Disrupting Mike Adams, UMass Shows Its Colors.

Professor Mike Adams was invited to the University of Massachusetts – Amherst, to give a speech on feminism by the Republican Club. Mike is an acerbic and provocative speaker and writer. He is also a tenured professor at the University of North Carolina – Wilmington where he is openly at odds with the administration and, I suppose, a great many of the faculty because Mike is an outspoken Conservative.

His speech at U Mass was interrupted and he was heckled as evidenced by the video which you can access through the links.

Defenders of the denial of Mike’s rights to give a speech and the students to hear him will either claim that Mike's view are so repugnant that he deserves to be shouted down, or will claim that the students who disrupted his speech were not “typical” of students at this campus or of students in general.

The first argument is simply indefensible in a nation that values the rights of free speech. The second argument may be true, but it is irrelevant. Very few radical movements have been represented by by the “typical” member of society. Lenin’s Communists were not a mass movement, but a well organized cadre who were able to highjack a society. At the height of Stalin’s power, member of The Communist party were a small minority of the Russian people, representing at most 10% of the Russian people.

Hitler’s Brown Shirts were no more representative of the German people. But there were enough of them and they were bold enough to intimidate the vast majority, allowing the Nazis to eventually take over.

It is not enough to say that these student don’t represent our community and turn our backs. They have broken the rules of comity and the rules of the University which, I assume does not condone disrupting speakers. There must be some punishment and this must not be allowed to continue.

One other point is worth making. The kind of disruption that the University allows to go on seems to be unidirectional. It is tolerated when the speakers being assaulted at people like Mike Adams or Anne Coulter, not Roger Moore or Professor (“Little Eichmanns”) Churchill. It is telling who the University community protects and who it allows to be disrupted, threatened and attacked.

Terrorists Dressed As UPS Men?

Got this in an e-mail from a friend. No idea if it's true or not.

UPS Uniforms

Government Warning regarding purchase of UPS uniforms:



There has been a huge purchase, $32,000 worth, of United Parcel Service (UPS) uniforms on eBay over the last 30 days. This could represent a serious threat as bogus drivers(terrorists) can drop off anything to anyone with deadly consequences! If you have ANY questions when a UPS driver appears at your door they should be able to furnish VALID I.D.


Additionally, if someone in a UPS uniform comes to make a drop off or pick up, make absolutely sure they are driving a UPS truck. UPS doesn't make deliveries or pickups in anything, except a company vehicle. If you have a problem, call your local law enforcement agency right away!



TAKE THIS SERIOUSLY! Tell everyone in your office, your family, your friends, etc. Make people aware so that we can prepare and/or avoid terrorist attacks on our people! Thank you for your time in reviewing this and PLEASE send to EVERYONE on your list, even if they are friend or foe. We should all be aware!


Kimberly Bush-Carr
Management Program Specialist
U.S.Department of Homeland Security

Bureau Customs and Border Protection

Washington, DC20229

A Fart for Ramadan

Please don't behead me, this was written by a Muslim. But Like Dan Schorr comments re the Mohammad cartoons, this should not have been published.

This past Ramadan was very nice, it was very enjoyable, a release of a well anticipated break from my immergence in this dunya. But little did I know that this Ramadan I would receive one of the biggest shocks of my life. It all begain one evening at the masjid, which will remain nameless, however I will say it is one of the more beautiful masajid here in New York City. It was after iftar and during sajdahtun fi salatutarawih that a brother farted!

I couldn’t believe my ears, it was such a strange occurence because one moment I was prostrating to God, “glorifying the most high”, and the next moment I was accosted by the most nefarious sound ever to grace my ears during a prayer and during Ramadanutarawih prayers!

The Swiftboating of Jack Murtha

Funny.

If we’ve learned anything from the annual jingo-rama known as “Veteran’s Day”, it’s that Americans are too quick to bestow "hero" status upon any uneducated moron who puts on a uniform and fights for his country. Anybody can pick up a gun and shoot someone, but true heroism comes from having the raw courage to sell out your fellow soldiers as well as the American People in order to obtain the power necessary to help them – whether they like it or not. A few such heroic individuals come to mind: Scott Ritter, Janis Karpinski, John Kerry, Benedict Arnold, and Rep. John “Jack” Murtha.

When a couple of nameless Sunni sock merchants informed him that a platoon of Marines went a wild shooting rampage, gleefully killing scores of innocent Iraqi civilians and blowing up a baby milk factory as hundreds of babies were being milked, Murtha didn’t waste any time waiting for an “investigation”, “evidence”, or other pointless distractions such as the Marines’ own version of events. In a display of unblinking honesty one usually only witnesses from members of Al-Qaeda, he quickly branded the Marines as “war criminals” and called for a Phased Redeployment of all U.S. forces. NOT a "retreat" – and right-wingers are only encouraging the terrorists by insisting on calling it that – but a phased redeployment, godammit! A PHASED REDPLOYMENT!! To “retreat” is to flee the battlefield with one’s tail tucked between his legs. “Phased Redeployment”, on the other hand, is simply taking your ball and going to Okinawa, where the REAL terrorists are.

Where is the opposition to the war coming from?

I disagree with the author that this is the reason, but it is "a" reason:

Forget all the articles about incompetence, failed plans to "win the peace" and all the rest of it. Americans don't care about that and never will; nor do they care about Iraqi schools or share the President's obsession with some foreign people's craving for "democracy". What they cared about was the war they were sold on, i.e. that the United States was taking the gloves off and from this point forward would wage war against international terrorist organizations and the governments that sponsor them.

Had Bush waged that war, the support would have held. Given how badly Bush has strayed from the "Bush" Doctrine, I'm frankly surprised that the support for him didn't wane earlier. In fact, given the "Islam means peace, the Saudis are our friends, and we must respect women of cover" rhetoric coming out of the White House, tied to the fact that our military obviously is fighting with one hand behind its back, it's *amazing* Bush's support held out as long as it did.

"Mirror, mirror.."

Ever wonder what's on Kos?

European Sales Tax Rates

Got this from You Bitch:

Country Sales Tax %
Austria 9.09-16.67%
Belgium 21%
Denmark 25%
Finland 17-22%
France 5.21-16.38%
Germany 7-16%
Greece 11.5-15.25%
Ireland 17.36%
Italy 4-20%
Luxembourg 15%
Netherlands 15.97%
Portugal 19% (13% in Madeira and Azores)
Spain 16%
Sweden 25%
Switzerland 7.6%
United Kingdom 17.5%

Daniel Schorr should apologize

Daniel Schorr is a superannuated idiot. As one of the leading lights of that part of the American people who happily consigned millions of people for Viet Nam and Cambodia to torture and death, he should be ashamed to show his face in public. However, he has landed a cushy job on NPR from which perch he takes cheap shot and repeats lies about the people who protect his fat ass.

It never hurts to remind those who have something to say about this walking, talking disgrace just what we think of him

Someone just did:

Reader David R. (he prefers anonymity) shared with us a letter he sent to NPR over the on-air behavior of Daniel Schorr. Since NPR receives tax money, it has an obligation to be both fair and accurate. Here is the letter:

Dear Mr. Scott Simon,

Daniel Schorr almost got through a news analysis on your Saturday morning show without a cheapshot at the President, but could not resist concluding with a snide and irrelevant remark about how Mr. Bush had “tried so hard” to avoid going to Viet Nam in his youth.

In this regard I would like to make two points to you and to NPR:

1. In this and in many other instances Mr. Schorr has made it clear that he has strong personal biases, and also that they color his reportage. Your own transcripts will offer hundreds of examples, by my memory. His value as an honest source of news analysis is highly questionable, and in giving him standing as your “Senior News Analyst” you cheapen the NPR brand profoundly.

2. Secondly, it is a fact that the young Mr. Bush did volunteer for duty in Viet Nam after he had completed his flight training, but that at that point in time, the aircraft he was trained to fly was being retired from overseas combat, and his thus there was no demand for his skills there.

The whole meme of the future President “avoiding” Viet Nam is based on the fact that he would not (and could not) volunteer for overseas duty when reporting for flight training, because it would have rather obviously conflicted with the flight training he HAD volunteered for. It may comes as a surprise to the NPR staff, but in order for the Air Force to make the investment of nearly a million dollars to “make” a pilot, a young man had to commit to the going through the training! I might as well ask you, Scott, why you are sitting in a warm studio fulfilling your contract, instead of out on the cold streets comforting the homeless! By the same logic the media applies to Mr. Bush’s actions, this proves that you are a mean-spirited, greedy person!

George W. Bush qualified for that training by virtue of having a college degree, being in excellent health, and being willing to commit several years of his life to a role for which there were constant shortages. He did not jump to the front of any line: for what he was qualified to do, there was no line! Yes, there was a line for non-degreed enlistees wanting to be in the ANG, but in the officer positions required of pilot trainees, the ANG was begging for applicants. No doubt most of the recent Yale grads were out helping the poor.

Mr. Schorr is well aware of these facts, but slyly keeps re-playing the canard that Mr. Bush somehow exhibited cowardice and took advantage of family connections when he volunteered to undergo several years of full-time, dangerous as hell, flight training. I would wager that Mr. Schorr has never done anything half so brave – I know I haven’t – and it is about time he and NPR apologized for the knowing slander he is allowed to utter on your radio network nearly every week.

Oh, and on the question of press freedom and free speech, Daniel Schorr is much more ... "nuanced?" for example, he came down firmly on the side of "discretion being the better part of valor" as the Islamofascists went berserk following the Mohammad cartoons. Follow the links and you can hear this weasel explain why the cartoon should not be shown, although our military secrets should be published.

Pelosi Declares Victory in Murtha-Hoyer Battle

Scott Ott has the REAL sory on the Murtha/Hoyer fight:

Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-CA, said yesterday’s 149-86 vote against the man she publicly endorsed for House Majority Leader was the first victory in her historic reign as the first female Speaker of the House.

