Does This Remind You Of Anyone?

ARLINGTON, Texas - Christina Aguilera flubbed a line as she belted out the national anthem at the start of the Super Bowl Sunday night.

When she was supposed to sing the line "O'er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming," she instead repeated an earlier line, with a slight variation.

She sang "What so proudly we watched at the twilight's last gleaming," which is the same line from earlier in the song but with the word `watched' instead of the word `hailed.'

Source

Greenbay Packers Win The Super Bowl 31 - 25

That was an excellent game! Both Teams deserved to be there and it kept everyone on the edge of their seats until the last minute of the Game.

The Halftime Show was, well, (could be my age) stupid. Maybe next year Raven's and Redskins Fans.

A Letter To The Editor

HADDAWAY-RICCIO DOESN’T PRACTICE WHAT SHE PREACHES!

Ms. H-R, whose district in the House of Delegates includes part of Wicomico County, is the new Minority Whip, and in that role gave the Republican’s response to O’Malley’s State of the State scam last week. She lambasted his absurd budget proposal that has even more spending this year, including a huge political payback to the state employees ($750 bonus, etc.). She set the tone early in her rebuttal by addressing the deficit reduction that O’Malley has proposed do: "While the Governor has made a start, it simply is not enough." After discussing other aspects of the budget/deficit she turned to Maryland’s version of earmarks – bills that members sponsor to get special state funding for pet local projects to curry favor with their constituents (commonly called "pork"). About that she stated:
"Many legislative members, including myself, have important projects that we would like to have funded, but in light of the economic times we face, our Caucus has asked that these projects not be funded."

At least Ms. H-R is not dishonest – in recent weeks she has introduced bills seeking bucks for these "important" projects in her district (none of them in Wicomico County, however):
$250,000 - Chesapeake Maritime Museum (Eckardt, Colburn)
$250,000 - hospice in Talbot County (Eckardt, Colburn)
$500,000 - senior housing in Cambridge (Eckardt, Cane & Colburn)
$ 75,000 - Dorchester Center for the Arts (Eckardt, Cane)
$300,000 - replica of a lighthouse (Eckardt, Cane, Colburn)

The names in parenthesis are co-sponsors in the House or have sponsored the same pork in the Senate, such as "Rich" Colburn.

As these bills make clear, some of the "big spenders" are Republican. Besides those mentioned above, Senator Colburn is sponsoring these pieces of pork:
$400,000 - culinary center at Caroline H. S. (Pipkin)
$200,000 - buildings at Salisbury Zoo (Mathais, Conway, Cane)
$300,000 - Tri County Council Service Center (Mathias, Conway, Cane)

"Addie" Eckardt is no slough when it comes to pork. At present the only Lower Shore Republicans who remain pork-free politicos are Mike McDermott and Charles Otto, the new kids on the block.

And our local Democrat members also have their hand in the pork-barrel once again. Norm Conway is sometimes called the "Prince of Pork" in Annapolis. In past years his slabs of fatback include money (several hundred thousand) that he got for the Rotary Club’s "boy scout camp" on Riverside Drive a few years back.

To him, Mathias and Cane, pork is an entitlement – just ask them.

Once again, with the General Assembly in session, there’s a loud noise coming from Annapolis: Oink, Oink.

SBYnews VERSES THE DAILY TIMES - REPORTING STANDARDS

As a freelance journalist and a contributing columnist for SBYnews - I cannot help but to notice of the stark differences in style and delivery of news between these two main stream medias.

For example - in today's Daily Times - front and center - is an article whereby The Daily Times touts that the local unemployment rate is actually dropping here in Wicomico.

'According to the Maryland Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation, unemployment peaked at 10.5 percent in January of last year in Wicomico County but dropped to 8.7 percent in December.'
As a lifelong resident - I can assure you that these numbers are erroneous as once the unemployment recipients have exhausted their unemployment benefits - then - these individuals fall out of the State unemployment reporting system.

I strongly maintain that the local unemployment rate is more than double - in the order of 20% range - as to what The Daily Times reading audience is being told.

