The Iraqi parliament receives the draft constitution:

The final draft was read to the parliament, but the assembly did not vote on the constitution, and it is a matter of dispute whether the Transitional Administrative Law - the interim constitution that governs the process - requires it to do so. The 15 Sunni Arabs who sat on the drafting committee said they rejected the document, despite several last-minute changes aimed at winning their support.

Democracy marches on . . .

More going on than I can keep up with here.

Free Republic has comprehensive coverage/commentary.

Arts Journal has a list of livebloggers.

From the New Orleans National Weather Service:

URGENT - WEATHER MESSAGE

NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE NEW ORLEANS LA

1011 AM CDT SUN AUG 28 2005

DEVASTATING DAMAGE EXPECTED

HURRICANE KATRINA

A MOST POWERFUL HURRICANE WITH UNPRECEDENTED STRENGTH...RIVALING THE INTENSITY OF HURRICANE CAMILLE OF 1969.

MOST OF THE AREA WILL BE UNINHABITABLE FOR WEEKS...PERHAPS LONGER. AT LEAST ONE HALF OF WELL CONSTRUCTED HOMES WILL HAVE ROOF AND WALL FAILURE. ALL GABLED ROOFS WILL FAIL...LEAVING THOSE HOMES SEVERELY DAMAGED OR DESTROYED.

THE MAJORITY OF INDUSTRIAL BUILDINGS WILL BECOME NON FUNCTIONAL. PARTIAL TO COMPLETE WALL AND ROOF FAILURE IS EXPECTED. ALL WOOD FRAMED LOW RISING APARTMENT BUILDINGS WILL BE DESTROYED. CONCRETE BLOCK LOW RISE APARTMENTS WILL SUSTAIN MAJOR DAMAGE...INCLUDING SOME WALL AND ROOF FAILURE.

HIGH RISE OFFICE AND APARTMENT BUILDINGS WILL SWAY DANGEROUSLY...A FEW TO THE POINT OF TOTAL COLLAPSE. ALL WINDOWS WILL BLOW OUT.

AIRBORNE DEBRIS WILL BE WIDESPREAD...AND MAY INCLUDE HEAVY ITEMS SUCH AS HOUSEHOLD APPLIANCES AND EVEN LIGHT VEHICLES. SPORT UTILITY VEHICLES AND LIGHT TRUCKS WILL BE MOVED. THE BLOWN DEBRIS WILL CREATE ADDITIONAL DESTRUCTION. PERSONS...PETS...AND LIVESTOCK EXPOSED TO THE WINDS WILL FACE CERTAIN DEATH IF STRUCK.

POWER OUTAGES WILL LAST FOR WEEKS...AS MOST POWER POLES WILL BE DOWN AND TRANSFORMERS DESTROYED. WATER SHORTAGES WILL MAKE HUMAN SUFFERING INCREDIBLE BY MODERN STANDARDS.

THE VAST MAJORITY OF NATIVE TREES WILL BE SNAPPED OR UPROOTED. ONLY THE HEARTIEST WILL REMAIN STANDING...BUT BE TOTALLY DEFOLIATED. FEW CROPS WILL REMAIN. LIVESTOCK LEFT EXPOSED TO THE WINDS WILL BE KILLED.

Stupid men for instance post articles like this. One way or another, I'm too chicken to actually include this in The Whip.

As intelligence scores among the study group rose, the academics say they found a widening gap between the sexes.

There were twice as many men with IQ scores of 125, for example, a level said to correspond with people getting first-class degrees.

At scores of 155, associated with genius, there were 5.5 men for every woman.
. . .
The paper will argue that there is evidence that at the same level of IQ, women are able to achieve more than men "possibly because they are more conscientious and better adapted to sustained periods of hard work".

I've got no argument with the last paragraph . . . I'll have to check with Snookums on the rest, though.

South Dakota Politics blog is there . . .

Yours truly, wearing my political science hat, is quoted saying much the same thing as I have said here. Thune received more grief than he deserved when the base was put on this list and perhaps will receive too much attention now that it has been taken off. Still, Thune will no doubt benefit politically from this event.

Much good local flavor there (and national, too, the Kos v. SDP blog argument is pretty amusing).

Mommy, what's the funny man doing?

The exhibit, which opened Friday, puts the three male and five female Homo sapiens side by side with their primate relatives — though separated from them by an electric fence. While their neighbors might enjoy bananas and a good scratch, these eight — chosen from 30 applicants who entered an online contest — have diverse interests, from a chemist hoping to raise awareness about apes to a self-described actor/model and fitness enthusiast.

Sadly, the exhibit only runs through Monday. Maybe the Kansas City Zoo could do this--it would be more fun than their "White Tiger" thing they've been running all summer.

The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs expresses frustration with the "national leadership's" inability to get the message out:

"I think it's incumbent on the national leadership, writ large, to help communicate this to the American public," said Myers, reporting on a 10-day, 18-base tour that included Iraq, Afghanistan and bases in Asia and Europe.

See also People close to Iraq soldiers support war more.

How the loony left and the wacko right are coming together to oppose the war against militant Islam:

An anguished Cindy Sheehan calls Bush "the world's biggest terrorist." And she goes on to blame Israel for the death of her son ("Yes, he was killed for lies and for a PNAC Neo-Con agenda to benefit Israel. My son joined the Army to protect America, not Israel").

Her antiwar venom could easily come right out of the mouth of a more calculating David Duke. Perhaps that's why he lauded her anti-Semitism: "Courageously she has gone to Texas near the ranch of President Bush and braved the elements and a hostile Jewish supremacist media."

Via Little Green Footballs. James Taranto at OpinionJournal's Best of the Web has also struck on the Harmonic Convergence parallel

In a speech to supporters Wednesday, Sheehan claimed the support of "tens of thousands of angels." The Associated Press reports that New York racial demagogue Al Sharpton plans to join Sheehan in Texas on Sunday, while the neo-Nazi Web site Stormfront.org says its backers will arrive tomorrow to "help put up a White Nationalist voice in the protest against Bush's War for Israel that was started by Cindy Sheehan."

Next, according to blogger Jonathan Wilson: "Celebrity boxing with Tonya Harding." The universe certainly has a sense of humor.

This would be funny if the stakes weren't so high.

I really wish I was making this up. I'm not.

So the hard left and the Islamists have established a coordinating committee, according to Douglas Davis of the London Spectator. In Britain the steering committee of the Marxist–Islamist alliance consists of 33 members — 18 from myriad hard-Left groups, three from the radical wing of the Labour party, eight from the ranks of the radical Islamists and four leftist ecologists (also known as ‘Watermelons’ —green outside, red inside). The chairman is Andrew Murray, a leading light in the British Communist party; co-chair is Muhammad Aslam Ijaz, of the London Council of Mosques.

In other words, the war on terror is to be a continuation of the old war, the war between capitalism and its various discontents that was waged throughout most of the twentieth century. Norman Podhoretz is right. This is World War IV.

This is not a surprise at all. The days when the Left stood for freedom and liberty are long past. And that is truly tragic.

Via Free Republic.

An AP poll calls into serious question the myriad of editorial decisions of the mainstream media on the Iraq war:

People with friends or relatives serving in Iraq are more likely than others to have a positive view of a generally unpopular war, an AP- Ipsos poll found.

Some of those surveyed said their relationships with troops helped them learn more about what's going on in Iraq beyond the violence. Others said their opinions of the war were shaped by a sense of loyalty to those in harm's way.

Do you suppose this might affect the daily Deathwatch of the major media?

"How many helpless soldier children died today, Wolf?"

Naahhhh...

Via Little Green Footballs.