“I endorsed Jack Murtha because I knew he would lose to Steny Hoyer,” said Rep. Pelosi, “and I also knew that after years of suffering low self-esteem due to our minority status, my colleagues needed another confidence booster.”

By defeating the Speaker’s apparent choice, she said, “149 Democrats experienced the adrenaline rush that comes from rebelling against authority and speaking truth to power.”

Rep. Pelosi said teaching Democrats to oppose her leadership is just part of her strategy to prepare them to stand up against the dictatorial rule President George Bush.

Kiss goodbye to a liberal Middle East

I don't believe this will neccessarily be the case, but it is instructive.

...the historic mistake of Arab liberals was to stand elbow to elbow with the despots oppressing them in condemning the American democratic project for the region, instead of exploiting it. Rather than drawing on the Americans' presence in their midst for their own benefit, far too many of liberals fell back on a restricting cliche that the US was practicing a new form of imperialism. Perhaps it was, but early on it became painfully clear that that imperialism was as soft and malleable as a warm slug; that if the Americans could bend before the frail figure of Ayatollah Ali Sistani, they would probably listen to, even assist, those like the Lebanese who had decided to rid themselves of previously unassailable oppressors.

The incredible narcissim of the media.

The members of the media are nothing if not self absorbed. They are continually giving each other prizes, exclaiming their fairness and objectivity, their courage, their character. And as we have seen in their reaction to Islamofascism they are, on the whole, craven cowards. In fact, they are perfectly willing to give up freedom of expression at the first opportunity, if that expression disagrees with their personal viewpoint.

If not the first, the most widely recognized example is their cowardice when it came to publishing the Mohammad cartoons.

Since I have no great respect for the denizens of the den of iniquity that is the media, I am pleased to bring this delicious tidbit to your attention.

Click on the link for the whole story.

Yet there lingers some delusion in segments of the press that the jihadist campaign is just another civil rights movement. A questioner at an international gathering of editors I attended in Edinburgh in May suggested that blame for the murders of journalists in Iraq — most of them Iraqi — rested with President Bush's refusal to acknowledge the Geneva Conventions. Jonathan Swift said it well. You cannot reason someone out of a position he has not been reasoned into.

Perhaps my beloved Britain has endured some of the worst excesses. When I spoke at the Hay-on-Wye literary festival a couple of years back and criticized newspapers that headlined suicide bombers as martyrs, I was told by two angry leading intellectuals that I had lived too long in America.

Something similar happened at this year's Hay-on-Wye festival, sponsored by the Guardian, where a five-person panel discussed "Are there are any limits to free speech?" One of the Muslim panelists said if anyone offended his religion, he would strike him. A lawyer, Anthony Julius, responded that Jews had lived as minorities under two powerful hegemonies, Christian and Muslim, and had been obliged to learn how to deal nonviolently with offense caused to them by the sacred scriptures of both. He started by referring to an anti-Semitic passage in the New Testament — which passed without comment. But when he began to list the passages in the Koran that denigrate Jews, describing them as monkeys and pigs, the panelists went ballistic. One of them, Madeline Bunting of the Guardian, put her hand over the microphone and said words to the effect, "I am not going to sit here and listen to any criticisms of Muslims." She was cheered, and not one of the journalists in the audience from right or left uttered a word about free speech — not hate speech, mind you, but free speech of a moderate nature.

An Ordinary Dutch Life

I think that this story may be behind the subscription wall, so I'll reproduce it in full. It illustrates the sheeplike passivity of Europeans as they are led to Muslim slaughter.

THE HAGUE -- When Geert Wilders rose from his desk, his head almost touched the narrow ceiling. The tiny corner office underneath the parliament's roof wasn't selected for space but security. Possible assassins can only come from one direction, making life easier for the two bodyguards outside.

Mr. Wilders has been living under 24-hour police protection ever since the assassination of Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh two years ago. The Dutch-Moroccan who stabbed and shot van Gogh in Amsterdam left death threats behind against him and the Netherlands' other, more famous critic of Islam: Ayaan Hirsi Ali. Like the Somali-born politician, Mr. Wilders has had to take refuge in army barracks, safe houses, even a prison cell.

The lawmaker's life is in danger because of his criticism of radical, or, as he calls it, "mainstream" Islam. In Mr. Wilders's view, Islam hasn't been "hijacked" by radicals. Rather, radicalism is embedded in the faith. "It's a violent religion, an intolerant religion," he said matter-of-factly in an interview.

This Wednesday, the Dutch go to the polls and Mr. Wilders's Party for Freedom is expected to pick up about six seats in the 150-seat parliament. His provocative thesis and calls for a five-year moratorium on non-Western immigration make it easy for his political opponents to dismiss him as a racist. But he will have none of that. "I make a distinction between the religion and the people. I believe in the people, I believe that Muslims can integrate in society. But I don't believe in a European, moderate Islam to come in the next 10,000 years."

Thus accused of violent tendencies, radical Muslims are calling for his head. "Videos on Islamic Web sites show my picture and name to the sound of what appears to be knives cutting through flesh while a voiceover says I will be beheaded," Mr. Wilders said calmly. "You never get used to it but you learn to live with it." Harder to accept is that his wife is suffering as well. "Everything I do, even if people strongly disagree with me, I do within the boundaries of democracy. And even though I know that I'm not responsible [for this situation], I know it's the result of the things I say, the things I do. It's not, though, the result of what my wife does. She often even doesn't agree and still she is in the same situation. I find it difficult to bear that everything is happening to her as well."

Is there outrage in the Netherlands about his situation? He first avoids a direct answer. "This is now, today, my problem but in a larger sense it is also a problem for democracy, the rule of law," he said. When pressed on the point, his response paints a troubling picture. "Real outrage? No. There was more outrage when a major paper once wrote how much the security for Ayaan and me costs," he said. "There were times when Ayaan and I said to one another and sometimes to the public, 'In what country do we live that things that are clearly not normal are almost being seen as normal or more or less ignored in public discussion and public life?'"

You don't have to share Mr. Wilders's views to realize that the threats against his life also threaten Dutch democracy. And yet the Dutch seem indifferent to his plight. Wednesday's elections in the Netherlands will choose the first new parliament since van Gogh's murder and the start of Mr. Wilders's ordeal. You'd expect these events to feature high on the national agenda. But the most remarkable aspect about the major parties' campaign is the absence of any serious discussion of terrorism, Muslim integration, or the Dutch troops in Afghanistan. It's mostly about tax breaks, pensions and health care. Quite rightly, the economy is always on voters' minds -- but to the near-exclusion of national security? According to a survey from this summer, terrorism is only the fifth-most-important issue for the Dutch. The country's antiterror coordinator recently warned of the continuing radicalization of young Dutch Muslims. Just two weeks ago, six people were arrested on terrorism charges.

Any sense of urgency the Dutch may have had after van Gogh's murder is lost. Back then, Deputy Prime Minister Gerrit Zalm declared "war" on radical Islam. Van Gogh's murder was even referred to as "our Sept. 11." Visitors to the Dutch "Ground Zero" will search in vain, though, for even a simple sign indicating the spot of van Gogh's near-decapitation. The second anniversary of his murder a couple of weeks ago passed without any official ceremony. Antiterrorism and immigration laws may have been tightened, but the latter measures in particular often lack the necessary finesse to address the country's real threats.

Understandably, the Dutch long for the days when their small country only consumed international news without making any. The rest of the Continent is not much different. Each terror attack or death threat briefly fills the airwaves before Europeans again pretend everything is normal. Meanwhile, the list of dissidents like Mr. Wilders is growing. Recent additions include Robert Redeker, a French philosophy teacher, in hiding since his September op-ed criticizing Islam, and Ekin Deligöz, a German member of parliament of Turkish descent. She has been put under police protection last month after receiving death threats for suggesting that Muslim women abandon the veil.

Europeans can keep pretending all this is normal. But only until the day they find their names on that dissident list as well.

Who's Generous? Conservatives

The book's basic findings are that conservatives who practice religion, live in traditional nuclear families and reject the notion that the government should engage in income redistribution are the most generous Americans, by any measure.
Conversely, secular liberals who believe fervently in government entitlement programs give far less to charity. They want everyone's tax dollars to support charitable causes and are reluctant to write checks to those causes, even when governments don't provide them with enough money.

[L]iberals give less than conservatives in every way imaginable, including volunteer hours and donated blood.

Liberals tend to specialize in giving away other peoples' money.

Blair "Disaster"

From Powerline:

But this is one of those "all headline, no story" episodes that we often see nowadays. What happened was that Blair was being interviewed on al Jazeera by David Frost:

Mr Blair was challenged by Sir David over the violence in Iraq, saying it had "so far been pretty much of a disaster".
Blair replied:

It has, but you see what I say to people is why is it difficult in Iraq?
It's not difficult because of some accident in planning.

It's difficult because there's a deliberate strategy - al-Qaeda with Sunni insurgents on one hand, Iranian-backed elements with Shia militias on the other - to create a situation in which the will of the majority for peace is displaced by the will of the minority for war.


Which is what Blair, like President Bush, has been saying for a long time. Blair didn't say that Iraq was a mistake; or that the war has been mishandled; or that our efforts there are doomed to failure. Those are the "admissions" the BBC desperately wants to hear, and tried to suggest through its coverage of Blair's inconsequential exchange with Frost.

