I’d like to take this opportunity to wish everyone a safe and happy Halloween. Whether you’re going out trick-or-treating, taking your kids around, doing to a party, or simply staying at home passing out candy, enjoy yourself and be safe.

There are plenty of sites out there with safety tips (try a Google Search), so I’ll just mention a few that stick out in my mind.

Safety Tips:

1. Be sure that all children are escorted by a trustworthy adult.
2. Be sure to bring flashlights and avoid excessively dark areas.
3. NEVER enter a house when trick-or-treating.
4. Do NOT allow children to consume candy without first inspecting it for tampering and potential allergy inducing foods (if your child has allergies).
5. Look both ways before crossing the street and make sure the driver sees you.
6. Be weary of masks - they may make it hard to see.
7. Avoid driving, but if you must, go slow when children are nearby and on residential streets.
8. Have fun and dress warm - make this a Halloween to remember!

And to close, I’d like to present an special Jack-o-Lantern. I made this one back in the 2004 election season and I thought the message still rings true. With the election in a mere six days, I remind you all to:

The GOPumpkin

Have a great Halloween,

-Andy

PS - I also encourage you to check out the Capitol Steps Halloween Special, playing in most areas tonight on your public radio station. You can also download it online. If you like political satire music, I highly suggest you check out the Capitol Steps.

When it comes to political polls, even staying on top of which company is conducting in which state is hard enough, let alone keeping tabs of the results.

Back before the 2004 presidential election, there were a number of sites that I would visit almost daily for the most up-to-date information. One of my favorite was www.electoral-vote.com. The concept of the was simple: compile all the poll data from around the nation and try to predict the electoral vote.

Fast forward to the 2006 midterm election. This election is potentially a real turning point for the House, the Senate, and the nation as a whole. With that in mind, I recently rediscovered the site and have been visiting it regularly.

Getting to the point, the predictions are looking interesting to say the least. Although it is by but a shoestring, the Republicans seem to be holding ion to the Senate, 51 to 49. On the other hand, the House is poised to swap party control, with Democrats leading 225 to 208, with two tie races.

Needless to say, I’d prefer it if Republicans maintained total control, but ceding the house will make for some real interesting debates and legislative sessions in the next two years.

I’m not sure how the results will turn out, but I know that I’ll be watching intently on election night.

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Although I’m not exactly sure that I’d want to eat whale in the first place, I see no real problem with Iceland’s decision to allow limited commercial whaling. Provided they severely punish those killing whales without licenses, thus allowing for sustainable populations to remain, there is really no downside to the decision.

I understand that endangered species need to be protected, but there are plenty of other animals that need more protection than whales. Scientists estimate only 1,500 Giant Pandas remain in the wild and around five to ten Northern White Rhinoceroses. According to the article, Iceland’s territorial waters alone have 43,000 minke and 25,000 fin whales - plenty to allow some minuscule whaling. Look at the numbers: nine fin and 30 minke whales are no more than 7/100 of one percent of the population in Iceland alone. I am not an expert, but it seems to me that so little a percentage is easily replaced be new calves.

Beyond the numbers, one must also look at the cultural significance of whaling in places like Iceland. Going back 1000 years and perhaps more, the Vikings tradition has included whaling. Why should exceptions be granted to Native American tribes and not other cultures with whaling ingrained - such as that of Iceland? I’d like to see a liberal give a good argument against that.

Regardless of everything else, it is my belief that international law has no real authority for regulating activities such as whaling that have no real impact/pose no real threat to other countries. Pollution, NBC weapons programs, genocide, acts of war, gross human rights violations; things like these are all valid reasons for international laws. In my mind, saving a whale (which is seemingly not all that endangered in Iceland) should not.

All I have left to say is thank goodness the International Whaling Commission has no apparent legal power and best of luck for Iceland in joining the elite club of whaling nations.

Common Sense:

Iceland and her fishing (er, whaling) vessels should be very careful of Green Peace and other environmental groups. It’s a sad reality, but violence and/or terrorism against whaling ships would not surprise me in the least.

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I find this story very depressing - how in the world can anyone possible turn on someone as important as their mother and take her life. I just don’t understand. At the same time, I have to wonder just how impaired his judgment was, after all, it was mentioned that he was drunk and high on LSD at the time.

Going off of that, I am disgusted that being drunk or on drugs qualifies as mitigating circumstances to lower the degree of murder or, as was true in this case, to reduce the sentence. I’ve said this and before and I’ll say it again: once you are old enough to know the difference between right and wrong (and 17 going on 18 certainly is) you should never be mitigated by circumstances you have direct and immediate control over. For example, drug use or terrible rage should not be valid defenses, but a heart attack causing a death on the road should be.

