The OIF Scorecard

We're still winning. Ace has this, noting the big-time captures of some senior Al-Qaeda terrorists.

Loseritis

Al Gore just won't shut up. He gets nuttier each year, nuttier by the second, even. I'd wager if the local electric company could rig an electric meter to measure his insanity-expansion-rate, it'd be spinning too fast too read. Here, in the Guardian, Gore exposes once more how much of an idiot he is:

Denying that his politics have shifted to the left since he lost the court battle for the 2000 election, Mr Gore says: "If you have a renegade band of rightwing extremists who get hold of power, the whole thing goes to the right."

That election loss still stings, I'm guessing.

But still, as if they just don't get it over there, the press wonders if this multi-time presidential wanna-be/loser is considering another go at it. Of course, they read our media, so they don't realize how out of touch the media in the US is with the actual citizenry.

But he claims he does not "expect to be a candidate" for president again, while refusing explicitly to rule out another run. Asked if any event could change his mind, he says: "Not that I can see."

That's because he sees the writing on the wall, which is written in hysterical scare caps: "You're a full-on tinfoil-hat-wearing cracker and everybody knows it." Riven with a bad case of loseritis, sad Al is only looking to remain in the headlines and do whatever damage he can to the United States and, specifically, Shrimpy W. Hallihitler.

Good luck, loser.

Severing Connections

You get to this point in your life, put the knife down, go to the nearest bar, have a drink and think things over. I mean, you cut that off, your wife will leave just as surely as if you were having an affair.

The Inconvenient Truth

Tim Blair notes the complex nature of the relationship between Al Gore and the environment, and how that generally mirrors leftist anti-thought. Key is this observation about Gore:

* Climate guy Dr. Robert C. Balling Jr: “The Kyoto Protocol was negotiated in December 1997, giving the Clinton-Gore administration more than three years to present it to the Senate for ratification. Given Gore’s knowledge and passion for global warming, you wonder why the vice president didn’t seize on the opportunity of a lifetime?”

You might want to read that paragraph again just so it sinks in. Then click over for some more.

The Philly Fanatics

The journalists at Philadelphia's two major newspapers are no doubt in deep shock and denial over the acquisition of their papers by a man from the public relations business. The NYT does a piece on it, in which it tries to make incoming CEO Brian Tierney look like a likely hamfisted neophyte who doesn't and can't understand what a newspaper is and will screw it up in the end. No doubt the liberal scribes at both those institutions fear a swing to the right in editorial policy, the loss of a "liberal" voice to promote Democratic Party and transnational progressivist policies, denounce Bush on a daily basis and generally advocate against America.

Hugh Hewitt does a nice analysis of the piece and notes the slants and lies of the NYT piece, where he notes "And [NYT writer Kathrine Q.] Seeyle is careful to warn Tierney that the gods and goddesses of Big Journalism would be watching his every step."

Idiots Rule

The Republicans in the state house just don't get it, despite having had their numbers culled in the recent primaries. How does one know they don't get it? By this:

One House Republican compared Perzel (R., Phila.) and his leadership team to "George Custers."

"I have some major concerns with those who led us into this ambush, with those who led us into this slaughter, with the George Custers who led us into this massacre," said Rep. Will Gabig (R., Cumberland), who fended off a GOP primary challenger.

"The question now is do we continue with the same people who got us here and hope for the best in November, hope more people don't get their heads taken off, or do we make changes?"

That Gabig is still asking himself this question at the end of May is telling, since he's obviously hoping the system can stay the way it is and he can live high off the hog. If I lived in Cumberland, I'd vote for his Democratic opponent, just because. Indeed, though Democrats in general are a bankrupt party, they are little more than harmless as controllers of the Harrisburg power levers. Little more, but still.

Why should Pennsylvanians throw any incumbent out? Because of this:

Rep. Daryl D. Metcalfe (R., Butler) blames Perzel and other leaders for giving in to the agenda of the Democratic governor and not only allowing votes on bills but also engaging in arm twisting to get members to sign onto unpalatable proposals such as the tax increase of 2003, legalization of slots in 2004, and the legislative pay raise of 2005.

Right there, you have the reasons I'm voting against incumbents:

1. Tax increase.
   
2. Slots.
   
3. Pay raise.

I'm not exactly sure how elected members of the state government understand their jobs, but I can't believe they just willingly break down into Democratic and Republican sides and then figure, "Gosh, I'll do whatever the leader of my party says I should do." But, apparently, that's the way the idiots rule the state.

In reality, they're members of a political party that believes certain things, but they represent the residents of a specific area. If the residents of an area don't support those specific things, then regardless of what the "party leadership" says, the representatives are bound to represent their constitutents. And, I'm going to go out on a limb here, I don't think anyone in the state wanted a tax increase, slots parlors and pay raise for legislators.

If you disagree, well, there's the comments.

