People in glass houses....

My alarm goes off at 5am, so the first thing I usually hear in the morning is the news on the radio. This morning, I got a good laugh when CNN radio reported that John Kerry said, in response to Dick Cheney's speech yesterday on the intelligence before we went into Iraq, that he couldn't think of anyone in Washington with less credibility on the Iraq War than Dick Cheney.

Actually, John coughChristmas In Cambodiacough Kerry, I can't think of anyone in Washington with less credibility on anything than you.

At least I got a good laugh to get me started this morning

Happy 230th, U.S. Marine Corps

Today's the 230th anniversary of the founding of the United States Marine Corps. This picture my great-grandmother's younger brother, Sgt. John E. Carey, who was honorably discharged from the Marine Corps on 10 November 1918 after servering for four years with the 147th Company (Signal), 1st Reg. Fixed Defense Force, based at the Marine Barracks, Philadelphia Navy Yard. Part of his duty in the Marines was spent in Europe during our country's involvement in World War I (this picture is taken from a family portrait my great-great grandparents had done when my uncle returned from the war).

To Uncle John and all those who have and will serve as a part of the USMC - Semper Fi.

From the halls of Montezuma
To the shores of Tripoli,
We fight our country's battles
In the air, on land, and sea.
First to fight for right and freedom,
And to keep our honor clean,
We are proud to claim the title
Of United States Marines.

A stopped clock....

I don't really care for Ruth Bader Ginsburg as a Supreme Court justice. Way too activist for my tastes. But even she says something I agree with on occasion.

Saw a story on Special Report with Brit Hume this evening where Justice Ginsburg was giving a speech at Wake Forest University yesterday and defended John Roberts refusing to answer certain questions which might cause him to pre-judge cases which might come before the Supreme Court, calling it "unquestionably right". The comment is also briefly mentioned in a story about Chief Justice Roberts' confirmation at FoxNews' website.

To say that I don't care for Hillary Rodham Clinton is an understatement. I've despised that woman since 1992 for reasons I won't go into now (maybe I'm suffering from HDS?). You couldn't pay me to vote for her for dog catcher, let alone to any higher office to which she might aspire.

Leaving aside her political motives for doing so (which I'm sure she has), I do agree with her opposition to the "International Freedom Center" being built at Ground Zero, opposition which seems to have finally convinced New York Gov. George Pataki that it was time to pull the plug on the thing (just don't get me started on his wishy-washy attitude about the whole thing up until Sen. Clinton's statement - it shouldn't have taken her, of all people, to get him to see that that whole idea was a very bad thing).

I don't care for either of these women or their politics, but bravo to both women for saying the right thing when it needed to be said.

Oh, What A Beautiful Day

Now that Mother Nature has taken a break from playing with hurricanes for a bit - hopefully, for a long bit, such as until next hurricane season in June 2006 - she's finally turned her attention to pipin' hot Texas (as weather.com put it yesterday).

After near-record temperatures in the upper 90s and low 100s for more than a week - including record highs on 22, 23 and 25 September and a near-record 104 yesterday - a cold front finally blew through last night. Aside from bringing much needed rain (although my boss complained that it rained for only about 4 minutes where she lives on the south edge of Arlington - to hear her tell it, there is some kind of barrier around her neighborhood, causing it to never rain by her house), it also dropped temperatures by 29 degrees, leaving us with a high today of 75 degrees.

It was so wonderful to wake up this morning at 5am and, instead of hearing "the current temperature is 80 degrees", hear a much more reasonable for late September "the current temperature is 66 degrees". Instead of being 10+ degrees above normal for this time of year (normal being 84 degrees today), we were at -9 degrees.

Now if Mother Nature could just do something about our -7.64 inches rain deficit....

Mary, Our Mother Of Sorrows, Pray For Us

As people are still fleeing the eventual landfall of Hurricane Rita, tragic news comes today out of Dallas. A bus carrying elderly Rita evacuees has caught fire and exploded on I-45 near Mars Road, just south of the city. The interstate, which was packed with evacuees, is now closed 12 miles south of Dallas.

45 people were reported to be on board, one person is confirmed dead, and the Dallas County sheriff's office is saying that as many as 20 may be dead. It is believed that the bus had a mechanical problem which caused the initial fire and that the fire was fed by oxygen tanks carried by the evacuees. The Houston Chronicle reports that the evacuees on this bus were from a Bellaire assisted living center.

In paradisum deducant te angeli:
in tuo adventu suscipiant te martyres;
et perducant te in civitatem sanctam Jerusalem.

Chorus angelorum tesu scipiat,
et cum Lazoro quondam paupere
auternam habeas requiem

UPDATE: The Dallas Morning News is now reporting that at least 24 people have died.

