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Thursday, September 2, 2010 @ 9:45am

Who do we blame THIS time?

Of all the things that would cause a man to strap bombs to himself and take hostages -

"Every single day he was talking about how much he hated the discovery channel."

James Jay Lee hated the Discovery Channel.

"I have a gun and I have a bomb, I have several bombs strapped to my body ready to go off," Lee had told police.

One of which did, when a police sharpshooter finally shot him dead. Fortunately no one else was hurt.

Immediately the blogosphere set out to determine whose ideology was to blame and since apparently this had nothing to do with Islam, it was tough. But people tried.

His MySpace rant talked about saving squirrels. He demanded Discovery stop glorifying human birthing. He found human babies disgusting.

Crazy environmentalist, right? But wait, he especially hated immigrants. He wanted to stop "ALL immigration pollution and the anchor baby filth that follows." That would make him an anti-immigrationist!

But it was Fox's Neil Cavuto who got Lee's brother-in-law on the air and learned that Lee was a little "off" even before Jon and Kate began celebrating human reproduction on Discovery.

He was a mean, deceptive, unpredictable know-it-all and when his mother and grandfather died, it apparently pushed him over the edge.

So you can blame environmentalists, you can blame anti -immigration-ists. Me, I blame the Internet. Which guarantees every know-it-all his say but it doesn't guarantee an audience.

No, for that you have to do something that makes people want to go to your page. Congratulations, Mr. Lee.

Wednesday, September 1, 2010 @ 11:53am

Did we win?

Listen to Dave's commentary:

The President has ended the combat mission in Iraq. Which means we should now be able to answer the big question:

Did we win?

I would say we did. Traditionally, you win a war when when the leader you set out to depose surrenders or is captured. So by that definition, we won the Iraq War on December 14, 2003:

When we captured Saddam Hussein.

But we decided to define victory differently.

"The United States and our allies will help the Iraqi people rebuild their economy in a unified Iraq at peace with its neighbors."

And in fact Iraq now produces almost as much oil as it did under Saddam, has more electricity than ever, 19.5 million cell phones, and is at peace with its neighbors. Just not with itself. And those democratic institutions are there, but not working quite yet.

And so last night President Obama couldn't declare victory, only that we had met our responsibility. Instead of Mission Accomplished, Responsibility Met.

"Now it's time to turn the page," Obama said.

Turn the page -- so we don't keep debating who was right and who was wrong, and who was a patriot and who wasn't, because it turns out the real key to America's security now ... is creating jobs ASAP.

But maybe -- as we turn the page -- we could at least BOOKMARK it so we can refer to it in the future. The next time we hear some grandiose promise about the great things wars can do.

Tuesday, August 31, 2010 @ 8:48am

A test, or a misunderstanding?

Listen to Dave's commentary:

A man who came to the US from Yemen 13 years ago, and was living in Alabama, gets on a plane in Birmingham. Screeners find he's carrying $7000 in cash; then the search of his suitcase finds what Bob Orr?

"TSA screens found 7 cell phones and blackberries, one of them taped to a Pepto Bismol bottle."

Cell phone and a Pepto Bismol bottle wrapped together with blue tape. Plus a knife and a box cutter.

However -- because the items "were not actual bombs and did not pose a threat," he is allowed to fly to Chicago.

Only when he changed his flight plans... so that HE would go directly to Amsterdam, while his LUGGAGE and the non-bombs attached to cell phones and watches would go to Washington DC did the TSA get suspicious, had his luggage removed, and alerted the Dutch authorities who arrested him.

Now I ask you: if YOU showed up at the check point with $7,000, and watches and cell phones taped to empty bottles in your luggage, would you expect to be waved onto the plane?

No! People who do stuff like this don't belong on a plane. People like this belong on the bus.

There will of course be an investigation:

"If it may have been a dry run, or if this was just a strange misunderstanding, or even a hoax."

Strange misunderstanding? Really? You've been in America 13 years. You get on a plane with a cell phone taped to a Pepto Bismol bottle. Let's see... you're trying to send a message that your phone bill is giving you heartburn?

That must be it!

I'm just worried they've found a way to make Pepto Bismol explode. The TSA will now start scanning us for antacids.

Monday, August 30, 2010 @ 9:16am

It's about God not politics

Listen to Dave's commentary:

The crowd estimates for Glenn Beck's weekend rally at the Lincoln Memorial range from 87,000 to half a million.

And what they heard was a call to bring God back into American life -- faith, hope, charity, honor, truth, LOVE. His movement for a smaller government is rooted in God, not politics. So does America really believe this?

There's a way to tell.

"Our nation can only do great works through our churches if they have the means to do it."

