Quarterpole

We are one-fourth of the way into this pretty surprising Orioles season, considering even eternal fans like this guy were prediction doom, gloom, and 107 losses.

What is shocking about the Orioles 21-19 start has less to do with the fact that this team is 2 over .500, but the fact that this team is far from firing on all cylinders:

• Nick Markakis is only hitting .261, and is 1 for his last 17
• Ramon Hernandez has been hurt off and on, and is hitting .211
• The .246 team batting average is third worst in the American League
• Luke Scott has the highest average on the team at .271.....despite hitting .198 in the last month, hitting .133 against lefties, and .194 on the road
• Steve Trachsel......'nuff said.

The fact of the matter is that despite that, this team can win ball games, even if they spot the defending champs a 3-0 lead two nights in a row. The bullpen has been mostly phenomenal, the starting pitching has done its job (keeping us in games) and the team is playing with confidence. It has been a fun group to watch.

Now, at the quarterpole, let's talk about the Most Valuable Orioles for 2008:

1. Dave Trembley: Sure, he isn't an active player. But it is hard to argue with the impact he has had on this club. Remember, the preponderance of players on this 2008 team were also on the 2007 team; that team was nine games out 40 games in, and was 11 games under .500 when Sam Perlozzo got canned. Trembley has had a year and a Spring Training to implement his philosophy and his system with his staff and his players. It's working.
   
2. Jim Johnson: Where would the bullpen be without this guy? He was a starter in the minors and had brief cameos in '06 and '07, but he has been the stopper out of the bullpen this year, including his amazing duel with Manny Ramirez on Tuesday that ended with a 1-2-3 double play to kill a Red Sox rally.
   
3. George Sherill: Sure, it hasn't been pretty, but Sherill has stepped into the closers role and gotten the job done when it counts.
   

2008 has been more than we can ask for. Let's hope it keeps up. But remember this: the 2002 overachieving squad got to 63-63 on August 23rd, only to go 4-32 down the stretch, so we're not even close to seeing this team be where it needs to be quite yet...

MTA Still Clueless

The Maryland Transit Administration can't properly operate the transit systems they have, but that isn't stopping them from asking for more money to expand services:

As gasoline prices climb toward $4 a gallon, more commuters in Maryland are leaving their cars and trucks at home and hopping a bus or train to work.

The Maryland Transit Administration will seek approval next week to expand service on its long-distance bus lines to accommodate a surge of new riders. The so-called "commuter" buses ferry workers to Washington from places as far-flung as Hagerstown, Kent Island and Ellicott City.

The action comes at a time when ridership on almost all forms of transit - including subway, city bus and commuter rail - is up in Maryland and across the nation. Maryland's long-distance commuter bus lines handle just a fraction of all the people taking transit every day, but officials say those lines are among the most sensitive to rising fuel prices because of the distances riders must travel to and from work

Given the complete incompetence of the MTA, additional funding for additional projects should be rejected. If these commuter bus lines need to exist, outsource the work out to private bus and coach companies who can offer such services competently and at a lower costs.

Apparently, the MTA senior leadership (who, despite my pleas, remain on the job) still haven't gotten the memo that their system is in disarray.The Governor needs to get the MTA's house and order, not create more ways for it to fail as a transit organization.

The Capital is for accountability?

A funny thing happened on the way to the forum. The Capital finally decided that somebody should be accountable for the school funding row:

Pity the poor parent in Anne Arundel County who is looking for someone - anyone - to lobby for more education funding. As our Sunday story illustrated, the county refers callers to the school system and the school system refers them to the county. Welcome to the budget merry-go-round....

....Who's in charge here? No one person, but an appointed school superintendent and an elected county executive - and that's the problem.

The local delegation would be wise to at least study the relationship between the school system - which spends our taxes - and county government, which raises our taxes.

That's funny. Because the same folks on the Capital editorial board who are in favor of holding somebody accountable for school system funding are the same people against allowing the Board of Education to be held accountable by being elected directly by our county voters.

So I have to ask this: why is accountability good in this sense, but not good in another?

