Big Daddy's Top Ten List for 2005

This is the time of the year when everybody does a top ten list, so I will do one too. Remember, this is the world according to Big Daddy.

10. Aftermath of the tsunami. Yeah, I know it actually occured 12/26/04, but the aftermath lasted well into 2005. When mother nature kills more people than atomic bombs, it brings man's arrogance into focus, because the power of the natural world is beyond our imagination.

9. Saddam on trial. He gassed his own people. He started wars. He thumbed his nose at the world. He hid in the spider hole. Now, he will get his, and from the Iraqi people.

8. Bengals make the playoffs. For the first time in 15 years, Bengals fans can cheer their team in the playoffs. At home, even!

7. 25th High School Reunion. Because I made it. And I don't get out much!

6. My oldest daughter learns to drive. Most tangible evidence yet that I'm getting old.

5. Elections in Afghanistan and Iraq. Despite the naysayers, the military was able to help these countries pull it off. If we are going to stop terrorists, one of the things we'll need to do is make their homelands better places, so maybe they won't want to die so badly.

4. Earthquake in Pakistan. Fifty thousand dead? Think of it, thats an entire small city, just gone. Never mind a million left homeless.

3. Hurricanes. Wilma, Rita, and the big monster Katrina. Biloxi devasted. Gulfport devasted. New Orleans, spared the worst, only to flood when the levee broke.

2. The passing of Pope John Paul. Arguably the most beloved and important figure of the last half of the twentieth century, and the only pope many people ever knew. His leadership and influence will be felt for many many years.

1. Renal cell carcinoma. When you get something like this, other things don't seem quite so important. So far, God has blessed me with a complete recovery. Being faced with your own mortality makes one feel an extra sense of gratitude for every day God gives us.

He's Got Big Shoes to Fill

It's easy to spend a lot of time complaining about whats bad in the world, but hard to do something about it. As we enjoy this Christmas, remember this man in our prayers to help him be a spiritual leader in the world.

Been so busy

Been so busy this week, haven't had a lot of time to post. Check out Powerline's posting on the NSA spying non-controversy. A sad day for Tony Dungy with his son's death. Say a prayer.

Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus!

And last night, he was visiting Cincinnati! It been such a long wait, it's time to celebrate!

Will today be the day?

Is today finally, after 15 years, going to be the day the Bengals clinch a berth in the playoffs? A win at struggling Detroit will do it. Many other important things are going on, I'm travelling to my sisters for a big family Christmas get-together, I've lost 32 pounds on the diet in the last month, but Bengals fanatics, long suffering as we are, can't wait for the playoff reward for the new-found success in Cincinnati. So the so-called important stuff will have to wait one more day. Who Dey!

Patriot Act Almost Done; NSA spying

Today comes the defeat in the Senate of the Patriot Act, attacked by some as giving the government too much power (as if it didn't have enough already.) I think making use of the same tools we've used against the mafia for years makes sense to use against terror cells already in the US, but oversight is a real problem. My friend Matt has expressed his concern about the government abusing its power against the citizenry, and I think he probably would not be in favor of the Patriot Act. My libertarian leanings make me lukewarm at best towards this, but I do believe the government has an obligation to try and find these guys using the smartest means we can muster. Also today, word of NSA spying on domestic terror suspects without warrants was leaked (by the CIA, who else) to the NY Times. I think they will run with this like the Abu Ghraib thing, until we are sick of hearing about it. I'd like to know how a leak of this sort is not worse than the Valerie Plame so-called covert agent outing.

You go girl!

This 77 year old lady speaks with more common sense than a whole bucketful of ACLU lawyers and so-called mainsteam media types. Follow this link and download the file to see her, in her own words. Anyone who really supports our troops overseas will get this.

Bye Bye Tookie

So Arnold has denied clemency for Tookie Williams. It's real hard to bring myself to feel sorry for this cold-blooded killer, even though I'm opposed to the death penalty. Don't take that to mean I'm somehow soft on criminals; I all for putting guys like this on a chain gang in a Northern Alaska gulag. I just don't think we accomplish much by bringing ourselves down to the level of the killer. Instead, I will try to do the Christian thing and pray for his soul and the souls of the people he slaughtered. If I can bring myself to do it.

