The confrontation over Cuba continues. Michael Moore has challenged Fred Thompson to a health care debate. At issue — Moore’s trip to Cuba and Thompson’s criticism of that trip. Moore noted Thompson’s evident favor for Cuban cigars as a possible violation of the trade embargo. Now Thompson responds, cigar in hand…

Those of you with whom I exchange emails know that, before I forward email “stories” (if I forward them at all), I check them out at snopes, my favorite of several similar sites aimed at debunking urban legends. Many of you have received at least one myth “outing” from me and some of you have even ribbed me about them. So this Randall Munroe ‘toon seemed particularly apropos…

It sounds cliché, but it’s the absolute truth. Dawn and I share a special relationship that can honestly be described as blissful. True soul mates, we were destined to find one another.

We’ve been together fifteen years, six as husband and wife, and today marks our sixth wedding anniversary. As we do each year, we’ll be reliving every moment of our wedding - reading the ribbons upon which each guest penned their best wishes for us, looking through our wedding albums and watching the video, reciting again the vows we wrote for our ceremony and our lives together, remembering every precious detail of our fairy-tale wedding and reception in Kauai, the fun activities with our wonderful friends and guests and, of course, our magical honeymoon.

And I can still say, without a moment’s hesitation, that I married my very best friend.

Share some of our memories here and here.

Cox & Forkum

From CNN: Size matters, so does shape under new postal rates.

The postal rate increase that kicks in Monday is shaping up to be a big headache for many businesses. Many companies say they are confused and frustrated as they try to adjust to the new rules, and some say mailings could be severely curtailed due to higher postage costs.

The new regulations mean larger envelopes and packages will automatically cost more than smaller mail. Currently, postage is determined by weight, unless it’s an especially large or odd-shaped package that warrants special handling.

If your solution come Monday is to stuff the same amount of material into a smaller envelope, the Postal Service could get you there, too: There are new thickness restrictions. For first-class, letter envelopes, the allowed thickness is a quarter inch. If you go over a quarter inch, you run into more costly large envelope or parcel rates.  […]

Cindy Golebiewski, an office manager in Wilmington, Delaware, said her company faces much higher postage costs under the new rules. “The price is just doubling,” she said. If not for the new thickness limits, “we would be better off stuffing a 6-by-9-inch envelope than putting it into a big brown envelope,” she said.

The Direct Marketing Association in New York is “very, very unhappy,” said spokeswoman Stephanie Hendricks. “The rates go into effect on Monday under protest.”  […]

Even mailing a simple brochure may pose a problem for businesses. Postage for a three-panel brochure weighing an ounce might cost the new rate of 41 cents — up from 39 cents — unless it’s not folded well and the envelope puffs up to half an inch. If the mail can’t be easily flattened, then the postage would shoot up to 80 cents. Under the old rules, the envelope could puff out and still cost the same.

Details of the new rates are available at http://www.usps.com/ or (800) 275-8777.

Cousin Mike sent this. He’s a real southerner, so it must be a true story…

Earl and Bubba, two good ole boys from Dixie, are quietly sitting in a boat fishing, chewing and drinking beer when suddenly Bubba says, “I think I’m going to divorce my wife. She hasn’t spoke to me in over two months.”

After about ten minutes, Earl spits, sips his beer and says, “You better think it over… Women like that are hard to find.”

A friend’s nephew is graduating this month from the United States Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs. I don’t yet have a photo of him or his graduating class of cadets, so I thought I’d meanwhile share this image…

I ran across this simple approach to profitably extricating ourselves from Iraq at Holy Juan. It’s as good as any so-called solution I’ve heard from Washington and trails only slightly behind the only workable alternative anyone’s suggested: Unleash the weapons. Think it might work?

Says Doug, “Let’s carve out a chunk of the United States and give it to anyone in Iraq who wants to leave [Iraq]. Here is my 8 step plan:

1. ADVERTISE

Posters (as a bonus, bulletproof posters) will line the streets, telling Iraqis of a better life over the ocean. All they need to do is pack two bags each and prepare to leave on July 4th.

2. PREPARE THE LAND

Choose about 400 sq miles of hurricane devastated land in the United States and kick off the squatters. Set up temporary housing that was never used after Katrina. Build a wall around it. Erect the WELCOME TO NEW IRAQ sign. Dust off hands.

3. LOAD THE CARGO CONTAINERS

Iraqis will be loaded on to cargo containers and shipped to the states. As a bonus, video screens will simulate a porthole view of a ship passing by the statue of liberty. The video will repeat every 10 minutes.

4. PULL OUT OF IRAQ

Anyone left behind can deal with it.

5. LAND HO!

Dump off the Iraqis and hand them shovels and brooms to begin the clean-up. They will fill the now empty cargo containers with trash and the bodies of the people that didn’t handle the trip so well.

6. CLEAN AND BUILD

The Iraqis will be provided with food and shelter. They will be provided building materials and help to construct cities. Coincidentally, the cities will be near gas refineries and bio diesel plants that are also under construction.

7. PROFIT!

The Iraqis will build cities where they will live and work in harmony. Cheap labor will provide Americans with goods. As the older and bitter Iraqis die off from working in the refineries, the younger folks will be Americanized through the free MTV2 pumped into their homes. In twenty years, we can tear down the wall.

8. REPEAT?

Oh shit? During this time we went to war with Iran? Crap… OK, play old tapes of the Iraq/Iran war and use the young Iraqis as cannon fodder. Once New Iraq is empty, fill it with Iranians and change the last letter on the WELCOME TO NEW IRAQ sign.”

