Monday -- September 12, 2005
 NEAL
HAS LEFT THE BUILDINGNeal has headed out for a little R&R.
Jay Severin will be filling in a bit on
the air and the Nuze has been left in the hands of the webwench. None of you
want to hear my views on politics so we'll be staying away from that. Instead,
expect morning sickness style stories, entertaining tidbits, maybe a few nerdy
things and whatever else I might find on The Internets. If none of this
interests you, then come back September 12th. Neal should be well rested and
"loaded for bear" as he'd say.
THE FAIRTAX BOOK BOOKPLATE
If you ordered your book online or you
couldn't make it to a book signing near you, Congressman Linder and Neal will send you an
adhesive-backed autographed book plate to place inside your copy of The FairTax
Book. Just send a self-addressed and stamped letter-sized envelope to:
Neal Boortz - Book Plate
1601 W. Peachtree St. NE
Atlanta, Georgia 30309
NEAL FORGETS HE'S ON VACATIONOk ... so I'm on vacation. I just can't
help but sticking my nose in here to drop a few thoughts into the Nuze ......
INSIDE THE DARK AND DEPRAVED MIND OF A LIBERAL
Many people from many walks of life have been opining on Hurricane Katrina and
its aftermath. We've heard from the likes of Sean Penn and Michael Moore. Robert
Kennedy Jr. weighed in to blame Haley Barbour for the whole mess. Katrina, it
seems, was born of the failure of the Mississippi governor to single-handedly
arrange for the ratification of the hideously flawed Kyoto accords. Aging hippie
Nancy Pelosi says its all George Bush's fault, and the NAACP, after having
nothing to say following four Florida hurricanes in 2004, is demanding that the
Katrina victims get the same cash payments as did the families of the victims of
9/11.
Nowhere, though, will you find a more screwed-up train of thought (if that's
what you want to call it) than in this letter which appeared in the Saturday
edition of Atlanta's burden, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution:
Monied America lacks moral goodness
[bugmenot]
Congratulations, monied America: You wanted your gated communities to keep out
the poor, to protect yourselves from crime, to separate yourselves from
undesirables. You took the high roads and built your gated communities on them
so you would stay dry and clean while the stormwaters of filth and despair
flooded their neighborhoods.
You did it. You kept out the poor, you concentrated the crime in the poor
neighborhoods, effectively ensuring those neighborhoods would remain poor and
broken. You separated yourselves from the undesirables.
And then you left them, to die in attics and on rooftops and in the streets and
in the disgusting halls of commerce and sports. The richest nation in the world
is the most destitute when it comes to true moral goodness. God could not bless
this America at all.
SAM MARIE ENGLE OK ... we're going to give Engle a pass for misspelling "moneyed" and for
her
failure to realize that "storm waters" are two words. It goes with the
territory. And just what territory might that be, you ask? Well, from reading
her screed, haven't you already guessed that Sam Marie Engle stalks the halls of
academia? Engle is
the director of something called the Kenneth Cole Fellowship
in Community Building and Social Change and is the senior program associate in
the Office of University-Community Partnerships at Emory University. Emory. That
says a lot.
Now let's deal with Engle's rant.
Obviously Engle has a problem with achievement. In a word, she harbors great
resentment toward those who have gone the extra mile to achieve success and
wealth. Somehow she has convinced herself that the problems that afflicted the
poor in New Orleans were due to the existence of gated communities and the
presence of the evil rich. If there had been no wealthy neighborhoods in New
Orleans the poor, somehow, wouldn't have suffered.
Engle also finds great fault with the idea that people would go to extra lengths
to protect themselves from crime. How hideously insensitive of the rich! How
very un-American! No doubt were we to locate Ms. Engle's automobile wherever it
is parked while she is out there community-building, we would find it to be
unlocked; ditto for her home. After all, Engle certainly wouldn't want to do
anything to protect herself from crime, would she? That would be a certain
indicator of a complete lack of moral goodness on her part. Furthermore, when
Engle finally moves on to her well-deserved retirement (and it can't be soon
enough) I'm certain that she is going to build her retirement home in a flood
zone rather than seek higher and safer ground. After all, if a flood were to
occur Ms. Engle wouldn't want to be accused by anyone of actually using her
wealth and power of choice wisely in selecting a building location. It's all
about demonstrating moral goodness, and you can't demonstrate moral goodness
making wise and safe choices in your personal life.
