Blaming Bush for domestic spying

I have been tempted to agree with the left’s argument that it’s all “Bush’s fault” because he started the data collection that we have today.  But that’s like blaming the murders in Chicago on the guy who invented gunpowder.  Data collection is a tool and thanks to technology we’re better at it than ever.  But the person using it and the way it’s used that determines if the use is evil or good. 

The NSA program and the way it's implemented, spying on reporters, IRS abuses, Fast & furious, Benghazi are all Obama programs and he is responsible. 

Remember when dissent was patriotic? If anyone tells you that the Tea Party is radical, remind them of this!

From the Dana Show

Listen to the whole thing:
"We're going to have to come out and kill somebody I guess."

George Bush as Hitler:

Sarah Palin as Hitler:

This is the Left, unvarnished, unfiltered by the MFM. These are Obama's natural allies. These are the ones who now call the Tea Party demonstrators racists and fascists, scary kooks and the American Taliban wanting to turn the US into a theocracy. They are the ones who did not get onto the pages of the Virginian Pilot, the NY Times or the Washington Post when Bush was president because they were an "inconvenient truth." They are the ones roaming the halls of congress and the White House today and the reason that the people are revolting at the ballot box.

We're not planning to kill anyone, even though they thought about killing us. We're just going to make them irrelevant; put them in a museum where people can look at them and and stare in wonder the these specimens ever took control in our country.

The Press, A President and a Recession

Note that Obama is telling us we are in a recession that's going to get worse and will lead to a catastrophe if we don't pass his pork bill. Here's how the press treated his predecessor when Bush spoke about a recession:

Every president must walk a rhetorical tightrope when talking about the economy, a lesson Mr. Bush learned quickly, being bashed just after taking office for delivering somber news. The United States was just entering a mild recession - it had been in one, it turns out, for about nine months - and the new president said so.

Liberals went berserk.

"Every time we turn around, this guy is bad-mouthing the economy. Is that lifting our spirit or dumping on it in order to sell his tax cut?" liberal comentator Bill Press said on CNN. Newsweek's Jonathan Alter, in an article headlined "Thanks Ever So Much, President Poor-Mouth," said, "Even if Bush turns out to be right in his predictions of gloom, that doesn't mean he was right to make them." The New York Times lectured Mr. Bush, saying that presidents were supposed to be "cheerleaders for the nation's economy."

But Mr. Bush tried that, too. As the United States recovered from the economic devastation caused by the 9/11 attacks, the president constantly talked up the economy, asserting that the American work force could compete with any in the world, and he assured Americans that happy days were right around the corner. Even as the currrent recession took hold, he continued to portray the nation's future in optimistic tones.

For all his effort, he was portrayed as a Pollyannish rube whose naivete so clouded his vision that he could not see the stark reality of the economic situation. How else to explain his optimism in the face of $4-a-gallon gas or exploding unemployment, or presidential statements a year ago, such as "I don't think we're headed to a recession, but no question we're in a slowdown."

The press has a simple formula: Republican presidents = bad, Democrat presidents = good.

I have given myself a waiver on press bashing.

No media mudballs this time

Powerline takes us back in time via the Wayback Machine to see how previous inaugurations were handled by the press.

Read the whole thing. Here's how it ends...

The day before Bush's swearing-in, ABC's Web site pleaded for tips of "any military funerals for Iraq war casualties scheduled for Thursday, Jan. 20." Sure enough, then-ABC anchor Peter Jennings got his wish to report how "just about the time the president was speaking, there was a funeral for a young Marine reservist: 21-year-old Matthew Holloway was killed in Iraq last week by a roadside bomb." Don't look for the networks to use such tactics to sour Obama's celebration.

The consequences of Bush hatred

Bush Derangement Syndrome is not only expressed verbally or in writing. It'a also expressed in bombs and terror threats.

Bomb suspect killed self; blasted Rove, Cheney and Bush in note

ASPEN — A man who left bomb threats and homemade bombs around Aspen on New Year's Eve shot and killed himself in his car a few hours after his threats cleared much of the resort town, Aspen Police said.

Assistant Aspen Police Chief Bill Linn said James Chester Blanning, 72, walked into two Aspen banks Wednesday afternoon and left packages wrapped in holiday paper along with notes saying the boxes contained bombs. The notes threatened "mass death" and demanded $60,000 cash, along with criticisms of President George Bush, Linn said.

