From the Daily Kenoshan.

The scammer is basically after your credit card's security code (the one printed on the back of Mastercard/Visa/Discover, or just above your main number on American Express.

If anyone calls you and for any reason asks you for this number, hang up immediately and call your card's 800 number to report a probable instance of credit card fraud.

Never, ever, ever give this number to anyone unless YOU have initiated the conversation.

I was thinking about some conversations I've seen on the Net regarding militant Islam's intent to impose by force Sharia (Islamic law) on everyone in the world. I wondered--wouldn't that be illegal in the U.S.?

Words like "treason" and "sedition" are appearing more and more often. What do they mean in the actual law? Now, I'm not a lawyer, and don't know how courts have interpreted these laws, or if a case has come up pitting the First Amendment religious freedom for Islam against these sections of the U.S. Code. Are we in danger, as Supreme Court Justice Robert H. Jackson warned, of turning the Bill of Rights into a suicide pact?

So with that, here's the U.S. Code, Title 18, Part I, Chapter 115 - Treason, Sedition, and Subversive Activities. (Text included in the full article--click the article name or "read more" below).

Our subdivision has lost power! Hopefully Aquila (our power company) will effect quick repairs. It's 100 degrees here in the K.C. metro, and I'm not sure how long my UPS powering my Internet equipment (or my laptop battery for that matter) will hold out.

Will Medary.com need to take it on the road to a Starbucks? Stay tuned. . .

UPDATE: That didn't really take very long. All I had to do is post about it and five minutes later wham! our power was back.

Thanks to Iowahawk, anyone can now protest any future Supreme Court nominee, no matter what name, gender, or ethnic affiliation that nominee may have. A true public service.

Hat tip: Little Green Footballs.

Reading Victor Davis Hanson is the intellectual equivalent of splashing very cold water on your face.

In his article titled Elegant Nonsense, this quote regarding the generally prevalent view in the entertainment industry of George W. Bush's intellectual capacity:

In fact, what do a talented Richard Gere, Robert Redford and Madonna all have in common besides loudly blasting the current administration? They either dropped out of, or never started, college. Cher may think George Bush is "stupid," but she — not he — didn't finish high school.

Article from the Houston Chronicle via Fark:

Costco's average pay, for example, is $17 an hour, 42 percent higher than its fiercest rival, Wal-Mart's Sam's Club. And Costco's health plan makes those at many other retailers look Scroogish. One analyst, Bill Dreher of Deutsche Bank, complained last year that at Costco "it's better to be an employee or a customer than a shareholder."

What a thought! Treat your employees well, and they'll treat your customers well. Nah, it'll never catch on.

A brave soldier of Allah selflessly took his own life today to stop an infidel American Marine dog from handing out candy to Iraqi children.

Twenty-seven Muslim youngsters were martyred in this glorious strike in the jihad against the infidels.

Do you still think that the Wahabbist gangsters are the good guys?

London: a new and bloody chapter for al-Qaeda?

An unknown al-Qaeda cell in Europe claimed responsibility for the attacks in London today on the al-Qal’ah - or Fortress - internet site.

Reportedly, seven bombs went off in four London Underground subway stations and in one London bus, killing at least 40 and wounding over 1,000.

"We shall have no truce or parley with you, or the grisly gang who work your wicked will. You do your worst, and we will do our best....We do not expect to hit without being hit back, and we intend with every week that passes to hit harder. Prepare yourselves then, my friends and comrades, for this renewal of your exertions. We shall never turn from our purpose, however sombre the road, however grievous the cost, because we know that out of this time of trial and tribulation will be born a new freedom and glory for all mankind." - Winston Churchill

Power Line shreds, dices, slices, and otherwise utterly discredits an Associated Press article on the supposed Valerie Plame "scandal."

This is the one where the right-thinking, upstanding and righteous Ambassador Joseph Wilson and his equally upstanding and trustworthy CIA employee wife Valerie Plame get involved with something called "yellowcake" that Saddam's Iraq was trying to buy from the African country of Niger. Much wailing and gnashing of teeth resulted from the revelation somewhere along the line that Plame indeed works for the CIA.

Leaving aside the utter impropriety of an employee of the CIA being married to a U.S. Ambassador in the first place, the whole story has transmogrified into some X-Files conspiracy theory featuring Karl Rove (thunder & lightning sound effect, with neighing of horses) as the Cigarette-Smoking Man of the piece.

The Powerline article notes:

If you're going to serve up a conspiracy theory--without any evidence, of course--shouldn't the theory at least make some kind of sense?

Obviously John Hinderaker isn't familiar with The X-Files. Ultimately, that show made absolutely no sense either, but it sure was popular until it collapsed under the weight of all those disparate conspiracy threads it was trying to work.

Fortunately, I already got mine!

From sfgate.com: Hey guys, women athletes are hot!

. . . women athletes are like domestic appliances. They come in many colors and sizes, the new models perform tasks that were thought to be impossible a few years ago and some men still don't know how to handle 'em.

Hat tip to Fark.