Son of a Geek

And a righty in the music business. Glenn and Helen have a podcast with the Anti-Dixie Chick, John Ondrasik (Five For Fighting). Listen, then go and make a video for his new charity, What Kind of World Do You Want?

You Want More Trees? Waste More Paper

This one's just for The Daddy -- Charles Johnson links to Penn and Teller's show on recycling.

Honest Work

Mark Krikorian has this post at the Corner on the Republican candidates weakness on immigration. Read the whole thing.

According to a congressman's wife who attended a Republican women's luncheon yesterday, Karl Rove explained the rationale behind the president's amnesty/open-borders proposal this way: "I don't want my 17-year-old son to have to pick tomatoes or make beds in Las Vegas."

There should be no need to explain why this is an obscene statement coming from a leader in the party that promotes the virtues of hard work, thrift, and sobriety, a party whose demi-god actually split fence rails as a young man, a party where "respectable Republican cloth coat" once actually meant something. But it does seem to be necessary to explain.

Rove's comment illustrates how the Bush-McCain-Giuliani-Hagel-Martinez-Brownback-Huckabee approach to immigration strikes at the very heart of self-government. It is precisely Rove's son (and my own, and those of the rest of us in the educated elite) who should work picking tomatoes or making beds, or washing restaurant dishes, or mowing lawns, especially when they're young, to help them develop some of the personal and civic virtues needed for self-government. It's not that I want my kids to make careers of picking tomatoes; Mexican farmworkers don't want that either. But we must inculcate in our children, especially those likely to go on to high-paying occupations, that there is no such thing as work that is beneath them.

The idea that there is work that Americans won't do is un-American, and it's been painful to watch Republican leaders embrace it. The Democrats, who seem to be running because they're pretty (except for Senator Clinton, who's running because she isn't pretty) are just as bad.

It's hard to believe, but we stand a very good chance of having to choose between two people for President who both think there's no real reason not to flout the nation's laws on immigration, and who both believe that the nation is made up of elitist snobs who prefer not to let themselves or their children get dirty whilst making a living. I am afraid that may ultimately be very destabilizing for both our security and our character.

Another Hat in the Ring

Former Arkansas governor and fitness guru Mike Huckabee has entered the race for the presidency. "He's not a doofus" says The Piano Teacher, who has met him. She's right, of course, but he is a Creationist. It remains to be seen whether the media can tell the difference.

I hope he makes a good run at it, not only because it might help force Guiliani to the right on guns (assuming Guiliani runs), but also because a pro-life, pro-gun (he has his own concealed carry permit), pro-flat tax, fiscal conservative, Creationist, Southern Baptist Minister is just the absolute worst nightmare of 90% of the talking heads. It's going to be so much fun watching them!

Dick Cheney vs. Nancy Pelosi: The Blink-Off

Quoth The Daughter "Someone's allergic to her eye make-up."

Wedding Thriller Dance

Okay, this is way better that everybody doing the electric slide, but by the time you can get something like this together for your wedding party it'll be sooo over...

Gladys Hardy on The Ellen DeGeneres Show

So cute.