One Year Ago: Merry Christmas!

Yes, it’s been a while since the last post . . . a fairly eventful week (in a domestic kind of way) here at the Palatial Abode. Since The Shot, my heel’s been somewhat better, and Janet’s mending nicely from her hip arthroscopy.

I started up a batch of hard cider from the world-famous Broadland (SD) orchards. A couple of pictures:

The recommended yeast
Cider on the stove

My South Dakota State Jackrabbits are a Top 25 team in women’s basketball[*1] , and the long-suffering men’s basketball team got a huge road win at Iowa State[*2] . Go Rabbits! (I got this Jackrabbit logo trophy statue thing because I’m a rich and influential donor–yeah, right!)

Jackrabbit trophy statue thingie

We cooked up some seafood bisque[*3] , fauxtatoes[*4] (I go kinda heavy on the cream cheese and butter), cranberry-orange relish, Jello(TM) molds, and some eggnog for today’s Christmas dinner over at Snookums’ parent’s place. Soon, we will indeed go “over the river and through the woods.”

Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, and Peace On Earth, Goodwill Towards Everyone!

Morning Whip, Dec. 24, 2009

They did it! They finally did it! Damn them all to HELL!!!!

Sorry the Whip is so long, and so late today. Damn Congresscritters.

The neverending struggle for liberty:
UK Press Gives Obama an “F” for His Historically Low Approval Rating [*1]
Nazis, Commies, and Death Panels [*2]
California Bailout – Not Only “No”, But “Hell No” [*3]
An Open Letter to Sarah Palin – By Patricia Melton and the Mineral City Coffee Club [*4]
AMERICA NEEDS SARAH PALIN MORE THAN EVER [*5]
USA Today Best Seller List: Going Rogue at #1 for Fifth-Straight Week [*6]
Congress back to finding ways to fund ACORN [*7]
Lucky for us, an under-performing president [*8]
Oh my: McCain working on getting another Democrat to switch? [*9]
Red, red meat: Gingrich rallies the base to take back Congress [*10]
IRS Has 70% Error Rate in Issuance of Taxpayer ID Numbers, Resulting in Fraudulent Tax Refunds [*11]
Lessons from John Galt [*12]
Sarah Palin: Democrats Will Awaken Sleeping Giant With Health Care Takeover [*13]

Health care “change” (called by some “reform”):
Markets, Not Mandates [*14]
A Bill of Goods, Maybe [*15]
A Surprise in the Health Care Bill [*16]
Obama’s Truthiness [*17]
The Senate needs Martian gold, unicorns, and alien slaves to make the Healthcare Rationing bill work financially [*18]
Could the Senate Bill Eliminate Private Insurance? [*19]
It’s time to start over on ObamaCare, says … top House Democrat [*20]
Fund: Dems will probably bypass conference committee for ping-pong [*21]
Jake Tapper fact-checks Obama assertion on public option campaigning [*22]
Beyond the Constitution: The Healthcare Bill Violates the Rule of Law [*23]
CBO: You can’t spend the same dollars twice [*24]
Justin Raimondo is cool [*25]
Palin’s Continued Popularity and Relevance [*26]
Christmas Back On! Build-A-Bear Surrenders, Pulls Videos [*27]
AGW: The Greens’ Tet Offensive [*28]
When legerdemain is used to pass an unpopular bill [*29]
For Their Next Trick . . . [*30]
The Fierce Urgency of February: White House To Put Health Care on Back Burner Until After He Offers Some Glib, Empty Rhetoric About the Economy? [*31]
Arrogance, corruption, stupidity [*32]
John McCormack from the Weekly Standard Slaps Dave Weigel and Others Over “Death Panels” [*33]
Coal for Christmas from the Senate [*34]
“Health Care Reform” Passes The Senate, Lady Liberty Passes Out [*35]
And, the bottom line:
If You Like Your Health Plan, You Will NOT Be Able to Keep It [*36]

Travel and cruising:
Crystal vs. Regent — On-Board Communication [*37]
United, Continental, ANA seek antitrust immunity [*38]
NEW Cruise Reviews: Two Antarctica Expeditions [*39]
USA TODAY report: Safety of food at airports spotty [*40]
Been away from the airport? A lot has changed [*41]
Don’t Blame the Airlines [*42]

