs. How can you say that someone who can laugh at a joke is no longer deserving of the right to live? And how can you sentence someone to die of starvation because she can't eat properly?

This is not a "right to die" case, as Terri's husband and his lawyers portray it. It's a "right to kill your wife when that whole 'in sickness and in health' thing becomes inconvenient" case. As far as I'm concerned, Michael Schiavo stopped being Terri's husband in all but name when he broke his marriage vows by moving in with Jodie Centonze in 1995. He should have been removed as Terri's legal guardian at that time, and on those grounds. Since then, he's repeatedly tried to accomplish his wife's death, even refusing to allow therapy or tests that could determine whether improvement is even possible. A CNA (Certified Nursing Assistant) who worked at the Palm Gardens Nursing Home testified in 2003 that she "was personally aware of orders for rehabilitation that were not being carried out. Even though they were ordered, Michael would stop them." Michael Schiavo is an unfit guardian who is not looking out for Terri's best interests, and ought to lose that power.

Congress has convened an emergency Sunday session concerning this case. They intend to pass legislation that might prevent Terri's life from being ended before the full extent of her present condition can be determined, by the very tests Michael Schiavo refuses to allow. This makes logical as well as moral sense. How can a person be sentenced to die -- the ultimate deprivation of civil rights -- when their condition isn't actually known?

Many of those on the Left are outraged by the involvement of Congress in this decision. They ask, "Do you want Congress to decide medical questions?" I don't see how allowing an unelected judge to decide medical questions is any worse. Their real concern, as evidenced by their speeches about "rule of law" and "judicial independence," is that the godlike power of activist judges will be curtailed.

Hat tip to Hyscience for the videos of Terri Schiavo reacting to stimuli.

March 20, 2005 will mark the second anniversary of the invasion of Iraq. The war lasted only three weeks before Saddam dropped out of sight and into a spider-hole... but for some hopefuls, it will never end. I'm not talking about the Ba'athist thugs who plot and struggle to regain the power -- built on fear and murder -- that they held over the Iraqi people for so long. I'm talking about the looney anti-war Left, who will spend the next few weeks continuing to protest a war that toppled a dictator, ended decades of evil tyranny and brutality, freed and gave hope to tens of millions, began the spread of democracy throughout the Middle East... and ended almost as quickly as it began. Yes, they're protesting a war that's already over.

When you think about it, it's almost laughable -- when it's not pitiful, that is. Caught in the grip of rabid Bush-hatred, these so-called "progressives" ignore all signs of long hoped-for progress in the Middle East to excoriate its author for bringing it about! Elections and free speech in countries that (in many cases) have never known such things fail to impress the "Not In Our Name" crowd. Where will these "anti-war" folks be in a few decades? It's as if there were still people actively protesting US involvement in WWII, even in light of the fact that Hitler is gone, the world is safe from the threat of Nazi domination and Germany has become a peaceful democracy. Imagine how ridiculous they would sound.

CARTHAGE, TUNISIA -- Carrying signs saying, "End The US Occupation of Germany" and, "War Is Not The Answer," the seven remaining members of Peace For Our Time, a group that once numbered in the dozens, have gathered once again. The group continues its protest against US involvement in World War II, at the spot on which it began 63 years ago in 1942.

"There was never any reason to invade Tunisia," said 82-year-old PFOT founder Scott Whiteflag, weakly shaking a fist in the air. "No Tunisians ever attacked America! We should have stayed at home and taken care of our own problems! The only people who attacked us were the Japanese, and Roosevelt didn't do nearly enough to find out why they hated us and offer them our apologies. Instead of trying to find a means of peaceful coexistence with Nazi Germany, a country that had never attacked us, he rashly led the country into an elective war based on lies about a German invasion of America. Roosevelt lied, and people died!"

The group Peace For Our Time takes its name from the statement made by Neville Chamberlain in 1938, after negotiating with Adolf Hitler. "My good friends, for the second time in our history, a British Prime Minister has returned from Germany bringing peace with honour. I believe it is peace for our time. Go home and get a nice quiet sleep." The group contends that Hitler was open to diplomacy and was "contained."

"We had no right to interfere with their culture," an unidentified member of the group insisted. "All those martial displays and Jew-killing was part of their heritage, and our unwanted interference just wasn't right. Just because we didn't agree with their laws against Jews, Slavs and Gypsies doesn't mean we had the right to go over there and invade a sovereign nation like that. Who died and made America the boss?"

"Of course Hitler was a bad person," said a grandmotherly woman named Ruth, "and it's a good thing he was removed from power -- don't get us wrong there! However, we protest the manner in which we were misled into the war, and the hundreds of thousands of American dead!" Ruth also accused General Patton of committing war crimes against the German people, and demanded that he be posthumously stripped of his rank as well as his decorations and awards.

Another member of the group whose walker bore a taped-on sign reading, "Containment Was Working!" collapsed at that moment.

"Poor Charlie!" exclaimed Ruth. "Now only the six of us are left to protest the way Mr. Roosevelt pushed us into war with his filthy Lend-Lease Act."

For the last sixty years, Whiteflag and his group have been funded by a cartel of Swiss bankers living in Argentina.