Here we go again...

Fox News Channel is carrying coverage from their sister network Sky News this morning, who is presently reporting three explosions in three subway stations around London, and a fourth explosion on a bus. One of these was a nail bomb which went off in the Warren Street Station. The Oval and Sheperd's Bush Stations have also been evacuated.

Of course initial reports are sketchy at best; more details are in the works.

These reports are coming two weeks on from the initial London terror strikes.

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Take-Two Interactive, parent company of video game developer Rockstar Games announced today that they are changing the video game rating on the popular video and computer game Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas from M (Mature 17+) to AO (Adults Only 18+). This was due to the "Hot Coffee" modification (which can be downloaded from the internet, and no, I'm not linking to the mod) that permits users to enact pornographic acts in the game.

The video game industry on Wednesday changed to adults-only the rating of "Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas," a best-selling game in which explicit sexual content can be unlocked with an Internet download.

The decision followed intense pressure from politicians and media watch groups, and retailers reacted swiftly — Wal-Mart Stores Inc., Target Corp. and Best Buy Co. said they would immediately pull all copies from their store shelves nationwide.

The game's producer, Rockstar Games, said it stopped making the current version and would provide new labels to any retailer willing to keep selling the games, which had been rated "M" for mature. The company also will offer a downloadable patch to fix the sex problem in PC versions, and is working on a new, more secure version, to be rated "M."

Rockstar's parent company, Take Two Interactive, also admitted for the first time that the sex scenes had been built into the retail version of that game — not just the PC version but also those written for Xbox and PlayStation2 consoles.

Company officials had previously suggested that a modification created by outsiders added the scenes.

Personally, I doubt that the bulk of those retailers will go back to carrying the revised version of the game if and when it is ever released by Rockstar.

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When the series ("Star Trek") ended in 1969, Doohan found himself typecast as Montgomery Scott, the canny engineer with a burr in his voice. In 1973, he complained to his dentist, who advised him: "Jimmy, you're going to be Scotty long after you're dead. If I were you, I'd go with the flow."

"I took his advice," said Doohan, "and since then everything's been just lovely."

Fare thee well, Jimmy. Thank you for the memories.

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Sophie Okonedo as Sithandra in the upcoming movie adaptation of MTV's Aeon Flux.

Am I being paranoid, or is this role going to generate a protest or three from "more sensitive groups" out there?

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Since his name is a real surprise to many, John G. Roberts is a true unknown to a lot of people.

Born in Buffalo, Roberts earned his undergraduate and law degrees from Harvard before launching a career marked by high-ranking government service and a lucrative run in private practice. After clerking for then Associate Supreme Court Justice William Rehnquist from 1981 to 1982, Roberts served as an aide to U.S. Attorney General William French Smith and White House Counsel Fred Fielding during the Reagan administration. In 1986, he joined the prestigious Washington law firm Hogan & Hartson, where he was a Supreme Court litigator. One colleague described him as "the best appellate lawyer of his generation." But Roberts continued to jump back into government, first temporarily as the U.S. principal deputy solicitor general from 1989 to 1993 and then, 10 years later, to take the D.C. Circuit Court seat. Roberts took a hefty pay cut to become a judge: from more than $1 million a year to $171,800. "It demonstrates a commitment to public service that's admirable," says attorney Carter G. Phillips, who's known Roberts since the 1980s. "He's the perfect kind of judge from a lawyer's perspective, someone with an open mind who takes their arguments seriously."

While some conservatives worry he's the next David Souter, whose brief time on the First Circuit masked moderate-to-liberal leanings that emerged after his confirmation, liberals have long argued that Roberts is too extreme. Roberts was first nominated for the D.C. Circuit Court in 1992 by President George H.W. Bush, but Democrats, who controlled the Senate, blocked his nomination because of concerns over his record as a deputy solicitor general. In 1990, Roberts raised eyebrows when he attached a footnote to a brief in a case about abortion financing stating that Roe v. Wade should be overturned. Roberts also cowrote a brief arguing that an antiabortion group's attempts to blockade abortion clinics did not amount to a violation of equal protection. He is affiliated with the conservative Federalist Society and supports restrictions on environmental protections.

For that reason alone, the liberals will fight his appointment, tooth and nail.