The Babykillers

Only, err, not at all. Not us, anyway. We're the good guys. Sometimes, it's hard to believe a significant minority of citizens -- and much of the media -- doesn't think so. Well, click over and take a look.

Add Russia to the Axis of Evil?

Well, Russia certainly isn't acting in the best interests of the US these last few years, if ever it were truly moving toward democracy and capitalism and liberalism. But aiding and abetting Saddam Hussein:

Just recently, Saddam Hussein's former southern regional commander, Gen. Al-Tikriti, gave the first videotaped testimony confirming that Iraq had WMDs up to the American invasion in 2003 and that Russia helped remove them prior to the war. His testimony confirms numerous other sources that have pointed to Russia's secret alliance with Iraq and the co-ordinated moving of WMDs before the American liberation. Today we've invited three experts on this subject to discuss the details of Al-Tikriti's testimony and its larger significance.

Take with grain of salt.

The Oh So Intelligent Left

This comment to this post is spot on:

The naivity of the world's most cynical decision makers never seizes to amaze. That article reads like something The Onion, which is a worry to say the least.

Naivity? Nope.
Seizes to amaze? Surprisingly, people have misheard "ceases to amaze" many times.

I mean, what the hell would "seizes to amaze" mean, in this "never" context? I mean, translated into normal, he's saying "the naivete of the world's most cynical decision makers never ceases to amaze," which in the common tongue is translated as "the inexperience of the world's most selfishly calculating decision makers never ceases to amaze me."

But what he's saying translates as "the [made-up word] of the world's most self-interested decision makers never takes [me] to wonder."

Theoretical Tony Blair Assassination

For a certain type of unthinking, uncaring, progressive moonbat, the liberation of Iraq is all about the accidental deaths of Iraqi civilians and how the US/UK invasion caused those deaths, and therefore the war is unjust and immoral. Never, not once, do these assclowns pause to consider the sheer number of lives saved by the removal of Saddam's brutal, opppressive, rape-happy regime.

Never do the anti-war people consider the good that is done, the evil that has been eliminated. Never. They just blather on about the death of Iraqi civilians, the deaths of US servicemen, the illegal war, blah blah blah. They just don't get it.

But as we see here, it's perfectly fine for some tinfoil hat type to equate the assassination of a leading politician in the West with justice of a global, karmic order. But if someone called for his assassination? You know, just in theory, as a parlor game kind of "what if" scenario.

Just saying.

More About Katrina and the Waves ... err, Media

Glenn Reynolds links to continuing bad news about the Hurricane Katrina coverage, which I will link to. And, of course, note this observation about the media coverage:

But what they learned was that if they all shouted lies in unison they could drive Bush down in the polls.

That's all that counts to the media these days.

Hurricane Katrina's Brutal Truths

The media blew the coverage of Katrina. Or, more likely, intentionally mis-reported what went on in order to make Bush look like a foolish loser incapable of responding. Not that it was his job to respond. Lou Dolinar at Real Clear Politics has more:

In the end, the media timeline was exactly backwards. The bulk of all rescues took place on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, and began tapering off on Thursday, officials say. Their account is buttressed by a Washington Post poll of survivors, which indicates that 75 percent of the survivors who had been trapped and rescued were picked by Thursday, and virtually all were picked up by the end of the week.

In other words, by the time the clichéd "long-awaited help" arrived, in the form of a visually-stimulating cigar being chomped by a cussing Lt. General Russel L. Honore, the worst was over. The majority of trapped survivors were out of the direst straits and awaiting evacuation.

Sadly, you can't trust the mainstream media to get it right. You probably never could have, but back when, we didn't know.

The Phony Winter Soldier

Wow. The lengths that a certain kind of person will go to to try and undermine their country. Jeff Goldstein wonders:

if this “interview” is confirmed as the fake it appears to be (oops—it’s interviews, evidently) is it okay—and I ask only because, you know, I want to know the rules, is all—is it okay now to question the “patriotism” of those who’d lie about the behavior of our soldiers and commanders in order to undermine support for the war?

The clown really works at a Wendy's, apparently. And he fancied himself Ranger material.

The Ultimate Endorsement

Want to ensure your career as a politician fails miserably? Get the right endorsement.

Tim Blair:

Ned: (sighs, looks with disgust into camera) I’m Ned Lamont, and apparently I’m living in a some kind of time-folding, moron-infested parallel universe.

He's currently something like 0-19, yet there are still suckers out there who think Markos "Kos" Moulitsas knows something about politics, America, or reality.

Racial Profiling is Good

I hadn't heard about this, but mostly because I'd been away from the news for most of the weekend, which is always a blessing. But, more surprising than the fact that two Saudis boarded a public school bus and weren't immediately accosted by the students and bus driver is the fact that there are dimwits like David Johnson who believe that all these years after 9/11 we are supposed to not take national origin and coincidence into the decision-making process. You know, if Arabs board a school bus in the US, something is wrong, not just misunderstood. And, in either case, everyone else should stop what they're doing and act, now.