He thought well of himself, as Liberals always do.

He gave no motive, but he wrote, "I was and am a good man."

While committed enough to plant several bombs along with ransom notes, like all Liberals, he did a piss poor job.

Later, police found two similar packages in a downtown alley atop a black sled. All four boxes contained homemade bombs made of gasoline and cell phone components.

"We believe the suspect abandoned his plan halfway through," said Linn, who said Blanning's notes didn't say which other two banks he planned to target.

Based on the story in the Rocky Mountain News, the Obama voter was a bit of an environmentalist but did not care for the “rich.” He preferred the "good old days."

Aspen residents recalled Blanning as an eccentric who grew up fascinated by Aspen's past as a silver mining town. People who knew Blanning say he became disenchanted with his hometown as it turned into a holiday playground for the rich.

This handwritten note was left with his friends at the MSM


This is the ransom note



The focus of his dementia is revealed here too. But except for the bomb how is this note much different from that expressed for the last eight years by the BDS afflicted?

Could it be that the Bush haters cannot let go of their hate now that Bush is leaving office. That they must act out their hatred otherwise they will be left empty vessels? There is a genuine psychiatric subject for study here. Except that the psychiatrists may also be infected.

The Virginian Pilot editors, having abandoned their ethical standards, now demand doctors do the same.

Pravda was a beacon of journalistic truth and technical prowess compared with the Virginian Pilot

The Virginian Pilot has a … shall we say “interesting” view of ethics. Let us first get rid of the canard that journalism has ethical standards to which it scrupulously adheres. That’s a punch line for a joke, not a serious point for discussion.

In this editorial it demands that people who are opposed to abortion be required – by law – to violate their own ethical standards in order to keep a job.

The editorial begins with the obligatory Bush bashing.

…as Bush prepares to exit the White House, he's tossing a prize to anti-abortion activists and leaving the victims of sexual assault more vulnerable than ever.

Note the referral to “anti-abortion activists” rather than people who believe abortion is ethically wrong. Most people who fall into that category are not active in any way, they simply believe in the sanctity of life. The members of the Pilot editorial staff do not.

And how does the belief of people who are opposed to abortion leave victims of sexual assault “more vulnerable?” The editors never say. They simply repeat what abortion activists say.

New regulations … would reduce access to emergency contraceptives and counseling by declaring a "right of conscience" for health care workers who refuse to provide those services because of their religious or moral beliefs. Hospitals, clinics or government agencies that fail to accommodate their employees would lose federal funding.

Does accommodating people who believe that abortion is murder create in insuperable barrier to women getting an abortion? How many medical workers would this affect? The editorial does not say. How many hospitals would this effect? The editorial does not say. And note the scare quotes around the term "right of conscience."

The Pilot has rarely expressed any opposition to laws mandating accommodation to any group, the lame, the blind the insane and the criminal. But woe to those who would put even the slightest and most momentary pause in the destruction of babies (or “non-viable tissue mass” in the view of the Pilot’s editors) and the paper goes ballistic.

Doctors and nurses already have legal protections that prevent them from being fired if they refuse to participate in an abortion. The 127-page regulatory change now pending is an unjustified overreach that would permit health professionals to shrug off their duty to the patients who need help the most. Sadly, indigent women who depend on public health programs would be most affected.

Three points about this paragraph. First, it fails to state what the regulation requires, so we really don’t know what the “overreach” the editors refer to means. Second, the editors cheat when they refer to people who have ethical standards as “shrugging off their duty.” Who has a duty to do what they perceive as evil? Dr. Mengele's assistants? Third, the reference to “indigent women” brings to mind part of an article written by Jonah Goldberg which recalls Margaret Sanger, the founding patron of “family planning” who saw it as a tool to get rid of the undesirable underclass – which included Blacks. You can be sure that it’s no accident that the Pilot’s editors advocate aborting “indigent women(s)” children in view of the fact that Blacks make up a disproportionate percentage of aborted babies.

If taken within 72 hours of a rape or unprotected sex, emergency contraceptives can prevent pregnancy, thus reducing the need for many abortions.

Note the lies in this sentence? “Emergency contraceptives” is a contradiction in terms. What the editors are talking about is not contraception – something that prevents conception – but early stage abortion.

Bush's regulation tears at the heart of medical ethics and must be suspended before it does terrible harm.