Religion on campus: A secular society that demands tolerance should also show tolerance

Secularists are showing increasing hostility to Christianity. There are cases in Canada where Christian ministers have been taken to court for stating their views on sin. On English college campuses

Three cases have acquired prominence. Birmingham University Christian Union was banned from the list of accredited societies after it refused to amend its constitution to permit non-Christians to become executive committee members. The Exeter Univers-ity Christian Union has been ordered by its student union to rename itself the Evangelical Christian Union and has been suspended until it complies. At Edinburgh University, the Christian Union faces sanctions after it was accused of adopting a Bible-based programme on human relationships that deems homosexuality to be un- desirable. These prohibitions mean that the organisations concerned are denied access to money, union facilities and a forum to publicise their activities.

And here in the US, the cross has been removed from the Wren Chapel in the
College of William and Mary

"In order to make the Wren Chapel less of a faith-specific space, and to make it more welcoming to students, faculty, staff and visitors of all faiths, the cross has been removed from the altar area,"

Alan Colmes and Mark Furman on O.J. Simpson

“I dealt with people like this for 20 years. They will get up every day, they will kill somebody, and go have some chicken at KFC. You will catch them eatin’ chicken and drinkin’ a beer…”

Ann Coulter Makes Fun of the Media Hysteria about Pelosi: the First Woman Speaker of the House.

DESPERATE CONGRESSWOMEN OF HYSTERIA LANE
by Ann Coulter
November 15, 2006

In the past week, there are 476 documents on Nexis heralding the magnificent achievement of Nancy Pelosi becoming the FIRST WOMAN speaker of the House.

I thought we had moved beyond such multicultural milestones.

The media yawned when Condoleezza Rice became the first black female secretary of state (and when Lincoln Chafee became the first developmentally disabled senator).

There were only 77 documents noting that Rice was the first black woman to be the secretary of state, and half of them were issues of Jet, Essence, Ebony or Black Entrepreneur magazine.

A New York Times profile of Rice at the time waited until the last sentence to note in passing that Rice was "only the second woman, and the first black woman, to hold the job." (In a separate column by me, it was noted that Rice was the "first competent woman" to hold the job.)

Not everyone ignored Secretary Rice's achievement. Gore's campaign manager, Donna Brazile — the last black person to hold a prominent role in any Democratic presidential campaign — told Newsweek that when she watched President Bush nominate Rice, "I had chills up and down my spine." Brazile said: "I never thought in my lifetime I'd see an African-American woman being nominated as secretary of state. George Bush made that happen."

On MSNBC's "Hardball," even Al Sharpton said of Rice's appointment, "I don't think you can sneeze at the fact that she has made a tremendous achievement as the first black woman in history to be a State Department head."

Rice was not the first black secretary of state because Bush had already made Colin Powell the first black secretary of state. That was back during Bush's first term, when Rice was the first female national security adviser.

Bush also named Alberto Gonzales the first Hispanic attorney general. He made an Arab-American, Spencer Abraham, secretary of energy; a Cuban-American, Carlos Gutierrez, secretary of commerce; an Asian-American, Elaine Chao, secretary of labor; and a retarded-American, Norman Mineta, secretary of transportation. It was as if Mariah Carey and Tiger Woods had children and they all joined the Bush Cabinet.

The whole place has been lousy with women since the first Bush term, including Gale Ann Norton, secretary of the interior, Ann Veneman, secretary of agriculture, and Margaret Spellings, secretary of education. For a while there, it looked as if Bush might become the first president whose entire Cabinet's menstrual cycles were synchronized.

In a rare article taking note of Bush's "Benetton-ad presidency," Time magazine's Joe Klein said of Bush's second-term appointments: "It took Bush a month before he named a standard-issue white male."

By contrast, John Kerry hired only white males for top positions in his presidential campaign, a fact so embarrassing that even the media eventually took notice. In Kerry's defense, almost all of his and Teresa's domestic servants appear to have been people of color, although we still don't have a final head count on the place in Aspen.

But when Nancy Pelosi — another Democrat who married a multimillionaire — achieves the minor distinction of becoming the first female speaker of the House, The New York Times acts like she's invented cold fusion.

There were two major articles breathlessly reporting Pelosi's magnificent achievement as first female speaker and an op-ed by Bob Herbert, titled "Ms. Speaker and Other Trends." Beatifying Pelosi as "the most powerful woman ever to sit in Congress," Herbert began: "Sometimes you can actually feel the winds of history blowing." There was a major Times profile of Pelosi, gushing that Pelosi was "on the brink of becoming the first female speaker." (Isn't she just the most independent little gal?)

So in addition to bringing back a cut-and-run national security strategy, tax-and-spend domestic policy and a no-enforcement immigration policy, the new Democratic Congress is apparently ushering in a return to feminist milestones.

I warned you people about what might happen if "Take Your Daughter to Work Day" ever caught on, and now you've got no one but yourselves to blame. Happy now?

White guilt doesn't help blacks

Good article by John Stossel.

Steele says too many blacks and whites are stuck in the old conversation, as though it was 1950. And he thinks there are questionable motives for this on both sides: "If we can get a big discussion going about what white privilege is, we never have to look at what blacks themselves are doing. And black responsibility. How are we contributing to our own problems? How are we holding ourselves back? Why don't our children do better in school than they do?"

Whites' preoccupation with guilt and compensation such as affirmative action is actually a subtle form of racism, Steele says. "One of the things that is clear about white privilege, and so many of the arguments for diversity that pretend to be compensatory, is that they advantage whites. They make the argument that whites can solve [black people's] problems. ... The problem with that is ... you reinforce white supremacy all over again. And black dependency."

Steele says that when blacks make racism their central focus, they mire themselves in destructive victimization -- and sabotage their own chances for advancement.

Of Whom Are The Newspapers Really Afraid?

Andrew Tallman gives us 5 posible reasons why this picture was published in no newspapers.

Update on Joe Arpaio

I got this via an e-mail froma good friend:

TO THOSE OF YOU NOT FAMILIAR WITH JOE ARPAIO

HE IS THE MARICOPA ARIZONA COUNTY SHERIFF

AND HE KEEPS GETTING ELECTED OVER AND OVER





THIS IS ONE OF THE REASONS WHY:

Sheriff Joe Arpaio (in Arizona) who created the "tent city jail":

He has jail meals down to 40 cents a serving and charges the inmates for them.

He stopped smoking and porno magazines in the jails. Took away their weights. Cut off all but "G" movies.

He started chain gangs so the inmates could do free work on county and city projects.

Then he started chain gangs for women so he wouldn't get sued for discrimination.

He took away cable TV ! until h e found out there was a federal court order that required cable TV for jails So he hooked up the cable TV again only let in the Disney channel and the weather channel.

When asked why the weather channel he replied, so they will know how hot it's gonna be while they are working on my chain gangs.

He cut off coffee since it has zero nutritional value.

When the inmates complained, he told them, "This isn't the Ritz/Carlton. If you don't like it, don't come back."

He bought Newt Gingrich' lecture series on videotape that he pipes into the jails.

When asked by a reporter if he had any lecture series by a Democrat, he replied that a democratic lecture series might explain why a lot of the inmates were in his jails in the first place.



More on the Arizona Sheriff:

With temperatures being even hotter than usual in Phoenix (116 degrees just set a new record), the Associated Press reports: About 2,000 inmates living in a barbed-wire-surrounded tent encampment at the Maricopa County Jail have been given permission to strip down to their government-issued pink boxer shorts.

On Wednesday, hundreds of men wearing boxers were either curled up on their bunk beds or chatted in the tents, which reached 138 degrees inside the week before.

Many were also swathed in wet, pink towels as sweat collected on their chests and dripped down to their pink socks.

"It feels like we are in a furnace," said James Zanzot, an inmate who has lived in the! tents for 1 year . "It's inhumane."

Joe Arpaio, the tough-guy sheriff who created the tent city and long ago started making his prisoners wear pink, and eat bologna sandwiches, is not one bit sympathetic He said Wednesday that he told all of the inmates: "It's 120 degrees in Iraq and our soldiers are living in tents too, and they have to wear full battle gear, but they didn't commit any crimes, so shut your damned mouths!"

Way to go, Sheriff! Maybe if all prisons were like this one there would be a lot less crime and/or repeat offenders. Criminals should be punished for their crimes - not live in luxury until it's time for their parole, only to go out and commit another crime so they can get back in to live on taxpayers money and enjoy things taxpayers can't afford to have for themselves.

If you agree, pass this on. If not, just delete! it.

Sheriff Joe was just reelected Sheriff in Maricopa County, Arizona.

Hail The (Re)Conquering Hero!

From Captain's Quarters:

Guess who's the most popular belle at the Democratic ball in DC? None other than Joe Lieberman, who had to run as an independent after party activists defeated him in the primaries with neophyte Ned Lamont. After having to endorse Lieberman's opponent, and in some cases campaigning against their long-time colleague, Democrats now line up to shake his hand ... or kiss it:

“It was all very warm, lots of hugs, high-fives, that kind of stuff,” said Senator Ken Salazar of Colorado.

Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon marveled, “One senator after another kept coming up and shaking his hand.”

And Senator Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas noted, “I gave him a hug and a kiss.”

Mr. Lieberman received a standing ovation at a caucus luncheon after Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, who is poised to become the majority leader, declared, “We’re all family.”

I'm tempted to ask where exactly Lincoln kissed Lieberman, but at least symbolically, every Senate Democrat has their lips pursed and aimed directly at his nether regions. Why? Lieberman himself gave them reason this past weekend on Meet The Press when he told Tim Russert that he would stick with the Democrats ... for now.

Duke Lacrosse Rape Update: 7:54 am | Manager: Duke accuser passed out

Now we know where she got the scratches:

DURHAM - Days before a woman said Duke University lacrosse players raped and beat her, she was passed out cold at a Hillsborough strip club and had to be carried to the parking lot, according to the club's former manager.

In that gravel parking lot on the night of March 11, the four people carrying the woman accidentally dropped her, said Yolanda Haynes, the club's former manager.

