Free kibbles

Half of immigrants in Texas are here illegally. That seems about right to me. 1 in 8 people in America are immigrants, the highest percentage in history. More than half in the last 7 years are illegal.

TSA wants background checks for fliers. This is nuts. Since they're too lazy, like all government agencies, to catch smuggled weapons, they want background checks to make their lives easier.

Cyber Cold War in our future. That's because our computer security sucks.

Slovak raid captures 500g of powered, enriched uranium for a dirty bomb.

Russia and US butt heads on election monitors. Putin makes campaign ad for his ruling party.

Musharraf to lift emergency rule on Dec. 16th. I wonder how he came up with that arbitrary date.

UK teddy bear teacher goes to court in Sudan. Sentenced to 15 days in jail. Britain expresses concern. That'll show them. I bet the Sudanese are quaking in their boots.

Photographer suspected of terrorist ties to get trial in Iraq after 19 months.

National Hurricane center naming storms earlier than usual, inflating the number of named storms and making it appear that hurricane seasons are getting worse.

60% of Americans don't trust the media coverage of the election. The other 40% will join us soon.

One complaint brings down Christmas tree. That's bull.

Trent Lott's nephew and brother-in-law indicted for bribery. I wonder if Lott is involved.

The Heritage Foundation advocates health care tax credits. That's a big government solution instead of a free market solution.

Pictures of Rosa Parks and the civil rights movement.

Apparently the CNN/YouTube debate had lots of declared Democrats, including a Hillary adviser, asking the Republicans questions. I don't think this is that big a deal. The questions still matter. Obviously it would provide the best service to have undecided Republicans asking the questions, but a president is president for everybody. It's pretty clear Anderson Cooper wasn't aware of the Hillary adviser plant, but it is hard to believe that nobody at CNN knew.

Cato reports that none of the Republican leaders named government programs they would cut, but named plenty of programs they would expand. Only Paul and Tancredo supported cutting the size and scope of government.

Scotland spends $250,000 to develop new slogan: Welcome to Scotland.

A new water park on the Tennessee/Georgia border? Haven't these people noticed the drought?

This flying suit might be the coolest thing I've ever seen.

China plans to free its currency, the yuan, somewhat.

The WSJ distrusts the Abu Dhabi stake in Citigroup.

Victor Davis Hanson celebrates the great individuals who are shaping history as we speak.

Prosecutorial abuse is widespread.

Government is ripping the traditional family apart at the seams, but I'm not sure that child abuse is going up. With California and Massachusetts considering outlawing spanking, it's pretty obvious that the threshold for what we call child abuse today is absurdly different than in the past. Government empowerment of the child over the parent results in many more reports of abuse, whether real or not, than in the past. Children can hold their parents for hostage in today's environment. To call that unhealthy is an understatement.

NASA demands JPL scientists surrender all rights to privacy. If this is true, and I have no reason to believe it isn't, it's outrageous. NASA has already devolved into another bloated, wasteful bureaucracy, but this will end NASA's ability to hire any of the best and brightest that we need. It will already take us twice as long and 10 times the money to get to the moon than it did in the 60s. As ridiculous as that is, this is insane.

Followup on the case of local politicians using the courts to steal the land of their neighbor.

Sweet post about Ron Paul.