Obama's Troubling Instincts

Karl Rove makes a point that I have been making for some time. Obama has said that he would be willing to meet with the leaders of rogue states without pre-conditions. While he has tried to walk that statement back, he still insists that meetings of that type would be fruitful.

Assuming that Obama's meetings would have the objective of advancing America's interests - an assumption that is not necessarily true - just how does Obama propose to achieve his aims?

On Wednesday, Mr. Obama said in Florida that in a meeting with the Iranians he'd make it clear their behavior is unacceptable. That message has been delivered clearly by Republican and Democratic administrations in public and private diplomacy over the past 16 years. Is he so naïve to think he has a unique ability to make this even clearer?

If Mr. Obama believes he can change the behavior of these nations by meeting without preconditions, he owes it to the voters to explain, in specific terms, what he can say that will lead these states to abandon their hostility. He also needs to explain why unconditional, unilateral meetings with Iran's Mahmoud Ahmadinejad or North Korea's Kim Jong Il will not deeply unsettle our allies.

If Mr. Obama fails to do so, voters may come to believe that he is asking them to accept that he has a "Secret Plan," and that he is hopelessly out of his depth on national security.

Obama cites other meetings American leaders like Reagan and Nixon have had with their adversaries. But they were anything but unconditional.

On Monday, he said it was a show of confidence when American leaders meet with rivals; he insisted he was merely doing what Richard Nixon did by going to China.

I recommend that he read Henry Kissinger's book, "The White House Years." Mr. Obama would learn it took 134 private meetings between U.S. and Chinese diplomats before a breakthrough at a Jan. 20, 1970 meeting in Warsaw. It took 18 months of behind-the-scenes discussions before Mr. Kissinger secretly visited Beijing. And it took seven more months of hard work before Nixon went to China. The result was a new relationship, announced in a communiqué worked out over months of careful diplomacy.

The Chinese didn't change because of a presidential visit. In another book, "Diplomacy," Mr. Kissinger writes that "China was induced to rejoin the community of nations less by the prospect of dialogue with the United States than by fear of being attacked by its ostensible ally, the Soviet Union." Change came because the U.S. convinced Beijing it was in its interest to change. Then the president visited.

Ditto for Reagan's meetings with Soviet leaders.

Unconditional meetings is a position that Obama is stuck with and he created that position because it sounded good to the Left. There was no more substance to it than any other position Obama has taken. This empty suit is as devoid of understanding of global affairs as anyone who has ever dreamed of becoming president. The only thing Obama knows is politics, and he's got that down pretty well.

SUCCESS IN IRAQ: A MEDIA BLACKOUT

This is a great follow up to my prior post: What Bush Should Have Said.

By Ralph Peters:

May 20, 2008 -- DO we still have troops in Iraq? Is there still a conflict over there?

If you rely on the so-called mainstream media, you may have difficulty answering those questions these days. As Iraqi and Coalition forces pile up one success after another, Iraq has magically vanished from the headlines.

Want a real "inconvenient truth?" Progress in Iraq is powerful and accelerating.

But that fact isn't helpful to elite media commissars and cadres determined to decide the presidential race over our heads. How dare our troops win? Even worse, Iraqi troops are winning. Daily.

You won't see that above the fold in The New York Times. And forget the Obama-intoxicated news networks - they've adopted his story line that the clock stopped back in 2003.

To be fair to the quit-Iraq-and-save-the-terrorists media, they have covered a few recent stories from Iraq:

* When a rogue US soldier used a Koran for target practice, journalists pulled out all the stops to turn it into "Abu Ghraib, The Sequel."

Unforgivably, the Army handled the situation well. The "atrocity" didn't get the traction the whorespondents hoped for.

* When a battered, bleeding al Qaeda managed to set off a few bombs targeting Sunni Arabs who'd turned against terror, that, too, received delighted media play.

* As long as Baghdad-based journalists could hope that the joint US-Iraqi move into Sadr City would end disastrously, we were treated to a brief flurry of headlines.

* A few weeks back, we heard about another Iraqi company - 100 or so men - who declined to fight. The story was just delicious, as far as the media were concerned.

Then tragedy struck: As in Basra the month before, absent-without-leave (and hiding in Iran) Muqtada al Sadr quit under pressure from Iraqi and US troops. The missile and mortar attacks on the Green Zone stopped. There's peace in the streets.