Jeckyl & Hyde Brownies Show Up and Play Tough

Cleveland and Charlie Frye showed up today and gave the Bengals all they wanted. If this was any year from 1991-2004, Cincy would've figured a way to bungle the game. Even though Carson and Chad didn't play their best, the team managed to hold it together and eek out a win. I think Cleveland is going in the right direction, as they have shown flashes of brilliance occasionally this year. The problem has been that they will come back and lay an egg the next week.

How about "Lost" -- anybody like that show? I like the character development.

Welcome! Open Comments

Thanks for visiting. Feel free to comment or let me in on some juicy secrets.

Did you hear?

Say, did you hear about this? Wouldn't be suprised if you didn't. How about this? All I hear everyday is the never-ending complaining about the evil bushies, the "illegal" war and the "mounting" casualties. For some good perspective, consider this.
Evil is real.
It must be opposed.
Go see the movie, its so superior to anything else out right now it makes you wonder why some of the moviemakers even try. They cannot hope to compete with the intellectual firepower of C. S. Lewis.

Update: A great review of the movie here.

Looks like good news on the SCOTUS case on the Solomon Amendment

Still recovering from possibly the most boring game ever on Monday Night Football, but today comes some good news from the Supreme Court, as the justices appeared to back up Congress, who tried to prevent federally-funded universities (practically all of them) from banning military recruiters. More proof that the elitists running these schools don't know anything about the military and don't care. Frankly, most of them hate all things military and look down their noses at those dumb red-staters that make up the greatest fighting force the world has ever known.

Bengals, Steelers Part Duex

Big Big game for Bengals faithful. Win today an its up two games with four remaining. Playoff anticipation is growing, I needn't remind you how long its been since that happened!

November comes to a close

Guaranteed not to be in any of the mainstream big newspapers was this little tidbit about five deaths from the use of mifepristone, also known as RU-486. Why, that pill was supposed to be safe, people aren't harmed by early chemical abortions, are they? Well, yeah, they are, this has been known for many years. It's just that that inconvenient little truth didn't match the bill of goods we were being sold on this little way to have an abortion. You can find a story about it in the Washington Times but don't bother looking anywhere else for it.
The big news outlets also wanted to paint a gloomy picture of sales following Thanksgiving, never mind that the actual numbers were strong. If you can make the economy appear to be bad, you can then blame Bush for it. If the numbers are actually good, all you have to do is cherry-pick some stat to make it appear not so. So when sales at the mall aren't up as much as hoped for, use that instead of the big increase in sales for stores like Best Buy and Target.
Well, how can you defeat evil Republicans if you report news thats actually good?

Light blogging week

With the holiday weekend, I haven't had much time to post. I won't even start about shopping on Friday morning 5:30 AM. Lets just say it's insane!

Giants Change Slowly, But They Do Change

It may be the home of the Atlanta Rhythm Section, but it's a sad day in Doraville, along with many other towns that will be losing GM plants. With the announcement in the last day of huge layoffs at GM, the writing is on the wall for the dominant American auto manufacturer, and a way of life my grandparents and parents knew, but we and our children will not. We created a nation where ordinary workers could know a life better than any working-class man ever had, but the invisible hand would not be denied in the long run, because the cost of labor would eventually increase to the point that the company would eventually be unable to compete. While GM workers are still very productive, the workforce was increasingly burdened with the "legacy costs" of providing health care to retirees promised years ago. So much so that $1500.00 of every car GM sells goes just to this cost. When I was a child half the new cars sold in the US were GM cars, but now it less than a quarter. Displaced union workers have excoriated corporations that took advantage of cheap labor overseas, as if they themselves had a divine right to those jobs. They don't, nobody does. The corporation exists only to make a profit for its owners, period. End of story. If a worker gets a full career there, great. If not, just move on. For many years, this same cycle has gone on, and one by one, the dinosaurs have fallen. So now we are finally reaching the biggest of dinosaurs. The writing is on the wall.