Ah yes. “Medical ethics” like “journalistic ethics” are slippery things. In the view of the Pilot's editors, abortion is demanded by medical ethics.

I thought that the primary rule of medical ethics is “first, do no harm.” That ethical rule has been chucked into the basket of medical waste along with the discarded fetuses. Given a chance for some medical practitioners to reclaim some ethical standards, if only for themselves, we get a lecture on ethics from the one group in the nation that has ethical standards so low that they have become a national joke.

Could Bush Be Hitler?

Frank J. asks the question that's on everyone's lips:

In Bush’s last days, if he suddenly unveils he is really Hitler and unleashes his Hitler plans involving world conquest through UFOs, dinosaurs, and pirates, the liberals are going to be like, “See! He was Hitler! We told you!” And we’re all going to look really stupid if we hadn’t even given that possibility some honest thought.

Read the whole thing.

The War, Obama and His Acolytes - A Flip Of Unimaginable Cynicism

David Limbaugh writes: What the Obama Cult Factor Portends

Excerpt:

Given the nation's Bush fatigue -- no matter how unjustified from a broad historical perspective -- and Bush's very low approval ratings, it only made sense for Democratic presidential aspirants to make themselves the anti-Bush.

Because the Iraq war was perceived as Bush's greatest sin and almost all other sins flowed from Iraq or were somehow conflated with it -- Abu Ghraib, rendition, waterboarding, "unilateralism," NSA surveillance, Halliburton, Gitmo, etc. -- Obama was uniquely positioned to be the anti-Bush.
...
Although Obama certainly articulated policies that were contrary to the status quo under President Bush, many of his supporters didn't care or weren't the slightest bit informed about the specifics of his policies. They were just swept up in his personality cult and nebulous promises of hope and change.

So it should be no surprise that Obama's series of head-spinning reversals so far have been met not with outrage from his supporters (fringe leftists excepted), but with glib rationalizations.

His newfound vacillation about Gitmo and NSA surveillance, his flip-flop on withdrawing from Iraq in 16 months, and his announced Cabinet appointments -- particularly Gates and Clinton -- are not being criticized as betrayals, but lauded as evidence that he is open-minded, adaptable, wise and, of course, presidential.

He's facing nary a shred of accountability for his anticipatory breaches of campaign promises. His flock is just happy that he will be implementing these policies -- not President Bush.

All of this says so many things about our electorate and the coming climate for the Obama presidency, but I'll just leave you with two quick ones. First, it shows that most of the hatred for Bush was not based on his policies, but on the eight-year hate-filled propaganda campaign against him.

Read the whole thing.

Limbaugh makes a very important point that should be repeated time and again as we go on: if Obama continues Bush’s policies on Iraq after denouncing them during the campaign, and his supporters do not denounce him for doing so, we have incontrovertible proof that BDS – whipped up by the media and academia – is not just a hypothesis but a fact. It also shows that Obama’s followers are not issue oriented but personality oriented. But we knew that, didn’t we?

UPDATE: 'Muted by Reality' Now that Obama has won, we could be in Iraq for a hundred years.
From Best of the web in the Wall Street Journal we read

Barack Obama was elected president a month ago and does not take office for another 6½ weeks. But his most fervent supporters already have reason to be disappointed in him. Witness the headline of a "news analysis" in today's New York Times: "Campaign Promises on Ending the War in Iraq Now Muted by Reality."

"As he moves closer to the White House," the Times reveals, "President-elect Obama is making clearer than ever that tens of thousands of American troops will be left behind in Iraq, even if he can make good on his campaign promise to pull all combat forces out within 16 months." That itself is a big "if," as the Times acknowledges:

That status-of-forces agreement remains subject to change, by mutual agreement, and Army planners acknowledge privately that they are examining projections that could see the number of Americans hovering between 30,000 and 50,000--and some say as high as 70,000--for a substantial time even beyond 2011.

We may be in Iraq for a hundred years! The Times notes that "there always was a tension, if not a bit of a contradiction, in the two parts of Mr. Obama's campaign platform to 'end the war' by withdrawing all combat troops by May 2010":

To be sure, Mr. Obama was careful to say that the drawdowns he was promising included only combat troops. But supporters who keyed on the language of ending the war might be forgiven if they thought that would mean bringing home all of the troops.