Actually, Engle's letter to the AJC editor is a literary achievement seldom
matched in our age. How one woman can get so many things wrong with so few words
is something that philosophers and scholars in logic will be studying for years
to come.
Shall we do a little picking apart?
Engle feels that the evil rich "kept out the poor" from their high-and-dry gated
communities. Sorry, Sam, the poor weren't "kept out" of those gated communities;
they just failed to make the decisions in life that would have gained them
access. The rich did nothing to them. They did it to themselves. It wasn't the
evil rich who decided that the poor would ignore the educational opportunities
available to all in America, rich and poor alike. Rich people don't teach poor
young blacks that learning is a "white thing." It wasn't some rich family living
in their gated community that decided that a poor woman was going to have a
child she could not afford to raise at 18, then another at 20 and a third at 21.
It wasn't "monied America" that made the choice for the poor that living on the
taxpayer's teat was a far more desirable way of life than developing a work
ethic and putting it to use in our opportunity-rich free market economy.
And here's something else for you to ponder as you light those votives under
your Che Guevara poster, Ms. Engle: It won't be the poor who rebuild those New
Orleans neighborhoods, and it won't be the poor who come back to the Big Easy to
invest and to provide the job opportunities that some, but certainly not all, of
the poor might seek.
Also, Ms. Engle, can you tell us just how those wicked rich people managed to
"concentrate(d) the crime in the poor neighborhoods"? Is it because they take
precautions to keep the crime out of their neighborhoods? Well, excuse the hell
out of them! How dare they sit there in their fancy homes and not accept
willingly their fair share of crime? Maybe we need some new kind of bussing
program. That can be your next letter to the editor, Ms. Engle; a demand that
some court order the bussing of petty thieves, burglars, rapists and murderers
to gated communities so that the rich can enjoy the benefits of the culture of
predatory crime together with the poor. The culture of the law-abiding should be
forced to mingle with the culture of the lawless, don't you think? Isn't that
part and parcel of the liberal mantra of multiculturalism?
And now, Ms. Engle, I need to take the gloves off for a moment, you supercilious
jerk. How dare you say that "you left them, to die in attics and on rooftops and
in the streets and in the disgusting halls of commerce and sports?" You sure
told us a lot about yourself with that sentence, didn't you? Commerce is
disgusting? This is the label you attach to the one economic system that has
lifted more people out of poverty than any other system in the history of
civilization? Disgusting? But then, you work in the academic world, don't you?
One wonders if you have a job skill that could earn you a comfortable living in
the private sectors. My guess would be that you do not.
"Left them to die?" What in the hell are you talking about? When police and
firefighters, the fantastic first-responders we all rely on, went in to rescue
the stranded they were fired on by roving gangs of thugs from the poor
neighborhoods you so love – and this started happening on day one. Nurses and
doctors (who very well may have lived in gated communities) stayed on duty in
their hospitals moving their patients to ever-high floors as the looters and
predators worked their way up from below. Helicopters trying to evacuate
patients from hospitals and from the Super Dome were fired upon. Left them to
die? These people were risking death to rescue the poor, and you write that the
poor were left to die?
Then you say that "the richest nation in the world is the most destitute when it
comes to true moral goodness." You mindless, hate-filled leftist,
anti-capitalist gasbag. Katrina has brought forth the greatest show of American
generosity since 9/11. Many believe that the charitable contributions of
Americans will far surpass that of four years ago. From the very day that
Katrina hit New Orleans people of means from across the country were writing
checks, making pledges and taking action. The total giving to date is nearing
$800 million, and will most likely surpass one billion dollars within a week's
time. This is the America, an America of compassion and giving, that you say God
would not bless.
