|
|
Saturday, May 30, 2009
RULE 5 SATURDAYBefore we present our Rule 5 Compliance: a word of thanks to Smitty for the Reach Around at The Other McCain—you and RSM have been very good to this lowly blogging SOB.
Now....Proving Once Again That There is a God...the
TCOTS Rule 5 Committee presents...
JILL ST. JOHN...
If Diamonds Are Forever, Then Thanks to Photography, So is Miss St. John...
And She'll Stand by You...
30 may 09 @ 7:21 pm edt
Friday, May 29, 2009
BIG LOVEOver at The Weekly Standard, Andrew Ferguson has a wickedly witty
article up that contains very good insight into the MSM's isolation from reality. A highlight:
Monday wasn't even over yet before everybody found out that Maureen Dowd, who as everyone knows
writes a column for the New York Times, had lifted a paragraph from a popular blog and put it into her column and
passed it off as her own work. Everybody loves Maureen. She's everybody's favorite. More important, everybody wants to be
Maureen's favorite. So everybody pretended this didn't happen. Instead everybody believed Maureen when she said she'd been
"talking to a friend of mine" who made a point in a "cogent--and I assumed spontaneous--way and I wanted to
weave the idea into my column." That's why it was woven word for word in her copy.
Her explanation was implausible
in every particular, compounding her original offense. Normally everybody loves it when this happens, because everybody gets
to say to one another, "In Washington the cover up is often worse than the crime!" But this was Maureen.
The unthinkable began to emerge as the implausibility sunk in. Everybody's favorite was not only lazy and unimaginative but
dishonest too--a bit of a fraud. Just in time the "media critic" for the Washington Post stepped in to
deliver summary judgment. Maureen, he announced, had made an "inadvertent mistake." Relieved, everybody went back
to loving Maureen and wanting to be loved by her.
Well, not everybody. A columnist in Chicago, for example, said
Maureen's appropriation of other people's work should be considered a "big deal." This fellow cited the old journalistic
rule that you're supposed to write the stuff that you publish under your own name. But, really: Chicago? Nobody lives
in Chicago.
Please take the time to click here and read the full article. [tip of the fedora to Mark Hemingway]
29 may 09 @ 8:15 pm edt
FRUITS OF AN UNHOLY ALLIANCEThe folks at the New English Review were scheduled to hold a
symposium this weekend entitled: Understanding the Jihad in Israel, Europe and America. It was
scheduled to be held at the Loews Vanderbilt Plaza Hotel in Nashville. It will now be held somewhere else, as Newsmax
reports:
The manager of a prominent Nashville hotel cancelled a contract with a
conservative foundation to hold a conference this weekend on radical Islam, apparently after learning that the group would
feature a keynote address by controversial Dutch parliamentarian and filmmaker, Geert Wilders.
Muslim groups succeeded
in preventing Wilders from screening “Fitna,” his 15-minute movie on radical Islam, in the House of Lords this
February, on claims it was insulting to Muslims, and dogged him during a recent U.S. tour as well.
Thomas A. Negri,
managing director of Loew’s Vanderbilt Hotel and Office complex in Nashville, told Newsmax on Wednesday that he had
taken the extraordinary step of cancelling the conference at the last minute “for the health, safety and well-being
of our guests and employees.”
Negri refused to say why he felt the conference would adversely affect the
“health, safety and well-being” of the hotel’s guests and employees, except to refer to the website of the
New English Review, the group organizing the conference.
The website features articles that warn about radical
Islam written by activists, journalists and scholars, including former federal prosecutor Andrew McCarthy, and former Muslim
scholar, Ibn Warraq.
One article, written by a retired U.S. army intelligence officer, Jerome Gordon, warns of
the growing problems caused by the recent influence of several thousand Somali Muslim refugees who have come to work for a
nearby Tysons Food plant to replace illegal Hispanic meat packers.
Negri appeared at a 2003 pro-immigration event
on the same dias with a well-known Somali warlord, Gordon told Newsmax.
In a written statement to the conference
organizers, Negri said that the hotel had “not received any information related to a specific security threat concerning
this event,” and declined to provide any justification for cancelling it at the last minute.
...
Negri also serves on the board of advisors of the Tennessee Immigrant and Refugee Rights Coalition, TIRRC, an activist group
that states its mission “is to empower immigrants and refugees throughout Tennessee to develop a unified voice”
and “defend their rights.”
The group boasts of having helped to defeat an “English only”
amendment this January that would have required all Nashville government communications to be in English.
Earlier
this month, the group won an award from the Migration Policy Institute, which is funded by grants form the J.M. Kaplan Fund,
a left-wing group that also funds the ACLU, the Tides Foundation, the Tides Center, the Sierra Club, the Southern Poverty
Law Center, and other left-wing causes.
I think it rather obvious that Mr. Negri was not motivated out of
any concern 'for the health, safety and well-being of [the hotel's] guests and employees'. This is but another
example of the Soft Jihad In America. In this case perhaps, since I have found no evidence that Mr. Negri is a Muslim,
we appear to be dealing with an action taken by a fellow traveller of the Jihadists: a Leftist [Click here for more information on the connections between the two groups].
I am very happy to see that the folks at New English Review are carrying-on with the symposium.
They publish very insightful articles on a wide-range of subjects that are both entertaining and insightful. Please take the time to visit their website by clicking here.
Please take the time to click here and read the full Newsmax report. [tip of the fedora to Robert Stacy McCain whose posting contains some good links]
29 may 09 @ 7:42 pm edt
THUS SPAKE OBAMATHUSTRA?I've been hesitant to comment on the speculation that Chrysler dealers who contributed
to Republicans are the ones being closed down by the government. Josh Painter and World Net Daily seem to think there may be something to it, while Jonah Goldberg, Michelle Malkin, and others are skeptical. As someone who is four-square against any amount of government ownership of any business, I am, naturally,
very interested in this. As someone who, with one exception, has always owned a Chrysler [my first car: a 1964 Plymouth
Belvedere; current car: a 1995 Jeep Grand Cherokee], I have a personal interest as well. The Editors over at Investor's
Business Daily have, I think, achieved the right tone on the matter in their editorial today:
Has our political class grown so petty that it would use the power of government to punish the political opposition?
We hope this isn't true. If it is, the country's in more trouble than we thought.
Indeed. The main
question, looking it at it politically, is: could Administration be so stupid? The trouble is—and its why the
allegations must be taken seriously and investigated—in so many other areas Tiberius Obamacus and his minions have displayed
an amazing arrogance and disregard for the morals and norms of a civilized society. They think they are above the law
and their fellow citizens, and they have been acting accordingly. It's as if they thought of Barack Hussein Obama as
the coming of the Ubermensch.
Please take the time to click here and read the full editorial.
SIDENOTE: Commenting on the complaints of one of the Dodge dealers who will see his dealership closed down, Mark Steyn offers some very good advice:
The Dodge dealer may be a "private business" but Chrysler isn't.
Good luck pleading your case to an entity that's 55 percent union-owned, eight percent U.S.-government owned, two percent
Canadian/Ontario-government owned, with a 20 percent stake held by an Italian manufacturer that brings no serious cash or
knowhow to to the table but will supposedly rescue Chrysler by inflicting on the U.S. multiple small-car models that even
non-Italian Europeans won't buy.
Meanwhile, the new GM is 89
percent government/union-owned. Nothing good will come of either of these legally dubious enforced "restructurings."