Today, Iraqi soldiers, not militia thugs, patrol the lanes of Sadr City, where waste has replaced roadside bombs as the greatest danger to careless footsteps. US advisers and troops support the effort, but Iraq's government has taken another giant step forward in establishing law and order.

My fellow Americans, have you read or seen a single interview with any of the millions of Iraqis in Sadr City or Basra who are thrilled that the gangster militias are gone from their neighborhoods?

What Bush Should Have Said

On April 20th, the New York Times printed an article by David Barstow in which he denounced the government for using retired military officers to get it's side of the story out on the war.

It appears that the government has backed down.

They should not have.

This is the prime time speech President Bush should have delivered.

My fellow Americans

I come to you tonight to discuss an important issue. In fact, it may well be the most important issue of the next decade.

On September 11, 2001 we were attacked by forces that have declared war on the United States. Prior to that date, neither my administration nor previous administrations took the threat seriously enough.

On 9/11, 19 men, armed with box cutters, murdered nearly 3000 of our fellow citizens, destroyed the Twin Towers in New York, destroyed part of the Pentagon, and had it not been for the courage and valor of the passengers on Flight 93, would have destroyed the Capital.

This was not, as some would have it, a crime; it was an act of war. I understood - and the American people understood - that we could not deal with this threat with police on the beat or with FBI agents. War had been declared, a terrible attack had been launched and we decided to act.

On December 7, 1941 it took the Japanese empire a battle fleet consisting of six aircraft carriers, numerous battleships, submarines, cruisers and destroyers to attack Pearl Harbor, yet they killed fewer Americans on that day than died on 9/11. Modern technology has made it possible for a mere handful of determined people to visit destruction on society that was undreamed of mere decades ago.

The old paradigm involving conventional armies wearing uniforms and fighting on battle lines no longer applies. The killers of 9/11 did not wear uniforms, did not spare civilians and broke virtually every rule of war; yet they succeeded in inflicting the deadliest attack on American soil in history.

The enemy is shares a belief that is inimical to ours. They oppose democracy, despise pluralism, deny freedom of religion, deny the equality of men and women, and demand strict obedience to a medieval moral code on pain of death. In pursuit of their objectives they are willing to commit crimes that are repugnant to civilized society. Their primary tactic is indiscriminate murder and grotesque beheadings. That is why we have called the war we are in the “war on terror.”

But while their chief tactic is wanton slaughter, their objective is more political than military. Their tool is the bomb, their objective is propaganda. They use terror tactics for media effect. And this can be effective. In Spain, a train was bombed at rush hour. 190 were killed, over a thousand wounded. The attack was timed just before an election. The result was the defeat of a government that was actively fighting the terror war and its replacement by a government that withdrew from that war.

Similar violence or threats of violence have occurred all across the globe, in every continent and virtually every country from England to India, from Indonesia to the Philippines, from Pakistan to Russia, violence has led to terrible loss of life and a population that lives in fear. As your President, it is my first duty to protect the American people from facing another 9/11, or something worse.

To that end the brave men and women in our military have gone to meet the enemy where he lives and plots his next attack. Our enemy is not a state, but an ideology. But our enemy has his state sponsors and it is our objective to end the state sponsorship of terrorism. It is a very difficult job, but our men and women in uniform have performed magnificently. We owe them and their families a debt of gratitude that we will never be able to repay. Many have suffered wounds and many have lost their lives, and their sacrifice humbles us.

But while our troops have made great progress in places like Afghanistan and Iraq, the battle will not be won by arms alone. This war like no other before it is an information war. The primary objective of the enemy in bombing, killing and maiming is not a conventional military victory; it is designed for the news media. It is designed to get it media attention and demoralize the people at home. Its objective is not to defeat armies in the field but to defeat the nations’ will.

The war is not being fought just on the streets of Iraq, it is being fought in the media: in newspapers and magazines and on radio and TV. And in this war we have barely begun to fight. The enemy knows it cannot beat us in battle, but it believes it can beat us in the press. The enemy has tried to convince you that the war was lost. That resistance is futile and that we should pack up and go home. We have shown that this war can be won and that we are winning it. The people of Iraq have experienced life under al Qaida and have said “enough.” They have turned against the jihadists and are cooperating in the pacification of their own country.