As most of you already probably know - SBYnews has been tabulating the actual number of local business closures, and, the estimated number of displaced workers. We've posted that information a number of times on our site and will do so again very soon.

So keep your eyes glued to SBYnews.

Delegate Mike McDermott Field Notes Jan 31-Feb 4 2011

Field Notes

Observations and Reflections on Legislative Activities

By  Delegate  Mike  McDermott

Week of Jan. 31^st through Feb. 4^th

• Monday afternoon I met with a Children’s Day Care advocacy group from Wicomico and Worcester Counties. There were about a dozen women, primarily single moms, who struggle with the cost of Day Care and are concerned about current government subsidies provided to them for this purpose. Many of them are dealing with dead beat dads heavily in arrears on Child Support payments. They had this in common…they all wanted to work and provide for their children. Yet, most of them would have been better off financially to stay home and receive welfare as opposed to working and paying for Child Care. This is not an easy fix, but I would much prefer to supplement folks trying to help their families become independent rather than to pay the same people not to work. This is too typical of our social programs.
• Monday following session I participated in an annual Chess Tournament between the House and the Senate. I beat my opponent and advanced to the next round. I cherished it for a few moments…it may be my only “victory” in the legislature this year.
• Tuesday the Judiciary Committee heard testimony on HB-35 which seeks to define “income” as it relates to Child Support payments. Those testifying wanted to see the state use the base amount of a person’s income used for determining Child Support payments as opposed to the counting of overtime into the mix as well. The same was said of second jobs. It seems many will take on second jobs to make up for payments in arrears and they do not want the secondary employment income seen as their “base income”. There were good points made, but I do not know if this bill will see a vote in committee.
• On Tuesday, the Judiciary Committee also received a briefing by MVA on the state’s Ignition Interlock System Program. This is a mandatory program which requires certain driver’s convicted of DWI offenses to have a device installed on their personal vehicle which requires the driver submit a breath sample before the vehicle will operate. Initial kinks seem to have been worked out of the system based on the questions asked by Committee members regarding past concerns. There was some discussion on the use of pictures taken by some of the machines which show clearly who is providing the breath sample at the time of delivery. It was thought this may be helpful insuring the breath sample is provided by the proper person. This was an interesting discussion as the committee will see at least two other bills regarding these devices and the potential for their expanded use in Maryland.
• I attended a reception hosted by the Cable Telecommunications Association early Tuesday evening and met with local Comcast representatives. On display was their latest technology offering of 3-D television viewing. The folks there were all sharing their concerns over further government regulations, mandates, and fees on their industry.
• Wednesday morning started off meeting with the Secretary of Agriculture and the Maryland Egg Council. This industry is pretty significant in Maryland and shared similar concerns that all poultry growers and farmers have of the current regulations being prescribed by the MDE and the EPA over their industry. We keep banging that gong, but so far we are meeting a deaf ear.
• Wednesday afternoon I met with Del. Conway, Sen. Mathias, and all 7 of the Worcester County Commissioners to discuss the LCB. We had a very open and candid discussion which lasted a little over an hour. It was agreed that the Commissioners would take a few days to address some of our concerns and then contact us for further action. It was very productive and moved the ball down the field of finding a satisfactory solution to the shared concerns around the table.
• Late Wednesday afternoon, a special meeting of the Republican Caucus was held. Following a great discussion, it was unanimously agreed that the caucus would issue a statement in support of Maryland’s definition of marriage as being between one man and one woman. I felt this was an important decision as several bills in the House and Senate are moving forward which seek to redefine marriage in Maryland. No doubt, this will be a fight in committee and on the floor of both chambers.
• Thursday morning I attended a briefing on the various pension systems, their insolvency, and their potential impact on future budgets. This was the third briefing I have attended in the early morning hours being conducted by Republican law makers. I have found them very informative. Bottom line: our systems are in a great deal of trouble and are not sustainable. They are broke and need fixing. We have heard the reports from a bi-partisan committee, and they are ugly. The ruling party has neglected to fund these liabilities for the past 10-years. This, coupled with the Stock Market crash, has led to a crisis that must be solved.
• Thursday both houses convened in the House of Delegates at 11:30 AM to receive the Governor’s State of the State Address. Much as been said regarding the governor’s intended direction, and I have issued my own response to his speech. I will say that these events are full of ceremony and recognitions which take a long time. The House floor is full to overflowing with folks waiting to hear the speech. While I deeply enjoyed the history of the event and being a part of it, I was very disturbed by some of the things contained in the Governor’s speech…as were many on both sides of the isle. I continued to hear those sentiments echoed throughout Annapolis until I left for home on Friday afternoon.
• Friday morning was the weekly meeting of the Eastern Shore Delegation. It is always nice to see folks from home in Annapolis. We heard from the folks with the DPI on the state of the poultry industry. Director Bill Satterfield spoke about how the industry has gone through 5 years of relatively flat growth and how we need to average roughly 100-new poultry houses constructed on the Delmarva  annually if we are to remain viable and growing. They voiced concerns over attempts to ban the antibiotic roxarsone (a feed supplement for birds which contains small amounts of arsenic). Some questions were raised over any potential impact of these trace levels of arsenic on the environment, and, in particular, the bay. DPI assured us the use was well within guidelines established by the USDA and the effects were negligible on the environment. The Delegation was also thanked for their support on legislative efforts to protect the poultry industry.