In 15 years, if any of the once glorious marques survive, they won't be owned by these entities, or manufactured by them.
My advice to the Dodge guy is to convert his showroom into an ACORN dealership.
29 may 09 @ 9:54 am edt
DID YOUR MOTHER HAVE ANY CHILDREN THAT LIVED?In a sneering [and psychologically interesting] commentary on this posting by Robert Stacy McCain, Freddie at The League Of Ordinary Gentlemen inadvertingly—and, I'm sure, quit unintentionally—reveals
some of the reasons we admire RSM:
...McCain chews diamonds and shoots pure lightening
out of his urethra! McCain plays hockey against gorillas and once arm wrestled the Pope. I once saw McCain chug a keg of Milwaukee’s
Best and then fill out a 1040 form. (Not even the EZ version!) McCain slings more dope in a morning than B.I.G. did his whole
goddamn life, and somehow, for McCain, that’s, like, the most conservative shit ever. McCain’s American flag has
a smaller American flag that flies from it, and he has a harem of Klingon women to give him sexual favors. McCain snorts Clorox
and when he gets pulled over, he karate slaps the cop and gives him the ticket.
'He's a complicated man', this Conservative Shaft.
One quibble Freddie, old boy: Mr. McCain has a harem of Orion slave girls—Mark Steyn is the one with the Klingon women.
Here's the link to Freddie Fink-Nottle's posting. But, I wouldn't waste my time by clicking on it dear readers, since nailing your head to the floor would be much more enlightening and satisfying to your soul. And, no, Mr. Fink-Nottle would 'not even have the Goddamn common courtesy to give [a] reach-around'.
29 may 09 @ 8:53 am edt
Thursday, May 28, 2009
SIC AD NAUSEAM IIII took another journey around the ether late this afternoon and collected some
more useful commentary on the nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor [pronounced: sot-oh-my-yer (as in: Mayer Lansky)]:
1). Some wisdom from a wise man, Charles Krauthammer, on last night's Special Report on Fox News Channel,
on if and how Republicans should oppose the nominations:
They can and they should. There should be nothing about rumors in liberal magazines
about her intellectual capacity, nothing about her temperament, nothing ad hominem. It should be entirely on judicial philosophy.
This ought to be a seminar that ought to focus on two issues — number one, identity politics, as we saw in that
clip. She and the president believe that her background is extremely important in her ruling as a judge.
She says
that she has the physiological, cultural, experiential tools as a Latina woman to be a superior judge to a white male, which
is reflective perfectly of the Democratic Party's identity politics, in which free citizens are herded into groups, arranged
into a hierarchy of wisdom, authority, and entitlement.
That's a Democratic idea, and I think it's her idea and
ought to be emphasized.
Secondly is the idea that Obama has stressed, and she has, as justice as empathy, as understanding
a person's positions, their needs, their wants, their history, and how a ruling will affect their lives.
That is
entirely contrary to the western tradition of justice, which is blind as to the person's station in life.
Republicans
ought to ask her, how do you believe in that, and swear her oath? If she is on the court, she has to swear an oath which says
I will solemnly swear I will administer justice without respect to persons and to equal right to poor and rich. That's what
Republicans ought to do, and not attack her in a personal way in any way.
2) As to the controversy over
the pronunciation of her last name [the politically correct one I've mocked at the beginning of every posting about
her here over the past three days], John Hood's comments are worth quoting in full because, in a just world, they would be the final word on the matter [they will, of course, be ignored by The People Who Really Matter]:
I, too, have
long found it tedious to see politicians and commentators preen in front of cameras and microphones to flip
their rs and flatten their as. It's a prissy pretense, a way to curry favor with certain aggrieved groups but never a consistent
rule of pronunciation. For example, during the presidential campaign, Obama made sure to say Pahk-ee-stahn at every opportunity,
but I never heard him say Ahf-ghahn-ee-stahn. He never said Frahns, or Deutschland, or Rus, or even Keh-bec. It would sound
silly.
Anglicizing foreign names while speaking in English isn't just a practical necessity and
a sign of good manners (yes, that's right). As others have said, it's a habit that helps to bind together people of diverse
backgrounds. I'm not just talking about the recent past. Let's just be clear here: If the new rule is that it is disrespectful
to pronounce proper names in any way other than how the natives say it, then I'm putting all Yankees, Midwesterners, and pedants
on notice that I will be outraged if my first name is not henceforth pronounced with both syllables.
Call
me Roberto.
3) From over at The Corner, John Derbyshire is spot-on:
Like my reader, and I'm sure a lot of other Americans, I get mighty annoyed by
the unspoken implication in a lot of commentary that anyone not a member of a Protected Minority must have grown up in a twelve-bedroom
lakeside mansion and been chauffered off to prep school with a silver spoon in his mouth. Judge Sotomayor was raised in public
housing? So was I. Her mother was a nurse working late shifts? So was mine. When did white working poor people disappear off the face of the earth? Where are the eager
listeners to their "compelling stories"?
Was it really not possible to correct past injustices
without creating an entire — and apparently permanent — class convinced that accidents of geography or
biology have gifted them with special insight, wisdom, and "empathy"?
It was possible and it was
happening in this country until the Left managed to get control of political institutions at all levels around the mid-Twentieth
Century. Slowly, but surely assimilation and acceptance of various new and, in the case of blacks, special groups was
happening in a process that was proceeding at a pace that complemented human nature as constituted in that unique place
named America. Blacks were becoming more and more integrated into society, first and second generation Italians and
Puerto Ricans were assimilating, to name just three of the groups.
For Blacks first, and then later other groups
like the Puerto Ricans [ie: the non-White groups], the passing of power into the hands of a Left brought radical upheavals.
The radicals were determined to not let the progression occur naturally, but demanded, instead, that human intervention
in the form of social engineering by force be the method for achieving equality. Following the same game-plan that
they apply to every endeavor of their's, the Left fought for and passed laws that compelled Whites to accept the non-Whites
as equals in all things immediately, no dissent allowed. This was coupled with a massive campaign in the culture involving
the constant ridicule and condemnation of any who would dissent from their methods. They falsely portrayed the dissenters
as not being against the methods, but, rather, against equality.
The Left practiced a variation of The Big Lie that I like to call The Big Deception which involves a Big Deflection away from
the reality of the situation. None of their policies or actions can survive direct questioning, so the Leftists must
turn the tables on the questioners and make it seem as though the inquisitors have bad or evil intentions. Overtime
and after constant and unrelenting hectoring, the Left's way of thinking triumphed. They successfully infected enough
people so that this diseased mode of thinking became chronic, deep-rooted, instinctual. If the Devil's greatest triumph
was that he convinced people he did not exist, the Left's greatest triumph has been to convince people that the Leftist way
of thinking is normal. It is not. It is a perversion of reason and a horribly mutant form of logic. It is
antithetical to human life. Nothing but decay and destruction are left [pun intended] in it's wake.
Having
been told repeatedly by the Left that they were deserving of special treatment because of the supposed injustice they had
suffered at the hands of the White man, these groups began to believe it, for they too were infected, but their condition
was much more grave.
America had once been as strong, as rugged, as handsome, and as brave as the most perfect
Gray Cooper or John Wayne character; now it has become like Gollum.
28 may 09 @ 7:33 pm edt
ON THE CASE......of Judge Sonia Sotomayor [pronounced: sought-oh-my-err (as is: Meyer
Lansky)]:
I just updated the special JUST THE FACTS, MAM section I've set up with links to information
on the Legal Latina and will continue to do so as warranted. So keep checking that part of the WWU-AM Page [scroll-down the middle column] on a regular basis.