The Times and Reality

the WSJ's Holman Jenkins provides us with a look at the journalistic standards of the NY Times, and includes these thoughts:

The real question is why do Times editors allow such stuff into the paper? Do they wave it through because it might prove personally inconvenient to try to stop it? Do they believe they have more pressing things to worry about than what appears in the newspaper?

For this reason, it's hard to resist the urge to cheer on Hassan Elmasry. He's the mutual fund manager who last spring organized 28% of the shares to withhold their votes from Times directors at the company's annual meeting and last week proposed to put before the next annual meeting the question of whether to end the special voting rights that allow the Sulzberger family to control the company while owning less than 5% of the shares.

Mr. Elmasry is a fund manager associated with Morgan Stanley's Van Kampen outfit, but he's based in London and began his campaign long before the Mack allegations emerged (so forget the idea that his motive is anything but to rescue his fund's long investment in the New York Times Co.). The selling point of his fund is its disciplined focus on buying a handful of companies (no more than 40) with unique franchises, holding them for the long term and watching them carefully. The New York Times Co. has been in his portfolio for a decade.

This hasn't stopped the usual kibitzers from suggesting that his Times campaign is just a "typical" Wall Street effort to squeeze out short-term profits at the expense of journalism. But Mr. Elmasry actually has a record of taking a dim view of companies that don't protect and burnish the long-term franchises that attracted him to invest in the first place. Thus when he writes to Times shareholders that the company's voting-rights rules are "eroding the foundations of the enterprise which they were created to protect," it's worth considering, in light of all the accidents the Times has inflicted on itself lately, whether he might be right.

Meet the New Boss John Murtha and Congress's "culture of corruption."

John Fund has a devastating summary of the whole sorry Murtha Abscam mess:

Gary Ruskin, director of the liberal Congressional Accountability Project, told Roll Call that "when it comes to institutional policing of corruption in Congress, John Murtha is a one-man wrecking crew."

Libertarian Asshole: Sanchez

This is one of the main reasons why I find doctinaire Libertarians disgusting piles of human debris.

MEDIA

NEXT!

Watch Gutfeld

Liberal Blogs & Al Qaeda, both sending the same message.

The Nature of the Abaya

I wonder why feminists don't care.

Donna put on an Abaya and then walked down a New York street talking and walking normally. She was criticized by Muslim men.

"Among those who observed Donna, however, were some Muslims, Arabs, and even some Saudis. The Saudis were upset by what they saw and told Donna so. When she asked why, they explained that she was using the abaya in an invalid way. She then became curious to find out what they considered a valid way to use it. They explained to her that she must walk slowly, must look down when walking and keep her eyes more or less in front of her - no glancing from side to side, in other words. She must not talk to anyone or laugh loudly and certainly must not address any remarks to anyone lest they misunderstand her purpose in doing so.

To say the least, Donna was astounded by their remarks and realized that they were not simply talking about a garment to be worn but about their perceptions of what an abaya symbolized. They seemed determined to deny that a normal human being was under the black material. The truth is that those Saudi men articulated something that the Saudi lifestyle and customs have created. The abaya indeed covers a typically weak and frightened character (a woman of course), who views herself as a sexual entity confined in a well-defined space she can never escape from. This is why the whole culture of the abaya imposes so many restraints upon women. One of the restraints is that she must walk as if her feet were hobbled and she was unable to move easily and normally. Nor is she allowed to look around and observe the surrounding world comfortably, as slowly or quickly as she might like. The abaya has also contributed directly to preventing certain basic movements; for example, she can no longer move her hands normally. Aside from that, ordinary free conversation is forbidden and is replaced with low and often unclear speech that makes little sense."


"The Abaya Makes Women Appear Humiliated, Submissive, and Blindly Obedient to Men"

A perfect storm may be brewing in Lebanon.

The Lebanese government says Syria and Iran aim to overthrow the elected government in Beirut and reconquer the country.

Day By Day

McGovern Resurrected

Technology as Mephistopheles

Belmont Club. Worth reading and following the links.

Say It Ain't So, W!

Powerline analyzes leaks about the Iraq Study Group. If the reports are true, I will have the same feeling of moral disgust as I did when we abandoned the Viet Namese and Cambodians to their killing fields and death camps.

No one should be ashamed of their country twice in a single lifetime.

So, under the Baker Commission's recommendations, what will become of the 12 million Iraqis who voted for freedom and for a normal life? President Bush has said more times than I can count, in speeches spanning the last four years, that all people want to be free, and that freedom is God's gift to all mankind. If he doesn't believe that, then what does he believe?

If the Iraqis are to be sold out, at least let them be sold out by the Democrats. No one expected anything better from them.

I have an idea, let's not sell them out at all.

Doubling Down in Iraq

From the Weekly Standard; read the whole thing.

The picture is clear: More soldiers mean less violence, hence fewer casualties. The larger the manpower investment in the war, the smaller the war's cost, to Iraqis and Americans alike. Iraq is not an unwinnable war: Rather, as the data just cited show, it is a war we have chosen not to win. And the difference between success and failure is not 300,000 more soldiers, as some would have it. One-tenth that number would make a large difference, and has done so in the past. One-sixth would likely prove decisive.

Counterinsurgency warfare is more about protecting than killing--like a nationwide exercise in community policing. And the lesson of the 1990s in American cities is that the best way to reduce the level of criminal violence is to put more cops on the street. The lesson of the past three years in Iraq is the same: If the goal is to cut our losses, the best move is not to pull back, but to dive in--flood the zone, put as many boots as possible on the most violent ground. Do that, and before long, the ground in question will be a good deal less violent.

War is not poker; the stakes in Iraq are much higher than a little money or a few chips. But war's psychology bears some resemblance to a well-played game of cards. The only way Americans lose this war is to fold. That seems likely to be the next move, but it is the last thing we should do. Far better to call and raise. Our cards are better than theirs, if only we have the nerve to play them.

TAWFIK HAMID: Stop it before they kill you

From NRO online:

Thus the extreme brand of Sunni Islam that spread from the Kingdom to the rest of the Islamic world is regarded not merely as one interpretation of the religion but the only genuine interpretation. The expansion of violent and regressive Islam, he continues, began in the late 1970s, and can be traced precisely to the growing financial clout of Saudi Arabia. "We're not talking about a fringe cult here," he tells me. "Salafist [fundamentalist] Islam is the dominant version of the religion and is taught in almost every Islamic university in the world. It is puritanical, extreme and does, yes, mean that women can be beaten, apostates killed and Jews called pigs and monkeys.

Hamid is infuriated by the Western reponse to this challenge: "Stop asking what you have done wrong. Stop it! They're slaughtering you like sheep and you still look within. You criticize your history, your institutions, your churches. Why can't you realize that it has nothing to do with what you have done but with what they want."

U of Michigan: Screw the Constitution, We Are the Rulers!

One of the few good things that happened on Black Tuesday was the passage of the Michigan Civil Rights Initiative, which makes state racial preferences unconstitutional. Unfortunately, U. Michigan “President” Mary Sue Coleman believes her institution is above the law, and is openly boasting of her intent to ignore it. Here are a few lowlights from the speech she delivered the day after the election, and has subsequently spammed to U Mich student accounts (h/t: Discriminations commenter M.J. Wise):

I am deeply disappointed that the voters of our state have rejected affirmative action as a way to help build a community that is fair and equal for all.

Join the frickin’ club. Me, I’m deeply disappointed that voters of your state re-elected Jennifer Granholm, and that voters of our country have rejected the rule of law by electing a Senate that’s guaranteed to bork any judicial candidate worth nominating. I’m even more deeply disappointed that my former state, California, rejected eminent domain reform and parental notification for abortion, while re-electing a gun-grabbing, abortion-obsessed court-packer who passes herself off as a moderate only because the other Senator is even more off her rocker than she is. I’m deeply disappointed by a lot of things that happen in a democracy. A dictatorship would be much better, as long as I get to be the dictator.


But we will not be deterred in the all-important work of creating a diverse, welcoming campus. We will not be deterred.

Translation: screw the law, we’ll do what we want.

Climate chaos? Don't believe it

In 1988, James Hansen, a climatologist, told the US Congress that temperature would rise 0.3C by the end of the century (it rose 0.1C), and that sea level would rise several feet (no, one inch). The UN set up a transnational bureaucracy, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). The UK taxpayer unwittingly meets the entire cost of its scientific team, which, in 2001, produced the Third Assessment Report, a Bible-length document presenting apocalyptic conclusions well beyond previous reports.

This is the same James Hansen who is today the leading proponent of human caused global warming. There is a very good living to be made by predictions of doom.

Iraqis Fearful of Dems Victory

From the Seattle Times

BAGHDAD, Iraq — Across the capital Wednesday, Iraqis balanced hopes against fears about how U.S. policy will change on the ground in the wake of the Democrats' overwhelming election successes Tuesday night and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's sudden resignation.

Rasha Tariq, 23, said she found herself near tears when she awoke Wednesday to the news that Democrats had won the House and were on the cusp of taking the Senate.

Tariq said she worries that the Democrats' victory will mark the beginning of a gradual U.S. pullout from Iraq and the disintegration of what little order is left on the dangerous streets of Baghdad.

The article also quotes

Dr. Sami Ismael, 58, said he hopes the Democrats' victory will push Republicans to make necessary changes in tactics.

"Whatever they do, it can't get any worse," Ismael said.

I wonbder if this is the same Sami Ismael who was arrested in Israel

Ismael was arrested and jailed by the Israeli authorities on a charge of having contact with terrorists. More specifically, the Israelis said he had taken terrorist training in Libya. Ismael denied the charge.

Pelosi Liberal?