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50 year-old Judge John G. Roberts, an appelate jurist on the DC Circuit is President Bush's choice to replace Justice Sandra Day O'Connor on the Supreme Court.

The networks all rushed the info to air in order to beat President Bush's 9P ET announcement.

Roberts is considered to be very conservative on most issues, including the major litmus test, abortion.

Network anchors across the dial have been bemoaning the appointment, emphasizing that Roberts would replace O'Connor as the swing vote on the court in many 5-4 decisions, and that with his young age, that he would likely sit on the Supreme Court for 30 years or more.

Though the moonbats on Capitol Hill have yet to weigh in, you know they will as the night progresses. And I'm certain that they're upset beyond belief. Needless to say, the confirmation battle promises to be epic.

B5 fans will understand when I say "And so...it begins..."

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Bill Hemmer, former co-host of CNN's American Morning, is joining Fox News Channel as a midday anchor and reporter.

Hemmer spent 10 years at CNN as an anchor and reporter. He started his TV career as a sports anchor for WCPO Cincinnati.

Fox is solidly out in front of CNN in ratings, but executives and anchors from the networks often swipe at the competition.

Hemmer lost his American Morning post last month when CNN opted to bring in Miles OÂ’Brien.

The network offered Hemmer a spot as White House correspondent, which he rejected.

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Erick at ConfirmThem notes that Edith Clement is the only person on the "short list" of potential SCOTUS nominees to have a private meeting at the White House (at least as far as anyone can determine). Her's was sometime last week.

Clement is known to be pro-defendant in civil rights cases and is like OÂ’Connor on business issues, which means that conservatives will be pleased with her on those issues. There is no indication that Clement takes an expansive reading of the Commerce Clause and every indication that she does, in fact, take the opposite view.

Sources close to the White House tell me that the pick has been made, but are not giving me the name. Third party sources who would be among the first to know are saying that there is every indication that Clement is the pick. In fact, we are beginning to see conservatives get on board and shift from Edith B. Clement having too thin a papertrail to her being “with us.”

No one knows how Clement would vote on the ultimate issue — is abortion a medical procedure subject to state regulation or a constitutional right. I am told that, with the pressing issues currently headed to the court, i.e. partial birth abortion, parental notification, 24 hour waiting periods, the Solomon Amendment, etc. — conservatives do not need to worry about Clement, they need to worry about Justice Kennedy and whether he will continue heading left.

I have been told by multiple parties that, though we know little about Judge Clement’s leanings on social issues, we should make no mistake that her family background is conservative and that her husband is a “loyal” conservative.

Sounds like if Clement is the choice, we'll see moonbat Senator Ted "Jabba The Drunk" Kennedy (Beefeater's-MA) turning purple in the face on CNN shortly after the President's speech.

That would be something to see.

We're still on for Bush's announcement at 9 tonight. Be there. Aloha.

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Fifth Circuit Judge Edith Clement

Current scuttlebutt is that the choice will be Fifth Circut Judge Edith Clement from New Orleans.

Clement is viewed as more moderate than many conservatives would like, perhaps to avoid an almost inevitable partisan fight in the US Senate over her confirmation. But we'll have to see.

Let the games begin.

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Paul from Wizbang, after posting a piece of biting satire on the Ebonics fluff yesterday, is having to defend himself from charges of racism this morning.

What David fails to understand is this:
When a I say (in jest) that black kids are too stupid to learn english it is "hate speech." When a liberal says it for real they are an educator.

Make no doubt about it. The California liberals are telling black kids they are too stupid to learn english. -- They just do it in a politically correct way.

You are a disgusting coward who would not dare utter those words, satire or no, in the presence of black people, or for that matter, decent people of any race or creed.

So picking your cotton is out of the question, but god help you if you ever make the mistake of spouting your childish and racist ideology in public.

Just damn.

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Here we go again.

A batch of lazy educators who aren't willing to teach students proper English are dumbing down the curriculum by teaching urban street slang as if it were some kind of "language" as opposed to the vernacular it truly is.

Mary Texeira, a sociology professor at Cal State San Bernardino, suggested that including Ebonics in the program would be beneficial for students.

