While in New Orleans, Mobile, Galveston, and Rio de Janeiro they’re historically counting down the minutes till Ash Wednesday and the season of Lent, today was always Shrove Tuesday when I was growing up. As a young Episcopalian, Shrove Tuesday was the one day you always got breakfast for supper, since - at least in my part of the world - that meant the traditional Shrove Tuesday pancake supper in the church hall. Why pancakes on the Tuesday before Lent, you might ask? I found this via the Pancake Parlour:

Perhaps the best known one is Shrove Tuesday or Pancake Day, which heralds the beginning of fasting in Lent. On this day (so the historians say) there were feasts of pancakes to use up the supplies of fat, butter and eggs… foods that were forbidden during austere Lent.

In England there arc several celebrations on this day but perhaps the best known one is the Pancake Day Race at Olney in Buckinghamshire which has been held since 1445. The race came about when a woman cooking pancakes heard the shriving bell summoning her to confession. She ran to church wearing her apron and still holding her frying pan, and thus without knowing it, started a tradition that has lasted for over five hundred years.

I guess the Anglican Church connection between the Episcopal Church of the USA and the Church of England made the Shrove Tuesday pancake supper a natural extension of the English tradition. Hmmm… if given the choice between eating a pile of pancakes in an austere parish hall setting or hurling my brains out in front of thousands of beaded partygoers in The Big Easy, I’d choose, ummm… neither!

Today’s CBS News poll showing the President’s approval rating falling to 34% is a joke. Although I have no expertise with polls and polling, K-Lo at National Review Online found someone who does, and his review of the poll’s internals is blistering:

· I believe the survey is among adults and not voters. In political polling no one cares about what adults think. They care only about what registered voters think. I can’t find data suggesting that this survey is anything BUT a survey of adults. CBS and most news orgs poll adults instead of reg. voters for two reasons (a) it costs less and (b) it makes the data more Democratic.

· The data set itself is dramatically more Democrat. It’s 28% Republican and 37% Democrat AFTER they weighted Republicans UP. In other words, the sample was even more Democrat when it came back. In fact, Democrats were 40% of the sample and Republicans were only 27%. Someone clearly knew having a sample that was 40-27 would be a tip-off, so they weighted Dems down into the 30%s in order to avoid extreme criticism. Why is the sample so Democrat? One reason may be because almost every question bangs the President and I would guess that the hang ups they get are vastly more Republican than Democrat. Think about it. Why would a Republican sit on the phone and answer loaded anti-Bush questions for 15 minutes?

· The survey is NOT being done for actual opinion research, but is being done for headlines. Most of the work I have done for 10 years – probably 90% of it – is NEVER released publicly. It isn’t being written for headlines, it’s being written to get the truth about how people feel. This survey is mostly done to zing Bush, Cheney and Republicans generally.

The mainstream media can cry all it wants about being made out to be the “bad guys” by the Bush administration, but it is in shameful actions like the moaning and wailing over the Veep’s hunting accident a couple weeks ago and the trumpeting of polls with obviously-skewed data that the MSM reveals just how little credibility they now have left. When Bush-hating becomes the motivator for shoddy reporting, disinformation, and concentrating on all things negative, is it any wonder that people are increasingly turning to blogs (rightly or wrongly) for their news and information. The mainstream media has let the American people down, and in the end we are all worse off for it.

Speaking of the mainstream media, what is it with the New York Times and their obsession with trying to reveal the nation’s security apparatus? At first, I thought they were just trying to do a reverse Woodward & Bernstein on the Washington Post in a feeble attempt to relive the days when the “mainstream” was the only stream, but now I’m truly beginning to wonder. Who’s really in charge there, and what are they really up to? Don’t they realize that we live in a technological age where the information they seek to have released can and will be shared by both predator and prey alike? I mean, weren’t these guys within shouting distance of the 9/11 attacks? Methinks the Old Gray Lady needs to revisit the horror of that day and reaquaint themselves with the kind of people we’re up against.

I hope you’ll excuse me two days in a row (I promise this will be the last time!) of Food Network links? This recipe is an absolute knockout. Try it, and you’ll feel as if you’re sitting in a quaint Boston North End restaurant sharing a basket of fresh Italian bread and a nice chianti with your significant other…

Finally (and here’s where the lagniappe comes in), I hope you find the links provided on the sidebar both interesting and entertaining. Between the House Rabbit Society (where today is the last day of Adopt-A-Rescued-Rabbit Month) and the UFO Filer’s Files (detailing recent UFO sightings over Alabama, Arizona, California, Connecticut, Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Maine, Maryland, Mississippi, New Hampshire, Nevada, New Mexico, New York, Ohio, South Dakota, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Washington, and West Virginia, as well as Argentina, Australia, Canada, India, Mexico, and the UK - and you thought we were alone!), there’s something for everyone!

Laissez les bons temps rouler…

…said the bumper sticker I saw yesterday. An apt description of the state of my existence, if there ever was one! Some points to ponder while waiting to see if our stretch of 130+ days without rain ends tomorrow.

Bill O’Reilly will have a cow on The Factor tonight at this news (hat tip, Captains Quarters). What say you, American Red Cross?

If the far-left couldn’t take back the White House via Senator “Reporting-for Duty” (D-Pompous A$$), then, by golly, they’re gonna try and take it by force. Check out this call to general quarters by a website from the group United for Peace and Justice; hah! sounds almost too good to be true.