Here's an interesting factoid from Brent Bozell;

You think their coverage of Speaker-to-be Nancy Pelosi was fair and balanced? Then consider this jaw-dropping fact: Since Pelosi was elected as the House Democratic leader in November of 2002, all the way through to late October of 2006, the networks have not once described her as a "liberal." You read that correctly. Not once. That's not news coverage. That's a four-year masquerade party. In 1994, Gingrich was the "national poster boy for resentment and rage." In 2006, Pelosi was "a mother and a grandmother" who was "known for her trademark smile."

Jihads Delighted that the Democrats Won

I join with Ed in hoping that we can prevent the Democrats from delivering Iraq to the jihadis, but my estimate of their good faith is lower than his. The Democrats have staked everything, politically speaking, on the proposition that the Iraq war is a failure and a disaster. They have every interest in ensuring that our effort there does, in fact, fail. I think, in short, that the terrorists are reading the Democrats' intentions correctly.

Webb Supporters: What did we just do?

From NRO via Jonah Goldberg:

Good stuff, from a reader:

They had to run that clip because the much of the rest of his speech was an absolute riot.

He started off by mentioning that "tomorrow is an extremely important day for America," and the crowd went wild, thinking he was talking about taking power. But of course, he launched into his praise of the Marine Corps, and the crowd cheered a little less loudly. Then he thanked all the brave veterans and brave men still fighting, and the crowd cheered a little less loudly again.

Then he mentioned that he received a call from Sen. Allen, and the crowd went nuts again. Then he mentioned how pleasant and dignified Allen was, and the crowd grew quiet. Then he said he was having lunch next week with Allen — and the crowd was dead silent. Finally he told the audience that they should all thank Sen./Gov. Allen for his many years of dedicated service to the people of Virginia — and you could almost hear the people gathered looking at each other asking, "What the $#@! did we just do?"

It was priceless.

Talking back to CAIR: Brown-Waite blisters Muslim

From the St. Petersburg Times:

U.S. Rep. Ginny Brown-Waite on Thursday angrily refused calls by a Muslim advocacy group to condemn a prominent Hernando County Republican who called Islam a "hateful, frightening religion."

Brown-Waite instead criticized Gov. Jeb Bush and the head of the Republican Party of Florida, both of whom last week demanded an apology from Commissioner Tom Hogan and his wife, Mary Ann Hogan.

On Friday, Gov.-elect Charlie Crist severed Mary Ann Hogan's relationship with his campaign.

"Mrs. Hogan expressed in her statements the views of many of my constituents, and while they do not encourage harmony in the community, they should demonstrate to you how many United States citizens perceive your faith," Brown-Waite wrote, responding to a Nov. 3 letter from the Council on American-Islamic Relations asking her to denounce the Hogans' remarks.

In her three-page reply, Brown-Waite blasted the leader of CAIR's Tampa chapter, accusing him of anti-Catholic comments, saying he staged a 2004 political "ambush" of her meeting with a local doctor and has done little to condemn terrorism by Muslim extremists.

For the letter to CAIR, click HERE

RNC asks Steele to replace Mehlman

That would be a great idea.

Troops Fear The Loss Of Rumsfeld

Two views from the troops in Iraq:

From the London Times:

Mr Rumsfeld “made decisions, he stuck with them and he did what he thought was right, whether people agreed with it, liked it, or not”, Staff Sergeant Frank Notaro said. He insisted that Iraq was better off now than before the war.

Staff Sergeant Michael Howard said: “It’s a blow to the military. He was a good Secretary of Defence. He kept us focused. He kept the leaders focused. It’s going to be hard to fill his shoes.”

And from the NY Times:

...which decided to go the full John Kerry and depict the Marines in Iraq as ignorant and intellectually lazy:

The sergeant went upstairs to tell his marines, just as he had informed them the day before that the Republican Party had lost control of the House of Representatives and that Congress was in the midst of sweeping change. Mr. Menti had told them that, too.
“Rumsfeld’s out,” he said to five marines sprawled with rifles on the cold floor.

Lance Cpl. James L. Davis Jr. looked up from his cigarette. “Who’s Rumsfeld?” he asked.

Who do you believe?

Mark Steyn: My visit with the President

Typically great article, but written before the election:

There's something faintly unbecoming about the terms in which the Iraq debate is conducted. News anchors talk about whether people are "for" or "against" the war, as if the citizenry are Olympic skating judges awarding marks to some prancing ninnies out on the ice. Whether we (i.e. the Western world) know it or not, we're all out on the ice, and it's getting mighty thin in places. Yet this demeaning, immature conception of war as a reality show you're bored with is said to be the key factor in polls showing big Democrat gains in Tuesday's elections.

Rumsfeld on the War

Despite all the enemy tries to do to make the world think otherwise, America is not what is wrong with the world. America is a force for good. We are on the right side of history. Let there be no doubt that the great sweep of human history is for freedom and we are freedom’s side.

The Press at War. What ever happened to patriotic reporters?

We are told by careful pollsters that half of the American people believe that American troops should be brought home from Iraq immediately. This news discourages supporters of our efforts there. Not me, though: I am relieved. Given press coverage of our efforts in Iraq, I am surprised that 90% of the public do not want us out right now.

Between Jan. 1 and Sept. 30, 2005, nearly 1,400 stories appeared on the ABC, CBS and NBC evening news. More than half focused on the costs and problems of the war, four times as many as those that discussed the successes. About 40% of the stories reported terrorist attacks; scarcely any reported the triumphs of American soldiers and Marines. The few positive stories about progress in Iraq were just a small fraction of all the broadcasts.

When the Center for Media and Public Affairs made a nonpartisan evaluation of network news broadcasts, it found that during the active war against Saddam Hussein, 51% of the reports about the conflict were negative. Six months after the land battle ended, 77% were negative; in the 2004 general election, 89% were negative; by the spring of 2006, 94% were negative. This decline in media support was much faster than during Korea or Vietnam.

[snip]

Suppose the current media posture about American military and security activities had been in effect during World War II. It is easy to imagine that happening. In the 1930s, after all, the well-connected America First Committee had been arguing for years about the need for America to stay out of "Europe's wars." Aware of these popular views, the House extended the draft by only a one-vote margin in 1941. Women dressed in black crowded the entrance to the Senate, arguing against extending the draft. Several hundred students at Harvard and Yale, including future Yale leader Kingman Brewster and future American president Gerald Ford, signed statements saying that they would never go to war. Everything was in place for a media attack on the Second World War. Here is how it might have sounded if today's customs were in effect:
December 1941. Though the press supports America's going to war against Japan after Pearl Harbor, several editorials want to know why we didn't prevent the attack by selling Japan more oil. Others criticize us for going to war with two nations that had never attacked us, Germany and Italy.

October 1942. The New York Times runs an exclusive story about the British effort to decipher German messages at a hidden site at Bletchley Park in England. One op-ed writer criticizes this move, quoting Henry Stimson's statement that gentlemen do not read one another's mail. Because the Bletchley Park code-cracking helped us find German submarines before they attacked, successful U-boat attacks increased once the Germans, knowing of the program, changed their code
[snip]
The mainstream media's adversarial stance, both here and abroad, means that whenever a foreign enemy challenges us, he will know that his objective will be to win the battle not on some faraway bit of land but among the people who determine what we read and watch. We won the Second World War in Europe and Japan, but we lost in Vietnam and are in danger of losing in Iraq and Lebanon in the newspapers, magazines and television programs we enjoy.

Orson Scott Card on the War and the Election

Long, but VERY worth while:

Wherever Islamicism has been tried, the result has been identical to Communism's miserable track record. The people are oppressed; the worst sort of vigilantes and thugs terrorize the population; the new power elite, regardless of their supposed piety and dedication to a holy cause, is quickly corrupted and comes to love the wealth and privileges of power.

When there is no hope of deliverance, the people have no choice but to bow under the tyrant's lash, pretending to be true believers while yearning for relief. In Russia it came ... after more than seventy years. China and Cuba are still waiting -- but then, they started later.

So it would be in the Muslim world -- if Islamicism were ever able to come to seem inevitable and irresistible.

You know: If America withdrew from Iraq and Afghanistan and exposed everyone who had cooperated with us to reprisals.

As happened in South Vietnam. The negotiated peace was more or less holding after American withdrawal. But then a Democratic Congress refused to authorize any further support for the South Vietnamese government. No more armaments. No more budget.

In other words, we forcibly disarmed our allies, while their enemies continued to be supplied by the great Communist powers. The message was clear: Those who rely on America are fools. We didn't even have the decency to arrange for the evacuation of the people who had trusted us and risked the most in supporting what they thought was our mutual cause.

We did it again, this time in the Muslim world, in 1991, when Bush Senior encouraged a revolt against Saddam. He meant for the senior military officers to get rid of him in a coup; instead, the common people in the Shiite south rose up against Saddam.

Bush Senior did nothing as Saddam moved in and slaughtered them. The tragedy is that all it would have taken is a show of force on our part in support of the rebels, and Saddam's officers would have toppled him. Only when it became clear that we would do nothing did it become impossible for any high-ranking officials to take action. For the price of the relatively easy military action that would have made Saddam turn his troops around and leave the Shiite south, we could have gotten rid of him then -- and had grateful friends, perhaps, in the Shiite south.

That is part of our track record: Two times we persuaded people to commit themselves to action against oppressive enemies, only to abandon them. Do you think that would-be rebels in Iran and Syria and North Korea don't remember those lessons?

[snip]

Here's the story the Islamic puritans are telling: The West is full of terrible evils -- atheism, sexual filth of all kinds -- in defiance of God's will. So seductive are the wiles of Shaitan that many Muslims aspire to dress, act, and live like westerners. Only by turning to full enforcement of ancient Muslim law can Islam purify itself and resist the blandishments of the west. It's evil on one side, God on the other.

If all we had to answer them was Hollywood movies, politically correct anti-religious dogmas, and the other trappings of a West that is almost as decadent as the Islamicists claim, then we would only prove their point.