Private Ventures

Looks like NASA is starting to finally get real (H/T Instapundit)

For decades, NASA kept a tight fist around the construction and operation of the spacecraft that ferried its astronauts and hardware into orbit. Sure, an army of private contractors actually built the vehicles, but NASA oversaw the designs—and always kept the pink slips. Now, however, the agency seems to be shifting course, as NASA officials insist that the budding commercial spacecraft fleet represents the only way the United States can realize its dreams of solar-system conquest on schedule and at an affordable cost.

Because of a new focus for NASA's strategic investments—not to mention incentives like the Ansari X Prize, which spurred the space-tourism business, and the Google Lunar X Prize, which could do the same for payloads—private-sector spaceships could be ready for government service soon, says Sam Scimemi, who heads NASA's Commercial Orbital Transportation Services program. "The industry has grown up," he tells PM. "It used to be that only NASA or the Air Force could do such things....."

....."I'd like for us to get to the point where we have the kind of private/public synergy in space flight that we have had for a hundred years in aviation," Griffin said. The spirit of private enterprise is crucial to the future of space exploration, he acknowledged. "I see a day in the not-very-distant future where instead of NASA buying a vehicle, we buy a ticket for our astronauts to ride to low Earth orbit, or a bill of lading for a cargo delivery to space station by a private operator. I want us to get to that point."

Hauling cargo represents the grunt work of space exploration and, dominated by the space shuttle, it has long gobbled millions of dollars of NASA's budget. The agency's new vision hands that duty off to private companies that, freed from government paperwork, can do it more economically. This would free up more of the NASA budget for space exploration missions, Scimemi says.

And this is exactly what NASA should have been doing for years. The NASA monopoly on government-backed space missions has always seemed silly particularly, as the story notes, since all of the components and crafts were being built by private contractors.

As we have seen time and time again, privatization of certain government functions gives the taxpayer more flexibility, more options, and a better product with less overhead, less bureaucracy, and lower costs. Let's just hope that NASA's newfound vision of the space program not only spreads to other agencies at the federal and (hopefully) state level, but also survives the next Presidential administration. I have a fear that such innovations will suffer under a Democratic administration....

It's Over.....for now

Well, the School Board Nominating Commission process is mercifully over for this year:

For the new District 32 seat, the commission chose candidates Teresa Milio Birge and Sam Georgiou. For the at-large seat, they chose Walter Chitwood, Kevin Jackson, Evelyn Gray-Mason and Tricia Johnson, the current board president who's up for re-appointment.

Of course, nobody has actually convinced anybody that the new process is any better than the old process. Particularly when you have attempts at stunts like this:

Tim Mennuti, a commissioner who represents the local teachers' union, asked for the vote to also happen behind closed doors, but not enough commissioners agreed.

That's right. The teachers union wants to conduct business behind closed doors. Shameful.

Of course, not as shameful as this entire cockamamie process in general. Once again, the O'Malley/Leopold Commission structure still does not address basic questions, such as why voters should not get the final say as opposed to unelected special interests.

We'll see how this all plays out with the Governor's appointment, and the silly "vote" on the ballot in November. Because I have a funny feeling that we haven't seen how this is going to play out in the end just quite yet...

Maxwell Can't Fool Everybody

It looks like Kevin Maxwell's campaign for more school money clearly isn't fooling everybody.

First, Eric Hartley in yesterday's Capital:

Money isn't the only answer. But the thing about government bureaucracies is they don't know any other answers. They're not equipped to come up with new ways of doing things that take account of reality; they just demand more money. Nice work if you can get it.

For all the rhetoric about how this money is needed for children and teachers, it helps to remember there were at last count 213 school employees making six figures. It goes without saying that not one of them is a teacher. Some of these folks have been getting bonuses or generous raises despite the tough times. Even Dr. Maxwell got a $6,000 bonus last year on top of his $231,000 salary. ("Personally, I would love to give you a bigger bonus," the school board president said at the time.)

By the way, Montgomery and Howard counties, with their vaunted schools, spend just over $12,500 per student. That's not much more than Anne Arundel and less than Baltimore. Money isn't the only answer.

