BKCFoC CotC ARK WCB

Might as well share another pic of Cece, others haven’t gone out where the good tummy shots are for Tummy Tuesday. Least during the day. Probably just as well, it got up to 99° F outside. Can’t wait for the summer. Not! I bout died by the time I got back from the store, never should have gone out in the daytime. Cats are smarter than I am. But they have more kitty food so they be happy cats. The sacrifices we humans make for the little beasties.

The cat stuff: BKCFoC CotC ARK WCB

By the same comments he only found offensive before, well those and a few more. From CNN is his response.

Sen. Barack Obama said he is “outraged” by comments his former minister, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, made Monday at the National Press Club and is “saddened by the spectacle.”
Sen. Barack Obama on Tuesday denounced comments made by the Rev. Jeremiah Wright.

“I have been a member of Trinity Church since 1992. I have known Rev. Wright for almost 20 years,” he said at a news conference in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. “The person I saw yesterday is not the person I met 20 years ago.”

Obama said he is outraged by Wright’s remarks that seemed to suggest the U.S. government might be responsible for the spread of AIDS in the black community and his equation of some American wartime efforts with terrorism.

Maybe he should have paid attention to the clips that have been running on FoxNews these past several weeks that sparked the outrage. Took Wright hammering in the point for Obama to get the point.

“What particularly angered me was his suggestion somehow that my previous denunciation of his remarks were somehow political posturing,” Obama said, adding that Wright had shown “little regard for me” and seemed more concerned with “taking center stage.”

His mild refuting of them earlier came across as disingenuous. And it took him a few days and more than one reiteration by Wright to notice Wright dismissed his distancing himself from Wright as political posturing. Wonder too if it still is. Note, with both of them, it’s all about “me.”

Obama said Wright’s comments were not only “divisive and destructive,” but they “end up giving comfort to those who prey on hate.”

Obama said he did not think Wright’s comments accurately portrayed the perspective of the black church and said they “certainly do not portray accurately” his own values and beliefs.

Oh yes, I had failed to come up with Wright’s comment on that, something along the lines of it being not an attack on him but an attack on the black church. Maybe Obama was one of those C & E people and just failed to catch the offensive sermons. That would have been a good excuse. He goes on to really distance himself from Wright.

Obama said Monday that Wright’s remarks were “antithetical to our campaign; it was antithetical to what we’re about.”

“I cannot prevent him from making these remarks,” but “when I say I find these comments appalling, I mean it. It contradicts what I’m about and who I am. … It is completely opposed to what I stand for and where I want to take this country.”

Well, Wright left no doubt where he stands and it isn’t taking sound bytes out of context. Obama had no choice but to come out forcefully against his former minister if he’s to win the election and put this mess to rest. But do we believe him or is it politics as usual?

While waiting for the fridge to be delivered, I took pics of the only cat I could find outside and that be Cece. Doesn’t he look just adorable here?

All the cats, Cece included, disappeared when they arrived with the fridge. Lots of styrofoam packing, didn’t recognize it until they had peeled off the stuff. Then I could say that’s the one. I was pleasantly amazed at how easily they got the old fridge out and put the new one in, even connected up the water line as this one has an ice maker. Never had one of those before. Only missed two pieces of tape, they had unpacked it pretty well. I was impressed.

Anyway, food is back in the fridge and the cats have come out and I gave them extra treats, Whiskas® | Purrfectly Fish, real fish in it too. Cats love it. Nothing like having happy cats.

More mancats and ladycats: BKCFoC CotC ARK WCB

The Reverend Wright story isn’t going away, well not with him going on his ‘all about me’ tour. This in USA Today article.

“I come from a religious tradition where we shout in the sanctuary and march on the picket lines,” he said. “The black religious experience is different. … Different does not mean deficient.”

During a nearly hour-long interview aired Friday on PBS, Wright said he had been “crucified by corporate-owned media.” He did not recant his controversial sermons — including one in which he suggested that the 9/11 terrorist attacks were payback for “terrorism” that the U.S. government had perpetrated abroad in military actions against Libya, Panama, Iraq and in the nuclear attacks on Japan that ended World War II.

He said he is being exposed to “vitriolic hatred” and death threats because Americans “would rather cling to what they are taught” than come to grips with facts about their government’s acts of oppression against Native Americans, African-Americans and foreign civilians caught in the crossfire of war.

And what Barack Obama had to say about the controversy, note he doesn’t say which comments offended him.

“I think that people were legitimately offended by some of the comments that he had made in the past,” he said. “The fact that he’s my former pastor I think makes it a legitimate political issue.”