Additionally interesting is dimbulb MJ's comment to the post, in which he/she pretends to be sensitive to the situation because of the "race" of the Arabs, and then phonily intones the notion that, technically speaking, the Saudi's are US allies -- I thought Saudi Arabia was supposed to be our "friend." -- in the GWOT.

Jackasses like these two will only get more of us killed in the long run.

That Whole Culture of Corruption Meme

They're all corrupt, at some level. Everybody has a price. In the Congress, that price is ridiculously low.

The Illegal Immigrant Illusion

Well, all our politicians are leading us to ruin on this one. The terms of the debate are phony; the talking points false; and those in charge of solving the problem aren't interested in solving it. All sides are triangulating:

from the Associated Press:

Mexico warned Tuesday it would file lawsuits in U.S. courts if National Guard troops detain migrants on the border.

On what basis? Posse Comitatus? It's unconstitutional to use the U.S. military against foreign nationals before they've had a chance to break into the country and become fine upstanding members of the Undocumented-American community?

I'm guessing that Congress is figuring the citizens of this republic won't notice because they're too busy doing other things. And this right here is a priceless confirmation of this sentiment:

Sen. John McCain, in a quintessentially McCainiac contribution to the debate, angrily denied that the Senate legislation was an "amnesty." "Call it a banana if you want to," he told his fellow world's greatest deliberators. "To call the process that we require under this legislation amnesty frankly distorts the debate and it's an unfair interpretation of it."

He has a point. Technically, an "amnesty" only involves pardoning a person for a crime rather than, as this moderate compromise legislation does, pardoning him for a crime and also giving him a cash bonus for committing it. In fact, having skimmed my Webster's, I can't seem to find a word that does cover what the Senate is proposing, it having never previously occurred to any other society in the course of human history.

The more I learn about the process, the more disgusted with the government I become. As I've said before, first we build a wall and guard it. Then, we figure out how to get rid of the illegals who need gotten rid of, and how to assimilate the ones that need assimilated. But keeping them all and giving them money on top?

The only problem is we can't vote them all out of office. And vote nobody in.

Iran: Member of Axis of Evil

Read this post and make sure to click the video link. This is what real torture looks like, not the phony "torture" the Western media says the US is performing on terrorists and illegal combatants held in Guantanamo and elsewhere.

And there are people out there who think the US should negotiate diplomatically with Iran. As if.

Quagmire in Iraq?

Oh, yeah, and it's sucking people in:

For some time now, all have been pointing in an unequivocally positive direction.

The first sign is refugees. When things have been truly desperate in Iraqin 1959, 1969, 1971, 1973, 1980, 1988, and 1990long queues of Iraqis have formed at the Turkish and Iranian frontiers, hoping to escape. In 1973, for example, when Saddam Hussein decided to expel all those whose ancestors had not been Ottoman citizens before Iraqs creation as a state, some 1.2 million Iraqis left their homes in the space of just six weeks. This was not the temporary exile of a small group of middle-class professionals and intellectuals, which is a common enough phenomenon in most Arab countries. Rather, it was a departure en masse, affecting people both in small villages and in big cities, and it was a scene regularly repeated under Saddam Hussein.

Since the toppling of Saddam in 2003, this is one highly damaging image we have not seen on our television setsand we can be sure that we would be seeing it if it were there to be shown. To the contrary, Iraqis, far from fleeing, have been returning home. By the end of 2005, in the most conservative estimate, the number of returnees topped the 1.2-million mark. Many of the camps set up for fleeing Iraqis in Turkey, Iran, and Saudi Arabia since 1959 have now closed down. The oldest such center, at Ashrafiayh in southwest Iran, was formally shut when its last Iraqi guests returned home in 2004.

And yet, somehow, the mainstream media and the Democratic Party pronounce the Operation Iraqi Freedom a failure that needs to be abandoned now.

The Pundit is Flat

Why I don't bother reading Thomas Friedman of the NYT. Plus, he's got a moustache.

In Name Only

Now, I'm Catholic only in name only, that being that I was raised that way, went through all the ceremonies and traditions, and then dumped them all when I moved out of the house and went to college. I never believed, but only because I didn't believe specifically in the Catholic religion. If there's a God, I'm agnostic on the issue. I can't be urged enough to believe or disbelieve, though, to be sure, I'd prefer a univese with a God than one without. You know: it would give some sorta meaning to the whole enterprise.

But I often forget that there are still people out there who hate Catholics:

Since I began column writing, I regularly receive calls and mail from anti-Catholic bigots.