A parent of two kids in the school system writes the Post and doesn't have much positive to say about Maxwell, either:

This is nothing new. Mr. Maxwell has a well-established pattern of engaging in thinly veiled public relations stunts and maintaining an antagonistic stance year-round with elected officials and parents. That route is much easier for him than engaging in constructive dialogue with all stakeholders to develop a realistic, comprehensive long-term plan to improve county schools. Since his appointment, he and the Board of Education have done nothing to foster positive relations with elected officials, parents and the community at large.

Mr. Maxwell consistently expands the size of the school's administrative bureaucracy, ignores recommendations for greater efficiency and uses the threat of cuts in the classroom to instill fear and anger in parents toward the council and executive. His long-term plan for school achievement lacks any accountability, which is apparent in both the current performance of the system and how he conducts himself in office.

It's easy to see that Maxwell's whining about funding issues, his refusal to actually prioritize school spending, and his refusal to cut the fat from Riva Road are not winning him many fans, either inside or outside of the County Government. I have documented for some time Maxwell's largesse directed at the sustainment of the overbloated, unnecessary school system bureaucracy. By reducing some of the redundancy and by reducing the high paying non-teaching positions located at school system headquarters Maxwell would be able to direct more money towards the classroom without raising anyone's taxes.

But as we have seen with other lifelong educrats, Kevin Maxwell cares more about feeding the beast, more about sustaining the overbloated school system bureaucracy, than he does with teaching kids and paying teachers. Maxwell, unfortunately, is one of a line line of administrators throughout our state and nation who puts the agenda first, and the kids second. Until we break that cycle, it's never going to change...

Silly Silly Silly

Syndicated columnist Cynthia Tucker seems to think that common sense voter ID laws like the recently upheld law in Indiana are some sort of Republican plot:

So what's the real motive for these punitive voter ID laws? Republicans are trying to block the ballots of a few poor and elderly voters, those least likely to have driver's licenses. It's probably no coincidence that those blocs tend to support Democrats. (Indiana's prohibition against out-of-state licenses would also work against all of those Obama-loving college students.)

President Bush has touted democracy in Afghanistan and Iraq, proudly pointing to the purple-ink-stained fingers of voters who were able to cast ballots without fear of political retribution. But in this country, the president's political party denies the ballot to elderly nuns.

Of course, as usual, Tucker's reasoning is asinine and devoid of logic. The fact of the matter is that it requires identification to cash a check, it requires identification to enter a government building, so why in the world should something as precious as the right to vote be treated any differently? It has nothing to do with partisan politics; it has everything to do with protecting the sanctity of the ballot and ensuring that somebody who shows up to the polls on Election Day is casting their vote legally and properly.

I just wonder why so many Democrats seem to think that voter ID laws are some evil Republican plot. What exactly do they have to hide, anyway?

No End in Sight

Another day, and more horror stories from riding light rail:

When the single-car light rail train pulled into Mount Washington station about 3:30 p.m., it was so crowded that David Utley couldn't board it with his bicycle to get to his job at Penn Station. He decided to wait for the next train - which didn't come for another 50 minutes. And it was so overstuffed that Utley just gave up. "Time for Plan B," he said as he wheeled his bike away from the station. The Mount Washington man is one of thousands of light rail riders who have had their lives disrupted as the Maryland Transit Administration grapples with maintenance issues that have sidelined more than three-quarters of its rail cars at peak travel times.

I think somebody needs to wake Governor O'Malley up and make him realize that he has a major crisis on his hands when it comes to public transportation. He has a Transit Administration that can't even make the trains run on time (literally and figuratively) and the people who use the system most frequently are fed up with it.

And actually, this entire fiasco regarding the safety of Light Rail trains brings up another question: where was the MTA on doing increased inspections before they found the crack? Was the wheel crack attributable to shoddy maintenance? Were enough inspections being done prior to discovering the wheel crack?