Instead, President Bush has offered something quite different. We don't want to turn you into mini-Americas, he says. We offer you, instead, democracy, in which you can choose for yourselves what parts of western culture to adopt. You will govern yourselves. It isn't a choice between wickedness and righteousness, it's a choice between freedom and oppression.

In other words, through nation-building, through the promise of democracy, Bush has created a rallying point with far stronger resonance than anything the Islamic puritans have to offer.

The "PLAN"

"Obsession"; the movie trailer

To be aired on FOX.

Words that never meet: Kerry and Honor

A long and emotional essay, well worth a read. It ends with this story:

In 1999 I briefly served as deputy commander of a Hurricane Mitch recovery operation headquartered in Puerto Barrios, Guatemala. An earthquake (6.6 magnitude) struck the region and damaged our barracks area as well as several of the dikes our engineers had erected along the Motagua River. We had to evacuate our barracks, in the midst of heavy rains spawned by a tropical depression. The day after the quake I flew to the US air base at Soto Cano, Honduras, to meet with our regional commander. After I met with the brigadier general in command I: (1) washed and dried two sets of BDUs and (2) bought a bottle of Chivas at the PX. The next morning I caught a plane flight back to Guatemala, and transfered to a helicopter to fly back to our base.




That night I took the still-boxed Chivas to one of the troops –a tired, exhausted fellow who had earned a gift so precious. He shook his head when I passed him the scotch. I told him, “You’ve earned it.” He looked at his watch, observed we were ten minutes from midnight, and said “You and I are now off duty.” I sipped a thumbs worth of scotch in my canteen cup (there is no more pleasureable a vessel for imbibing booze).



We chatted for about twenty minutes, about my trip to Soto Cano, about the task force’s new job (earthquake relief), about the lousy weather, about how tired we were. The discussion of weariness led the conversation to our advanced age and years of service, which in part explained the conversation’s next turn. My friend asked, with a glint in his eye: ”You remember what John Kerry said about those of us who served in Vietnam?”


I nodded.



“I was in Vietnam in 1971,” my buddy continued. “I didn’t commit any war crimes and I didn’t see any. Kerry said we were committing war crimes everywhere all the time.”



Remember, readers, this is 1999. We’re in a creaky barrack, wearing t-shirts, BDU trousers, and boots. Earthquake aftershocks occasionally boom –and the booms sound and feel like heavy artillery. And he mentions John Kerry.



“I despise the man,” my friend said. “He lied and benefited politically from his lies….He lied about me.”


I simply listened — that’s what you do in a moment like this. I remember noticing I still had scotch in my cup. He had barely touched his drink. He took a long sip, put his cup down. Plop. Period. End of moment.



The man had served honorably in Vietnam. He had served nobly (another word those of the noblisse oblige set have trouble with). Twenty-eight years later this admirable American soldier was still pulling duty, this time on a humanitarian mission in another jungle. For some hard cases it may seem odd that in a midnight moment of reflection John Kerry’s ugly Winter Soldier spiel would intrude. But Kerry’s trash talk had tarnished the man’s honor — and that sense of deep insult and betrayal had lit a long, slow fuze of righteous anger.


In 2004 Big Media missed that story. In 2006 the troops serving in Iraq and Afghanistan didn’t.

Iraq: What Now (re Vanity Fair)

Cliff May responds to the Vanity Fair article that perports to show neocons abandoning Bush on Iraq.

David Rose writes that he “spent the better part of two weeks in conversations with some of the most respected voices among the neoconservative elite. What I discover is that none them is optimistic.”

Of course they are not optimistic. If they were, they’d be fools since it is obvious that after three years the mighty American military machine has not been able to suppress insurgents, terrorists and thugs armed with cell phones and garage door openers. That is depressing and frustrating.

Rose adds: “Their dismay extends beyond the tactical issues of whether America did right or wrong, to the underlying question of whether exporting democracy is something America knows how to do.”

I would argue that there has never been any question: No one knows how to export democracy, certainly not to a region as troubled as the Middle East. But there is a difference between exporting democracy and supporting democrats and freedom fighters wherever you find them. By failing to do that in the Middle East (as we did, for example in Eastern Europe), we left people in the region with only two options: dead-end dictatorships or the Islamist dream of victory and conquest.

I also would argue that the evidence does not suggest that most Iraqis prefer not to be free, that most would rather not choose their leaders, that a majority enjoys a good suicide bombing every day or two.

The evidence suggests that a fanatical, determined minority can do vast amounts of damage, can destroy faster than anyone can build, can so terrorize people that they relinquish their hopes in exchange for protection. Why is this surprising? When the Bolsheviks took over Russia, it was not because most Russians were Marxist-Leninists. Most Germans were not Nazis in the early 1930s. When New Jersey store owners pay the Mafia protection money it’s not because that’s the way they like it.

I would suggest that there is also too much attention being paid to Iraq. If this surprises you it’s because you have not been paying attention. The media focus has been on Iraq so that’s what people pay attention to. But we are in a war against Islamofacism or, as the administration have termed it, a “War On Terror.” Keep in mind that none of the 9/11 highjackers were Iraqis. In that respect the Left is correct; if we had simply struck out against the immediate perpetrators of 9/11 we would have struck Saudi Arabia instead of Iraq.

But while the immediate focus is on Iraq because that’s where one of the major battles is being fought, we are not in a war with Iraq, but in a much wider war. The epicenter of the ideology we fight is in Iran. It also has a locus in Saudi Arabia which openly supports and finances the export of the particularly virulent forms of Islam that infects much of the Islamic world and many parts of the West. There are festering sores of Islamofascism in Pakistan, only partially held in check by General Pervez Musharraf.

And an area that has gotten almost no attention is Indonesia, the world’s most populous Islamic country which has a violent uprising ongoing headed by the group known as Jemaah Islamiyah.

So the attention paid to Iraq is also a distraction, and takes away our focus on the big picture. The bloody lessons we are learning in Iraq will help us to overcome and defeat the Islamic threat that we face on a global scale.

And I, for one, am optimistic.

Saddam to Hang

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Iraq's High Tribunal on Sunday found Saddam Hussein guilty of crimes against humanity and sentenced him to hang for the 1982 killing of 148 Shiites in the city of Dujail. The visibly shaken former leader shouted "God is great!"

Saddam's half brother and former intelligence chief Barzan Ibrahim, and Awad Hamed al-Bandar, head of the former Revolutionary Court, were sentenced to join Saddam on the gallows for the Dujail killings after an unsuccessful assassination attempt during a Saddam visit to the city 35 miles north of Baghdad.

The death sentences automatically go to a nine-judge appeals panel which as unlimited time to review the case. If the verdicts and sentences are upheld, the executions must be carried out within 30 days.

Terrorists Endorse Democrats In Election; Media Silent

From Ace of Spades:

But the media knows damn well the quotes are genuine, and certainly will not arrange telephone interviews (with people quite happy to talk to the press) in order to report the story themselves. They'll just embargo the story completely.

That's the media's most potent power -- not shading or slanting stories this way or that. But simply refusing to report major stories they feel may cause Americans to think "the wrong things."

So CNN can hang itself with its claim that "We're not in the business of censoring the news." That's precisely the business it's in, and business is good.

Guess Who’s’ Endorsing Michael Steele?

I think he'll win.

Are the North Koreans and Iran Jointly Developing Nuclear Weapons?

In Captain’s Quarters there is some very interesting analysis about the North Koreans decision to come back to the bargaining table. The reason seems to be money. The NKs are running out thanks to American pressure on their international bankers.

One comment that followed this analysis was intriguing because it is so very plausible:

The Iranians intended to do all their atomic testing and design in Korea. That just hit me when the Washington Times leak came out about U.S. Plans to go medieval on the DPRK atomic apparatus. We would wake up one day with six or seven plutonium bombs on Shahab III warheads aimed at Israel and Western Europe without there never having once been an atomic test in Iran. Kim benefits from any joint results of Iranian-funded programs. Everyone wins, except the Jooooos, of course. Moving the weaponization research to the DPRK keeps it away from the prying eyes of the Mossad, who probably do not have any assets in the DPRK.

Iran is crawling with Mossad, and has been since the Shah's time. So you can see why the Iranians would want to move things around.

That's why Bush, Condi, and Rumsfeld are moving now. They're on to the scam. The question is, why are the Chinese cooperating? Or are they? Have we told them that we are acting unilaterally if they don't play ball?

This has everything to do with the next chapter of the Israeli/Hezbollah war. There are reasons for our seeming passivity in Iraq and the halting diplomacy. North Korea is about to be cut off in the east. Syria will be taken care of in the West due to the stupidity of the Boy President, so eager is he to seize the Golan with missile barrages. The intent is to leave the once-very confident Persians isolated.

This makes a great deal of sense. The Iranians are afloat in oil revenue. The NKs are trying to raise cash by counterfeiting and the production of illicit drugs. What better way to earn money than to set up a joint venture with Iran in the development and production of nukes? Why do it separately when you can do it together? That way the NKs earn money and the Iranians get a nuke without ever testing a nuke.

That source of revenue is now drying up thanks to China closing the banking window to the NKs. That means that we can delay or stop the Iranian weapons program by disarming NK, killing two birds with one stone.

If this proves to be true, George Bush will be right up there with Reagan in terms of geopolitical acumen.

Want to see waterboarding?

Video: Steve Harrigan gets waterboarded on Fox

Lutheran vicar Roland Weisselberg set himself on fire to warn against the danger of the Islamization of Europe

Unlike Thich Quang Duc's self-immolation in Viet Nam, an action that was on the front page of the New York Times, this act of protest was only reported on the Internet in the U.S.