Hmm, here is what the Times editorial page said about the subject when it endorsed Obama back in October:

The unnecessary and staggeringly costly war in Iraq must be ended as quickly and responsibly as possible.
While Iraq's leaders insist on a swift drawdown of American troops and a deadline for the end of the occupation, Mr. McCain is still talking about some ill-defined "victory." As a result, he has offered no real plan for extracting American troops and limiting any further damage to Iraq and its neighbors.
Mr. Obama was an early and thoughtful opponent of the war in Iraq, and he has presented a military and diplomatic plan for withdrawing American forces. Mr. Obama also has correctly warned that until the Pentagon starts pulling troops out of Iraq, there will not be enough troops to defeat the Taliban and Al Qaeda in Afghanistan.

It is awfully generous of the Times to forgive Obama's supporters for believing what they read in the Times.

It must be said that not everyone is surprised to find Obama's campaign promises "muted by reality." Those of us who were paying attention to reality before Nov. 4 never took Obama's pledge to flee Iraq seriously. Although it is especially repugnant to seek political gain by promising to lose a war, it is also common for presidential candidates to make unrealistic promises, especially on foreign policy, and disregard them once elected. (Remember how George W. Bush was going to stop "nation building" and Bill Clinton was going to get tough on the Red Chinese?)

Obama thus is carrying on a long tradition of making empty and irresponsible promises. While he may deliver victory in Iraq, his war against cynicism has already been lost.

This incredible back-flip by the NY Slimes and the rest of Obama's acolytes is simply staggering. It is evidence that they did not believe their own propaganda at the time they were writing it. and give us not reason to believe a word they say now.

Cheap turkeys are Bush’s fault.

I stopped at the local Food Lion last night to pick up a few pre-Thanksgiving groceries. Walking from my car to the store I saw a sign advertizing turkeys for 29 cents a pound. The only hitch was that you had to buy $25 worth of groceries and I was only buying a package of cake mix and some ice cream for the Thanksgiving meal.

Inside, I found 15 pound turkeys for $4.35! What a deal!

I love turkey and asked the woman at the checkout register if that $25 purchase policy was firm. That’s when she told me that, yes the policy is firm and that it’s the lousy Bush economy that forces Food Lion to sell turkeys for 29 cents a pound.

All of a sudden the recent election campaign was brought back to me. The feelings of that campaign and the view that – to me - the most repellent part of the Obama campaign was its supporters. And the undercurrent of concern I have about a political figure that can attract and energize the most rabid, and stupid, among us.

For the rest of us, have a great Thanksgiving with family and friends. We have so much to be thankful for in this great country. And go to Food Lion, planning to spend at least $25 so that you can get a 29 cent per pound turkey.

Suddenly the “illegal, immoral, unconstitutional” confinement of terrorists is off the table

The Volokh Conspirators and an interesting bunch of guys. It may not be their fault that they attract a bunch of nuts and Jacobins to their blog site.

The individual contributors are capable of making reasonable-sounding arguments as to why the detention of enemy combatants should not be held indefinitely at Guantanamo (assuming you view our war against Islamic radicals as a civil police action in which the US military got involved). But, as I said, their arguments usually avoid the foam flecked comments that follow these postings.

But suddenly, now that Obama has been elected, the subject has been dropped. I go to the site almost daily and the subject is internet hoaxes, the auto bailout, Eric Holder, Prop 8, God in the Declaration of Independence, Virgin Annulment, Dan Rather, Sarah Palin, Hillary Clinton, and much more.

Why the disinterest? Could it be that there have been hints out of the incoming Obama administration that they may have to keep these people confined? That there may be a reason for not granting them bail and letting them out in the streets? Could we be setting the stage for the “normalization” of Guantanamo (or its equivalent)?

And then Eureka! I find it. The thing that I thought I had lost. The Volokh article on Military Commissions and National Security Courts After Guantanamo

Because I wanted to re-visit just one more time what Liberals believed should be done to members of the Bush administration:

--Impeachment of Bush and Cheney. If necessary, after they leave office!

--Impeachment of a federal judge for writing a memo that enabled “torture”

--Local, State, and federal prosecutions such as the Brattleboro, Vermont, ordinance that calls for the arrest on sight of Bush and/or Cheney…

--Charge Bush and Cheney with murder of U.S. soldiers who have died in the Iraq and Afghanistan war under state law.

--Use of common law courts … as a means to turn revisionist international law theory by asserting international humanitarian and human rights law violations as common law in state courts prosecutions.

--Having citizens file charges with the police in various countries

--Foreign and International Prosecution of US officials.