Every organized faith asks for money. The traditional tithe is ten percent, and that's what Glenn asked for:

"Tithe with firm reliance on divine providence. If you have firm reliance you gladly give 10 percent because you know you'll be fine."

And that's how we can measure whether this is real or not.

Right now the government takes a little less than 20% of every dollar earned in this country. Well, if every believer in America gave TEN percent of what they earn to a church, the churches could take a HUGE bite out of government!

In fact, if every Christian Jew and Muslim in American tithed, you'd have almost enough money to make Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid unnecessary.

The old and infirm could go to a nearby church, probably with far less paperwork. Federal bureaucrats would come to their offices and hear crickets.

If this is REALLY about taking government back, The believers are free to do it, starting IMMEDIATELY.

Friday, August 27, 2010 @ 12:31pm

Are These Parking Excuses Lame?

I asked for stories from drivers wronged by aggressive meter maids:

Hey Dave,



Yesterday I laughed when I saw a mini-van with over 50+ parking vouchers on their side window. Clearly they've paid for parking, I was wondering what would happen if they didn't pay. Does the parking attendent have to search through all the old vouchers to see if they paid "today"? Is there a rule that says you must remove old parking vouchers from your window?

[Only one voucher on the window at a time, or you get a ticket]

Dave,

What I'd like to know is what the protocol is for those private lots that hand out their own tickets. I got one, alleging I was taking up two spaces, when in fact I was 2 inches over the line and there was a car parked without trouble in the adjoining space into which I had encroached. What recourse do I have if this ticket is illegitimate? I assume if I don't pay, they'll use a collection agency to come after me since they are not the police. Do I have to pay them, then sue in small claims court?

[I've been dinged by the privates too. They don't even give you the chance to go before a judge. I guess the city isn't the only one milking us.]

Dave,

My girl friend got a parking ticket in Bothell for parking the wrong direction on a residential street. When you first think about it, you might say it was just. The whole story is, is that she was parked infront of her moms house for 5 minutes, in between 2 cars parked the same direction (they too were parked the wrong direction) as well as 4 other cars. So in total, 7 cars, including my girl friends where parked the wrong direction. After returning to her car after 5 minutes, she found a parking ticket. She look around and saw that none of the other cars had them. When she called the police station and asked about the ticket, the reason behind it was because the officer didnt want people to think that the street was one way.

[Yes, that seems silly. I see lots of cars parked the "wrong way" in neighborhoods.]

I have a motorcycle and had to back into a spot. Even though I know that you are supposed to put the sticker on the headlight, I also knew that putting the sticker on the headlight would make the poor meter maid have to step into the street to look at it. Knowing they'd be on the sidewalk I put it right on top of the gas tank facing the sidewalk. Nope... overthought that one. Got a ticket for putting it in the wrong place - 10" away from the headlight. A couple days ago I had my car broken into through the driver's side window and fully expected to get parking tickets all day parking on the left side of the street because I had no curbside window. Some times people deserve a break.

[This, to me, is a legit excuse. And with motorcycles, how do you prevent some evil-doer just stealing your parking sticker and using it himself?]

This one --which I just opened -- almost exactly paralleled my closing rant. Great minds...

Hi Dave -

On the parking ticket issue you are talking about this morning....

Isn't this an issue of supply and demand? A limited commodity (parking space) is priced according to the high demand for its limited supply. The ticket is the penalty applied when someone tries to take more supply than they paid for (essentially stealing the commodity for the period of time they are over the limit).

Free market principles at work, right?? Aren't conservatives howling that government should act more like business?

And just for kicks:

Name: Bradley
City: Seattle

Parking as a parallel to illegal immigration?! This kind of inflammatory red herring hunt is what makes our media so screwed up. I just turned off my radio. What a bunch of garbage.

Dave:

There is one unjust parking ticket issued in the city of Seattle in the past year: the dead guy who got ticketed because he didn't respond to the parking enforcement officer. That just seems wrong to me.

By the way, your comparison between parking tickets and immigrant visas is totally right on. Nice!

Friday, August 27, 2010 @ 8:00am

The Man Update.

Time for an update on issues involving men. Man issue number one:

Dateline Britain. It's reported that in the last 12 months, the British hotel chain Travelodge, which runs 452 hotels in Spain and the UK, has reunited 75,000 lost teddy bears with their owners.

This prompted the company to conduct a survey among its customers, and that survey found that 35 of adults admit they sleep with stuffed animals because they need something safe to cuddle when they're on the road.

Here's the kicker - most of them are MEN! One out of every four men in this survey of 6000 travelers takes a stuffed animal with them. Of those these are the British men we're talking about. When American men cuddle, they cuddle with an old Superman comic, or a favorite firearm.