Bucks win, Bengals lose

Ohio State can go 1-10, but if they beat Michigan it's a good year. This year they went better than that, but the come from behind win on Saturday was one they'll be talking about for years.
The Bengals gave the Colts all they wanted, but 37 isn't enough to beat Peyton and the boys. Baltimore did Cincy a favor by knocking off Pittsburg, so they stay in front of the AFC North. Denver, San Diego, and Seattle all showed they are teams to be reckoned with.

Tired of the MSM crap about Iraq

If you are, like me, tired of the same old garbage being repeated about our military day in and day out, you gotta get out of the MSM! Check out this. Now these guys should inspire you, putting some real perspective to the daily body count on CBS, which is only reported in a way to hurt the prosecution of the war.

Bengals - Colts Let it Snow!

We've seen how well Indy does in the snow at Foxboro. We just might have some snow for Peyton and the boys this week. Big Sunday national audience game at PBS (that's Paul Brown Stadium for the uninitiated) with the top CBS crew doing the game. You can go to the game in person if you've got 400-600 bucks for a scalper, just make sure you don't buy a counterfeit ticket.

I'm done with 'em.

No more time, no more MONEY! NO more to my worthless friends that I helped to elect. Eleven years after the House became Republican majority, five years into the Bush presidency, even the Senate is (supposedly) Republican. And it is the Republicans blocking permanent tax cuts. It is the Republicans blocking ANWR drilling. It is the Republicans spending money like there is no tomorrow. Republicrats and Democans in Washington, they are set. They do not have to worry about social security because they don't pay into it and they get basically full pay when they retire, compliments of you and I the taxpayer. There is no difference to me, I'm the one getting screwed regardless.
This country is in serious trouble. Look at the trouble in Europe. Forty years from now, that will be us.
The Constitution Party or the Libertarians will be happy to take my political contributions. No more for Lugar, no more for the RNC, definately no more for any RINOs.
David Frum had it right. Dead Right..

Happy Birthday Marine Corps

Happy birthday to the Marine Corps, and salutations to all veterans on this Veterans Day. We owe them a debt that can't be repaid, but luckily most vets would never ask.

Eh-Oh-Way-to-go-Ohio

Congrats to Ohio voters who weren't fooled by the MoveOn.org backed "reforms" masquerading as amendments to the state constitution. They were nothing more than attempts to help Democrats win elections in Ohio. It was a great strategy for the lefties: put forth ballot initiatives in an off-year election cycle; bring in big bucks from George Soros to fund a big media blitz; make sure the nineteen pages of changes were confusing enough so that only a Philadelphia lawyer could fully understand them; try to sneak through changes in absentee ballot procedures so that close elections could be stolen fraudulently; clamp down on corporate campaign contributions while leaving union contributions unfettered; and take away the constitutional authority of the Ohio Secretary of State, who has overseen previous elections.
But Ohio was not fooled by the out-of-state liberal interest groups. In a loud voice , they said "Mind Your Own Business!"
Chrissie Hynde would be proud. Or maybe not.

7-2 Feels Great in Bengal-land

It was 1988 the last time the Bengals had this record. Of course, they made it to Super Bowl XXIII only to lose to the 49ers on a Montana to Taylor touchdown with 31 seconds left. If there is to be a trip back to Detroit where the Ken Anderson led Bengals first played in a super bowl in 1982, the current version of Bengals will have to answer to the Colts, who they play next after the bye week. This year the AFC runs through I-74.

Paris is Burning; Is Rome next?

Nine nights of rioting, the police and fire fighters can't get near the hotspots. Toledo? No, it's gangs of Muslim thugs rampaging thru the slums of Paris. I guess because they aren't getting enough welfare. There is a good article about it here. I wonder, it's already spreading in France. Is Rome next? Seriously, Europe has a BIG problem with millions of unassimilated Muslims. Signs of the culture clash have been evident for awhile now. See this.
What are the elistist socialist governments going to do about this? I'll be watching.

