Bleeding Heart Conservative

2003-10-21T16:12:00.000-07:00

FrontPage magazine.com: "After all, conservatives understand that Tony Blair is a socialist, that he is a friend of Bill and Hillary Clinton and that on all domestic issues he is their adversary. But conservatives have been unstinting in their recognition of the enormous courage, the true statemanship and steady vision of Tony Blair and have been generous in their praise for his leadership and achievement.
The reason for Berman's inability to do likewise is that it would jeopardize the moral superiority he feels as a 'progressive' that allows him to look down his nose at those who don't agree with him, shut his his mind to their arguments and close his heart to their humanity. Apparently this is the only way the champions of an idea that has been discredited by a century of misery can maintain their illusions that they are still in the vanguard of history."

2003-10-18T16:31:00.000-07:00

Pejmanesque: "We must ever bear in mind that the great end in view is righteousness, justice as between man and man, nation and nation, the chance to lead our lives on a somewhat higher level, with a broader spirit of brotherly goodwill one for another. Peace is generally good in itself, but it is never the highest good unless it comes as the handmaid of righteousness; and it becomes a very evil thing if it serves merely as a mask for cowardice and sloth, or as an instrument to further the ends of despotism or anarchy. We despise and abhor the bully, the brawler, the oppressor, whether in private or public life, but we despise no less the coward and the voluptuary. No man is worth calling a man who will not fight rather than submit to infamy or see those that are dear to him suffer wrong. No nation deserves to exist if it permits itself to lose the stern and virile virtues; and this without regard to whether the loss is due to the growth of a heartless and all-absorbing commercialism, to prolonged indulgence in luxury and soft, effortless ease, or to the deification of a warped and twisted sentimentality.
Moreover, and above all, let us remember that words count only when they give expression to deeds, or are to be translated into them. The leaders of the Red Terror prattled of peace while they steeped their hands in the blood of the innocent; and many a tyrant has called it peace when he has scourged honest protest into silence. Our words must be judged by our deeds; and in striving for a lofty ideal we must use practical methods; and if we cannot attain all at one leap, we must advance towards it step by step, reasonably content so long as we do actually make some progress in the right direction."

2003-10-17T17:19:00.000-07:00

SALAM PAX: "Having coffee with Ann Clwyd at he Houses of Parliament and finding out that she has been supporting [The Free Prisoners Society]. Before I went there people were telling me that she was so pro-war, when I sat and talked to her she amazed me with her knowledge and commitment. So pro-war she is, but her heart is in the right place, if more anti-war people were as committed to helping Iraq out of the bad place it is now as she is things would be great."

2003-10-15T17:50:00.000-07:00

Go visit the new Michael Medved Fan site!

2003-10-15T17:35:00.000-07:00

According to the Angry Left, we're the bad guys. I defy them to find a similar photo of a Fedayeen soldier.

2003-10-14T10:29:00.000-07:00

Jim Miller on Politics: "Six People Died In A Baghdad Suicide Bombing and it was the lead story in newspapers and on broadcast news programs all over the world. At least ten Christian villagers died from terrorist attacks in Indonesia, and news organizations mostly ignored it. The Indonesian attacks, almost certainly by Muslim extremists, don't matter to news organizations because they have nothing to do with American policy, or, more crudely, give no reason for defeating President Bush next year.

Since this is a Reuters story, we have to check for bias, and it is not hard to find. They say that: 'Muslim-Christian violence in the region has caused about 2,000 deaths in clashes since 1999.' Nearly all the dead were Christian villagers killed by Muslim terrorists, something concealed by the bland 'Muslim-Christian violence'. For Reuters, the killers are not terrorists, but 'militants'. Their estimate of the death total may be low by a factor of 10. I have seen much higher estimates, though I have not seen a careful study. "

Good for Jim for pointing this out. I don't know for sure that they only put up stories that will affect the election, but I do believe they ignore "tribal" violence in third-world countries. They would of course be quick to cover a single Palestinian death at the hands of the IDF.

2003-10-13T17:29:00.000-07:00

'Uncle Sam's Plantation': 'America has two economic systems,' says Star Parker, author of 'Uncle Sam's Plantation,' the latest offering from WND Books – 'capitalism for the rich, and socialism for the poor.'

Star Parker

Parker should know. Once caught up in the miserable world of welfare fraud, sex, drugs and abortion, she underwent what many have called a miraculous transformation into what she is today – one of America's leading advocates for true, faith-based success and empowerment of the nation's poor. "

2003-10-13T14:47:00.000-07:00

The Last Word: "What do available statistics show, as to the nature of American 'poverty'?"

"Nearly 40 percent of all 'poor' households owned their own homes, and the average home of those classified as 'poor' by the Census Bureau is a three-bedroom house with a garage. More than 750,000 of the 'poor' owned homes worth more than $100,000, and 71,000 owned $300,000 homes. Nearly 60 percent of 'poor' homes have more than two rooms per person. That means that the 'poor' have twice as much living space as the average Japanese. And the same percentage have air conditioning.

64 percent own a car; 14 percent own two or more.
74 percent own microwave ovens; 23 percent have automatic dishwashers; 91 percent have color television and 29 percent have two or more TVs.
'Poor' Americans are better off than the general population of Europe.
'Poor' children eat more meat than do higher-income children and, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, have protein intakes 100 percent higher than middle-class children.

The obesity rate is higher among the 'poor' than among the middle class. The same report notes that the daily intake of such vitamins as E, C and thiamin among children in families below 75 percent of the poverty threshold is greater than among children in families 300 percent above that threshold."

If things are so bad, why are they so good? To listen to Michael Moore and others, poor people are being physically lifted by the scruff of their neck and hurled into a tent-city. A poor person lives better than an average income person in 2/3 of the world.
Maybe it's all about envy, in the end.

2003-10-11T14:43:00.000-07:00

Saddam's Forgotten WMD Confession:

Not only did Saddam's regime admit to possessing thousands of tons of lethal chemical and biological agents, Baghdad gave a detailed inventory of their WMD arsenal to the United Nations.
This week's Weekly Standard revisits Baghdad's 1998 WMD mea culpa - complete with a laundry list of the frightening weapons that the press continues to suggest were a figment of the Bush administration's imagination.
Just before Iraq kicked out U.N. weapons inspectors in 1998, Saddam admitted he had:
• At least 3.9 tons of deadly VX nerve gas, along with 805 tons of precursor ingredients for the production of more VX.
• 4,000 tons of ingredients to produce other types of poison gas.
• 8,500 liters of anthrax.
• 500 bombs fitted with parachutes for the purpose of delivering poison gas or germ payloads.
• 550 artillery shells filled with mustard gas.
• 107,500 casings for chemical weapons.
• 157 aerial bombs filled with germ agents.
• 25 missile warheads containing germ agents, including anthrax, aflatoxin, and botulinum.

Again, the above arsenal is NOT what U.S. or European intelligence suspected Baghdad had. These are the WMD's that Saddam himself admitted to having.
It's also worth noting that the overwhelming majority of the WMDs Saddam confessed to went completely undetected by U.N. weapons inspectors who combed Iraq for 12 years.

Pres. Bush's SOTU referred to the above list. The press has been ardently insisting that the neocons pulled the figures and amounts of unaccounted weapons out of their posteriors.
Clinton bombed Iraq in 1998, unilaterally, pre-emptively, in response to the same threat. Either Desert Fox was equally unjustifiable, or Iraqi Freedom was every bit as justified.
The insurmountable obduracy of the reflexively anti-Bush left leaves me with no hope that even the discovery of stockpiles could allay their vitriolic spleen.

2003-10-11T14:01:00.000-07:00

2003-10-11T12:21:00.000-07:00

The Command Post - Op-Ed - Rumsfeld confesses : "It's beyond me":
"[J. David Chadwick]: Considering that we still have troops in every area that we have conducted operations during the Clinton administration, why is this operation in Iraq viewed negatively in the press as a Vietnam- style quagmire?

Secretary Rumsfeld: Give that man an 'A'.
I'll tell you, it's beyond me. I just had a hearing before the House of Representatives Appropriations Committee on an emergency supplemental budget. And that very day, 17 members of the United States Congress, Republicans and Democrats alike, had just arrived back from Iraq. And six of them were on that committee. And they went right down the line, every single one of them, saying that what they see and read about Iraq in the United States and in the region does not compare with what they personally saw and experienced with their own eyes. These people went right down -- they were stunned by the difference between what they experienced in that country and what they saw and what they were being told in the press.
Now, it should not surprise you that the next day there was not a single word in the press about that hearing. Not one of those first eyewitness comments by seven members -- six or seven members of the United States House of Representatives of both parties -- not a single word of what they said about what was taking place in Iraq appeared, to my knowledge, in -- at least in the Washington press."

2003-10-11T11:45:00.000-07:00

Illinois Leader:

"Is a crying baby alive? No, not necessarily, decided Cook County Circuit Court Judge Karen Thompson last November when she acquitted a mother previously convicted twice of murdering her newborn daughter.
"Thus is the latest of increasingly grotesque decisions made by liberal judges to accommodate abortion - first of unborn babies, then of partially delivered babies, and now of babies who are delivered but have not “established a separate and independent life,” as required by Thompson in her reversal.
"In question is whether a six-pound, 19-inch baby girl was “completely separated” at delivery when her mother, Elizabeth Ehlert, killed her.
"Cook County State’s Attorney Dick Devine has asked the Illinois Supreme Court to intervene, arguing that “complete separation” would mean the umbilical cord must be cut."

If this doesn't disgust you, then you are incapable of being disgusted...

Infanticide is being redefined before our eyes. This is political activism, not justice, not law. Meanwhile, the Senate judiciary committee keeps out anyone with a even hint of pro-life tendencies.

Judge Karen Tobin Thompson, Municipal, District 3 can be reached at (847) 818-2094. When you call, simply voice your opinion, be courteous and respectful.

2003-10-11T10:35:00.000-07:00

[Saddam's] WMD Lies: "Suppose for an instant that no weapons of mass destruction ever turn up in Iraq. Of course, they might well still appear, but let's imagine that Saddam Hussein did not have an advanced program for chemical, biological and nuclear weapons, as well as the missiles to carry them.
What would that imply?
President Bush's Democratic opponents say it renders the decision to go to war a 'fraud' or 'hyped.' But they miss the point, for there was indeed massive and undisputed evidence to indicate that the Iraqi regime was building WMD.
Defectors and other Iraqi sources nearly all agreed on his WMD program. The actions of Saddam's government - fending off United Nations weapons inspectors tooth and nail, hiding evidence, forgoing opportunities to have the economic sanctions lifted - all confirmed its existence. "

2003-10-10T15:31:00.000-07:00

Jim Miller :

FDR Made The Great Depression Worse:
"That's not an unusual view among economic historians, but it is almost unknown among the general public. Thomas Sowell plugs a new book on the subject, and sketches the evidence against FDR. Who was most hurt by FDR's policies? Sowell says, 'poor people and blacks', the very groups that gave him the most support. "

I'm getting verklempt! Talk amongst yourselves. I'll give you a topic. The New Deal was not new, nor was it a deal. Discuss. -- Linda Richman/Mike Meyers

Not all of Roosevelt's alphabet soup was bad, of course! A lot of wonderful public works were built during that time: dams, bridges, parks, trails, etc.
What wasn't good were the punitive tax levels...90% the top bracket. Why work hard? Why take the risk?
I have no "sympathy" for the rich on that note, but it goes back to the basic bleeding heart conservative ideal: the poor and needy are best served by a growing economy. The tax cuts Kennedy proposed were accepted in his time without any of the current class-warfare clamor, because the basic idea was sound: the same should be true today.
You grow an economy by releasing resources/energy into it, even if the government must operate at a deficit to accomodate the tax relief.
But the Bush-haters of today cannot get their mind around the idea that tax cuts will help the needy, not hurt them. They refuse to accept this, since it runs counter to their ideal of a nanny-state.

2003-10-10T10:09:00.000-07:00

FrontPage:How widespread is the persecution of Christians in the Islamic world?

Paul Marshall: Very widespread, there are few Muslim countries where it does not occur. It takes four forms.
First, there are direct, violent attacks by extremists on Christian communities. These occur in Egypt, Algeria, Iran, Yemen, Pakistan, Bangladesh, the Phillipines, Nigeria, Indonesia (the list is not exhaustive). In most of these cases the Government is either unable or unwilling to stop the attacks.
Second, there is civil war and communal violence where the Christian community has resisted the spread of radical varieties of Islam. Since the National Islamic Front (formerly the Muslim Brotherhood) took power in Sudan in the late 1980's two million people have been killed, mostly Christians and animists. In Nigeria some 11,000 people have been killed in the last three years over the introduction of Islamic sharia law. There is a similar death toll in eastern Indonesia, where paramilitary militant organizations such as Laskar Jihad, allied to international terrorists, have slaughtered local populations.
Third, there is widespread discrimination against Christians in Muslim countries. They are frequently at a disadvantage in marriage, custody and inheritance cases, are forced to subsidize Islam through taxes, are severly restricted in building and repairing churches, and are often excluded from government positions. This happens in most Muslim countries. In some cases, as in Pakistan or Iran or Nigeria, the testimony of a Christian counts less in a court case.
Fourthly, blasphemy and apostasy laws disproportionately target minorities.
In Saudi Arabia, Christianity is entirely forbidden.

And the penalty is quite severe.
Yet so many groups contend that Muslims are persecuted by the West and the USA in particular, domestically and internationally. I have yet to see evidence that, on balance, any Western community persecutes Muslims, random isolated incidents notwithstanding. The church I attend, University Presbyterian, sent flowers to the local mosque after vandals spraypainted their building. Would that ever happen in Pakistan? Well, after a group of Muslims killed Christians in a church in Quetta, there was NO outpouring of sympathy.
Is it wrong to point out the contrast? By the measure you use, it shall be measured back to you. The West is quick to say mea culpa, the Islamic world is quick to accuse and find fault. I hear no grace, forgiveness, or love in their prayers for our speedy deaths and destruction. Meanwhile, we depose their tyrants, send them medical volunteers, and they shoot at us.

2003-10-09T12:38:00.000-07:00

Toys have arrived! Wiggles got pictures! Go!