We also heard from Secretary John Griffin of the Department of Natural Resources. There was clearly some tension in the room as the Secretary was questioned about the status of Oyster Sanctuaries and recent enforcement efforts impacting local fishermen. It seems Natural Resources Police are utilizing GPS tracking devices to monitor the whereabouts of some fishing boats on the bay for possible violations. This led to some very testy remarks between Sen. Rich Colburn and Sec. Griffin. Clearly, there is general angst between the professional watermen and the DNR. The elected officials were just delivering the message.

We also heard from folks with Bramble Construction Contractors. They came in to voice support for a hike in the fuel tax to restore funding to the Transportation Trust Fund. It was clear that the Delegation believes that the Trust Fund is adequately supplied through current taxes if the governor and the ruling party would stop raiding hundreds of millions of dollars to support the General Fund. I did not see anyone at the table who though another 10 cents per gallon at the pump was a good idea.

Krauthammer: Toward A Soft Landing In Egypt

Who doesn't love a democratic revolution? Who is not moved by the renunciation of fear and the reclamation of dignity in the streets of Cairo and Alexandria?
  
The worldwide euphoria that has greeted the Egyptian uprising is understandable. All revolutions are blissful in the first days. The romance could be forgiven if this were Paris 1789. But it is not. In the intervening 222 years, we have learned how these things can end.
  
The Egyptian awakening carries promise and hope and of course merits our support. But only a child can believe that a democratic outcome is inevitable. And only a blinkered optimist can believe that it is even the most likely outcome.

Yes, the Egyptian revolution is broad-based. But so were the French and the Russian and the Iranian revolutions.

Indeed in Iran, the revolution only succeeded -- the shah was long opposed by the mullahs -- when the merchants, the housewives, the students and the secularists joined to bring him down.
   
And who ended up in control? The most disciplined, ruthless and ideologically committed -- the radical Islamists.

More

Dangerously Underestimating The Muslim Brotherhood

The precedents are fresh and obvious. Yet the US government seems intent on ignoring them.

In Iran in 1979, leftist and other secular forces, central to the rising pressure that ousted the Shah, were duped and then outflanked by Islamist supporters of Ayatollah Khomeini, who took power and have cemented it for 32 years since. The Islamists achieved this despite having constituted only the most marginal of forces just a couple of years earlier.

In the Palestinian territories in 2006, the US insisted on pressing ahead with elections that, in part because of Fatah’s corruption and disorganization, saw the underestimated Islamist Hamas terror group gain a parliamentary majority, which it then exploited to violently take over the Gaza Strip a year later.