What it seems like to me is the fact that there is a lack of institutional control over the Maryland Transit Administration. The Governor's office should have already been looking into this issue, but even now it seems like there is no interest in addressing the problem. His office should be demanding that MTA senior leadership answer the questions surrounding their incompetence. And the Governor needs to make major changes in MTA leadership, instead of accepting the continuance of the MTA's culture of failure. We need accountability in leadership of all high profile government agencies, and O'Malley could (but likely won't, given his past history) make a major statement about government accountability at the state level by doing the right thing and making a change.

But since it isn't likely that changes will be made, it's going to be more of the same for the commuters who use mass transit....just as the state encourages them to.

The Party of the People

Hint: it's not the Democrats (H/T Ross Douthat and Instapundit):

In this upside-down campaign season when populist GOP campaigners like John McCain and Mike Huckabee surprised the pundits with their primary victories or, in the case of Ron Paul, their fundraising prowess, it almost makes sense that the party of the country club set has been winning the fundraising race among the common man. That’s right. The white-shirt/red-tie brigade of Republican presidential aspirants holds a nearly three-to-one edge among janitors, custodians, cleaners, sanitation workers, factory workers, truckers, bus drivers, barbers, security guards, and secretaries. While Democrats command the financial loyalty of architects, Republicans successfully woo contributions from the skilled craftsmen who turn their blueprints into reality — specifically, contractors, hardhats, plumbers, stonemasons, electricians, carpenters mechanics, and roofers. This trend extends to the saloons, where the Democrats carry the bartenders and the Republicans the waitresses. The GOP field even secures more financial support from teamsters, steelworkers, bricklayers, and autoworkers.

These are just demonstrable examples of what I have been saying for some time: that the Republicans are the party that best represents the interests of working and middle class families.

Who do the Democrats represent these days? According to Franc's article, contributions from Democrats came from Wall Street, lawyers, teachers, journalists, college professors and scientists (except, oddly, for rocket scientists). Why? Because these individuals have the most to gain from Democrats providing them with bigger and bigger government. They are the ones who will benefit.

Maybe that's why Republicans are becoming the party of the people. It's the middle and working class families that has the most to gain from low taxes and smaller government. It gives them the freedom the Democrats don't want them to have...

Same Old Song

Looks like we have another satisfied MTA customer...

The doors opened and people were spilling out because they were so jammed in the exit wells. Needless to say, I did not get on; it did not look safe, much less comfortable. Ten or so minutes later, the next one arrived - same story. People were falling out when they opened the doors, and again I declined to board. (This also happened to be a day when the Orioles had a 12:30 p.m. game at Camden Yards that let out at rush hour.)

Thirty minutes later, I was finally able to get onto a two-car train. Why would the MTA use only the singles during rush hour and on the day a game lets out during rush hour?...

....I think I speak for many when I say that's a long time to put up with such inconvenience. At a time of soaring gas prices and clogged highways, transit officials should be doing what they can to encourage ridership - not driving people away.

Amen to that. The Maryland Transit Administration has been a disaster for some time, and I have long called for a house cleaning of all MTA senior leadership. I just continue to ask why the O'Malley Administration, who advocates the expansion of transit, continues to allow this kind of failure and mismanagement from its transit system managers?

More SBNC Shenanigans

The School Board Nominating Commission process is so screwed up that they are now changing the rules as they go:

County Executive John R. Leopold's appointee to the School Board Nominating Commission successfully pushed through a rule change that limits the power of the governor's five appointees. Each candidate, even the five appointed by the governor, now needs approval from eight of the 11 commissioners to have their name sent to the governor, who appoints new school board members from among those names.

Before the commission changed the rule last night, candidates had needed only six votes - easy to get if Gov. Martin O'Malley's five appointees voted as a bloc.

Of course, the change is likely cosmetic as the O'Malley/Leopold/Union liberal block is pretty likely to be in line on candidates. But does this not serve as a wonderful display of the absurdity of this kangaroo court system?

And speaking of the absurdity of this system, the same School Board Nominating Commission doesn't think the Board of Education should be involved in school system operations. So explain this:

The county Board of Education plans to discuss raising school lunch prices at its meeting tomorrow.

Meal prices haven't gone up for four years, said Jodi Risse, supervisor of the school system's Food and Nutrition Services.