“Global warming” aka “Climate change” — or should that be “Climate Reform?”:
The Climategate Timeline: 30 years visualized [*43]
Von Storch op-ed in the WSJ: ‘Climategate reveals a concerted effort to emphasize scientific results useful to a political agenda’ [*44]
A Cycle of Cathay [*45]
Nothing Voluntary About Obamacare’s Mandate [*46]
Ping Pong: Dems to Avoid Conference in Favor of (Please Sit Down) Shady Back-Room Deal [*47]

The Economy:
The Deficit is Mind Boggling [*48]
Tempting the Tipping Point [*49]

miscellany:
VIDEO: Peter Jackson talks ‘Hobbit’ [*50]
Blizzard forms in U.S. Midwest, Plains [*51]
Holiday Movies [*52]
Reward offered after 6 colts killed [*53]

Sports:
Depressing Royals Story of the Day [*54]
SDSU men fall to Gophers [*55]
Foreign policy:
The ending year [*56]
The thrill of victory or the agony of defeat? [*57]

Crashing the party: January 20, 2010

UPDATE: I’m informed that the date of the State of the Union address has not yet been set. So, I now advocate going with plan B–go on strike Jan. 20.

From somebody called the Westwood Tea Party[*1] , via The Other McCain.[*2]


Calling all red blooded, Patriotic Americans!

It’s time for another march on Washington DC.

On the date of the State of the Union address, January 20, 2010.

On this day, a joint session of Congress, the President of the United States, his entire cabinet, the Supreme Court and the Joint Chiefs of Staff…plus distinguished guests will be in attendance.

You want media coverage? All major broadcast and cable networks will be there to broadcast the event.

This is the most strategically advantageous opportunity for Patriotic Americans to hold a demonstraion against an out of control government that’s trashing our Constituion.

This march needs to dwarf the size of the crowd that showed up on 9/12/2009. We need to surround the Capitol Building.

Who’s sick and tired of being ignored?

It’s time for a second Declaration of Independence!

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.”

It’s time for us to tell these Marxist bastards that we don’t consent to what they’re doing, and we therefore no longer recognize them as the legitimate government of We the People!

Personally, I’m not quite ready to go as far as “we therefore no longer recognize them as the legitimate government,” but unless we, the people explain in detail to these out-of-control yahoos in Washington that they are REPRESENTATIVES, not RULERS, then things could really get out of hand, in ways that I very much do not want to contemplate on Christmas Eve.

I’m quite sure that they either don’t understand how very, very angry a lot of people in this country are, or they simply don’t care.

They would be wise to start caring.

Make January 20, 2010 a National Day of Protest. Close your business. Call in sick to work. Don’t go to school.

Go on strike.

If you can, go to Washington. Make yourself heard.

While you still can. If now now, when?

Morning Whip, Dec. 23, 2009

Politics and applied philosophy:
TEA Party Patriots: Don’t Go Home, Fight! [*1]
Unhinged update: Left-wing hate-crime hoaxer pleads guilty in Denver [*2]
Worst Decade Evah? Nick Gillespie on NPR Discussing Same [*3]
Crowdsourcing The Contract With America 2.0 [*4]
The Health-Care Backlash [*5]
New Poll: Health Care Approval Down To 36% [*6]
Our Coming Medicare Debacle [*7]
Change… Obama Now More Loathed Than Bush at End of His Second Term [*8]
Of Course… Obama’s White House Christmas Tree Includes Mao Tse-Tung Ornaments [*9]
New Missouri Polling Data Shows McCaskill Tanking [*10]
Beer Is Cheaper Than Water—When You Compare Really Cheap Beer to Expensive Water [*11]
Libertarianism in Ancient China [*12]
Congressional Democrats Already Preparing to Lose Control of Congress [*13]
Why the ‘Angry Mob’ Is Angry [*14]
A Republican’s Airing of Grievances [*15]
Repeal the 17th Amendment. Nuke the Federal Reserve [*16]
Palin as litmus test [*17]
Old GOP message: “We’re going to fight to the finish line;” New GOP message: “Let’s go home” [*18]
Palin: I told you so! [*19]
White House: We didn’t know Mao was on our Christmas ornaments [*20]
Rasmussen: Strong disapproval outstrips overall approval for first time [*21]
Top Ten Foreign Policy Blunders of 2009 [*22] — hmm. Should I have a separate “foreign policy” Whip sub-heading?
The Dems’ political payoff [*23]
University of Michigan Study Confirms Link Between Financial Bailout and Corruption [*24]
Tea Parties, Third Parties and the Republican Party [*25]