But that is not the message that the American people have received. Prior to the surge, the media was filled with images of bombings; there was a daily focus on death tolls as if the press was taking a morbid delight in each milestone. Once the situation improved, the news from Iraq virtually disappeared.

Things were not always thus. In World War 2, reports of Allied disasters were often not reported. During a training exercise for the D-day landings, nearly 749 men died in one day. Not a word was reported and no newsmen were critical of the people who were involved. In that long ago world, our troops, our press and our people stood fast against the enemy. We knew who we were and we knew we were right. The press was not a disinterested spectator between good and evil; between the forces of freedom and oppression.

Somehow Viet Nam changed all that. In a debate some years ago, an American reporter was asked what he would do if he saw the enemy prepare to attack American troops. He stated that he would be honor bound by his reporter’s code to stand by and watch the Americans get ambushed. In other words the story was more important that the lives of America’s soldiers.

That appears to be the code being followed by the leaders of the mainstream media today. American failures like Abu Ghraib get non-stop headlines, front page coverage for weeks on end. There is no question that Abu Ghraib was a scandal and people responsible have been punished. But the wall-to-wall media coverage made it into a major propaganda defeat, even as mass murder was being committed by the enemy.

Even lies like the story about the Koran being flushed down a toilet – a physical impossibility – are repeated by so-called responsible media outlets.

The recent successful effort by the Iraqi army in Mosul was reported by most of the media as an Iraqi defeat, with Muqtada al-Sadr, still an exile in Iran, being hailed as the victor. Strangely enough the so-called victor is still in hiding and the Iraqi army, who were reported by the Mainstream media as the losers, is arresting his followers.

The American government is learning and adapting to this new kind of warfare. We realize the importance of information, not only to the troops but also to the American people. Young American men and women from cities and towns throughout the land are daily volunteering to serve in the military. You provide the troops; they are your sons and daughters. You are the support for the troops; you deserve to know the truth.

There are many good and honest reporters in this country, but we realized that we could not depend on the American press to tell you the entire story. Whether this is due to ideological biases, the use of local partisans as reporters in the field or simply lack of knowledge of military tactics and strategy, I believe it is important for the American people to get the facts. I believe that you deserve the truth, warts and all. But you do not deserve to be shown only the warts, and not the whole picture. You do not deserve to be shown only battlefield losses, not battlefield wins.

And this is important not only for you, the American people, but for people throughout the world. After all, the Koran flushing story was eventually carried worldwide, creating indignation and riots in which people were killed.

To begin to counter this incessant drumbeat of pessimism and defeat we offered to show some knowledgeable retired military officers what was really going on. We allowed them to see for themselves the situation on the ground in Afghanistan and Iraq. We invited them to see the detention facility at Guantanamo. And they gave their assessment of what they saw to you, the American people. This is important to counter the media campaign which is being used so successfully by the enemy. We are determined that they will not be able to wage the media war without opposition.

Strangely enough, this administration effort has been denounced by the mainstream media as if it were a scandal. The NY Times wrote an article about it that implied wrongdoing by the American government and accused the retired military men of being war profiteers.

The arrogance and presumption of this leading media outlet seems to know no bounds. They are in effect telling you, the American people, that they are the only source of information you are allowed to have; that other sources are illegitimate; that the American government cannot bring you the truth even as they bring you their version of the truth often laced with enemy propaganda. They are – in essence – telling your government that it cannot counter the enemy’s lies and the media’s slant.

This will not stand. I will not allow an arrogant and unelected media to limit what you, the American people, are allowed to know about this global war.

It once was said that you don’t want to pick a fight with someone who buys ink by the barrel. But this is too important for the future of the American people and the people of the globe. Thanks to new technologies like the Internet and an increasing diversity on radio and television, you have access to the truth that the mainstream media find inconvenient; that does not fit their template of defeat, of blame America first. I will not allow the media Barons to set the tone for the nation.

We are determined to fight the enemy not only on the battlefield but also in the media, because this will determine the outcome of the war.

You deserve the truth and the truth will set you free.

Thank you and God Bless America.

Things You Can't Say About Obama

Rush Limbaugh lists them:

RUSH: With Obama we started out, we couldn't talk about his big ears 'cause that made him nervous. We've gone from that to this: Not only can we not mention his ears...

We can't talk about his mother.

We can't talk about his father.

We can't talk about his grandmother unless he does, brings her up as a "typical white person."