Inexcusable

When we talk about the great sacrifices our men and women in uniform are making to prosecute this war, it goes without saying that these people deserve our support and our thanks. But, if liberal political agendas can be furthered by twisting the words of our soldiers, well that's OK because we are the NY TImes.
Well, it's NOT OK.
It's not OK to marginalize the intelligence of our fighters just because they don't have Ivy League pedigrees.
It's not OK to make up soldier's complaints to advance the notion you would have us have us see.
It's not OK to cherry pick video images of a real combat op to make it look like our soldiers are a gang of bloodthirsty killers.
And it's really not OK change the meaning of honorable soldier's words, supporting all they do, and make it appear that there is but a shallow complaint. Take the words of a real American hero and make it sound like whining from beyond the grave.
It's NOT OK. It IS inexcusable.

Check this out

No wonder the Boston Globe had heartburn with this guy.

As predicted

Bush has nominated the anti-Miers, Sam Alito. The fight is taking shape quickly, along the usual lines. He has twice been unanimously confirmed by the Senate, but that has stopped the moonbats from calling him "Scalito" and accusing him of extremism. We knew this was coming.

One Gigantic Full Circle

I remember the day well, Sept. 20, 1992, a beautiful day I headed over to my buddy Dave's apartment to watch the Bengals game. The Bengals had been to the Super Bowl three years ago, and had ruined the football career of Bo Jackson in the playoffs a little more than a year prior. Sunday afternoon with the Bengals is a fall ritual in these parts, which is not really surprising in metro Cincinnati. Cincinnati had a new coach and the optimism of a new season. During the game, the Green Bay quarterback Don "Magic" Majkowski was injured and in comes this back-up hardly anyone had ever heard of, Brett Favre, although we thought is was "Farve" by the way the name was being pronounced. Although the Bengals had a healthy lead in the fourth quarter, Favre led Green Bay to a come-from-behind win, threading the needle with a hypersonic throw through two defenders for the winning score. Thus began the divergence, the Bengals lost in years of malaise while Green Bay became a championship team and a contender every year. Now on October 30, 2005, with Favre still leading the Packers nearing the end of his Hall-of-Fame career, the Packers have struggled mightily this year. The Bengals seem to have finally recovered and come full circle. But for fans, it's hard to believe just how long and how hard its been.

Another Wonderful Day

You could hear the champaign being uncorked in the background at CNN when the indictment was handed down. Finally, those evil-doer Bushies were getting what they had coming to them. Meanwhile, this and this going on in the GWOT. But its more important to find out who "leaked" the name of an "undercover" CIA agent to a reporter, an agent who is not, by definition, covert but is a Democratic activist. This doesn't pass the smell test, I'm sorry. Especially since the person who supposedly told VP Cheney about Valerie Wilson was none other than the Director of the CIA himself, George Tenent. Having said that, it was foolish of Libby to contradict his own notes in grand jury testimony. His career is over and he'll be lucky to avoid a felony conviction. Perhaps he should consult with Sandy Burglar, sorry Berger on how to get out of a serious pickle.

Thoughts on the Miers fiasco

She threw in the towel (or was told too). I see the reasons that Bush nominated her and I think he had good reasons to do so. But this nomination was in serious jeopardy for a lot of reasons, and the President I think realized there had to be unity on the right in order to get a confirmation. I think he was trying to avoid the nasty fight with the left, and forgot about his base. Many, many voters chose Bush the last two elections precisely because they wanted a new direction for the Supreme Court. That the nominee would be a constructionist was a given, and pro-lifers hoped that a new balance in the Court may finally rid us of the national disgrace of abortion on demand. When Miers was nominated, many were fearful of another "Souter", a republican appointee without a long paper trail that morphs into a liberal. I understand the fear and wish for a more known quantity like Luttig or Brown, but I thought they should have given the President the benefit of the doubt. No matter now, Miers was smart enough to see the writing on the wall and gave her President a way out of this mess.
So now what? The big, knock-down, drag-em-out brawl is coming now, for sure. Bush must appoint a big-name conservative jurist, and the Democrats WILL PLAY ROUGH. They understand as well as we the stakes involved. There WILL end up being a fillibuster and the Republicans WILL be forced to use the "nuclear" option to break it. And it may take a long time and Bush may have to send up more than one such candidate. I hope Justice O'Conner lives long enough to retire.
Lord help us if Stevens retires or dies.
By the way, there are some mainstream media types figuring out all this blog stuff. Funny they didn't memtion Big Daddy's Digest. I guess I need a few more thousand hits a day.

