Free kibbles

Another step toward getting US combat troops out of Iraq by 2011. Iraqi PM Maliki says the US has agreed to the deal.

Illegal immigrants self-deporting in record numbers. Isn't is amazing what a little bit of enforcing our laws will do? Of course Democrats get in office, their taxes on the rich, who hire illegal immigrant nannies, gardeners and construction workers, might send even more packing.

Russia wants good relations with the west but is hearing only threats. The way Russia shows their desire for good relations with the west is to invade a free country on its border and try to topple its pro-western government. What a bunch of bull. Russia is playing the west for fools, and most of the west is playing right along. Russian parliament votes to recognize independence of the 2 rebellious provinces of Georgia. Supporting independence for rebellious Georgian provinces is another way Russia shows its desire for good relations with the west. Syrian President Bashar visits Moscow in support of Russia's invasion of Georgia and won a new supply of weapons in response. The alliances of tyrants are getting tighter. This is a natural response to the expansion of NATO.

Here's one of Putin's useful idiots at the NYTimes claiming Russia didn't want this war. Ignore the fact that Putin's goons provoked this war by attacking Georgian citizens from South Ossetia, forcing the Georgian president to respond to the rebellion at the time and place of Putin's choosing. The NYTimes has a long history of having useful idiots cover-up Russian tyranny, atrocity, oppression and aggression.

On the other extreme, the British Times thinks the Russian invasion of Georgia will weaken Russia. I don't see how. They're strategy of long term pressure by Russian troops ostensibly establishing security zones in Georgia but outside the rebellious provinces and Georgia's major port will likely bring about the fall of the pro-western government and lead to a Russian puppet government, giving Russian control of the final pipeline for the flow of oil from the east to the west. We can only hope that the west isolates Russia, but with Putin controlling all that oil flowing into Europe, it's unlikely.

Pakistan governing coalition splits.

Zimbabwe's opposition party won surprising victory for speaker of parliament. Mugabe will probably have him killed.

Dollar nears 6 months high.

Modern Rosetta stone is a disk and designed for future generations.

Government give government employees special treatment during tropical storm Faye. Have I mentioned that these people are aristocrats just like any other aristocrats in history? I'm so glad the city provided sandbags to these individuals while the commoners were ignored.

Nancy Pelosi and Democrats hate the military, and Pelosi made that abundantly clear once again when she ordered that a poster commemorating the sacrifice of America servicemen in Iraq and Afghanistan be removed from the Capitol hallways. You would think Pelosi and Democrats would be smart enough to at least pretend they cared about the military and veterans shortly before an election, but their hatred of the military is more powerful than even their power lust.

Obama misrepresents $800,000 in funds sent to the serial campaign law violater ACORN. This stinks of corruption.

Obama identifies exactly what's wrong with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, then he promises to extend the moral hazard at the root of the problem anyway. This is kind of like when Obama was confronted with the fact that raising the capital gains tax reduces revenue and lowering it increases revenue, Obama said he would raise it anyway.

According to this liberal, the only possible way McCain can beat Obama is because of racism. The message is, if you don't support Obama, you must be a racist. You couldn't possibly disagree with him on issues or character. Once the Democrat convention is over, this is going to be the mantra from the left all day, every day. Don't get me wrong, racism is a huge factor in this race. 90% of blacks support Obama just because he's half black. On the other hand, 40% of whites support Obama. Based on those numbers, a far better argument could be made that if Obama wins the election, it's only because of racism.

Follow that with yet another comparison between Jesus and Obama (both are black and liberal), and you've got the press' entire agenda until November.

Rampant fraud in Medicare is the model for liberal socialized medicine plans.

The solution to problems created by government is always bigger, more oppressive government. In this case the problem is the government monopoly on schools. The symptom is kids who skip out of their terrible government schools often. The non-solution is GPS ankle-bracelets. The next, new symptom of will be a dramatic increase in juvenile deliquency.

Teenagers are getting jobs. Why haven't they had jobs all along. Oh yeah, the minimum wage.

Bus drivers stopped from turning left. Singling out bus drivers doesn't make much sense, but it might make a lot of sense to redesign city streets to get rid of left turns for everybody. I bet traffic flow would be greatly improved. Or it may be a disaster. They have computer models for traffic flow. Some city planner should simulate this.

Ron Paul provides a welcome history and economics lesson about the evils of central planning.

The Onion reports that the Bush administration warns US allies not to border Russia. These guys are funny.

This is a perfect example of what's wrong with our political system, which is a mirror of our country. Last year, Democrats declared any state moving its primary earlier than a certain date would not have their delegates counted. Michigan and Florida violated those rules, and the DNC said it wouldn't count their delegates. After much whining and nashing of teeth, the DNC changed the rules mid-stream and said half their delegates would be counted. Now at the convention the DNC has decided not only to seat the Florida and Michigan delegates, but to count them all, and to give them preferred positions on the floor. All this in the name of beating Republicans. The lesson is, break the DNC rules, be really loud and selfish about it, and the DNC will reward you for it.

But rules are important. Obeying them is important. Discipline is important. And this is an important rule because it prevents chaos. Rewarding Florida and Michigan for breaking the rule undermines the rule of law and respect of government in the interest of beating Republicans who are almost identical to Democrats. Whatever happened to doing the right thing? What ever happened to self-control? Our government is feeding this unhealthy "me, me, me" attitude, it always burdens and harms mainstream Americans for the good of noisy special interests. And it's ruining our country.

Google is losing employees, but are they losing their mojo? I've seen uncharacteristic performance problems for gmail and adwords lately.

Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations online.

Author claims that the development of formal economic models has proved what we already learned from history - free market and free trade form the best economic system ever devised.