[Guest post by DRJ]

For the first time in 30 years, NASA has posted a hiring notice for new astronauts:

“NASA posted a hiring notice for new astronauts Tuesday, seeking for the first time in almost 30 years men and women to fly aboard spacecraft other than the shuttle.

The pilots, scientists, engineers and educators that NASA recruits will train primarily for three- to six-month missions aboard the international space station. However, some could be among those who stroll on the surface of the moon as part of NASA’s plan to return human explorers to the lunar surface by 2020 aboard the shuttle fleet’s successor spacecraft.”

The deadline for applications is July 1 and you can get more information online:

“The space agency’s help-wanted notice for 10 to 15 new space fliers was posted Tuesday on www.usajobs.com, the federal government’s employment Web site.”

Successful applicants get a trip to Houston “for interviews with a selection panel and medical screening” which undoubtedly includes a detailed psychological screening.

NASA is an important program. I hope the best people take this opportunity to reach for the stars.

— DRJ

[Guest post by DRJ]

Orem, Utah, resident Betty Perry is not your typical criminal defendant:

“A 70-year-old woman arrested in a dispute over her brown lawn pleaded not guilty Tuesday, then stood by as a Los Angeles lawyer waved handcuffs for the cameras outside court. “I ask the citizens of Orem: How many of you would like to have your great-grandmother taken from her home with bruises and blood and placed in handcuffs for failing to water her lawn?” attorney Gloria Allred said. “Let’s bring sanity back to law enforcement,” she said.

Betty Perry is charged with resisting arrest and failing to maintain her landscaping, both misdemeanors. She was arrested July 6 after failing to give her name to a police officer who visited her home. During a struggle, Perry fell and injured her nose. She spent more than an hour in a holding cell before police released her.”

There’s no great-grandmother exception for resisting arrest and there shouldn’t be, but I don’t think it should be a criminal offense to have a brown lawn.

— DRJ

[Guest post by DRJ]

Andrew Meyer is the college student who was tasered by University of Florida police during a John Kerry appearance at UF. Now he has a couple of videos:

The Taser incident which has been shown in the media, and this video from what is apparently Meyer’s website (or a website set up by his supporters). The website includes a link to help visitors Buy Stuff like “The Pimp Light.”

Meyer reminds me of many young liberal college students who can simultaneously rail against war and authority as fervently as they celebrate college sports. He might have been better off if he had stuck to cheering for the Gators.

Update: Hot Air wonders if this was a publicity stunt.

— DRJ

UPDATE BY PATTERICO: Don’t tase me, bro!

[Guest post by DRJ]

There’s another Andrea Yates-type case in Haltom City, Texas, a suburb of Fort Worth:

(more…)

[Guest post by DRJ]

Seattle’s South Lake Union neighborhood has a new SLUT:

(more…)

[Guest post by DRJ]

Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan has written a book that reportedly said the Iraq War was “largely about the oil.” I don’t know if there was an explanation for this statement in his book but reporters and bloggers interpreted it to mean Greenspan believed the Bush Administration went to war for oil.

Greenspan has now clarified his remarks to say that while he felt deposing Saddam Hussein to protect the Straits of Hormuz was essential for economic reasons, he did not mean that was the Bush Administration’s motive in ousting Saddam:

“Greenspan, who was the country’s top voice on monetary policy at the time Bush decided to go to war in Iraq, has refrained from extensive public comment on it until now, but he made the striking comment in a new memoir out today that “the Iraq War is largely about oil.” In the interview, he clarified that sentence in his 531-page book, saying that while securing global oil supplies was “not the administration’s motive,” he had presented the White House with the case for why removing Hussein was important for the global economy.

“I was not saying that that’s the administration’s motive,” Greenspan said in an interview Saturday, “I’m just saying that if somebody asked me, ‘Are we fortunate in taking out Saddam?’ I would say it was essential.”

I’m glad Greenspan clarified this but I don’t blame anyone for misunderstanding his comment. I haven’t read his book but unless the context made his intent clear, this was a striking statement. You might even call it politically tone-deaf, given the staying power of rhetoric like “No Blood for Oil.”

— DRJ

You knew this was coming.

[“Deport the Criminals First” is a recurring feature on this blog, highlighting crimes committed by illegal immigrants — with a special focus on repeat offenders. I argue that, instead of arresting illegal immigrants who work hard for a living, we should use our limited immigration enforcement resources to target illegal immigrants who commit crimes in this country.]

From yesterday’s Muncie Star Press:

Simon Rios was sentenced today to life in prison for raping and killing 10-year-old Alejandra Gutierrez, then leaving her body in a Delaware County gravel pit.

(Via Hazy.)

Alejandra was one of five people Rios killed. Four were children; three of those were his own. The backstory is recounted in the blog Missing and Murdered Children:

Alejandra Gutierrez was reported missing on December 8, 2005 after not returning home from school that day. Her mother watched her walk down the street towards her school bus stop at approximately 9:50 a.m. and that is the last time anyone saw her alive except for her alleged murderers. Extensive searches of the area failed to locate Alejandra.

A seemingly unrelated crime was reported to police during the early morning hours of December 13, 2005. Simon Rios a thirty-three-year-old illegal Mexican National called 911 to report that he had murdered his wife and their three children.

When police arrived Rios told them that he and his wife had argued about him doing household chores so he struck her with a pipe on her head, strangled her and then strangled their three children. Police found the four bodies lying on the bed where Simon Rios had positioned them. Simon Rios was arrested and charged with the murder of his family.

While incarcerated in the County Jail, Simon Rios indicated to authorities that he knew where they could find the body of the then missing 10-year-old Alejandra Gutierrez. . . . Rios eventually told authorities that he and seventeen-year-old Juan Rosales dragged Alejandra into his van. Juan Rosales raped Alejandra, and then he raped her. They eventually dumped her body in a remote location in another county. Her body was located based on the information given to authorities by Rios, it was frozen. The Coroner had to wait a few days for Alejandra’s body to thaw out before they could perform the autopsy.

And now, the disgustingly familiar details. Rios is an illegal alien. And this could have been prevented — because this illegal alien had been in the system before. The blog explains that in 2003, he pled guilty to domestic violence:

A police report said officers responded to a battery complaint at 4122 S. Calhoun two days earlier. Casas-Rios told police she was home with Simon Rios when he was drinking and the two argued.

Rios hit Casas-Rios in the head and abdomen, cornered her behind the front door and began to punch her in the head and abdomen, the report said. Officers saw hair stuck to the wall where Casas-Rios was beaten, the report said. Liliana, then 8, saw the fight, police said…

That wasn’t his only contact with the system:

In February 2002 Rios was found guilty of DUI. He received a suspended 90 day sentence, a one year suspended jail sentence and one year of probation requiring successful completion of a counseling program.

Who knows if deportation would have saved Simon Rios’s family? Maybe they would have gone with him. Or maybe they would have stayed here — perhaps to be interviewed by some liberal publication for a human interest feature on the heartbreak of families split up by deporting illegals.

But the rape and murder of Alejandra Gutierrez . . . that damn well could have been prevented.

Rest in peace, Alejandra.