28 may 09 @ 2:45 pm edt
DE MINIMIS NON CURAT PRAETORTo Tiberius Obamacus and his lap-dogs in the Senate, I suppose the following is
a trvial matter:
As President Obama's Supreme Court nominee comes under heavy fire for allegedly being a "racist,"Judge Sonia Sotomayor is listed as a member of the National Council of La Raza, a group that's promoted driver's licenses for illegal aliens, amnesty programs, and no immigration
law enforcement by local and state police.
According the American Bar Association, Sotomayor is a member of the NCLR, which bills itself as the largest national Hispanic civil rights and advocacy organization
in the U.S.
Meaning "the Race," La Raza also has connections to groups that advocate the separation of
several southwestern states from the rest of America.
...
As WND previously reported, La Raza was condemned in 2007 by former U.S. Rep. Charles Norwood, R-Ga., as a radical "pro-illegal
immigration lobbying organization that supports racist groups calling for the secession of the western United States as a
Hispanic-only homeland."
Norwood urged La Raza to renounce its support of the Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano
de Aztlan – which sees "the Race" as part of an ethnic group that one day will reclaim Aztlan, the mythical
birthplace of the Aztecs. In Chicano folklore, Aztlan includes California, Arizona, Nevada, New Mexico and parts of Colorado
and Texas.
What can you say? Aztlan, here we come? Its one of those Howard Roak moments: 'This
is slowly becoming a world in which I cannot permit myself to live.' Aztlan, my ass.
Please take the time to click here and read the full report.
28 may 09 @ 2:21 pm edt
FOREWARNED IS FOREARMEDOver in THE WAR OF THE WORLDS Section of the WWU-AMPage,
I've posted a link to Phil Kerpen's posting that explains very well and succinctly why the Value Added Tax [VAT] being floated
about my Barack The Unready's minions is a very bad idea. I urge you to check it out and to keep checking back with
WWU-AM, where I keep track of the shenanigans being perpetrated by Comrade Obamin and his apparatchiks.
Please click here to go to WWU-AM—The Voice Of The Restoration.
28 may 09 @ 11:14 am edt
ALL THESE THINGS COME BACK TO YOURoger Clegg on the Democrats, the Republicans, the President, and the handling
of the Judge Sotomayor [pronounced: sought-o-mayer (as in Oscar Mayer Weiner)] nomination:
We know that the Democrats in Congress will do the wrong thing — that is, they will do whatever they can to
advance the use of racial preferences to the nth degree. They are hopeless. The question is, what role will the Republicans
play — and what will President Obama do?
One might expect Republicans to have good instincts and President
Obama to have bad (he nominated Sotomayor, after all), but I fear that the Republican stance can’t be taken for granted
and I hope that Obama’s can’t. Republicans can be cowardly on these issues, and President Obama’s words,
if not his actions to date, indicate that he is better than the rest of his party.
We’ll see. Opposing racial
preferences would certainly be a good issue for Republicans, and it would be a political masterstroke for Obama. And, of course,
there is the little matter that an African American president who rejected our racial spoils system would be doing a great
and noble thing.
As the big-lipped singer from Boston wrote:
Dream
on...
Dream on...
Dream on...
Dream until your dreams come true
Regarding his hopes
for our Fearless Leader's conduct in this matter, I have to ask the Mr. Clegg, who I respect a great deal [and is doing the
Lord's work as President and General Counsel at the Center for Equal Opportunity]: what planet have you been
living on? Me, I'm living in the Year Zero in Barack Obama's Oceania.
As regards the Republicans, I think he should change
the 'can be' to 'will be'. Would that they would live up to the words of Condoleezza Rice, as recounted by Jay Nordlinger:
It’s not very fashionable now to quote Condoleezza Rice — was it
ever? — but I remember well what she said at the 2000 convention. She said that she was glad to belong to a party that
“sees me as an individual, not as part of a group.” That, ladies and gentlemen, is what Republican music should
be — at least in my opinion.
Hear, hear, Mr. N.
Please take the time to click here and read Mr. Clegg's full posting.
28 may 09 @ 10:12 am edt
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
WHITHER NORMALITYWriting about what's happening in Britain, Melanie Phillips's words can also be applied
to all the nations of The West [most especially the Anglosphere]:
...the tolerance
of homosexuality that a liberal society should properly show has long been hijacked by an agenda which aims at destroying
the very idea of normative sexuality altogether – and does so by smearing it as prejudice. The true liberal position,
that it is right and just to tolerate behaviour that deviates from the norm as long as it doesn’t hurt anyone else,
is deemed to be rank prejudice on the grounds that homosexuality is not ‘deviancy’ but normal. ‘Normality’
is thus rendered incoherent and absurd and accordingly destroyed altogether. The agenda is therefore not liberal tolerance
but illiberal coercion against mainstream moral values, on the basis that the very idea of having normative moral principles
at all is an expression of bigotry. So anyone who speaks out against gay rights is immediately vilified as a ‘homophobe’
and treated as a social and professional pariah.
Most people have been intimidated into silence under this onslaught.
‘Society has changed – get over it’ is the uncompromising message which few now dare gainsay.
Please take the time to click here and read the full posting.
27 may 09 @ 7:25 pm edt
THIS IS WAY, STEP INSIDE...In a blog posting about the fact that the Value Added Tax [or VAT, or national
sales tax] is being seriously considered in Washington, Pundette came up with the following spot-on observation
that is all too true these days:
The title is telling: "Once considered unthinkable
. . . " That perfectly captures the many "achievements" of the Obama administration thus far.
In two short sentences, she's captured how appalling and dismaying things are in The Year Zero.
Please take the time to click here and read her full posting.
27 may 09 @ 7:06 pm edt
WHAT IS AND WHAT SHOULD NEVER BEIn his column yesterday in the New York Post, Ralph Peters says
what needed to be said:
WE made one great mistake regarding Guantanamo: No terrorist
should have made it that far. All but a handful of those grotesquely romanticized prisoners should have been killed on the
battlefield.
The few kept alive for their intelligence value should have been interrogated secretly, then
executed.
Terrorists don't have legal rights or human rights. By committing or abetting acts of terror
against the innocent, they place themselves outside of humanity's borders. They must be hunted as man-killing animals.
And, as a side benefit, dead terrorists don't pose legal quandaries.
Captured terrorists, on the other
hand, are alwaysa liability. Last week, President Obama revealed his utter failure to comprehend these butchers when
he characterized Guantanamo as a terrorist recruiting tool.
Gitmo wasn't any such thing. Not the realGitmo.
The Guantanamo Obama believes in is a fiction of the global media. With rare, brief exceptions, Gitmo inmates have been treated
far better than US citizens in our federal prisons.
But the reality of Gitmo was irrelevant -- the left needed
us to be evil, to "reveal" ourselves as the moral equivalent of the terrorists. So they made up their Gitmo myths.
Now we're stuck with sub-human creatures who should be decomposing in unmarked graves in a distant desert....
I disagree only with his use of the term 'sub-human'; they are all too human. We should stop pussyfooting around:
we're at war with an enemy that does not observe the civilized world's rules of war. As Mr. Peters's writes, the Muslim
terrorists have placed 'themselves outside of humanity's borders'. They have abrogated any claims to be treated as civilized
people. They are rightly labeled 'barbarians' because they have rejected the rules of civilized behavior.