--Complaints to licensing boards for professionals who assisted the government

The person who proposed this is a law professor in Ohio. And he is far from alone. There is a third-world smell to the Left in this country; the sort of things that juntas do to their predecessors after they take over the government. All, of course, in the name of justice. All great crimes are committed in the name of Justice for the People. I am reminded that most of the leaders of the French Revolution were lawyers, Jacobins, who revelled in the destruction of the old regime via the Reign of Terror, and then, having finished off the aristocracy turned on each other after which they drowned Europe in blood for a generation. All in the name of Justice and Virtue.

A question to ponder: is this a case of Bush hatred or is the professor planning to follow the same course of action against members of the Obama administration should the prisoners at Guantanamo not be released?

George Will, Race Riots and the MarkField Temptation

There is a little Fascist in all of us; the desire to smash our enemies, to humiliate them and to make them crawl before they … go. It’s the farthest we get from the Sermon on the Mount and a reason to remind ourselves how far we are from grace.

George Will, perhaps inspired by Barack Obama’s comment that “America ..ah.. .is .. is … no longer what it could be … what it once was. I don’t want that future for my children.” Reminds us what America once was.

On the night of Aug. 13, Mabel Hallam, a pretty young white woman whose husband Earl was working the night shift as a streetcar conductor, retired early. Around 11:30 p.m. she was awakened by a man's weight on her. "Why, Earl," she said, "what is wrong with you?" The man, who was not Earl and was black, said, "I am drunk." He raped her and fled. So she said.

"Negro's Heinous Crime" and "Dragged From Her Bed and Outraged by Negro" were the next day's headlines. As Jim Rasenberger reconstructs events in his fine book "America 1908," police plucked black men from the streets of Hallam's neighborhood until she identified one, George Richardson, as her assailant. By 5 p.m. the jail was surrounded by a mob of at least 4,000 baying for blood. Eighty-nine blacks would be lynched in America in 1908.

Springfield's sheriff enlisted a leading citizen -- owner of the city's largest restaurant, and of a fast automobile -- to spirit Richardson and another black man also accused of rape out of town. This further inflamed the mob, which destroyed the restaurant -- a white patron was killed by a stray bullet -- piled its furnishings on the owner's overturned automobile, and burned the pile.

I’m fairly sure that that is not the America that Barack Obama was referring to when he wished for the America that once was. I’m sure that he meant to convey that the America he wants to bring back is the ideal America that existed before the Evil Bush-Cheney Conspiracy to spy, torture and kill for oil and for Halliburton turned America into the Police Terror State it is today.

With that viewpoint as the bedrock of your belief system (and I am not exaggerating much – if at all - what a large contingent of the Left believes) it is little wonder that they are baying for blood. They believe that what America needs after the Bush Administration leaves office is a Nuremberg style trial where the officials in this administration can be tried for war crimes. War crimes that are as evident as the nose on your face and if you deny them you are condoning evil.

Which brings in the tactic of how to get to Nuremberg. That’s where MarkField comes in. At the Volokh Conspiracy we have people, like the good citizens of Springfield in 1908 who were aflame with the desire to insure that their pure womanhood will not get attacked by the vile creatures who lust after them. Of course there quite a few racists in that community who did not want “Negros” to get any ideas. But the good citizens of Springfield were not ready to lynch them, yet. They needed to be inflamed.
The racists used the MarkField strategy.

As one who strongly favors prosecution, I think your sense of the public reaction is very likely correct. For that reason, I think it's important to begin slowly with the least sympathetic defendants and develop the evidence in some detail. As public disgust builds, so will the desire to see punishment inflicted.

The race haters in Springfield now they had an opportunity to make an example. They had an unsympathetic defendant who was identified by the victim as the rapist. What more evidence is needed?

MarkField: From there, as public disgust builds, so will the desire to see punishment inflicted.

After beating an elderly black man and a paralyzed black man, at 2 a.m. the mob seized a 56-year-old black barber from his home, beat him unconscious, hanged him from a tree and mutilated his body. Souvenir hunters carved away bits of the tree, which was entirely gone by the end of the day.

The next night a mob of 500 brought a rope and proceeded to the home of a prominent and wealthy 84-year-old black man who, standing in front of his house, inquired, "Good evening, gentlemen. What can I do for you?" He was beaten, slashed with a razor, hanged from a tree too supple to bear his weight. He was alive when troops from the state militia reached him. He died that night.

