Andrew McLaughlin, senior policy counsel for Google, submitted a statement to the Congressional Human Rights Caucus. Here are some of the more appalling portions:

In order to operate Google.cn as a website in China, Google is required to remove some sensitive information from our search results. These restrictions are imposed by Chinese laws, regulations, and policies. However, when we remove content from Google.cn, we disclose that fact to our users.

"Sensitive information?" This isn’t about top-secret nuclear bomb designs or anything. We’re talking some of the most famous news photographs ever, and they’re being suppressed in order to stop the spread of pro-democracy activism.

When a Chinese user gets search results from which one or more results has been filtered, the Google webpage includes an explicit notification – an indication that the search results are missing something that might otherwise be relevant. This is not, to be sure, a tremendous advance in transparency to users, but it is at least a meaningful step in the right direction.

No, it’s not a meaningful step in the right direction. People in China already know they live under an oppressive regime. That’s why they do things like stand defiant before a column of tanks.

Other products – such as Gmail and Blogger – that involve personal and confidential information will be introduced only when we are comfortable that we can provide them in a way that protects users’ expectations about that information.

Google’s lawyer is attempting to paint Google as a tough protector of privacy, a company that would withhold its services rather than submit to Chicom surveillance of its users. I don’t buy it. First of all, Blogger is the complete opposite of "personal and confidential information." You can set up a Blogger account in two minutes with a bogus name and a throw-down email address, and immediately set up publishing your subversive thoughts for the whole world to read. And that’s why the Chinese government will not allow it.

Looking beyond the Google.cn launch, we will continue to make significant investments in research and development in China. We believe these investments – and the innovations that will result – will help us to better tailor our products to user demands and better demonstrate how the Internet can help advance key objectives supported by the Chinese government, such as building stronger, more efficient, and more equitable markets, promoting the rule of law, and bolstering the fight against corruption.

Again, I’m not buying it. Google is too smart to carry on its R&D in a country that’s notorious for its piracy, reverse engineering and other violations of intellectual property rights. The company also has no incentive to conduct R&D for its Chinese products at all, since they’ve accepted the notion of Google China as just a half-assed Commie version of real Google? As for "promoting the rule of law:" that’s something the Chinese have way too much of.

It’s plain as day what Google has done: helped the Chinese silence political dissenters in exchange for a shot at the world’s biggest market. All the other stuff is just whitewash.

Here is a little something highlighting the neglected area of concealed carry permits for plumbing equipment.

Father, son use toilet to fight off knife-wielding man

A father and son were watching the Super Bowl and saw a man and woman fighting down the street. They ran to help her. The man pulled out a knife and stabbed the father and son. They picked up part of a toilet and hit him with it. He’s being treated for head injuries. The woman and the father and son are also being treated.

No word on the toilet’s condition, but obviously Mayor White’s new “Flush Clear” program is beginning to have an impact on Houston’s crime rate.

The Houston Chronicle takes some swipes at the oil industry in one of their staff editorials today. Naturally, much of it is thoughtless and stupid:

While oil companies can rightly claim they are businesses entitled to an honest profit and not charities, the record profits should cause them to temporarily retire some the industry’s usual talking points:

•"OPEC made me do it." Like the oil cartel, oil companies also benefit from charging whatever the market will bear. As long as demand is rising, they have no inducement to cut prices.

Is the Chronicle really so simple-minded that it can’t tell the difference between charging the market price for a commodity, and setting up a cartel whereby suppliers collude to fix prices?

I’ll give the Chron a hint: If ExxonMobil did what OPEC does, they’d be hauled into court. We have laws against price-fixing and collusion, and nobody has shown that oil companies in the US have been violating them. Hence this is a ridiculous example of moral equivalency, which only serves to boost the stature of OPEC.

President Bush has unveiled his newest budget proposal, and the reactions follow the usual “How to portray a Republican President’s budget” script.

The Democrat take:

Democrats attacked what they said were Bush’s skewed priorities. They said he was trying to impose austere budgets that will harm programs for the poor while protecting tax cuts Democrats said were going primarily to the wealthy.

Apparently Democrats fax the same press release to reporters every time President Bush does anything. “He’s wrong, tax breaks for the wealthy, doesn’t care about the poor, blah blah blah.” Unfortunately, they have been saying the same thing for decades and media outlets continue to pass it along unquestioned.

Which brings us to the press take:

But among the losers were 141 government programs that Bush sought to sharply reduce or eliminate entirely. Almost one-third of the targeted programs are in education including ones that provide money to support the arts, vocational education, parent resource centers and drug-free schools.