One can only hope that there are American soldiers out in the field who, since 20 January 2009, have been acting accordingly.
Please take the time to click here and read the full column.
27 may 09 @ 6:47 pm edt
SIC AD NAUSEAM IISince I had a little time this afternoon, I decided to take another spin around
the ether and collected three more good commentaries on the nomination of Judge Sotomayor [pronounced: sought-toe-mayer (as
in Oscar Mayer wiener)]:
1) From Paul Chesser over at AmSpecBlog:
Newt Gingrich has followed Rush Limbaugh in calling Sonia Sotomayor a racist, based
upon her 2001 statement, "I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experience would more often
than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life." CNN Sucks notes in its political blog: On Wednesday, Gingrich tweeted:
"Imagine a judicial nominee said 'my experience as a white man makes me better than a latina woman.' new racism is no
better than old racism." Moments later, he followed
up with the message: "White man racist nominee would be forced to withdraw. Latina woman racist should also withdraw."
President Obama's spokesman Robert Gibbs was asked about
Gingrich's charge, and he responded: "I think it
is probably important for anybody involved in this debate to be exceedingly careful with the way in which they've decided
to describe different aspects of this impending confirmation," Gibbs said.
Be careful or what? Tell us what will happen to those who want to express their opinions
about this, Gibbsy.
Only the next DHS report knows for sure.
2) From Wendy Long over at Bench Memos:
Comments yesterday by the White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs, and today by Sen.
Chuck Schumer, that statements made at Duke University by Judge Sotomayor in which she said appellate courts should "make
policy" were taken out of context are purposely misleading and outright misinformation designed to walk back an obvious
vetting problem this White House has become known for. They say her Duke comments really meant that district courts "deal
with individual cases" and appellate courts "deal with complex legal issues and constitutional theory."
But that's just what she did NOT do — and the district court tried to do — in the firefighters case.
Moreover, if Mr. Gibbs or Senator Schumer were to read other law review articles written by Judge Sotomayor, as well as
reviewed her other speeches, it is clear and unequivocal that Judge Sotomayor has a long track record of advocating for using
courts to make policy and laws. It is obvious that the reason the White House has churned up its spin machine on this is because
countless polls consistently show that the American people to do not support judges making policy or law from the bench. The
American people have spoken loudly and often on this subject, they want judges who interpret law as made through the people
and their elected representatives, not through judges imposing their personal political views from the bench as Judge Sotomayor
has consistently advocated.
3) The ever vigilant Michelle Malkin weighs in:
Since when did securing a Supreme Court seat become a high hurdles contest? The White
House and Democrats have turned Second Circuit judge Sonia Sotomayor’s nomination into a personal Olympics event. Pay
no attention to her jurisprudence. She grew up in a Bronx public housing project. She was diagnosed with childhood diabetes
at 8. Her father died a year later.
And oh, by the way, did you hear that she was poor?
It’s a
“compelling personal story,” as we heard 20,956 times on Tuesday. Sotomayor’s a “real” person.
Why, she even read Nancy Drew as a young girl, President Obama told us. She’s “faced down barriers, overcome the
odds and lived out the American dream that brought her parents here so long ago,” Obama said.
If Sotomayor
were auditioning to be Oprah Winfrey’s fill-in host, I’d understand the over-the-top hyping of her life narrative.
But isn’t anybody on Sotomayor’s side the least bit embarrassed by all this liberal condescension?
...
The selective elevation of hardship-as-primary qualification demeans the entire judiciary. If personal turmoil makes
one “incredibly qualified to pass judgment on some of the most important cases in our country,” let’s put
reality-show couple Jon and Kate Gosselin on the bench. Millions of viewers tune in to watch their “compelling personal
story” of life with eight children on television. It’s a “richly, uniquely American experience” of
facing obstacles and overcoming the odds. Get them robes and gavels, stat.
God love her.
What
next? Appointing a horse to satisfy the PETA folks?
27 may 09 @ 6:24 pm edt
IS THERE ANYONE ON THE AIR?From Bloomberg, Heejin Koo reporting, we learn:
North Korea threatened a military response to South Korean participation in a U.S.-led
program to seize weapons of mass destruction, and said it will no longer abide by the 1953 armistice that ended the Korean War.
“The Korean People’s Army will not be bound
to the Armistice Agreement any longer,” the official Korean Central News Agency said in a statement today. Any attempt
to inspect North Korean vessels will be countered with “prompt and strong military strikes.” South Korea’s
military said it will “deal sternly with any provocation” from the North.
South Korean President Lee Myung Bak ordered his government to take “calm” measures on the threats, his office said
in a statement today. Japan’s Chief Cabinet Secretary, Takeo Kawamura, echoed those remarks and called on North Korea to “refrain from taking actions that
would elevate tensions in Asia.”
The threats are the strongest since North Korea tested a nuclear weapon
on May 25, drawing international condemnation and the prospect of increased sanctions against the communist nation. South
Korea dispatched a warship to its maritime border and is prepared to deploy aircraft, Yonhap News reported, citing military
officials it didn’t identify.
Well, Mr. President...what are you going to do? The North Koreans
have been testing you for some time and you've been cheating.
What are you going to do?
From Reuters-India, Oleg Shchedrov reporting, we learn:
Russia is taking security measures as a precaution against the possibility tension
over North Korea could escalate into nuclear war, news agencies quoted officials as saying on Wednesday.
Interfax
quoted an unnamed security source as saying a stand-off triggered by Pyongyang's nuclear test on Monday could affect the security
of Russia's far eastern regions, which border North Korea.
"The need has emerged for an appropriate package
of precautionary measures," the source said.
"We are not talking about stepping up military efforts but
rather about measures in case a military conflict, perhaps with the use of nuclear weapons, flares up on the Korean Peninsula,"
he added. The official did not elaborate further.
What are you going to do?
From the AP, Hyung-Jin Kim reporting, we learn:
North Korea threatened military action Wednesday against U.S. and South Korean warships
plying the waters near the Koreas' disputed maritime border, raising the specter of a naval clash just days after the regime's
underground nuclear test.
Pyongyang, reacting angrily to Seoul's decision to join an international program to intercept
ships suspected of aiding nuclear proliferation, called the move tantamount to a declaration of war.
"Now
that the South Korean puppets were so ridiculous as to join in the said racket and dare declare a war against compatriots,"
North Korea is "compelled to take a decisive measure," the Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of Korea said
in a statement carried by state media.
Seoul's decision comes at a time when "the state of military confrontation
is growing acute and there is constant danger of military conflict," the statement warned.
South Korea's military
said Wednesday it was prepared to "respond sternly" to any North Korean provocation.
Well,
Mr. President?
LOOK! UP IN THE SKY!...Peter Wehner got it just right yesterday in a posting over at Contentions:
...President Obama is a man of extraordinary, never-before-seen-on-Planet-Earth self-regard.
It is probably beyond any human being's capacity to measure it....
And who are we, the lowly clingers, to
dare try to measure it.
Please take the time to click here and read the full posting.
27 may 09 @ 10:26 am edt
TOOL SHEDOver at The Other McCain, I think Smitty is spot-on in this observation:
What I do know is that the mood of the country is significantly altered. The general
case of the blues is not the same as when the Internet bubble burst, post-Clinton. It's not the worry about whether the world
was ending on 9/11. It's not just the certainty that the economy is going to stay parked in the toilet for the foreseeable
future. No, it's the sobering realization that the worst pre-election fears about the current administration are true, and
then some: BHO represents the culmination of a lengthy cultural and academic campaign fomented by the likes of [Bill] Ayers
to put an absolute tool in the Oval Office.
