I tried.  I really did.  Listen -- I wanted to create my own list of linkables for 2005, but a few gazillion other bloggers beat me to it.  I mean, them. 

So, while I watch the V-Tech Hokies (and if you have to ask what a Hokie is, you obviously don't know the secret handshake, either -- Gawd, I hate Miami ... ), I'll   (tip the hat to) bloggers who have already beaten me to the lists ....

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Oh, yeah .... we sorta-kinda made a "list" in this our first year of full-fledged blogging.

Well, actually we were listed a post BELOW a list -- but who's counting? 

Especially when you're recognized by one of your favorite sites (even though the link was not exactly on-target -- see below) amongst other links to a few of our other favorite sites! 

Yesterday, Stop the ACLU referenced our tongue-in-cheek-ish jab at the ACLU and MSM: Surveillance Leak = WhistleBlowing? in Jay's  Sunday Funnies!

Reflective moment:  Did I ever blog my personal ire toward the ACLU (and attorneys in general)?  I'll make it another post, but it had to do with the ACLU's non-interest in a "civil rights" law suit (mine) which they did not deem "relevant" or politically notable -- which I wrote myself, found someone to present (i.e., represent me) to the tune of every-thing-I-owned-past-present-and-future, survived 4 years of hell, including a 3-week trial (with a bitchy, biased judge on the bench and two relatives of the defendants' on the jury) AND won.  Remind to me tell you about that sometime .....

But back to the lists .....

's to all those below:

Thespis Journal makes a Top 10 list ....
So does Roto-Rooter. As in plumbing highlights of 2005.
We've already blogged Michelle Malkin's list of blog critics.  Pfffth.
Wonder Woman shares her choices for best, worst and humor.
RWN provides us with a list of 2005's most obnoxious quotes ....
Someone named Dave Barry submitted a Review of 2005.  Try not to giggle.
One of the most profound and courageous lists, however, has to be the 2006 predictions by the Anchoress and her commentors.

And by the time you finish reading all those, I'll have another list of lists for you.  And there will be a pop test.

Sometime in 2006.

 to Michelle Malkin for her review of 2005 blogging critics ...

Amazing how bloggers (especially those who lean to the right of center) have indeed made an impact on the role and reliability of main stream muddle -- I mean, media,  in 2005.

And we've only just begun ...... 

(To turn off the midi, hit ESC on your keyboard!)

That "esc" thing is not working for me, either.  I hope Rhet doesn't mind if I turn that music off.  -- Dawg

  With over 60% of Americans (i.e., Republicans, Democrats, Unaffiliateds, etc.) NOT irate or angry or beside themselves that the President authorized wiretaps on al-Qaeda related communications -- it's time to examine MSM's intent in miscommunicating, misrepresenting and "exposing" lawful applications of national security efforts.   And if you're in the 30+% who are irate that the President authorized al-Qaeda wiretaps, whatcha got to hide?   

I see.   

You, too, are so blinded by hatred of anything-Bush that you'll let criminal acts and treason slide this time, eh?  

Thanks. 
But no thanks. 

Just don't spend the grocery money for a ticket on the "unlawful" hype-train.    

Remember:  Bush-haters, the MSM and the ACLU may talk the talk, but they do NOT have national security at heart.  They (collectively) will do and/or say anything to discredit one person:  George W. Bush, President of the United States.  That's a version of tunnel vision, by the way.  And there IS a train at the other end of the tunnel.

   to the Captain, et al, for their take on the New York Times and the Washington Post leaks which fanned the fires of "Big Brother hysteria" and bellowed smoldering coals among our European allies/critics RE: "secret prisons for terrorists" and the sharing of intelligence on terrorism.   

"... most of it [the NYT expose is] complete nonsense and almost all of it miscommunicated and misunderstood. The NSA program that the NYT "exposed" has less reach than the infamous Echelon program, reported by CBS News in 2000, but has specific application to suspected al-Qaeda assets and their contacts. Despite the continuing insistence of critics to call it 'domestic spying', the Times report clearly stated that domestic calls only got wiretapped after getting a FISA warrant, and that the presidential directive only applied to calls and communications that crossed international boundaries and did not appear to involve "US persons" as defined by FISA. Those communications don't require a warrant at all, especially while the President works under a grant of war powers from Congress."  (Bold for emphasis.)

Let me personalize this for those still riding that "unlawful" train.   

Even if my American citizen-next-door-neighbor is plotting with anyone to commit acts of violence which will harm others -- specifically me, my family or my nation --- tap his phone lines, dammit!  Feel free to use my home as an operational base.  If necessary, use my car, my telephone line, my computer, my bathroom, my anything to stop the low-life from harming anyone.  And if you don't and he does harm others, I'm gonna be really pissed.  