The most recent is a caller on voice mail who venomously complains there are too many Catholics on the U.S. Supreme Court. He calls American Catholic schools “a madrassa system,” which should be “eliminated

He continues: “All these Catholics in this country came from poor Catholic-controlled countries — Poland, Italy, Ireland and now Mexico. Why did they leave them? Because [their governments] don't work, especially the failed Catholic experiments in South America and Mexico. That's why they're pouring over the [southern] borders. The pope tells them to produce more Catholics than they can feed so they can send them up north where the white Anglo Saxons can feed them.”

Err, ahem. I went through the Catholic-controlled education system and wasn't brainwashed to "produce more Catholics" as a method of taking over the country. Or, maybe I was, seeing as I have two children. But the notion the pope controls Catholics in the voting booth (or anywhere) is laughable in extremis in 2006.

Retention & Re-enlistment

Despite the continuous, non-stop, deafening anti-war, anti-military drumbeats of the U.S. media, the U.S. military has been doing just fine on the recruitment and retention fronts:

In the last seven months, the U.S. Army has met or exceeded all of its recruiting goals. In that time, over 160,000 people have enlisted, or re-enlisted. The total strength of the active duty and reserve forces are 1.2 million men and women, all of them volunteers.

Except for a few months in 2004-5, the military has been able to maintain its strength, despite wartime conditions. The biggest problem has not been casualties (only about 10,000 soldiers have been killed or disabled so far, less than one percent of overall strength), but the disruption to family life caused by so many troops getting sent to combat zones. This discouraged re-enlistments in reserve units, although mainly among the non-combat troops. In combat units, re-enlistments were at record levels.

The media just keeps getting it wrong: ":When the media does address the recruiting situation, it is dismissed as not relevant. The troops are described as not "getting the big picture," or worse." It's the media that doesn't get the big picture, of course.

Another Reason French People Suck

In France, they name streets after cop killers. The Mumia Abu-Jamal stuff is so nonsensical it leads to outrage when you hear about this kind of crap. But what's even more outrageous is that this happened here in Philadelphia, and even the Phinqy can't play straight with the facts:

Abu-Jamal, a former Philadelphia journalist, Black Panther member, and critic of police brutality, has maintained his innocence.

No mention of this to counter-balance the murderer's claims:

According to police, Jamal fired three or four more shots at the prone Faulkner and, at some point during the incident, Faulkner managed to fire once at Jamal, striking him in the right side of the chest.

Yeah, that's from the Phinqy, too. Makes the entire "framed" scenario moot, doesn't it? But in France, the guy gets a street named after him. And in Philadelphia, some craven journalist refuses to note the facts indicating Jamal's guilt for fear of offending some PC sensibilities. He's "maintained his innocence?" So what?

He's a murderer. You can call him that without fear.

Bush's Numbers

Polls don't mean much of anything. They only kinda sorta detect anything, and predict nothing. If they asked me, depending on the question, I'd probably say I disapprove of Bush's something policy. But this kind of crap is idiocy designed to manipulate the public into believing in something that isn't:

Americans have a bleaker view of the country's direction than at any time in more than two decades, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News poll. Sharp disapproval of President Bush's handling of gasoline prices has combined with intensified unhappiness about Iraq to create a grim political environment for the White House and Congressional Republicans.

First off, Americans do not have a bleaker view of the country's direction than at any time in more than two decades, that is just an out-and-out lie. Second, the price of gasoline has absolutely nothing to do with Bush. Nothing. Gas is a commodity controlled by market forces. Period. Bush couldn't do anything about the price if he wanted to, and he wants to.

Are the Republicans headed for trouble in November? Maybe. That's what the media wants you to believe, anyway, and the MSM is spinning hard to sell you that line. This bit of analysis is partly interesting:

This decline is fundamentally not a matter of PR or press bias but of policy and the philosophy behind it. Bush and the Republican Congress have had a difficult time selling themselves to the public because their policies have not been appealing. They have adhered to a philosophy, big-government conservatism, that has finally alienated nearly everyone. The War on Terror delayed the effects of this alienation for several years, but ultimately the Bush administration's errors and Congress's addiction to big spending -- which was based on this big-government conservative philosophy -- alienated both those outside the party, first, and then a great proportion of Republicans themselves.

I'd say a great deal of the decline is a matter of PR and press bias. Bush has notoriously bad PR and the media absolutely hate the guy and will not give him a break, or honest analysis. But the part about the failure of big government conservatism to catch on is telling, because it's true. While both the executive and legislative branches of government are to blame, it's not the fault of either, exclusively. Plus, the Democrats are equally complicit, since they're the champions of big government and excessive spending.

But does this equal disaster at the polls in November? I'd say not, since the Democrats haven't been able to come up with any policy or position that isn't merely anti-Bush, and that's not going to sell well in the marketplace of ideas. Additionally, Republicans and conservatives aren't likely to stay at home and sulk just because the MSM says that's what's likely to happen given their disatisfaction with choices, because they know doing so dooms the country. It's more likely that the Republicans will retain control of both houses and have to start dealing with an internal ideological struggle over what conservativism is vis a vis Republicanism. But, unlike the ongoing struggle for the heart and soul of the Democratic Party, there are actual ideas and points-of-view to fight over in the Republican Party.