Indict! Indict!

The lynch mob gathers, hoping to get the object of their frustrations, Karl Rove. They are convinced he is the brains of the White House, and Bush will collapse without him. And hatred for Bush comes before ALL else, even the welfare of the country.
Never mind there was no crime. Never mind the so-called conspiracy to obstruct justice essentially was one conversation from a couple of years prior that wasn't recollected. Do you remember everyone you talked to last week? Last month? Six months ago?
And never mind both Clintons conveniently "couldn't recall" over 250 times when it suited their purposes. The complicity of the mainstream press is stunning -- the relevant facts were laid out months ago, yet the central allegations are repeated again and again, as if nothing is known about Joseph Wilson, or his wife, or Judith Miller.
Oh yeah, the press doesn't like Rove or Bush, either. A lot of them probably thought Fahrenheit 911 was real investigative journalism, too.

No gloating, no crying either

Can't gloat because my team got beat. And I lost a sub sandwich in a bet. But hey, my team is still in the lead, and still is looking good for a playoff run.
Maybe it's the year of the Colts, anyway.

Football, you bet!

Bengals, Steelers
Always a big game, but not for a long time has the game meant this much. For us long-suffering Bengals fans, this is a real test. Is this team going to be for real against a team that always plays us tough? At home, in the cold drizzle, the way football should be played. Count on me to gloat when the Bengals triumph.

so much going on

There's so much going on it's hard to comment on everything.
Such as -- is Harriet Miers withdrawing (or going to be withdrawn?)
The CIA leaks info to try and get Karl Rove and the White House.
Journalists deliberately distort the burning body story and embellish for additional anti-US effect.
Republican senators can't say no to spending. (Hint: Which IN senator voted for the Coburn Amendment? It wasn't the Republican...gee I remember getting a re-election fund-raising e-mail from him just recently.)
Idiot lefties plan to celebrate milestone 2000th death of US soldier in Iraq/Afghanistan.
Yet another hurricane. (Watch out for Alpha?)
CBS news continues to be a sad joke. (not really surprising)
Bengals vs. Steelers -- finally something important!

Living in the Material World

This is too good!!!
The material girl herself, "Madonna" is now telling us we are on the fasttrack to hell. See here. I am hard-pressed to think of one single person MORE responsible for societies' going -to-hell-in-a-handbasket in the last 20 years than Madonna. From the glorification of promiscuous attitudes to the "sex" book to the relentless self-promotion to the much-publicized procreation without the benefit of marriage, Madonna used her sexuality and modest talent to make hundreds of millions dollars out of the most purient elements of society. If she really wants to impress me she should give up those millions of dollars and care for the world's destitute, ala Mother Teresa. I know better than to hold my breath waiting for that to happen.

Oh Toledo

Can you think of a better way to publicize the Neo-nazis than throw a riot in their honor? Not only do they give the nazis a national stage, they help them recruit, too. Ask Cincinnati about what to do, they've been through it recently.

Go Bengals!

Beat 'dem Titans der boy.
Also welcome RHIT Delta T brothers.
I'm no Fighting Irish fan but I'll admit I wanted to see them pull off the big upset. Anybody who really loves football had to like that game, just for the heart and soul that went into it, from both sides.