He retains a positive attitude:
I remain optimistic, however, that the coming Tea Parties on 04Jul and 12Sep will build momentum, and McDonnell will
win the VA gubernatorial race, and the 112th Congress won't suck as much pondwater with Pelosi Galore out of the picture.
This administration needs to become the Battle of the Bulge for the collectivists, the time where they threw in everything to the last union, acorn,
and unicorn but couldn't quite crush the American spirit.
I, being a cynical bastard from birth [ie: conservative],
am not so hopeful. I hope he's right and I'm wrong.
Please take the time to click here and read the full posting.
27 may 09 @ 9:57 am edt
HOME SWEET CORTLANDT HOMEOver at AmSpecBlog, The Prowler reports:
The White House was aware that U.S. Secretary of Energy Steven Chu would call for flat-topped roofs (both current and new construction) to be painted with white reflective paint. Chu
made the remarks on Tuesday at a conference of Nobel laureates in London. "[Chu's] press people said there wouldn't be
much press coverage," says a White House aide familiar with the vetting of Chu's trip.
Chu claimed that a government plan to mandate white reflective roofs would
achieve the environmental equivalent of pulling all of the world's cars off the road for eleven years.
Chu indicated that government regulations would most likely have to require construction firms and
developers to paint the flat roofs of building white, and slanted roofs colors that would reflect heat and energy.
Forgetting that this is a serious violation of property rights, let me ask you Mr. Secretary: how is reflecting the heat
from our houses in the Winter here in the NorthEast going to save any energy and help the environment? I mean...Whiskey
Tango Foxtrot??? I'll Howard Roark my house before I let you touch my roof.
Please take the time to click here and read the full posting.
27 may 09 @ 9:49 am edt
SOTTO VOCEI've just posted links to four pieces of background information on Judge Sotomayor
over on the WWU-AM page in the JUST THE FACTS, MAM Section.
Over at Bench Memos, Matthew Franck asks whether the Judge would agree with the following statement from Chief Justice John Marshall:
Judicial power, as contradistinguished from the power of the laws, has no existence.
Courts are the mere instrument of the laws, and can will nothing. When they are said to exercise a discretion, it is
a mere legal discretion, a discretion to be exercised in discerning the course prescribed by the law; and when that is discerned,
it is the duty of the Court to follow it. Judicial power is never exercised for the purpose of giving effect to the
will of the Judge; always for the purpose of giving effect to the will of the Legislature; or in other words, to the will
of the law.
[Osborn v. Bank of the United States, 22 U.S. 738, 866 (1824)]
Would
that one of our glorious Republican Senators would ask the question.
27 may 09 @ 9:27 am edt
SIC AD NAUSEAMI've been flying through the ether in my gas-guzzling jet gathering the best
of the commentary on the nomination of Sonia Sotomayor [sought-o-myer (as in the weener)] to SCOTUS...
1) From Roger Kimball posting over at Pajamas Media [emphasis mine]:
...Sonia Sotomayor, the first Hispanic nominee to the Supreme Court,
believes that the job of judges is to make the law, not uphold it.
Don’t believe me? Look at this clipfrom a 2005 symposium at Duke University. The Court of Appeals, said Sonia Sotomayor, the
first Hispanic nominee to the Supreme Court, “is where policy is made.” She went on to note that she shouldn’t
say that publicly — after all, cameras were rolling — but that, she said, was the truth of the matter. I hope
that video clip is played early and played often. [UPDATE: I hope her 2002 comments at Berkeley about how it is appropriate for judges to draw upon their “experiences as women and
people of color" in their judicial decision making are aired often as well. The more one looks into Sotomayor's
record, the clearer it is that, as a friend of mine put it, identity politics is her judicial philosophy.]
To my mind, what Sonia Sotomayor, the first Hispanic nominee to the Supreme Court, said there disqualifies her from her
position on the Court of Appeals. It should render her beyond the pale for a position on the Supreme Court of the United States.
Will it? Of course not. But it should prompt anyone who cares about the rule of law to oppose her nomination.
2) From Paul Mirengoff over at Powerline:
One thing has become clear to me as a result of the discussion surrounding Judge Sotomayor:
political correctness dictates that the collection of ethic minority groups previously known as Hispanic now be referred to
as Latina or Latino. I'm told that "Hispanic" is out because the Spanish imperialists of yesteryear do not deserve
to give their name to the descendants of those they oppressed.
But what about me? I'm of half-Italian
descent. My ancestors invented Latin, dammit. Tum podem extulit horridulum.
3) El Rushbo [tip of the fedora to Nicole Russell]:
...But here is why, even though she may not be
able to be stopped, here is why Sonia Sotomayor needs to be opposed by the Republicans as far as they can take it, because
the American people need to know who Barack Obama really is, and his choice of Sonia Sotomayor tells everybody, if we will
tell the story of her, who he is.
He got up in his announcement and said everything about her that isn't true,
that she's a great constitutionalist; that she doesn't use personal opinion; that she understands what her role is and the
oath is of a Supreme Court justice. She has done just the opposite of that. She is a hack like he is a hack in the sense that
the court is a place to be used to make policy, not to adjudicate cases, not to adjudicate constitutional law but to make
policy.
4) From Warner Todd Huston over at Red State:
...we should stop pretending that being nice to every Hispanic candidate for anything
regardless of that candidate’s ideology will “get” us anything. George W. Bush went out of his way to pick
Hispanic candidates for all sorts of government positions. He has Hispanic family members and is well known for his soft stance
on immigration reform. No Republican can stake a claim to being more Hispanic friendly. What did it get him? Not a single
thing. Over his 8 years the Republican Hispanic vote has steadily eroded.
So, any obviation of conservative principle
to pander for the Hispanic vote is a fool’s errand. It isn’t worth the erosion of our principles to try and cajole
votes from the Hispanic community. This is absolutely not to say that we should abandon any efforts to recruit good Hispanic
candidates that exhibit strong conservative principles, far from it. But, as in this case, meekly accepting a candidate like
Sotomayor will do no good to help us gain the vaunted Hispanic vote.
Let's stop, once and for all, playing
the Leftist's identity politics game.
5) From Jonah Goldberg over at The Corner:
...it occurred to me that maybe what he really wants to do is appoint himself...or
at least the best approximation of himself he can find that politics will allow.
Think about it. He places this
huge emphasis on a personal narrative that produces empathy for select disadvantaged groups — minorities, single moms
etc. He wants someone who is smart enough, but whose real priorities can be boiled down to trite lefty tropes about "social
justice." He allegedly wants someone charming and bipartisan solely so they will seduce conservative members of the court
to more liberal positions (I say "allegedly" because you often hear this ascribed to the White House, but never
actually stated outright). All of these traits are hallmarks of what might be called "Obamaism."
Now
I know that Obama has some very well-thought-out, or at least elaborate, arguments for his idea of a good justice. But
isn't it possible that some of this is really just a rationalization for a more fundamental narcissistic projection? After
all, it is hardly news that Obama thinks very highlyof himself, and sees all sorts of major issues through the prism of Obama. Everything
he says about what would make a great, ideal, Supreme Court justice is stuff he clearly sees in himself. I
think that is at least interesting.
A brilliant observation by Mr. Goldberg. 'Obamaism': the hopeychange
version of onanism!