Health care “change” (called by some “reform”):
Birthers, fanatics, and right-wing militias[*26]
Tyranny in the Senate [*27]
A Free-Market Guide to Healthcare [*28]
Biggest Defection of The Day (That You Never Heard About) [*29]
Health Care: The Pig in the Road [*30]
Can Obama Open His Mouth Without Lying About Health Care? [*31]
The Singapore Alternative [*32]
Pay Your Own Bill [*33]
DeMint to force vote on constitutionality of mandate [*34]
The list of payoffs that got Reid his cloture vote [*35]
Why is the AMA Supporting a 20% Pay Cut for Their Members? [*36]
Obamacare’s Constitutional Problems Proliferating [*37]
Alan Reynolds: Death Panels? Sarah Palin Was Right [*38]
Midnight Votes, Backroom Deals, and a Death Panel [*39] — from the ‘Cuda herself.
Big PhRMA Payoff: Hidden Tax on Pedialyte, Prenatal Vitamins, and Pain Relievers [*40]

Travel and cruising:
DOT Mandates Passenger Bill of Rights and I’m Not Happy [*41]
Q&A: “Cruise Confidential” Author on the Life of a Crewmember [*42]

“Global warming” aka “Climate change” — or should that be “Climate Reform?”:
Climate Plan B [*43]
Build-A-Climate-Scare: Why You Should Boycott Build-A-Bear [*44]
Unbearable Global Warming Hype Threatens the North Pole at Christmas [*45]
Met Office and CRU bow to public pressure: publish data subset and code [*46]
Texas State Climatologist: “IPCC AR4 was flat out wrong” – relied on flawed WWF report [*47]
A story of conversion: Global Warming Believer To Skeptic [*48]
The Cultural Contradictions of Anti-Nuke Environmentalists [*49]

The Economy:
The Financial Villain of the Decade [*50]
Shoppers were online, not at malls, last weekend [*51] –WARNING: plays a video without your consent! Bad Reuters! BAD!
Job distress for Generation X [*52]
After ‘fat cat’ comment, Obama changes tone with small-time bankers [*53]
Geithner: U.S. job growth unlikely before spring [*54]
Obama says he has unemployed relatives [*55] — yeah. Mostly in Kenya.
“If American farms such as hers were forced to compete in the global free market, they would collapse.” [*56]
How Government “Reforms” Prolong The Great Recession [*57]

Simians:
Wild chimps have near human understanding of fire, says study by ISU’s Pruetz [*58]

Miscellania:
Man jailed for eating rare tiger [*59]
Dog Meat Supplier [*60]
Michelle Obama’s Most Hideous Outfits of 2009 [*61]

Tech:
Microsoft loses Word appeal, will adjust program [*62]
Power goes out twice at Alaska air traffic control [*63]

Sports:
Circling the Summit [*64]
SDSU women falter at Iowa [*65]

Do I read all of these articles? No. But I want to.

UPDATE: The chimps were sooo wild that they had spread to the Tech and Sports sub-headings.

UPDATE 2:Miscellany, not Miscellania which isn’t even a real word. I make them up sometimes.

Here’s a scary thought . . .

This is how ice ages begin. One really cold winter.

Via WUWT.[*1]

Oh, yeah, winter started just yesterday.

I’m not saying that this little global cold snap/snow storm is the start of an ice age. But if we’re talking about how cold next April, May, and June are, it may be time to start burning every hydrocarbon we can get our hands on.

I’m just sayin’.

Morning Whip, Tuesday Morning, Dec. 22, 2009

Yes, the Whip returns. Who knows how long it will stay?

