Ms. Normand

If you liked Mabel as the farmer's daughter in that Wiki cite, you you'll love her as an urbane grownup.

Libya: "I thought YOU brought the custard pies."

Reuters characterizes some of the activity this weekend:


Without the backbone of regular forces, the lightly-armed volunteer caravan has spent days dashing back and forth along the coast road on Brega's outskirts, scrambling away in their pick-ups when Gaddafi's forces fire rockets at their positions.


And if that doesn't make a guy think of Mack Sennett I'll kiss your arse on the shores of Tripoli and give you a day to muster an Arab Brotherhood audience.

Serene Sunday Morning

I was Binging all over the place -- trying to make sense of statistics on Mexican gun imports -- when New Dog Libby started fussing. Since I was dressed only from the ankles up, I settled for through-the-window surveillance of whatever threat alerted her.

--One lonesome hen turkey, pecking around the mulch pile,

--A mallard swimming in the canal.

--Three or four very hyper fox squirrels prospecting for buried acorns in the newly thawed earth.

Spring is nice. Screw Mexico.
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Even if you don't like what those people do

There's a certain unease in citing this opinion piece by a recovering homophobe politician who may have finally decided it's catastrophically wrong to screw up our constitutions with limits on individual rights.  Jeff has, perhaps, come to understand that the purpose of a constitution is to limit government power.

Jeff left the Iowa senate and opened a "media relations" operation. He is now somehow connected with One Iowa, part of the national coalition of weepers who, among more noble goals, want to turn the gay-lesbian-transgendered-etc. bunch into another victim group. If he's being paid, he's not the first ex-pol to shoot for riches by hawking his residual clout to the highest bidder, ideas be damned. Within the limits of my Bing patience this morning, I couldn't learn if he is taking One Iowa bucks.

That said, I recommend the piece. Among other things, he makes a point pertinent to "conservatives" interested in freedoms guaranteed by Amendment Two:

When we start allowing constitutional amendments that limit individual control, and give that control over to the government, we open ourselves up to more limitations on our individual freedom. It's easy to feel so passionately about an issue that you don't look at it objectively, but what happens when the individual freedom we're discussing is gun control or universal health care? We need to set aside the rhetoric and look at the slope on which we're starting to slide.