OK, that means he’s fair game for the Republicans. Meanwhile over at CNN, Wright clarifies his position.

Democratic candidate Sen. Barack Obama’s former pastor told an audience of thousands at an NAACP dinner Sunday that he was “descriptive” but “not divisive” when he talks about race relations in America.

“I describe the conditions in this country,” the Rev. Jeremiah Wright said during his lively keynote address at the Detroit chapter’s 53rd Freedom Fund dinner.

“Conditions divide, not my descriptions,” he said.

“I am sorry your local political analysts and your neighboring county executives think my being here is polarizing and my sermons are divisive, but I’m not here to address an analyst’s opinion,” he said. “I am here to address your 2008 theme … (of) change is going to come.”

Um, not divisive, not buying that. And from the sound bytes I’ve heard today and I’ve heard plenty, he’s still divisive.

None the worse for wear but a wee bit dirty, Meowza, after his little wrassling match with Cece.

Weekend brings some mighty fine catblogging on some very pretty blogs:

Bad Kitty Cats Festival of Chaos at Pet’s Garden Blog
Carnival of the Cats at House Panthers
Friday Ark at the Modulator always
Weekend Cat Blogging at A Byootaful Life

Found this fun plugin for WordPress blogs that makes posting more fun… if you’re a cat. I think it explains their attention to details like spellcheck. Meowza tested it out as did I, works up to 2.6 (bleeding).

It is not necessary to have all boring plugins, gotta have some amusement.

Unrelated, I finally fixed the nice title bit when I mouse over stuff. I’ve been tinkering with the site.

Now, I must peruse this dictionary, always can find words I don’t know. Or can’t spell.

And soon to be put out of it’s misery, my fridge. What! You didn’t think it was a cat, did you? They are all nice and healthy. Anyway, got to get ready for the new one, clean out the fridge and all. Big pain, even bigger cause of the way the kitchen is designed, kindof U C shaped with one entry between counter and wall, all of 28 inches wide. Hard to find a fridge that will fit in the kitchen at a reasonable price seeing as they make the more affordable ones too deep for the space.

I was expecting it seeing as the fridge was 23 years old. They don’t last forever. Longer than kittycats thou. I thought about replacing the thermostat or whatever is making it so everything is freezing but doubt I could find the part seeing as it is so old.

Still, going for economy not flash, no stainless steel fridge for me.

Well, it was for me, $3.439 per gallon for regular. Just filled up. Was $3.199 per gallon last time I filled up, same station, not quite three weeks apart. Expected to go higher too.

At the pump, meanwhile, gas prices rose another 2.1 cents Friday to a record national average of $3.577 a gallon, according to AAA and the Oil Price Information Service. Gas prices have been following oil futures higher, but are also rising due to concerns about whether gasoline supplies are adequate to meet peak summer driving demand.

Analysts expect gas prices to continue rising for at least another month to $3.70 to $4 a gallon. To a large extent, how high gas prices peak depends on what oil does.

Next higher grade was up there, they didn’t waste any time here raining the price. Why the rise? Today? Oh just this.

Oil prices rose sharply Friday on news that a ship under contract to the U.S. Defense Department fired warning shots at two boats in the Persian Gulf. Retail gas prices as expected rose further into record territory, nearing $3.60 a gallon.

Crude prices rose on initial reports that a U.S. ship had fired on two Iranian boats; the news raised concerns that a conflict between U.S. and Iranian forces could cut oil supplies from the region. A Navy spokeswoman said the origin of the boats was unclear.

Just what we needed, a provocative move by Iran. Not! Oil and gas prices are doing just fine going up on their own. Don’t need Iranian help.

The news was enough to send light, sweet crude for June delivery up to $119.55 before the contract retreated to settle up $2.46 at $118.52 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

Least oil is still below $120 a barrel. Some consolation.

From the header of my WordPress.com blog, I can post to three blogs, this one, my test blog, one of them anyway, and obviously from my WordPress.com blog. I can access the dashboards of all three too. Note this one is still using WP 2.3.3, the test blog is running WP 2.6 (bleeding), and the WordPress.com blog is running WP 2.5 customized for WordPress.com. Doesn’t seem to matter.

All my blogs are using WordPress’s API key so not sure how they picked those three. I could state in my profile which one I considered my main blog, obviously this one with some 15mb worth of data. Another interesting bit of trivia.