2003-10-07T13:39:00.000-07:00

DO YOU THINK SLAVERY IS A THING OF THE PAST? THINK AGAIN ...:

In this groundbreaking modern slave narrative, Francis Bok shares his remarkable story with grace, honesty, and a wisdom gained from surviving 10 years in captivity.
May, 1986: Selling his mother's eggs and peanuts near his village in southern Sudan, 7-year-old Francis Bok's life was shattered when Arab raiders on horseback, armed with rifles and long knives, burst into the quiet marketplace, murdering men and women and gathering the young children into a group. Strapped to horses and donkeys, Francis and others were taken north, into lives of slavery under wealthy Muslim farmers.
For 10 years, Francis lived alone in a shed near the goats and cattle that were his responsibility. Fed with scraps from the table, slowly learning bits of an unfamiliar language and religion, the boy had almost no human contact other than his captor's family. After two failed attempts to escape -- each bringing severe beatings and death threats -- Francis finally escaped at age 17, a dramatic breakaway on foot that was his final chance.
Yet his slavery did not end there, for even as he made his way toward the capital city of Khartoum, others sought to deprive him of his freedom. Determined to avoid that fate and discover what had happened to his family on that terrible day in 1986, the teenager persevered through prison and refugee camps for three more years, winning the attention of United Nations officials and being granted passage to America.
Now a student and anti-slavery activist, Francis Bok has made it his life's mission to combat world slavery. His is the first voice to speak for an estimated 27 million people held against their will in nearly every nation, including our own. "Escape from Slavery" is at once a riveting adventure, a story of desperation and triumph, and a window revealing a world that few have survived to tell.

Don't hold your breath waiting for this to be the high on the Democrat's agenda, or mentioned on indymedia.

I seem to recall a recent speech condemning the modern scourge of slavery, and calling on nations to act to end it... who was that... where... OH YEAH!! It was Pres. Bush, right-winger, at the UN General Assembly.
By the way, I found this on WorldNetDaily. You know, the e-zine that leftists despise. Good to know somebody knows what principles are.

2003-10-03T12:42:00.000-07:00

WORLD :
"From the time the UN began to receive oil revenues under Iraq's Oil for Food program (December 1996) until the start of the war, the body raised $64 billion in oil revenue from Iraq. Humanitarian imports designated on paper total less than $45 billion, and only $25 billion was actually delivered. No one has accounted for the difference. The UN placed Iraq funds 'with five different creditworthy banks' but won't disclose which ones or how much money is on account. In nearly seven years of operation, the program has never been audited."

J'accuse.

No less a villain are the international news agencies, BBC, CNN, and others, who bribed and capitulated with the Baathist dictatorship.

Now, consider, who are the leading voices of criticism against Iraqi Freedom?

News agencies, and the UN.

2003-10-03T11:52:00.000-07:00

The Corner :
"WARSAW, Oct 3 (Reuters) - Polish troops in Iraq have found four French-built advanced anti-aircraft missiles which according to the military were built this year, a Polish Defence Ministry spokesman told Reuters on Friday. 'Polish troops discovered an ammunition depot on September 29 near the region of Hilla and there were four French-made Roland-type missiles,' Eugeniusz Mleczak said. 'It is not the first time Polish troops found ammunition in Iraq but to our surprise these missiles were produced in 2003,' Mleczak said. The Roland anti-aircraft system is a short-range air defence missile in service with at least ten countries, including France and Germany. It is mobile, usually mounted on a vehicle, and defence experts say the missiles are highly effective against aircraft attacking at low and medium altitude. Under a strict trade embargo imposed by the United Nations, Iraq was barred form importing arms since the invasion of Kuwait in 1990. Mleczak said Polish troops were notified about the missiles by a local Iraqi, who received a reward for the information..."

2003-10-02T08:27:00.000-07:00

lgf: Breaking WMD News:

The Orwellian language engineers of the neo-Stalinist left have been hard at work for many years.
'Unilateral' is one of their favorite targets, along with 'intervention'. Originally, it meant an action by a single nation as opposed to that of an alliance or a treaty group.
Today it apparently means anything that is done without the approval and consent of Noam Chomsky, the Guardian editorial staff, and the UN bureaucracy.
'Intervention' of course is any action that does not acknowledge left-wing rhetoriticians as the final authority.
The entire left-wing worldview, from Vietnam onward, is a myth, a big lie adapted to the centralized media of a past era; a relic, if you will, of 1960s American television and its insufferable hubris and elitism. This is why a billion Muslims cannot destroy tiny Israel, why leftists cannot loot American wealth and re-distribute it to dictator-pandering European investors, and why Euro-profiteer sponsored dictators like Saddam Hussein cannot survive.
The authoritarian sound-bite world of the linear media has passed its peak just as the backward elites of Europe have learned to exploit it. How sad.
It is often alleged on the far right that the commercial media are tools of the extreme left. On the evidence, the opposite is true; left-wing poltical culture as we know it today is entirely an artifact and tool of the advertising industry and the commercial media.

This comment, from "Shiplord Kirel," was so clever I just had to preserve it.

2003-10-01T12:11:00.000-07:00

BLAIR'S WAR:

"Imagine you are PM. And you receive this intelligence. And not just about Iraq. But about the whole murky trade in WMD. And one thing we know. Not from intelligence. But from historical fact. That Saddam's regime has not just developed but used such weapons gassing thousands of his own people. And has lied about it consistently, concealing it for years even under the noses of the UN Inspectors. And I see the terrorism and the trade in WMD growing. And I look at Saddam's country and I see its people in torment ground underfoot by his and his sons' brutality and wickedness. So what do I do? Say 'I've got the intelligence but I've a hunch its wrong?' Leave Saddam in place but now with the world's democracies humiliated and him emboldened? You see, I believe the security threat of the 21st century is not countries waging conventional war. I believe that in today's interdependent world the threat is chaos. It is fanaticism defeating reason. Suppose the terrorists repeated September 11th or worse. Suppose they got hold of a chemical or biological or nuclear dirty bomb; and if they could, they would. What then?"

Amen, brother Blair.

9-11 was not only the murder of 3,000 people, the destruction of three buldings, the hijacking of 4 planes.

It was the attempted murder of over 50,000 people, stemming from a limitless bloodlust. Do not doubt for a moment that the killers desired a higher number than even that. If they'd had a nuke, they would have used it that day.

Saddam as a state actor was no threat to the contiguous US. His threat was from a proxy war, a sponsorship of non-state actors sowing death and wanton destruction.

Does anyone truly doubt that if Saddam could have supplied Al Qaeda with anthrax or sarin he would have?

2003-10-01T11:01:00.000-07:00

HIDDEN STORIES OF IRAQ:
"Troops e-mailing their families or interviewed by hometown papers often express amazement at the dissimilarity between what they see and what the media emphasize. They ask, Where are the stories about schools reopened, city councils established, infrastructure repaired?
“To hear the media tell it, America has done nothing to improve…security, and the Iraqi public is volatile and seeking revenge,” Eric Knapp, a Marine stationed in Najaf, wrote recently in a New York Post article linked to Instapundit."

2003-09-30T17:58:00.000-07:00

Guardian Unlimited | The Guardian | David Aaronovitch: The conference speech Tony should make:
"Last year I told you that we were at our best when we were boldest. I could have added that we are at our worst when whingeing. But whingeing is all most of you have done since then. It has been a year of complaint.
"A lot of that has been about Iraq. OK, some of you are pacifists, like Mahatma Gandhi, and you don't like war on principle. Fair enough, I suppose, until they turn up to cart you off to the dusty field. But many of you others don't seem to care how many Iraqis old Saddam was killing, just so long as we didn't kill any.
"It doesn't appear to bother you at all that - according to all polls - most Iraqis still think the invasion was a good thing. You know better than they do. You are so certain that it would have been preferable to have left Uday and Qusay in their palaces, and the political prisoners in their torture chambers, yet you call yourselves internationalists! "

2003-09-30T13:55:00.000-07:00

Give it a chance to get off the ground...

2003-09-30T09:58:00.000-07:00

Michael Novak on Liberalism : "The rich should be the indispensable heroes of liberals, because the rich are the linchpin of the liberal agenda, the one true hope for liberal success. Liberals need the rich. Take away high taxes from the rich, and the liberal program flounders, Chait suggests. Why, then, do liberals hate the rich? It's easier to understand why sheep hate to be shorn, than why liberals hate those they shear."

Sheer petulance.

2003-09-29T11:29:00.000-07:00

Quote of the Day:
"It is the soldier who salutes the flag, who serves beneath the flag, and whose coffin is draped by the flag, who allows the protester to burn the flag."

2003-09-29T10:02:00.000-07:00

Palestinian Official Laments 'Intefadeh':
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip (AP) - The Palestinians were better off before they launched their uprising against Israel, the ousted Palestinian security chief said Monday, as thousands marched to mark the three-year anniversary of the revolt.
In an interview with The Associated Press, Mohammed Dahlan also said the Palestinians misread the dramatic changes brought by the Sept. 11 terror attacks on the United States, and that hurt their aspirations of statehood.
It is rare for Palestinians to openly criticize the 'intefadeh' despite growing misgivings among some, especially those whose lives have been severely disrupted by Israeli travel bans and military raids aimed keeping suicide bombers and gunmen out of Israel.

2003-09-29T09:58:00.000-07:00

Front Line Voices: A Poem From Josh:
'Wish You Were Here'
For all the free people that still protest.
You're welcome. We protect you,
you are protected by the best.
Your voice is strong and loud,
but who will fight for you?
No one standing in your crowd.
We are your fathers, brothers, and sons,
wearing the boots and carrying guns.
We are the ones that leave all we own,
to make sure your future is carved in stone.
We are the ones who fight and die,
We might not be able to save the world, Well, at least we try.
We walked the paths to where we are at
and we want no choice other than that.
so when you rally your group to complain,
take a look in the back of your brain.
In order for that flag you love to fly
wars must be fought and young men must die.
We came here to fight for the ones we hold dear.
If that's not respected, we would rather stay here.
So please stop yelling, put down your signs,
and pray for those behind enemy lines.
When the conflict is over and all is well,
be thankful that we chose to go through hell.

Corporal Joshua Miles and all the boys from 3rd Batallion 2nd Marines

2003-09-28T11:27:00.000-07:00

Rantingprofs writes:

1st Lt. Eric Knapp describes the successes in Najaf and (a story missed by the press) the way things were worked out in the wake of the murder of that moderate cleric. And his point is clear -- what I saw on the ground and what I saw on TV just are not the same. Knapp was with the 1st Marine Division. The Commanding General of that Division, Jim Mattis, was on The Newshour last night (I will post a link to the transcript if one goes up) and was asked about the kinds of tactics that have led to the disparity between the situation in the areas under his control and, say, Baghdad. (No Marine KIAs under his command since April 20.) Aside from the fact that it was nice for a media outlet to notice there were differerences in the country, his answer was fascinating. He sent tanks home.
He sent Marines home to REDUCE the appearance of an occupation. He introduced 'wave' tactics (everybody wave!) and had his people make eye contact all the time (no sun glasses.) Patrol on foot. etc etc. (NOTE in the midst of the debate over whether what is needed in Iraq is an infusion of additional troops, no one seems to have noticed that one of the most successful commanders WAS SENDING PEOPLE HOME INTENTIONALLY.) And (this strikes me as pure genius) when there were protests and rallies, they went out and distributed cold water to the protesters. The General said (this is a paraphrase) 'It's hard to throw a rock at a man who's just given you a cold drink.'

"Do good to them that spitefully use you."--Jesus Christ
Now, imagine you're an Iraqi, and are afraid of big brother Saddam's secret police all your life. Then things become really chaotic in your homeland after a group of westerners, who you've been taught all your life to hate, invade.
So you protest, after being shown how to by Iranian rabblerousers.
And then your "enemy" gives you water to drink.
Don't you think you might begin to feel a new life, a new hope, emerging within your heart?
Hey, International ANSWER... do you want to take that hope away? After all, if you had your way, it would never have come in the first place.

2003-09-25T16:43:00.000-07:00

New Technology for the Third World, September 2003

Production Mini-plants in mobile containers. Worldwide Partners program
SN World Foundation will supply to countries and developing regions the technology and necessary support for production in series of Mini-plants in mobile containers (40-foot). The Mini-plant system is designed in such a way that all the production machinery is fixed on the platform of the container, with all wiring, piping, and installation parts; that is, they are fully equipped... and the mini-plant is ready for production."

More than 700 portable production systems: Bakeries, Water purification, Dehydrated food, Steel Nails, Fruit juice preparation, Tire Retreading, Reinforcement Bar Bending for Construction Framework, Sheeting for Roofing, Ceilings and Façades, Plated Drums, Aluminum Buckets, Injected Polypropylene Housewares, Pressed Melamine Items (Glasses, Cups, Plates, Mugs, etc.), Mufflers, Construction Electrically Welded Mesh, Plastic Bags and Packaging, Mobile units of medical assistance, Sanitary Material, Hypodermic Syringes, Hemostatic Clamps, etc.

SN World Foundation has started a Co-investment program for the installation of small Assembly plants to manufacture in series the Mini-plants of portable production on site, region or country where required. One of the most relevant features is the fact that these plants will be connected to the International Trade System, with access to more than 50 million raw materials, products and services and automatic transactions for world trade.

Due to financial reasons, involving cost and social impact, the best solution is setting up assembly plants on the same countries and regions, using local resources (labor, some equipment, etc.) SN World Foundation participates at 50% (fifty percent) for investment of each Assembly plant.

By Sarah Mathews, Manager Program

2003-09-25T15:56:00.000-07:00

Structural collapse on Temple Mount:
"An interior wall has collapsed at a hotly contested Jerusalem holy site, setting off fears of religious violence between Muslims and Jews. "

So a holy wall fell down, let's kill somebody? Wait there's more:

"Despite the fact the Temple Mount is the only real estate in the world revered by Jews, Israel has turned over day-to-day administration of the area to the Waqf, an Islamic trust with close ties to Yasser Arafat's Palestinian Authority."

Then no matter how you slice it, it will be their responsibility.

"Should it collapse, some archeologists fear a doomsday effect – dead worshippers, perhaps in the thousands, riots throughout the Middle East and charges that Israel is responsible."

No blood for rocks.

2003-09-25T09:23:00.000-07:00

The Iraq-Al Qaeda Connections:

"A wealth of evidence on the public record -- from government reports and congressional testimony to news accounts from major newspapers -- attests to longstanding ties between bin Laden and Saddam going back to 1994.
Those who try to whitewash Saddam's record don't dispute this evidence; they just ignore it. So let's review the evidence, all of it on the public record for months or years:
* Abdul Rahman Yasin was the only member of the al Qaeda cell that detonated the 1993 World Trade Center bomb to remain at large in the Clinton years. He fled to Iraq. U.S. forces recently discovered a cache of documents in Tikrit, Saddam's hometown, that show that Iraq gave Mr. Yasin both a house and monthly salary.
* Bin Laden met at least eight times with officers of Iraq's Special Security Organization, a secret police agency run by Saddam's son Qusay, and met with officials from Saddam's mukhabarat, its external intelligence service, according to intelligence made public by Secretary of State Colin Powell, who was speaking before the United Nations Security Council on February 6, 2003.
* Sudanese intelligence officials told me that their agents had observed meetings between Iraqi intelligence agents and bin Laden starting in 1994, when bin Laden lived in Khartoum.
* Bin Laden met the director of the Iraqi mukhabarat in 1996 in Khartoum, according to Mr. Powell.
* An al Qaeda operative now held by the U.S. confessed that in the mid-1990s, bin Laden had forged an agreement with Saddam's men to cease all terrorist activities against the Iraqi dictator, Mr. Powell told the United Nations.

