In The Jetstream II

Tabby undergoes surgery Friday in Charleston:

Dr. Marcelo Hochman (search), a reconstructive plastic surgeon, was operating on Tabby Friday, with the support of The Hemangioma Foundation. "Something we really, really believe in is that all children deserve the right to look normal," said the foundation's Jane Milner. "And we want to make that happen."

Just days before making the trip to the United States, Tabby went for her first vaccinations — during which doctors discovered heart complications. The child had a murmur, a hole in her heart and congestive heart failure, which will also require surgery.

"We'll evaluate the heart and at the same time determine a plan for what's best for the treatment of the hemangiomas," Hochman said before the Friday procedure.

In all, the baby will need at least three surgeries. FOX News was in the OR Friday while Hochman performed the first of the operations.

Kudos to the US Marine Corps, Chief Wiggles, and everyone who contributed to help bring this little girl to the United States and save her life. And thanks to Fox News for covering the story.

*** There is now a Tabby page where you can see the latest news on her condition and help with the costs of bringing her and her father here for treatment. She is going to need three surgeries, so this is not going to be a trivial undertaking. Please donate if you can - every little bit helps.

US Army Commander: we took 250 tons of munitions from Al CaCa. In a related but mysterious development, NY Times suddenly drops story from front page... [yawn...zzzz]

FL Dept. of Law Enforcement will not investigate GOP complaint that 1000 convicted felons (925 of them Democrats) voted by absentee ballot until after the election.

My Brethren-in-Christ have finally gone completely mad... yes, the 'Piskies are at it again:

A druidic "women's eucharist" and a "divorce rite," both posted on the Episcopal Church's official Web site, have outraged Episcopal conservatives.

Question of the Day: what, pray tell, is an Episcopal conservative??? I was unaware that such a mythical beast existed...

The "eucharist," subtitled "A Celebration of the Divine Feminine," was posted Oct. 8 on the denomination's Office of Women's Ministries page at www.dfms.org. It invoked "Mother God" and used a lighted candle, a vase of flowers, a chalice of sweet red wine, a cup of milk and money and a plate of raisin cakes to invoke images of sexuality, fertility and birth.

Hmmm... Perhaps I should start going back to church. But wait! there's more!

One, an "erotic ritual" for the spring festival of Beltane, used Christian phrases for the rite, including an opening "litany" and an "invocation" of the "Earth Mother." The ceremony, which culminates with the lead couple engaging in sex in front of the other participants, ends with a "chant of Communion and Praise" to the tune of the Irish hymn "St. Patrick's Breastplate." The Babylonian god "Bel" honored in the rite has been linked to the Canaanite god Baal, whose worship was condemned in the Old Testament.

I'm speechless. By St. Patrick's Holy Breastplate! I swear I know not what to make of this...

Via Power Line: Bin Laden's tape has been mistranslated. Apparently MEMRI believes the media's translation missed an important nuance:

The U.S. media in general mistranslated the words "ay wilaya" (which means "each U.S. state") to mean a "country" or "nation" other than the U.S., while in fact the threat was directed specifically at each individual U.S. state. This suggests some knowledge by bin Laden of the U.S. electoral college system. In a section of his speech in which he harshly criticized George W. Bush, bin Laden stated: "Any U.S. state that does not toy with our security automatically guarantees its own security."

...When he [Osama Bin Laden] said, 'Every state will be determining its own security, and will be responsible for its choice,' it means that any U.S. state that will choose to vote for the white thug Bush [Ed. note: can these people turn a phrase or what?] as president has chosen to fight us, and we will consider it our enemy, and any state that will vote against Bush has chosen to make peace with us, and we will not characterize it as an enemy. By this characterization, Sheikh Osama wants to drive a wedge in the American body, to weaken it, and he wants to divide the American people itself between enemies of Islam and the Muslims...

MEMRI also noted the almost defeated tone of the tape.

NLPC demands FEC probe of George Soros (couldn't happen to a nicer guy...) for failure to disclose expenses.

VA absentee ballots up sharply over 2000 - 73,000 more requested. Move along... nothing to see here.

American Federation of Government Employees charges Cordier talk violates Hatch Act, saw no problem when Max Cleland invited to talk. Audience member felt "highly coerced" when Cordier responded to "How do you feel about those guys who threw their medals over the fence?" question with "I think they're scumbags". Three words: Get over it.

Lovely example of tolerance in action... if you don't agree with speech, threaten violence. Where's the outrage, Mr. Kerry? Every time anyone even remotely connected to the RNC says or does anything, you demand that the White House condemn it. It's your turn.

Can you say sense of humor failure boys and girls? I knew that you could....

You go girl... Talk about demeaning women:

The complaint hinges on allegations that O' Reilly engaged in "phone sex" with a former associate producer, Andrea Mackris. Of the many awkward questions raised by the accusations, one looms large: How could anyone demand $60 million for conversations on which they could have hung up?

Or better yet, why not do what I always used to do... laugh?

FreeRepublic is reporting that NBC edited out Kerry's comment that his records weren't public, which I reported here earlier. It still seems to be in the MSNBC transcript I linked to then, but I saved a copy just in case:

Kerry: That's great. More power. I don't know how they've done it, because my record is not public. So I don't know where you're getting that from.

Here's a shocker... a new study found that the media are pro-Kerry. I know, I didn't want to believe it either....

"It's not just that John Kerry has gotten better press than President Bush before this election, he's gotten better press than anyone else since 1980.

In October alone, Mr. Kerry had a "record-breaking 77 percent positive press evaluations," compared with 34 percent positive for Mr. Bush, the study states.

Unprecedented, untrammeled accolades for Mr. Kerry were more than debate-related bounce, however. Since Labor Day, he also had a total of 58 percent positive stories, with just 36 percent for Mr. Bush.

Journalists seem particularly transfixed by the Democratic challenger this year: In the 2000 election, Mr. Bush and challenger Al Gore got equally lousy press, with each receiving evaluations that were about 2-to-1 negative.

Just when you thought our public schools could not get any more stupid...

The school superintendent's order was final. Halloween was "prohibited" during school hours.

Why?

"We have been contacted by followers of the Wiccan religion, and they indicated they have been offended after seeing elementary school depictions of witches with long noses, warts, cauldrons and such," said Tony Apostle, the superintendent who banned Halloween.

UPDATE: Two after-the-fact hat tips: I was behind on email and comments this weekend, so I didn't see these until after I did my posts this morning. But I do want to thank Dave Mendoza for alerting me to the Osama tape translation and Pile On for mentioning NBC's editing out Kerry's remark (I think that one was in the comments somewhere, and his was on Captain's Quarters vs. Freepers). I try really hard to give credit - sometimes I lose track or simply don't see something in time (or see it somewhere else before I see your tip, as in this case). Anyway, thanks :) I am noticing that I'm having a hard time keeping track of things lately, so if you notice I've forgotten to mention you, please drop me a line - it wasn't intentional.

- Cassandra