She said the combination of federal and state money and revenue from the lunches isn't enough to cover expenses of the county's school lunch program.

Superintendent Kevin M. Maxwell is recommending the board raise school lunch prices by the following amounts:

Milk, ½ pint, up 5 cents from 45 to 50 cents

Breakfast up 25 cents from $1 to $1.25

Elementary school lunch up 25 cents from $1.75 to $2

Secondary school lunch up 25 cents from $2 to $2.25

This isn't a knock on the decision to raise prices, because if you gotta do it, you gotta do it. But isn't this the kind of thing that the Commission believes School Board nominees should not be vetted for (i.e., their thoughts on operations) before the Commission passes the buck on to the Governor's office?

The school lunch price decision, no matter how minor, just goes to show out of touch and poorly planned the Nominating Commission concept is....

The Brian Griffiths Minute: 5-4-2008

Of course not, that would be helpful

It's not liked anybody expected the O'Malley Administration to do anything to benefit taxpayers, but still:

With gas prices continuing to reach new heights, the part of the cost controlled by federal and state governments is coming under increasing scrutiny as some politicians lobby for a break during the summer driving season.

Officials in Gov. Martin O'Malley's administration, however, caution that any reduction in gas tax revenue - which is dedicated solely to transportation spending - would hurt the government's ability to maintain roads.

"It might be a 'penny wise' and a 'pound foolish' at this point, especially since we've seen chronic underfunding of our transportation system," said Rick Abbruzzese, the governor's press secretary.

No, because god forbid the taxpayers of Maryland actually get a break after the Democrats pillaged them time and time again over the last few months. What's even more absurd is that Rick Abbruzzese actually talked about the chronic underfunding of transportation when the O'Malley Administration raided the Transportation Trust Fund to cover the excesses of their profligate spending!

Maryland taxpayers need a break, even if it is a largely symbolic break on state gas taxes. The fact that O'Malley and Maryland Democrats refuse to take even such a minor step to benefit the citizens of Maryland shows the kind of contempt these people hold taxpayers in: you are an ATM to benefit their pet projects, enrich their cronies, and keep them in office, and nothing more.

Bologna Boy still full of Bologna

David Paulson, of all people, has a column up at PolitickerMD.com regarding "political courage." Now, never mind the fact that "Maryland Democrat" and "political courage" tend to be oxymoronic, I want to highlight this comment, which highlights why Paulson doesn't get it:

It is easy to whine, gripe, attack and predict disaster is at the doorstep. Having the courage to solve real problems is hard and sometimes costly. After all, there is always someone or some group ready, willing and able to do what's easy.

You're right David, it is easy to whine, gripe, attack and predict disaster. So why, David, do you instinctively defend Martin O'Malley at every turn? All the Governor does is whine about Governor Ehrlich, gripe about how hard his job is, attack anybody who even remotely opposes his bad ideas, and predicts disaster if the people of Maryland don't roll over for his whims, and right now.

And you're right David: having the courage to solve real problems is hard and sometimes costly. I just wish that Maryland Democrats had some of this courage that you speak of, because they sure as hell didn't show it during the General Assembly session. Instead of reducing the size of government and assuring the people of Maryland that our state was under prudent financial stewardship, they instead rubber stamped O'Malley's profligate spending, sticking the citizenry with a higher tax bill as a result. That's certainly not leadership, that is, in fact, doing what's easy. Maryland Democrats are good at that.

Paulson later goes on to say something even more patently absurd:

In the end they couldn't even agree with each other on the Smith Island Cake. Some belittled our new "state cake" as a complete waste of time for a General Assembly facing serious issues. They must have forgotten it was a Republican sponsored bill in the first place.

Paulson forgets three key points:

1. Just because something is sponsored by Republicans doesn't mean it's a good idea. There are a lot of ideas from the moderate wing that aren't exactly beneficial to our side, nor are any number of bills that Republicans sign-on to as co-sponsors at all representative of our ideology;
   
   
2. Republicans actually have the testicular fortitude to call each other out when they go astray: Democrats outside of leadership have been for all intents and purposes been politically neutered in Maryland for some time now; and,
   
   
3. The Smith Island Cake was not the issue for a lot of people; it was Page Elmore's sellout of his vote for O'Malley's profligate budget to get the Smith Island Cake bill passed that was the real key issue.

