09 Jan 98: Ted Kaczynski allegedly attempted to hang himself with his undershorts in his cell. Marshals noticed that he was not wearing underpants when he changed in the courthouse yesterday. Court room observers noted rings around Mr. Kaczynski's neck. A search of his cell revealed that he has no underwear. Some of his victim's families are reportedly organizing an "undershorts for Ted campaign". Give a man enough rope…
Janet Reno is defending the FBI aganst charges that they poorly conducted the investigation into Terry Nichols and the Oklahoma City bombing. At least one juror mentioned that the prosecution's evidence was not complete. Shoddy work by the FBI included not using a tape recorder when they interviewed Nichols for nine hours, miscounted fingerprints on key pieces of evidence and allowed some evidence to be tainted when an FBI lab flooded. Ms. Reno has also been forced to defend investigations conducted by her own department (campain finance abuses) as well as the conduct of the FBI at Ruby Ridge, and the ATF at Waco.
Scientists announced that the universe may keep expanding forever. Six months ago the consensus in the scientific community was that the mass in the universe would contract after it lost its present momentum. Twenty years ago scientists were worried about a new ice age, now some fret about global warming. Some psychologists conclude that the scientific mind may be schizophrenic.
Australian Prime Minister, Tim Fischer said that Australia would not apologize to the Aborigines for past misconduct by the government. Neville Bonner one-time member of the Australian Parliament said, "It behooves the people in authority to stand up and say sorry." He neglected to mention that these people in authority were not the ones responsible for the misconduct.
08 Jan 98: The Congressional Budget Office projected only a $5 billion shortfall for next year. They did not mention that the interest on even $5 billion not to mention the TRILLIONS that are still owed via the national debt are still creating tremendous governmental waste and are a drag on the economy. (See Lee Presser's Jan 01 Commentary.)
President Clinton wants to add $22 billion to the budget to pay for individual child care. Now that Chelsea is out of the house the Clinton "empty nest syndrome" has also prompted Mrs. Clinton to offer to personally look after all the little children - after all, it takes a village.
FBI sniper, Ron Horiuchi must stand trial in Boundary County, Idaho for the death of Vicki Weaver. She was shot and killed by a bullet he fired in the 1992, 11-day siege that occurred at Ruby Ridge, Idaho. In an August interview with the Conservative Bookstore Newsletter, Dave Kopel, author of several books about the 2nd amendment and law enforcement agreed with the State of Idaho's decision to prosecute Horiuchi, but he went further, "Larry Potts, the FBI official in charge of Ruby Ridge, should be prosecuted. Although it can't be proven that he approved "shoot to kill" order, he did approve "license to kill" orders which violated the criminal law of Idaho, and the United States Constitution. So Potts, and also perhaps several people in the chain of command from Potts to Horiuchi, ought to be prosecuted."
07 JAN 98: Clinton proposed to offer Medicare coverage to more people, yesterday - 300,000 early retirees and displaced workers. Most analysts agree that this will place an added burden on the failing health care insurance program and helps to incrementally expand a socialistic health care agenda that will end in inefficiency, higher costs and degraded care. "It is the right thing to do," Clinton declared.
Criminal charges alleging improper use of governmental authority are expected to be levied against members of the IRS and possibly Democrats in Congress for directing an IRS audit of Paula Jones. Paula Jones has filed a credible sexual harassment suit against President Clinton and a Treasury Department probe indicates that this audit may have been directed against Ms. Jones in an effort to get her to withdraw her charges against the President or at least accept an out of court settlement.
OJ Simpson guilty of murder of his ex-wife? In an interview with Celia Farber from Esquire Magazine he said, "Even if I did do this, it would have to have been because I loved her very much, right?"
Condolences from the staff at the Conservative Monitor to the families of Sonny Bono and Michael Kennedy.
06 JAN 98: Theodore Kaczynski, the Unabomber, is making a stir at his trial. Just as the trial opened he said, "Your honor, before we begin, I would like to read something I've written." All in the court room were hoping he was not referring to his famous manifesto. When he stated that he wanted to "revisit my relationship with my attorneys," the Judge ordered a closed door session which lasted five yawn filled hours hours.
Geraldine Ferraro, liberal extremist, has committed to run against Alphonse D'Amato for his US Senate seat from New York. She opened her campaign with an attack on the Senator who beat her six years ago. At the end of her invective she might have asked the proverbial liberal question, "Why can't we all get just get along?"
A study shows that children who are breast fed as infants do better in reading and math in school. Factors that were not considered were whether breast feeding mothers tend to be better care givers in general, whether they tend to be stay at home mothers, and if breast fed babies have more ambitious and thorough parents in general.
05 JAN 1998: US Military commanders say that they have detected a pattern in Saddam Hussein's bellicose movements. They believe that he tends to renege on his treaty commitments when US forces in the region are on the wane. The commanders also confess that Saddam's behavior might be linked to the phases of the moon.
Infertile foreigners are reputedly seeking US sperm and egg donors. It seems other nations severely restrict the production of sperm…for sale. In the US such trade is not restricted. Thus we may become the major sperm producing nation in the world. There will be a sperm bank on every corner. This could solve some of the nation's problems with youth violence and crime.
Politicians in Washington are arguing over where to apply surplus dollars collected by the Internal Revenue Service. GOP lawmakers favor tax cuts and others want to pay down the national debt. Democrats are looking at ways to spend the money. John Kassich, a Republican congressman from Ohio, noted that 43 percent of the nation's income is spent on government. He wants a tax cut and a reduction in government spending. Give it back to the people. After all, whose money is it?
02 JAN 1998: President Clinton has made up a "fat little notebook" of ideas to guide him in the coming year. An illicit glimpse into the notebook reveals his plans for campaign finance reform (doing away with that troublesome controlling legal authority), to save social security (declare a chapter 13 reorganization and charge $5.00 a head at the FDR memorial), and to heal race relations ("talk about it, feel pain"). Various groups are reportedly conspiring to get their hands on the notebook. Steve Forbes wants to write in "Flat Tax" in bold letters, and an unamed underground libertarian group is employing a mole in an effort to "tear out a few pages."
A bipartisan group in the house is pushing to end the embargo on Cuba. The embargo presently only restricts trade directly between the US and Cuba. A well-placed Senator reportedly said, "It's ridiculous, I have to go all the way to Canada just to get a good cigar."
01 JAN 1998: Cuban star pitcher, Orlando Hernandez escaped from Cuba on Friday and were granted permission to enter the US yesterday. If Communism were so great, why is everyone trying to get out of Cuba except American psuedo-intellectual-socialists - who only want to visit.