Course, not annoying like when I started a Blogspot blog so I could check out their themes and it imported all the posts I had made to my original blog circa 2001 - 2003 hosted on my site admittedly using Blogger. Still wondering how they did that. I had thought that once I posted them to my site, they were mine not Blogger’s. Note one need not go there to see the old posts as I long ago imported them here.

Just discovered I can view the stats for all three WP blogs from all three WP blogs although I have to log in to WordPress.com each time even thou I am already logged in and I click “remember me” every time, same browser.

The Reverend Wright’s comment on Barack Obama’s comment on Reverend Wright’s comments to his congregation which were taken out of context according to Reverend Wright.

“He goes out as a politician and says what he has to say as a politician. I continue to be a pastor who speaks to the people of God about the things of God.“

Got that? Obama has to say what he has to say as a politician, typical. Not some innovator arguing for change, a politician. P. O. L. I. T. I. C. I. A. N. And we know what they’re like.

Oh, incidentally, from that comment and others he has made and been widely circulated on FoxNews, looks like Wright considers his black congregation the people of God. Never mind historically, it has always been the Jews. Brief primer on history, Christianity was taken to the Gentiles after the Jews, God’s people, rejected it and, even then, they proceeded to pervert it.

Yes, I consider Black Liberation Theology a perversion of Christianity and I am not alone in that assertion.

And the Messiah who will come isn’t black either. Whether one believes him to be Jesus, a Jew, or not, he will still be a Jew.

There, I’ll get off my soapbox and go back to petting kitties.

Prefer cats to politics: BKCFoC CotC ARK WCB

Maybe there will be peace in the land today unlike yesterday when Cece decided to interrupt Meowza’s roll in the dirt. Note Cece watching Meowza bare it all.

And he jumped right on poor defenseless Meowza too. Well, not really defenseless. Meowza has sharp teeth and claws.

Now I know it wasn’t a food fight as Cece had just been in to chow down, twice in one day. I think Meowza’s tummy is just so irresistible he couldn’t help himself. Cece just isn’t into petting tummies is all.

It’s a cat thing.

Weekend catting: BKCFoC CotC ARK WCB

Got this in the email and decided to take a look at it. I copy/pasted it exact, spelling errors and all. Thought it was funny.

Dear Friend.

Good day is an act of greeting, I dont mean your name is Good day all i mean is an expression of greeting so dont get me wrong. Meanwhile, Like i told you before. i have been waiting for you since to come down here and pick your bank draft but did not hear from you since that time then i went and deposited the $1.200,000.00 usd draft/cheque in the bank.We have arranged your payment through swift card payment center Asia pacific, this card center will send you an atm card which you will use to withdraw your money in any atm machine in any part of the world, but the maximum is One Thousand, Five Hundred United States Dollars Per-Day.

Kindly contact the below person who is in possition to release your ATM Payment Card.Send your information which they will use to send the card to you.

1:: Your full name::
2:: Your home address were you them to send the atmcard::
3:: Current occupation::
4:: Age::
5:: Your current home telephone number/mobile phone number::
6:: A Copy of youridentification::

However, kindly contactthe below person who is in position to release your atm card.
YourATM Payment Card
Mr. samuel kelvin Director,
ATM Payment Department Apex Bank
Ttel: +229-93 89 80 82
Email:APEX_bank_b@yahoo.com

I have paid for the processing and delivery charges.the only money that your are going to pay to them is only $165 dollars which they will use to obtain the affidevit of onwership from the federal high court of Benin Republic.

Try to contact them as soon as possible to quicken the processing of your card before your draft gets expired .

Let me know as soon as you receive your card. Wait for your respond. .

Note the email address. What reputable bank would have a yahoo.com email address? Incidentally, Benin borders Nigeria. Apple didn’t fall far from the tree.

Anyone falling for this scam should be forced to accompany Jimmy Carter on one of his infamous trips. Eediots would go together so well.

Messing with blogs on the other hand…

Must find theme that works for Cece. Keep cat happy although food works for him.

And the others, always.

I’ll be checking on the TGH members blogs for ideas.

And the bracelets arrived today, thankies. They’re adorable.

Bringing it’s own special flavor to Earth Day celebrations, oil was up getting high.

Light, sweet crude for May delivery rose as high as $119.90 barrel, then slipped back to settle at $119.37, up $1.89. But it appeared inevitable crude would pass $120.

Which will only incite the greenies to want more alternative energy sources. More ethanol, less corn. Less food period. Dumb. We already have food rationing. Here. In the U.S..

Major retailers in New York, in areas of New England, and on the West Coast are limiting purchases of flour, rice, and cooking oil as demand outstrips supply.

