Man Repellent

That's Leandre Medine (discussed previously).

Frankly, I don't think she's trying too hard, and the fashionistas love her.

Where is the String That Theseus Laid...

How about some Gothic rock?

Bauhaus, "In the Flat Field."

A gut pull drag on me
Into the chasm gaping we
Mirrors multy reflecting this
Between spunk stained sheet
And odourous whim
Calmer eye- flick- shudder- within
Assist me to walk away in sin
Where is the string that Theseus laid
Find me out this labyrinth place

I do get bored, I get bored
In the flat field
I get bored, I do get bored
In the flat field ...

And for your reading pleasure, the blogosphere's top atheist, PZ Myers links: "New rules: there are some things you are not allowed not to say anymore."

From what I gather, this dude is an in-your face kind of atheist.

And to think: I thought the Elizabeth Edwards backlash had died calmed down. Obviously not yet, and she's moldering by now.

Holiday Terror Warning Cites Car Bombs and Small Arms Attack

At ABC News, "Authorities Worry About Christmas Attack For 'Psychological Impact'."

The news has been buzzing a bit about holiday travel threats. It's serious, but the car bombing angle is especially interesting. My bet is that we'll indeed see "Mumbai-style" attacks in the U.S. at some point. The national security focus remains overwhelmingly on air travel, and the jihadi extremists will simply develop new approaches:

Federal law enforcement terror bulletins have become as much a part of the holiday season in the past decade as egg nog and department store Santas.

But this year, which ends amid a heightened concern over terror, is a little different. A Department of Homeland Security bulletin sent to law enforcement nationwide Thursday says that federal authorities worry terrorists will try to rattle Americans by attacking during the holidays, and lists concerns including car bombs, trucks ramming crowds and a Mumbai-style small arms attack.

"We are concerned these terrorists may seek to exploit the likely significant psychological impact of an attack targeting mass gatherings in large metropolitan areas during the 2010 holiday season, which has symbolic importance to many in the United States," The "Security Awareness for the Holiday Season" bulletin states.

The bulletin cites no specific threats for Christmas and New Year's, but makes clear that this year's enhanced concern is based on a persistent, evolving threat. The past 12 months brought multiple attempted attacks on U.S. targets, including the attempted Christmas Day underwear bombing of Northwest 253, Faisal Shahzad's failed Times Square car bomb, the "printer bomb" cargo plane plot and a number of alleged would-be bombers caught in stings in Oregon and elsewhere.

VIDEO: 'Larry King Live' Ends After 25 Years

Well, I promised, so here you go:

PREVIOUSLY: "Larry King Exit Marks End of Era."

And at Althouse, "Larry King, Bill Clinton, and the 'zipper club'."

The 8th Annual Right Wing News Conservative Blog Awards

At Right Wing News.

There's a really low response rate, but interesting nevertheless.

The Other McCain's pretty popular, Instapundit's overrated, and Dan Riehl's annoying.

I don't see Althouse making any of the categories, but she's great, fearless even.

Progressives and Rape

Here's the latest John Hawkins vlog, "Liberalism in 120 Seconds: Liberals and Rape":

Yeah, I wrote on this last night: "Jill Filipovic Responds to Michael Moore's Dismissal of Julian Assange Rape Charges as 'Hooey'." And they're not liberals. I'm gonna start bugging John about that.

What's the Biggest Threat to Free Speech?

The biggest threat?

Progressives — and the hypocritical television bloviators who enable them, like Andy Levy, first here at the clip. And you gotta love it. He announces famously: "I believe the right to free speech is the right to be an asshole. I believe what made this country great is ... assholes":

Yeah. Right.

And that's why on December 8th Andy Levy took to Twitter to attack me — wait for it! — as an asshole! I'm sure there's some profound irony there somewhere, but at the moment it escapes. Or, well, perhaps it's that Andy Levy just proved himself to be an epic asshole.