Oh, what happened in the end?

One hundred seventeen rioters were indicted. One was fined $25 for petty larceny; another, a teenager, was sent to a reformatory. Mrs. Hallam later admitted that she invented the attack to explain to her husband some bruises inflicted by her boyfriend.

George Will ends:

So, remember Springfield. The siege of the jail, the rioting, the lynching and mutilating all occurred within walking distance of where, in 2007, Barack Obama announced his presidential candidacy. Whatever you think of his apotheosis, it illustrates history's essential promise, which is not serenity -- that progress is inevitable -- but possibility, which is enough: Things have not always been as they are.

And remember that the MarkField’s are still among us, ready to lay the fuse that sets off the explosion. And proud of his defense of virtue.

BBC erases all traces of lies over Bush speech report; so what have we learned?

Exhibiting a thoroughness worthy of Orwell's Ministry of Truth, the BBC has been busy erasing all traces of the corporation's blatantly dishonest reporting of President Bush's speech on the fifth anniversary of the Iraq invasion

Read the whole thing.

Glenn Greenwalt on the American-Iranian incident in the Strait of Hormuz

Glenn Greenwald and his sock puppets believe that the Navy, the military and the Bush administration lied about what happened. You can read his rant here.

Kevin Sullivan at Independent Liberal takes him to task.

Glenn Greenwald–who I consider a generally reliable resource on matters of domestic politics–brings the same abundance of outrage when he writes on foreign policy, but for whatever reason forgoes all of those annoying things we call facts.

Take, for instance, this post from yesterday on the American-Iranian incident in the Strait of Hormuz. Let me just preface this by noting that Greenwald offered nothing terribly “new” to the discussion, and instead echoed the same Left-Wing conspiracy theories on what happened there that day. This gem starts us off:

Those are the two “facts” that infused the story with such a sinister tone — explicit threats from the Iranian boats to destroy the American ships, followed by their dropping of unidentifiable boxes, which, one was supposed to infer, could easily have been explosive devices.

But the first “fact” seems almost certainly false, and the second one is highly questionable. Iranian Hooman Majd at The Huffington Post noted that the voices on the tapes issuing the melodramatic threats were unquestionably not Persian. As he put it: “the person speaking doesn’t have an Iranian accent and moreover, sounds more like Boris Karloff in a horror movie than a sailor in the elite branch of Iran’s military.” A regular Iranian commenter at Cernig’s blog made the same point. Listen for yourself to the audio and see how credible the threats sound.

This is, in sum, insane. For starters, it’s not only logical to infer that the boxes were explosives, it was in fact the appropriate Naval response following the JAG investigation of the USS Cole bombing. This forced the Navy to account for how our ships–whether docked or in motion–should deal with such attacks. Well built ships and training wont suffice, in cases such as these, you need to give your sailors the leeway to respond appropriately. Many of Greenwald’s fellow citizens were on those ships, yet their immediate security apparently took a backseat to the dangers of inference. The good sense of Stuart Koehl was apparently lost on Greenwald.

But the insanity continues. Not only does Greenwald not trust his own Navy, but he instead opts to defer the whole matter to someone who’s sole credential is the fact that he’s an Iranian-American. Not only that, but he is an Iranian who has served as an advisor to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Some of the comments that follow are interesting and well reasoned:

This is an interesting debate, but a rather silly one, I think. ChrisWWW - your interest in holding the government’s feet to the fire, so to speak, is fine, but it seems that you assume the Bush administration is lying, presumably about everything. And your dislike (hatred?) of Bush causes people like you and Greenwald to then give our enemies equal credibility with our government. That’s silly. It’s also, frankly, juvenile. I get sick of the constant conspiracy theories spun by opponents of this administration. An incredible amount of time is spent - wasted - trying to figure out the “Diebold angle” on every damn thing that happens. And the danger is that this mentality creates real problems, which is the point that the other MikeS seems to be making. It must be clear to those pulling the strings in Iran that attiudes such as those expressed by you here have considerable political traction in the US. Ahmadinejad’s regime can, therefore, safely conclude that pushing the envelope a bit more will be permitted - permitted by the American people, that is, many of whom have become so poisoned by BDS that even a real attack on an American ship might be brushed off as not worth responding to. So I don’t think you want anybody to be killed, but I think that you have effectively hidden from your own conscience that that is the practical result of your views, since they are widespread.
Hey - I supported and continue to support the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and I know that innocent people have been blown to pieces by US forces as a result of these wars. I don’t try to assuage my conscience by denying that. I also know that young men and women more worthy of life than me have given theirs defending a cause they believe in. I admit that. You, and others like yoou, however, occupy a moral world where, apparently, there are no negative moral consequences as the result of your views. This is simple-minded and intellectually dishonest.
So maybe that is whatt MikeS meant. And, by the way, thank you MikeS, sir, for your service.