We can't talk about his wife, can't talk about his preacher, can't talk about his terrorist friends, can't talk about his voting record, can't talk about his religion.

We can't talk about appeasement.

We can't talk about color; we can't talk about lack of color.

We can't talk about race. We can't talk about bombers and mobsters who are his friends. We can't talk about schooling. We can't talk about his name, "Hussein."

We can't talk about his lack of experience. Can't talk about his income. Can't talk about his flag pin.

This started out we can't call him a liberal.

It started out we just couldn't talk about his ears.

Now we can't say anything about him.

The Local

Believe it or not, The New Republic is doing the "Lord's Work" in exposing the crime syndicate Obama is part of. Read the whole thing despite the obligatory swipe at Bush.

The Teamsters in Chicago are continually linked to organized crime--so why is a presidential candidate from that city promising to end federal oversight of the union?

There are two reasons to be concerned about Obama's actions here. The first is procedural. Obama's promise to close down the IRB suggests a Bush-like contempt for the customary relationship between government and the judicial process. The president himself can't shut down the IRB. He can only recommend to his attorney general that he recommend to the U.S. Attorney in New York that it be shut down. But in these kind of touchy matters, presidents usually defer to the judgment of their attorney generals. By coming close to promising a shutdown, Obama was putting politics above judicial procedure--which is just the kind of "Washington" behavior that he likes to criticize his opponents for doing.

The second reason for concern is more substantive. Labor leaders have made plausible arguments for shutting down the IRB, but a Chicago politician should be extremely wary of acceding to them. If there is continuing mob influence in the Teamsters, it is probably centered in the Chicago area. And in the last decade, the Teamsters in Chicago have shown little enthusiasm for rooting out corruption in their ranks. As a veteran Chicago politician surrounded by a veteran Chicago campaign staff, Obama had to have known this--and that makes his warm words to the Teamsters all the more disturbing.

Thin-Skinned Candidate Says What? - Update: Tenn. GOP is 'Low Class'

From Little Green Footballs:

Barack Obama is becoming known as the snapping poodle of the 2008 election, snarling and lashing out and whining about poor treatment as he runs for the most powerful position in the world: Obama tells Tenn.’s GOP: ‘Lay off my wife’.

That's an unfortunate choice of words.

Welcome Freepers. Click HERE for something "deeper."

Nuremberg on the Willamette

Power Without Responsibility

The Belmont Club has a thought provoking article about the civil war in Lebanon . Be-bop Galula.

Having coerced the government to do its bidding, the Islamofacists – Hizbullah – retreated back into the shadows.

As Carolyn Glick explains in the Jerusalem Post:

What is interesting about Hizbullah's successful overthrow of the elected government in Lebanon is that after his forces defeated their foes, Hizbullah chief Hassan Nasrallah ordered his men to retreat to their customary shadows. Why didn't Hizbullah just overthrow the government? Understanding why Hizbullah refused to take over Lebanon is key not only for understanding Hizbullah but also for understanding Hamas, Fatah and the insurgency in Iraq.

A compelling answer to this question is found in David Galula's classic work, Counterinsurgency Warfare: Theory and Practice. ... As Galula explained, one of the main advantages that insurgents have over the governments they seek to overthrow is their lack of responsibility for governance. Far from seeking to govern the local population, the goal of insurgents is simply to demonstrate through sabotage, terror and guerrilla operations that the government is incapable of keeping order. And it is far easier and cheaper to sow disorder and chaos than to maintain order and secure public safety.

In Hizbullah's case, Nasrallah and his Iranian bosses have no interest in taking on responsibility for Lebanon. They don't want to collect taxes. They don't want to pick up the garbage or build schools and universities.

Wretchard explains that there is a great advantage to power without responsibility.

The goal of seeking power without responsibility isn't confined to insurgents and Galula's theory might just as well have been a critique of the modern media as much as Hezbollah. A generation of public intellectuals found it was possible to have both a decisive influence over policy yet remain exempt from accountability for its effects. The next time someone asks how it is possible to simultaneously be a rebel and celebrity, a critic of Global Warming and owner of an executive jet, or become a successful hate-America pastor living in a multimillion dollar mansion, refer him to Galula.

Is there any way of spoiling this little game?

One obvious method is the shockingly simple expedient of making information warfare a part of operations. To patiently label every roadside bomb; every massacre as the work of the hidden hand. The success of the Surge is in large measure due not only to kinetic action but information action. It is not enough to arrest terrorists, it is equally important to connect them to their acts.