Nice huh? Not as nice as no pee on the bread machine thou. Think I’ll go buy some cooking oil and bake some bread.

Was blissfully ignorant of how widespread the holiday is, worldwide. Why it’s like a religious holiday. Not on my list to celebrate.

One of the highlights of the week for me is Tummy Tuesday or is it for Meowza? He loves to roll in the dirt and I love to take pics of him doing so.

Meowza waxes apolitical on his tummy post.

More kitty goodness: BKCFoC CotC ARK WCB

At the bottom of my admin screen, it states, “You are using a development version (2.6-bleeding). Cool!” That’s the test blog not this one. So far, it’s working. Not much different from 2.5 just some minor fixes. I blogged about it at some length there then took to the sofa and a cat nap with the kitties. Still nodding off.

Fell asleep before finishing this.

OK, now it’s finished.

The usual cat stuff: BKCFoC CotC ARK WCB

Classical Values has the most interesting post about earth day and it’s relationship to certain persons’ birthdays and their value systems. It’s a must read if one is to make sense of my ramblings.

It made me think. Just what does going green mean to us? Moreover does being a vegetarian, animal lover, “attracted to nature mysticism and homeopathic cures, and staunchly opposed to vivisection and cruelty to animals” make one a better person? Does valuing animal life equal to or above human life make one a better person? Or does it make one an ecofascist?

“You can’t resist us kittycats.”

I imagine that were he alive today, Adolph and Al would have hit it off rather well both being “visionary environmentalists.”

What too does that say about our current environmentalist movement, the politically correct green movement, the global warming alarmists? Those that would save a spotted owl yet abort their own children? Now this is not to say there is anything wrong with being concerned with the environment. Just that some people have their priorities screwed up. After all, we were given stewardship over the earth.

“And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.” Genesis 1:28

We were supposed to have dominion over the animals. Something must have gotten lost in translation here. Admittedly, if you read on, we were all initially vegans.

“And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat.

“And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so.” Genesis 1:29

That won’t wash as justification for the greens even if they put any stock in the Bible. Cause that all changed with Noah.

“And God blessed Noah and his sons, and said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.

And the fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every beast of the earth, and upon every fowl of the air, upon all that moveth upon the earth, and upon all the fishes of the sea; into your hand are they delivered.

Every moving thing that liveth shall be meat for you; even as the green herb have I given you all things.” Genesis 9:1-3

So eat that steak and don’t feel guilty. You can still love your kittycats. I just don’t see the need to go to extremes that the environmentalists would have us do. We are a higher life form therefore should take precedence over the earth worshippers. Drill for oil in Anwar. We just might need it with oil topping out at $117.60 a barrel and gasoline $3.86 a gallon.

“You do love me dirty and all.”

Disclaimer: I do believe the Bible, I don’t believe Al Gore and am not a rabid environmentalist. I do love cats thou.

Blogging from laptop while Backup runs. I’d already done the take pics of Meowza and Cece and let Cece in to chow down then let him out again bits. Meowza went with him, both very dirtyboys. Rolling in the dirt is fun for them. Speaking of them, it’s time for my afternoon lay on sofa with the kittycats routine. Pics after.

OK, now 8PM, backup is finished, cleaned up the desktop and now adding pics. First up, dirtyboy himself.

“Yeeessssss. What do you want?”

And his cohort in grime, Cece. Note the lick. This was before he made a beeline for the door.

“I can taste it now, yum. Food for me.”

Cause Cece is guest hosting Weekend Cat Blogging and cause he’s just so cute, he deserved a snack.

Other kitty goings on this weekend:

Bad Kitty Cats Festival of Chaos at The Cat Blogosphere
Carnival of the Cats at Catymology
Friday Ark at the Modulator always

Them again, together almost like they were family. Meowza noticed the one lone flower growing amid the gravel while Cece groomed himself.

Cece is guest hosting Weekend Cat Blogging leaving me free to read this deposition. Gotta check it for errors and stuff. Cats got extra treats today.

Other kitty goings on this weekend:

Bad Kitty Cats Festival of Chaos at The Cat Blogosphere
Carnival of the Cats at Catymology
Friday Ark at the Modulator always

“You go into these small towns in Pennsylvania and … the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing’s replaced them.

“And it’s not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.” Barack Obama

This sums up the elitist opinion of the rest of us or does it? After all Republicans have guns, religion, are anti-illegal-immigrant, elitists included excepting Bush for that last part. Even John McCain isn’t anti-illegal immigrant. And isn’t it Obama himself that has problems with trade, NAFTA anyway?