Man Repeller

A really interesting blog, and with a background story at NYT, "Fashion Triumph: Deflecting the Male Gaze."

And I'll tell you, while the fashion is genuinely off, the blogger, Leandra Medine, is hardly repellent.

"What is a Man Repeller?"

man·re·pell·er  [mahn-ree-peller]
–noun
outfitting oneself in a sartorially offensive way that will result in repelling members of the opposite sex. This includes but is not limited to harem pants, boyfriend jeans, overalls (see: human repelling), shoulder pads, full length jumpsuits, jewelry that resembles violent weaponry and clogs.
–verb (used without object),-pell·ing, -pell·ed.
to commit the act of repelling men:
Girl 1: What are you wearing tonight?
Girl 2: My sweet lime green drop crotch utility pants
Girl 1: Oh, so we're man repelling tonight? ...

Added: Now also at Instapundit and Memeorandum, where Jill Filipovic is linked. Yeah, it turns out that repelling men is a feminist thing: "Is Man-Repelling Fashion a Feminist Statement?"

Larry King Exit Marks End of Era

At London's Daily Mail, "The end of an era: Larry King signs off after 25 years of hosting his chat show on CNN."

I watched it. Larry King was humble and often emotional, and his guests truly love him. A genuine treat and throwback to the old days. I'll update later with some YouTube clips when they're available. I think there was a time when I'd make it a point to watch the first half hour of Larry King then switch over at 6:30pm for World News Tonight with Peter Jennings. Was that a better time? Perhaps. But I don't long for the old days of "non-partisan" news. I like the new media age. I think regular people are empowered like never before and the level and quality of information available nowadays is much better. That said, the nostalgia was overwhelming tonight. It felt like the Clinton years of the 1990s in a lot of respects. More later ...

Added: At WaPo, "With a star-studded guest list, 'Larry King Live' signs off for the last time" (via Memeorandum).

Obama Hails Progress in Afghanistan, Doubts Remain

At LAT, "Uncertainty marks White House review on Afghanistan, Pakistan":

A review of President Obama's war strategy cites progress in Afghanistan and Pakistan, but leaves until later the answers to questions that have plagued the U.S. effort since Obama dispatched additional troops last year.

The review unveiled by the president and his top advisors at the White House on Thursday sheds little new light on major questions such as how soon Afghan forces will be able assume more responsibility for security, and whether international troops can effectively choke off access from insurgent sanctuaries in Pakistan.

The reason is that the answers are largely still in doubt.

A five-page summary of the review's findings released by the White House concludes that the "strategy is showing progress," especially against Al Qaeda in Pakistan, and is "setting the conditions to begin a responsible reduction of U.S. forces in July 2011," the date previously set by Obama for beginning withdrawals.

But an undercurrent of uncertainty runs throughout the assessment. "I want to be clear, this continues to be a very difficult endeavor," Obama told reporters at the White House, even as he declared, "We are on track to achieve our goals."

Being on track is not the same as being confident in the outcome. Every mention of indications of progress is accompanied in the report by a caveat noting that the gains are "fragile" and "reversible."

The review seems to keep alive the possibility that the administration could shift strategy next year if isolated gains cannot be cemented despite the presence of nearly 100,000 U.S. troops.

Since ordering 30,000 additional troops to Afghanistan a year ago, Obama has moved repeatedly to deepen the U.S. involvement, most recently at the NATO Lisbon summit in November, when he signed on to a timetable that would delay turning over lead security responsibility to the Afghan army and police until 2014.

In that sense, Obama has seemed to side with Gen. David H. Petraeus, his top commander in Afghanistan, as well as some of the president's senior civilian advisors. They suggest that large-scale troop reductions will not be possible for years because Afghan forces remain unable to take over. The White House has emphasized that the pace of the withdrawals next July will be dependent on conditions at the time.

More at the link.

Marriage is Dead! Long Live — Civil Unions?

This isn't a gay rights issue as much as post-modern social landmark. And for the traditional French, one of the great European post-industrial societies, it's a harbinger for the West.

