Free Speech, Afghanistan Style...

It is great to live in a country where we have so many freedoms that we pretty much take them for granted. Despite the paranoid delusions of certain groups, we pretty much have more rights and freedoms than people from most other countries in the world.

Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for people in most Muslim countries, where someone being sentenced to death for being critical of Muhammad is not unheard of.

The student, Sayed Parwiz Kambakhsh, 23, who also works for a local newspaper, was charged with insulting Muhammad by calling the prophet “a killer and adulterer,” the judge, Shamsurahman Muhmand, said in a telephone interview.

Ironically, Mr. Kambakhsh's death sentence pretty much proves his point (at least on the "killer" part). This is very sad. The severe problems currently afflicting the Muslim world have no chance of getting any better until the powers that be in that world allow their people to be critical of the culture and religion that they see around them.

Drunk on Ethanol

The state ethanol whores (as Mark Belling calls them) are trying yet again to force us to use ethanol (pdf). This is bad public policy for several reasons.

• Ethanol is not a good replacement for petroleum based fuels.
• It is not as efficient of a fuel as petroleum.
• It takes almost as much energy to produce a gallon of ethanol as you get out if it. In some studies, which also take into account the cost of distribution, it actually takes more energy to produce and distribute a gallon of ethanol than you get out of it, making its production a net lose.
• Ethanol is produced primarily from corn, causing the price of corn to skyrocket. Since corn is also a stable food, this causes the price of almost all other foods to go up.
• As more land goes into production producing corn for ethanol, less land is used producing other crops, causing the prices of those crops to go up, also resulting in higher overall food costs.
• The key is to reduce fuel consumption. Ethanol does not result in reduced fuel consumption. Private enterprise is working on real solutions for this, however, such as improved hybrid engine technologies.
• Other, cleaner fuels, such as hydrogen, exist. Private enterprise is also working on making these types of fuels practical.
  

The legislation that is currently being put in front of the state legislature would allow for other renewable fuels. However, as it stands right now, it is nothing more than pork for farmers and the ethanol producers. Worse yet, it is pork that benefits few, and hurts many while needlessly tying us to a harmful fuel source for no good reason.

Stop the whoring out of our state to farmers and ethanol companies, and let the market place determine the most reasonable solution to this problem.

Football as God Intended...

This is how God intended for football to be played! The Packer's winning at home, in the cold, with the snow falling. Could life get any better?

Yes, I am Still Alive

In case anyone is still reading this, yes, I am still alive.  I have just been really busy lately, and haven't really had much to say.

I found the following candidate quiz over at Stacy's blog.

87% Mike Huckabee
84% John McCain
81% Fred Thompson
79% Mitt Romney
72% Ron Paul
69% Tom Tancredo
60% Rudy Giuliani
36% Bill Richardson
27% Hillary Clinton
26% Chris Dodd
26% John Edwards
24% Barack Obama
22% Joe Biden
20% Mike Gravel
17% Dennis Kucinich

2008 Presidential Candidate Matching Quiz

Hmmm, the Huckster?  I don't see myself pulling for him any time soon.  McCain either.  I may agree with some (or many) of the things they say, but what they have been saying does not really jive with what they have actually done in their political careers.

Thompson and Romney I could back.

Why is Ron Paul so high on the list?  It was probably the questions on pot and on free trade.  He is a libertarian, after all.  Problem is, he is also a nut...  It sure is good to see that the true nuts are all at the bottom of the list, and by a big gap.