This is going to be one of those dumb comments that dog him thru the campaign. Or should be.

One has to wonder if Obama is an elitist who looks down on us proletariats or a politician who will suck up to whoever will give him money or votes. Or both.

Mog and Meowza were slated to host Weekend Cat Blogging but I, Cece, am taking over just like I took over Mog’s blogs. So leave your links in the comments anytime before Monday… ah ha, see you have been doing that already in the previous post. OK, must work for my treats here. Anyway give me links and maybe Mog will give me some of those kitty treats or that new cat food she got today.

Things be shaking, not around here, over at Rocky, Callie, Fracas’ house. Not even party time either. Do they look like they are partying? This one’s so not my fault. Must give kitties extra loves and treats. Always.

Urgent help is needed to save these humans cat rescue operation from the clutches of the incredibly shortsighted city council. Must save kitties. Peeps that take care of us kitties are special and hoping this turns out ok. All those kitties will need homes too if they have to lose their shelter.

Meowza chimes in with why he’s so magnanimous in letting me do the blogging. Something about enjoying the nice warm weather. Hey wait a minute. I think he just wants to have all the fun while I slave away at the keyboard. Grrr. Well, I suppose it would be a lot worse if WordPress didn’t have spellcheck. Least he confirms my suspicions that Mog is a soft touch when it comes to us kitties.

Look, Parker can spell too. See, I’m not the only one even thou spellcheck might be seen as cheating.

Kitikata-san sure is a beautiful cat 美しい猫, better yet in person. Nothing beats being with us kitties. Looking for some tummy shots this Tuesday. Hint. Hint. Oh, I use Systran too.

Luna makes the perfect sculpture too, what a gorgeous girl. Is she taken?

I even have a post proving I do more than just blog. Yes, I too laze around in the sun way too often. Hint, Mog. Let me in more often.

Muchos gatos, hermosos. I so loved seeing all the kitties… and all the little critters kitties love to play with.

Show us your paws, Samantha, you beautiful girl. Between you and Tigger, let the kitties decide who is the most ferocious. I’m not telling.

Aww, she’s so cute, must go see pics of the most adorable DeeDee. Cute is what we trade on, gets me free food.

When this kitty plays, he really gets into it. Don’t overdo it now KamiKazi. That cat has energy to burn. Whew! Exhausted just looking at him. Reminds me a nap on Mog’s sofa is just the thing. I need to rejuvenate after that.

Love to have them mousies, mousies what I love to eat and play with. One of our favorite toys too.

Now this is the life, what every cat dreams of. Go China Cat and Willow! You show them how it’s done.

Keep sharing those links, weekend’s not over until Monday. I want more kitty treats.

Next week’s Weekend Cat Blogging will be at a Byootaful Life.

Other weekend cat events:

Bad Kitty Cats Festival of Chaos at The Cat Blogosphere
Carnival of the Cats at Catymology
Friday Ark at the Modulator always
Do take a look at The Catbloggers Frappr Map

Technorati tags: weekend cat blogging, WCB, cat, blog carnival

Bout time for a nice kitty pic, this time just Meowza sniffing the flowers.

More kittycats: BKCFoC CotC ARK WCB Note, I am hosting WCB this weekend.

First they sent me a new credit card although the old one doesn’t expire for another two years. I haven’t gotten around to activating it.

Then they sent me a notice that they closed the account due to inactivity. OK, I can deal with that. I haven’t charged anything on that account in ages.

Then today I got balance transfer checks for said account. Choose my rate of interest and pay off other cards, those kind of checks, the go in the shredder kind.

Did I mention account is closed.

Really makes sense, no?

Some further thoughts on WordPress 2.5.

Manage Posts: The good - one can batch delete if one so desires. It shows a post’s tags. The confusing - edit and view posts are not immediately obvious, have to mouse over to see which link does what. The bad - the time of day is gone as is the ability to find drafts easily. I realize they only have so much space to cram the stuff in and overall did a credible job.

Image upload works in a fresh install, is borked in upgrade. I await a fix.

Widgets: The drag and drop function is missing and if one wants to move a text widget to another column, one loses the widget he has customized. One is then forced to copy the contents of the widget into a separate file to keep in such case so he can paste them into another widget. That makes changing themes dicey as one may lose their widget if one goes from say a three column to a two-column theme. I hesitate to make changes despite being curious about the other themes. Sides, I like the theme I’m using now.