At NYT, "In France, Civil Unions Gain Favor Over Marriage":

PARIS — Some are divorced and disenchanted with marriage; others are young couples ideologically opposed to marriage, but eager to lighten their tax burdens. Many are lovers not quite ready for old-fashioned matrimony.

Whatever their reasons, and they vary widely, French couples are increasingly shunning traditional marriages and opting instead for civil unions, to the point that there are now two civil unions for every three marriages.

When France created its system of civil unions in 1999, it was heralded as a revolution in gay rights, a relationship almost like marriage, but not quite. No one, though, anticipated how many couples would make use of the new law. Nor was it predicted that by 2009, the overwhelming majority of civil unions would be between straight couples.

It remains unclear whether the idea of a civil union, called a pacte civil de solidarité, or PACS, has responded to a shift in social attitudes or caused one. But it has proved remarkably well suited to France and its particularities about marriage, divorce, religion and taxes — and it can be dissolved with just a registered letter.

“We’re the generation of divorced parents,” explained Maud Hugot, 32, an aide at the Health Ministry who signed a PACS with her girlfriend, Nathalie Mondot, 33, this year. Expressing a view that researchers say is becoming commonplace among same-sex couples and heterosexuals alike, she added, “The notion of eternal marriage has grown obsolete.”

France recognizes only “citizens,” and the country’s legal principles hold that special rights should not be accorded to particular groups or ethnicities. So civil unions, which confer most of the tax benefits and legal protections of marriage, were made available to everyone. (Marriage, on the other hand, remains restricted to heterosexuals.) But the attractiveness of civil unions to heterosexual couples was evident from the start. In 2000, just one year after the passage of the law, more than 75 percent of civil unions were signed between heterosexual couples. That trend has only strengthened since then: of the 173,045 civil unions signed in 2009, 95 percent were between heterosexual couples.

“It’s becoming more and more commonplace,” said Laura Anicet, 24, a student who signed a PACS last month with her 29-year-old boyfriend, Cyril Reich. “For me, before, the PACS was for homosexual couples.”

As with traditional marriages, civil unions allow couples to file joint tax returns, exempt spouses from inheritance taxes, permit partners to share insurance policies, ease access to residency permits for foreigners and make partners responsible for each other’s debts. Concluding a civil union requires little more than a single appearance before a judicial official, and ending one is even easier.

It long ago became common here to speak of “getting PACSed” (se pacser, in French). More recently, wedding fairs have been renamed to include the PACS, department stores now offer PACS gift registries and travel agencies offer PACS honeymoon packages.

Even the Roman Catholic Church, which initially condemned the partnerships as a threat to the institution of marriage, has relented; the National Confederation of Catholic Family Associations now says civil unions do not pose “a real threat.”

RTWT.

'Tron: Legacy'

In theaters today.

Reviewed at Los Angeles Times. My youngest is excited. We'll probably see it tomorrow:

KlaviLeaks

Via Glenn Reynolds:

PREVIOUSLY: "Cowardly WikiLeaks."

Jill Filipovic Responds to Michael Moore's Dismissal of Julian Assange Rape Charges as 'Hooey'

By not responding?

Why? These are serious allegation, no?

Withdrawal of consent should be grounds for a rape charge (and it is, in Sweden) — if you consent to having sex with someone and part of the way through you say to stop and the person you’re having sex with continues to have sex with you against your wishes, that’s rape.

Right.

So you'd think Ms. Filipovic would really lay into Michael Moore's dismissal of the charges against Assange? Not. She just wants Moore to establish a "Free Bradley Manning" fund to help "the little guys" who aren't getting raped all the media attention. It's open season on Naomi Wolf, however. (Down with this, it turns out: "Some Shit I’m Sick of Hearing Regarding Rape and Assange.") But sheesh, even Lame-ieux gets it.