Not Weisselberg's death, but the fact it was unremarked may be the real story of this event. Gestures must express some deep but unexpressed emotion to be effective. Roland gave the performance of his life but the gallery was empty. And now there is a stir offstage. Is it a new cast of players come to perform? Or have the night watchmen arrived to turn out the lights?

Scott Ott Explains It All

Click on the link for the video

Kerryism by Victor Davis Hanson

OK, maybe one more but then this is really the end...(crosses fingers):

Kerry surely must be one of the saddest Democratic liabilities around. Some afterthoughts about his latest gaffe, which is one of those rare glimpses into an entire troubled ideology:

(1) How could John Kerry, born into privilege, and then marrying and divorcing and marrying out of and back into greater inherited wealth, lecture anyone at a city college about the ingredients for success in America? If he were to give personal advice about making it, it would have to be to marry rich women. Nothing he has accomplished as a senator or candidate reveals either much natural intelligence or singular education. Today, Democrats must be wondering why they have embraced an overrated empty suit, and ostracized a real talent like Joe Lieberman.

(2) How could Kerry possibly claim that he was thinking of the uneducated in the context of George Bush, who, after all, went to Harvard and Yale?

(3) Some of the brightest and most educated Americans are not only in the military, but veterans of Iraq. Two of the best educated minds I have met-Col. Bill Hix and Lt. Col. Chris Gibson, both Hoover Security Fellows-were both Iraqi veterans. What is striking about visiting Iraq is the wealth of talent there, from privates to generals. Without being gratuitously cruel, the problem of mediocrity is not in the ranks of the military, but on our university campuses, where half-educated professors and non-serious students killing time are ubiquitous. Personally, I'd wager the intelligence of a Marine Corps private any day over the average D.C. journalist. Every naval officer I met at the USNA, without exception, seemed brighter than John Kerry, whose "brilliance", after all, has managed to offend millions of voters on the eve of a pivotal election. If the Democrats lose, it will be almost painful to watch the recriminations against Kerry fly.

(4) This is not the first, but third, time he has denigrated soldiers in the middle of a war-and there is a systematic theme: John Kerry's assumed superior morality allows him to pass judgment from on high about supposedly lesser folk who become tools of a suspect military: thus we go from limb-loppers and Genghis' hordes to terrorists to dead-beats. The only constant is that the haughtiness is always delivered in the same sanctimonious, self-righteous, and patronizing tone.

(5) The mea culpa that Democrats are blaming the war and not the warriors is laughable after Sens. Durbin, Kennedy, and Kerry have collectively compared American soldiers to Nazis, Pol Pot's killers, Stalinists, terrorists, and Baathists.

(6) The problem is that Kerry is not just a senator, but the most recent presidential candidate of the Democratic Party, and thus in some sense, especially given the diminution of Howard Dean, the megaphone of the entire party.

(7) His pathetic clarification, as he blamed everyone from Tony Snow to Rush Limbaugh, displayed the same Al Gore derangement syndrome, and thus raises a larger question: what is it about George Bush that seems to reduce once sober and experienced liberal pros to infantile ranting?

(8) And why is the supposedly lame Bush so careful in speech, and the self-acclaimed geniuses like a Ted Kennedy, John Kerry, or Howard Dean serially spouting ever more stupidities? For all the Democrats' criticism of George Bush, I can't think of a modern President who has so infrequently put his foot in his public mouth, and, by the same token, can't think of any opposition that on the eve of elections seems to have an almost pathological death wish.

The Democrats should use this occasion to have an autopsy of Kerryism, or this strange new tony liberalism, that has turned noblisse oblige on its head. It used to be that millionaire FDRs and JFKs felt sympathy for those of the lower classes and wished to ensure that the hoi polloi had some shot at the American dream. But today's elite liberals-a Howard Dean, Al Gore, Ted Kennedy, George Soros, Ted Turner-love the high life and playact at being leftists simply because they are already insulated from the effects of their own nostrums that always come at someone poorer's expense while providing them some sort of psychological relief from guilt. Poor Harry Truman must be turning over in his grave-from bourbon, cigars, and poker to wind-surfing and L.L. Bean costume of the day says it all.

Is Kerry the poster child for modern liberalist liberalism?

OK, I know it's piling on, but this is too good not to post:

Let's see.... billionaire (or nearly) completely out of contact with everyday people, stuck in time (acts if we are still in the Vietnam War when there was a draft - hence his idiotic statement today about staying in school in order to avoid military service), acts as if he has no culpability for the Iraq War (although he voted for it), has virtually no response to Islamic fascism, in fact acts as if it does not exist ... I could go on. He's almost too much of a sitting duck. It's kind of amazing he was so dumb as not to apologize quickly. (No, it's not-ed. This guy was not exactly at the top of his class at Yale. No, he wasn't.] Will this latest Kerry fiasco rescue the Republican Party from a debacle next Tuesday? It just might help, if the Repubs can keep it in the news a few days (and Kerry certainly helped by refusing to apologize). But the Repubs don't really deserve rescue. This is an election in which both parties deserve to lose.

Six Arab states join rush to go nuclear

Not a good idea.

U Penn President Amy Gutman at Halloween Party with Suicide Bomber

Click HERE for picture.

Claiming that the student had the right to wear the costume is, I believe, a dodge and a moral cave-in to the very forces that made possible his entrance into the party and her subsequent acceptance (at least initially) of his costume. This is not a question of rights, after all, as Penn is a private university and can regulate what its students wear. No one is allowed to attend class or stroll across campus in the nude because such actions would be universally seen as morally unacceptable (or, at the least, socially disruptive). It would violate agreed-upon norms of public behavior. I also doubt students would be welcomed if they wore transparent clothing or pants with the crotch cut out.

What's missing from President Gutmann's statement, and from the larger academic community of which she is a part, are moral parameters within which every member of the community must act, short of the prohibition of criminal acts, which this of course is not. This applies particularly to statements or actions concerning terrorism, the war on Islamism, and the representations of those actions.

Had Mr. Saadi, or anyone else, shown up dressed in as Hitler, Pol Pot, David Duke wearing his Klan garb, Bull Conner, Sirhan Sirhan, John Wilkes Booth, a slave trader with a whip, a rapist, or any such person, he would have been identified immediately as representing someone, and perhaps some force, that is evil. Neither Ms. Gutmann nor anyone else would have objected to having him barred from her home and party; indeed, to have failed to act in such a way would have invited opprobrium.

But in the modern university, especially in anything relating to Middle East studies, the guardrails are down. After years of scholarship that consistently fails to investigate thoroughly, much less condemn, terrorism or jihadism, or which misrepresents both these historical actors and the consequences of their actions, can we be surprised at President Gutmann's lack of shock? With moral equivalency between bombers and the bombed, especially regarding suicide bombers, a mainstay of modern scholarship and pedagogy in Middle East studies, why wouldn't a young man presenting himself as a killer of innocents be laughed at rather than set straight by his intellectual and moral superiors--i.e., women like Amy Gutmann?

VIDEO: The Kerry Record on the Troops

"CRAZY" --- Starring John F'n Kerry

John Kerry Would Not Denigrate the Troops, Right?

From Patterico's Pontifications (just scroll down):

Lefties, this will help with your BDS. John Kerry:

If anyone thinks a veteran would criticize the more than 140,000 heroes serving in Iraq and not the president who got us stuck there, they’re crazy.

Also John Kerry:

They told stories that at times they had personally raped, cut off ears, cut off heads, taped wires from portable telephones to human genitals and turned up the power, cut off limbs, blown up bodies, randomly shot at civilians, razed villages in fashion reminiscent of Ghengis Khan, shot cattle and dogs for fun, poisoned food stocks, and generally ravaged the countryside of South Vietnam in addition to the normal ravage of war and the normal and very particular ravaging which is done by the applied bombing power of this country.

John Kerry, 1971:

In our opinion and from our experience, there is nothing in South Vietnam which could happen that realistically threatens the United States of America. And to attempt to justify the loss of one American life in Vietnam, Cambodia or Laos by linking such loss to the preservation of freedom, which those misfits supposedly abuse, is to us the height of criminal hypocrisy, and it is that kind of hypocrisy which we feel has torn this country apart.

New Jersey Turnpike For Sale

I first saw this on an internal media watch e-mail I get every day because UBS has been chosen by New Jersey to look into the sale of the turnpike.

TRENTON, N.J. -- New Jersey, the state with the most highways per square mile, may sell the best-known of them all -- the 148-mile New Jersey Turnpike.

Ford: For Abortion Before He Was Against It.

LAST NIGHT, ON HANNITY & COLMES, CONGRESSMAN FORD SAID HE WAS NEVER "PRO-CHOICE." YET, DURING HIS FIRST RUN FOR OFFICE, CONGRESSMAN FORD CALLED HIMSELF "PRO-CHOICE."

Congressman Ford Saying He Never Called Himself "Pro-Choice"

Congressman Ford: "No, No. I Was Not Pro-Choice At One Time." (Fox News' "Hannity & Colmes,”" 11/1/06)

Congressman Ford Saying He Is "Pro-Choice"

Congressman Ford: "[A]s It Relates To Abortion, I'm Pro-Choice. I'm Not Pro-Abortion. A Woman Has A Right To Choose Not To Have An Abortion As Much As She Has The Right To Choose To Have One." (Harold Ford, Jr. As Quoted In The Ninth U.S. House District Debate, The Commercial Appeal, October 29, 1996)

NY Times Confirms Iraq Nuke Plans

From NRO Online:

I'm sorry, did the New York Times just put on the front page that IRAQ HAD A NUCLEAR WEAPONS PROGRAM AND WAS PLOTTING TO BUILD AN ATOMIC BOMB?

What? Wait a minute. The entire mantra of the war critics has been "no WMDs, no WMDs, no threat, no threat", for the past three years solid. Now we're being told that the Bush administration erred by making public information that could help any nation build an atomic bomb.

