Surprise!

Yep, I know it's been a while, but I was so enjoying the unprecedented activity on my comment board that I figured I'd let it play out a bit.

Obviously, there are more political items to attend to, but first, a blast from the past.

Life was going well for young Fox. After a short but intense show career, he retired at the tender age of ten months, and his horizons seemed boundless. His whole life was ahead of him, retirement awaited, and who knew what the future might hold?

But something went wrong.

The details are sketchy, but something caused this promising young pup to change his name, bleach most of his face, yank a few teeth, and eventually gouge out an eye, all to escape his past. What else can explain this transition?

Confounding the confusion, early on in his quest for a different identity, the collar manufacturer transposed a vowel in his new moniker, leading some to dub him "Sonny", whilst others (perhaps also perplexed by his mincing femininity) believed him to be "Sunny"- an error that continues to be made to this day.

Whatever the reason, Fox/Sonny went from crowns of laurel leaves, mingled parties with comely females, and top of the line Purina dog chow to his current existence- launched in ballistic arcs by impatient pharmacists, psychologically tormented by family friends, and playing second fiddle to obnoxiously cute babies.

Anyway, you heard it here first.

So, now that we're a few primaries/caucuses down the line, things are a tad more settled (but just a tad). Hillary Clinton shocked the world by pulling it out in New Hampshire (me not least of all), and therefore is making a race of it. I think Obama will pull it out in South Carolina this weekend, but from there it's anyone's guess. We'll have to wait for Super Tuesday to know for sure.

Over in Republican land, John McCain continues to win where it counts (comments from my last post notwithstanding). Fred Thompson, once my favorite candidate, dropped out of the race today after a disappointed SC finish. Romney managed to save his bacon in Michigan and financially remains the best off, but I'm not really sure where he has to go from here. Romney, principled man that he is, apparently does not care about polls, which makes his departure from SC to run uncontested in Nevada virtually unexplainable. It's almost as if someone read him a poll showing him in fourth place going into the primary, but that can't be it.

I was really shocked to see that Ann Coulter actually thinks Romney is the best guy for the job. We really are an absolutely fractured party if she'd endorse him.

Just to reiterate why I think McCain's the best candidate for us at this point, here are my reasons (in vague order of importance):

1. He can win in the general election, since he alone of the Republicans has cross party appeal.


2. He supported the surge in Iraq when half the party was reading polls and ready to make a deal with the Democrats- which would have undercut the whole war effort, which I think is the single most important issue of our time.


3. He's always been against pork barrel spending, which is, again, a huge issue that needs to be dealt with. I didn't think this was an important issue before, but given the vast increase in government size and waste under Bush, it's time to get a handle on this.


4. He's made up for one of my major problems with him (immigration) by changing his stance to "Secure the Borders first". We can talk about what to do with illegals once that's done, but that has to be done first.

Yes, there is that abominable McCain/Feingold law that he authored, which hopefully the Supreme Court will gradually dismantle in the coming years, but I'm inclined to overlook that in favor of the above.

Now, I'm sure I'll get a few more broadsides for that, so let 'em commence.

So, on to other things.

I don't know whether anyone here heard about the whole Jena-6 thing (I salute you if you managed to avoid it), but back in August, one of my coworkers forwarded this email around about it. Now, I have a lot of respect for her, but reading the email at the time, and knowing how these incidents usually turn out, I was very wary of lending any support to it. Turns out my caution was well justified, as described in this lengthy article. It's amazing the sheer lack of scrutiny that the media shows when the story plays into their preconceptions.

Shelly, for her Moot Court competition, has sold her soul to the devil. OK, perhaps that's a bit dramatic. She's endeavored to deprive millions of Americans of their most basic human right. What? Still too over-the-top? OK...perhaps I'll just tell you about it.

Shelly has to write a brief defending the Collectivist Rights model of the Second Amendment for her Moot Court competition. There. I said it. And I've been (sob)... helping her.

Now, it actually is a good exercise in that you have to find out what the basis is for your opponent's point of view, and with that end in mind, it's been very illuminating. For instance, the Circuit Courts that have rendered decisions since Miller in 1939 either refuse to apply Miller as written (in Cases and Tot) or illegitimately cite to it when it doesn't say what they purport it to say. Don't believe me cause I'm biased? Go read this.

It's also refreshing to see Shelly review the material herself, and come to the conclusion that the Collectivist model is pretty much pure crap. I had feared she'd see something there I didn't. Could've been a marriage breaker! ;)

But it's her job to defend it, and I constantly find myself saying (after reading something she's written) "Well, it's about the best anyone can do with it." Love you honey!

Well, the night wears on. So much else to say, and I'm only halfway down my list of blog ideas. I guess I'll have to pick this up either tomorrow or Thursday (since Jen Glass is going to be over tomorrow- yet another thing I didn't get to mention).

So I'll at least mark one last thing off my list and leave you all with a picture of Charlotte.

(Anyone else notice that all my pictures were of the Hawkins family members? Geez, they're monopolizing my blog!)