* In 1999 the Guardian, a British newspaper, reported that Farouk Hijazi, a senior officer in Iraq's mukhabarat, had journeyed deep into the icy mountains near Kandahar, Afghanistan, in December 1998 to meet with al Qaeda men. Mr. Hijazi is "thought to have offered bin Laden asylum in Iraq," the Guardian reported.

* In October 2000, another Iraqi intelligence operative, Salah Suleiman, was arrested near the Afghan border by Pakistani authorities, according to Jane's Foreign Report, a respected international newsletter. Jane's reported that Suleiman was shuttling between Iraqi intelligence and Ayman al Zawahiri, now al Qaeda's No. 2 man.

(Why are all of those meetings significant? The London Observer reports that FBI investigators cite a captured al Qaeda field manual in Afghanistan, which "emphasizes the value of conducting discussions about pending terrorist attacks face to face, rather than by electronic means.")

* As recently as 2001, Iraq's embassy in Pakistan was used as a "liaison" between the Iraqi dictator and al Qaeda, Mr. Powell told the United Nations.

* Spanish investigators have uncovered documents seized from Yusuf Galan -- who is charged by a Spanish court with being "directly involved with the preparation and planning" of the Sept. 11 attacks -- that show the terrorist was invited to a party at the Iraqi embassy in Madrid. The invitation used his "al Qaeda nom de guerre," London's Independent reports.

* An Iraqi defector to Turkey, known by his cover name as "Abu Mohammed," told Gwynne Roberts of the Sunday Times of London that he saw bin Laden's fighters in camps in Iraq in 1997. At the time, Mohammed was a colonel in Saddam's Fedayeen. He described an encounter at Salman Pak, the training facility southeast of Baghdad. At that vast compound run by Iraqi intelligence, Muslim militants trained to hijack planes with knives -- on a full-size Boeing 707. Col. Mohammed recalls his first visit to Salman Pak this way: "We were met by Colonel Jamil Kamil, the camp manager, and Major Ali Hawas. I noticed that a lot of people were queuing for food. (The major) said to me: 'You'll have nothing to do with these people. They are Osama bin Laden's group and the PKK and Mojahedin-e Khalq.'"

* In 1998, Abbas al-Janabi, a longtime aide to Saddam's son Uday, defected to the West. At the time, he repeatedly told reporters that there was a direct connection between Iraq and al Qaeda.

*The Sunday Times found a Saddam loyalist in a Kurdish prison who claims to have been Dr. Zawahiri's bodyguard during his 1992 visit with Saddam in Baghdad. Dr. Zawahiri was a close associate of bin Laden at the time and was present at the founding of al Qaeda in 1989.

* Following the defeat of the Taliban, almost two dozen bin Laden associates "converged on Baghdad and established a base of operations there," Mr. Powell told the United Nations in February 2003. From their Baghdad base, the secretary said, they supervised the movement of men, materiel and money for al Qaeda's global network.

* In 2001, an al Qaeda member "bragged that the situation in Iraq was 'good,'" according to intelligence made public by Mr. Powell.

* That same year, Saudi Arabian border guards arrested two al Qaeda members entering the kingdom from Iraq.

* Abu Musaab al-Zarqawi oversaw an al Qaeda training camp in Afghanistan, Mr. Powell told the United Nations. His specialty was poisons. Wounded in fighting with U.S. forces, he sought medical treatment in Baghdad in May 2002. When Zarqawi recovered, he restarted a training camp in northern Iraq. Zarqawi's Iraq cell was later tied to the October 2002 murder of Lawrence Foley, an official of the U.S. Agency for International Development, in Amman, Jordan. The captured assassin confessed that he received orders and funds from Zarqawi's cell in Iraq, Mr. Powell said. His accomplice escaped to Iraq.

*Zarqawi met with military chief of al Qaeda, Mohammed Ibrahim Makwai (aka Saif al-Adel) in Iran in February 2003, according to intelligence sources cited by the Washington Post.

* Mohammad Atef, the head of al Qaeda's military wing until the U.S. killed him in Afghanistan in November 2001, told a senior al Qaeda member now in U.S. custody that the terror network needed labs outside of Afghanistan to manufacture chemical weapons, Mr. Powell said. "Where did they go, where did they look?" said the secretary. "They went to Iraq."

* Abu Abdullah al-Iraqi was sent to Iraq by bin Laden to purchase poison gases several times between 1997 and 2000. He called his relationship with Saddam's regime "successful," Mr. Powell told the United Nations.

* Mohamed Mansour Shahab, a smuggler hired by Iraq to transport weapons to bin Laden in Afghanistan, was arrested by anti-Hussein Kurdish forces in May, 2000. He later told his story to American intelligence and a reporter for the New Yorker magazine.

* Documents found among the debris of the Iraqi Intelligence Center show that Baghdad funded the Allied Democratic Forces, a Ugandan terror group led by an Islamist cleric linked to bin Laden. According to a London's Daily Telegraph, the organization offered to recruit "youth to train for the jihad" at a "headquarters for international holy warrior network" to be established in Baghdad.

* Mullah Melan Krekar, ran a terror group (the Ansar al-Islam) linked to both bin Laden and Saddam Hussein. Mr. Krekar admitted to a Kurdish newspaper that he met bin Laden in Afghanistan and other senior al Qaeda officials. His acknowledged meetings with bin Laden go back to 1988. When he organized Ansar al Islam in 2001 to conduct suicide attacks on Americans, "three bin Laden operatives showed up with a gift of $300,000 'to undertake jihad,'" Newsday reported. Mr. Krekar is now in custody in the Netherlands. His group operated in portion of northern Iraq loyal to Saddam Hussein -- and attacked independent Kurdish groups hostile to Saddam. A spokesman for the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan told a United Press International correspondent that Mr. Krekar's group was funded by "Saddam Hussein's regime in Baghdad."

* After October 2001, hundreds of al Qaeda fighters are believed to have holed up in the Ansar al-Islam's strongholds inside northern Iraq.

2003-09-24T16:26:00.000-07:00

Mullahs on the U.S. payroll:

New details about the lengths the United States went to in its post-9-11 war on terror reveal the CIA hired Islamic mullahs to stem the rising tide of anti-American sentiment in the Arab world. And where they couldn't sway clerics, they created fake religious leaders to preach a moderate message.
The revelation is made in an upcoming book by investigative reporter Ronald Kessler titled 'The CIA at War.' 'In Islam, as in many other religions, anyone can call himself a religious leader,' Kessler writes, according to the Reuters News Agency. 'So, besides paying mullahs, the CIA created fake mullahs– recruited agents who would proclaim themselves clerics and take a more moderate position about non-believers.' According to Reuters, a CIA source is quoted in the book as saying: 'We are taking over radio stations and supporting clerics. It's back to propaganda. We are creating moderate Muslims.'

Creating moderates? Perish the thought.
It won't be long before this is written up in every Arab newspaper.

Mr. Kessler: by revealing this, even if true, exactly what have you done for the world? Well let's think about it...

Now, every time a moderate, balanced Muslim speaks against violence or terrorism, or in favor of any form of liberalism, tolerance or pluralism, he will be accused of treachery, working for the CIA, probably heresy and apostasy, too. Any moderate voice will be marginalized, repudiated and chastened if not killed outright.

We are likely to see far fewer calls for peace and tolerance, if the proponents of such ideas are regularly reputed to be American puppets. Does this hurt America? Yes. Does this hurt minorities in Arab and Muslim states? Yes. Does this hurt Muslims, eager for reformation, especially women? Yes.

So thanks, thanks a lot. May a camel spit on your laptop keyboard. May your vaunted journalist's call to expose classified operations be exposed for what it is: a thoughtless selfishness which hurts everyone.

2003-09-24T12:51:00.000-07:00

Christian who married ex-Muslim detained
"Egypt bars Christian men from marrying Muslim women. The government, refusing to recognize Badawi's conversion, still recognizes her as a Muslim. "

" "It is interesting that the Egyptian government has no problem with Muslim men marrying Christian women," said VOM spokesman Todd Nettleton in a statement. "But they won't recognize the right of Christian men to marry Muslim women." "

2003-09-23T15:23:00.000-07:00

2003-09-23T15:17:00.000-07:00

Straight Talk on Homeland Security

"The backlash against the Bush administration’s War on Terror began on 9/11 and has not let up since. Left- and right-wing advocacy groups have likened the Bush administration to fascists, murderers, apartheid ideologues, and usurpers of basic liberties. Over 120 cities and towns have declared themselves “civil liberties safe zones”; and the press has amplified at top volume a recent report by the Justice Department’s inspector general denouncing the government’s handling of suspects after 9/11. Even the nation’s librarians are shredding documents to safeguard their patrons’ privacy and foil government investigations.

The advocates’ rhetoric is both false and dangerous. Lost in the blizzard of propaganda is any consciousness that 9/11 was an act of war against the U.S. by foreign enemies concealed within the nation’s borders. If the media and political elites keep telling the public that the campaign against those terrorist enemies is just a racist power grab, the most essential weapon against terror cells—intelligence from ordinary civilians—will be jeopardized. A drumbeat of ACLU propaganda could discourage a tip that might be vital in exposing an al-Qaida plot.

It is crucial, therefore, to demolish the extravagant lies about the anti-terror initiatives. Close scrutiny of the charges and the reality that they misrepresent shows that civil liberties are fully intact. The majority of legal changes after September 11 simply brought the law into the twenty-first century. In those cases where the government has expanded its powers—as is inevitable during a war—important judicial and statutory safeguards protect the rights of law-abiding citizens. And in the one hard case where a citizen’s rights appear to have been curtailed—the detention of a suspected American al-Qaida operative without access to an attorney—that detention is fully justified under the laws of war.

The anti–War on Terror worldview found full expression only hours after the World Trade Center fell, in a remarkable e-mail that spread like wildfire over the Internet that very day. Sent out by Harvard Law School research fellow John Perry Barlow, founder of the cyber-libertarian Electronic Freedom Foundation, the message read: “Control freaks will dine on this day for the rest of our lives. Within a few hours, we will see beginning the most vigorous efforts to end what remains of freedom in America. . . . I beg you to begin NOW to do whatever you can . . . to prevent the spasm of control mania from destroying the dreams that far more have died for over the last two hundred twenty-five years than died this morning. Don’t let the terrorists or (their natural allies) the fascists win. Remember that the goal of terrorism is to create increasingly paralytic totalitarianism in the government it attacks. Don’t give them the satisfaction. . . . And, please, let us try to forgive those who have committed these appalling crimes. If we hate them, we will become them.”

2003-09-23T14:33:00.000-07:00

Socialism kills again:
"A Son says he is disgusted that his late mother was forced to wait eight 'traumatic' hours for an ambulance. Stephen Brown even managed to fly back from a Spanish holiday and get to the hospital before his eighty-six-year-old mum, Clarice Burgin.

It was on August 11 that mum-of-nine Mrs Burgin became ill at her house in Western Spot Close, Ripley. Her family called her GP, who suspected pneumonia and immediately called an ambulance to take her to hospital within two hours. To meet Government targets, this should have arrived within 15 minutes of that two-hour spell.

That was at 2.20pm. The ambulance eventually arrived after 10pm. During the eight-hour wait, family members called the service several times, only to be told they were busy and it would be there soon.

Their mum eventually arrived at Derby City General Hospital at 10.45pm. Mr Brown (41), of Borrowfield Road, Spondon, was already there. The next day, Mrs Burgin suffered a stroke and was later transferred to Ripley Hospital, where she died on September 6."

This is proof that socialized medicine is not going to "save" the US health system.

When the dems brought out sob stories of people who couldn't get proper care as some form of testimony to why we need a nationalized health care plan, they forget that many more examples of horrid lapses in state-funded care exist abroad. I can't say how much better our system is, but I can guarantee it isn't any worse.

2003-09-22T17:24:00.000-07:00

CHARITY OF THE DAY:
From Chief Wiggles:
Toys for Iraqi Children
"Okay! We are finally ready for this to start! First, some ground rules. These toys are for Iraqi children, so let's keep that in mind when shopping.
Some "no-no" toys: Any guns, of any kind
No violent action heroes, No violent toys
No barbie dolls or dolls skantily dressed
No toys that shoot something, no projectiles, No water guns
Lets just keep it simple, simple toys, just the basics. These kids have nothing."

Here are my suggestions:
whistles, mini-flutes, tambourines
Tops, frisbees, boomerangs
soccer balls, rubber balls
kaleidoscopes, prisms
flashlights, glowsticks
silly putty, yoyos, beanbags
toy cars, trains.

2003-09-22T15:41:00.000-07:00

Socialism stinks:

An ill 90-year-old WWII fighter pilot was left lying helpless on the floor of his home because paramedics refused to pick him up without special lifting equipment, citing 'regulations'.
Air Marshal Sir Patrick Dunn, who was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross in 1941 and later served as an aide-de-camp to the Queen, was left begging the two ambulancemen for help.
However, the paramedics decided to wait for the lifting equipment.
Sir Patrick's wife, Diana, 92, had telephoned 999 after her husband, who has had two strokes and needs a wheelchair and walking frame to move around, fell at their home in Cookham Dean, Berkshire. She was not strong enough to lift him on her own.
Lady Dunn claimed that, when the paramedics arrived, they said that 'regulations' meant that they were not allowed to pick up Sir Patrick, even though he weighs less than 10 stone.
'They said they are not allowed to lift anybody from the floor,' Lady Dunn said last week.'I did not know what to do. He had been about an hour on the floor. He was lying on the floor saying "please help me" and holding up his hands, but they would not.'

------
His treatment sparked outrage last night and calls for a review of the rules on lifting patients. It comes just 10 days after Lorraine Wolstenholme, 51, told the High Court that she had been forced to sleep in her wheelchair every night for 15 months because health managers refused to let nurses lift her into bed.

If you can think of similar stories in the USA, be sure to acknowledge that it is always govt. regulations creating the stupidity, often the result of a suit brought by a litigious bloodsucker. Tort reform is opposed by the same people who want socialized medicine.