Travel and cruising:
New Cruise Ships for 2010[*1]
Staying Safe in Port [*2]
A Christmas Message for American Samoa
Boeing says second 787 will fly on Tuesday [*4]
Carl’s Cruise Capers and Travel Tips [*5] — Our friend Carl has some new posts up on his blog.

Technology:
China to require Internet domain name registration [*6]
The ghost of Christmases past [*7] — The continuing corruption of history via Wikopedia.

Writing:
Thoughts On 2009 [*8]
The March Toward Publication (or What Happens Next, Part Two) [*9]
Guest Post: Books on Writing [*10]

“Global Warming”-er-“Climate Change”-er-Fleecing The Developed World
Hansen on the surface temperature record, Climategate, solar, and El Nino [*11]
Other Consequences of Climategate [*12]
Truth Is Victim When The Left Abuses Science [*13] –pay attention to this one. It’s by Thomas Sowell.

Health Care “Change” (called by some “reform”)
The States’ Failed Experiments [*14]
In Pursuit of Death [*15]
Health Care Debate Reveals Prejudices of Liberal Elites [*16]
Obama’s Latest Health Care Lie [*17]
The Six Key Issues the House Must Cave On Before Obamacare Becomes Law [*18]

Politics and applied philosophy
Mr. Obama: Tear Down Your Wall of Secrecy [*19] (ok, it’s a “birther” piece. Yeah, I’m a bad person. shrug)
Returning to the Moon [*20]
St. Cloud Times: Precocious girl pens Palin [*21]
Obama: A Republican Plant? [*22]

The Economy
The Deflation Threat [*23]
A Christmas message for America[*3]
Q3 GDP revised sharply downward — again [*24]

The “Bollywood to South Beach” Voyage

This is the front page for our dispatches from our “Bollywood to South Beach” cruise on the Regent Seven Seas Voyager, from October 29-December 18, 2009.

Here are the individual posts, collected all in one handy location for your reading pleasure. As we travel, we’ll be adding posts so you can follow our journeys.

(Click the Read More to see all the post links . . .) Part 1, Mumbai, India
Part 2, The Seven Seas Voyager enroute to Cochin, India
Part 3, Cochin, India
Part 4, Cochin, India
Part 5, Male, Maldives and Port Victoria, Seychelles
Part 6, Praslin Island, Seychelles
Part 7, cruising the Indian Ocean
Part 8, Mombasa, Kenya
Part 9, Mombasa, Kenya
Part 10, Mombasa, Kenya
Part 11, Mombasa, Kenya
Part 12, Mombasa, Kenya
Part 13, Mombasa, Kenya
Part 14, Zanzibar, Tanzania
Part 15, Zanzibar, Tanzania
Part 16, Richards Bay, South Africa
Part 17, Richards Bay, South Africa
Part 18, Richards Bay, South Africa
Part 19, Richards Bay, South Africa
Part 20, Cape Town, South Africa
Part 21, Cape Town, South Africa
Part 22, Cape Town, South Africa
Part 23, Walvis Bay, Namibia
Part 24, Walvis Bay, Namibia
Part 25, Cruising the South Atlantic Ocean
Part 26, Jamestown, St. Helena, U.K.
Part 27, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Part 28, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Part 29, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Part 30, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Part 31, Salvador de Bahia, Brazil
Part 32, Fortaleza, Brazil
Part 33, Crossing the Equator
Part 34, Bridgetown, Barbados
Part 35, San Juan, Puerto Rico
Part 36, Cruising the Atlantic Ocean
Part 37, Ft. Lauderdale, Florida

The “Bollywood to South Beach” Voyage, part 37

The Bollywood to South Beach Voyage – Regent Seven Seas Voyager, October 29-December 18, 2009

Text by Snookums, Pictures by Filbert

Part Thirty-seven

December 17 (Thursday, Day 50, Crossing the Tropic of Cancer) –

Doughnut

We both woke up around 9:30 and hurried upstairs for our last leisurely breakfast. Christiaan saw Snookums coming and immediately found her a chocolate doughnut and ordered Filbert’s two pots of hot water. There wasn’t much of a breeze and we were mostly in the shade but it was still quite warm so our breakfast wasn’t too long.