The New New War

"War, what is it good for?

Absolutely nothing, say it again:"

voters would say there is no war; it's just a lot of fearmongering got up by Bush and Cheney to distract from the chads they stole in Florida or whatever. And they're right -- if, by "war," you mean tank battles in the North African desert and air forces bombing English cities night after night. But today no country in the world can fight that kind of war with America. If that's all "war" is, then (once more by definition) there can be no war. If you seek to weaken, demoralize and bleed to death the United States and its allies, you can only do it asymmetrically -- by killing thousands of people and then demanding a criminal trial, by liaising with terrorist groups in Afghanistan and Pakistan and then demanding the government cease inspecting your phone records.

It's all in your perspective. And this war has about twenty more years of fighting to it.

The Talking Cure

Now, I've already said we're currently at war with Iran, the only thing not warlike about this war is that we're not actually shooting anybody on a daily basis. And along comes Matthew Yglesias with this brave new idea:

It'd be dumb to just take the Iranian government at its word, but there's no denying that they're trying to open a discussion and, frankly, it would be insane of us not to give this path a shot. Bush's view that talking to "evil" regimes is bad because it legitimizes them is silly and it's going to be completely impossible for us to get any international support for anything at all if we're seen as ignoring diplomatic initiatives. What's more, it's at least possible that direct talks could lead to a satisfactory resolution of the situation.

Now, lemme see, the Europeans have been holding talks on a weekly basis with the Iranians for years, in an attempt to solve this problem, and so far ... nothing. And, curiously, Yglesias believes that if the US sends an envoy to join the talks, it'd be at least theoretically possible to reach a "satisfactory resolution," whatever that would be. But what's really telling is the cavalier attitude Yglesias takes toward the nature of "evil," as he phrases it, as if there is no evil in the world, and the insinuation that people who believe in evil are silly people.

And, typical of people with Yglesias' mindset, he urges talking our differences out, but doesn't offer a single talking point to begin with. All talk, no action.

And no ideas.

Ma Bell & Uncle Sam

I don't know whether I even believe this story. There's no actual quotes by any actual people who can be asked if they said what they said. Is it true? Maybe. Is it agitprop ginned up by some anti-Bushie looking for some way to make Bush & Co. bad? Maybe.

But if it is true, then it is shameful of USA Today not to include some real names of the true patriots who stand for freedom and the veracity of their information and truth-telling and speaking-truth-to-power by disclosing this program to the nation. I mean, if this is true, and the officials mean to do good by disclosing it, do they not have the courage of their convictions? If it is true, why do they fear being known for their claims? If it is true, and the program is, perhaps, bad/illegal, are these anonymous sources not protected by the law and the justness of their claims?

If it is true, why are the people disclosing the nature of the program afraid to stand tall and accuse?

The Man with No Plan

Now, this is just great:

Mr. Swann, a Republican, has called for fundamental but unspecified changes in the state's property tax system.

So far, Swann has stood for nothing and, so far as I can tell, not proposed anything. Things stay this way, I have to pull a lever for Candidate #3, whoever that might be.

When Officials Decide

I don't know about you, but a Scores strip club is about as important to me as a $750,000 condo. In the sense that I will never have a use/need for either. But I don't know why city officials would automatically think that the future residents of those unbuilt, hoped-for $3/4-million condos would't want an upscale strip club featuring the hottest of the hot babes baring their G-strings and pasties in the middle of the neighborhood.

If the choice is abandoned factory vs. fancy shmancy strip club, which would you choose? Me? I choose nekkid chicks over empty factory every time.

But the obviously noticeable bit is that none of these city officials are worried about the poor or middle class being able to afford housing in the up-and-coming NoLib area of the city. They're worried about the rich being offended by a strip joint. Right. Nice.

And, no, I couldn't care less about them, either. I'm just saying.

Deep Thoughts

Duncan "Atrios" Black takes a crack at listing the things he'd do if he were in charge of America. Tax, spend, over-regulate. Jeff Goldstein smacks D"A"B up pretty good with this post, noting:

Not surprisingly, Atrios ("DID I MENTION THAT I SHARED A WINE COOLER WITH JANEANE GAROFALO? OPEN THREAD!") wants the feds to control our medical choices and collect more of our money in taxes (after all, who better to decide how our money should be dispersed than our betters), while he is all for allowing the courts to issue judicial fiats that circumvent the wishes of voters, so long as they have the happy effect of reaching the “proper” conclusions— “proper” here being synonymous with “what progressives have decided is just, regardless of what the knuckledragging, racist, homophobic, misogynist cousin-fuckers in flyover country think. Because let’s face it, if those paste-eating morons didn’t have the franchise, this representative democracy of ours would run a whole lot better, I can tell you that much.”