In my mind a 15 year sentence for such a blatant murder is really a bit of an outrage. If anything, the mitigating circumstances should keep the death penalty out of play - 30, 40, or 50 year sentences should still be an option. That’s what I hate about the American Justice System - we go too easy on many crimes and allow too many defenses and mitigating circumstances. And to those that say we need these ways defenses and other such matters, I have a simple message for you: IF YOU DON”T WANT TO GET IN TROUBLE, DON”T BREAK THE LAW.

On a more positive note, I’d like to offer a warm and hearty congratulations to the police department in charge of the case. “Thank You for helping to bring justice to your town and our nation.”

Common Sense:

Don’t murder - it’s really the worst of crimes, short of terrorism. Especially don’t murder your own mother - that’s wrong on an even deeper level.

This post comes as an update to my September 23rd post, “Pledge to Mexico in US School“.

As you may well know, there was some controversy at the time of just how involved the kids actually were in the pledge and other activities. Although I find the pledge video rather inconclusive, the intense waving of the Mexican Flag - a foreign flag, mind you - in an American school truly speaks for itself. Despicable to say the least.

Special thanks to Hotair.com for posting the story and KTRH.com for finding the videos

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If you know me or it you’ve been reading this blog for more than a few weeks, it should come as no real surprise that I am outraged at the verdict. More than that, I’m outraged that a border patrol agent can receive prison time for doing his job, stopping a smuggler, serving his country, and possibly saving a life.

Yes, some of the blame may fall on Compean and Ramos for failing to report the discharge of a weapon, but at most they should receive disciplinary action in regards to his job - not criminal charges.

The charges are in regards to violating the suspect’s civil rights and violating certain United States Border Patrol policies. Again I firmly believe that polity violation should only be punished be the employer. As for the Civil Rights violations, I trust Ramos in that he truly believed the suspect had a gun and that the shots may well have been his.

I have no idea what Border Patrol policy regarding shell casings is, but I find it despicable of the prosecutor to use the fact that Compean picked his up as grounds for destroying a crime scene and contributing to the attempted cover up. If anything, I’m sure it came as a result of the stress involved in the pursuit and the shooting. Law enforcement agents should not be held liable except in cases of gross negligence or of actual malice. He may have made a bad decision, but I bet others would have done it as well.

Yes, they may have acted in a manner unbecoming of Border Patrol agents; yes, they may have fired when it could have been prevented (even of that only becomes apparent with 20/20 hindsight); yes, they may have perused when policy says not to. But none of what they did should be a crime for law enforcement officers, none of what they did should put them in jail. They are brave and patriotic Americans who deserve a round of applause and a thank you for protecting our borders and out nation.

Beyond the implications of this case, I strongly question the sanity behind border patrol policies. Not shooting unless the suspect is dangerous makes sense - similar rules apply to many local police jurisdictions - but the pursuit rules make no sense. It is a crime in its own right to flee even a traffic stop for a minor infraction and the officer will (most likely?) pursue and arrest you. Being in the United States illegally is a crime, but people fleeing from Border Patrol agents does not even allow for pursuit? Who in the world came up with that? I, for one, would feel a greater danger knowing an illegal drug smugglers in nearby than having a car going five miles over the speed limit. Maybe I’m just crazy.

Common Sense:
I hate to say this, but I guess no Border Patrol agent should ever peruse a suspect or shoot them unless they have a gun in their face. On the other hand, I guess drug smugglers can roam free with little worry of bing caught as long as they intend to flee back to Mexico when perused.

It took a little while longer than I had hopped, but I finally managed to get an e-mail read by a member of the Technorati support staff. Within two hours of sending the e-mail, they had their spiders crawling my site and the issue (although they didn’t say what it was) was fixed. This is my first post since the fix, so I’m crossing my fingers that everything works well and there are no more problems.

I am especially happy, as I should now get a good boost in daily hits and be able to grow and maintain a larger readership. A lofty goal, I know, but I think I can do it if I continue with interesting updates and strong, witty commentary.

At this point, I’d also like to offer some of the recent updates to the site itself. The most obvious is the introduction of general icons designating external links in posts and comments, as well as specific icons for common sites and sources (currently Wikipedia, US Government (.gov) sites, and WorldNetDaily). I hope that you find these somehow useful in navigating this site and the vast world of the internet.

