…I’d been having a serious craving for a dinner of knockwurst, sauerkraut and mashed potatoes.

In Charlotte, the closest I could come to real knockwurst (at least, after much searching) was a pre-packaged product from New Jersey sold at the deli counter in one of the city’s more gourmet oriented supermarkets, and that hardly passed muster — it was the wurst worst I’ve ever had and shaped more like slightly fattened, short hot dogs than any knockwurst I’d seen before.

Here in Chicago, however, I figured I had a much better chance of finding the real thing, given the historic German population and the variety of foods one is more likely to encounter in a big, diverse city like this one.

Even so, I began my search with a paucity of even near success until I found a place a block from Lincoln Square, at 4661 North Lincoln Avenue, called the Lincoln Quality Meat Market.

The establishment is really small, but has what can only be called an incredible selection of fresh meats, including a large selection of homemade sausage that is guaranteed to please everyone who crosses their threshhold (except perhaps a vegan or general purpose vegetarian — those folks are on their own). There’s a whole lot more, just read their list of fare at the above link. I will be visiting them shortly regarding their cut-to-order filet mignon.

Back on topic, feeling somewhat like a little boy in a candy store, I was thrilled to discover that they sell their own homemade knockwurst, and that it is the gen-u-ine article. I bought a bunch of it, and guess what I had for dinner! We’re talking YUM!

They also feature andouille sausage (although whoever makes up their signs insists upon spelling it “andulie”, but you can’t win ‘em all), for which I developed a major affinity when I lived in Nawlins years ago.

I used the andouille in some gumbo a couple of nights ago.

Now, I can cook many good things, but gumbo, which I love beyond description, is not one of them. For that, I relied upon my old standby (the same many New Orleaneans use when they aren’t up to a lengthy cooking project), Zatarain’s. Zatarain’s products, available in supermarkets all over the country, are the closest “instant” products I’ve yet to find to foods one encounters in Nawlins, wherein dwells some of my all-time favorite cuisine.

So with a large bowl of Zatarain’s Gumbo with Rice and andouille sausage, I sat in front of the TV and watched a DVD of a film I had wanted to see since its release (I haven’t been a major movie-goer in years), Tears of the Sun, with Bruce Willis and Monica Belucci.

The film is about brave men (in this case, U.S. Navy SEALS) who defy both orders and almost certain death in following the courage of their convictions, and concludes with the Edmond Burke quote, “The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to stand by and do nothing”.

What grabbed me was the realism of the murderous and unspeakably evil acts of the Nigerian rebels and soldiers as they slaughtered innocent men, women and children for no sane reasons whatsoever, and did so with apparent joy, raping and killing without compunction.

We read about this penchant of Africans to conduct their “affairs of arms” thusly all the time (just look at Dharfur, for example), as a corrupt, do-nothing United Nations (spit!) and people everywhere scream their outrage — I heard some enraging stories decades ago from friends on the less conventional end of things who had hired out their military experience and skills fighting communist insurrection in places like Rhodesia (Zimbabwe since) and Angola — and little if anything gets done about it.

I, myself, have always been an optimist, and I try to understand everybody’s point of view before passing judgement, but I can also be extremely hardnosed and often ruthless when events warrant it, yet it is totally beyond me to accept the atrocities some so-called human beings perpetrate on their fellow man as anything short of grossly unforgiveable.

From the satanic deeds of the Third Reich (the very fact that the German people, all economic and other explanations notwithstanding, were capable of what they did to the Jews, including relatives I consequently never had the pleasure of meeting and those I did meet who had concentration camp numbers tattoed on their arms, and millions of others, bespeaks volumes about the contents of their souls), to the more modern acts perpetrated by Islam, the North Vietnamese, Pol Pot and these monsters in Africa who possess neither any value on human life nor any iota of the concept of mercy, I feel only intense despair and the total conviction that unmitigated, outrageous extremes are the only solution in all too many cases.

One of the things that really aggravates the living hell out of me is the aggression against Turkey by the PKK.

These assholes are so wrapped up in their own stupid millieu that they feel they have to pick a time when the U.S. and our allies are battling to stabilize Iraq to antagonize the Turks into an invasive and well justified military action. If I were the head honcho in Ankara, I’d already have a few thousand troops in northern Iraq, supported by jets bearing napalm.

Then there are Islamic terrorist activities everywhere on the planet from Indonesia to the former Soviet Socialist Republics, the MidEast and Southeast Asia, western Europe to the Balkans.

And now Iran is once again bee-essing the idiots at Turtle Bay by agreeing to talk turkey re their nuclear weapons program atomic energy ambitions.

But I’ll digress no further.