6) I've saved the best for last: Quin Hillyer is dead solid perfect:
...Barack Obama is quite clearly trying to upend all the underpinnings of American
society in order to create his own version of a Brave New World. Government takeovers of banks and car companies, firings
of executives, politically based decisions on which individual car dealerships remain open, world tours apologizing for supposed
American sins, mollycoddling our enemies while insulting our friends, broken promises about transparency combined with selective
release of classified documents to serve political purposes.... and so much more, and now.... THIS. He nominates the most
radical possible choice for the Supreme Court, a woman whose speeches and writings are so obscenely racialist that no white
male could possible get away with saying anything like those things and live, professionally, for even a single additional
day. Obama's emphasis today, in introducing Sotomayor, on biography over all else was absolutely sickening. And despicable.
To which all decent Americans ought to respond: No, it does NOT make a difference whether she grew up rich or poor, black
or white or Hispanic, left-handed or right-handed, ill or healthy, Jew or gentile. All that matters is whether or not she
will uphold her oath to serve the Constitution and laws as written, including the explicit and tacit restrictions therein
on judicial authority....
Obama has invited a war over the very meaning of being an American, a war over whether
government still is legitimate only if and when it is based on the duly determined consent of the governed. This is a war
for our civic souls. We dare not lose it.
As a colleague of Mr. Hillyer's might say: WOLVERINES!
SIDENOTE: Steven Waldman has done us the courtesy of posting Mzz. Sotomayor's high school yearbook entry [tip of the fedora to Kathryn Jean Lopez]:
She quotes Norman Thomas, notorious socialist. Me, I quoted Solzhenitsyn ['...people also have the right not to know.... The right not to have
their divine souls stuffed with gossip, nonsense, vain talk.'], but what did I know? I was unenlightened.
27 may 09 @ 8:59 am edt
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
SIGNIFYING NOTHINGOver at his blog at The London Daily Telegraph, James Delingpole,
who once thought our Divine Obamacus was a 'cool' speech-maker, has become disillusioned:
Never mind the bizarre reputation Obama has acquired
as a great public speaker: his speeches are fast beginning to sound almost as excruciating as anything in his predecessor's
"enhanced interrogation program."
Yeah, I know, I know. I too was taken in when I first heard him speak.
I remember thinking when I heard that measured, steady voice with its pleasant but authoritative timbre that here was a guy
fit to govern the world. He sounded cool. Clint Eastwood "Make my day" cool.
Now, though, that novelty
has worn off. Now, it's becoming clear that this carefully worked, glacial poise is all there is to Obama. He's just a hollow
man spouting empty rhetoric.
Compare and contrast the flatulent pomposity of Obama's speech with Cheney's angry,
from-the-heart, tell-it-like-it-is riposte. No one is accusing Cheney of being the next Marc Antony but as Toby Harnden rightly says, he had some strong points to make and his audience got the message.
Obama's speech on the other hand, was the usual grandiloquent exercise in high-sounding nothingness. Apart from the familiar
gangsta-rap-style boasting about how big and important he now is ("I took an oath as your Commander In Chief.."),
all he had to offer were platitudes designed - a la Belial - to make inaction and pusillanimity in the war on terror look
the only sensible course.
Please take the time to click here and read the full posting.
26 may 09 @ 7:03 pm edt
SELF-HATING AMERICANSJeff Emanuel had a great and wonderful posting up yesterday over at Red
State, cross-posted over at Pajamas Media. From his opening paragraphs:
Despite taking place in the Information Age, very few of the heroic exploits of American soldiers, sailors, airmen
and Marines since September 11, 2001, have made their way into the living rooms of ordinary Americans — at least in
any lasting way.
Whether this is the result of changing values among the American people, the general population’s
perpetually dwindling attention span, or because there are so many things closer to home our nation is choosing to focus on
instead of our service men and women’s gallant deeds and efforts (whether that be a rocky national economy or the latest
season of American Idol), the fact is this generation has failed to identify and treasure its incarnations of historic
military heroes like Audie Murphy, Jimmy Doolittle, Pappy Boyington, Bill Pitsenbarger, Bud Day, and countless others.
This disappointing reality is not unique to the current decade. Who, for example,
can name the most recent pre-global war on terror (GWOT) recipients of the Congressional Medal of Honor? The names of Randy
Shughart and Gary Gordon — two Army special operations sergeants who received the nation’s highest award for their
heroic actions in Mogadishu, Somalia, in 1993 — are utterly foreign to the vast majority of the same American population
that can name the latest movie star to file for divorce, the latest starlet to have borne a child out of wedlock, or the latest
teen sensation to enter alcohol rehab.
Part of the problem is a lack of reporting on stories of true heroism among
the men and women serving this country in war zones around the world. After all, how can people know of the deeds being done
by our best and brightest if the news media — whose sole raison d’être is to report on deeds and
events — doesn’t the job it exists to do?
This lack of reporting on American military heroism isn’t
due to a lack of media access to the military in any form. On the contrary, Operations Iraqi and Enduring Freedom have begun
a new era of access for journalists who desire to observe firsthand coalition military operations abroad, on the front lines,
or in the rear, as part of the Department of Defense’s media embed program.
The ability to embed with coalition
troops and report from the battlefront has spawned a new generation of independent combat journalists. Intrepid individuals
— often veterans — like Michael Yon, J.D. Johannes, Michael Totten, Bill Roggio, Pat Dollard, and Bill Ardolino
have followed in the footsteps of legendary World War II reporter Ernie Pyle, giving generously of their time and resources
to travel to and within the combat zones that make up the many fronts of the global war on terror, for the dual purpose of
accurately reporting on events (something so many media outlets have demonstrated time and again that they are incapable
of doing) and of telling stories that simply would not make it back to the American people any other way.
Mr. Emanuel then goes on to tell, in brief, some of the stories of our brave warriors. It is a great read.
The vast majority of the major broadcast media ignore these stories [actually, everyone except Fox News].
You often have to be tuned into a local news broadcast to hear them.
The major city newspapers often ignore them
or bury them. Until 20 January, they preferred to print only negative stories about the War and usually their only upfront
mention would be about some bogus study that purported to show how screwed-up returning vets are. After the Inauguration,
they have been practicing a benign neglect. Perhaps this is one explanation for why they are failing.
I think
a good number of people would like to forget there is a war going on; thinking about it would interfere with their hedonistic
pursuits. But...I think the majority of Americans still do care and want to honor our warriors, especially the farther
you get away from the blue enclaves. You see it in small acts and read about it in local newspapers and on the Internet.
Such acts and actions just don't get the broad coverage they deserve [excepting Fox News again and the local stations and
papers]. Let's face it: most of the people who go into journalism these days are elitist and Leftist. You've heard
of the self-hating Jew; they're the self-hating Americans. They are not like the rest of us. We have to face
this fact. They feel no connection to what this country stands for. And they despise those of us who do.
I urge you to take the time and click here and read Mr. Emanuel's full posting.
26 may 09 @ 6:49 pm edt
GOTTERDAMMERUNGThose of us who grew up during the Cold War remember the fear of nuclear war that
always lurked in the back of our minds. It wasn't a fear that weighed heavily on us because we believed that ultimately
the Soviets and Red Chinese were rational. We certainly knew that the leaders of The West were rational. We believed
that the 'non-aligned' nations that had nuclear capabilities were rational enough or would succumb to Western or Soviet or
Red Chinese pressure if a situation escalated. So the fear stayed firmly in the backs of our minds. It went
even further back with the collapse of the Soviet Union, the moderations in Red China, and the willingness of the United
States to enforce the Pax Americana.