And one is funny:

As a 22 year veteran of the US Army, I can vouch for pretty much everything ChrisWWW asserts. Every video recorder, every digital camera, even every cell phone capable of taking video and stills, owned by every soldier now serving in the military, is digitally connected to the White House, as per Army Regs (see AR 25-1, Army Knowledge Management and Information Technology Management). They all go into the BushChiplerPretzelBurton filter; that’s the same one that monitors every single telephone call made by every single American. That way, if Bush or Cheney find a need to squelch the truth, they not only control every single facet of digital media that might have been taken of the event, they also can automatically erase any proof that ever existed. And of course every single serviceman or woman now serving is immediately given the White House talking points within 2 hours so that they can unquestioningly swear to the new "truth". Didn’t you guys read that part of the Patriot Act?

We need a respite from peace

Danny at Sampson Blinded is not a fan of the "peace process."

Here, however, is a short summary of our reasons to oppose the peace process.]

Peace process doesn’t lead to peace. Concessions to Arabs and imploring for peace only provoke them for the last-ditch fighting. That correlation is clear at least since the Oslo accords.

Peace process cannot lead to peace. If history is any lesson, peace is only achieved through crushing defeat of one’s enemy.

Peace process is highly unusual. Every other nation destroyed whatever aborigines happened to live on the land that nation chose to build a state.

Peace process is illegal. The original arrangement for the Jewish state included Transjordan, but the British illegally cut it off. Then the UN further partitioned Israel to accommodate Palestinian Arabs.

Peace process is immoral. Palestinian Arabs don’t constitute a nation. Offering them a state is a plot against Jews.

Peace process doesn’t offer safety. Jews need a secure state rather than a beach strip eight miles wide.

Read the rest ...

“Danny” at Sampson Blinded is very much opposed to the “peace process.” I agree with the underlying assumptions of his argument although I think some of his reasoning is a little facile

The fact is that the Israelis and the Arabs have only been able to live in peace as long as the Arabs were dominant. In the Middle East, the few Jews were tolerated because they were a small and manageable minority in countries run by Arabs who followed Islam. Following the founding of the State of Israel, the universal dominance was broken and the despised minority now became a despised minority that was not longer under Arab control. That was intolerable to the Arabs and they were and are determined to end this state of affairs.

Several wars followed.

There is little reason to believe that this situation will end unless and until the United States establishes its hegemony over the region. The Iraq war is a necessary and fundamental basis for this condition. If the United States is able to create a stable and democratic Iraqi state it will have demonstrated its ability to establish the conditions for peace in the region. That is why, for the Jewish people, victory in Iraq is so vital. Should we fail, Israel will fail. If we succeed, Israel will succeed because the Arabs will be forced to acknowledge our ability to control their destiny.

The key to the future, not just of the Middle East but of the rest of the world, is found in Iraq. It’s a terrible challenge and burden that the Left seems incapable of seeing, so consumed are they with BDS. I doubt if most Jews in or out of Israel realize this.

Schizo NYT Has One Constant on Mid-East Democracy: Bush Always Wrong

OK, class, someone tell us: what's been the attitude of the New York Times and the elite media at large toward democracy-building in Iraq?

What's that, Johnny? That it was naive for George Bush to imagine that democracy was attainable in a Muslim country riven by religious and ethnic factions? Correct.

OK, then, who'd like to predict the Times's reaction to Pres. Bush's measured response to the curtailing of democracy in Pakistan by Pervez Musharraf, perhaps our most important ally in the region in the war against terrorism?

What's that, Janie? Pakistan being another Muslim country riven by religious and ethnic factions, George Bush has adopted the appropriately pragmatic course?

Wrong! Call it a trick question, but I did say "the Times's reaction." No, the correct answer is of course that Times is blasting President Bush for the insufficiency of his efforts to promote democracy in Pakistan.
...
OK, class dismissed. Oh, last thing. For future quizzes on the NYT's opinion, remember, you'll never go too far wrong in assuming that whatever the Times' past policy, when it comes to the latest development, George Bush will always be wrong.