But here is where the traditional MSM become a major player. The MSM is perhaps the definition of power without responsibility. Go to the dictionary and look up “power without responsibility” and you will see a picture of a journalist. Ever the critic, never the play. Sniping from the sidelines, never in the game. If the NY Times recipe for defeating terrorism fails, what are the consequences? It holds no office from which it can be removed. It cannot be sued for failure of its policies. It sets the terms of the debate and establishes the ground rules and it is never, ever, ever wrong.

And the MSM have set the rule that information warfare is “unfair” when our side ingages in it.

But the task wasn't easy because at every step of the way AQI's cheering squad yelled "foul". Power without responsibility has been a time honored tradition of the professional critic for so long it's almost a constitutional right. Therefore when Bob Owens at Pajamas Media documents the use of Iranian EFPs against American vehicles some will call it "beating the drums of war against Iran". But he's just connecting the dots. When bloggers replay clips from Jeremiah Wright's all time hit sermons, they'll be accused of character assassination or worse. But they're just connecting the dots.

Accepting the terms under which an opponent chooses to engage in conflict is first and often the worst concession one can make. And it's a concession that many traditionally accord to the left.

The MSM demands that they and they alone are the sole legitimate vehicle by which the public may be informed. If the Pentagon wants to get it's story out, it is accused of spreading propaganda.

That arrogance and presumption are characteristic of the MSM, and it’s often that case that in the face of this kind of brazen presumption this government, led – let us not forget – by George Bush - will often cave when it should counter-attack.

It appears that Barack Hussein Obama has read the book. As evidence, he has told the Republicans that they cannot attack his wife for her statements …. Or else.


"That I find unacceptable" Arrogance on parade.

Commuters and cellmongers repent!

I hate the way Sunday has become official morality day.

I say this not in criticism of organized religion or morality in general, but because I don't like trickery, and I don't like the way Sundays have become the official day for media to play preacher and promote morality -- especially the newly manufactured morality which appeals to the non-churchgoers with unacknowledged spiritual needs.

In today's Inquirer, "our" car culture and our cell phone culture are been subjected to good sound scoldings. So, after the poor sinful readers spend their weekdays indulging their decadent lifestyles by commuting to work in their greenhouse-gas-emitting cars and facilitating their needless and wasteful lives by using culturally-destructive cell phones, they need to be shamed on Sunday.

If it weren't so predictable and so tired, this would call for a long essay.

But I have to go out and commit sins -- of the automotive and telephonic variety -- so I don't have time for a long essay.

Forget about atonement. As it is, I never had time to atone for my more pleasurable sins.

Atoning for driving and communicating is impossible.

(In a way, I don't envy today's preachers, so maybe I shouldn't be too hard on them. It is easier to induce guilt over pleasurable things like recreational sex and drugs. Scolding people who have to do things like commute and communicate simply to make a living must be an uphill battle, as well as a thankless task.)

Totally like whatever

Barry & Me

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I notice Senator ... that you are not wearing a flag lapel pin?

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Am too.
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Click on the link for the rest.

"There Will Be Bamboozling"

WSJ Washington Editor: Network Newscasts 'Don't Matter Anymore'

The MSM is figuring out what to do now that the world no longer revolves around them.

According Gerald Seib, an assistant managing editor and the executive Washington editor of The Wall Street Journal, ABC’s “World News,” the “CBS Evening News” and the “NBC Nightly News” just aren’t important in the grand scheme of Washington politics, and that’s part of the changing culture of the news media.
...
“And he [Abrams] talks about how in the Reagan White House where he worked, the whole place shut down between 6:30 and 7:30. All activity stopped because everybody wanted to see what was being broadcast on the ABC, CBS and NBC nightly news broadcasts. They were that important to the agenda in Washington. Much of the previous day had been constructed to influence what would be on those three newscasts. He said, ‘Now I work in the White House, I haven’t watched in months. They just don’t matter anymore. That’s not where people get their news.’”

Here is the money quote:

People are watching news on cable television. They’re reading it online all day long. It’s splintered, it’s fractured. Is that a good thing or a bad thing? I can make an argument either way. It’s a more democratized flow of news, but there’s less sort of central understanding and a lot of people are getting their news the way they want it to be rather than the way it is and that’s a bad thing.