And then there's this from John Hawkins of Right Wing News:

It's also worth noting that there's nothing in there about illegal immigration, deficit spending, the Kyoto Protocol, or the International Criminal Court. Furthermore, Atrios skips all the tough foreign policy issues. Could that be because Democrats become completely paralyzed when they have to deal with serious national security issues? Could it be because it's more important to liberals to have the French and Kofi Annan happy with us than to protect America? Indeed, it could!

But, don't get me wrong: I applaud Atrios for having the courage to put forth even this partial agenda. If only the Democrats running for office would be this straightforward and honest about what they believe, the country would be better off....mainly because there would be a lot less Democrats who'd be elected.

I think the country would be better off if there were serious Democratic candidates with serious ideas about how to deal with the Republican agenda (which, currently, isn't very conservative in the ways I'd like it to be, since it seems to be more about keeping Republicans in control rather than bettering America).

Imperialism Claims Rebuked

From time to time, mostly in commenting elsewhere, I shout down the idiots who spout out moronic nonsense about US "imperialism" in the world. We're not taking over any countries or anything even remotely like it. Far from it, in fact. And here comes Mark Steyn with the artillery rounds:

The UN and other transnational agencies were mostly designed by America at the dawn of the American era and continue to be funded principally by America to this day. Yet they're such an explicit rejection of American values that their language can't even embrace such routine American activities as private philanthropy.

One understands why our commentators viscerally recoil when the prime minister says "God bless Canada." It strikes their ears as the language of an alien culture. Now think about how the Americans feel listening to UN and EU panjandrums: the assumptions of their language are equally alien to American ears. That's a sad comment in an age of supposedly unprecedented American power. But the U.S. has left its cultural imperialism, like its aid, mostly in private hands. All across the globe there are young men in Yankees caps and Star Wars T-shirts eating Big Macs and listening to Snoop Dogg--and many of them hate America. In the end, the world can do without American rap and American cheeseburgers. American ideas on individual liberty, federalism, capitalism and freedom of speech would be far more helpful.

It's going to be a lonely world for the US in a couple of decades if someone doesn't figure out how to turn things around.

Eurabia's Uncomfortable Problem

One foot in the grave, Europe still doesn't want to come to terms with its Muslim problem and, oddly, seems to be shooing out those moderate Muslims trying to point the problem out:

But here is the grave and sad news. After being forced into hiding by fascist killers, Ayaan Hirsi Ali found that the Dutch government and people were slightly embarrassed to have such a prominent "Third World" spokeswoman in their midst. She was first kept as a virtual prisoner, which made it almost impossible for her to do her job as an elected representative. When she complained in the press, she was eventually found an apartment in a protected building. Then the other residents of the block filed suit and complained that her presence exposed them to risk. In spite of testimony from the Dutch police, who assured the court that the building was now one of the safest in all Holland, a court has upheld the demand from her neighbors and fellow citizens that she be evicted from her home. In these circumstances, she is considering resigning from parliament and perhaps leaving her adopted country altogether. This is not the only example that I know of a supposedly liberal society collaborating in its own destruction, but I hope at least that it will shame us all into making The Caged Virgin a best seller.

That's Hitch in Salon. Click to read the whole thing. Click here to buy the book at Amazon.

Addicted to the Template

They just can't help themselves:

Mercer County town mourns first war loss since Vietnam

Tuesday, May 09, 2006

By Chico Harlan, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

JAMESTOWN, Pa. -- The single yellow bow hugging a big tree in front of a small house explained the sacrifice. The nine cars outside, parked in sequence, explained the loss.

The soldier who grew up there, Sgt. David Veverka, 25, died Saturday in Iraq when his military vehicle was rocked by an explosion, said his father, Ronald. An Army officer appeared at the small house's front door hours later -- roughly 2:30 Sunday morning, Ronald Veverka said -- releasing a flood of grief into a town whose touchstone values Sgt. Veverka single-handedly embodied.

This war ain't no Vietnam. It was never Vietnam. It will never mimic Vietnam. Stop comparing it to Vietnam. But the media seems to be on some endless quest to make it so.

But, more to the point, is the Post-Gazette going to write a story about each and every town that experiences a soldier's death in the current war? If so, could it please explain why individual soldier's deaths are somehow momentous events requiring full stories in the paper detailing the death of the soldier?

The UN Solution

Someone, quick, tell me how the UN is going to solve the Darfur problem:

KALMA CAMP, Sudan May 8 The United Nations evacuated aid workers and journalists visiting this vast, restive camp for displaced people in Darfur today amid a huge demonstration that suddenly turned violent during a visit by a top United Nations official.

Protestors demanding quick international intervention in Darfur tried to stab an aid worker they suspected of being a government spy. They then approached an African Union compound where eight unarmed soldiers barricaded themselves inside.