2003-09-22T13:41:00.000-07:00

Falsely bleak reports reduce our chances of success in Iraq:
"News media reports about our progress in Iraq have been bleak since shortly after the president's premature declaration of victory. These reports contrast sharply with reports of hope and progress presented to Congress by Department of Defense representatives -- a real disconnect, Vietnam déja vu. So I went to Iraq with six other members of Congress to see for myself.
The Iraq war has predictably evolved into a guerrilla conflict similar to Vietnam. Our currently stated objectives are to establish reasonable security and foster the creation of a secular, representative government with a stable market economy that provides broad opportunity throughout Iraqi society. Attaining these objectives in Iraq would inevitably transform the Arab world and immeasurably increase our future national security.
These are goals worthy of a fight, of sacrifice, of more lives lost now to save thousands, perhaps tens or hundreds of thousands in the future. In Mosul last Monday, a colonel in the 101st Airborne put it to me quite simply: 'Sir, this is worth doing.' No one I spoke with said anything different. And I spoke with all ranks.
But there will be more Blumbergs killed in action, many more. So it is worth doing only if we have a reasonable chance of success. And we do, but I'm afraid the news media are hurting our chances. They are dwelling upon the mistakes, the ambushes, the soldiers killed, the wounded, the Blumbergs. Fair enough. But it is not balancing this bad news with 'the rest of the story,' the progress made daily, the good news. The falsely bleak picture weakens our national resolve, discourages Iraqi cooperation and emboldens our enemy."

2003-09-22T12:49:00.000-07:00

OpinionJournal - Best of the Web Today:
Akila al-Hashemi, of the Iraqi Governing Council, was critically wounded in an assassination attempt. She had this to say to Chirac:

She said in the interview that she had admonished the French not to try to drive a wedge between the United States and the new Iraqi government by offering tempting plans for quick sovereignty.
'Don't think the Iraqis will ever forget what the Americans did in liberating them,' she said she told French officials, adding, 'we will not allow the Americans to fail.'

2003-09-22T10:36:00.000-07:00

President Bush's own words: No question that Saddam Hussein had al-Qaeda ties.

“We've had no evidence that Saddam Hussein was involved with September the 11th. Now, what the Vice President said was is that he has been involved with al-Qaeda and al-Zarqawi, an al-Qaeda operative was in Baghdad. He's the guy that ordered the killing of a U.S. diplomat. He's a man who's still running loose involved with the poisons network, involved with Ansar al-Islam. There's no question that Saddam Hussein had al-Qaeda ties.”

2003-09-22T10:21:00.000-07:00

Heard dems and media say "the threat was not imminent, as the president insisted..."?
" 'Some have said we must not act until the threat is imminent. Since when have terrorists and tyrants announced their intentions, politely putting us on notice before they strike? If this threat is permitted to fully and suddenly emerge, all actions, all words, and all recriminations would come too late. Trusting in the sanity and restraint of Saddam Hussein is not a strategy, and it is not an option.' - president George Bush, State of the Union, 2003, clearly conceding that the threat from Saddam was not imminent."

2003-09-22T09:25:00.000-07:00

Iraq and al Qaeda
There's more evidence of a link than the critics admit.

The Bush Administration was cautious, arguably too cautious, when making its case for the liberation of Iraq. Exhibit A is what it said about the links between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda. Investigators, interrogators and even journalists are turning up evidence of a stronger relationship than the limited ties originally sketched by President Bush and Colin Powell.
That wasn't the big story last week of course. The big news was that Mr. Bush said he has 'no evidence that Saddam Hussein was involved' in the attacks of September 11, 2001. Predictably, this is being spun as a concession from the Administration, which has been accused of exaggerating the al Qaeda link.
In truth, Mr. Bush has never gone further than what he reiterated last week: 'There's no question Saddam Hussein had al Qaeda ties.' U.S. intelligence officials, meanwhile, have confirmed that fact once again. Abdul Rahman Yasin, a suspect in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, was being harbored in Iraq; documents recently found in Tikrit indicate that Saddam provided Yasin with monthly payments and a home. According to federal authorities, the Ramzi Yousef-led terror cell that carried out the 1993 bombing received funding from Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, alleged mastermind of the 2001 attack."

2003-09-20T11:52:00.000-07:00

Jim Miller links to the story of Marine Lance Corporal Aaron Job, home from Iraq:

"All you hear on CNN is that all the Iraqis hate Americans and want us out," said Job, 20, who returned to his home base in California on Saturday after five months in Iraq.
Job, of Issaquah, doesn't doubt that anti-American sentiment is strong in Baghdad, but in towns south and west of the capital, where he spent most of his time after Saddam Hussein's fall, Iraqis were welcoming, warm and generous.
"They'll invite you into their homes and they'll give you anything. ... They would give us stuff off their trees, dates, limes ... and they love to make you tea."
Some residents would offer works of art or furnishings. Job said polite enlisted men, such as himself, declined by tugging on their collars, where officers carry their insignia. "They knew that meant it was something the officers didn't want us to do."

Compare the Iraqi gratitude with the ingrates on staff at indymedia or ANSWER... who would as soon spit on a soldier as welcome him into their home.

2003-09-20T11:35:00.000-07:00

The following excerpt from the Iraq Foundation's website was written years before Operation Iraqi Freedom. As you read it, consider how much of what they sought is now within their grasp. Emphases added:

Philosophy
With its educated population and oil reserves, Iraq commands considerable human and natural resources, and enjoys a tradition of intellectual and economic prominence in the Middle East. A peaceful Iraq can serve as a stabilizing force and as a catalyst for security and economic prosperity in the region. However, Iraq will only live in peace within its borders and with its neighbors once democracy and accountable government are established. The Iraqi people will only flourish when their civil and human rights are respected.

Objectives
To expand the constituency for democracy among Iraqis. The Foundation works extensively with expatriate Iraqis, who today constitute over 10% of the Iraqi population, and whenever possible, the Foundation maintains direct or indirect contacts within Iraq as well.
To highlight human rights abuses in Iraq. Human rights abuses by the Iraqi state, dismal for the past thirty years, have escalated and multiplied. In a 1995 report, the UN Special Rapporteur for Human Rights called Iraq's human rights situation the worst of any country since World War II. Without sufficient recognition and exposure of the problem it will be impossible to embark on a healthy future for Iraq.
To educate non-Iraqis about Iraq and strengthen support for a democratic new beginning. The Foundation endeavors to give a clear understanding of the consequences of totalitarianism in Iraq, and the cost in personal suffering, economic collapse and social disintegration.
To educate non-Iraqis about the potential for Iraq to become a major contributor to democratic reform and socio-economic development in the region in a climate of democracy and an open society.

Let us pause to consider the enormity of such a statement: the worst since WWII. I believe it. It's hard to dispute. Pause again to consider the enormity of the hypocrisy of the opposition to the war.
I heard a human shield interviewed on CNN say that he didn't think Saddam was "quite the demon Bush made him out to be."
And we've all heard "Bush lied, people died." Once and for all: Saddam lied, people died, for years. And it's over now, no thanks to the "human shields"!!

2003-09-20T11:19:00.000-07:00

As Long As It Takes
U.S. Secretary of State Colin L. Powell

I have just returned from Iraq. What I saw there convinced me, more than ever, that our liberation of Iraq was in the best interests of the Iraqi people, the American people and the world.

The Iraq I saw was a society on the move, a vibrant land with a hardy people experiencing the first heady taste of freedom. Iraq has come a long way since the dawn of this year, when Saddam Hussein was holding his people in poverty, ignorance and fear while filling mass graves with his opponents. The Iraqi regime was still squandering Iraq's treasure on deadly weapons programs, in defiance of 12 years of United Nations Security Council resolutions. While children died, Saddam was lavishing money on palaces and perks, for himself and his cronies.

Thanks to the courage of our brave men and women in uniform, and those of our coalition partners, all that has changed. Saddam is gone. Thanks to the hard work of Ambassador L. Paul Bremer and the Coalition Provisional Authority, Iraq is being transformed. The evidence was everywhere to be seen. Streets are lined with shops selling newspapers and books with opinions of every stripe. Schools and universities are open, teaching young Iraqis the skills to live in freedom and compete in our globalizing world. Parents are forming PTAs to support these schools, and to make sure that they have a voice in their children's future. The hospitals are operating, and 95% of the health clinics are open to provide critical medical services to Iraqis of all ages.

Most important of all, Iraqis are on the road to democratic self-government. All the major cities and over 85% of the towns have councils. In Baghdad, I attended a city council meeting that was remarkable for its normalcy. I saw its members spend their time talking about what most city councils are concerned with -- jobs, education and the environment. At the national level I met with an Iraqi Governing Council that has appointed ministers and is taking responsibility for national policy. In fact, while I was there, the new minister of justice announced the legal framework for a truly independent judiciary.

The Governing Council has appointed a central bank governor who will be in charge of introducing Iraq's new, unified currency next month. It also recently endorsed new tariffs and is now discussing world-class reforms to open the country to productive foreign investment. Now, the Governing Council is turning its attention to the process for drawing up a democratic constitution for a democratic Iraq.

I was truly moved when I met with my counterpart, Hoshyar Zebari, free Iraq's first foreign minister. He will soon be off to New York as part of the Iraqi delegation to the opening of the United Nations General Assembly.

Iraq has come very far, but serious problems remain, starting with security. American commanders and troops told me of the many threats they face -- from leftover loyalists who want to return Iraq to the dark days of Saddam, from criminals who were set loose on Iraqi society when Saddam emptied the jails and, increasingly, from outside terrorists who have come to Iraq to open a new front in their campaign against the civilized world. But our commanders also briefed me on their plan for meeting these security threats, and it is a good one.

We also need to complete the renewal of Iraq's electrical grid, its water treatment facilities and its other infrastructure, which were run down and destroyed during the years of Saddam's misrule. Here, too, we are making progress. Electric generation now averages 75% of prewar levels, and that figure is rising. Telephone service is being restored to hundreds of thousands of customers. Dilapidated water and sewage treatment facilities are being modernized. But it will take time and money to finish the job.

Indeed, that's Iraq in a nutshell. With our support, the Iraqis have made great progress. But it will take time and money to finish the job. President Bush has asked Congress for $20 billion to help rebuild Iraq's infrastructure. Next month, the international community will meet in Madrid to pledge additional assistance for Iraqi reconstruction. With these funds, and our continued help, I know the Iraqis will take great strides in rebuilding their battered country.

How long will we stay in Iraq? We will stay as long as it takes to turn full responsibility for governing Iraq over to a capable and democratically elected Iraqi administration. Only a government elected under a democratic constitution can take full responsibility and enjoy full legitimacy in the eyes of the Iraqi people and the world.

Anyone who doubts the wisdom of President Bush's course in Iraq should stand, as I did, by the side of the mass grave in Halabja, in Iraq's north. That terrible site holds the remains of 5,000 innocent men, women and children who were gassed to death by Saddam Hussein's criminal regime.

The Iraqi people must be empowered to prevent such mass murder from happening ever again. They must be given the tools and the support to build a peaceful and prosperous democracy. They deserve no less. The American people deserve no less.

2003-09-20T09:56:00.000-07:00

For some reason, as I was reading stories of soldiers in Iraq, this song kept going through my mind:

If I Stand from the "Songs" album
Rich Mullins

There's more that rises in the morning than the sun
And more that shines in the night than just the moon
It's more than just this fire here that keeps me warm
In a shelter that is larger than this room

And there's a loyalty that's deeper than mere sentiments
And a music higher than the songs that I can sing
The stuff of Earth competes for the allegiance
I owe only to the Giver of all good things

So if I stand let me stand on the promise
That you will pull me through
And if I can't, let me fall on the grace
That first brought me to You
And if I sing let me sing for the joy
That has born in me these songs
And if I weep let it be as a man
Who is longing for his home

There's more that dances on the prairies than the wind
More that pulses in the ocean than the tide
There's a love that is fiercer than the love between friends
More gentle than a mother's when her baby's at her side

And there's a loyalty that's deeper
Than mere sentiments
And a music higher than the songs
That I can sing
The stuff of Earth competes
For the allegence
I owe only to the Giver
Of all good things

So if I stand let me stand on the promise
That you will pull me through
And if I can't let me fall on the grace
That first brought me to You
And if I sing let me sing for the joy
That has born in me these songs
And if I weep let it be as a man
Who is longing for his home.

To the soldiers: you're our best. I wish I could be there. I wish I could help. America is what she is because of you.

2003-09-18T15:53:00.000-07:00

Caucasian Club? Why?: " Lisa McClelland says she isn't a racist.
She says her campaign for a Caucasian Club at Freedom High School in the eastern Contra Costa County town of Oakley is a move toward diversity, not bigotry."

Well, if those other ethnically exclusive clubs serve no purpose, why start your own?

But reading this I had a wild idea. Suppose you were a very poor white kid like I was growing up, but due to geographic chance went to school with Jesse Jackson's or Al Sharpton's grandsons, or Oprah Winfrey's kids, or any group of children of wealthy African Americans; you were a minority. And suppose they had their own country club or exclusive social establishment, no whites allowed. And then, in frustration you started your own caucasian association. Would the NAAdvancementCP have a legitimate case against it-- how could they "advance" any more, being at the top, the dominant group?

Which raises questions about diversity issues in general. Many African-Americans are quite well-off, and their kids are quite well-off. Do they deserve breaks or special legal advantages? I'd prefer to see affirmative action disallowed for wealthy African-Americans; the law needs to take into account economic realities. I have a feeling that many black folks might agree with me.

2003-09-18T15:16:00.000-07:00

Commanding Heights: Hernando de Soto:
"INTERVIEWER: Why does capitalism fail everywhere else and triumph in the West? [ed.--and Japan and Singapore or wherever it is practiced]
HERNANDO DE SOTO: Because the West has a property rights system, and property rights systems seem to be about ownership. What we're discovering more and more is that it's really the system that undergirds the system of values called capitalism. In other words, you have property rights in the West. In developing nations we do, too, but they're not legal. Once you legalize them and you have recordkeeping systems and you have tracking systems and you've got contracts and you're able to get all the information about somebody's ownership over an asset, all of a sudden you obtain enormous amounts of data that you do not have in developing nations.
In the West, that is captured in the property system. If you are somebody that is honorable and pays their debts, which is what somebody would be interested in, that's going to be captured in your records, and your records are linked to your property records. All of these are property rights, [but we don't have them] organized in a central system ... in Third World countries.
INTERVIEWER: Is this a possible change in the Third World?
HERNANDO DE SOTO: Yes, of course. ... You [The United States] were also a Third World country 150 years ago, and you transformed yourselves into a First World country. The same occurred for most countries throughout the world."

You mean to tell me it isn't America's fault that much of the world isn't like us?
The average leftist will find a way to explain how America oppresses the world, when in fact we fight like mad to get them to copy our system, so we could all be safer and happier.

2003-09-18T15:01:00.000-07:00

Hernando de Soto: Targeted by Peruvian Terrorists: "Peru, in fact, 'had become two nations: one where the legal system bestowed privileges on a select few, and another where the majority of the Peruvian people lived and worked outside the law, according to their own local arrangements.'
In an effort to understand the size of this 'extralegal' or informal economy, De Soto and a group of colleagues combed the streets and shantytowns of Peru during late afternoons and weekends, talking to people about their work, and counting their businesses and enterprises.
De Soto and his team were able to quantify their findings about Peru's 'unseen' economic life.
In the early 1980s, De Soto discovered that 90 percent of all small industrial enterprises, 85 percent of urban transport, 60 percent of Peru's fishing fleet (one of the largest in the world), and 60 percent of its food stores operated outside of the law.
Contrary to the views of the government and Peruvian elites who thought of the poor as lazy, many of Lima's poor were in fact carrying the economy on their backs.
The more people the ILD researchers talked to in the shantytowns and rural byways of Peru, the more they realized that it was not so much that the poor were breaking the law as that the law was breaking them. "

Read this: you'll thank yourself later.