Oddly enough, though, I do want to thank you for your letter to the editor, Ms.
Engle. You have done more to demonstrate the moral decadence of the left with
your pompous diatribe then I could hope to do with five years of talking about
your type on the radio.
Please keep writing your anti-individualist rants. You're the best thing the
right has going out there.
AND MOST AMERICANS CAN'T SEE THROUGH THIS?
Now ... think back. Who were the first people to the microphones to start
assigning blame for the Katrina disaster. That answer would be Democrats. And
who were the Democrats blaming? Anyone Republican, that's who. Louisiana
Governor Kathleen Blanco and New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin were virtually immune
to any criticisms from Democrats in Washington.
Now here's the best part. The Democrats manage to sharply divide the country
with their finger pointing, and then they come up for a solution to that
division. (Oh this is rich.) The left's solution to the divide that they caused
with their hysterical finger-pointing is for George Bush to (1) appoint a
Supreme Court Justice who is "mainstream" (as defined by Democrats) so that the
appointment won't cause any rancor on Capitol Hill; and (2) abandon any plans
for making the tax cuts permanent or for the repeal of the death tax.
Wonderful -- just wonderful. These Democrats bring this country to turmoil
with their "blame Bush" hysterics, then tell Bush that the way to bring the
country back together again is to raise taxes and appoint a liberal to the
Supreme Court. What gall.
Neal's thoughts end there. He's not responsible for the rest of this...
LAB GROWN MEAT
Imagine supplying the entire world's population with
meat from just one cell. The idea may not be science fiction with the concept of
lab grown meat.
A paper in the journal Tissue Engineering [pdf] suggests that it could be an
answer to feeding the growing world population. Imagine no chicken farms, pig
farms or beef feed lots. If you've ever driven by one or actually lived near one
you understand how nice that might be. Even if you aren't aware of the
environmental impact of such facilities or you don't care about animal welfare
your senses would tell you it'd be better to not have these things around. But
how would you feel about this meat? If the taste and texture was exactly the
same as what we know as meat now, would you eat it? Would you choose it over
farmed meat? Would you still insist on meat from a live animal? Personally, I
wouldn't be interested in eating it as I haven't eaten meat in 9 years. But I
can see the advantages to health, hunger and animal welfare.
Tour Gallery | amazon.com reviews
REDNECK SCRAP BOOKI wonder if
he hit it with "new car smell." More in the
Redneck Scrap Book.
READING ASSIGNMENTS
Morning Sickness 1: If for some reason you decide it's a good idea to eat the
neighbor's dog, you might want to
make sure it doesn't have rabies first. [bugmenot]
Morning Sickness 2: In China, if you're looking for an exotic meal,
let the buy beware. Gives new meaning to "this tastes like ass."
The Church of the
Flying Spaghetti Monster demands equal time with evolution and intelligent
design in Kansas schools.
Books in the public domain + volunteers to read them =
literary podcasts for you. Very
cool.
Joel Johnson and
Jacob Appelbaum are in
New Orleans working on communications. Each of them are blogging about their
experiences on the ground. Note: graphic images.
Signed an anti-gay marriage petition recently? If you're in Massachusetts you
might just find
your name and address posted to the internet.
Hello Kitty Fire Extinguisher - because a standard red one just isn't cute
enough.
Time to start thinking about holiday gifts for the kiddies.
Here's one for the kid who dreams of growing up to work for the TSA.
Plan your next vacation to include the
annual tomato fight in Bunol, Spain.
Here's a gallery of the giant food fight. Hint, don't wear white.
I have a love of bizarre cover songs and I'm going to force that love on you.
Here's a
bluegrass version of Motorhead's Ace of Spades [17MB mov] done by
Hayseed Dixie. I'm
going to host the video on our server so as not to suck down bandwidth from
wherever it is now. If anyone has a problem with that, like the band,
let me know.
More pictures from WSB's reporter Richard Sangster down on the ground in New
Orleans. | 
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