We continuously read and hear of mindless mass murder and downright genocide all over the world and then of diplomatic veneer or media apologism or blame cast on the victims, or of empty pledges by the U.N. or individual government spokespersons to proactively address the problems, but nothing ever happens other than additional or increased existing problems.

We have to face the facts: Whether they are based upon religion, political dogmas or both, the world’s problems of massive violence originate almost exclusively from sources on the African continent and southwest Asia, where murder, torture and mayhem are business as usual and human life counts for little, and spread from those locales to the rest of the planet, and no amount nor quality of diplomacy will ever serve as a permanent solution.

Civilized societies, decency and diplomacy will never break through the shell of barbarism that is shared by Islam and the inherently corrupt, violence as a lifestyle tribal mentalities of Africa.

It is my personal belief that no matter what we opine, legislate, say or do, the reality is that the final disposition of human co-existence on our planet, no matter what the individual dispositions of the myriad citizenries throughout the world may be, will be determined by a total encompassment of conventional and unconventional warfare and the deaths of billions of people.

Somehow, even utterance of the word “bummer” doesn’t cover it — so I’m going to sit back in my most excellent of swivel chairs (courtesy of Office Depot), sip some brandy and listen to the next two pieces of music in the playlist my computer is delivering, another study in complex diversity: Kiss Them For Me by the awesome Siouxsie Sioux and the Banshees followed by one of my favorite classical music pieces, Smetana’s Vltava.

G’night…

…Mark Steyn column addresses the jobs Britons won’t do.

Does government health care inevitably lead to homicidal doctors who can’t wait to leap into a flaming SUV and drive it through the check-in counter? No. But government health care does lead to a dependence on medical staff imported from other countries.

(Truncating)

When the president talks about needing immigrants to do “the jobs Americans won’t do,” most of us assume he means seasonal fruit pickers and the maid who turns down your hotel bed and leaves the little chocolate on it. But in the United Kingdom the jobs Britons won’t do has somehow come to encompass the medical profession.

This particular set of chickens has come home to roost by unwitting invitation courtesy of Britain’s socialized medicine institution, the National Health Service, the same sort of program our very own Democrats would love to see inflicted upon We, the American People.

Aneurin Bevan, the socialist who created the National Health Service after World War II, was once asked to explain how he’d talked the country’s doctors into agreeing to become state employees: “I stuffed their mouths with gold,” he crowed. Sixty years later, no amount of gold can persuade Britons to spend their working lives in the country’s dirty, decrepit hospitals (they spend enough of their nonworking lives there, waiting to be seen, waiting for beds, waiting for operations). According to a report in the British Medical Journal, white males comprise 43.5 percent of the population but now account for less than a quarter of students at UK medical schools. In other words, being a doctor is no longer an attractive middle-class career proposition. That’s quite a monument to six decades of Michael Moore-style socialist health care.

Anyway, read the entire column, it’s on point and conveys a predilection of what we can expect from a like health care situation here in the United States. It’s what happens when government takes over what should remain a marketplace managed industry.

Of course, Mark Steyn has a flair for hitting the proverbial nail right on the head.

In his book America Alone, he details other demographic details of socialist Europe that are already being manifest in the news, such as this item, which the U.S. will eventually echo if we continue to subscribe to the Democrats’ birth control at all costs and damn the torpedos baby murdering abortion agendas.

And yet, as is forever the case, one of the greatest shortcomings of the American left is that they are totally incapable of learning from the mistakes of the socialist EU countries, who continuously provide us with perfect examples of what not to do and why, insisting instead upon forcing us to make the same tragic errors. They apparently believe that what fails miserably elsewhere will be a sure success here.

Go figure.

…with which I recently became acquainted that I think is well worth sharing with those who haven’t yet visited, called West Neanderthal Drive.

Therein, conservative blogger Uncle Pavian posts a unique blend of great classical poetry, spot-on political commentary and even the occasional interesting recipe that all combine to make for an enjoyable and informative read.

Enjoying poetry as much as I do and having become too engrossed over the years in other areas to devote the time I once did to that wonderful form of literary art, I find it quite refreshing to be able to visit a blog that incorporates copious poetry among its other offerings.

My profound thanks to Uncle Pavian for a great blog.

Go on over and pay him a visit.

…is an echo of my own belief on the subject.

Americans are flush with success over killing comprehensive immigration reform. Good for us–but. Do you wonder how it got as far as it did? How did a Congress with a 14% approval rating–the lowest recorded by Gallup since they began polling in 1973–get to a point where they were poised to defy the overwhelming sentiment of those who elected them?

The answer is simple: we keep re-electing them.

It’s a short column, read the whole thing.