2003-09-18T10:16:00.000-07:00

An Interview With Milton Friedman - John Hawkins:

Milton Friedman: Roosevelt's policies were very destructive. Roosevelt's policies made the depression longer and worse than it otherwise would have been. What pulled us out of the depression was the natural resilience of the economy & WWII.
You know, it's a mystery as to why people think Roosevelt's policies pulled us out of the Depression. The problem was that you had unemployed machines and unemployed people. How do you get them together by forming industrial cartels and keeping prices and wages up? That's what Roosevelt's policies in the New Deal amounted to. Essentially, increasing the role of government, enhancing the monopolistic position of labor, and creating as I said before the equivalent of price fixing cartels made things worse. So most of his policies were counterproductive.
John Hawkins: Fast forward to today and there are a lot of Democrats & people on the left out there who say, 'Why don't we just have exorbitant taxes on the rich and minimal taxes on everyone else'? What would that do to the economy?
Milton Friedman: That would eliminate the rich.
John Hawkins: Right. Would it have a negative effect on economy overall?
Milton Friedman: Well, who would provide the funds, the capital, and the entrepreneurship for the new industries? In a world in which there were no rich people, how would you have ever gotten the capital to produce steel mills or automobile plants? You can do it through the state, but the world tried that with the Soviet Union.
It's an interesting thing. If you ask yourself, 'what tax system would be best for the low income group,' it's the opposite of what they're saying there. It would be a system with a maximum amount of taxation rather than a minimum. If you look at the taxation system in China for example, which is now doing very, very, well, that's exactly what it is. In Russia you now have a 20% flat tax which is having the effect of increasing revenues rapidly and also stimulating production. You cannot help the poor by destroying the rich.

This is EXACTLY what I'm trying to say with this weblog. I am a conservative, and a Republican, because I believe this is the better path for the poor, for the many. "Life isn't fair:" and when liberal Democrats try to force society to conform to their vision of fairness, they end up being fundamentally unfair, hindering individual liberties, thereby hurting everyone, especially the "disadvantaged" people they were trying to protect.

A million examples, but here's one: the luxury tax on yachts discouraged buyers, and caused unemployent in the boatbuilding industry. We can see the results of similar policies in the colossal unemployment in Germany and France.
I know that many conservatives don't look at it this way, that for the most part, we just want to be left alone and free to succeed and grow our lives and families the way we choose, as long as we're not encroaching on our neighbor's rights. And they're not greedy: most conservatives are extremely generous and charitable.

Liberal democrats should be understood to be a well-meaning, if somewhat condescending, sympathetic group, which ends up doing more harm than good. They worry about the poor and kill them with short-sighted "kindness."

Conversely, one could say that even if conservatives truly were trying to favor the rich at the expense of the poor (an untrue liberal canard), the policies stemming from that cynical goal still "inadvertently" help the poor! Even if a rich man LOATHED all poor people, in order to get rich, he would improve the economy, and become the poor's best friend despite himself.

2003-09-17T12:56:00.000-07:00

An Engineered Tragedy:

The proportion of females among Israeli fatalities was relatively low in the early months of the conflict, and gradually rose to a level of around 30 percent; since June 2001, this proportion has remained fairly stable. Palestinian fatalities, in contrast, have been consistently and overwhelmingly (over 95 percent) male (see Graph 1.5).

2003-09-16T17:24:00.000-07:00

2003-09-16T11:11:00.000-07:00

FINALLY GOT RESULTS (although no credit, oh well)

Media Research Center responded to the comparison between Amanpour's unfounded claims agianst the administration and Brown's legitimate complaints against the despots. The Tuesday CyberAlert says:

Amanpour has quite a lot of chutzpah to accuse the Bush team or anyone of disinformation when her boss, Eason Jordan, admitted in a New York Times op-ed in April that CNN for years withheld knowledge they had of Saddam Hussein's brutality, including later fulfilled death threats against two of Hussein's sons in law, a murder plot against CNN staffers in Kurdish-controlled Northern Iraq, fingernails and teeth pulled out of Iraqis and the threats of imprisonment or death for journalists and Iraqis working for them, such as translators, if they reported something the regime wanted kept quiet.
While Amanpour was wishing for tougher coverage of the Bush administration, New York Times reporter John Burns was critical of the media’s weak coverage of Saddam Hussein’s atrocities.

This is consistent with the harangues from Maureen Dowd, indymedia.org, Pilger, Rall, and others: willing to ignore and enable horrors by Saddam and other fascist tyrants, while distorting anything the Bush administration does. Eager to believe the best of our enemies, eager to believe the worst of our president.

2003-09-15T10:37:00.000-07:00

Amanpour: CNN practiced self-censorship?:

Said Amanpour: 'I think the press was muzzled, and I think the press self-muzzled. I'm sorry to say, but certainly television and, perhaps, to a certain extent, my station was intimidated by the administration and its foot soldiers at Fox News. And it did, in fact, put a climate of fear and self-censorship, in my view, in terms of the kind of broadcast work we did.'
Brown then asked Amanpour if there was any story during the war that she couldn't report.
'It's not a question of couldn't do it, it's a question of tone,' Amanpour said. 'It's a question of being rigorous. It's really a question of really asking the questions. All of the entire body politic in my view, whether it's the administration, the intelligence, the journalists, whoever, did not ask enough questions, for instance, about weapons of mass destruction. I mean, it looks like this was disinformation at the highest levels.'
[Former Pentagon spokewoman Tori] Clarke called the disinformation charge 'categorically untrue' and added, 'In my experience, a little over two years at the Pentagon, I never saw them (the media) holding back. I saw them reporting the good, the bad and the in between.'
Fox News spokeswoman Irena Briganti said of Amanpour's comments: 'Given the choice, it's better to be viewed as a foot soldier for Bush than a spokeswoman for al-Qaeda.'
CNN had no comment.

Hypocrisy will do that.

CNN's Eason Jordan made it clear he was intimidated by Saddam a few months ago, so they neglected to report torture and abuse by the Ba'athists, in order to retain access in Baghdad. Now we hear from John Burns of the NYT :

"There were correspondents who thought it appropriate to seek the approbation of the people who governed their lives. This was the ministry of information, and particularly the director of the ministry. By taking him out for long candlelit dinners, plying him with sweet cakes, plying him with mobile phones at $600 each for members of his family, and giving bribes of thousands of dollars. Senior members of the information ministry took hundreds of thousands of dollars of bribes from these television correspondents who then behaved as if they were in Belgium. They never mentioned the function of minders. Never mentioned terror.
We now know that this place was a lot more terrible than even people like me had thought. There is such a thing as absolute evil. I think people just simply didn't recognize it. "

Contrast Amanpour's comments about CNN with John Burns' general comments about the media in Iraq. She criticizes the administration, claiming to be intimidated by Pres. Bush and Fox News, to the degree that the network decided, of its own free will, to change their TONE!!
At the same time, the press corps capitulated to and eagerly participated in (CNN included) Saddam's conspiracy of silence. No rigorous questioning, no seeking to expose disinformation.
So if Fox News were footsoldiers for Bush, what does that make CNN? Fedayeen with a camera crew?
And finally, Amanpour's main whine seems to be that the media should have questioned the war more forcefully... to what end? Stopping it, I presume, thus allowing this regime, one that was truly muzzling, truly censoring the media about its horrors, to remain.
The differences between these two reporters tells you everything you need to know about the national divide on Operation Iraqi Freedom. One whines about, well, nothing really, the other is furious that the media served at the pleasure of a murderous tyrant.

2003-09-14T18:12:00.000-07:00

Arab Rulers Getting Nervous: "In the five months since U.S. forces rid Iraq of Saddam Hussein's rule, the country's ethnically and religiously diverse people have, in one giant leap, overturned decades of social and political injustice, replaced a brutal one-party system with a multitude of groups advocating a rich range of ideologies and created a free press."

But you keep hearing that we're in a quagmire, that our triumph has descended into "dust and ashes" (Paul Krugman).

Comparisons to Vietnam are odious, ludicrous, untenable. We were stuck in a conflict without advance, a standstill, and when we left Vietnam the enemy swept in and established a brutal communist nightmare.

We are in charge in Iraq. The old regime is gone, never to return. How can that be a quagmire by any conceivable definition? Yes, foreign terrorists (called insurgents by reporters) are shooting at our soldiers. To my way of thinking, that does not mean we aren't in charge, any more than a cop shooting in Seattle means the municipal government isn't in charge.

I honestly think these voices decrying the state of Iraq had a standard of utoian perfection: considering how long they were brutalized and underserved by the Ba'ath, I think things are going amazingly well.

For our fallen troops, God rest your souls. May God bless your families. I vow to fight the political liars who seek to dishonor your memories by saying you died for nothing.

2003-09-14T10:08:00.000-07:00

Hubris, thy name is Albright:
"Q:Has the war made the problem of terrorism better or worse?
A:The Administration immediately tied Sept. 11 to Saddam. They said, basically, that Saddam and Iraq were a hotbed of terrorism. While I had many criticisms of Saddam, that's not the way I saw it. But now Iraq is in fact a breeding ground for terrorists."

1. Where, oh, where is any documented evidence that the Administration immediately tied Sept. 11 to Saddam?

2. In Iraq: Ansar al Islam, Salman Pak, Abu Abbas, Abu Nidal.

3. Good to know you "had many criticisms of Saddam," at least, but since direct terror support to Palestinian suicide bombers, meeting with Osama operatives, communication with al Zarqawi, etc. all are something you didn't see ("not the way [I] saw it") it's too bad your criticism didn't go further towards protecting the US.

4. The madrassahs were the breeding ground for terrorists, and Iraq is now their graveyard.

"Q:What should the U.S. do next?
A:Frankly, if there was a President Gore, we wouldn't be in this particular mess. But we are, and we cannot fail. I very much hope there will be a U.N. resolution that makes clear the U.S. has military command but that would set up a U.N. high representative to coordinate the political and humanitarian things the U.N. does very well."

1. Right. We'd have a bigger mess down the road.
2. How well did they do with the oil-for-food program? The billions of dollars of food left in warehouses, the piles of cash found in the homes of Ba'ath leadership?

"Q:Bush's foreign policy started as 'Anything But Clinton' in almost every area—the Middle East, North Korea, China. Now events have pushed it back much closer to your approach. Do you ever succumb to schadenfreude?
A:No, I'm much too kind and generous a person. "

Tempted to say: "No comment. That's self-fisking." But let's take a look at North Korea. The inspectors that were lied to for years are now kicked out: surprise! They were taking steps to rebuild their nuclear program while inspectors were there!

How successful was Clinton's Middle East policy? I would put it somewhere between: "total" and "absolute" failure.

2003-09-13T18:42:00.000-07:00

Are you tired of hearing about the PATRIOT Act?

I'm sure some libertarian concerns are valid, but one worry that seems baseless is this idea that the DOJ wants to start "monitoring" our bookstore and library usage. That's not a true representation of the law as written or its intent.
It's useful to law enforcement to have the ability to subpoena library records: it helped them catch the Unabomer, after all.

Considering that anybody in the library can see what you're carrying out, and that the entire library staff in any system, county or citywide, has easy and open access to the records, I can't see what the big deal is, if a court summons is necessary. Their aim is to compare suspect notes and messages against linguistic or textual clues from books that a terror suspect may have checked out. So what?

I wrote the following letter to the Seattle P-I after they published an editorial praising local librarians for shredding records to "protect the privacy of patrons from John Ashcroft."

Dear Mr. Shapley,

Your editorial got me worried about our constitutional protections Sunday... the slippery slope, etc.
I looked into it and was SHOCKED to discover that, even before the Patriot Act, law enforcement agencies could not just subpoena my library internet usage, not just seek a warrant to investigate my book checkout record, but with the same kind of probable cause, can actually come to my home, put handcuffs on me, and put me in a jail cell until I get a hearing! Can you believe that?! I mean, loss of privacy (with probable cause and a subpoena) about my internet usage on a publicly owned computer and publicly owned books is bad enough, but with the same court permission, they can actually deprive me of my liberty!!

I also heard a rumor that they could come into my home and seize my personal home computer, books, and financial records! I heard about some guy named Richard Jewell in Georgia, how they sent dogs to sniff all over his home after an Olympics bombing, and took everything he owned to search for explosive residue.

But that may be only an an urban legend. I mean, if the citizenry that reads your paper is so incensed about public library materials being subpoenaed (I think that's what you meant by "unbridled government surveillance"), surely they will be implacably enraged by the idea of being dragged out of one's home or having one's personal effects confiscated?

Don't you think? With a slippery slope like this, what's next, summary executions?
My paranoia-meter is really off the scale about this!

Cordially,
Brian

His reply? One word: "Cute."

2003-09-13T09:43:00.000-07:00

From National Review's Corner. A reader emails Jonah Goldberg:

As an Army reservist, I have been trained at some length about the Middle East -- What I've heard from numerous experts essentially agrees with your column about how superstition and ignorance are rampant in the Arab world.
One particular comment stays with me, this from an American woman who is fluent in Arabic and has spent much of her life in different Arab countries. She told us... that the germ theory of disease... is widely disbelieved among Arabs. 'If [Allah] wants me to get sick, I will get sick' is their idea."

OK, it's pretty well-known: kismet or fate, is a cultural tenet in the Islamic world.
Clearly, however, this cosmology doesn't prevent them from seeking medical attention? I raise the question because it is clear that although they may believe that fate and Allah's will is bringing the disease, they do not act as though they must therefore resolve to accept it-- else hospitals would be "haram." Were they at peace with their environment, accepting events as pre-determined and within providence, they would not react with such bitterness and anger when they experience suffering. They would place no blame, have no proclivity to create conspiracy theories.
Since this is not the case, what are we to make of the constant strife? Is kismet only relevant when human will is not involved?
May seem like a theology question; my goal is to learn the best way to challenge the culture with its own precepts. It must be hard for a society that believes it is uniquely obedient to Allah to know that the Dar al-Harb has the greater wealth, influence, freedom, security, and might. Why would Allah allow the USA and Israel to have nuclear weapons? Do they perceive it as a punishment for not being fundamentalist? Is that why Osama is in such high esteem to so many Muslims?