What's odd is that David Paulson would spend his time kicking us while we were already down. I just wish that Paulson would spend less time psychoanalyzing the Republican side of the aisle, and instead spend more time trying to explain and justify why Martin O'Malley and Maryland's Democratic leadership want to tax Marylanders right out of the state and why these "leaders" want to destroy Maryland's Middle and Working Class Families.

Kevin Maxwell: Smartass

Anne Arundel County School Superintendent Kevin Maxwell decided to respond to John Leopold's budget statement with less comments about how to improve schools, but did plenty to act like a smartass:

And even though he already decided to cut 50 non-teaching positions, he'll have to look at slicing more administrative positions from the school system's central office - all cuts that ultimately will hurt student achievement and his goal of taking county schools "from good to great."

"If you want a Mercedes, you have to pay for a Mercedes," Dr. Maxwell said. "And we didn't even ask for a Mercedes. We asked for a Chrysler, and we got a pogo stick."

Yeah, that's clever. Not as clever, though, as it would be for Maxwell to adequately fund teacher pay and adequately fund classroom development. The fact of the matter is that in the Anne Arundel County School System all of the pork is at the top of the heap. I have talked previously about all of the unnecessary bureaucracy in public schools, all of the unnecessary positions and money tied up in Riva Road as opposed to being in the classroom where it is actually needed. Why does Maxwell insist that he needs to have record-high school funding when, in actuality, we aren't even quite sure what we have exactly with so little money going towards the classroom?

Kevin Maxwell needs to get his fiscal hosue in order....and this is exactly why this was a stupid statement from the School Board Nominating Commission

Growth Potential

Read it for yourself:

How? Well that's the truly remarkable part. It wasn't a transplant. Mr Spievak re-grew his finger tip. He used a powder - or pixie dust as he sometimes refers to it while telling his story.

Mr Speivak's brother Alan - who was working in the field of regenerative medicine - sent him the powder.

For ten days Mr Spievak put a little on his finger.

"The second time I put it on I already could see growth. Each day it was up further. Finally it closed up and was a finger.

"It took about four weeks before it was sealed."

Now he says he has "complete feeling, complete movement."

The "pixie dust" comes from the University of Pittsburgh, though in the lab Dr Stephen Badylak prefers to call it extra cellular matrix.

Yikes....though I guess we have finally figured out a way for Maryland Democrats to get a clue.

New Refuge Podcast

If you can't get enough of hearing me opine, take a listen to the new Conservative Refuge Podcast, where Greg, Mark and I tackle the recent General Assembly session, as well as Greg and I talk about the School Board Nominating Commission.

As always, it's a great listen...

Saving the Planet, Starving the Poor

Another catch-up from yesterday, here is a frightening thought:

And it has linked food and fuel prices just as oil is rising to new records, pulling up the price of anything that can be poured into a gasoline tank. "The price of grain is now directly tied to the price of oil," says Lester Brown, president of Earth Policy Institute, a Washington research group. "We used to have a grain economy and a fuel economy. But now they're beginning to fuse."

That's right, ethanol is making it harder and harder for people to put food on their plate. Not just because it makes it harder to buy grain, but because of all of the other uses grain has as it relates to food production, particularly when it comes to feeding livestock. Read the whole thing...

I've talked before about the potential pratfalls of switching to an ethanol based fuel situation, whether it relates to the impact on the poor, increased pollution due to higher grain production, or the further degradation of rain forests. And once again I can't emphasize enough the idea that people are jumping headfirst into support ethanol production no matter how wasteful ethanol production is and how much the increased use and production of ethanol may hurt, not help, our environment.

Obviously, the private sector needs to take the initiative in creating alternatives to both the use of oil and the use of ethanol in fuel consumption. Clearly, if there is a way to produce cleaner fuels we need to investigate those alternatives but we certainly should not do so at the cost of making it harder and harder for our working families to put food on the table.