In Lebanon over the past few weeks, the Iranianinspired, controlled and financed Hizbullah outmaneuvered the hapless prime minister Saad Hariri, to complete what amounts to a gradual, highly sophisticated takeover of the country.

In Turkey in recent years, confidence that such secular bulwarks as the army and the judiciary would prevent growing Islamic domination of the national agenda has proved increasingly misplaced, again via the subtle and protracted marginalization of these former establishment pillars. Turkey, champion of Hamas, nemesis of Israel, is now drifting inexorably out of the western orbit.

Washington’s apparent disinclination, as it now tries to influence the process of Hosni Mubarak’s replacement, to internalize the dangers highlighted by the Iran, Gaza, Lebanon and Turkey disasters, and thus do everything in its power to prevent the Muslim Brotherhood presiding over a similar process in Egypt, is incomprehensible.

And it could prove immensely threatening for Israel.

For all President Barack Obama’s declared intent to usher in a new partnership between the US and the Muslim world, what he termed “a new beginning” in his 2009 speech in Cairo, his diplomats did not deliver significant diplomatic pressure on Mubarak to reform his regime in the past two years. This was most starkly confirmed by December’s vigorously fraudulent parliamentary elections, which featured mass arrests of opposition supporters and the firm muzzling of critical media, and in which the Muslim Brotherhood’s 88-seat share of theprevious 454-member parliament descended to zero because of the regime’s machinations.

Washington evidently failed to foresee that embittered Egyptians might then resort to the massed protests of the past two weeks, and it abandoned Mubarak with alacrity as it scrambled to avoid being caught on the wrong side of a largely spontaneous people’s push for freedom and democracy.

Read more at JPost

Mice Trained To Rat On Terrorists

An Israeli start-up uses mice to sniff out explosives at security checkpoints. The company, named BioExplorers, is staffed by IDF Special Forces reservist soldiers and biologists. They say that mice have a keener sense of smell than dogs, and can be trained to identify the odor of explosive material as an unpleasant one.

"Bio Explorers systems are based on combining the hyper- sensitive olfactory capability of rodents with the care-free reliability of a hi-tech machine system," the firm explains on its website. "Many millions of years of evolution made the olfactory system of rodents incredibly sensitive, quick and specific as this is their main sense used for foraging, mating and avoiding predators."

The system does not involve any physical contact between the mice and the people being screened. As the embedded promotional video shows, the mice are completely invisible to the people being checked. The "Biosensors," as the trained mice are called, are housed inside "cassette enclosures," each holding 4-8 mice supplied with all their needs. The warrior rodents' basic training takes about 10 days. In this time they are trained to identify a specific odor as unpleasant, and react to it by moving into a different compartment, away from the smell. Training for recognition of additional odors take a few days each.

"Rodents are known to remember dozens of different odors and differentiate them from thousands of other odors," the website explains. "Each of the 4-8 rodents in the system will be trained to react to all the relevant odors."

Biosensors claims that skepticism over the reliability of mice is not justified, noting that sniffer dogs are currently considered the most reliable means of detecting explosives. Checking a person or item with mice takes 3-6 seconds, while a check using dogs takes at least a minute.

The firm claims it conducted a successful experiment in a Tel Aviv shopping center in December 2009, in which 22 explosive charges were planted on people entering the mall, or in objects they carried. All 22 charges were identified by the mice.

More here

'Pattern Emerges' Of Abortionists Covering For Child Sex-Traffickers

Three more undercover videos taken at separate Planned Parenthood clinics have been released by an organization called Live Action, which claims it's finding "alarming patterns" of abortion providers willing to aid and abet underage sex-trafficking.

"Live Action has previously released more than a dozen hidden camera videos from ten states," Live Action asserted in a statement. "This body of visual evidence shows several alarming patterns of illegal Planned Parenthood activities including cover-up of sexual abuse of minors, the skirting of parental consent laws, citing unscientific and fabricated medical information to manipulate women to have abortions, and Planned Parenthood's willingness to accept donations earmarked to abort African-American babies."

