Links and Minifeatures 09 25 Sunday

Captain's Quarters has the most coherent take on the possible scandal involving Senator Frist and the HCA stock he's alleged to have sold. If this is true, it's a lot more serious than Trent Lott being nice to an old man at his retirement dinner, and Senator Frist should resign his leadership post as well as facing criminal charges. This is securities fraud. The worst problem apparent with this article is that the trustee improperly notified Senator Frist of a specific investment in the trust, something for which the senator is likely blameless. Now if that had been what happened, the Senator would have been morally correct (I don't know about legally) to order it sold so that he would no longer be aware of what was in the portfolio. That it coincided with an insider selling binge would likely have been pure coincidence. The senator evidently has family active in the corporation, making insider information likely.



RULE: If you find out something not only unknown but unknowable to the general public, don't change anything with any investments you have (or don't have) in the company. The SEC is serious about insider trading, and any profit you make will likely be spent several times over on lawyers fees and fines. One more reason why most people should consider mutual funds and similar investments rather than individual stocks.

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Regarding Texas oil country and my recent "Petroleum and Energy" article, it looks like we may have gotten lucky. Signs Encouraging From Texas Oil Patch. Everything I wrote is still true. We just don't have quite as large a bottleneck in refining as I thought we might.



On the other hand, ROFASix wrote something agreewing with my post, albeit with less detail.



Willisms has the first Houston area coverage of Rita's passage I've seen. Seems like we dodged a bullet. Whether Texas would have been okay on it's own, or whether it learned from Louisiana, is not important. They did things more right than otherwise.



Wizbang makes a point that I've made too often to count in other venues. Civil Defense in the United States should be a national joke with the state it's in. It is a national disgrace.



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Victor Davis Hanson has an article up debunking those who want us to change strategies.



Indepundit has a letter from a soldier in Iraq and more background on why the professor is right.



Now this guy has the right idea in how to support the troops. Invent a better detector for IEDs.



While we're on the subject of the war on Terror, Captain's Quarters also has a story on Hamas using unstable rockets on parade. They exploded, killing 15 and wounding 80. They also committed acts of war against Israel, firing rockets over the border, which missed.



A few more like this, and even the people of Palestine will be calling them the Bozo Brigade.



Boxing Alcibiades is recommending a Darwin Award. I agree, in both the biological and political sense.



Michael Barone has an article urging the Bush Administration to send someone high level to assist negotiations between the Palestinians and Israeli's. I think this would be smart, also. At least this way when the Palestinians violate the truce, they won't be able to claim they didn't understand they weren't supposed to shoot Israelis.



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This article about a conference on the massacre of Armenians by the Ottomans in 1915, is both good news and bad news. Good news because it shows that there are people who will speak out for allowing the truth to be spoken. Bad news in how vehement and organized the would-be repressors are.



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Captain's Quarters has two stories on Able danger developments between the Pentagon and the Senate. Keeps looking more like rope-a-dope to me so far.



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HT to DANEgerus for showing my Brainster debunking a study in California accusing the state of racism in applying the death penalty.



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World According to Nick covers Senator McCain and five GOP allies calling for a 5% cut in all non-defense, non-entitlement spending. Well, it's a start, and better than anyone else has done.



If all we have to praise is baby steps, praise the baby steps.



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Respectful Insolence has a post on another reason to love the Harry Potter Books: teaching genetics to children! I love it! Take that creationists!



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Q and O has a good piece examining judicial activism in light of the Constitution. Those promulgating judicial activism come up short. Of course, that's kind of like saying if you drop something, it'll fall.



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Pigilito says links a study that says, not surprisingly for anyone paying attention, European universities are still lagging american ones when it comes to attracting talent, graduating qualified professionals, etcetera.



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Cool! My elven name is Elessar Elensar. My wife is Tari.



On the other hand, my hobbit name is Till Hamwich of Buckleberry Fern.



Always knew I was an Elf trapped in a hobbit body.



HT to Ogre.





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Art of the Blog has a short post up speculating that the media saying that Bush has lost his invulnerability is a sign he's lost it, politically. He says "The lady doth protest too much," and I agree. Seems like they're trying to make it true by repeating it until everybody believes it.



At the risk of violating Godwin's law (in spirit), I ask my readers rhetorically, who pioneered the use of this particular technique in modern politics?



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Wizbang has an article on the value of failure that I agree with in its entirety. I have said similar things in the past, I will continue to say similar things in the future, and given todays "all viewpoints are valid", "We all win", culture, I'm always gratified to know I'm not the only one who has retained my sanity on this point.



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Last but certainly not least, check out Armies of Liberation. She reports on:



The Heroes of Yemen, about how the Yemeni parliament rejected the resignation of one of its members, and was doing the right thing thereby.



Furthermore, she must be having an effect because the regime is getting mad at her! Keep it up, Jane! You've got them worried! Not all by yourself, of course - there are heroes aplenty. But when they mention you by name above all of their domestic heroes, you're having an effect.