What's the Big Deal?

Catching up from yesterday, the Sun had an editorial bemoaning the Supreme Court's decision in an Indiana case requiring voters to identify themselves before casting their ballot:

By upholding Indiana's voter identification law, the U.S. Supreme Court has virtually ignored the nation's ignominious history of disenfranchising certain groups and sanctioned an overly restrictive solution in search of a problem. While the court's 6-3 ruling is not expected to have a major effect on the coming presidential election, it is likely to encourage more states to follow Indiana's lead, guaranteeing that more Americans could be denied one of the most basic rights in a democracy. Maryland should stick to its convictions and continue rejecting stricter voter ID requirements.

I am extremely confused by the Sun's logic on this one. On one hand, the Sun wants to protect "one of the most basic rights in a democracy" while simultaneously refusing to support ID measures that would strengthen that right. The fact of the matter is that when somebody casts their vote illegally, it cheapens the vote and diminishes the rights of all of those individuals who do the right thing, follow the law, and only vote legally.

Furthermore, the argument that ID requirement would negatively impact the poor and the elderly is just spurious. How in the world can anybody logically survive these days without some sort of identification card? And when you consider that the Motor Vehicle Administration issues non drivers-license identification cards, I'm not sure what the argument is.

Finally, the Sun trots out this silliness:

Rooting out voter fraud may be a legitimate concern, but ID laws such as Indiana's have taken on a distinctly partisan cast - generally favored by Republicans and opposed by Democrats - and seem to be more about limiting the right to vote. In a nation where voter participation is pretty pitiful, states such as Maryland that have successfully resisted stricter voting requirements come closer to the democratic ideal.

Again, there is no logical sense in this argument either. While sometimes the arguments for voter ID take on a partisan take, they really should not. It's not about limiting the right to vote, it's about limiting voter fraud, something that is all too common in places like Maryland, that do not have strict voter ID requirements.

If we all want to protect the sanctity of our votes, we all should support common sense voter ID laws like the Indiana law the Supreme Court just upheld.

But what about the independence of scientists?

What about it? You see, William Gray (as I have noted before) is the world renowned meteorologist from Colorado State University, famous for his hurricane season predictions. He's also a global warming skeptic. And one for whom the university tried to curtail funding for recently:

By pioneering the science of seasonal hurricane forecasting, William Gray turned a university far from the stormy seas into a hurricane research mecca.

But last year, the long-term relationship between Gray and Colorado State University, where he has worked for nearly half a century, nearly unraveled in an episode that highlights the politically charged atmosphere that surrounds the global warming debate.

University officials told Gray that handling media inquiries related to his forecasting required too much time and detracted from efforts to promote other professors' work.

Gray, who has emerged as a leading voice of skepticism about global warming, reacted hotly, firing off a memo to Dick Johnson, head of CSU's Department of Atmospheric Sciences, and others. He didn't buy the too-much-media reasoning.

"This is obviously a flimsy excuse and seems to me to be a cover for the Department's capitulation to the desires of some (in their own interest) who want to reign (sic) in my global warming and global warming-hurricane criticisms," Gray wrote in the memo obtained by the Chronicle.

Gray initially declined to speak about the issue. But on Tuesday, Gray acknowledged the dispute.

"You see, so many people in our department make a living off the global warming threat," he said. "So I think that's part of why they came to me."

Since last year, he said, the university has "backtracked" on its position.

CSU officials said late last week that they intend to support the release of Gray's forecasts as long as they continue to be co-authored by Phil Klotzbach, a former student of Gray's who earned his doctorate last summer, and as long as Klotzbach remains at CSU.

Gray, an emeritus professor at CSU who has taught dozens of graduate students who populate the National Hurricane Center and other research institutions, has become increasingly vocal in his skepticism about climate change, saying the planet is warming due to natural causes.

Other than once again noting the fact that the concept of scientific "consensus" on global warming is pure crap, I have to ask this question; is the row over funding at Colorado State related to his skepticism of global warming. And if it is, would not the global warming believers be crying foul if, say, a scientist who believed in global warming had his fundingcurtailed by a Republican administration?