Captain Ed (OK, I’m a shill for Captains Quarters today), I think, pins the tail on the donkeys perfectly:

It doesn’t take much to put up a website, of course, and this looks like the work of a nutcase in search of company in the asylum. However, given the political climate these days, I have no doubt that a number of people will actually appear on March 15th to “storm” the White House. It boasts a long list of member groups, and a number of those groups are listed on their steering committee roster. These are the groups that apparently are endorsing a call to overthrow the elected government of the United States:

* CODEPINK
* The Communist Party (no surprise there!)
* National Hip Hop Political Caucus
* Iraq Veterans Against The War
* September 11th Families For Peaceful Tomorrows
* Teen Peace Project
* Not In Our Name
* Military Families Speak Out
* US Campaign To End The Israeli Occupation
* National Network On Cuba (again, no surprise)
* DC Anti-War Network

From now on, when people from these groups organize and demonstrate, we know what they support: an armed coup d’etat and the end of democracy in America. They want the UN to topple our government and to replace it with, one assumes, the rule of Kofi Annan and the rest of the world.

Oughta be a good one. If this isn’t a rally perfect for a Protest Warrior response, I don’t know what is. If that’s the best they got, all I can say is (to quote Senator “Reporting-for-Duty” one last time): Bring. It. On.

Look, I love the Food Network’s Rachael Ray as much as, if not more than, any red-blooded American male cook might, but I have two main issues with her: 1) why does everything on 30 Minute Meals have to have a whole lotta cheese in it, and 2) doesn’t she realize that the only reason she can survive on $40 A Day is to tip the wait staff 10%. Heck, even she should realize that if the food is as good as it always seems to be, it oughta be worth at least a 15, if not a 20 percent, tip, right? After all, these people have to eat, too…

Anyone see Zach Johnson’s ball bouncing like a pinball on the rocks by that par-5 during his Accenture Match Play Championship consolation round yesterday? That sucker bounced at least five - count ‘em, five! - times: backward-forward-sideways-forward, then backward again before finally coming to rest in play beside a rock. Unbelievable for a pro during a televised round of golf, perhaps, but The Great White Shank has seen it all too often before…

Be back later, off to meet Dollar Bill tonight to yap some rap, holler some dollar, pick me up some fully-licensed gear and CD samples, and plan that “Twice as Good as 50 Cent” tour marketing blitz my friend Pasquale (LP) and I know can work if we push LP’s contacts back east. The seal’s the real deal - if you haven’t heard him yet please check his site out and say (to quote the dude himself), “Yo, What’s Up”. Be sure to tell him The Great White Shank sent ya.

Actor Darren McGavin died yesterday at the age of 83. Like many, my favorite role of his was the father in A Christmas Story. One of the great movie lines of all time: Spying the word “Fragile” on the crate containing the fishnet stocking leg lamp he won as a prize, he says, “Fra-gee-le….must be Italian!” He was also great in another of my favorite movies, The Natural, where he played the gambler, Gus Sands. R.I.P. Darren, you were an original.

The last time I visited New Hampshire, I saw their new signs welcoming visitors to the state with a new motto: “You’re Going to Love it Here”. No more “Live Free or Die”? I wasn’t impressed. Neither is former resident John Hinderaker of Powerline, who recounts the latest controversy:

New Hampshire, inspired by its more liberal elements–or, more likely, by its real estate developers–came up with a new jingle; it doesn’t really qualify as a motto: “You’re going to love it here.” Feeble, no? Nevertheless, signs displaying the new slogan were posted along highways entering New Hampshire.

Turns out, John and I aren’t the only ones, as the only thing the new signs (a bland but tastefully done country village scene) appear to have illicited is general unhappiness:

…The only problem is the governor and other top officials hate them.

“Right now, every time I go past those things I’m embarrassed,” Senate Majority Leader Robert Clegg said Thursday.

Gov. John Lynch acknowledged that he, too, can’t wait to get rid of the beige signs that depict a small village along with the “love it” slogan.

“It’s true. I want to be there when they take out the first one,” he said.

The Senate passed a bill Thursday to require the state motto, “Live Free or Die,” on highway welcoming signs. The motto could replace the “love it” slogan on the beige signs, or, more likely, appear on new signs.

“Live Free Or Die” just won’t go away, I guess. Somewhere there must be old-fashioned Emmets who stubbornly hew to the old-fashioned values. Actually, I think this kind of conflict is a good thing: the plain vanilla ad man slogan vs. the early 19th century challenge. Personally, I’m with General Stark.

Anytime we can replace bland 21st century marketing with a reminder of our nation’s truly revolutionary roots, that can only be a good thing. Congrats to the Garnite State and its elected leaders.

Regardless of his motives, this can only be seen as a positive thing. Anything Iraq can do to take responsibility for maintaining its own security and unity further diminishes al-Zarqawi and al-Qaida’s ability to force political change in the Middle East. I can’t help but think this week’s failed attack on a Saudi oil refinery and blowing up the Samarra Golden Mosque, rather than furthering its interests in Iraq and Saudi Arabia, will in the end do nothing else but hasten al-Qaida’s rush to obscurity as nothing more than the neighborhood bully and thug.

So yesterday, I’m against the Dubai Port Deal. Now I hear Hillary Clinton blasted both the administration and the deal, saying it will turn over our sovereignty to another country. Riiiight….

If Hillary is that set against it, that’s good enough for me. Therefore, I’m now in favor of it; enthusiastically so.

It’s snowing back home in Massachusetts but - what else? - sunny, warm