2003-09-13T08:10:00.000-07:00

Exit Arafat?: "There are of course many, far too many, individuals and groups who bear responsibility for the violence that has afflicted the Holy Land. But in the long Middle Eastern roster of ignominy one name stands out: Yasser Arafat. The virtual embodiment of modern terrorism, the main instigator of its resurgence against Israeli civilians in the last three years, the indirect cause therefore of the deaths of innocent Palestinian bystanders as Israel struck back, Arafat certainly deserves exile--or worse. And the people of Israel, and the Palestinians, deserve better, far better, than to be bedeviled by his presence.
Whether it is prudent to remove him is of course another issue. We are inclined to believe it is. But that is admittedly a complicated question, involving on-the-ground calculations of the risks of harm to Arafat, and how damaging that harm would, or would not, turn out to be. But this is clear: Arafat, in Ramallah, has succeeded in torpedoing one peace process after another. He scorned Secretary of State Colin Powell's rather pathetic August 21 plea to work with Prime Minister Abbas and 'make available' to Abbas the security forces Arafat controlled. We believe Arafat's ability to deny peace a chance would decrease if he were far away, especially if he were deprived of control of the Palestinian Authority's treasury, its money-making monopolies, and the security services. "

2003-09-12T17:47:00.000-07:00

Even Al Qaeda hates Arafat? MEMRI

"The breasts of the Jews – Allah's curses upon them – are filled with an arrogance that is not present in others, and therefore they have not settled for the kind of covert colonialism that satisfies the Crusader countries. Likewise, their occupation of Muslim Palestine stems from the belief that they cannot give it up, or else they would be apostates from their Judaism, exactly like the Arab rulers were apostates from Islam to which they belonged…

"The issue of Palestine is [actually] the issue of the Islamic world… but the Zionist media and the collaborating media neutralized the non-Arab Muslims by calling it 'the Arab issue.' Repeating [this term] has a powerful effect on the distortion of consciousness and eradication of the facts, and thus every non-Arab Muslim has been excluded of those interested in the Palestine issue…

"The establishment of the Palestinian state wrested the issue even from [the hands of] the countries of confrontation, and made it an issue of the Palestinian state and its treacherous government, headed by the vilest of agents ever in history – Yasser Arafat, who will get what he deserves from Allah…"

Odd. What does this portend?

UPDATE: Arafat's losing it.

2003-09-12T17:33:00.000-07:00

Jim Miller notes this article from the Guardian:

"Patients who have major surgery in Britain are four times more likely to die than those in America, according to a major new study."

"The comparison of care, which reveals a sevenfold difference in mortality rates in one set of patients, concludes that hospital waiting lists, a shortage of specialists and competition for intensive care beds are to blame. "

"A team from University College London (UCL) and a team from Columbia University in New York jointly studied the medical fortunes of more than 1,000 patients at the Mount Sinai Hospital in Manhattan and compared them with nearly 1,100 patients who had undergone the same sort of major surgery at the Queen Alexandra Hospital in Portsmouth."

"The results, which surprised even the researchers, showed that 2.5 per cent of the American patients died in hospital after major surgery, compared with just under 10 per cent of British patients. They found that there was a sevenfold difference in mortality rates when a subgroup of patients - the most seriously ill - were compared."

Socialism kills the poor.

2003-09-12T17:10:00.000-07:00

SMILING FROM THE WOMB:

Pioneering scanning techniques have produced astonishing images from inside the womb which show the foetuses yawn, blink, suck their fingers and seem to cry and smile.

Up to now, doctors did not think infants made such expressions until after birth and believed they learned to smile by copying their mother.
The procedure has been pioneered by London obstetrician Professor Stuart Campbell at the Create Health Centre for Reproduction and Advanced Technology.

His pictures reveal foetuses moving their limbs at just eight weeks.

Keep your laws off their bodies.

2003-09-12T09:59:00.000-07:00

2003-09-11T17:01:00.000-07:00

Q&A with Laurie Mylroie at National Review Online:

Lopez: Why hasn't the administration been able to do a better job of tying Saddam Hussein to 9/11? It's a laughable contention to many.

Mylroie: Yes, for many it is laughable. Indeed, over the weekend the Washington Post ran a story that nearly 70 percent of the American public believes Saddam was involved in the 9/11 attacks, but there is 'no evidence' to prove that. NBC's Tom Brokaw reported on that story, with the exact same tone, a few days later.
But, of course, there is evidence. There is lots of evidence, which I, and others, [ed--such as Mansoor Ijaz] have put into the public record. Still, this is how the bureaucracies, or elements within them, carry out their side of the argument. They refuse to recognize what is before their eyes and the media just repeats the cry, "no evidence."

That happened when I was testifying before the 9/11 Commission. Another person on the panel — from the CIA — kept saying there is "no evidence," even as I was presenting evidence.
It's a word game. Evidence, according to Webster's, is "something that indicates." For example, your smile is evidence of your feelings toward me. Proof is conclusive demonstration.
After the 9/11 Commission panel, former Navy Secretary John Lehman, one of the commissioners, told the press that he thought Iraq was involved in the attacks, citing the terrorist training camp at Salman Pak. That's evidence.

I don't really know why the administration doesn't make this case. Deputy Secretary of Defense, Paul Wolfowitz, explained that the administration had two reasons for war: Iraq's weapons and its terrorism. There was so much dispute about the latter (read bureaucratic opposition), however, that they focused their public case on the weapons alone.

It's a litany to the anti-liberation crowd: "Saddam was not involved in 9-11! Bush lied!!!" And here is Mylroie, who strongly believes it, but says the President should make this case but hasn't.

I spoke to a splenetic leftist spazz named William Pitt (Truthout.org), a much sought-after prevaricator at anti-war luncheons who told me that he believed the Salman Pak training camp was a legitimate hijacking training facility. After all, Iraqi jets could get hijacked, too. (Though they never were.)

Eager to believe the best of Saddam, eager to believe the worst of President Bush. The modern "progressives."

2003-09-11T10:28:00.000-07:00

How Secure Are U.S. Borders?: "The... project involved a shipment... of just under 15 pounds of depleted uranium, a harmless substance that is legal to import into the United States. The uranium, in a steel pipe with a lead lining, was placed in a suitcase....
If they can't detect that, then they can't detect the real thing,' explained Tom Cochran, a nuclear physicist at the Natural Resources Defense Council...
Cochran said the highly enriched uranium used for nuclear weapons would, with slightly thicker shielding, give off a signature similar to depleted uranium in the screening devices currently being used by homeland security officials at American ports."

How are we to protect ourselves from a suitcase nuke?

Can we check every bag flown in? Maybe, though I kind of doubt terrorists would take the risk of bringing such a rare commodity aboard a bag which has the potential to be checked. Unless their goal was to detonate upon landing...

But we do know that not every container can be checked. Not every small boat from Mexico can be checked as it comes ashore in Texas or California. Like it or not, we will never be impervious to a smuggled WMD. Never.

So how are we to protect ourselves from a suitcase nuke?

Go to the source of the risk, and take away the motivation to create one.

Can you imagine such a bomb coming from a terrorist network of French or Russian citizens? No two capitalist democracies have ever gone to war with each other, despite cultural enmity and societal dislike.

From what societies are we likely to see such an attempt? We all know the answer, one would hope.

A democratic and free Iraq has potential to stimulate reforms in other parts of the Middle East. Iraq will be the first Arab democracy. It is going to win hearts and minds, as it already has:

A similar view is expressed by Hussein Khomeini, a mid-ranking mullah and a grandson of the late Ayatollah Ruhallah Khomeini, the founder of the Islamic Republic in Iran.
"I decided to leave Iran and settle in Iraq where the Americans have created a space of freedom," Hussein Khomeini says. "The coming of freedom to Iraq will transform the Muslim world."

And with that transformation comes the hope of true victory in the war on terror: when Arab states are capitalist democracies, we will be in far less danger than we are now from a suitcase nuke. We can't kill them all, nor would we want to. We can't isolate them all, arrest them all, or even track them all.

But when they are a free people, perhaps we won't need to.

2003-09-08T12:38:00.000-07:00

AMIR TAHERI:
"Iraq is the only Arab country today where all political parties, from communist to conservative, operate freely. Visitors will be impressed by the openness of the political debate there, something not found anywhere else in the Arab world. Also, for the first time, Iraq has no political prisoners.
Almost 150 newspapers and magazine are now published there, offering a diversity not found in any other Arab country. One theme of these new publications is the need for democratization in the Arab world. This may be putting the cart before the horse. What Arabs, and Muslims in general, most urgently need is basic freedom, without which democracy cannot be built. The impact of Iraq's liberation is already felt throughout the region."

But hey, it's quicksand, if you believe the cartoonists.

2003-09-07T23:46:00.000-07:00

Taliban recruits new tier of terror :

Hundreds and possibly thousands of Taliban recruits known as the 'Sarbaz' — those who care nothing for their own lives — are involved in an increasing number of hit-and-run attacks against government and American troops.
Among them are young men like Siddiqullah, 24, who despite his recent engagement has put his life on hold to wage a holy war on 'infidel' forces occupying his country.

1. Now with all the names like mujahedeen, jihadis, Fatah, etc., did they really need another term for "brainless, self-righteous killer punk of innocents and country's future"?

2. Why do papers assent to call it a "holy" war? If scare quotes were appropriate around "infidel"...

His enthusiasm is shared by hundreds of students from religious seminaries in the Pakistani province of Baluchistan who have crossed into Afghanistan to fight.

Ok. "Enthusiasm"? "Religious seminaries"?
We've got to find some new words, or at least use proper ones.

2003-09-07T23:20:00.000-07:00

While all the other blogs battle about the President's speech, I thought I'd escape the political sphere for brief fantasy interlude.

Tolkienoclasm.

The lost page from the Coronation of Aragorn, The Return of the King, JRR Tolkien

Frodo and Samwise walk before the thronging people of Gondor, flowers at their feet.
"Gandalf? Thank you for sending Gwaihir to save us, but can I ask you something?"
"As you just did, you certainly may."
Somewhat darkly Frodo strained a false laugh. "Ah, heh... heh. The eagles certainly got to us in the nick of time, saving us from the fires of the cracks of Doom."
Gandalf lifted his staff in salute to the crowd, as they ascended the stairs leading to the throne and said, "The Lord of the winds is faster than any creature in Middle Earth. You were saved on the edge of hope. But a moment later..." His voice trailed off.
"Yes, well, about that, see. I am somewhat troubled. Do you realize how long Samwise and I were in Mordor before we reached Orodruin?"
"At least three weeks by the Shire reckoning."
"Right. And Gwaihir flew with you and the other eagles in how much time?"
"I think I see where you are going. Well, it's complicated, take the winged Nazgul for example..."
"Yeah, tell me about it: Sauron didn't give them fell winged steeds until we were almost to Rauros. So there we are all of three feet tall, walking barefoot in a swamp then sharp rocks, eating frogs and rabbits and then nothing but lembas day and night, with no water. Close to madness from the Ring. Almost eaten by a giant spider. Manhandled and beaten by orcs. Tangling with Gollum and getting my finger bitten off... was it THAT complicated, Gandalf?"
"I'm not sure you should speak to a wizard that way, Ring-bearer..."
"Oh-hoooh. Well, while your winged friend was carrying you down from Zirakzigil Sam and I starved and slogged our way across the living nightmare of Mordor and Cirith Ungol, and the whole time we could have FLOWN from Rivendell to the Mount, and back, in TWO BLOODY DAYS."
This had simply never occurred to poor Sam. His head looked ready to burst with the sudden revelation that the miseries they'd endured could have need avoided. His breathing became very laboured, as though choking a scream.
Gandalf cleared his throat. They were standing before the king, facing the people of Gondor. The Wizard forced a smile, said a mystic spell of forgetfulness and waved his hand over the two glaring hobbits. "Whenever this story is told or read, the hearers and readers will not think of this...." The halflings blinked and startled, then looked puzzled.

The crowds, hearing none of this, began to shout, after Aragorn: "Praise them with great praise!! Hail the ring-bearers!!" Sam and Frodo began to weep and were unsure why images of strangling Gandalf were fleeting from their minds.

2003-09-07T16:51:00.000-07:00

Neocon / neoconservative=Uses USA superpower status as world reform tool.
paleocon / paleo-conservative=Trent Lott, Strom Thurmond (RIP).
Rubicon=river in Rome.
Icon=well known and admired conservative.
bleedocon=A conservative who would rather persuade a liberal to see another perspective than shout him down. A conservative who assumes the best of liberals, assuming they do want the best for our country, and makes distinctions between far-left and liberal thinking.

2003-09-04T17:48:00.000-07:00

From Little Green Footballs:

Apartheid Mecca

The sign on the highway to Mecca (Makkah), complete with separate (but equal?) roads for the faithful on hajj and the heathen swine. What's the Arabic for "Jim Crow"?

You can be put to death for giving a Bible to a Muslim in Saudi Arabia, as in Afghanistan before we removed the Taliban. Never forget that.

2003-09-03T21:27:00.000-07:00

The PUNCH Bowl introduces us to Robert P. George, constitutional law and moral philosophy professor, Princeton. George takes on calumnious ethics-perverting freakazoid Peter Singer, PhD, with a similar 'bleedocon' take on the abortion issue.

'Some politicians say that they're "personally opposed," yet "pro-choice," says the 48-year-old professor. 'But we must ask: Is this a position that can survive a test of logical coherence? After all, if abortion is wrong, surely it is wrong because it is the unjust taking of the life of a developing human being.' He pauses to let that sink in and then launches another question: 'And if one believes that, then what could possibly justify a regime of law that licenses so grave an injustice? If abortion is not a form of homicide, if the developing embryo or fetus has the moral status of an unwanted growth -- such as a tumor -- there would be no grounds on which to "personally oppose" abortion. So the question is this: Is the developing embryo or fetus a human being or a mere unwanted growth? Notice that this is not a religious or even an ethical question. It is a question of human embryology and developmental biology.'

The formula that those politicians will use to justify their position: a moral distinction based upon personal beliefs regarding the humanity-status of the fetus, but no wish to interfere with a woman's right to choose. That is what they will say-- which of course ignores what George has proposed: either it's murder and universally wrong, or it isn't.
You can't have it both ways, wrong enough for you, but not wrong enough for society.

As I said in June, and at every debate on this issue, if it wrong at 8 months and 29-days, why is it "right" at 5 months 29 days? Is this legal boundary scientifically derived, or emotional and arbitrary?

And, has any scientist proven that a fetus feels no pain at 2 months as it is destroyed, since it has developed nerve endings? That never seems to enter into the equation: is a living thing dying in pain as it is aborted or not?

A consequence so easily avoidable too. But that's "moralistic and theocratic," as they say.