As WND reported earlier this week, the Live Action team, posing as the leaders of an underage prostitution ring in Richmond, Va., discovered a Planned Parenthood worker assuring them they'd find "no judgment, no sharing of information, like, uh, nothing here," at the clinic and explaining how they could go about getting a "judicial bypass" of abortion laws for girls as young as 14 or 15.

Now Live Action has released three more videos to demonstrate an ongoing "pattern" of ignoring sex-trafficking.

"We are sending [Virginia] Attorney General Cuccinelli and Virginia law enforcement officials new, disturbing footage from three Virginia clinics," says Live Action President Lila Rose. "The footage explicitly shows Planned Parenthood staff willing to engage in activity that sexually exploits minors and young women. The evidence continues to mount and shows a clear pattern where Planned Parenthood is willing aid and abet the sex-trafficking industry.

"These are abhorrent practices, and it is time Planned Parenthood be held accountable," Rose said.
The videos capture conversations between the undercover "pimp" and Planned Parenthood staffers in three Virginia cities: Charlottesville, Falls Church and Roanoke.

In the Roanoke video, viewable below, the Planned Parenthood staffer offered the "pimp" emergency, 5-day contraceptive pills that he could pick up for his underage "girls." The staffer also encouraged him, if he was worried about having a sexually transmitted disease, to go donate blood, because the plasma places "have to test for everything anyway."

She further explained for his underage girls, "From the age of 12 up, for birth control, you can just come in and do that. You don't have to have a parent, OK?"

More from WND

Winter May Not Be Over Just Yet

We're watching the possibilities of a snow event for the region, beginning on Wednesday night and going into Thursday night.

And to add insult to injury, we may find ourselves in the coldest air of the winter right afterward.. maybe even single digits.

The aforementioned system should begin in the western Gulf of Mexico, bringing lots of trouble with it as it tracks eastward into our area.

Of course, the storm hasn't even formed yet, and if this were any other winter, we could probably disregard some of the tools we look at suggesting a major winter storm along the Atlantic Seaboard and in part of the South.

If this storm develops, it will begin as a swath of snow and wintry mix over the southern Plains and the lower Mississippi Valley Wednesday, then roll into the Southeast Wednesday night, and the Northeast Thursday.

The track and strength of this particular storm, if it indeed occurs, will determine precipitation type and intensity for tens of millions of people. And storm or not, more intense cold will empty out of the Arctic into much of the eastern two-thirds of the U.S.

More from Accuweather

SB316

Dear Senator Madaleno,

As the President of the citizens group VOICE in Wicomico County we would like to know why a Senator from across the bay would be introducing a bill that would try to by pass our county's Revenue Cap? Now I know your county has a similar cap but your citizens left an opening for the county council to over ride the cap with a super majority. That was a drastic mistake. I know how many times your county council has taken advantage of this and raised taxes. I mean after all, anything can be considered an emergency right? So why would you be doing this if it really doesn't affect you? Who was the person from our county who contacted you to do this and what explanation did he give? Our people would surely love to know who is behind this type of politics. You can believe this will come out on the Senate floor. I'm sure you wouldn't like it if we came to one of your county council meetings and encouraged your county voters to amend your County Charter to remove the section that allows them to over ride their cap. I ask that you reconsider SB316 and withdraw it before this goes any further. I would also ask that you contact whoever ask you to do this and tell them that they need to visit the results from the last election and explain to them what the results meant. I'm sure this type of politics would be appreciated by his constituents in his next re-election bid.

Changing Light Bulbs @ 1,700 ft.

GO HERE and check this out.

The Future Of Shopping

Matthew John Swinehart Is The WINNER Of The Fernando Free Tocket Giveaway

Matthew John Swinehart was the first person to answered the question correctly and has won 2 FREE Tickets to the Fernando Guerrero Fight on Feb. 18th. Matthew answered the question soon after we published the post. Great job!

Mathew, your two free tickets will be available to you at the Will Call Window on fight night at the WCYCC. Congratulations and thanks for participating.

If you have any questions you can contact me at alberobutzo@wmconnect.com.