Ginny's Bloggity-Blog

MIAMI, March 5 (UPI) -- U.S. gasoline pump prices have jumped about 31 cents a gallon in the past month and the reasons are unclear, AAA said.

It might be because refineries switched to making more-expensive warm-weather fuels from winter-weather fuels, spokesman Geoff Sundstrom in Orlando, Fla., said. But the surge arrived earlier than usual this year, he told The Miami Herald.

Other industry observers point out crude oil prices have risen a couple of dollars a barrel in the past month.

"I'll have to start taking the bus if this continues," Samuel Maldonado told the Herald as he filled his red minivan with $2.61-a-gallon regular gas.

The U.S. unleaded average gasoline price is $2.481 a gallon, AAA said Monday. A month ago it was $2.170 a gallon, AAA said. The year-ago average was $2.284 a gallon.
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Record profits. An administration that is directly involved with oil and oil services.
Nothing suspicious here. Move along.

WTF?

This has got to stop. Now!

http://www.capitolhillblue.com/blog/2006/03/warning_financial_responsibili.html

( Article below cut )

http://www.sunherald.com/mld/sunherald/13984932.htm

JACKSON, Miss. - A Mississippi House committee voted Tuesday to ban most abortions in the state - an unexpected move that left abortion opponents grappling to stake out a position on a proposal that could prompt a lengthy court battle.

The only abortions allowed under the bill would be if the life of the pregnant woman were in danger. There would be no abortions allowed in cases of pregnancy caused by rape or incest.

It's similar to a bill that South Dakota lawmakers passed last week.

WTF?? So it begins...

Scalia Dismisses 'Living Constitution'
By JONATHAN EWING, Associated Press Writer

PONCE, Puerto Rico - People who believe the Constitution would break if it didn't change with society are "idiots," U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia says.

In a speech Monday sponsored by the conservative Federalist Society, Scalia defended his long-held belief in sticking to the plain text of the Constitution "as it was originally written and intended."

"Scalia does have a philosophy, it's called originalism," he said. "That's what prevents him from doing the things he would like to do," he told more than 100 politicians and lawyers from this U.S. island territory.

According to his judicial philosophy, he said, there can be no room for personal, political or religious beliefs.

Scalia criticized those who believe in what he called the "living Constitution."

"That's the argument of flexibility and it goes something like this: The Constitution is over 200 years old and societies change. It has to change with society, like a living organism, or it will become brittle and break."

"But you would have to be an idiot to believe that," Scalia said. "The Constitution is not a living organism, it is a legal document. It says something and doesn't say other things."

Proponents of the living constitution want matters to be decided "not by the people, but by the justices of the Supreme Court."

"They are not looking for legal flexibility, they are looking for rigidity, whether it's the right to abortion or the right to homosexual activity, they want that right to be embedded from coast to coast and to be unchangeable," he said.

Scalia was invited to Puerto Rico by the Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies. The organization was founded in 1982 as a debating society by students who believed professors at the top law schools were too liberal. Conservatives and libertarians mainly make up the 35,000 members.

From Wall Street Journal

Jan. 31, 2006
Judge Samuel Alito was confirmed by the Senate as the next Supreme Court associate justice. Alito is expected to help lead the court into a new conservative era following the retirement of Justice O'Connor, a key moderate swing vote on issues like assisted suicide, affirmative action and abortion.


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Grr. This was expected, of course.

"Minister for Sustainable Development Mona Sahlin has declared that Sweden is going to become the first country in the world to break the dependence on fossil energy. Sweden will stop using oil by 2020 and eventually the energy supply of the country will be based on renewable energy only. The goal is to gradually rid the country of gasoline-run cars and oil-heated homes"

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2006/01/sweden_raises_t.php

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2006-01-20-md-same-sex-mariage_x.htm

"Although tradition and societal values are important, they cannot be given so much weight that they alone will justify a discriminatory" law, she wrote.

This is common sense. Amazing... as opposed to good ol' Texas and the institutionalized evil we're creating.