As for those self-acclaimed constitutional authorities, paper-pundits and far-left lolligaggers who feel that self-serving members of the press deserve to be legislatively protected from revealing their sources -- or that governmental employees with a grudge against department or federal policy who leak classified information deserve "whistleblower" status --   

What part of ut uh don't you understand?    

No one (as MSM has repeatedly reminded us ....) is above the law of the land.  You breakee the lawee (i.e., breach national security) and you payee likee the restee of us-ee.  Uday uyah understanday?  

You media guys really ARE stuck on stupid, ain'tcha?  

Face it.   

The blogosphere has now displaced MSM as the most viable and OPEN communications venue -- especially for distinguishing fact from hype and opinion, for revealing our Congressional mugwumps who place self-interest above national security and for exposing the liberal loonies and Bush-bashers-at-any-cost -- led by :::: eye roll :::: the self-appointed protector-of-Americans-from-their-own-Constitution, the clueless ACLU.  

Godspeed to the Justice Department in investigating a media that has historically hidden behind "anonymous sources" and snitches.  Godspeed to a fast and just investigation of leaks which have likely stalled and/or exposed thesecurity of thousands, if not millions of US and global citizens.   

   again to the Captain, et al, for slicing through the Washington Post's own acknowledgment:  

Justice Department investigators will examine whether classified information was unlawfully disclosed to the New York Times, which reported two weeks ago that the National Security Agency had been conducting electronic surveillance on U.S. citizens and residents without court-approved warrants.  

The Justice Department has also opened a probe into whether classified information was illegally disclosed to The Washington Post, which reported on a network of secret CIA prisons in Eastern Europe and elsewhere.  

Me?    I feel better already.    Roast is in the oven; card tables are ready; NC State is playing on TV.  It's New Year's Eve.  I'll likely not blog again until next year.   

Oh yeah -- and my neighbors are coming over tonight.  Big Brother can take the evening off in this small corner of the world. 

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

   Sorry.  Couldn't help myself. 

I just read that libbers and fibbers are hyping the surveillance leak (aka, the New York Times promotion for a book to be released this month) as whistleblowers -- and not criminal acts or treason.

Uh huh.

When I think of hyping a breach of security as a noble act of whistleblowing, the image I have is of Howard Dean pursing his lips and pretending to blow out a Plame --- I mean, flame-thrower.

  I reserve the right to change my mind, of course, but in the waning moments of 2005, I resolve not to make unrealistic resolutions OR end-of-year best/worst lists.

Not that I'm avoiding the responsibility of setting a firm course for the new year.  My course is already set.  Publishing my resolutions would be meaningless to all be me. 

Sobeit.

Nor am I lacking in ideas about who/what were best and/or worst.  Other than natural disasters, I have lots of candidates.  I'm sure no one really cares that, on my lists George Bush, the troops, Coach K, my dawg, my staff and the Iraqi elections were among the best o' 2005 or that the New York Times, the Mayor of New Orleans, Tom Cruise, senseless suicide bombings, a slew of child molesters/murderers and the Terri Schiavo story topped the worst. 

Sobethat, too.  

Happy New Year.

Just what we need .... Bloggers in the White House Press Corp!

Hat tip: Michelle Malkin:

From the Washington Post:

The White House spokesman will spin on a new stage next summer.

With the administration moving ahead with plans to renovate the dirty and decaying press room off the West Wing of the White House, spokesman Scott McClellan -- or his replacement, if he steps aside before then -- intends to start briefing the world from historic Jackson Place, across Pennsylvania Avenue from the White House, as early as July.

This means the television, print and radio reporters and crews will be booted from the White House for at least seven months as the James S. Brady Press Briefing Room is modernized...

...  and to Hugh Hewitt: 

Whoever is doing the redesign, let's hope they put in a bloggers row, right at the front, and lose the reserved seating for the dinosaurs from MSM.

Can we hope?  Our blog-leaders need to crank up the cyber-ways and get the message to the White House!

                                Is it THAT time already? 

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

If only it could be true again ....

A Christmas Truce 

.... and extended to the New Year

                                                                                    and beyond.

Jason at Generation Why?  and folks over at the American Digest dilute the ink on the New York Slimes ... errrr, Whines ... errr, Times. 

Sales are sinking.  Fast.  And not strictly for the NYT. 

"Looks like trust in the MSM wasn't the only thing that tanked over the last couple of years. They thought they could "get" George W. Bush and the Republicans by pumping life into dead non-stories and publishing classified information while simultaneously ignoring real stories...

I would subscribe to the MSM papers... but I find Charmin is much softer."

Charmin ain't all that's being squeezed, eh?   Love it.

Lest we forget ....

Christmas at Arlington