And as long as we're on American Men - Barbara Walters has announced she plans to develop a spinoff of The View geared toward MEN. Instead of an hour of women talking, and arguing and looking gorgeous, it would be an hour of MEN talking and arguing and looking Marvelous.

The key of course is picking the right cast, and the word is that former Today show host Bryant Gumbel is at the top of the list.

Still NOT known is what the new show featuring men talking for an hour, would be called. It can't be called the View - how about "The Leer". Come to think of it, we already have a show where men sit around and talk aimlessly. It's called POKER.

Thursday, August 26, 2010 @ 10:23am

Who does the cabbie stabber represent?

Listen to Dave's commentary:

We know a little more about the accused NY cabbie stabber -- he's Michael Enright, a filmmaker from suburban New York.

He was a volunteer with a religious organization of moderate Christians, Intersections International -- which seeks reconciliation between Muslims and non-Muslims, and which has supported that NY mosque.

The leader of this group says he's shocked at what Mr. Enright is accused of doing.

And what he's accused of doing is getting into Ahmed Sharif's cab drunk, and committing a hate crime:

"I'm driving, he asks me where I'm from, I said, 'Bangladesh.' Second question he asks me 'Are you Muslim?' I say, 'Yes.'"

And then, he allegedly says "This is a bleeping checkpoint" takes out his Leatherman, and leaves Sharif with 32 stitches worth of stab wounds.

So - can we dismiss this as merely the crazy actions of a drunk?

Well we could. But not by the rules of the current debate.

By the rules of the current debate over whether to trust ANY Muslims -- based on the fact that Muslims committed 9/11 -- we have to figure out what group Michael Enright represents and if we can trust people in that group.

So what's his group? He is white (like me) from the NY suburbs (like me), volunteered with a moderate religious group (as I've done), and had just returned from making a film in Afghanistan about US soldiers... which would explain the checkpoint comment.

This would seem to indict white moderate Christians who sympathize with the military.

That's awkward. I vote for just labeling him a crazy drunk.

Wednesday, August 25, 2010 @ 9:10am

Why I'm suddenly a fan of bacteria

The only thing more shocking than the size of the BP oil spill has been how QUICKLY it's managed to disappear. The latest miraculous development is a previously-unknown bacteria which thrives in deep water, and is cheerfully consuming BP's lost inventory.

"They grow at very low temperatures and they're able to degrade the oil quite nicely," said Terry Hazen, one of the researches who discovered them.

So how about THAT!

What the earth seems to be telling us is that it still has some tricks up its sleeve.

Scientists have been desperately trying to build man-made oil-eating bacteria, and suddenly, without any help from us, these NATURAL oil-eaters - simply built themselves!

And did it in an incredibly hostile environment. The water pressure is overbearing. The temperature is 41 degrees. And yet -- these perfectly-adapted bacteria appear right on cue.

So, if the earth can heal an oil spill of this size - once the source of the pollution is cut off - why couldn't it heal other potential catastrophes? I'm thinking, of course, about climate change. Lately we've had the gloom-and-doomers saying it's too late, we blew the chance to cut off the carbon dioxide, the arctic ice is already melting, pretty soon the ocean waves will be lapping at the Oklahoma border.

But who's to say Mother Earth, given half a chance, couldn't come up with some airborne bacteria which eats greenhouse gases and turns them into dental floss or some other benign result?

And maybe if we leave the recession alone, spontaneous economic bacteria could create 4 million family wage manufacturing jobs.

Dave Ross Commentary: De-regulation, the gift that keeps on giving. 05.07.10

Pastor Terry Jones Pastor Terry Jones of the Dove World Outreach church talks about the churches plan to hold a bonfire burning Koran's on September 11th. Play it...

Thomas Chatterton Williams Thomas Chatterton Williams, author of: "Losing My Cool: How a Father's Love and 15000 Books Beat Hip-hop Culture" talks to Dave Ross. Play it...

Ali Aslan Ali Aslan, columnist for the Daily Zaman in Turkey, and Foreign Policy magazine, talks to Dave about the fallout in Turkey following Israel's raid on the "Free Gaza" flotilla. Play it...

Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn talks to Dave Ross about a possible veto of the Alaskan Way Viaduct unless the city council agrees the city will not foot the bill for any cost overruns. Play it...

Craig Robinson Craig Robinson, brother of First Lady Michelle Obama and head coach of OSU basketball, talks to Dave Ross about his brand new book, "A Game of Character." Play it...

Andrew Young Andrew Young, author of The Politician: An Insider's Account of John Edwards's Pursuit of the Presidency and the Scandal that Brought Him Down Play it...

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