More after the jump . . . Filbert worked on putting photos in the journal in the Observation Lounge and Snookums attended the auction in the Atrium. Voyager has an auction twice a year of items donated by passengers as well as Regent and the proceeds benefit the Crew Welfare Fund. Passengers donated items that they bought and no longer wanted or had room for like African paintings and wooden and Regent donated dishes from the various restaurants and a housekeeper’s apron signed by all the housekeepers and things like that. Snookums was the only bidder on size-12 black cocktail dress for $10 and at the end of the auction there were a few items that were leftover and up for grabs. She also got a black and purple casual dress from the leftovers (although it never made it to the auction). When she tried them both on, the black cocktail dress was way too big but the black and purple casual dress fit quite well so she was happy. Snookums’s mom can probably alter the black cocktail dress to make it fit perfectly.

Auction:

Stuff for sale
Auction on the courthouse–er–atrium steps

Filbert had two of his meal replacement bars for lunch and Snookums ordered a tuna salad sandwich from room service. There was a German sausage buffet by the pool but it poured for about 20 minutes during the time it was scheduled so it might have been cancelled. The rain turned into a partly sunny day. Snookums went up to the pool bar to find Oscar, the bartender that has been saving “Coke Reward” codes for her from all of the 12-pack boxes of Coke products. He gave her a bunch of them so now she can get more free magazine subscriptions or Holiday Inn points or other free items.It started pouring rain around 3 PM and that’s when the swells came, too. The sea was so calm and it was kind of neat to actually see the swells develop. Snookums went to her final workout class and did make her goal of going to the gym 22 times for an hour each time. While Snookums was working out, Filbert started the packing process but said he had to take it kind of slow since he was getting a little queasy from looking down into the suitcase and then back up again.We had a nice dinner with Joel and Monica and Kay and Marleen but everyone left the table around 9:30 PM for their rooms to finish packing. We got to turn our clocks back one last time which was good since we needed that extra hour to finish our packing. The $12.50 travel scale that we purchased from the boutique didn’t work and the boutique was closed so we put that on our “to do” list for tomorrow.

December 18 (Friday, Day 51, Ft. Lauderdale, FL) –

We had our alarm set for 7 AM but ended up waking up around 5 AM since the ship was bouncing up and down so much. It wasn’t rolling or pitching, but was “jumping”. Filbert looked outside and Ft. Lauderdale was very close. The ocean was pretty calm but the ship was going 2 knots. Obviously the captain got to the port too early and had to cut our speed to almost nothing which caused the bumpy ride. Oh well. It was raining, too.We ate breakafast around 7:30 and Snookums was disappointed that there were no cinnamon rolls and that the doughnuts were the yucky peanut butter ones. Christiaan managed to find her two cinnamon rolls from somewhere on the ship so she did get them, albeit 20 minutes later.Snookums went to the front desk to inquire about what to do about the broken luggage scale and was happy to find that the boutique manager just happened to be there, too. The boutique manager had to do some checking but ultimately gave us $12.50 back so we were happy.We took a cab ($12.10 was the metered fare) to the Ft. Lauderdale airport rather than using Regent’s transfer service that cost $60 per person. We also skipped the shuttle service van that was waiting outside the port terminal that was charging $11 per person to go to the Ft. Lauderdale airport. The 10-minute ride was uneventful and so was Southwest check-in.

Holiday candy at the Ft. Lauderdale airport courtesy Southwest Airlines

Our flight was 30 minutes late due to the severe rainstorm. We didn’t think that was any big deal until we got home and unzipped our four suitcases and found that just about everything in them was soaking wet! Snookums started doing load after load of laundry. Nothing was ruined, but that sure put a damper on our trip. Other than that, we had a fine time and met lots of great people. Our next cruise will also be on Regent (ms Navigator) for a 20-day Panama Canal cruise with Snookums’s parents and sister. We are interested in seeing what the 450-passenger ms Navigator is like compared to the 700-passenger ms Voyager. For now, though, we’re glad to be home! (Note — We did weigh ourselves when we got home. Snookums gained one pound and Filbert gained ten and already got back on his diet.)

Next: hey, there is no next! We’re home! Oh, we might get around to posting some kind of finale sort of thing, but it’s Christmas and we’re going to get into the holiday spirit–at last. So, until the next Journey . . . see ya!