Yesterday, self styled liberal (I say “self styled” because he is better informed and makes more sense than your average liberal) commenter BB Idaho added a link to a comment he made on my previous post that I thoroughly enjoyed, as usual.

Being me, I ended up following a link from there to a number of YouTube videos featuring my choice candidate for Presidential Election 2008, U.S. Representative from Colorado Tom Tancredo.

Therein, among many other videos, was Tom’s speech at the New Hampshire Republican Party Dinner. For those who haven’t read or heard much of what he is about, the ten minute video is well worth viewing.

So the other day a whole bunch of Senators grew brains – (at least temporary ones) and finally got the picture – voting for the amnesty based immigration bill would very definitely have mandated the typing of their resumes before the end of autumn, 2008. A lot of credit goes to junior senators who thankfully opted to buck their more senior counterparts and do the right thing for their country, thus proving my theory that imposing term limits on members of Congress would constitute a much needed reform. So-called “junior” senators apparently still possess the principles that drove them to serve to begin with, whereas most of the “senior” ones have become part of the machine.

At any rate, they shot down the bill. We conservatives are both pleased and relieved. I had been really sure that amnesty would pass if for no other reason than that too many Republican Senators would be sold on the proactive additions to the bill, figuring they could use them to placate their anti-amnesty constituencies. After all, a politician’s only real career asset is the gift of gab. He or she can be as dumb as a post, but as long as his/her skills as a con man (or con woman) remain intact, he or she can continue to parasite off the taxpayer for decades.

But I digress (ahem).

Let’s see what happens next – the amnesty that centralized the bill was like a shark, while all the positive ad-on agendas like securing the border and enforcing work eligibility laws were like pilot fish clinging to the shark.

Unfortunately, these particular Naucrates ductor didn’t enjoy the option afforded other pilot fish of simply dropping off a dead shark’s teeth and going elsewhere, they shared the fate of the shark. Bummer.

Now, watch the amnesty mongers on the Hill interpret this to mean that all immigration issues are up for individual assessment or reassessment. Bush signed off on the border fence, but that was before the Democrats became the Congressional majority. Those critters could promise us the moon, then not fund the acquisition when the time comes, somehow blaming their failure to deliver on the Republicans, the liberal mainstream media making it believable to the folks on Maple Street. Since they didn’t promise the fence, starving the project of funding would be at most a picayune bit of intentional neglect.

Given the above, the entire illegal immigration issue can be brought forward, without definitive resolution, right through the 2008 election season, giving the Democrats something to “champion”, with their own patented brand of misleading spin, as a co-side dish to man made global warming “climate change”, alongside the hefty Iraq entrée.

I perceive this as a political misstep for the Democrats, as their immigration agendas are offensive to the majority of Americans. But they would tear flesh from bone to stifle the viewpoint of right thinking Americans and flood the field with their liberal propaganda.

On the other hand, the more they obfuscate and promote delays, the larger the criminal alien problem can grow. The M-19 gangs can expand their memberships and bloody influence, emergency rooms can continue to close, billions of dollars in untaxed wages can be wired out of the country and out of our economy, American tradesmen such as carpenters, masons, roofers, plumbers, painters and landscapers, as well as general laborers, custodial workers, furniture movers and others can go hungry along with their families while unscrupulous contractors replace them with illegal, dirt wage, benefit free illegals.

In short, our enthusiasm regarding the defeat of the amnesty bill should be tempered by concern as to how both Bush and the Democrat majority, neither of whom has exhibited any real interest in quelling the flow of criminal aliens into the U.S. (actually, quite the opposite), will now attempt to exploit whatever they can in its aftermath in order to perpetuate a continued increase in the problem as they drag it out in hopes of eventually seeing their amnesty agenda succeed via the pressure of continuous attrition.

…who loves my home town, I can’t say I’m enamored with the field of candidates coming from there to vie for the Presidential election in 2008. Not Hillary (perish the thought!), not Giuliani, who made a fine mayor, but…, not Bloomberg, heaven forbid, should he decide to run.

The specter of an all-New York November 2008 was raised when Bloomberg, a titular Republican since his 2001 mayoral run, announced last week that he was quitting the GOP to become an independent. His predecessor, Giuliani, is running for the Republican nomination for president, while second-term New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton is among the Democratic hopefuls.

While New Yorkers are all too aware of the differences between the Big Apple’s big three, folks beyond the Hudson River were not as certain.

“I think basically they are the same candidate,” said Bob House, a Republican from Des Moines, Iowa. “We all love New York. But when our options are New York, New York, New York, I think people want to see a different life experience.”

Angeles Perry, 65, feeding the slot machines in Las Vegas, saw more similarities than differences among the New York triumvirate.

“They have the money,” said the retiree from California’s Silicon Valley. “And they all have big egos.”

