Watcher's Winners

Sometimes the Watcher of Weasel's weekly competition for best on-line writing of the week is nothing more than a race for second place because the winners are winning by a mile. Such was the case this week.

In a break from tradition, I'm going to start with the entry from a non-Watcher's Council member, because its author deserves all honors, and because it swept the competition with the highest vote count I can remember. You've probably already read it; it's probably the best-read blog post of the week. Thank God.

It's the post Andy Olmsted from Obsidian Wings, the post Andrew Olmsted, US Army, wrote over time, to be posted only upon his death in Iraq. Olmsted was the first U.S. casualty of 2008, so ...

This is an entry I would have preferred not to have published, but there are limits to what we can control in life, and apparently I have passed one of those limits.

On the Watcher's Council side of the slate, Wolf Howling tallied up a 3-point lead with his post, Britain's Prosecution of the Blogger Lionheart for Criticism of Islam. I'd read several posts about this horrible case before Wolf Howling's but his was the best. It includes an analysis of the law Lionheart is being prosecuted, plus another, more recent British anti-free-speech law that's not being used, includes info WH got from an interview with Lionheart's attorney and has just the right amount of outrage and concern.

Soccer Dad came in second with an excellent post, Getting a "Clue," that shows once again that you just can't trust anti-Israel news out of Palestine. Thanks for the two or three Council members who gave my post, Honor Killing? What Honor Killing? a tally of 1.

Even if you're not nominated by a Council member, you can join the fun by exploiting for your purposes the Watcher's offer of link whorage.

Thanks, Watcher, for providing us a way to honor former Watcher's Council member Andy Olmsted.