Things Ain't Goin' Too Good At Houston

(with all due respect to Dallas which had an episode called "Things Ain't Goin' Too Good At Southfork")

Yesterday, I was praising Texas' officials for their cool-headedness and evacuations plans. Well, pictures out of Houston today tell a different story....

This is I-45 North and Paramatta in Houston, captured from a traffic camera at 6:26PM CDT. Where the hell is the contraflow? I count 7 cars, I think, in the southbound lanes, while everyone is just sitting in the northbound lanes. There have been reports of people taking a couple of hours just to travel 3-4 miles. Other people have been pushing their cars to conserve gas. TXDoT officials have been trying to get to people stuck on the road with gas cans, but TXDoT are running out of gas themselves. A noble effort, but they can't possible get to everyone.

Who is responsible for making the decision to set up contraflow on a highway? Is it local officials? Governor Perry? Why wasn't it set up earlier? It reportedly has been in some places, but obviously not everywhere.

Things seemed to be going so well yesterday. Whoever should have made this decision, but didn't until the highway around Houston became parking lots, needs to be tarred and feathered.

A letter to Representative Kenny Marchant (R-TX)

Here is the text of the e-mail that I just sent to my local representative about pork-barrel spending in Dallas County....

With Hurricane Katrina having torn through the Gulf Coast over three weeks ago and Hurricane Rita currently having another section of the Gulf Coast in her sights, this is a devestating hurricane season for millions of Americans. The government is doing all it can to help, and I believe that most of President Bush's initiatives are praise-worthy, I am concerned in this age of deficit spending about how our country is to pay for it.

I am concerned about the amount of money being thrown at districts, the so-called "pork barrel spending", including many projects that you had included in the latest transportation bill. For instance, do we really need...

A 14 foot wide concrete hike and bike trail approximately 2.2 miles long in Grapevipe at a cost of $400,000?

$3.2 million for a preliminary engineering study of the SH 114/SH 121 "Funnel Project". If the preliminary study alone costs that much, how many more millions will eventually be spent?

$2.6 million for a preliminary design for a DART hub station in Carrolton. Again, I have the same question as above - if the preliminary work costs this much, how much will this project cost before it is all over?

$4.4 million for a ramp from eastbound I-20 to Clark Road. I do see the need for this ramp (as well as a similar ramp from westbound I-20) as not being able to get directly to Clark Road from I-20 is an annoyance. However, we have lived without the ramp for this long, so I am willing to forgo it so the money can be spent in areas that need it more.

I urge you to put this money, and more that has been earmarked for projects in Dallas County, to better use rebuilding vital infrastructure in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama - and perhaps even south Texas depending on how much damage Hurricane Rita does when she eventually makes landfall. At least we are capable of getting from point A to point B in Dallas, even if it takes us a little longer than we would like at times. There are people along the Gulf Coast who can't get from point A to point B at all.

Thank you for your consideration.

I'll let you know what kind of response I get.

Technorati: porkbusters

No Bacon, please Part II

Had a few moments to check out my representative's website and it turns out he (Kenny Marchant, 24th TX) promotes himself in a news release as the only Republican from the DFW area on the House Transportation Committee. So guess what he's bringing home to DFW? Yep, the bacon....here are a few highlights with some of my notes (see here for the complete press release)

• $400,000 - 14 foot wide concrete hike and bike trail approximately 2.2 miles long in Grapevipe. Nope, doesn't seem necessary to me, and not just because I don't live in Grapevine. This quote is funny from the press release - "This bill will go a long way to ease traffic congestion and highway safety in our area". So what exactly does building a hike and bike trail have to do with easing traffic congestions and highway safety?
• $3.2 million - SH 114/SH 121 "Funnel Project" - preliminary engineering study, also in Grapevine. Preliminary studies that cost so much money don't give me warm and fuzzy feelings. How much is going to be funneled into this project before it is all over?
  
• $1.6 million - SH 183 (Airport Freeway) from SH 360 to I-35 E in Irving. I drove this road a few weeks ago when I got back from Binghamton and the road seemed fine for the most part to me until you get to the south end (near I-35E, which is also near Texas Stadium). The south end could use some repairs (and some better signage at a couple of exits as I nearly missed my exit because the sign was a "blink-and-you'll-miss-it" sign that was tiny compared to the signs for other exits) and maybe some widening, although I imagine Sunday traffic on the road will be alleviated once the Cowboys pack up for Arlington in 2009. So what is the money to be used for?
  