Interpretation: democracy is good except in the dissemination of information. That "central understanding" was the Liberalism view of reality. He confuses lack of diversity with the truth.

Getting the news you are looking for is a bad thing? Well, it could be if you get told a lot of lies, like Walter Cronkite proclaiming "and that's the way it is." Strikingly reminiscent of Pravda, which happens to be the Russian word for "truth."

Harkin: Nothing Bad Happened In Viet Nam After the War

This needs to be widely distributed.



it's a clip of John McCain appearing on Des Moines' WHO radio last July, when on-air talent Jan Mickelson played him Tom Harkin's comments from earlier that month, recorded on the floor of the Senate:

And if we leave, there will be a bloodbath in Vietnam. All of the people who supported us will be slaughtered in the streets. Well, it didn't happen.

Harkin is evil.

Day By Day

Fighting against a Christless Christmas

I like Christmas with its decorations and presents. I get nostalgic for Christmases that I actually never had, but which are depicted in so many pictures: snowy nights with sleighs and farmhouses with families gathering. I like the "feel" of the Holiday. But, like many Christians, I am angered by the efforts of aggressive secularists to banish Christ from Christmas.

So here's an article from the American Thinker that, if it could become a movement, I could join, ... reluctantly.

In the fourth century A.D., the Catholic church made a big mistake. Acceding to the popular tradition that Jesus Christ had been born on December 25 and wishing to keep Christians from participating in the infamous orgies of the year-end pagan festival of Saturnalia, the Church established December 25 as the feast of the birth of Christ. Thus, for seventeen centuries, Christmas and Saturnalia have competed for the attention of the public. By now, I think we must admit that Saturnalia has won and that Christmas has been thoroughly de-Christianized.


During its long and varied history, Christmas has seldom been entirely free of Saturnalian contamination. As its celebration rose to prominence in the Middle Ages, the nativity scene was flanked with older pagan symbols, such as decorated trees and Yule logs, and religious adoration was admixed with feasting and revelry. After the Reformation, many Protestant sects viewed Christmas with suspicion as "popish" and/or pagan; its celebration was actually banned during the Puritan regime in England.


The 19th century ushered in a trend toward popularizing Christmas by transforming it into a secular holiday of sentimentality and benevolence. This was done at the expense of elbowing Christ off the stage. (It is noteworthy that in the most famous expression of Victorian Christmas spirit, Dickens' Christmas Carol, the words "Jesus" and Christ" do not occur even once.) By way of substitution, a new central figure was created---a motley amalgamation of Saint Nicholas, the god Odin, the pagan Yule goat, and the British Father Christmas. His image was defined by cartoonist Thomas Nast and his personality and activities by Clement Moore's "The Night Before Christmas".


Throughout the twentieth century, Santa Claus grew in importance as Christ faded into the shadows. This was largely because "Santa" equated to "gifts" which equated to "sales receipts". But the moguls of commercialization were tolerant. If you were eccentric enough to attribute some sort of religious significance to Christmas, then you were permitted to do so, just so you did it quietly. You couldn't make a major movie about the birth of Christ but you could sneak in an angel or two, as in It's a Wonderful Life, which became the entertainment world's epitome of Christmas. During this period, the infant Jesus was still allowed an occasional walk-on role, mainly in artistic Christmas cards and French carols whose cultural value outweighed their offensive religiosity.


But by the beginning of this millennium, even this crumb was denied to Christians. In a series of aggressive confrontations, every trace of Christ in Christmas has been attacked. Public nativity scenes and even Christmas trees have been challenged in the courts as violations of the First Amendment. Holiday children's movies have ceased to be religiously neutral and either deify a gigantic godlike Santa, as in The Polar Express, or else attack Christianity, as in the cynically atheistic Hogfather and the clumsily anti-Catholic Golden Compass.


Even the name "Christmas" has been erased, in the interest of inclusiveness and diversity, and been replaced by "the Holidays"---a bit of PC censorship that stores such as Sears, Kmart, Target, and Gap persist in even after threats of boycotts. The change is now complete. In the thick advertising sections of a recent Sunday newspaper, the word "Holiday" was invariably used; "Christmas" did not appear once.