Hmmm. Sounds strangely plausible…

Often without realizing it, we’ve all witnessed the sometimes amazing results of Photoshop and other photo retouching software. Now ubiquitous, such photographic “makeovers” are commonly used to enhance images of models and actresses for magazine covers and advertisements. While there are numerous videos circulating the Internet showing extreme Photoshop makeovers, this one shows a broader range of the software’s amazing capabilities.

Okay, I’ll admit it looks like a bargain, but the upkeep would drive you to the poor house…

Here’s a promising article. Seems two professors at the University of Oklahoma say they’ve developed a protein that can stop the spread of certain cancer cells without damaging normal cells. The new fusion protein keeps some types of cancer cells from ingesting a vital protein called methionine and doesn’t affect normal cells because, unlike cancer cells, normal cells can be healthy without that protein.

The research started with breast cancer and expanded to include other types of solid tumors. They found the fusion protein to be just as helpful in fighting lung, prostate and pancreatic cancers and could be applicable to other forms of cancer as well.

Of course, more animal, clinical and human testing are required as well as FDA approval, so it may be ten years before it’s brought to market. Still, it’s a very encouraging breakthrough.

We’re enjoying beautiful spring weather although temps have reached the 90s, a little above normal for this time of year. A cooling trend to the 80s is forecast for the rest of the week.

Call me a weenie, but I’m most comfortable with 72-80 and a summer peak around 85. Still, I’m thoroughly enjoying spring. Birds are chirping, mama ducks are ushering their recently hatched ducklings to the lake for their first swimming lessons, flowers are blooming in all their glory…everything is fresh, clean and new.

Michael sent this short quiz aimed at measuring your “attractiveness.” Go ahead (if you dare.) Give it a try…

My cousin Mike sent me the following letter from an ROTC cadet preparing for commencement this Friday, May 18, I believe, at The College of  New Jersey. I’ve been unable to confirm the writer’s full name but his letter is well worth a read, especially the quote from Sam Adams at the end. God bless our troops!

Friends,

In one month, my colleagues and I will become the newest officers in the United States Army when we are commissioned at The College of New Jersey. We go off to various branches; infantry, field artillery, ordnance, quartermaster, aviation, medical service corps. Some of us are going into the New Jersey National Guard, some active duty.

We all expect to go to Iraq. We are all conscientious, intelligent, well-informed college students. We all contracted after 9/11and after the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq. We all chose this path and we are all proud to serve. We disagree on many things - I am an evangelical traditional conservative (I say think Edmund Burke gone federalist), but there are atheists and democrats in our program as well. We all agree that the United States faces a very real enemy and that the United States is worth defending, even unto death.The above is true of all of us. What follows is my opinion.

I wish I could say that Senator Reid’s comments were surprising. But the truth is that the Democrats have never convincingly supported the troops. They throw the term around as a disclaimer, a modifier to be followed by political posturing. “I support our troops, but this President…” or “We support the troops which is why we want them out of this civil war.” Claiming to support the troops has always smacked of a sort of legal caveat at the end of a commercial. Like the quickly flashing text on an Audi commercial “Driving professional on closed course. Do not attempt.”

As I prepare for my career in the Army, whether it is four years or twenty four, I wonder if Senator Reid would like to speak at our commissioning ceremony. He can tell us he supports us, and that we are going off to fight a war that has already been lost. After all, the leader of the Senate has proclaimed it for the world to see. Perhaps he thinks since it is lost we should give up the struggle. There is nothing wrong with recognizing defeat and submitting to your enemy: we call it an official surrender, and we have grown accustomed to receiving them, not issuing them.

Does he honestly believe that our nation is at the end of its capabilities?

George Washington and John Adams did not surrender when the British had taken New York, Rhode Island, and New Jersey and driven the Continental Army back across the Delaware. Even when Washington’s army was leaving in droves as enlistments ended and the treasury ran dry, these real Americans clenched their jaws and prepared to surrender their lives for freedom.

You can delude yourselves and say that he is being realistic, or you can embrace some nonsense anti-war agenda. But the fact of the matter is that some things are worth the fight, worth the sacrifice. There is no “diplomatic” solution to armed extremists trying to kill us. And I seem to remember something about some airplanes flying into some buildings a few years back…

I have a message for Senator Harry Reid, a message from the past that is heard in the wailing and groaning of our founders turning in their graves:

“Contemplate the mangled bodies of your countrymen, and then say, ‘What should be the reward of such sacrifices?’ Bid us and our posterity bow the knee, supplicate the friendship, and plough, and sow, and reap, to glut the avarice of the men who have let loose on us the dogs of war to riot in our blood and hunt us from the face of the earth? If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude than the animating contest of freedom, go from us in peace. We ask not your counsels or arms. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains sit lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen!” - Samuel Adams

Behold a man of virtue, worthy of the office Senator Reid disgraces.

S. Lee [Last name withheld]
CDT, US Army ROTC
The College of New Jersey
Philosophy//Classics//Law and Politics

Andy Huang made this futuristic short film at Palos Verdes on the Net Community Computer Technology Center in Rancho Palos Verdes, California. In it, a machine with a doll face mimics images it sees on a television screen in search of a satisfactory visage. Doll Face presents a visual account of desires misplaced and identities fractured by our technological extension into the future. Christina Frenzell plays Doll Face.

Noah Kirchner, Michael and Sisko’s son, snapped this bird image the other day and wants to know if anyone can help him identify it. If you think you recognize the little critter, let us know in “comments.”