2003-09-03T17:12:00.000-07:00

Blogger Jeff Jarvis:

The more I think about this, the more I fear that we are still in the age of victimization, when being a victim is the highest political form, for a victim can’t be criticized, a victim gets to set the agenda, a victim gets to say what is offensive (and this is also the age of offense), a victim gets to act entitled (for this is also the age of entitlement). But we forget that being a victim also means that you’re weak, you lose. Victim is a past-tense word. This war is still present tense and future tense. We are still fighting. We still have a war to win here. We cannot afford to be victims.
So do not speak in hushed tones about September 11th. Speak still with loud anger and proud memory.
We are not victims.

2003-09-03T15:35:00.000-07:00

Paul Wolfowitz:

"Not long ago, a woman named Christy Ferer traveled to Iraq along with the USO. She'd lost her husband Neil Levin at the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, and she wanted to say thank you to the troops in Baghdad. She wrote a wonderful piece about her trip, and in it, she wondered why our soldiers would want to see her, when they could see the Dallas Cowboy cheerleaders, movie stars and a model. When the soldiers heard that a trio of Sept. 11 family members were there, she found out why. "
"Young men and women from across America rushed to the trio, eager to touch them and talk to them. One soldier, a mother of two, told Christy she'd enlisted because of Sept. 11. Another soldier displayed the metal bracelet he wore, engraved with the name of a victim of 9/11. Others came forward with memorabilia from the World Trade Center they carried with them into Baghdad. And when it was Christy's turn to present Gen. Tommy Franks with a piece of steel recovered from the Trade Towers, she saw this great soldier's eyes well up with tears. Then, she watched as they streamed down his face on center stage before 4,000 troops."
"To those who think the battle in Iraq is a distraction from the global war against terrorism . . . tell that to our troops. "

Well, they would, Paul, but to that type of willfully ignorant person, the military isn't worthy of them.

2003-09-02T22:03:00.000-07:00

Yabba Dabba Doo time in Iraq

"We defeated the Flintstones in this war ... I mean, this was not some modern army by any stretch of the imagination." -- Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times columnist THOMAS FRIEDMAN discussing the war in Iraq on CNN's "Reliable Sources."

SCUDs launched at Israel. Thousands of Kurds gassed. Nuclear centrifuge and MiGs found buried. That prehistoric rascal! (Saddam, Uday and Qusay's behavior could certainly be classified as Neanderthal.)

Yet somehow the entire Middle East was afraid of a supposedly stone-age military.

What does their paleolithic army indicate about the chief arms suppliers, Russia, China and France?

And what does it say about Friedman himself, that he's willing to denigrate the achievement of our troops, who are still dying over there?

Thanks, Tom. May your camel spit on your laptop.

2003-09-01T13:39:00.000-07:00

Mark Steyn knocks it out of the ballpark.:

The intellectual left has been scrambling for decades to come up with explanations as to why, if everything's so bad, everything's so good: Noam Chomsky's theory of media manipulation -- 'manufactured consent' -- can stand for an entire school of philosophers who believe a subtler breed of capitalist overlords than Fritz Lang ever foresaw are maintaining the workers in some sort of fools' illusion of content.
----------------
To the irritation of their self-appointed spokespersons, the oppressed masses refuse to stay oppressed. If they were still down in the basement chained to the great turbines, all would be well. But, instead, they insist on moving out of their tenements, getting homes with non-communal bathrooms, giving up the trolley car, putting a deposit down on a Honda Civic and driving to the mall. When it was just medieval dukes swanking about with that kind of high-end consumerist lifestyle, things were fine: That was "sustainable" prosperity. But now, everyone wants in. And, once you do that, there goes the global neighbourhood.

My sentiments exactly.

The Left will reply that things aren't really so good, though. People still have to pay for health care, homes, and college educations.

If the USA ever does decide to foot the bill for all those things, it won't be long until groceries are socialized.

2003-08-31T14:18:00.000-07:00

The Observer | West must allow Iraqis the chance to manage our own country:

"The Kurds were dispossessed - emasculated in the new international system based on nation-states and marginalised politically and geographically. We were forced to fight successive Iraqi regimes to preserve our culture, livelihood and honour. Last week we saw the capture of one of the most evil men ranged against us - Hassan ali Majjid, known to everyone as Chemical Ali for his brutal use of chemical weapons against my people."
------
"As Kurds and Iraqis, we are profoundly grateful to the allies for getting rid of Saddam and for capturing men like Chemical Ali. They now have to make sure that malevolent and reactionary forces are no longer able to gain power and to use such power in the pursuit of racist and genocidal policies."

Consider the fevered pitch of the rhetoric surrounding the 'Palestinian cause.' Cries of "Zionism=racism, Israel is committing genocide, using brutal force, destroying the Arab culture, and livelihood..." a mixture of exaggerated distortions, persecution complex, and spinning security procedures (undeniably necessary in the face of weekly terror attack attempts) as oppression. Besides the PA, is there any other equally well-armed, well-funded group claiming human rights violations?

The suffering of the Kurdish people has been far worse than anything happening in the West Bank or Gaza, and only recently ended with the removal of the Ba'ath Nazis. Have you heard much about it? Was it front page?
The chemical genocide in Halabja, a nightmarish pogrom with mass murder weapons, casts into sharp relief how the suffering of the Palestinian/Jordanians is magnified beyond proportion due to the ethnic identities of the parties involved.

The intifadeh is a proxy religious war, a pan-Arabist jihad against Jews (to reclaim honor after the Naqba of 1948), masquerading as a territorial war.

The Kurds were allowed to suffer without much attention from the Middle East because their antagonists were Arab Muslims. And try as it might (not!), the Middle East can't get as angry when brutality is perpetrated by one of their own.

2003-08-30T23:14:00.000-07:00

2003-08-30T17:07:00.000-07:00

CHARITY OF THE DAY
Mercy Ships has three vessels full of volunteers helping out in war-torn and impoverished areas.
If you've considered giving up a few months of time to contribute some of your blessings to others in the world, consider Mercy Ships. If you want to make a direct impact on hurting people in the world, donate. A boat full o' saints.

2003-08-30T17:02:00.000-07:00

The Authentic Liberal

Pay this man a visit. US dollars go far in Canada.

2003-08-30T10:03:00.000-07:00

Islamic law

You may have read that jihad merely means internal struggle. It should not be presented to mean "holy war," as it often is in Western media, according to CAIR.

How does one explain this:

o9.0 Jihad means to war against non-Muslims and is etymologically derived from the word mujahada, signifying warfare to establish the religion. And it is the lesser jihad....
The scriptural basis for jihad, prior to scholarly consensus is such Koranic verses as: (1) Fighting is prescribed for you (Koran 2:216); (2) Slay them wherever you find them (Koran 4:89); (3) Fight the idolators utterly (Koran (9:36) and such hadiths as the one related by Bukhari and Muslim that the Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace ) said, "I have been commanded to fight people until they testify that there is no god but Allah and that Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah, and perform the prayer, and pay zakat. If they say it, they have saved their blood and possessions from me, except for the rights of Islam over them. And their final reckoning is with Allah"; and the hadith reported by Muslim, "To go forth in the morning or evening to fight in the path of Allah is better than the whole world and everything in it."

The objectives of jihad:

o9.8The caliph makes war upon Jews, Christians and Zoroastrians (provided he has first invited them to enter Islam in faith and practice, and if they will not, then invited them to enter the social order of Islam by paying the non-Muslim poll tax (jizya)--which is the significance of their paying it, not the money itself--while remaining in their ancestral religions), (and the war continues) until they become Muslim or else pay the non-Muslim poll tax (in accordance with the word of Allah Most High.
o9.9 The caliph fights all other peoples until they become Muslim (because they are not a people with a Book, nor honored as such, and are not permitted to settle with paying the poll tax).

Compare with "In your hearts set apart Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. Do this with gentleness and respect." I Peter 3:15

2003-08-26T18:57:00.000-07:00

Of Bleeding Hearts and misunderstandings

Webster's Dictionary defines bleeding heart as "one who shows extravagant sympathy esp. for an object of alleged persecution."

I would like that better if the definition said something about taking action to end persecution. Sympathy is mere emotion, can be patronizing and paralyzing. If it leads to viewing the object of sympathy with an unrealistic exaltation, it can swell into self-righteousness.

"Compassionate conservative," as a label, draws scoffs and sneers from cynics who deem Republicans to be hard-hearted and callous (even if the cynic has done nothing for the poor himself). I've met thousands of kind-hearted, giving, generous, unselfish people vote GOP. There are millions more: note the affinities between conservative groups and charitable organizations. Republican people who would willingly sacrifice years of their life, or large chunks of their resources, to volunteer far from home or to contribute to help out the destitute, infirm, orphaned, sufferers in abject poverty.

But these same people believe in limited government and lower taxes. So they are considered uncompassionate.

Thus I've begun using the term "bleeding heart": not only because I want to represent a life of compassion and caring, but because the other label was weighted with political baggage, as though conservatives suddenly decided to slap on the label 'compassionate' because it looks good to the voters.
I strongly feel the same as a lot of liberals: the rich should help the less fortunate and downtrodden, the strong aid the weak. I think it is a sign of mental illness to buy a $3,000 watch (or a $200,000 car). I think it is hideous that 3rd-world laborers get pennies per day while a CEO, of the same company, who performs poorly, might get an 8-figure severance after he or she is fired.
I think companies should seek to have a diverse employee base at all levels, not have monochromatic upper management. We should all be open to the stranger or foreigner, live simply that others might simply live.
"To whom much has been given much shall be required." But where liberals and many of us in the Republican party agree on the ends, we disagree on the means.

I am a conservative because of my belief that government can't change these things via restrictive legislation and confiscatory taxes, without causing worse problems. The abridgement of freedom is just as deleterious to an open and fair society. The poor are suffer more in a bad economy than the rich, and capital-draining taxes do not strengthen economic growth.

Affirmative action is another great example: employers are taking steps to create a diverse work-force without needing a law: it's good business as well as a moral choice. They are taking initiative and hiring the best people for the job. Pres. Bush hired Condoleezza Rice since she was the most qualified. We don't need a law forcing a corporation to make a decision based solely upon a person's race: the better candidates will win-- there's every reason to believe, I should hope, they could be black or Hispanic!

And finally, can I really even fault the Rolex buyer? His puerile, ostentatious and over-priced status symbol put bread in the mouths of several dozen people, from the maker to the salesman to the shopkeeper.
On a personal level, extravagance is never healthy, creating silly indulgences and prodigality. In the final analysis, however, it's a private, spiritual decision: I'd rather have a free society with those excesses, than the alternative. And as long as there are "rich idiots looking to impress other rich idiots," the average citizen will have something to sell them.

Liberty is more important than equality.

2003-08-24T10:11:00.000-07:00

DON'T CALL US, WE'LL CALL YOU

How many times have you heard, "under President Bush, America has lost 2 million jobs"?

Hold the phone: are the ones screaming that every employment loss is directly attributable to Pres. Bush adamantly refusing to enter their phone numbers in the national Do Not Call registry? But what about those jobs?

The American Teleservices Association has petitioned the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver to review new Federal Communications Commission rules regarding the list. The group says the FCC rules are unconstitutional and could cost the nation 2 million jobs.

Interesting number.

Democrats support the 'Do Not Call' list. Not just by registering, but also by pushing for the legislation.

Will future speeches decrying the unemployment of millions "under this administration" note how many were telemarketing jobs ended through bipartisan and popular collaboration? Or will the fault always be Pres. Bush's?

2003-08-23T21:57:00.000-07:00

Saddam's al Qaeda Connection

THE ADMINISTRATION'S CRITICS, including several of the Democratic presidential candidates, have alluded to new "evidence" they say confirms Iraq and al Qaeda had no relationship before the war. They have not shared it.

Even as the critics withhold the basis for their allegations, evidence on the other side is piling up. Ansar al-Islam--the al Qaeda cell that operated out of northern Iraq before the war, attacking Kurdish enemies of Saddam--has stepped up its activities elsewhere in the country. Ansar is joining with remnants of Saddam's regime to attack Americans and nongovernmental organizations working in Iraq.

Farouk Hijazi, former Iraqi ambassador to Turkey and Saddam's longtime outreach agent to Islamic fundamentalists, has been captured. In his initial interrogations, Hijazi admitted meeting with senior al Qaeda leaders at Saddam's behest in 1994. According to administration officials familiar with his questioning, he has subsequently admitted additional contacts, including a meeting in late 1997.

The worst argument offered by the anti-liberation crowd as to why the world should allow the rapacious, murderous status quo in Iraq (in the name of peace and justice) was a riposte to allegations of terrorist ties to Baghdad: "Osama would never accept anything from Saddam, money or weapons."

Silly and counter-intuitive, I know, but these armchair analysts presumed to negate the very idea that a religious fundamentalist could ever work with a secular Ba'athist against a common enemy.
The profundity of such ignorance of recent Middle East history is breathtaking-- another example of a maniacally eager, desperate effort to invalidate the case against a fascist tyrant. Desite their belief in Al Qaeda's aversion to Iraq, recall that they somehow simultaneously expected a massive increase in terrorist recruitment, and huge sympathy from the Arab street.

They forget several things. First, the butcher of Baghdad "found religion," as he became an international pariah. He made a great show of religious observance. He may have even believed he was pious, for all we know.
Second, they forget ethnocentrism. It's not hard to find quotes such as this from Arab media:

Jordanian: Of course I support Saddam. He's Arab.
Interviewer: Well, there are good Arabs, and bad Arabs...
Jordanian: (scoffing) The worst Arab is better than the best American! Or Zionist. Or British.

Third: They had common goals: to elevate Arabs and Dar al Islam, to attack Israel, to attack America, to attack the West. This is a stronger by far than their differences, especially considering Saddam's representatives may have shown sincere religious fervor, winning over the fundamentalists.

Yeah, I know. It doesn’t prove the connections between Saddam Hussein and 9-11 yet; but he didn't mind if people thought he had one. Remember, UN inspectors were able to have seen this.

UPDATE: Remember old Moammar Qaddafi/Ghadafy (he of many spellings)? He was also a 'secular' despot, one which fundamentalists, if we apply the same logic as the anti-Bush cabal, would reject. Well, in the early 80's, Islamic terrorist groups set up 50 camps in Southern Libya.

2003-08-23T13:58:00.000-07:00

Palestinian Child Abuse

You hear a lot about how America's strong-armed tactics have squandered the good will of the world. That after the surge of sympathy post-terror attacks, we could have held onto it if we weren't so "arrogant."
Does that same logic apply to the Palestinians? Has their militarism squandered the world's sympathy?

It's hard to have hope.

I feel pity for these kids, and angry. If their parents would lay down the weapons, and deal with the Israelis in civilized negotiations, their lives would instantly improve. How can the Israelis deal with a commmunity calling for blood, whipping up jihad frenzy?

Consider that the Jerusalem bus bombing last week killed several infants. Consider that the Palestinians handed out sweets to each other in celebration.

2003-08-23T13:20:00.000-07:00

Old news, missed it before. Dearborn, MI Iraqis celebrated the deaths of Uday and Qusay --ptui!-- while the dems, press, and Al Jazeera gnashed their teeth and seethed.