No longer.
We now live in a world where regimes
manned by unstable people either have nuclear weapons or will soon have them. This threat has been building for well
over a decade. Presidents Clinton, Bush II, and Obama have been negligent in confronting this very dangerous truth.
Over at The Corner, Mario Loyola gets it just right:
When Clinton allowed North Korea to break out of the nonproliferation regime,
the nuclear genie was let out of the bottle. Iran saw what North Korea had been able to accomplish armed with little more
than crazy talk, and lunged for nuclear weapons of its own. It only backed off this gambit briefly in 2003, when it seemed
like a secret nuclear program was not the smartest thing for a terror-sponsor to be pursuing, but 2003 turned out to be a
temporary blip in the long decline of America’s effective strategic deterrent. In 1994, the appearance of a single U.S.
aircraft carrier 12 miles off your coast might have been a terrifying sight. Today, we cruise three aircraft carriers in plain
sight off the Iranian coast — each of them much more powerful than the carriers of the Cold War, because of precision-strike
— and the Iranians basically laugh at us.
Though our actual military power has continued to increase, deterrence
is ultimately psychological, and nobody really believes any longer that we are willing to risk a fight in order to prevent
anybody from going nuclear. Petty rogue regimes were afraid of us in 1994; no longer. I used to blame Clinton for this, but
that’s sort of like blaming FDR for the neutralism of the 1930s. The simple fact is that a majority of Americans nowadays
would rather get bluffed and pushed around by petty criminal regimes than lay down the law on what kind of world we want to
live in. And it could take something more tangibly horrifying than a faraway underground nuclear test to make us snap out
of it. But that thing could be closer than anybody realizes: The nuclear genie is out of the bottle.
As
so many wise commentators have been saying and writing: we now face only bad decisions and worse ones. All of the other
issues pale in comparison to the threat of nuclear attacks on The West. We are at war with a foe that seeks nothing
less than our total annihilation and has allied itself with lunatics and dangerously deluded opportunists. While Presidents
Clinton and Bush II were negligent, all of the indications so far are that President Obama will be criminally negligent.
God help us all.
26 may 09 @ 2:43 pm edt
THE ASS WITH NO CLASSIn a posting over at Beltway Confidential, Chris Stirewalt comments on one thing our Fearless Leader said
in his Saturday Radio Address:
In his weekly radio address, President Obama took time to commend American fighting
forces and to explain how his defense, veterans and even economic programs (which he continues to call the "New Foundation")
are part of serving the armed forces.
It might have been superior for the president to have offered only a patriotic
message and a word of thanks and remembrance for the fallen soldiers, but that's debatable.
What seems wholly out
of place, though, is the president's swipe at his predecessor, George W. Bush, and others:
"Our fighting men
and women – and the military families who love them – embody what is best in America. And we have a responsibility
to serve all of them as well as they serve all of us. And yet, all too often in recent years and decades, we, as a nation,
have failed to live up to that responsibility. We have failed to give them the support they need or pay them the respect they
deserve. That is a betrayal of the sacred trust that America has with all who wear – and all who have worn – the
proud uniform of our country."
That is the president's lead in to talking about his military requisitioning
plans, veterans' funding and his economic program. It's how Obama often sets things up -- create a straw man opponent to his
policies and then attack.
It gets little notice, but even to this day Bush makes calls on wounded veterans at military
hospitals, corresponds with families of fallen servicemembers and gives his own money to veterans charities. In office, Bush
hugely increased funding for veterans programs and worked relentlessly to improve the lot of ordinary troops.
After reading The Messiah's remarks, I must admit I was apoplectic. How dare he. Then I remembered that what
we have elected to the Presidency is a classic narcissist. I should not be surprised that he spouts such utter and total
rubbish; it seems to happen daily. The poor man-boy can't help himself. Must be the result of his 'unique upbringing'.
A tip of the fedora to John Hinderaker for turning me on to this posting. His comments are spot-on:
It would be interesting to know how much of his own money Barack Obama has given to
veterans' charities over the years. I'd hazard a guess: zero.
Obama's incessant attacks on the Bush administration
tell us nothing about former President Bush, but a great deal about Barack Obama: the man has no class.
Our
Fearless Leader:
26 may 09 @ 11:30 am edt
WHERE HAS ALL THE VALUE GONE?What many of us predicted is starting to happen: inflation. As Jennifer
Rubin writes over at Contentions:
...As the Times notes, the Fed
"is printing money from thin air, and the government is issuing trillions of dollars in new debt as it tries to spend
its way out of the recession with a huge stimulus package, new lending programs, health care overhauls and automotive rescues."
The immediate impact is already seen in higher oil and other commodity prices and higher interest rates. In the longer term
economists now worry about the loss of the U.S. AAA bond rating. All this is occurring as unemployment is climbing into double
digits.
And so those
(Republicans in Congress and even those supposed rubes who were out at Tea Parties on April 15) who warned of stagflation
don't seem so alarmist after all. Remember the "misery index"? If we see the debilitating combination of high unemployment
and rising inflation it will be hard to miss the analogy to Jimmy Carter. And given the president's spending and bailout spree
and "Helicopter Ben's" monetary policy, it will be even harder to shift the blame elsewhere. What we are seeing
is the predictable result of Obama's policies, which most conservatives and libertarians - to their credit - warned against.
On this one, not even George W. Bush can be blamed.
When will we ever learn?
When will we...ever
learn?
Please take the time to click here and read the full posting.
26 may 09 @ 11:02 am edt
DOPE-SLAP TIMEMrs. Belvedere will tell you that I've been ranting about the consequences of
the tattoo craze for well over a decade. Now we learn from the New York Post, Anna Karni reporting:
Dermatologists across the city
are reporting a boom in tattoo laser removals, as body-art fanatics fretting over their professional image rush to erase their
inky mistakes.
"People can't afford to handicap themselves be
cause of a tattoo in a tight job market," said Dr. Jeffrey Rand, founder of the Tattoo Removal Center in Midtown. "We're
seeing a huge surge right now in people getting rid of their tattoos."
Mobeen Yasin, a graduate student at Mercy College, said the script tattoo of
his first name creeping around his neck is a liability.
Really? Who would have thought it?
One 34-year-old pharmaceutical salesman said the
Irish flag and the wizard that decorate his calves were costing him clients.
"I play a lot of golf with doctors, and these tattoos really stand out," said the salesman, who
did not want to use his name because he feared losing clients.
"I'm
embarrassed. I feel like they judge me, and it's affecting my business."
Now he gets costly laser treatments once a month to expunge the images from
his legs.
Can't have anybody judging a man with a wizard on his legs. No, no.
I liked the JammieWearingFool's comment:
This could well turn out the be a recession-proof business: Tattoo removal. Morons
snap out of it and realize tattoos in all the wrong places prevent them from getting jobs.
Duh.
How about we mandate one dope-slap
for every tattoo? I'd volunteer to administer the program.
Please click here to read the full report.
26 may 09 @ 10:54 am edt
STUPID IS AS STUPID PARTY DOESIt would now seem that the National Republican Senatorial Committee is not
the only Republican organization that has 'betrayed its mission, betrayed Republican voters, and betrayed the Reagan
legacy'. Over at The Corner, Kathryn Jean Lopez published this posting this morning that is quite disturbing [and worth quoting in full]:
Over the weekend, I was forwarded a request from
the Republican National Committee from someone who was being asked to be a surrogate for the RNC on the Supreme Court pick
— that is, talk on TV and radio on behalf of the RNC. The request included the guidance that the RNC is "looking
to come out very neutral on the subject."