Fluency rocks, makes the admin area look a lot better. I find it easy to get around in too. I have one blog with it, one without so I can compare. Oh, and WordPress.com is now running 2.5 with better thumbnail sizes. Have blog there too for that Akismet key. Found a theme I like too although I need to add text to my header image.

Posting: The post page lacks the drag and drop functioning of 2.3 as well as a workable layout. Nearly everything is below the post area and requires lots of scrolling to add categories, tags and trackbacks. Stuff that would fit in the nearly empty sidebar are below the post area too. A custom edit-form-advanced.php solves part of the problem, puts categories in the right sidebar but need more.

TinyMCE: It works in Safari for the very first time.

I’m sure there will be plug-ins to fix and customize WP further. And I expect the developers will take into consideration the few remaining problems in 2.5 and fix them. Hopefully soon as I am enjoying the added functionality on the test blogs.

Jimmy Carter who met with Hamas’ Gaza leaders today in Egypt and is set to meet with it’s exiled leader in Syria on Friday. According to Gaza leader Mahmoud Zahar:

Zahar said Wednesday that Carter’s meetings with its leaders will boost the group’s legitimacy despite criticism by Israel and the U.S. government.

“This meeting is a message to those who don’t recognize Hamas’ legitimacy as a movement,” he said as he left for Egypt, according to Hamas’ Web site.

When will we recognize Carter’s illegitimacy and absolute stupidity in interfering in what should be the U.S. government’s job? He’s not the State Department, not President either, and good they criticized him. If enough people disavowed and condemned his sticking his self in where he doesn’t belong, would he get the hint? Probably not.

Meryl has more including some astute comments and one not so. I particularly like Maggie’s. It’s short and sweet.

Jimmy Carter is blight on the presidency, current and past. He needs to have his passport yanked, sent home to sulk, and told to shut up and build houses.

Exactly.

image credit AP via Yahoo

He laid a wreath at Arafat’s tomb, Arafat whose long history of terrorism is legendary. Nuff said.

Getting a lot of news coverage cause visits from a pope to the U.S. are so rare, this one makes two.

Sissy adeptly covers the Pope’s visit to the U.S. and has uncovered some interesting facts about, not the Pope, but George Bush. I never knew he surrounded himself with so many Catholics and was influenced by their doctrine. Her post’s a must read. And not just for the cat pics which are exquisite.

That doesn’t bode well for that border fence. But I can see where he’s coming from. One could do with far worse role models.

I admire the Pope cause he hasn’t gone around changing church doctrine to follow the whims of the people and holds to moral values. Quoting from his meeting with Bush:

“The two reaffirmed their total rejection of terrorism as well as the manipulation of religion to justify immoral and violent acts against innocents,” the statement said.

The pope said freedom “is not only a gift but also a summons to personal responsibility” toward the less fortunate.

“Democracy can only flourish, as your founding fathers realized, when political leaders and those whom they represent are guided by truth and bring the wisdom born of firm moral principle to decisions affecting the life and future of the nation,” the pope said.

Personal responsibility towards every aspect of one’s life is sorely needed, not just toward the less fortunate. And it hardly needs to be said, we need moral principles, morals even if this nation is to survive. Pope’s on the right track.

Now if only the faithful would get the hint.

Are blooming and look rather lovely no? And they are enjoyed.

More enjoyment of the feline kind: BKCFoC CotC ARK WCB

Thought it would be Tummy Tuesday, well had to do something different for a change. Yeah, Cece. Big change. But he looked like a begging cat here. What am I saying, he is a begging cat.

Other fine cats, tuxies and otherwise: BKCFoC CotC ARK WCB

Today’s brief news is on the oil front. Sorry, being tax day isn’t newsie. Getting money back might be. But we be spending it to fuel our cars. And feed our faces.

Light, sweet crude for May delivery jumped as high as $114.08 a barrel shortly after regular trading ended on the New York Mercantile Exchange. That is nearly $2 above an intraday high set last week.

Concerns about insufficient global supply, stoked by a high-profile report by the International Energy Agency that said Russian oil production dropped this year for the first time in a decade, was largely responsible for the surge. Oil prices rose as high as $113.99 a barrel during the regular session before settling at $113.79, up $2.03 from Monday’s record close of $111.76 a barrel.

And gasoline prices were up as well. Next to go up will be food prices and prices of everything else. Joy. Not! And I’m not the only one who thinks so.

Update: Teach me to blog on this too soon, price hit $114.95 after I woke Wednesday morning. Probably will go even higher too.