"The Arab media still portray them as heroes, not the murderous criminals they really are," said Al-Hashimi, showing deep scars around his wrists, which he said were the result of torture when he was imprisoned for opposing Saddam's regime.

But where are the WMD's? blahblahblah

2003-08-23T12:23:00.000-07:00

"Once a man has been given the reputation of an early riser, he can sleep until noon." --Mark Twain

As I look at our main political parties, and their respective reputations (stereotypes?), it occurs to me that a democrat can get away with things that a Republican cannot.
Rockefeller and Kennedy come to mind: rich, greedy, indolent party boys, one of whom got kicked out of college. But give them the reputation of a "friend of the downtrodden," and they can be as self-indulgent as they like.

2003-08-23T11:57:00.000-07:00

2003-08-23T10:17:00.000-07:00

(Thank you to Jay Currie.)

Just in case you think this is a tasteless photo-shop joke or a "Protocols of the Elders of Zion"-type forgery, follow this link: Al Muhajiroun. Be sure to bring a barf bag.

Don't be afraid. Be angry. And then get busy. Pray for God to reform their twisted souls. Let your community know. This is not something to ignore.

2003-08-22T21:21:00.000-07:00

Another Question on Iraq

If you opposed the war, but would have supported it with UN approval, why do you not fault the UN for its unconscionable abandonment of the Iraqi people?

"Iraq is a sovereign nation."

Yes, with an unelected autocratic despot, who seized power in an illegal coup, bankrupting the populace and destroying lives and security in the region. No need to revisit his human rights abuses, I should hope.

So we did the morally right thing, but had no legal right to do it, eh?

2003-08-21T18:15:00.000-07:00

On willful misinterpretation of the 1st amendment

The Anti-Christian Leftist Union (ACLU) has struck again:

Fisking:
"I can't understand why someone would be in favor of this guy keeping his monument."

Well, some people believe in freedom of speech. Some people dislike hypocrisy.

What's on that "monument"?
Ideas. Words. Ancient law. The decalogue. Tradition.
I can't understand why this bothers anyone.
(And is it HIS monument?)

"when Federal Court, Federal Appeals Court, the Supreme Court and his own Court have all told him he can't"

When did they get the right to be so unfair? The Supreme Court has these same words on one of its walls. And the Supreme Court has not ruled on this issue at all-- they didn't hear the case.

" (and when the Constitution pretty clearly denies him the right to)."

I defy anyone to find the place in the Constitution that says judges have no freedom of speech. That says carvings with ideas are not allowed in a public place. That says the court has a right to remove another person's statue...

A curious concept of rights and freedom.

In the end, the reason the ACLU is dead wrong is this: many government facilities harbor statuary and monuments which are inscribed with text, some of which comes from >>horrors<< religious sources. Unless we apply a fair (or equally unfair) standard and remove ALL such horrific and frightening (to certain types) words, then it is grossly unfair to tell one judge that he must comply with an unconstitutional abridgement of his freedoms. It seems arbitrary.

The First Amendment states that "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof". That's it. Nowhere is there a prohibition against words, however derived, present in public places.

If Moore was a Hammurabic scholar and wanted to post Rosetta laws, you know what? Nobody WOULD CARE. Nobody would have sued to have them removed...

Which is, in the end, the entire point. The establishment clause does not mean that all religious ideas, words, and contexts are anathema on public property.

UPDATE: Several of you have pointed out that he is in breach of the law, and you're right. My statement here is the context of the case. I agree that he should comply with the law, and fight it in court on appeal. He should not defy the court order.

2003-08-21T17:16:00.000-07:00

The ultimate bleeding heart conservative case study

First, this is horrible. My condolences to the families that have lost loved ones.

Socialism is emotionally appealing but just doesn't work. It hurts the poor more than it helps. Here's proof, from Hawken:

Chirac Admits Health Care System was Flawed

''Everything will be done to correct the insufficiencies that we noted in our health system,'' the president said in an address after a Cabinet meeting on the heat that baked France in the first two weeks of August.
The minister for the elderly, Hubert Falco, said after the meeting that ''most probably'' 10,000 people died. That matched an estimate released a day earlier by France's largest chain of undertakers.
The heat wave, which saw temperatures go as high as 104, caused morgues and funeral homes to overflow with bodies, overwhelmed hospitals and prompted painful soul-searching about France's attitudes about the elderly.
-----
Some critics blamed families for abandoning elderly relatives alone at home while they took August vacations. Health workers blamed understaffing and underfunding at hospitals and retirement homes.
-------
He called the heat wave ''exceptional,'' echoing some government health officials who said little more could have been done to save lives in such extreme weather.
----

Chirac was vacationing in Canada during the heat wave -- his decision not to break off his vacation irked some of Chirac's opponents.
----

He also said emergency services would be given means to better deal with temporary crises. He stopped short, however, of saying whether the government — would give emergency services more funding.

France's medical system is widely regarded as one of the best in the world. But some health workers said it fell short in August because of a law which has restricted France's working week to 35 hours, which has led to staff shortages, and because hospital and retirement home workers were on holiday.

So. Temps of 104 degrees. A regularity in the Southern USA.

Does anyone want to tell me this would have happened here, in our capitalist "medical system"? The one the Dems condemn? (condemnocrats?)

Uh uh. Doesn't happen. Wouldn't happen.

This crisis of failure, this crisis of indolence and poor work ethics in France, is echoed to some degree by the USA education system. Too many teachers don't genuinely care about the students. But when they're slack, the students don't die of heat stroke.

Socialism just doesn't work.

2003-08-20T17:54:00.000-07:00

George Orwell: Pacifism and the War:This truth can never be repeated often enough.

I just created an updated, bowdlerized, modified version of Orwell's famous essay (original at above link), with apologies to Simon Blair:

Pacifism is objectively pro-terrorist. This is elementary common sense. If you hamper the war effort of one side you automatically help that of the other. In practice, ‘he that is not with me is against me’.
The idea that you can somehow remain aloof from, and superior to the struggle is a bourgeois illusion bred of money and security. Noam Chomsky remarks that ‘according to this type of reasoning, an Iraqi or Palestinian pacifist would be “objectively pro-Western”.’ But of course he would be! That is why pacifist activities are not permitted in those countries (in both of them the penalty is, or can be, beheading) while the Islamists, Palestinians and the Wahhabists do all they can to encourage the spread of leftist pacifism in European and American territories, such as through "Middle-Eastern Studies" at major universities. They would stimulate pacifism in Israel as well if they could, but in that case they have tougher babies to deal with.
In so far as it takes effect at all, pacifist propaganda can only be effective against those countries where a certain amount of freedom of speech is still permitted; in other words it is helpful to totalitarianism.

I am not interested in pacifism as a ‘moral phenomenon’. If Noam Chomsky and others imagine that one can somehow ‘overcome’ the Al Qaeda/HAMAS army by lying on one’s back, let them go on imagining it, but let them also wonder occasionally whether this is not an illusion due to security, too much money and a simple ignorance of the way in which things actually happen. It always makes me shout with laughter to hear, for instance, Gandhi named as an example of the success of non-violence. [why?] As long as twenty years ago it was cynically admitted in Anglo-Indian circles that Gandhi was very useful to the British government. [ooooh!] Despotic governments and terrorists can stand ‘moral force’ till the cows come home, believing there's is always the superior; what they fear is physical force.
But though not much interested in the ‘theory’ of pacifism, I am interested in the psychological processes by which pacifists who have started out with an alleged horror of violence end up with a marked tendency to be fascinated by the success and power of Islamic jihads. Even pacifists who wouldn’t own to any such fascination are beginning to claim that a Muslim victory is desirable in itself.

I object to the intellectual cowardice of people who are objectively and to some extent emotionally pro-terrorist, but who don’t care to say so and take refuge behind the formula ‘I am just as anti-Saddam or anti-terrorist as anyone, but—’. The result of this is that so-called peace propaganda is just as dishonest and intellectually disgusting as war propaganda. Like war propaganda, it concentrates on putting forward a ‘case’, obscuring the opponent’s point of view and avoiding awkward questions. The line normally followed is ‘Those who fight against terrorism go terrorist themselves.’ War is terrorism, after all, to them.
In order to evade the quite obvious objections that can be raised to this, the following propaganda-tricks are used:

1. The "terrorizing" processes occurring in America as a result of war are systematically exaggerated.

2. The actual record of terrorism, especially its pre-9/11 history, is ignored or pooh-poohed as ‘propaganda’. Discussion of what the world would actually be like if Islam dominated it is evaded.

3. Those who want to struggle against terrorist Islamics are accused of being wholehearted defenders of capitalist ‘democracy’. The fact that the rich everywhere tend to be pro-Fascist and the working class are nearly always anti-Fascist is hushed up.

4. It is tacitly pretended that the war is only between America and the rest of the world. Mention of Europe and Africa, and their fate if Islamic fascism is permitted to win, is avoided.

-----------

UPDATE: Remember, Orwell was anti-communist but a socialist. I only changed a few names and labels, hardly any text. He says socialist things, with which I don't agree, in places.

2003-08-20T17:15:00.000-07:00

MEMRI: Latest News of Hope in Iraq

The Arab Regimes are Shocked by the Prospect of a Successful Democracy in Iraq

In a scathing criticism of the Arab League, an editorial in the daily affiliated with the Kurdish Democratic Party says
"… since the fall of the Ba'athist regime, and the liberation of the Iraqi people from it, the Arab countries have not paid any attention to the economic, political, and security problems that the Iraqis face… But under international public opinion pressure, the Arab League established a committee to look into the horrific crimes and mass-graves in Iraq. But aside from the report about its establishment, we have not heard anything from the committee… Suddenly, the official Arab interest has escalated following the establishment of the Governing Council… and its statement about the preparations for a constitution, free general elections, and a legitimate government based on a democratic federal regime. [And] suddenly, the Committee started to check what is happening in Iraq as if it was surprised by the prospect that democracy could succeed in Iraq …"
Since the Arab regimes were incapable of dealing with the Coalition occupation in Iraq, they reverted to attacking the Governing Council and accusing it of treason.
"…This style is not alien to the local culture… the Arab countries (and the official policies of the Arab League) want any possible substitute in Iraq except democracy and free pluralism, meaning that the Iraqis should give up their aspirations for democracy… The Iraqis will not agree to this."

Was Iraq Independent? Did It Constitute a State?

Al-'Adala asks whether Iraq, prior to the war, was actually independent, or even constituted a state. The paper answers by saying:
"We don't believe that there is anyone in Iraq or the region, or even the world, who does not realize that the country was ruled by a gang, and not by a government. And this gang broke all religious and civic laws. It usurped power and did not come to it through elections. Since day one, and for three decades, Saddam's gang lacked legitimacy… Most countries used the slogan of 'non-interference in [other Arab] domestic issues' in order to deal with it. They ignored the fact that this terrorist regime used chemical and other WMD against the Iraqi people…"
The article continued with a list of crimes committed by the former regime and concluded
"Regretfully, there are countries that have been shedding crocodile tears about Iraq's freedom and independence, although Iraq – for more than thirty years – was neither free nor independent."

And in the same vein:

Al-Ittihad (the main Kurdish newspaper) deals with the crimes committed by the former regime, and says
"it seems that the cronies of the former despotic regime, and their deposed president at their head, are still deluding themselves… The Iraqis scorn his audio messages, broadcasted by dubious TV channels, which are still circling in his orbit. It seems that delusion accompanies him like a shadow, and he still believe in his evil soul that he has authority and prestige…"
The article describes a host of thefts committed by Saddam Hussein at the expense of the Iraqi people and says that the reason for these crimes is simple:
"The deposed dictator has proven that he was the leader of large bunch of hooligans whose task was to steal the country's money…" [11]

Sweeeet.

2003-08-20T17:01:00.000-07:00

"U.S. HAS HIGHEST ADULT IMPRISONMENT RATE in the world,” screamed the headline of a story in Monday’s Chicago Sun-Times.

This article buries the fact that the numbers include recidivism.

Inside the Leftist mind plays the 1938 movie “Angels with Dirty Faces.” Two juvenile delinquent kids are chased by the cops, and both try to escape by jumping a fence. One makes it, escapes punishment, and becomes a Roman Catholic priest played by Pat O’Brien. The other gets grabbed before he clears the fence, gets sent to learn crime from other delinquents in reform school, and becomes a gangster played by James Cagney.

The only difference between them, liberals believe, is that one got caught and was sent spiraling downward – as so many African-Americans are by prison experience and its blot on their job resume – while the other equally-criminal youngster outran police and became a veritable saint. The politically-correct subtext is that we are beneficiaries or victims of fate or luck or other forces beyond our control.

The delinquent that became a priest made a choice, one that he might have made after going into the justice system. The delinquent that was caught may well have committed more crimes even if he'd never been prosecuted.

That said, everyone has hope. For any crime other than murder, rape or molestation, the convict should be given a second chance.

2003-08-20T15:31:00.000-07:00

Marduk reminds us of how hypocritical and unprincipled the "intifadeh" is.

To think that a group called the "Al Aqsa Martyr's Brigade" got its start when Ariel Sharon visited the Temple Mount. The horror! A Jew walked on a piece of ground and looked inside a building!

The Middle East conflict: It's not about land. It's not about "oppression." It's certainly not about apartheid.

It's about religion. It is about a proxy war by defeated nations looking to salvage their honor and alleviate cognitive dissonance after a tiny nation overcame 5 Arab states that attacked it on the day of its birth.

2003-08-19T13:16:00.000-07:00

CHARITY OF THE DAY

Then again, it's hardly charity when you give back to someone to whom you owe so much...

2003-08-19T13:12:00.000-07:00

A joke that is more sad than funny
From a recent Jerusalem Post editorial

"Cannibals capture three hunters an American, a Briton, and an Israeli," begins a classic Israeli joke. The first two hunters make last requests typical to their nationalities, then it is the Israeli's turn. He asks that he be punched in the face.

The surprised cannibal grants the wish, at which point the Israeli pulls out a gun, shoots the chief, and frees himself and his friends. The American and Briton, furious, demand to know why he prolonged their terrifying experience when he had the power to free them all. The Israeli replies: "What? Are you mad? The UN would have condemned me as the aggressor."

From Shark Blog

2003-08-19T12:59:00.000-07:00

Growing Leftist and Middle Eastern Hatred

The new version of anti-Semitism, that of the Muslims and leftists, integrate these images into a new paradigm, depicting Jews not as outcasts within Western society but new world-class oppressors of the poor and downtrodden. This is an appeal far more likely to disarm liberals and leftists and even win their sympathy than the older forms of anti-Semitism that presumed a Jewish community of marginalized victims. As a result, the new anti-Semitism is much harder to counter by traditional methods that rely on exposure, education and shame.

Amen.