• $800,000 million - Loop 12/I-35 E and SH 183 west extension to MacArthur in Irving. This really sounds like it should be a part of the project above as it's in the same area. So why two separate funding projects?
• $2.6 million - preliminary design for a DART hub station at intersection of Union Pacific and cotton belt rail lines in Carrolton. Just like my remarks on the "funnel project" above - If it takes $2.6 million for the preliminary design, I'd hate to see how much it would cost to build the damn thing.
  
• $4.4 million - ramp from east bound I-20 to south bound Clark Road at the southern terminus of Spur 408 in Duncanville. Okay, this one is actually in the town where I live, and is the only project on the list that I whole-heartedly approve of. It is beyond annoying that you can't get to Clark Road from I-20 and with Cedar Hill growing the way it is, there really does need to be more than one exit to it off I-20 besides FM1382. Of course, I do question why they didn't do this four years ago when they were working on the ramp from east bound I-20 to north bound Spur 408 four years ago (for those of you not familiar with this part of Dallas County, Spur 408 ends at I-20 and becomes Clark Road, which is the west dividing line between Duncanville and Dallas and eventually leads to Cedar Hill - from I-20 in both directions you can exit onto Spur 408, but not onto Clark Road). I guess they can't walk and chew gum at the same time around here, which is also evidenced by the fact that this is for a ramp on east-bound I-20 only. What about west-bound I-20 to Clark Road? But, since we're currently living without this ramp, and the money could be put to higher priority uses, I can live without this project right now.
  

Also in 24th TX are two of the projects I listed in my first post, the $3.6 million for the I-35E/I-635 interchange in Farmer's Branch and the $800,000 for the Trinity River Bridge on I-30 in Dallas.

Technorati: porkbusters

It's not because of Katrina, stupid....

Sorry, just had to use that word. God, I love General Honore.

As Texans near the coast pack up and move out of Dodge (i.e., Galveston, Houston and the surrounding areas), I've heard the comments that Texas is learning the lessons Louisiana learned the hard way during Katrina.

Gov. Rick Perry held a news conference this morning, more than two and a half days before Rita's projected landfall, urging people to get out of harm's way. Constrast that to a governor in a neighboring state who appeared on television one Sunday morning, less than 24 hours before landfall of another hurricane, saying that the President had personally called her urging the state to issue mandatory evacuation orders.

The city of Galveston held a press conference on Monday (yes, Monday, more than five days before landfall) informing its citizens - some of whom are descendants of victims of the great hurricane of 1900 that leveled the city - that voluntary evacuations would begin on Tuesday with mandatory evacuations beginning on Wednesday. On the other hand, the mayor of the major metropolitan area in our neighboring state, appearing at the same press conference as his governor, issued mandatory evacuation orders for his city with less than 24 hours to go before landfall when all the experts say it takes at least 72 hours to evacuate the city.

Galveston informed its people on Monday that buses would be available for those unable to get out on their own - all they had to do was call a phone number and sign up. Transportation was also set aside to evacuate the hospitals, and when buses meant to evacuate a mental health hospital didn't show up, the city swiftly made other arrangements. Constrast this (via Generation Why?)



To this....



In Texas, provisions were made for the animals to be evacuated, as well - from people being allowed to take their animals on the buses as long as they are in cages to a veterinarian who sent a horse trailer to a shelter in San Leon which was having a hard time finding shelter for 40 animals. In our neighboring state, many people stayed in their homes because they wouldn't leave their pets to fend for themselves, while others did leave their pets to fend for themselves to heartbreaking and tragic results.

But Rita comes after Katrina, so Texas had three weeks to learn from Louisiana's mistakes. Right? Wrong. Sorry to burst your bubble, but Texans have kept level heads during impending storms for at least several decades (from Wikipedia)....

"Carla [a 1961 storm which made landfall in Texas as a Cat4] killed 43 people, 31 in Texas. The low death toll is credited to what was then the largest peacetime evacuation in US history. One half million residents headed inland from exposed coastal areas."

Texas has been doing it the right way for years. If there were any lessons to be learned about not messing around with Mother Nature, Texas learned them during in 1900, when a local meteorologist ignored warnings from Cuba that a monster storm was headed towards the city - to disastrous results. Our friends in our neighboring state need to pay attention and take notes on how to respond when the mother of all storms sees a big bullseye on your state's coast.

No bacon, please....I'm on a diet

I've been on a diet for the last year (have lost 65 pounds since June '04) and one of the first things I cut out of my diet was the four slices of bacon I would get at the cafeteria at work every other morning. I love bacon, but when you're trying to tighten your belt, the fat should be the first thing to go. It works just as well for governments as well as people.