"Ebonics is a different language, it's not slang as many believe,' Texeira said. "For many of these students Ebonics is their language, and it should be considered a foreign language. These students should be taught like other students who speak a foreign language.'

"There are African Americans who do not agree with me. They say that (black students) are lazy and that they need to learn to talk,' Texeira said.

When I grew up, teachers would demand that we, as students, speak in proper English. We certainly used slang with our friends on the playground and outside the classroom, but not in class. And we never would dare to use it in front of our parents or grandparents.

The politically correct-feel good mindset that has permeated our society allows a "dumbing down" of all aspects of life in order to placate those who refuse to take responsibility and work for what needs to be done.

Teaching "ebonics" -- urban slang -- will not provide a means for an individual to acquire a job, it will not help him maintain a living, it will not provide an individual with the skills necessary to compete in an academic setting, let alone a professional setting. It does absolutely nothing positive for the individuals that it is taught to. On the contrary, it will hinder individuals who are trying to learn to use contemporary standard English properly. It will provide a crutch for individuals who too lazy to do what is necessary to teach standard English in the nation's schools.

We already have ESL (English as a Second Language) classes for native Spanish speakers. What are these people going to ask for next, ESL classes for people who are born here and cannot learn English to begin with?

This measure is foolish, and a complete waste of resources, talent, effort, energy and time. It should be soundly denounced and eliminated from the San Bernadino schools.

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Marc Xavier takes a cold look at the history and state of black culture at Very Small Doses. A lot of people may not like some of what he has to say though.

In the turbid sojourn that weÂ’ve made in the past 400 or so, African Americans have endured a historical experience unlike any other ethnicity in this country. When my ancestors were brought over here from Africa, they were spread across the New World with little regard to family ties or tribal affiliation. It was in this process that we originally lost our culture.

Our customs, our ideas and our worldviews were gradually smothered in a manner not dissimilar to what the Babylonians tried to do to the Jews during the Captivity. By breaking up our family units and moving us around to the highest bidder, our ability to pass on the building blocks of our culture to the next generation was lost. ItÂ’s like what the good Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. once said: "The Negro is an American, we know nothing of Africa."

Time passed, we lost even our languages and we learned to speak English. The succeeding generations of slaves born in captivity increasingly had no recollection of the Old World we came from. ItÂ’s a horrible thing to be robbed of oneÂ’s identity like that, but even more so because we had no way of even knowing what we had lost of ourselves. But itÂ’s a testament to my ancestors that they nonetheless persevered, even building a new culture.

most young black men see themselves in an intractable socio-economic quagmire and needlessly carry the weight of generations of past wrongs on their shoulders. It appears to me that many African Americans feel emasculated about these wrongs of the past, and in order to prove ourselves our culture demands that we act in a manner to show that we are a force to be reckoned with. Though lacking the calm self-assuredness of one who truly knows our history, we overcompensate by behaving hyper-masculine, or “hard” as the term is used. Violence is the inevitable result.

I have to agree with him; though many folks will find other reasons to work with. Many people refuse to deal with taking personal responsibility for their actions, instead pointing to some sort of "generational post-traumatic" disorder or some other such gobbly-de-gook.

Is there an easy answer? No; but with time, effort, energy and introspection, progress can be made. There's no reason not to.

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Josh Marshall has boiled the entire sordid Plame/CIA affair down to a basic truism: Joe Wilson's a liar.

The Democrats have latched onto Wilson's lies, because they figure to knock off the percieved power behind the throne. And they're looking more and more stupid by the day as a result.

Joe Wilson's a liar. Plame's covert status wasn't protected well by the CIA. It was just a short phone call. Rove really wanted to speak about welfare reform. Wilson said Cheney sent him to Africa. Plame sent Wilson to Africa. Rove leaked Plame's identity in the interests of good journalism. Wilson went on too many TV shows.

BLITZER: But the other argument that's been made against you is that you've sought to capitalize on this extravaganza, having that photo shoot with your wife, who was a clandestine officer of the CIA, and that you've tried to enrich yourself writing this book and all of that.

What do you make of those accusations, which are serious accusations, as you know, that have been leveled against you.

WILSON: My wife was not a clandestine officer the day that Bob Novak blew her identity.

BLITZER: But she hadn't been a clandestine officer for some time before that?

