What is truly unfortunate is that the libertarian philosophy is truly the governing philosophy most closely related to that of our founding fathers; things such as limited government, low taxes, individual liberty and a free market. Of course, those are the same principles often articulated by Republicans. So what�s the difference?

The Libertarians mean it.---Chuck Muth (Republican).

The sectional of the high school robotics competition was in town the last couple of days, and we thought we'd wander over and see whassup. We sat with the Jesuit side, so a dad was explaining the problem to us as we watched. It's definitely Quidditch. There are small goals with big yellow balls on them. Trigger balls on the sides. Racks filled with smaller blue balls. There are openings in each corner for the small balls. There are tall goals. A bar across the middle. They have two minutes: first they attempt to push off the trigger balls, or block the opponent's openings. The first 15 seconds the robots are working on their own, and after that the teams are directing them. Two teams work together, and some of them have an offensive and defensive robot.

After the first 15 seconds, all the blue balls drop. If they get out the openings, the teams can throw them into the tall goals. The robots try to cap the goal with a big yellow ball and hang themselves on the rack, all within 2 minutes.

We saw one team push a goal to block an opening, then sit under the rack with a net, but then they dropped half the balls back in the wrong direction. The other team capped their goal and hung their robot and won this round.

I wouldn't even have this much understanding without the dad. They're given the problem in January and have to have the robot approved by someone in early March. This match had teams from Florida and Hawaii as well as more local ones, including two schools from Oregon on the NASA Oregon Space Grant.

We need Vince to get moved to Folsom so he could advise the Jesuit team!

*******
Kerry fights Bush first, terrorism second, Daniel Henniger. It's Sour Grapes Politics.

Taranto, If this guy weren't so damn electable, we'd say he has no chance of winning.

The New York Times finds Kerry arrogant. More:

When asked about the [fall while Kerry was snowboarding] mishap a moment later, he said sharply, "I don't fall down," then used an expletive to describe the agent who "knocked me over."

Nice guy. I wonder what he called the agent (a man who is there to take a bullet for him).

Notice something else about the quote? Kerry says, "I don't fall down." Not "I didn't fall down": "I DON'T fall down." It sounds like he's saying, "I don't make mistakes." I.e., he is Mr. Perfection.

Kerry's Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day.

More seriously, though, was he at the Vietnam Veterans Against the War meeting where they planned to assassinate Senators? He quit around then (to his credit) but surely he should have reported it? Not reporting this kind of plot is a felony. Quick says "If this gets out, and it seems it will, he's going to have big trouble..." Whatever made him think he could run for President? Must be the arrogance.

Heh.