There's been a lot of talk in the last few days about how the American people are going to pay for President Bush's initiatives for Katrina recovery. Naturally, the talk has turned to what can be trimmed from the federal budget (oink), such as the infamous "Bridge To Nowhere" in Alaska. So I started doing a little investigating and I found some interesting statistics at the website for Citizens Against Government Waste (http://www.cagw.org/site/DocServer/Pork_per_capita__2005.pdf?docID=1021) -

• Did you know that the two states with the greatest population, California and Texas, are ranked 50 and 51 on the amount of pork per capita? NOTE - D.C. is included, which is why there are 51 states listed - they've got taxation without representation (voting representation, anyway), but I guess they also get pork without representation. I guess Puerto Rico and Guam don't get any pork or get negligible amounts, since they aren't listed.
• Conversely, the 5 states/districts with the least population rank in the top 15 of pork per capita. They are, in ascending order by population - Wyoming (pop. 506,529, #14 pork per capita), District of Columbia (pop. 553,523, #2), Vermont (pop. 621,394, #10), North Dakota (pop. 634,366, #7), Alaska (pop. 655,435, #1) and South Dakota (pop. 770,883, #6). Also, the 7th least populous state - Montana with a population of 926,865 - ranks #5 on the list (Delaware, the 6th least populous state, comes in at #22).
• Alaska, the #1 state in pork per capita AND in total pork $$, received $645,502,000 or an amazing $984.85 per person. D.C., number two in per capita pork, received less than half that per capita ($464.61 per person). $645 million would go some distance (not a long way, but some) in helping out the Gulf Coast. They want to build bridges? How about rebuilding some of the bridges damaged/destroyed by Katrina?
• And what is it with our 49th and 50th states? They rank #1 (Alaska) and #2 (Hawai'i - per capita rank #3) in total pork dollars. I love Alaska (lived there for 6.5 years, would do almost anything to go back) and I'd love to visit Hawai'i, but I live in Texas. I don't want my tax dollars paying for the "Bridge To Nowhere". What's next? Bridges going from one island to another in Hawai'i?
• By contrast, I'm almost proud of my state. Texas gets a measly $2.90 pork per resident. Not that some of that isn't wasteful (some of it does go to military bases, which isn't necessarily wasteful, depending on how it's used), but it's a lot less than everyone else is getting.

Speaking of Texas, I didn't find anything that comes strictly from my congressional district (although I may have to study the map again to refresh my memory since redistricting), but here are some things that stand out in the Lone Star State -

• Does Lance Armstrong's foundation really need $100,000 in Austin for the "Lance Armstrong Foundation Survivorship Center"?
• There's this thing called the Trinity River Vision in Ft. Worth. Some levees were built for flood control (and we all know how well those work) and now there is a project to "pretty it up" (see their website here). According to their website, the focus of the project is to "addresses issues such as flood protection, the environment, recreation, access to the waterfront, green space, and urban revitalization". Just looking at the intro flash animation when going to their site, this screams "PORK". All I care is that the levees work (see New Orleans). Anything else beyond that right now is just window dressing. If the two Trinity River Vison projects are eliminated, that's $1.225 million in savings (add another $500,000 if you add in the money for general investigations of the Upper Trinity River Basin in the Department of Energy budget).
• Highway constructions/rennovations. When we lived in Kentucky, my mom and I used to joke whenever we went to the Louisville Zoo that I-264 had been under perpetual construction since 1965 - they'd get to one end of the highway, finish, then go back to the beginning and start all over again. Well, in the nearly six years I've been in Texas, I've found a couple of highways like that - I-30 and I-635. From CAGW, we have construction of a bridge on I-30 over the Trinity River (yes, that river again, to the tune of $500,000), $2.45 million for "National Corridor Planning and Border Development Program" for I-635, $500,000 for the I-30 interchange at Collins and Center Streets in Arlington, $8 million for an I-30 replacement bridge somewhere in Dallas, $1 million for the I-30/I-635 interchange in Mesquite, $1.5 million for the I-35E/I-635 interchange in Dallas, another $1.1 million for some bridge on I-30. There's also $8.5 million for something called the NW/SW Extension in Dallas and $2 for the eastern extension of the President George H.W. Bush Tollway. Excuse me? That last is a frickin' tollway! That means you pay for the privilege of driving on it! Why do they need money from Washington to finish the road? Add to all that $3.1 million to the Ft. Worth Transportation Authority ($2.4 million for "fleet modernization" and $700,000 for "passenger shelter replacement") and you have a total of $28, 650,000 in highway pork for DFW.

Technorati tag: porkbusters

PS - Bad Alia for not giving credit where credit is due. Kudos to Instapundit and Truth Laid Bear for organizing/advertising the Porkbusters project. TLB has a page listing the pork projects that bloggers have found so far.