No Runny Eggs

The repository of one hard-boiled egg from the south suburbs of Milwaukee, Wisconsin (and the occassional guest-blogger). The ramblings within may or may not offend, shock and awe you, but they are what I (or my guest-bloggers) think.

Archive for July 11th, 2008

The Wisconsin Sports Bar turns 3 today

by @ 16:35. Filed under Sports, The Blog.

Thanks for kicking me to this side of the blogging world, Chris. There’s a rumor that Godzilla will be making a return appearance to the Bar to help celebrate, along with the confirmed Marilyn Monroe and the Beatles.

HOORAY BEER!

ANWR – A Scenic Treasure?

by @ 11:39. Filed under Energy.

I’ve been searching for a video like this one. If you have any concerns about “spoiling the natural beauty” of ANWR, watch:

Perhaps John McCain would like to explain how exactly this compares to drilling in the Grand Canyon?

I appreciate McCain’s desire to drill offshore. However, ANWR is still a lighting rod for the gas price issue. You can see the Dems slipping on their refusal that this is a supply problem. I hope McCain takes this entire issue and builds a practical not theoretical line between himself and Obama. John McCain should support drilling in all areas, especially those that are proven, and make Obama come to him on this issue!

H/T Bill Dupray

The Morning Scramble – 7/11/2008

by @ 9:15. Filed under The Morning Scramble.

It’s going to be a hot one today…

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o5g2yyvdjrE[/youtube]

  • Zip puts the demographic numbers behind the decline and pending fall of the last vestiges of the British Empire.
  • JammieWearingFool says that 4 rent-controlled apartments for Charlie Rangel is 3 too many.
  • Marshall Manson has a warning for the Twittering politicians who aren’t actually listening. I’ll lay odds on Barack Obama disappearing from the online community if he wins.
  • Rick Moran has the Barack-Track Headline of the Day.
  • Mondoreb sings “Barack the Blazing Liberal”.
  • Moe Lane is popping a fresh batch of corn over a name that popped up in the Obamination Veep Sweeps – Chris Dodd.
  • Curt found the presstitutes are in a land of confusion over Obama’s intentions. Memo to the media – they’re not good.
  • Ace and we Morons prove that with our takes on the Obamination “…You Can Believe In” poster (note; this may not be safe for work – we’re talking about Morons after all).
  • Slublog highlights the arrogance that is Obama.
  • Ed Morrissey notes the tax policies of an Obamination Administration are helping push the breakup of one of the NFL’s longest-running family dynasties.
  • Dean Barnett does his best Michael Buffer impersonation over Obama’s forgetfulness over his pledge to help Hillary Clinton retire her debt. The Photoshop simply cannot be missed.
  • Tom McMahon has a photograph of Jesse Jackson’s new coffee mug.
  • James T. Harris found the happiest man in America – Al Sharpton.
  • Eric is now the campaign manager for the Jesse Jackson for President of Iran campaign.
  • Jim Hoft caught Iranian President Mad Man/Puppet of the Mad Mullahs Mahmoud Ahmadinejad saying that the American generals in Iraq have a “special place in their hearts” for him. Oh, they have a special place for Ahmadhimmijob all right; the only question is the number (.50-cal or 2,000-lb).
  • Wyatt Earp found today’s episode of presstitute bias; this time from CNN over a story that John McCain won’t answer the “Viagra” question.
  • Sister Toldjah adds to that find as she notes the New York Times Sedition Slimes is trying to get their Republican candidate of the spring disqualified on, at best, dubious claims about his “natural-born” citizenship.
  • It’s not like McCain needs help from the NYT to crash his campaign; even Ed hits him on his latest thumb to the eyes of conservatives.
  • Brian has a message to those of you who voted for the ‘Rats in 2006 – They lied to you before; they’ll lie to you again.
  • GOPgal has the new logos for the few conservatives left and the bipartian Party-In-Government.
  • Pelosi’s Epic FAIL, Part 1 – Michelle Malkin caught her calling drilling a “hoax”. Bonus coverage – see-dubya broke out a chart showing just what happened since Pelosi got to within 2 heartbeats of the Oval Office.
  • Pelosi’s Epic FAIL, Part 2 – John McCormack notes that the most-important thing on her docket now is rushing impeachment charges through the Judiciary Committee. Nancy; I dare you. I DOUBLE-DOG DARE YOU!
  • Flip found Denver imitating “art” (sorry, “South Park” doesn’t qualify as true art) on the issue of panhandlers.
  • J.R. Dunn explains how the envirowhackos captured energy policy.
  • Headless Blogger explains why we can’t GROW our way out of the energy crunch (this also qualifies as Pelosi’s Epic FAIL, Part 3).
  • The Unreal one mourns the coming death of the European supercar.
  • John Hawkins proves shamnesty is political suicide for the GOP.
  • XBradTC has a slightly different take on Drill Here, Drill Now; specifically, the Army take.
  • David St Lawrence wonders what it will take to keep the deer from munching on his garden; they picked up a taste for hot peppers.
  • Jon Ham has bad news for teetotalers. PROST! for good health.

My “Worst of the Best” list

by @ 7:53. Filed under Miscellaneous.

