Order tossed for I-912 backers

The Washington Supreme Court has thrown out a judge’s order that forced backers of a anti-gasoline-tax initiative to report the online-air activities of two Seattle talk-show hosts as in-kind campaign contributions in 2005.

All nine justices agreed that the lower court ruling by Thurston County Superior Court Judge Chris Wickham was incorrect on free-speech grounds.

They issued two separate decisions Thursday to explain their views in the case, which dealt with KVI Radio hosts John Carlson and Kirby Wilbur.

The backers of Initiative 912, who had sought unsuccessfully to overturn the gasoline-tax increases, now are considering whether to pursue a civil-rights claim for damages against the prosecutors in San Juan County, Seattle and other jurisdictions in the case.

Harsh?  I don't think so.  It's completely true, according to the News Tribune:

Democrats support Watada, caucuses

Leaders of the state Democratic Party voted overwhelmingly Saturday to support Lt. Ehren Watada, the Fort Lewis officer who refused orders to serve in Iraq.

Maybe traitor is too harsh, but I have no kind words for the man who joined the service knowing we were in a war, and then used specious reasoning to justify his refusal to fight.  He ignores the entire reality of the chain of command and his responsibility as an officer, and the oath he took when he was granted his commission.

And maybe it is accurate, as he left his unit without its leadership as they deployed to harms way.  He is at best a dishonorable disgrace to his uniform, to his service and to his country.

But the democrats think he is mom and apple pie.

US Senator Ted Kennedy praising Reagan. The United States Senator also said, among other things,

“We can and sometimes must defend democracy by force, but we cannot impose it by force. Democratic principles are universal, but democracy must find its champions within each country’s culture and tradition.”

Aaah, what about WWII and post-WWII Germany, Italy and Japan, Senator?  We imposed democracy at the point of a gun, and obviously, thank G*d it blossomed.  (In all fairness, all three nations quickly found their own champions of democracy… as has Iraq and Afghanistan.)

Hat-tip: Orbusmax

Pplease test the comments and let me know if the paragraphing is a little better.

LSU

You read that right. 

The new binding energy targets the EU voted on and approved to lower CO2 and make Europe more 'green' will actually increase global warming, threaten endangered species and speed the deforestation of the South East Asian rainforests.

Via the Mighty Orb:

EU green targets will damage rainforests

European union green fuel targets will accelerate the destruction of rainforests in South-East Asia and threaten the habitat of endangered species, such as the orang-utan.  

In March EU leaders agreed to set a binding climate change target to make biofuel - energy sources made from plant material - account for 10 per cent of all Europe's transport fuels by 2020.

But the European Commission has admitted that the objective, which aims to cut carbon dioxide emissions, may have the unintended consequence of speeding up the destruction of tropical rainforests and peatlands in South-East Asia - actually increasing, not reducing, global warming.

Here goes:

• Rewriting History a Classroom at a Time: Fred Thompson says:

  It's bad enough hearing from a distance about the bizarre anti-Semitic theories taught by heads of state as well as schools and religious leaders. Now, according to a study funded by the British government, we find out that some schools in Great Britain have stopped teaching history that is offensive to Muslim students.
  The topics that have been erased from the curriculum, the study found, include both the Nazi genocide and the Crusades. This rewriting of history through omission wasn't some government policy. It was the result of individual decisions in local schools by teachers with large populations of Muslim students. Unfortunately, many of these students have been taught by parents and mosques that the holocaust never happened and that the Crusades were an unprovoked attack on Islam by European Christians. History books that present these events in any other light, they believe, are part some giant conspiracy designed to attack their very religion.
  If anybody needs to hear these facts, it is the children who are being abused by those who are teaching the same hateful lies that have helped turn the Middle East into the self-destructive and often suicidal mess it is today.

The British declared a 200-mile exclusion zone around the Falkland Islands, initiating operations to retake the islands from the Argentines.

Expect regular posts from me as the history progresses this spring.