RELATED: John Hawkins, "Julian Assange and Bradley Manning: Liberal Hypocrisy On Rape And Torture," and R.S. McCain, "Merry Christmas, America: Feminists Attack Michael Moore as ‘Rape Apologist’ Over Swedish Case Against Julian Assange." And at Mediaite, "Olbermann Refuses To Correct Treatment Of Assange Rape Allegations On Twitter." (Via Memeorandum.)

The Case for Faith

One of the commenters at this atheist website contacted my department chairman regarding my comments on Elizabeth Edwards. This was the second person to contact the department this week. A woman e-mailed on Monday or Tuesday, but I didn't mention it at the blog since I'm generally not writing about things that involve LBCC's servers, etc. But in the case of this second incident, the complainant bragged about how tough he was going be in sending "an email with a link to the blog post to the head of his department." This guy, named "Jeff," followed through and then posted my chairman's response at the thread. Not satisfied (mad even) with my chairman's brief (and perfect) reply, folks there get all enraged, and then another commenter, "Dan," takes to Google to find some information, and comes back to slam my chairman, saying he's "been in the dept for 20 years and lists himself as ABD, which is all but dissertation, meaning that he's likely a failure in his doctoral studies." It means no such thing. But that's not the point. These atheists are doing the devil's work. They'd like to destroy me for speaking truth to His power, and falling short of that they're out to impugn those who stand up for integrity and proper procedure. It's impossible for me to express the enormity of my contempt. But this is the radical left for you (Robert Farley's Lawyers, Gays and Marriage gets the appropriate citation at the thread.) I'll have more on this later, but I should mention that after talking with my chairman this week we shared our views on faith and strength in God, and he suggested I check out Lee Strobel's The Case for Faith: A Journalist Investigates the Toughest Objections to Christianiy. And so I picked up a copy on the way home yesterday, and I'm heading up right now to read and reflect for a while. I'll have some additional thoughts on the left's hatred and intolerance in due time. All in a day's work, I guess, God's work.

Cowardly WikiLeaks

From VDH, "Julian Assange’s EgoLeaks: WikiLeaks is the Journalistic Equivalent of the Art World’s Piss Christ — a Product of the Cynical Postmodern West" (via Blazing Catfur):

Julian Assange, the public face of WikiLeaks, is, among many things, cowardly. Courageousness would involve meeting with Iranian dissidents, Russian journalists, Pakistani Christians, or Chinese human-rights activists — and then releasing any confidential information that they might have about the torment institutionalized by their countries’ authoritarian regimes. That would be risky to Assange, however, since such governments do not customarily go to court against their leakers; they gulag them — or liquidate them.

So, instead, Assange navigates through the European northwest among the good-life elites whose economic and security protocols he does so much to undermine. Being summoned to a trumped-up Swedish hearing for being an exploitative cad who fails to wear a condom in his ephemeral hook-ups is not the same thing as being dragged into the basement of the Pakistani intelligence service or appearing in an orange jumpsuit on an al-Qaeda execution video. Why does not the peripatetic Assange at least drive about, say, the back roads of the Middle East, Mexico, or Central Africa in his quest for conduits to spread cosmic truth and justice?

In truth, Assange is a sorry product of the postmodern West. He reminds us of the morality of Western shock artists who freely caricature Christianity on the hallowed principle of free speech, but, in a nano-second, censor themselves when Islam might provide an even larger target for their cynical secular disdain. WikiLeaks is the journalistic equivalent of a Piss Christ exhibition of the contemporary art world — a repellent reminder of the cowardly selectivity of the shock-jock huckster.

RTWT.

Happy Holidays vs. Merry Christmas

Many of my students, taking their final exams this week, have said goodbye with a warm "Holiday Holidays" farewell. And while that's very nice, I gave my last final this morning, and as I was handing out the exams I wished everyone "Happy Holidays," but added, "I celebrate Christmas at my house, and I'm not offended if you want to wish me a Merry Christmas."