Read the rest.

Cable Channel Nods to Ratings and Leans Left

The New York Times shills for Bush Derangement Syndrome on MSNBC:

Riding a ratings wave from “Countdown With Keith Olbermann,” a program that takes strong issue with the Bush administration, MSNBC is increasingly seeking to showcase its nighttime lineup as a welcome haven for viewers of a similar mind.

Here are the numbers: Bill O'Reilly is number 1 with over 2 million viewers. Olberman is number 20 with 677,000 viewers.

The other MSNMC host who foams at the mouth daily is Chris Matthews, listed at number 34 with about 400,000 viewers.

With the exception of two CNN shows, CNN Presents and Larry King Live, all the top 15 rated cable shows are on FOX. You have to go to number 16, Lou Dobbs Tonight, before the other networks begin to be noticed.

Even the NY Times is forced to admit (headline "Circulation Plunge") that the dead tree media, including the NY Times has been losing readers even as the population is expanding.

Conservatives have been abandoning a medium that has been insulting them for generations. And why not? By the time the so-called "news" gets delivered to your door, reality has passed on. People are keeping up with events as they occur via the Internet. Reuters: Poll finds nearly 80 percent of U.S. adults go online.

By going on-line adults in the US may find themselves insulted, but they don't have to pay for the privilege and they find people of like minds who inform them of events in the world without the filter of editors and publishers who decide what the "masses" should know.

But the focus on the NY Times on media failures like Olberman and Matthews may explain why the Times itself - and its media allies - are failing. The article focuses on a demographic where the disparity between the top show and the 20th show is only 2 to 1 rather than 4 to 1. If that is the NY Times measure of success, don't weep for the Sulzberger family. People that stupid deserve to lose.

Stark Raving Mad

From Powerline:

Paul noted earlier the bizarre rant by Congressman Pete Stark during today's "debate" on the SCHIP program. Here it is; it has to be seen to be believed. This could be the craziest outbreak of Bush Derangement Syndrome ever. "Bush just likes to blow things up," soldiers in Iraq are being killed "for the President's amusement," and so on. The guy is a nut. The real question is, are there any members of the Democratic Party, prominent or not, who mind?

The question is asked: is it possible for a Democrat to go too far?

Stark's tirade was insane, but for some time, not a single Democrat tried to distance himself or herself from it, while Stark was wildly applauded on the left (and equally crazed) side of the blogosphere.

Great series by Glenn Reynolds

THEY TOLD ME THAT IF GEORGE W. BUSH WERE REELECTED, we'd have an authoritarian state where children were encouraged to inform on their parents. And they were right.

French official suggested Bush was behind September 11

Insanity is not a disqualifier for high public office. A former Canadian Defense minister believes in UFOs and worries that...

The United States military are preparing weapons which could be used against the aliens, and they could get us into an intergalactic war without us ever having any warning. Mr. Hellyer went on to say, "I'm so concerned about what the consequences might be of starting an intergalactic war, that I just think I had to say something."

And now:

French Housing Minister Christine Boutin appearing to question that Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda group orchestrated the attacks. Boutin's office sought to play down the remarks.

Asked in an interview last November, before she became minister, whether she thought Bush might be behind the attacks, Boutin says: "I think it is possible. I think it is possible."

Of course there are plenty of Americans who also believe that. Many people go though life believing in fantasies, untouched by reality. You just wish to fewer of them held governmental power.

One Crazy Party

Jonah Goldberg explains:

Rasmussen Reports, the public opinion outfit, recently asked voters whether President Bush knew about the 9/11 attacks beforehand. The findings? Well, here’s how the research firm put it: “Democrats in America are evenly divided on the question of whether George W. Bush knew about the 9/11 terrorist attacks in advance. Thirty-five percent of Democrats believe he did know, 39 percent say he did not know and 26 percent are not sure.”

So, one in three Democrats believe that Bush was in on it somehow, and a majority of Democrats either believe that Bush knew about the attacks in advance or can’t quite make up their minds.

There are only three ways to respond to this finding: It’s absolutely true, in which case the paranoid style of American liberalism has reached a fevered crescendo. Or, option B, it’s not true, and we can stop paying attention to these kinds of polls. Or there’s option C — it’s a little of both.