As the old year rings out and the New Year rings in, the obvious result is a reflection of all the events in the past year, both a celebration of the good and a hand wringing of the bad.

Boring.  Been there done that.  The major events of 2006 are so numerous I could never pick out a list to do justice to it.  So many others have already, and done so well, I don't feel remiss.

Suffice to say, the year contained a few very personal things, such as my launching this blog on its own domain name, and the launch of NW Bloggers.  It contained joyous moments with family and friends.  It also contained some grim reminders of the frailty of life as well, for this is the price we all share for living.

In one of the best games I’ve seen out of the Seahawks in weeks, the Seahawks beat the Bucs 23 to 7. A couple of injuries didn’t help, bringing the Hawks into the playoffs without either of their starting cornerbacks.

The offence was better than expected. Not a single three-and-out for the Hawks in the whole game. Just as it looked like they might give up their first three-and-out, Jamie Winborn ran into Ryan Plackemeier, for a five yard penalty and a Seahawks first down.

The Seahawks finished off the game with a couple of knees by Matt Hasselbeck, breaking their losing streak. They go into the playoffs just as most of the offense is getting healthy. They also broke the “curse” of the Superbowl losers and finished out with a winning record. Meanwhile the Steelers didn’t even make the playoffs.

GENTLEMAN'S WARNING - ALL LINKS ARE TO GRAPHIC MATERIAL OF HANGING

HERE is a still pic of this monster's broken neck.

The Jawa Report - Blog Post & Google Video of the total termination.

Hotair.com - Flash video of Saddam's execution, the real deal.

The news is in.  Saddam Hussein el-Tikriti is starting his journey to hell, which is a good thing.  God Bless America, the Liberator of Iraq.  A good 4-part obituary at The Times of London starting HERE.

That joy I feel aside and having calmed down over an hour after receiving the good news, I feel now that we have liberated the country, killed Saddam and given democracy to that land - once we give provincial control of security to the Iraqi forces, then we should declare victory, hold victory parades and draw down our forces.  Translation: Iraq owes it to the 3,000+ Coalition fallen - including a family friend - to stand on its own two feet and take ownership of not just its democracy, but its security.

Below are six things we will (probably) never know from Saddam's mouth as a result of his execution - if you have any qs, please add:

Yea, I suppose my flippant title is off base, but I have a hard time feeling any sorry for the death of the man.  After all, he looked at the person responsible every day when he shaved.

Himself.

One of the arguments I used to get into with some liberal friends was that of accountability.  While this is not a partisan issue, it does seem that a lot of liberals look to excuse behavior with mitigation.  Conservatives generally fall back on personal responsibility, do the crime do the time.

I am sure we will hear this asked many times in the near future:  Was Saddam a monster, or some kind of victim?  In fact, it has already started.

On the TV tonight I heard stories about how harsh his upraising and how that may have made him what he was.

Originally via Instapundit, the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun violence puts out a yearly scorecard for all states giving a letter grade based on a number of criteria, and Washington State earned a D+ for 2005. The breakdown of the grades are as such:

Juvenile Possession Law B+

Juvenile Sale/Transfer Law A

Child Access Prevention Law F

Gun Safety Locks and Safer Design Standards F

Allow Cities To Regulate Guns (Non-Preempt) D-

Secondary "Private" Sales Background Checks F

Carrying Concealed Weapons Law F

The good news is that in the upside down world that is gun control, a low grade from the Brady Campaign actually means if anything, we are less prone to violent crime as Howard Nemerov writes at Chron Watch:

From the Seattle Times, it is the beginning of the annual hajj pilgrimage for Muslims with 3 million expected this year.

More than 30,000 police and other security forces have fanned out to help smooth traffic around ritual sites that have been plagued with deadly stampedes. More than 360 people were killed during last year's hajj in a stampede at Mina during a ritual symbolizing the stoning of the devil, sparked when some pilgrims in the crowd stumbled over luggage.

360 dead, three and a half times more dead during a religious pilgrimage than the number of U.S. soldiers in a war zone in the deadliest of months of fighting in Iraq.

Problems are so common that Wikipedia has an entire page of Incidents during the Hajj:

On July 2, 1990, a stampede inside a pedestrian tunnel (Al-Ma'aisim tunnel) leading out from Mecca towards Mina and the Plains of Arafat led to the deaths of 1,426 pilgrims.

As first heard on KTTH's Sitman and Boze show.  From a link found at Hotair

Sen. Kerry found himself all alone while he was over here. He cancelled his press conference because no one came, he worked out alone in the gym w/o any soldiers even going up to say hi or ask for an autograph (I was one of those who was in the gym at the same time), and he found himself eating breakfast with only a couple of folks who are obviously not troops.

….

….

What is amazing is Bill O'Reilly came to visit with us and the troops at the CSH the same day and the line for autographs extended through the palace and people waited for two hours to shake his hand.

Maybe they were just too dumb to know who he was.

Just finished a few days ago the paperback of Imperial Grunts by Robert D. Kaplan - a 5-star book I highly recommend - and reading that book only fuels my belief that if you support our troops, you need to read up on them.

You can start, for free, by reading Mattis on the Marines: Pendleton commander upbeat about morale, progress in Iraq in the North County Times.  If you know anybody who either is relative to or is a Marine, probably a wise thing to e-mail them a link to the story.

Iran is in the news a lot these days.  Most notably for their intent to develop Nuclear Weapons Power, but also because of their support of terrorists in Iraq, Lebanon, and Palestine.

Now, According to the Washington Post , Iran's Oil production is suffering from a lack of reinvestment:

(Roger Stern, an economic geographer at Johns Hopkins University) said oil production is declining and both gas and oil are being sold domestically at highly subsidized rates. At the same time, Iran is neglecting to reinvest in its oil production.

Iran produces about 3.7 million barrels a day, about 300,000 barrels below the quota set for Iran by the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries. The shortfall represents a loss of about $5.5 billion a year, Stern said. In 2004, Iran's oil profits were 65 percent of the government's revenue.