The reasoning behind this censorship is positively frightening. When challenged about the change from "Christmas trees" to "holiday trees", Sears responded"

"The reason for our use of holiday tree is due to the [sic] Sears Holding is a very diverse company, we do not want to offend any of our associates, but also our valued customers. We decided to call them holiday trees because even if Christians are the only religion that uses a Christmas tree we still do not want complaints from other customers of different religions complaining about our use of Christmas."

So the name "Christmas" is now offensive, the forbidden "C word". Jesus Christ is now He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named.


What should Christians do against this onslaught? Since public complaints and boycotts have so far proven futile, let us try Gandhian passive resistance. Let us quietly secede from the "holidays" by abstaining from all of the customs that have helped to secularize Christmas. Specifically:

Do not tell your children sweet lies about Santa Claus. Have the courage to tell them the blunt truth about that hypocritical old fraud and bone up on the Wikipedia article to get your facts straight. By being frank with them, you will gain their respect and give them the pleasure of being worldly-wise and cynical with their playmates. (You will also be off the hook about Christmas presents.) Bear in mind that if you yield to the temptation of telling them those "little lies" (as Prachett called them in Hogfather) about Santa and the Easter bunny and the tooth fairy, you will run the risk that, as they grow older and learn to disbelieve those myths, they will conclude that your stories about Jesus were myths too.

Do not allow your children to participate in inclusive 'holiday' celebrations at school. Tell the school authorities that you are offended by the secular profanation of your religious holiday and that you wish your children to be excused. (Take them out for a family treat instead.) And complain that the use of a "Christian religious figure" (i.e. Santa Claus) in their parties is a violation of the first amendment.

Do not take kids to non-religious seasonal shows. Or, if they must see The Nutcracker or Mr. Magorum's Wonder Emporium, at least make an effort to take them to one or two religious performances. If enough people express an interest in nativity plays, entrepreneurs will fall over themselves in their rush to fill that need. By way of example, the recently made Nativity Story has been shown several times this month on HBO.

Do not emphasize a Christmas tree. Combine or even replace it with a nativity scene.
Do not send non-religious Christmas cards. Send cards that mention the nativity and Christ, however briefly. As the sole exception, send Hanukkah cards to your Jewish friends, who are fellow victims in the war against religious holidays.

Do not buy any Christmas gifts. If possible, avoid all purchases before Christmas and then take advantage of the after-Christmas sales to buy Epiphany presents. Take particular pains to shun the stores that avoid the use of the word "Christmas" in their promotions---and let them know why you are doing so.. If a ten percent drop in holiday receipts is enough to frighten merchandisers , think what a boycott of all practicing Christians could accomplish.

Finally, replace all of these abstentions with religious practices. Devote as much tine and money as you can to the charities that help the poor at Christmas time; these activities are the last vestige of true Christian spirit in the 'holidays'. Within your own family, revive the old customs of Advent calendars and candles. Make a ceremony of putting the infant Jesus in your crib on Christmas Eve and singing carols. And go to church together.

By taking these steps, we can rescue the sacredness and peace of Christmas for ourselves and our families and be rescued from the turmoil, fatigue, and expense of the frantic 'holidays'.


After Christmas. it will be our turn to celebrate. On Epiphany (January 6), we can ceremonially add the Magi to our nativity scenes and then (to the envy of the neighborhood children) distribute presents to our children.


Some of you may think that the measures I've proposed are extreme and divisive. I would answer that they are no more extreme than the measures others have taken to deprive Christians of the right to publicly express their christianity. By now, we should have learned that we must fight for our rights or lose them. The question really is: do we believe and cherish our beliefs strongly enough to fight for them?

The NY Times Still Doesn't Know Who Won In Sadr City

From the NY Times: Truce Holds in Sadr City Amid Iraqi Army Patrols by ALISSA J. RUBIN

BAGHDAD — Iraqi Army troops moved a few blocks north of the fortified front line in Baghdad’s Sadr City district without incident on Saturday, signaling that a shaky truce with the cleric Moktada al-Sadr’s Shiite militia was holding.

Let’s see if we can give them a hint. The Iraqi army is patrolling Sadr City.

In Mosul, another Sadr stronghold, the Iraqi army is arresting wanted men. That’s what happens when the fighting is over; you start arresting people instead of shooting them.

Members of Sadr’s staff are helping the Iraqi army.

IEDs are being identified, located and removed.

Sadr is still in Iran, but has created his “surrender team.”

So let’s tally it up and think about who may possibly be in charge.