Straight from the Liberal Press Handbook: “Eeeeevil Republicans try to cut the funding for education! Bush doesn’t care about children! Bush wants drugs in schools!” This kind of slanted reporting is the reason for the decline of the mainstream media, yet they continue their “objective reporting” oblivious to criticism or slipping bottom lines.

Finally, the big government truth:

Bush’s spending proposals, contained in four massive volumes featuring green and beige covers, are for the 2007 budget year that begins next Oct. 1. The $2.77 trillion in spending would be up by 2.3 percent from projected spending of $2.71 trillion this year.
The administration in its budget documents said the deficit for this year will soar to an all-time high of $423 billion, reflecting increased outlays for the Iraq war and hurricane relief.

The federal budget is closing in on three trillion dollars, yet we are still treated to the chorus of “It’s not enough!” How things have changed from the nation’s income-tax-free founding. Today Americans work for over three months out of the year to pay the tax man, but the politicians always demand “More!” Hardly the limited government envisioned by the Founders.

If you were partaking in some adult beverages while watching the Super Bowl last night, you might be surprised by this amazing news flash:

Nighttime Drinking Can Lead To Morning Drunkenness

Shockingly enough, if you are drinking late into the night or early morning, you may still have alcohol in your system at 5:30am according to KPRC-TV. You could be loaded for your commute to work!

Who knew?

By the way, the party animals at Channel 2 supplied a bottle of vodka and a couple cases of beer to their test subjects for the story, so if you are interested in assisting them with any “follow-up research” you might want to let them know.

Thanks to tipmeister Tom Bazan, I know that Metro has a brand spankin’ new website, and it made me curious. Just for kicks, I thought I’d fire up Metro’s trip planner to see how long it would take our beloved transit authority to haul me to work in the morning. So I typed in my home address and my work address, hit "Get Trip Plan" and got the following route:

For the benefit of participants in LST’s current poll:

In a morbid (and embarrassingly immature) riff on the old Spy magazine "Separated at Birth" gag, I can’t help but note the passing of…

Grandpa Munster and Betty Friedan

Of no particular importance:

1. Generally speaking, the commercials really sucked this year. The "best"– probably the Sprint/ESPN mobile phone spot, since it was interesting to look at and succeeded in communicating what it was they were actually selling (a world of sports on your cell phone).
2. I also liked the cell phone commercial where the one guy chucks his "crime deterrent" phone at the other guy’s head. I think that was Sprint too.
3. While I always enjoy watching a monkey act like a human, the careerbuilder.com spots felt old… you needed an entire year to come up with this?
4. If I found myself in Hell and was forced to choose between spending eternity watching Janet Jackson’s floppy breast or Mick Jagger’s pasty/chicken-string arms…. I don’t know which I’d choose. Hopefully Satan would let me suck on his fungus-soaked sweat-socks instead.
5. I’m a born and bred Packer fan, with no particular investment in this game– yet I quickly learned I will never be capable of cheering for a team against Mike Holmgren, especially when the stakes are that high.

Feel free to kick around the game, the commercials, or the Great Jackson Floppy Breast vs. Jagger Chicken-Arms debate in comments.

As of 6:22 this morning– 48 minutes earlier than promised, which is about par for his course– Edd Hendee began to broadcast on KSEV 700 AM from the field in Iraq.

Stay tuned all week to LoneStarTimes.com– your home for right-wing conservative talk-radio online ephemera, including Edd’s (Daily?) Journal entries, pictures from the front lines, and "Stand w/the Troops" fundraising updates.

Speaking of that latter item: Many readers will recall Edd’s wildly successful fundraising effort during his trip last year, which managed to raise over $209k (significant amounts in the form of in-kind equipment donations; $85,442.58 via LST’s PayPal account) to up-armor Humvees and provide other support services to troops stuck on the wrong side of Big Government’s inevitable bureaucracy.

Perceptive readers will note that a "Stand w/the Troops" image is now located on the right side of LST, near the top of the screen. This image is linked to a separate and independent PayPal account managed by Edd’s partner-in-patriotism, Danny Lee of Forges, Flanges & Fittings.

LST is proud to lend a hand and encourages its readers to donate to Edd and Danny’s operation. Our understanding is that any funds raised may be devoted to Humvee protection, but will also be spent on unique items that best meet the needs expressed by actual troops Edd comes into contact with while in Iraq.

God Bless our troops and keep them, and Edd, and Laura, and all innocent Iraqis safe.

And please rain Hell on the jihadis.

First!