So, a top UN representative shows up, chaos ensues, and unarmed soldiers have to hide from the danger created. Uh-hunh. That'll enforce the peace, soldiers without weapons. I guess this is some new kind of outreach program, perhaps called soldats sans frontières.

Hey, if it works for doctors and reporters...

Institutional Opposition

The opposition to appointing Gen. Michael Hayden as the new CIA chief, described in this WaPo article as receiving "heavy criticism" from Republicans, is little more than reportorial spin to try to pretend that Hayden is opposed by the president's party and make the WaPo look "neutral" by leaning heavily on Republican sources.

Read the article and you won't find any criticism of Hayden other than rampant speculation of the generic "may not be the right candidate" kind. May not be. May be. Who knows? Nobody in this article, that's for sure. But you have a reporter working hard to portray the choice of a four star general as possibly a bad idea, with nobody coming even remotely close as to giving a supporting reason.

Republican chairmen of the House and Senate intelligence panels raised serious concerns Sunday about Hayden, with Rep. Peter Hoekstra (R-Mich.) calling him "the wrong man at the wrong place at the wrong time."

That's as specific as the WaPo gets, and about as specific as anybody on the morning news shows gets. Somehow, being a general is a nebulous disqualifier, perhaps especially in a Bush Administration. As usual in stories like these, there are also no counter-proposals on the table; the story is always just how the Bushies got it wrong, again.

Don't Know Nothing About Trends

My guess on stories like this one in the Phinqy is that if reporters and Democrats say this kind of stuff often enough, they think it'll come true. I don't.

With the Iraq war forcing other issues to the sidelines and Republicans abandoning conservative principles, former Rep. Patrick J. Toomey says there is a "distinct possibility" the GOP could lose control of one or both houses of Congress.

As I've already noted, I think the average American already realizes what it would mean to the country over either house to the Democrats, and I think they all realize the chaos and disorder to turn would be catostrophic for America.

See, the trick here for the reporter is to find a "conservative" or Republican doubter and write a story about that person's doubts, buoyed with poll data and such. But this kind of story isn't actual reporting on the situation so much as trying to lay the groundwork to put the situation in place, an attempt to create despair and disorder among Republicans and hopefully keep them from the polls in November.

The problem for Democrats here is that since they don't stand for anything, have nothing to propose doing, nobody is going to vote for the antiwar, anti-American party that merely hates Shrimpy W. Hallihitler and wants to censure/impeach/execute him. And that's sad, because there are lots of reasons to vote against Republicans, just none of them have to do with Iraq or the war on terror. You get Democrats on America's side, you'd get voters on the Democrat's side. I think come November, it will be the Democratic voters who, depressed and disappointed with the crop of pols they have to pick from, will stay home, demoralized, watching CNN.

The Law Enforcement Option Outcome

"America, you lose," said Zacarias Moussaoui as he was led away from the court last week.

He gets life in a SuperMax prison, at taxpayer expense. He should've gotten a .303 round to the brainpan while tied to a wooden pole in a narrow dirt yard surrounded by concrete blocks and barbed wire. No blindfold.

We need to hunt the terrorists down and kill them, not prosecute them:

On the afternoon of Sept. 11, as the Pentagon still burned, Donald Rumsfeld told the president, "This is not a criminal action. This is war."

That's still the distinction that matters. By contrast, after the 2005 London bombings, Boris Johnson, the Conservative member of Parliament, wrote a piece headlined "Just Don't Call It War." Johnson objected to the language of "war, whether military or cultural . . . Last week's bombs were placed not by martyrs nor by soldiers, but by criminals."

That difference determines your credibility, your willfulness, in the face of the age's greatest enemy: Islamofascism. You either believe they're coming for you, your family, your way of life; or, you believe it's a rag-tag fringe group incapable of doing much than irritating you and killing a handful every once-in-a-while.

You believe the latter, you'll be dead.

House, DC

On the one hand, I think having different parties controlling different houses of government would be a good thing, as it would force compromise and ensure little damage is done to the US by the government, because there would be little compromise and much inaction.

On the other, giving either legislative house to the Democrats at this point in time would be an extremely bad idea, given that they are almost guaranteed to start "investigations" and "commissions" that would try to expose how the Bush administration did nefarious/bad/illegal things:

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (Calif.) said in an interview last week that a Democratic House would launch a series of investigations of the Bush administration, beginning with the White House's first-term energy task force and probably including the use of intelligence in the run-up to the invasion of Iraq. Pelosi denied Republican allegations that a Democratic House would move quickly to impeach President Bush. But, she said of the planned investigations, "You never know where it leads to."

Such "investigations" and "commissions" would serve only to expose US state secrets and otherwise undermine US interests. The left so hates Bush it will do anything -- has already done everything -- to get rid of him or emasculate him. Giving them the House or Senate would only embolden the most extremist of the Angry Left. The left doesn't have American interests and priorities at heart and can't be trusted with either house.