Apparently the NY Times is so committed to defeat that even if Sadr shot himself and had his body burned in his bunker, they would tell you he is stronger than ever.

Oh, and those fact checkers that the MSM is famous for let this one get by:

When the police, a car parked on the side of the road exploded, killing three civilians and wounding 15 others, according to a police official in Baquba, the capital of Diyala Province.

That's it; that's how the story ends.

Reporting was contributed by Robert Nickelsberg and Michael R. Gordon from Baghdad, and employees of The New York Times, from Mosul, Diyala and Baghdad.

Anyone want to venture a guess who those unnamed employees in Mosul, Diyala and Baghdad are? Bueller, ... Bueller?

UPDATE: Thanks to Diogenesis at Free Republic

What's Right

Wouldn't you like to be a politician who's running against an opponent most people distrust or hate?

I would.

That's why, if I ever ran for office, I would run against the media as much as I would run against my opponent. I would associate my opponent with the media. That should be easy and credible since I am conservative and the media is liberal. I would refuse to sit down with editorial boards and denounce the media's endorsement.

So Hillary's decision to run against the media (see ad below) is both smart and infuriating. It's smart because it's good politics. It's infuriating because this is something Republicans should have been doing for years. Instead, we have one member of the team that disgraced the country and survived thanks to the media. She was the media's darling but they have abandoned her like their first spouse, whoring after the young babe.

She has been jilted and is taking it public. Good for her, but it should have been one of us.

Idea

President Bush should denounce "dickless wonders who crap themselves in the face of any opposition and both look and smell like a baboon's butt" and see if any Democrats get angry saying Bush was talking about them.

The Abuses of Human Rights By Human Rights Groups

The Volokh Conspiracy features a post by David Bernstein Human Rights Watch's Credibility:

In it he faults HRW for it's undue emphasis on Israel and it's lack of emphasis on regimes that deny human rights as a matter of policy.

I can see the argument that a disproportionate focus on Israel is appropriate, because Israel should be held to higher standards as a liberal democracy, and because liberal democracies are far more likely to be responsive to groups like Human Rights Watch than are countries like Saudi Arabia. Instead, Whitson claims that the disproportionate focus isn't disproportionate to begin with, and indeed it's incomprehensible that anyone might think otherwise, which is another nail in HRW's credibility coffin.

I read down the comments and found that defenders of HRW were not really interested in "human rights" in the abstract, but more generally in the idea that HRW could only effect human rights in nations that are democratic and are likely to react to complains of HRW.

Even David Bernstein concedes this point. I find that offensive.

What is interesting in this debate is that those, like Orin, excuse the lack of emphasis on the most egregious violators of human rights because such a focus would have no effect. In effect, organizations that follow these guidelines are not “human rights” organizations at all. They are self criticism forums for Democracies.

Orin:

Similarly, I don't think any (rational) human being on the planet needs to be reminding that Kim Jong Il II is batshit insane and treats his entire country like peasants while forcing them to stay in 1955. I don't think any (rational) history book will ever omit or gloss that fact.

So what exactly is the point of interjecting North Korea into this?

Because we need to be reminded of these facts or we will forget them or ignore them to our peril. David Bernstein concedes the point when he says:

I can see the argument that a disproportionate focus on Israel is appropriate, because Israel should be held to higher standards as a liberal democracy, and because liberal democracies are far more likely to be responsive to groups like Human Rights Watch than are countries like Saudi Arabia.

It’s as if during World War 2, a human rights organization should have focused on racism in the United States because we are more likely to be responsive while giving a pass to the Nazi death camps because criticism of their existence would not deter the Nazis.

Today, seven years after the attack of 9/11, with the exception of a few sites on the internet, the images of that event are expunged from the media. To even mention that event leads the Left to accuse you of fear mongering. This leads people to question why we are trying to stop Islamofacism.

In 1941 it took the Japanese empire an entire battle fleet including all six first line aircraft carriers, submarines, battleships, cruisers and destroyers to bomb Pearl Harbor and kill about 2400 soldiers, sailors and civilians. In 2001 it took 19 men with box cutters to kill nearly 3000 people and bring the Twin Towers down. In some places in this country they are hailed as heroes. Without that background and the understanding that a few people now have the ability to cause mass casualties, we don’t understand what we are doing.

That is the point of focusing on the actual countries that destroy human rights and human dignity. The rest is intellectual onanism.