In any case, more on that at Stamford Advocate, "'Merry Christmas' Without Apology":

Has there ever been a more innocuous and vague holiday greeting than "Happy holidays?" For some reason -- an unfounded fear of upsetting someone who does not observe Christmas? -- that vacuous phrase is now heard more than "Merry Christmas," which used to be the only greeting you heard during the Christmas season.

I can understand using it when Hanukkah and the Christmas season coincide, as they did from Dec. 1 to 8 this year. But after that, I don't know of any other holiday we should be "Happy holidaying" about unless it's New Year's Day, a primarily stay-at-home holiday.

True, Christmas is the pre-eminent Christian holiday of the year. But let's face it: All of the trappings of the season -- buying and decorating Christmas trees, playing and listening to Christmas carols and other "Christmas" music, decking the halls with wreathes, garland and mistletoe, sending and receiving Christmas cards and, of course, shopping -- make the entire Christmas season a festive and joyous experience for almost everyone.

RTWT, at the link.

Plus, Rev. James Martin throws in the towel at PuffHo, "The War on Christmas is Over ... And Christmas Lost."

Federal Prosecutors Prepare Case Against Julian Assange

At NYT, "U.S. Tries to Build Case for Conspiracy by WikiLeaks."

But Threat Level says the Times gets the story wrong.

I'll have more on all of this later ...

Added: Here's David Dayen's headline at FDL: "Justice Department Looking for Pretense to Charge Julian Assange."

Right. Pretense.

WikiLeaks is a criminal enterprise and I'm sure prosecutors could get an indictment under the Espionage Act. The problem is whether the administration would be acting under a double standard by not indicting media outlets who published the leaks. This is holding back the prosecution, as noted at the Times' piece above. That's why Threat Level suggests the feds may seek to prosecute Assange under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA), which apparently affords greater leeway in charging those who encourage "a source to obtain documents in a manner known to be illegal is not protected."

Dayen links to progressive asshat Glenn Greenwald, although it's probably not worth your time to click through who is also at the video with communist Amy Goodman:

But check The Economist, "Extradition and WikiLeaks: Courting Trouble":

Some reports say that an American grand jury has already been secretly sworn in. Prosecutors seem to be focusing on Mr Assange’s involvement in enabling the leaking of secrets, rather than in their publication. That may seem a fine distinction. But it would avoid having to prosecute the New York Times.

Mr Assange may be vulnerable under the 1917 Espionage Act, which punishes leaks involving, and injuring, America’s “national defence”. The State Department warned him in writing on November 27th that the leaks would harm military operations. WikiLeaks is now trying hard to portray itself as a journalistic organisation, in order to benefit from the first amendment’s protection of the press and free speech. That was crucial in the 1971 “Pentagon Papers” case, when a Supreme Court decision upheld the New York Times’s right to publish secret material. However, Leonard Orland of the University of Connecticut notes that one of the judges’ opinions distinguished between illegal “prior restraint” and legitimate prosecution after publication. He says the more relevant precedent is United States v Morison, when the defendant was convicted for leaking photographs of Soviet naval construction to a British magazine.

So a charge against Mr Assange is possible. But extraditing anybody usually requires the deed concerned to be a crime in both countries. Convincing a judge in Sweden, which has one of the world’s most liberal press-freedom laws, of the virtues of America’s Espionage Act may be tricky. A 1961 treaty between the two countries forbids extradition for “political” crimes.

So does Britain’s extradition treaty with America. But it also sets a lower burden of proof. Simon Chesterman, a law professor at the National University of Singapore, notes that Britain’s tough Official Secrets Act would also outlaw WikiLeaks’ actions. For Mr Assange and his pals, Sweden may soon seem a haven, not a threat.

Well, maybe the U.S. can put a little pressure on Sweden to play hardball. Assange is dangerous to all parties involved.

More: At LAT, "WikiLeaks' Julian Assange is granted bail, will leave jail for country mansion":

After nine days in jail, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was granted bail Thursday in a politically charged case concerning alleged sex crimes in Sweden.