I am also working on some small changes to the template and site design, hopefully getting things looking a bit more professional and maybe getting the pages to load more quickly (although most of that is due to WordPress). You may have noticed the (somewhat) recent addition of collapsible items in the left menu bar, as well as the addition of an ‘incoming links’ link to the right menu bar on the homepage. Look for more such changes in the coming weeks as I try to make News. Views. Common Sense. more intuitive and user friendly.

-Andy

Again, I realize that this is a bit of a turn from my usual content, but I found this story interesting.

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A team of researchers from Russia?s Joint Institute for Nuclear Research and the United States? Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory announced today that they have discovered (produced) the controversial element 118.

For those of you who don?t know, there is actually quite a story behind element 118, unofficially known as ?ununoctium?. In 1999, researchers at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in California claimed to have discovered the element.

Trouble began brewing, however, as other teams of scientists were unable to replicate the data. By June of 2002, it was shown that the lead researcher, Victor Ninov, had falsified data and that the team had not discovered the element.

According to reports, the team bombarded Californium and Calcium together in a particle accelerator to create the element, which remained for less than one one-thousandth of a second.

Sources: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Element_118 and http://apnews.myway.com/article/20061016/D8KQ0G780.html

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First I?d like to congratulate the scientists on their amazing accomplishment. In terms of real commonsense, I guess I?d have to wonder if it?s really worth it go through all the trouble of producing an element that is gone in less than the blink of an eye.

I understand the discovery behind in and all, but it seems to me that it would be better to focus on elements that are likely to be fairly long-lived. That is, ones with favorable electron configurations which are atomically stable.

More than anything, I suppose, this discovery reaffirms that the United States (in this case working with Russia) is still a world leader in Physics research. It will be very interesting to see if this holds up when CERN opens up it?s LHC in 2007.

Common Sense:
Always check your facts before making claims of new discoveries (apparently the folks at Berkley didn?t in 1999) and don?t make anything too dangerous or unstable (I?d hate to see what potential element 119 does with water).

In the interest of accountability, this post has been retained. Please note that as of February 7th, 2007, News. Views. Common Sense. no longer accepts sponsored posts or advertising. Thank you.

Weblogs - today known simply as blogs - have been around in one form or another since the mid 1990s. In the beginning, most blogs were simply online diaries of a person’s life (as is now often seen on sites like MySpace and Facebook) and were a hobby more than anything.

Fast forward to circa 2000, when a number of major political and technology blogs began to emerge. Suddenly a personal hobby was becoming more than that, people actually began to make money through the sale of ads. A banner here, a link there, and some really very profitable sites were born.

Fast forward again, this time to 2006 where an apparent revolution in blog advertising is taking place. An internet startup known as PayPerPost has recently launched a second beta of their innovative system. The idea is truly simple: instead of displaying banners or targeted text ads (such as Google ads), the blogger simply makes posts about an advertiser or their products and gets paid for their efforts. A quick look at their blog reveals that some users have made over $1000 simply posting in their blogs. I’d have to say that this looks like a very interesting service.

At the same time, however, I see some controversy in this. As was mentioned at Techcrunch, the issues mainly revolve around the fact that bloggers are not required (and in some cases not allowed) to mention that a post is sponsored, and that advertisers can require a positive tone in the post. In my opinion, these issues are null and void if the blogger is responsible and always discloses his sponsored posts. After all, there is nothing wrong with a hobby that makes you a little extra cash, right?

Again, this is a sponsored post.

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Needless to say, I find this quite outrageous. I simply cannot comprehend why anyone in the world would want to go out and slay a (seemingly) innocent family. Not only that, but this particular shooting occurred in such a small town - it seems to me that such circumstances will only make the situation worse.

Imagine what it’s going to be like Monday morning at the girls’ high school. Three students in a school of 145 were murdered over the weekend. I can’t imagine what that would be like even at my school of more than 2500, but in a school as small as Harmony I’d imagine in must be especially tough. My condolences go out the the staff, students, and all members of the surrounding community.

Something also sounds just a bit fishy to me, what are the chances that the son was arrested on ‘unrelated’ charges within hours of the bodies being discovered. I’m not saying that he did it or had any knowledge of it, but the circumstances seem just a little too suspicious to this blogger.

Why is it that so many families have been killed recently? There was the one in Florida earlier this week and now one in Iowa. And all this comes after the week of widespread school shootings. And the body of the college student found in Vermont. I’m really getting sick of breaking news stories about slain families and children.

My appeal to the mainstream media and all would be murders, can we please have something happy for a change?

Common Sense:

Not much to say on this one… Don’t go out and shoot people?