WILSON: That's not anything that I can talk about. And, indeed, I'll go back to what I said earlier, the CIA believed that a possible crime had been committed, and that's why they referred it to the Justice Department.

I understand the visceral hatred that liberals feel for Karl Rove and George W. Bush. I really do. But this game of charades they are playing really makes them look bad.

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Mariah Carey, still under the mistaken impression that she knows how to act, blames the 9/11 attacks for the poor showing that her movie Glitter had at the box office in 2001.

“I released it around September 11, 2001,” the singer told Swiss newspaper Sonntags Zeitung as translated on fan site MariahDaily. “The talk shows needed something to distract from 9/11. I became a punching bag. I was so successful that they tore me down because my album was at number 2 instead of number 1. The media was laughing at me and attacked me.” Additionally, Mariah also said that the movie was just too cutting-edge for it’s own good. “‘Glitter’ was ahead of its time,” she explained. “Today it’s ‘in’ to make 80’s music.”

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Bassam Khalaf, who is known as the Arabic Assassin on his unreleased rap CD, "Terror Alert," has lyrics that glorify the 9/11 hijackers, and describes himself as a "crazy, suicidal Arabic ... equipped with bombs."

And until last week, he screened luggage passing through Bush Intercontinental Airport in Houston.

"I've been screening your bags for the past six months, and you don't even know it," said Khalaf, who also said Thursday that he is not really a terrorist and that his rhymes are exaggerations meant to gain publicity.

An Internet search of Khalaf's name brings up Web sites that feature his obscene, violent and misogynistic raps that threaten to fly a plane into a building on Sept. 11, 2005.

Khalaf, 21, was hired on Jan. 16 and fired July 7, according to a TSA termination letter that cited his "authorship of songs which applaud the efforts of the terrorists on September 11th, encourage and warn of future acts of terrorism by you, discuss at length and in grave and alarming detail various criminal acts you intend to commit, state your belief that the U.S. government should be overthrown, and finally warn that others will die on September 11, 2005."

Then again, behind this, the Arabic Assassin's CD (whenever it gets released) will probably sell out.

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White House reporters Terry Moran, David Gregory and John Roberts (ABC, NBC & CBS, respectively), along with the rest of the White House press corps smell blood in the water regarding Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove and his role in the Plame/CIA affair. They have become very aggressive with their questioning behind a White House statement supporting Rove.

During yesterday's White House press conference yesterday, the trio pelted White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan with questions about Rove. McClellan, for his part, tried to parry and defend, but it wasn't pretty.

Want an example? Let's go to the audio tape...

Q: Let me -- let me just do what you did a few moments ago and step back from the context of the investigation to the President's agenda. Does Karl Rove, with all the attention being paid to him now, become a liability to the President, an impediment to his pushing his agenda?

MR. McCLELLAN: See, you're asking all these context in -- all these questions in the context of the news reports relating to an investigation --

Q: I'm talking about it now in the larger sense of Rove being the Deputy Chief of Staff.

MR. McCLELLAN: We're continuing to move forward on our agenda, and the -- we're on the verge of accomplishing some very big things when it comes to the agenda. And --

Q: But is Karl Rove an impediment now, with all this attention distracting from that push on your agenda?

MR. McCLELLAN: Everybody who is working here is helping us to advance the agenda, and that includes Karl in a very big way.

Q: Has he apologized to you for telling you he is not involved?

MR. McCLELLAN: Helen, I'm not going to get into any private discussions.

Q: He put you on the spot. He put your credibility on the line.

MR. McCLELLAN: And, Helen, I appreciate you all wanting to move forward and find the facts relating to this investigation. I want to know all the facts relating to the investigation.

Q: You people are on the record, one quote after another.

MR. McCLELLAN: The President wants to get to the bottom of it. And it's just not appropriate. If you'll remember back two years ago, or almost two years ago, I did draw a line and I said, we're just not going to get into commenting on --

Q: You also made comments in defending Mr. Rove.

MR. McCLELLAN: We're just not going to get into commenting on an investigation that continues. And I think you've heard me explain why I'm not going to do that. I do want to talk about this --

Q: Do you regret putting yourself out on a limb, Scott?

MR. McCLELLAN: I do want to talk about this, and we will talk about it once the investigation is complete.