As far as I’m concerned, the best candidate for the next POTUS election remains Colorado’s Tom Tancredo, a man who has proven, as opposed to merely delivering campaign promises, that he fights hard on behalf of his supporters to deliver results.

The U.S. House of Representatives this morning voted to withhold federal emergency services funding for “sanctuary cities” that protect illegal immigrants.

Anti-illegal immigration champion Rep. Tom Tancredo, R-Colo., sponsored the measure, which he says would apply to cities such as Denver and Boulder. He was elated by its passage, which stunned critics and supporters alike.

The Littleton Republican’s amendment to the Department of Homeland Security appropriations bill appears to have no language specifically defining a sanctuary city. Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper has long disputed giving the city that label.

“The issue has come to fruition,” Tancredo said by cell phone after the vote. “The people of the country really have spoken. It’s a really good indicator of just how much closer to the people the House is than the Senate is.”

The House passed the amendment, 234 to 189, with 50 Democrats voting in favor.

Tancredo and his staffers hooted and cheered from his office across the street from the Capitol immediately after the vote.

Run, Tom, run!

…in the U.S. Congress aren’t all that different from their counterparts that infest the British Parliament. They’re certainly right behind the Brits in engineering this state of affairs.

“We supposedly live in a truly democratic society where freedom of speech is a fundamental right enjoyed by everyone,” friction.tv Chief Marketing Officer Andy West said in a press release. “However these survey results have shown rather powerfully that most adults in the U.K. feel that this is not the case.”

West added, “We live in such a politically correct society that people don’t know what they can and can’t say anymore and there is a constant fear that if you go against the grain, you’ll be vilified by your peers.”

Sally McNamara, a senior policy analyst in European Affairs for the Heritage Foundation’s Margaret Thatcher Center for Freedom, blamed recent British policy.

“The government’s role in any free society is to ensure the safety of its citizenry and pursue policies that guarantee basic rights for all law-abiding people,” she told Cybercast News Service on Monday. “This has been taken to the extreme; legislating against language, behavior, etc.”

Perhaps we should learn from the Brits’ mistakes before it’s too late — if it isn’t already…

…doing something like this would get you in…

If you are sitting next to someone who irritates you on a plane or train:

1. Quietly and calmly open up your laptop case.

2. Remove your laptop.

3. Turn it on.

4. Make sure the guy who won’t leave you alone can see the screen.

6. Close your eyes and tilt your head up to the sky.

7. Then hit this link.

H/T Shana

…is, as the Bard might have said, much ado about nothing.

The MSM and much alternative media as well promote the information czar turned New York mayor’s quitting the Republican Party as a significant event. Right, sure, um… it’s, er, truly an epic event.

Bah!

That’s right, Bah!

Bloomberg was a staunch Democrat prior to the N.Y. mayoral elections at the end of the Giuliani years. However, the Democrats already had a candidate. Really determined to be the mayor, Bloomberg went the turncoat rout and “became” a Republican for the sole purpose of running for mayor. He won.

His first move as the new Republican mayor was to revert to a Democrat, big time.

Now that he’s in the twilight stages of his second term, he no longer needs to be a “Republican”.

The headlines shouldn’t read, Bloomberg Leaves GOP, they should say, Hizzoner Casts Off Sheep’s Clothing.

Now the speculation begins: “Will Bloomberg make a run for President in 2008?”

The media and assorted pundits make reference to his $5.5 billion smackers, wondering if he will use a chunk of it to campaign for POTUS.

And then the wishful thinking makes its way to columns, blogs and broadcast — if he runs as an Independent, his candidacy will be good for, depending upon the commentator, the Democrats or the Republicans.

Now, all opinions are based upon the fact that he won’t win the general election, but that he’ll take votes away from one of the two major parties, like a major league Ralph Nader.

I am not a wishful thinker. Though I’m not always right, I tend to base my opinions and/or projections on what I view as reality based on evidence, human nature, track records, real circumstances, etc, etc. As often as not, I find myself at odds with fellow conservatives who continue to have faith in the integrity of today’s politicians while I reserve judgement under an umbrella of doubt based upon the “bitter pill” of experience.

Personally, as a conservative I would welcome a Bloomberg campaign.

He is for gun control, he is pro-”choice”, he is for stem cell research and other Democrat themes. He certainly wouldn’t get any votes from conservatives or true Republicans.

He would, however, get a lot of votes from moderate Democrats who mistakenly view Bloomberg as a conservative possessed of “progressive” ideals. With or without Nader running, the billionaire, with his monetary edge, would suck up Democrat votes like an aardvark with a Dyson tromping through ant country.

So sure, let the schmuck run for President. His loss would be America’s gain.