Of course, on the plus side, if the Democrats were to take the House, it would ensure absolutely nothing gets accomplished by the government for the next two years. Which is usually a good thing. But in addition to the leaking of state secrets and the weakening of US interests in the world that would be assured by such a switch, I don't know if the nation is ready for all the column inches and 60-point headlines written by preening editorialists triumphantly exulting in how Bush has been exposed to be the devil.

Or Hitler.

Not that I think the Democrats have a chance of taking the House or the Senate, though. I think the average American realizes how out-of-touch with American values the average Democrat politician is and won't vote against even the most pork-barrel-hungry Republican. Which is sad, truly, because the Republicans need some honest opposition.

Economics Explained Re: Gasoline Prices

It's so obvious that it's supply and demand at work that I can't believe I'm posting about it [again]. Here, Tim Russert of whatever channel exposes his sheer incompetent idiot inability to understand that gasoline prices are driven by market forces. This comment sums up how it works.

The Law of Unintended Consequences

As Alanis Morrisette put it, "Isn't it ironic":

While its key evidence turns out to be based on a programming error, its plausibility in the marketplace derives from a more casual assumption -- that the 45 million unborn children aborted since 1973 would, absent Roe vs. Wade, all have been born. In fact, the legalization of abortion caused the number of conceptions to go up by 30 per cent, while causing the number of births to go down by only six per cent.

[emph. mine]

I guess we've become more promiscuous and careless.

The Iran Conundrum

Well, Iran has said it won't abide by anything the UN decides. Iran says so. So, the UN passes a resolution ordering Iran to cease nuclear development. Iran says no, and doesn't. So, what happens next? The UN decides it must hold meetings to decide upon the language for a next-step resolution which is somehow more stern. Iran says it will not abide by anything the UN promulgates.

So, nothing will happen, and nations delude themselves. But this is surely the most fatuous statement to come out of the debate:

Churkin said that Russia, which supplies nuclear technology and missile components to Iran, has strong reservations about some key provisions in the draft resolution. He expressed concern that the threat of unspecified "further measures" against Tehran could be used as a pretext for military action. "We do not believe the matter can be resolved by the use of force."

If there's one thing we can be certain of, it's that the use of force can definitely settle the matter.

But, you know, Iran can't invade the US, nor can its soon-t0-be nuclear tipped missiles reach us, so, hey, why not play the resolution game? After all, Iran isn't playing the looming superpower role.

Or is it?

The Illegal Problem

The media likes to just call them "immigrants," as if they had "immigrated." Instead, they are largely Mexicans who snuck into the country by any means available, but not "legally." Immigrants migrate here from other countries, having filled out the necessary forms first and waited the years it takes for the federal government to process the paperwork. Then, they migrate. Legally.

So, what's it mean when perhaps millions of illegal immigrants pull a stunt and attempt to negatively affect the US economy by their refusal to show for work en masse for a day? What's it mean when they stage marches in major metropolitan areas, parading Mexican flags and demanding they be assimilated. Well, it should mean that the US federal government gets serious about the issue. It won't, though.

I'm going to guess that both parties, paralyzed by uncertainty over how to lure future-legalized Mexicans to their respective parties, will do nothing. Or, nothing of import. What can they do and not possibly offend future-legalized votes? This is their dilemma.

This is because they are idiots not interested in what's best for the nation, but, rather, what's best for their party. It's pathetic. And, it's the beginning of the end of this republic, I suspect.

The problem is easy to solve: erect a 40-foot high, two-tier-deep fence the entire length of the border; build checkposts at regular intervals and have roving patrols move between them; establish a 10-year plan to citizenship for those already here, with those who don't meet English-speaking and US-history-knowledge requirements booted; open the legal immigration flood gates to Western Europe, where there's high unemployment, allowing anyone with a college education or defined skill in; and, fund the whole thing by cutting the DEA's budget in half, telling the affected agents they can patrol the border if they want to keep their government "agent" jobs.

This won't happen. No fence will be built. The House and the Senate will come up with entirely different and unreconilable solutions to the problem, and nothing will be voted on. Everyone is angling for the "legal Latino vote" that's a decade or so in the future; nobody is angling for the "US citizen vote" of the present. Of course, fifty years from now, the demographics of America will make the "Latino" group the largest minority group in America, and, over time, America is likely to continue "browning." Especially so with no fence and illegal immigration policy. So, politics will change, anyway: there's no need to pander, now. The Democrats aren't guaranteed to lock in Latinos just because, so Republicans shouldn't be panicky over protecting the borders.

The "ship everyone back" option doesn't exist, either, so those few weirdos salivating over it can be ignored. We don't have the agents to find and arrest all the illegals - they're too busy enforcing the US drug prohibition policy [now you see it]. Plus, most of the illegals would make perfectly fine, normal taxpayers over the long run. Just learn English and US history basics.