Let's go back and clarify: IRAQ HAD NUCLEAR WEAPONS PLANS SO ADVANCED AND DETAILED THAT ANY COUNTRY COULD HAVE USED THEM.

UPDATE: From Captain's Quarters:

This is apparently the Times' November surprise, but it's a surprising one indeed. The Times has just authenticated the entire collection of memos, some of which give very detailed accounts of Iraqi ties to terrorist organizations. Just this past Monday, I posted a memo which showed that the Saddam regime actively coordinated with Palestinian terrorists in the PFLP as well as Hamas and Islamic Jihad. On September 20th, I reposted a translation of an IIS memo written four days after 9/11 that worried the US would discover Iraq's ties to Osama bin Laden.

It doesn't end there with the Times, either. In a revelation buried far beneath the jump, the Times acknowledges that the UN also believed Saddam to be nearing development of nuclear weapons:

Among the dozens of documents in English were Iraqi reports written in the 1990’s and in 2002 for United Nations inspectors in charge of making sure Iraq abandoned its unconventional arms programs after the Persian Gulf war. Experts say that at the time, Mr. Hussein’s scientists were on the verge of building an atom bomb, as little as a year away.
European diplomats said this week that some of those nuclear documents on the Web site were identical to the ones presented to the United Nations Security Council in late 2002, as America got ready to invade Iraq. But unlike those on the Web site, the papers given to the Security Council had been extensively edited, to remove sensitive information on unconventional arms.


That appears to indicate that by invading in 2003, we followed the best intelligence of the UN inspectors to head off the development of an Iraqi nuke. This intelligence put Saddam far ahead of Iran in the nuclear pursuit, and made it much more urgent to take some definitive action against Saddam before he could build and deploy it. And bear in mind that this intelligence came from the UN, and not from the United States. The inspectors themselves developed it, and they meant to keep it secret. The FMSO site blew their cover, and they're very unhappy about it.

And from Michelle Malkin

Suddenly, the New York Times
is worried about dangerous disclosures

The NYTimes blabbermouths are accusing the Bush administration of being careless with national security data?

Ouch. Stop. Sides. Splitting.

And from The Belmont Club:

The New York Times is complaining that information from Iraq's nonexistent nuclear weapons program that was posted on the web by the Bush administration to disprove the NYT's assertion that Iraq's program didn't exist has helped Iran advance its own existing nuclear weapons program. It's Bush's fault. It is just me, or is something wrong with this train of reasoning?

Reading Lolita in Tehran

Excerpt:

"I have to tell you that the Ayatollah himself was no novice in sexual matters," Nassrin went on. "I've been translating his magnum opus, The Political, Philosophical, Social, and Religious Principles of Ayatollah Khomeini, and he has some interesting points to make."

"But it's already been translated," said Manna. "What's the point?"

"Yes," said Nassrin, "parts of it have been translated, but after it became the butt of party jokes, ever since the embassies abroad found out that people were reading the book not for their edification but for fun, the translations have been very hard to find. And anyway, my translation is thorough—it has references and cross-references to works by other worthies. Did you know that one way to cure a man's sexual appetites is by having sex with animals? And then there's the problem of sex with chickens. You have to ask yourself if a man who has had sex with a chicken can then eat the chicken afterwards. Our leader has provided us with an answer: No, neither he nor his immediate family or next-door neighbors can eat of that chicken's meat, but it's okay for a neighbor who lives two doors away. My father would rather I spent my time on such texts than on Jane Austen or Nabokov?" she added, rather mischievously.

We were not startled by Nassrin's erudite allusions to the works of Ayatollah Khomeini. She was referring to a famous text by Khomeini, the equivalent of his dissertation—required to be written by all who reach the rank of ayatollah—aimed at responding to the questions and dilemmas that could be posed to them by their disciples.[2] Many others before Khomeini had written in almost identical manner. What was disturbing was that these texts were taken seriously by people who ruled us and in whose hands lay our fate and the fate of our country. Every day on national television and radio these guardians of morality and culture would make similar statements and discuss such matters as if they were the most serious themes for contemplation and consideration.

Cast of characters: Part III

Thomas Sowell has a well written analysis on the DBM (Drive by media) and their protection of John Kerry:

Benedict Arnold was a military hero during the Revolutionary War. But General Arnold changed his mind on that war, just as Senator Kerry has changed his mind on the war in Iraq -- and no one has claimed that Benedict Arnold's earlier military service made him exempt from criticism.

How is this story played in the media? The front-page headline on the San Francisco Chronicle read: "Bush, GOP seize on Kerry's Gibe to Turn Focus from War in Iraq." The Chronicle has learned well the New York Times' technique of imputing motives instead of reporting facts.

Has any Democrat ever been accused by the mainstream media of "seizing on" some statement by a Republican, much less have bad motives imputed?

This is not the first time the media have circled the wagons around Senator Kerry. Despite the fact that Kerry has shamelessly tried to exploit his military service in Vietnam decades later, Tim Russert is the only major media commentator who has ever asked him why he will not open his military records, as President Bush has done.

Read the whole thing.

The Virginian Pilot and John Kerry

The Pilot finally got around to John Kerry’s slur of the troops in Iraq.

If you have been hiding under a rock, or depend on the Pilot for your information, you would have missed the remarks Kerry made to students in a California college:

“You know, education, if you make the most of it, if you study hard and you do your homework, and you make an effort to be smart, uh, you, you can do well. If you don’t, you get stuck in Iraq.”

Today, thanks to covering fire from some leading Democrats, readers of the Pilot learn about the Kerry statement, on the front page, below the fold. The top story, by the way is about falling new home sales.

The headline of the story “Kerry apologizes for remarks about U.S. troops in Iraq” provides the puzzled reader of the Pilot no context since the front page does not have Kerry’s famous quote. The quote shows up on page A9, with a file picture of Kerry and an excuse. The Pilot quotes Kerry’s remark and right below it gives a much longer “quotation” citing unidentified “prepared remarks” which provides a totally different slant, making his remarks an attack on President Bush by attacking his intelligence.

Given the fact that Bush got better grades than Kerry in college and is reported to has a higher IQ, it's a dubious comment for Kerry to make.

I am, frankly, dubious about the Pilot’s “prepared remarks” because first, he did not say them, second, the firestorm that his remarks created have now generated two intemperate and rather savage public attacks on Republicans for having created this controversy followed by a limp “apology” on his web site: “I personally apologize to any family member or American who was offended.”

I have no doubt that Kerry has supplied the lapdog media “notes” that change the meaning of his remarks, conveniently backdated.

Why do I believe that Kerry meant every word of what he said? Because it fits a pattern. This is far from the first time Kerry has attacked American troops. His infamous testimony to congress during the Viet Nam war about raping, murderous soldiers acting like Genghis Khan was the beginning of his personal and despicable attacks on the honor and sacrifice of American soldiers. And during the current conflict he joined other Democrats in denouncing the troops for invading Iraqi homes at night and terrorizing the inhabitants.

I will have more to say on this subject and will provide appropriate links when time permits. For now, the Pilot has done what it does best, provide the "news" with a Democrat slant and several days late.

Big Lizards on "Kerrying Water for the Vision"

Liberals don't merely believe their ideas are better than those of conservatives; they believe they are better than conservatives: intellectually and morally. This explains the repeated atttempts this year to run on the theme of "the culture of corruption," notwithstanding that Democrats are as apt to be corrupt as Republicans: "even when we take money from lobbyists or diddle the pages," they argue, "we're actually doing so to serve a higher moral purpose -- so it's totally different!"

Perhaps Liberals hate the military because they see them as stupid, inept, lazy, and inferior; therefore, like fairy-tale ogres, they break everything they touch. They despise Southerners for the same reason, and Westerners, and... well, basically everyone who doesn't share "the Vision" that Sowell discusses. Only the "anointed" -- liberal Democrats -- can be trusted with the levers of power.

And I believe that is what we just saw slip out of John Kerry's mouth when he wasn't listening (thereby joining the tens of millions of others who never listen to what he says): more than anything else, he is annoyed by menials questioning the wisdom of their betters.

Sure, Kerry himself might "criticize the more than [500,000] heroes serving in [Vietnam]" when he returns from that war; but that was totally different, not to be questioned... not by the likes of you lot. Remember, in this context, his response to the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth and their campaign against him: rarely did he try to argue with them, point by point; he left that to subordinates and his natural allies in the antique media.

Rather, he bitterly attacked his accusers for being the wrong class of veteran... not good ones like himself, but bad ones who don't share the Vision, hence should simply be dismissed.

American Indian Genocide?

Here’s an interesting and rather long article about the conflict between the white immigrants and settlers and the American Indians. The issue has been politicized over the last 50 years and the white hats and black hats have moved from head to head.

It’s interesting to see a scholarly analysis of the history of this conflict.

Kerry Blows 2006?

Via ABC News. While part of the Voice of the Democrats, even ABC News could not completely ignore this one:

While stumping for local Democrats in California, Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., addressed students at Pasadena City College and made a comment about education and the war in Iraq that lent itself to much controversy.

"You know education, if you make the most of it, you study hard, you do your homework and you make an effort to be smart, you can do well. And if you don't, you get stuck in Iraq," he said.

A Democratic congressman told ABC News Tuesday, "I guess Kerry wasn't content blowing 2004, now he wants to blow 2006, too."

Here's the video.

Here's Bush's response.

While the news was all over the internet, on ABC News, on talk radio, on YouTube and was being hotly debated on the campaign trail, the Virginian Pilot said not a word about John Kerry’s insult to the troops.

The paper did devote an article on page A6 to the topic of Bob Barker leaving “Price is Right.”

You can often tell more about the ideological bent of a newspaper by their decisions of what NOT to write about than by the use of language and emphasis in their columns.