I again filled all 10 slots.   Like Steve, I had a few others on the “Honorable Mention” list but tried not to violate the desire of the poll.   Here it is:

Chuck Hagel
Olympia Snowe
Susan Collins
Ted Stevens
Wayne Gilchrist
Christopher Shays
Michael Castle
Jim Ramstad (a MN Congresscritter who is retiring this year!)
Arlen Specter
Charlie Crist

Right Wing News – Least-favorite elected Republicans

by @ 6:55. Filed under Politics - National.

Building on yesterday’s favorite elected Republicans list over at Right Wing News, Shoebox, 40 other bloggers, and I chose our least-favorite elected Republicans (they had to be current governors, Congresscritters, or Presidents, so I couldn’t throw in Trent “Cave-A-“Lott, Mike Huebsch or Jeff Wood). Like the favorites list, I decided on sending 8 John Hawkins’ way:

– Arlen Specter
– Lindsey Graham
– Chuck Hagel
– Tom Petri
– Ray LaHood
– Christopher Shays
– Ted Stevens
– Don Young

To see which ones (if any) made the top 20, as well as the full top 20, head on over to Right Wing News.

Digging Up an Unrequited Love?

by @ 5:14. Filed under Lawgivers-In-Black.

Here’s a story I was going to leave alone.    But after hearing a talk radio show carry on about it, I decided to chime in. From the Chicago Tribune:

Laura Tennessen case leads Wisconsin to outlaw necrophilia

Now first, let me be very clear that I do not, nor have I ever, endorsed necrophilia.   Although, when I saw a picture of the perps I can certainly see why they resorted to it as  a dead woman  would be the only woman they could get near.

As I said, I heard a bunch of carrying on at a local talk radio show.   The gist of the issue for the announcer was that the two dissenting judges were complete idiots for thinking that having sex with a dead person was ok.   The problem is, that’s not what the dissenting judges were saying.

The two dissenting judges argued that the law as written did not apply to necrophilia.   if you read the statute, Wis. Stat. Ann. § 940.225. Sexual assault, you’ll note that throughout the statute it refers to “person” in a context that assumes the crimes occurred with a person who was alive at some point of the act.   Not until the end of the statute do you see this:

(7) DEATH OF VICTIM. This section applies whether a victim is
dead or alive at the time of the sexual contact or sexual intercourse.

The dissenting judges argued that the statue was intended to allow prosecution of a crime where the victim died during the crime or it was impossible to determine when during the crime, the individual died.

The problem that I have with the ruling is two fold. First, the language of the bill is at best, ambiguous. In a 2002 ruling, the Wisconsin Supreme Court talked about ambigous language and how it should interpret law if it exists in a statute:

In contrast, if the language of the statute is ambiguous, the court must resort to judicial construction. Id. at ¶15 (citing Kelley Co. v. Marquardt, 172 Wis. 2d 234, 247-48, 493 N.W.2d 68 (1992)). A statute is ambiguous if it is capable of being understood by a reasonable person in either of two senses. Reyes v. Greatway Ins. Co., 227 Wis. 2d 357, 365, 597 N.W.2d 687 (1999). A statute is not rendered ambiguous, however, merely because two parties disagree as to its meaning. Forest County v. Goode, 219 Wis. 2d 654, 663, 579 N.W.2d 715 (1998). If the statute is ambiguous, we then look to extrinsic factors, including legislative history, and the statute’s scope, context and subject matter, to determine the intent of the legislature. Landis, 2001 WI 86, ¶15.

In fact, even in the current opinion, the Court recognizes there are times where they should look past the plain language of the bill:

While extrinsic sources are usually not consulted if the statutory language bears a plain meaning, we nevertheless may consult extrinsic sources “to confirm or verify a plainmeaning
interpretation

While they did look back at the Legislative notes on the original bill, they focused on what they wanted to see rather than what the “plan meaning” of the Legislative notes were.

Secondly, the same 2002 ruling dealt with what the definition of what a “person” was and the Supreme Court addressed that issue with detail in that decision.

The majority opinion in this case did not address what a “person” is i.e. is a “person” a live person? if not, did the Wisconsin Supreme Court just open the door for a fetus to be a “person?”

In the end, the majority opinion was derisive of those who didn’t see the “plain meaning” of the language:

A reasonably well-informed person would understand the statute to prohibit sexual intercourse with a dead person

Does that mean that the two dissenting judges are imbeciles?

If the statute was so clear that a “reasonably well-informed person would understand the statute,” why did two lower courts hold otherwise and why did the Wisconsin Legislature spend time on a bill to specifically make necrophilia a crime? Are they all idiots?

I end up agreeing with the dissenting opinion on how the majority reached its conclusion:

The majority reaches a desired result through an undesirable analysis. I acknowledge that this is heinous conduct and good public policy would indicate that this conduct should be criminalized.

In short, it appears that the majority knew what they wanted the outcome to be and interepreted the case to conform with that conclusion rather than interpret the law and turn it back to the legislature for clarification, if necessary.

OK, I’ll admit, I’m not laying awake at night worrying about the next necrophilia case in Wisconsin. However, this is a situation where Conservatives need to be consistent.   misuse of a court’s authority, even if the end result is one that  you agree with,  is a lot like lying; if you get away with it the first time, on a small issue, it’s easier to do it the next time with a bigger issue and the time after that with an even larger issue. If left unchecked this could eventually lead to a court writing Constitutional provisions out of whole cloth!

What? That’s already happened?

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