Q: Do you regret what you said in 2003?

Bottom line, there's nothing new. Rove came clean months ago, while testifying to a grand jury. Time confirmed that Rove was one of Matthew Cooper's sources from when he disclosed Valerie Plame's identity as a CIA employee.

Plame was a CIA employee, period. According to noted Bush-basher, Joe Wilson, Plame was a CIA agent, and the press has siezed upon this notion, but there is no evidence supporting it, save Wilson's rants. And if she wasn't covert, there was no crime.

But don't confuse the press -- or the Democrats -- with the facts. They think they've got something here.

And they're going to act like petulant children throwing a tantrum until they get the White House to give them what they want: Karl Rove's head on a platter. After all, they think that Rove is the solitary eeeevil mastermind behind the Bush presidency. They figure they get Rove, then Bush is easy pickings.

But the picture is never as clear as it seems, is it?

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Men's News Daily columnist Bob Parks fires back at Julian Bond's annual anti-conservative whine-fest in his new column.

Parks points out that despite Bond's incessant ranting, the NAACP hasn't done much of note lately.

And while continuing the fight is admirable, it would seem the present-day NAACP is fighting more for relevance since the message of “blame Republican whitey” is starting to fall on deaf ears, and it would appear the only people who will lose out are the very people who draw on an NAACP paycheck.

And as far as widespread discrimination goes, what has the NAACP fixed lately...?

Bond assumes that all black people are stupid and if he just recites the approved script from the DNC, he'll continue to receive the prominence he craves, and the paycheck he's grown accustomed to.

As long as black people attend the lousy public schools in the hood managed by Democrats and teacher's unions, listen to rap music created by Hollywood and New York liberals that steals the souls of their young listeners, have an overwhelming out-of-wedlock birthrate that makes a government social worker drool, there will be no solutions offered from people like Julian Bond.

It's definitely worth a look this morning.

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Donald Trump, supposedly disappointed with the outcomes of the past couple of seasons of the NBC hit The Apprentice, is contemplating some potentially controversial changes to the format of the teams on the show.

Among the proposals: pitting a team of African-American contestants against a team of all-white players.

“Whether people like that idea or not, it is somewhat reflective of our very vicious world,” according to Trump. “But needless to say, not everybody thinks it’s a good idea.”

I don't know that NBC will go along with The Donald's proposal -- they just watched ABC nix airing their controversial reality series Welcome To The Neighborhood before airing a single episode. The ABC show would have given three conservative white families the power to decide which diversely liberal family would be able to move into a house in their cul-de-sac.

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"You Will Fail" is from London mayor Ken Livingstone's quote after the London terror attacks late last week.

They choose to come to London, as so many have come before because they come to be free, they come to live the life they choose, they come to be able to be themselves. They flee you because you tell them how they should live. They donÂ’t want that and nothing you do, however many of us you kill, will stop that flight to our city where freedom is strong and where people can live in harmony with one another. Whatever you do, however many you kill, you will fail.

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USA Today columnist Julianne Malveaux, speaking on Sean Hannity's nationally syndicated radio program yesterday, called the United States a "terrorist nation" and President George W. Bush a "terrorist."

During the interview, moonbat Malveaux began ranting about past problems in this nation, including the 1921 mass murder and arson that killed more than 300 blacks in Tulsa, OK.

"Terrorism in the United States is as old as we are. You want me to give you a litany of terrorism? You want me to start with what's happened to the Indian population? You want to go on to what happened in Tulsa, Oklahoma, in 1921?"

"C'mon now, Sean," Malveaux told Hannity. "We are terrorists."

Asked point-blank if the U.S. was a "terrorist nation," Malveaux shot back: "Oh, Absolutely."

Asked if America was "a good country," Malveaux responded tersely, "We're a country." Pressed on why she omitted the adjective "good," she replied: "I can't answer that. I think we have some good and I think we have some evil."

As the interview was winding up, Malveaux went on a tear about the Iraq war and "the weapons of mass distraction."

"You know they weren't there. I know they weren't there," she told Hannity. "George W. Bush is evil. He is a terrorist. He is evil. He is arrogant. And he is out of control."

Moreover, if this is such a terrible place, why, oh why are you livng here?

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