Grim Reality For Gun Grabbers

Even in the midst of the shootings in the DC area, the gun prohibitionists are admitting that their movement is on the ropes. And Michael Moore’s incoherent propaganda isn’t going to help.

Great news (though the article contains the usual misinterpretation of Miller–the Supremes did not rule that the Second Amendment pertained only in the context of militias).

Why Do They Hate Us?

The Daily Cal has retracted this story, which originally reported that some Berkeley professors were claiming that the US may have carried out the Bali bombing.

The professors in question are justified to be concerned with such a false accusation on the part of the campus paper, but they should be even more concerned about the fact that it seemed like a perfectly credible story. They should be asking themselves why.

Dealing with that problem is going to require a lot more work than was getting a simple retraction.

Idiotic Web Site Design

I’m on the phone with a bank. I have two credit card accounts with them. I’ve got one of them registered for on line banking and bill paying. The other one needs to be paid. Today.

There’s no way that I can see on the web site to register the other one, at least with the same user name.

I call the help number. I have to call three times, each time repeating my sixteen digit credit card number, each time having them verify all of my vital information, each time telling me that they can’t help but that they’ll transfer me to someone who can. The first two times, this results in a long hold period, and then a dial tone as the line is dropped.

The third time is the charm.

I talk to the young woman on the other end, and explain that I’d like to pay both of my cards on line. She says she’ll have to go talk to someone else.

She comes back in a few minutes, and informs me that we can register my other card, but first we have to cancel the first one.

???

“I don’t want to cancel the one that I’ve already successfully registered. I want to have them both registered.”

She says, “That’s the only way to do it.” She says this as though it’s perfectly reasonable. As though no one in their right mind would want to be able to make an on-line payment of their bills on more than one card, or would mind continually cancelling and reregistering the credit cards twice a month in order to do so.

I finally persuade her that this is not exactly a customer-friendly policy, and she goes off to talk to them again.

This is yet to be resolved, but I’m simply amazed at how stultifyingly dumb the designers of some on-line commerce sites can be.

Supersonic Squash

Just in time for Halloween, an Indiana man is building a pumpkin gun that will launch a ten-pound speciman a mile, with a muzzle velocity of 900 miles an hour.

He’d better beware of recruiters from Iraq.

My prediction: the oversized gourd will be instantaneously squashed and cooked. Perhaps they can use a pie shell as a target.

Only in America.

Backtracking?

Not necessarily.

Secretary of State Colin Powell, who has spoken of “regime change” in Iraq for at least 18 months, said Sunday the United States might not seek to remove Saddam Hussein if he abandoned his weapons of mass destruction.

Other semantically equivalent statements:

“The United States might not seek to remove Saddam Hussein if Susan Sarandon, Woody Harrelson, Alec Baldwin and Sean Penn issue a joint press release that isn’t utter nonsense.”

“The United States might not seek to remove Saddam Hussein if the Democrats will support elimination of the corporate income tax.”

“The United States might not seek to remove Saddam Hussein if the sun rises in the west.”

“The United States might not seek to remove Saddam Hussein if snowball fights break out in Hades.”

Our Friends The Saudis

According to this story, Al Qaeda is funded by about a dozen individuals, mostly Saudis.

Not to worry, though–they’re our allies.

The administration does not plan to confront Saudi Arabia with the new information. But officials said the United States plans to first form a coalition that will ensure that Europe will be off-limits to Saudi financing.

On Friday, the Washington Post said Al Qaida has relied on human couriers to fly cash from Saudi Arabia to agents around the world. The newspaper said U.S. intelligence followed the couriers and helped identify the money trail.

“In the next few weeks, you will hear cries of pain, mostly from Saudi Arabia,” the senior official was quoted by the Post as saying. “If the Saudis don’t take action against these people, we will at least make sure they cannot travel outside their home country and cannot do business as usual around the world.”

Gee, wasn’t it some American president who a little over a year ago said something like:

“We will make no distinction between the terrorists who committed these terrible acts and those who harbor them…”

I guess he forgot the little escape clause “…unless they’re our ‘allies’ and have a lot of oil.”

Biting Commentary about Infinity…and Beyond!