Archive for the 'Around MD and Nearby States' Category

I once read about someone saying that her favorite day of the year was March 4th, because it’s a complete sentence. Technically, that’s not true, since the sentence is “March forth!” and the date is “March fourth”. But for what it’s worth, they sound the same. In history, March fourth was America’s original Inauguration Day, before being changed by the 20th Amendment, and was the birthday of Venetian composer Antonio Vivaldi. So without further ado, I give you the news on or around March fourth.

PETA has decided to forgo their plans for a billboard depicting Tiger Woods.

How much of a chance does this have of passing? Congressmen Jeb Hensarling and Mike Pence propose an amendment to limit spending to 20% of GDP.

If you’re a car nut, but also would like to consider yourself “green”, you might like this. Ferrari has unveiled a hybrid auto.

In the Netherlands, a pilot who was not licensed for passenger flights was arrested just before takeoff.

Students protesting cutbacks in Davis, California got close to blocking an interstate highway. (H/T CDC Journal)

Earlier this evening, two police officers were shot at the main entrance of the Pentagon.

From Atlas Shrugs: In San Francisco, three muslims have been charged with shooting a gay man in the face with a BB gun.

From A Catholic View: Maryland Catholic Conference backs state plan to fund adult stem cell research. Historically, Maryland was founded to provide a refuge for Catholics who were mistreated in England.

Because of falling real estate values, spouses facing divorce are now telling each other “No, you take the House.”

From the Weekly Standard: Is Obama offering a congressman’s brother a position as judge in exchange for his vote on health care?

From Yahoo News: The Chilean quake’s effects on the earth include shortening its rotation period.

Yet more geologic activity. Fox News reports a 6.8 magnitude earthquake in Taiwan.

For the second time this winter, my corner of the world has been covered by a large quantity of white powdery global warming (or climate change or whatever it’s called these days). Here at the unofficial Bigfoot weather station (consisting of a yard stick and the deck immediately adjacent my back door), the amount is 27 inches. This beats December’s storm, which yielded 19 inches. I can’t even remember the last time we had two snow storms of similar size during the same winter. But I can look at the bright side. Shoveling snow is good exercise.

Among those reporting on the storm are:
Capital Weather Gang at the Washington Post,
Associated Content,
Fox Weather Channel,
KMOX News,
the Washington Examiner,
WCBS Newsradio,
and a YouTube-savvy student at Catholic University.

Another weekend come and soon to be gone. This one featured about 4 inches of powdery white stuff, a small amount by this winter’s standards. Here in Maryland, every few years or so, we seem to get what I call “Winter in December”, where December is cold and snowy, but January and February are milder. This past December certainly fit the bill, but there’s been very little let-up in January, with a long spell of below-freezing temperatures early in the month, and a snow storm to close it out. It looks like this will be a real winter, from start to finish. Just stay in your hole, Punxatawney Phil. Looking for your shadow doesn’t seem to be worth the effort this year. Meanwhile, here’s a bit of what’s been going on:

Ice Age Now reports how NASA and NOAA have been “cooking the data” on global warming, er, climate change. Such climate monitoring is now what the Obama administration wants from NASA, instead of going back to the moon.

The Washington, DC Metro had a horrible year in 2009, as 24 people were killed in the system.

From Atlas Shrugs via Newsbusters: Eleventh graders at an Ohio high school get a chance to earn school credit by becoming interns for Organizing for America. Suggested readings include Saul Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals.

According to Michael Medved, trying to emulate Truman will not work for Obama.

Want to take a ride on a military airplane, at taxpayer expense? It helps if you’re related to Nancy Pelosi.

Obama bows again! Not to a king or emperor, but to an American mayor. (H/T Snooper Report)

From Gateway Pundit: Illinois gubernatorial candidate Adam Andrzejewski, whom Duncan noted a few posts ago, has surged to within two points of the lead among Republicans vying for their party’s nomination. (Rock-n-roll trivia: Name the female vocalist whose maiden name is Andrzejewski.)

According to White House press secretary Robert Gibbs, the Obama administration is determined to have Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and other terrorists tried in New York.

Oh the other hand, Bill Burck and Dana Perino, writing in National Review, claim that KSM and four others will instead be tried by military commission.

The Egyptian government has announced plans to reveal the results of DNA tests from the Pharoah Tutankhamun. I wonder if “King Tut” was anything like Steve Martin’s portrayal.

John Muhammad, mastermind of the “beltway sniper” attacks that left 10 people dead in Maryland and Virginia in 2002, was executed at 9:00 PM Tuesday night, by lethal injection. He was convicted and sentenced to death in Virginia for the murder of Dean Harold Meyers, who was shot at a gas station in Manassas.

“He died very peacefully, much more than most of his victims,” said Prince William County prosecutor Paul Ebert, who witnessed Muhammad die by injection at 9:11 p.m. at Greensville Correctional Center, south of Richmond. Muhammad, dressed in a blue shirt, jeans and flip-flops, had no final statement.