A high-court judge in London upheld an earlier decision to allow Assange to remain free while he fights extradition to Sweden, where authorities want to question him over allegations of molestation, unlawful coercion and rape stemming from encounters he had with two women in August.

Assange, 39, can now swap what his lawyer calls the "Dickensian conditions" of a south London jail for the tony comforts of a country mansion owned by a friend, where the high-court judge agreed that he could stay while out on bail. But he must surrender his passport, submit to monitoring by electronic tag, abide by a curfew and report to the police daily.

It's hard out there for a pimp, I guess.

Also, at London's Daily Mail (with lots of pics), "Rape-charge WikiLeaks chief heading for Christmas in a country mansion after being granted bail at High Court."

Added (11:40am):

Electric Eel

I just learned something about electric eels. Turns out they can generate a electrical current "capable of producing a shock at up to 500 volts and 1 ampere of current (500)." (600 according to National Geographic.). That's enough to kill a human being, and it certainly put the lights out of this alligator [crocodile?] looking for an afternoon meal. Nature is endlessly fascinating. It really is a jungle out there.

AAUP Endorses Classroom Indoctrination

At the National Association of Scholars (via Instapundit), "Free to Indoctrinate: The AAUP Applauds Penn State's Retreat from Academic Freedom":

It was the one of the best institutional statements on academic freedom in the United States, according to David Horowitz. And now it’s about to be ruined.

Pennsylvania State University’s Policy HR64: Academic Freedom was first published in 1950 and revised in 1987. The Faculty Senate recently decided that the policy needed a facelift to make the statement more “current.” For example, in 1987, “the classroom” did not include online education, nor was shared governance seen as falling under academic freedom. So last week, the Senate approved major changes that will go into effect upon approval by the president.

These changes include the deletion of key passages that described the responsibility of the professor not to introduce unrelated controversial material into the classroom. The section, “In Instructional Roles” (formerly “In the Classroom”) has been changed as follows:

It is not the function of a faculty member in a democracy to indoctrinate his/her students with ready-made conclusions on controversial subjects. The Faculty members are is expected to educate train students to think for themselves, and to facilitate provide them access to those relevant materials which they need to form their own opinions if they are to think intelligently. Hence, in giving instruction upon controversial matters the fFaculty members are is expected to present information fairly, be of a fair and judicial mind, and to set forth justly, without supersession or innuendo, the divergent opinions of other investigators that arise out of scholarly methodology and professionalism.

No faculty member may claim as a right the privilege of discussing in the classroom controversial topics outside his/her own field of study. The faculty member is normally bound not to take advantage of his/her position by introducing into the classroom provocative discussions of irrelevant subjects not within the field of his/her study.

Inside Higher Ed describes the revision decision largely in a positive light and cites the Faculty Senate chair, Jean Landa Pytel, saying that no specific incident prompted the alterations. But David Horowitz’s praise for the old policy could have been a factor. Horowitz, a longtime champion of academic freedom for both faculty members and students, held up HR64 as evidence that some universities value true academic freedom, at least in theory. He cited it in his book The Professors: The 101 Most Dangerous Academics in America and in testimony to the Pennsylvania legislature in 2005.

In contrast, Cary Nelson, president of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP), criticized Penn State’s policy as “especially bad” in his book No University is an Island: Saving Academic Freedom. He told Inside Higher Ed via email, “Penn State had one of the most restrictive and troubling policies limiting intellectual freedom in the classroom that I know of. It undermined the normal human capacity to make comparisons and contrasts between different fields and between different cultures and historical periods. The revised policy is a vast improvement.”

More at the link.

AAUP is abandoning academic freedom for institutionalized indoctrination.

And Penn State, some might recall, was at the center of the IPCC global warming e-mail hacking scandal. Lead scientist Michael Mann was cleared after an investigation. Yet for some reason I don't get the feeling Penn State's the model of integrity in teaching and research at the academy.