Remember the Gang of 14

It's becoming clear to me that the loud opposition on the right to the Miers nomination is mostly about the fight the conservatives have been waiting to fight for many, many years. Ever since the Bork fiasco and the Clarence Thomas/ Anita Hill soap opera, many rightward-leaning individuals have just been itching for the showdown over ideology, the fight that would restore some balance and sanity to court decisions. The main reason many conservatives supported Bush two times was the hope that the Supreme Court would get more Scalias and Thomases. After all, Ginsberg and Breyer were bitter pills to swallow during the God-awful Clinton years. For five long years the faithful of the political right waited. And waited.
And then it happened! The rapid-fire announcement of the O'Conner retirement followed by the death of the Chief Justice finally brought the opportunity to fix the Supreme Court. And when the nominees didn't have perfect conservative pedigrees the bitching began. Don't forget the Ann Coulters and others on the right were not high on Roberts, either. But remember that the President cannot be motivated so much by the ideological battle as the practical necessity to actually get confirmable Justices. So the fight that the right wanted was thwarted before it ever began by famous "gang of 14" and the Republicans who refused to enable the so-called "nuclear option," ever-fearful of not being able to use it themselves in the future. As if the Democrats would not invoke it themselves if it was in their own interest. C'mon, boys and girls, the Senate is no longer a Gentlemens club; Hardball is played there.
So the "nuclear option" is on the shelf. The Democrats have reserved the right to filibuster for essentially any reason they see fit. So what real chance would a Luttig or a Janice Rogers Brown stand in the Senate. None, of course.
So the fight cannot be now. The President knows this, so he made a choice calculated to to have a high chance of success. Look to McCain, Dewine, and the other wishy-washy Republicans if you don't really like this nominee, because its the only kind Bush could make after they stupidly scuttled the "nuclear", sorry Constitutional, option earlier this year.

Say a prayer

For those of you who pray, I ask that you say a prayer for my cousin, Devin Reid, aged 17 and a senior at Newark Catholic High School. He, like me, was diagnosed with cancer this year. Unlike me, his cancer is rare and virulent. He is a fine young man, well-liked and a track and cross-country athlete. He currently is at Sloan-Kettering in New York, receiving treatment. You can also sign his guestbook here.

The split on the right

The argument of the Miers' nomination continues. People with vastly greater educations than mine parry back and forth on the relative merits of Miers or the lack thereof. Could this be part of the plan? I doubt it. Why would the White House anticipate the bulk of opposition of this nomination would come from the right? Perhaps they were confident, arrogantly so, that the track record of the judicial nominees to date would allow the base to trust their judgment. Why shouldn't they have been confident? Most of the base had never heard of John Roberts before his nomination, and he made the Donkey Dinosaurs look stupid at the hearings. (Not that they really are stupid, just stupid by comparison.) I, for one, am glad that someone without the blazer is finally deemed worthy to sit on the Court that decides who lives or dies, which laws pass muster, and which laws are unconstitutional because of a "penumbra" that I am too stupid to see. Amonst the big bloggers only Hugh Hewitt seems to want to give George Bush the benefit of the doubt. I think his hard-earned track record deserves better.

The Miers Nomination - Hyperventilation (from the right!)

It's been really eye-opening this week to see the reaction of the Miers nomination from many of the bloggers on the right that I read and respect. There has been the type of opposition I've grown accustomed to seeing the Democrats use against Bush's nominees, except now it's coming from places like National Review and the like. I saw a great post concerning this here that says it much better than I could. (HT to HH). Those on the right like me who would have liked to see someone else, a known entity, get the nod would do well to stop the hyperventilation and really think about what a shrewd move this really is.

Pictures

Got pictures?

I got pictures!
Playing around and getting some pictures on. Now if I can figure out that crazy juiceman.....

Football season is near

It's that time of year again...football season is near. Fantasy football drafts are going on all over the country. I love it..do you?

Whitewash at CBS

The long awaited report is out. OOOH bad reporters, shame on you. Here is a little slap on the wrist. The chiefs get to keep their jobs. No evidence of bias. Yeah, right.