Until Muhammad and his accomplice Lee Malvo were apprehended at a rest stop in Maryland, the general public seemed unaware of how many perpetrators were involved in the attacks. Most news outlets simply refered to a “beltway sniper”, apparently assuming that only one gunman was involved. Some reports mentioned a white van being present near some of the places where the “sniper” struck, but their vehicle turned out to be a Chevrolet Caprice, its back seat able to fold downward to allow a person to enter the trunk from the inside the car, an arrangement also used during the 1990’s by terrorists in Northern Ireland. The gun was aimed through a hole in the trunk’s wall. Malvo, who was 17 at the time of the attacks, is serving a life sentence.

This execution of John Muhammad leaves me with two regrets. First, it’s too bad that Virginia law doesn’t allow execution by firing squad, and thus make the punishment fit the crime. Second, even though Muhammad has now undergone the most severe penalty possible, there is still no way he could ever have paid for all 10 of the lives that he and Malvo took. In that sense, true justice cannot be achieved.

According to Yahoo and Fox News, Republicans have won the odd-year gubernatorial elections in Virginia and New Jersey.

In Virginia, where governors are limited to a single 4-year term, Bob McDonnell has defeated Democrat Creigh Deeds by 59% to 41%. Republicans also won the races for Lieutenant Governor and Attorney General, thus making a rare sweep of the three statewide offices.

In New Jersey, challenger Chris Christie has been projected as the winner, with a 49% to 45% margin over Democrat incumbent Jon Corzine, as 91% of the state’s districts have reported. Independent candidate Chris Daggett garnered 5% of the vote.

In the special election in New York’s 23rd Congressional district, Democrat Bill Owens leads Conservative Party candidate Doug Hoffman 49% to 45%, with 63% of the precincts reporting. This is the race recently vacated by Republican Dede Scozzafava, whose name still remains on the ballot.

Tucked into the hills of southwestern Pennsylvania, next to a waterfall on a bend in the Youghiogheny River, is the small town of Ohiopyle, the center of a state park of the same name. A bike trail, converted from an old rail line, runs along the river and is accessable from some of the town’s streets. Rafting and canoeing on the Youghiogheny are also popular activities.
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Annapolis, Maryland resident James von Brunn, held in the fatal shooting of guard Stephen T. Johns at the National Holocaust Museum yesterday, is obviously a white supremecist and an anti-Semite. But while these beliefs are often thought of as being of the extreme right, Mark Tapscott of the Washington Examiner points out that von Brunn is not your typical right wingnut. Instead, his own writings show that he:

Hated Christians.
Despised Bush and McCain.
Posted lengthy rants about “Neocons” involved in Jewish conspiracies to alter U.S. foreign policy in favor of Israel.
He placed credence in 9/11 “truther” theories.

Tapscott’s post includes links to this information, and to his source, the blog Red State.

Ben Johnson, in FrontPageMag, goes into more detail about von Brunn’s beliefs.

A review of his lengthy associations reveals Von Brunn hardly fits the stereotype of a Religious Right, GOP precinct captain. He denounced the Christian faith as a dastardly Jewish conspiracy, a “HOAX” invented by the Apostle Paul to “DESTROY ROMAN CULTURE” from within by undermining its pagan virility. (All screaming capitalization and grammatical errors in this piece appear in the original.) Like others on the racist fringe, the shooter proclaimed clearly: “SOCIALISM, represents the future of the West.”

An extremist? You bet. Right wing? Doesn’t look that way to me.

This past Memorial Day weekend, I drove up to Gettysburg, PA. Famous for the Civil War battle fought in July of 1863, the town is just a few miles north of the PA/MD border, and mostly surrounded by Gettysburg National Military Park. A few blocks south of the center of town, the park includes Soldiers’ National Cemetery.

The taller monument is surrounded by rings of ground-level gravestones, which can’t be seen directly at this angle, but are each marked with a small flag placed there for Memorial Day. While most of those buried here gave their lives in the Civil War, there are areas containing the graves of soldiers who died in the two World Wars.
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Earlier today, Governor Martin O’Malley announced the opening of Maryland’s Swine Flu Operations Center in Baltimore, which will be under the Maryland Department of Health and Mental Hygiene (DHMH). According to the governor,

“We want the citizens of Maryland to know that their government is doing everything we can at this time to prepare for any contingency with regard to swine flu. I want to thank our health and emergency professionals for their quick and thorough efforts as we take these precautions to protect the citizens of Maryland.”

Maryland hospitals are also getting prepared.

And not a moment too soon. Six possible cases of swine flu in Maryland have been reported, three in Baltimore County and three in Anne Arundel County. Fortunately, the people are all recovering. (For the record, I don’t live in either county.)

For some general information:
The Washington Post has some questions and answers about swine flu. The Baltimore Sun lists 14 things you need to know to stay safe. The federal Centers for Disease Control has put out this video.

I recently did a bit of hiking in Cunningham Falls State Park. Before hitting the trail, I stopped at the nearby Catoctin Furnace. I’ve run across several of these old truncated-pyramid-style furnaces in Maryand and southern Pennsylvania, but this is probably the best preserved one that I’ve seen. As early as 1776, this furnace was producing ammunition for the Continental Army.

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