Neutral? The Left sure isn't "neutral" on the Court or
on Republican presidential nominees for the Court. By all means, be reasonable. But the RNC wants to be "neutral"?
If the RNCis neutral is there anyone left in America to join the likes of Cheney and Gingrich (as Bill Kristol puts
it; scroll down) to oppose Obama-administration moves?
As Pundette wrote:
I was thinking more along the lines of fighting the
nomination with tooth and nail.Conservatives are being betrayed by the RNC.
Having been involved
with the Republican Party off-and-on since 1976, I must say I'm not surprised: there's a very good reason why they're called
'the Stupid Party'. Perhaps the Not One Red Cent campaign should be expanded to include the RNC?
26 may 09 @ 10:35 am edt
Monday, May 25, 2009
ENOUGHYou may have noticed the link to the new blog Not
One Red Cent in the right-hand column of this page. I'm not the type of person who joins organizations.
I prefer to remain outside all of the loops so I can freely criticize them. But, I am proud to tout this group.
It is a creature of the conservative grassroots. Their goal is a noble one:
On
May 12, 2009, The National Republican Senatorial Committee betrayed its mission, betrayed Republican voters, and betrayed
the Reagan legacy.
The NRSC sided with an establishment candidate, Florida Gov. Charlie Crist, in a Senate primary
against young conservative leader, former Florida House Speaker Marco Rubio.
Republicans across the country were
outraged by this action, which is only the latest betrayal of grassroots conservatives by the out-of-touch GOP elite in Washington.
The word went forth among conservative activists: Do not give money to the NRSC. The current chairman, Sen. John Cornyn,
must resign. His replacement must pledge to keep the committee neutral in contested primaries. Let Republican voters -- not
party elites -- choose Republican candidates.
This is where the conservative grassroots rebellion begins. When
the NRSC asks you for money, tell 'em:
NOT ONE RED CENT!
I accept no ads here at
The Camp Of The Saintsso I have no monetary incentive to endorse these folks. I just believe in what
they're doing. Please check out the site and see for yourself.
Over at The Greenroom, Robert Stacy McCain has up a posting reporting on the latest goings-on
related to the issue at hand. A highlight:
“It’s insane,”
one of my Texas Republican sources said, discussing the National Republican Senatorial Committee’s endorsement of Gov.
Charlie Crist in the 2010 Florida Senate race. “It absolutely makes no sense at all. . . . What’s the point of
even having a primary?”
The NRSC’s decision was denounced by several local GOP leaders in Florida and
sparked the nationwide Not One Red Cent revolt. By Wednesday night, Florida Republican Party Chairman Jim Greer had been forced to back downfrom his own premature endorsement of Crist.
A source in Orlando tells me that
Greer and Crist are longtime buddies, so this smug little arrangement — the state party chairman trying to guarantee
the Senate nomination for his friend the governor — was typical Bush-era cronyism. (“Heck of a job, Brownie!”)
Please take the time to click here and read the full posting.
25 may 09 @ 8:35 pm edt
POWELL NO. 5In a posting over at AmSpecBlog, Quin Hillyer performs a service
to his country by putting Colin Powell in his rightful place:
Gen. Colin Powell
was on Face the Nation today, trashing the Republican Party again, as if he has some particular moral authority.
I beg to differ. Colin Powell has almost as little moral authority as did the bystanders in the Kitty Genovese rape case. While his own administration, and especially a very good man named Lewis "Scooter"
Libby, was being raped by Patrick Fitzgerald's out-of-control investigation into the Valerie Plame leak, Powell and his top
aide Richard Armitage stood by silently even though both knew that Armitage had been (without malice aforethought) the
actual source of the leak. To let Libby (and Karl Rove and others) twist in the wind for so long when Powell and Armitage
knew what had really happened was the stance of either two cowards or, more likely, two vindictive political infighters who
cared more about seeing their adversaries (in internal administration disputes) be kneecapped than they cared about seeing
justice done and the truth be made public.
...
I had long been a fan of Colin Powell even while disagreeing
with him on social issues. And I have publicly credited him even after the Plame case for something few others have recognized
him for, namely his superb diplomacy that brought Pakistan in (originally) as a real ally during the major part of the war
in Afghanistan even while not losing at all the U.S.'s growing alliance with India (Pakistan's frequent enemy). So I am willing
to acknowledge his contibutions to this nation. But his actions during the Plame imbroglio were those of a cretin. And he
has offered nothing positive since then, only criticisms of the sort given by a man settling personal scores. For those reasons,
he should stop pushing his mug into public settings. Instead, he should find a nice shady rock, with plenty of crawl space,
to use as shelter.
Bravo, Mr. Hillyer, bravo. I've spent over twenty-five years working in the government
and I can tell you he is nothing more than the typical petty bureaucrat. As I wrote in a posting here several weeks ago:
Apparently, he wants bland and dull-witted people like himself [name one original
and/or innovative thought he has ever espoused] to lead the Party and make it a pale version of the Democratic Party.
Enough with listening to this serial bureaucrat. He was a mediocre General and a middling Secretary Of State.
When he was still an officer, many warriors considered him to be near-perfect example of a Perfumed Prince.
Please take the time to click here and read Mr. Hillyer's full posting.
25 may 09 @ 8:11 pm edt
STEYN OF THE WEEKENDFrom his latest appearance last Thursday on the Hugh Hewitt Show:
HEWITT: ...Mark, just generally, quite an extraordinary day on the national security
front with these battling giants of the national security world.
STEYN: Yes. I thought the President’s speech
was revolting and contemptible, and one that he really should not have given. In a sense, the Vice President, Dick Cheney,
all he had to do, really, was say well look, whatever you feel about these policies, for eight years, they worked, whereas
during the 90s, we had attacks on American targets routinely throughout the 1990s, leading up to 9/11. Now obviously, there’s
an element of luck in that as the IRA famously said to Mrs. Thatcher, you have to be lucky every day, we only have to be lucky
once. But when you’ve been lucky for eight years, I think clearly you’re doing something right. And there was
no need for Obama to give this speech, and he should not have given it.
HEWITT: He’s clearly feeling very
defensive. And Dick Cheney’s speech today was so sober, so detailed, so specific in its rebuttal of the airy claims
about what’s going on in the world that I think it leaves a huge mark. But let’s listen to the worst two passages
among many from the Obama speech, cut number 12A:
BHO: All too often,
our government made decisions based on fear rather than foresight. But all too often our government trimmed facts and evidence
to fit ideological predispositions. Instead of strategically applying our power and our principles, too often we set those
principles aside as luxuries that we could no longer afford. And during this season of fear, too many of us, Democrats and
Republicans, politicians, journalists and citizens, fell silent.
HEWITT:
Mark Steyn, this is a deeply dishonest statement. It lacks the specificity that would allow people to rebut it, and it is
an attempt to give himself credit for that which he does not deserve, the national security success of the last eight years,
and to diminish that success.
STEYN: Yes, I think that’s true. I mean, let me say first of all, I think it’s
entirely improper for him to be giving this speech. It’s far more specific, if you look for example at Jimmy Carter’s
famous speech, again, saying that, I think in 1977, saying we were all far too hung up about communism, and we had “an
inordinate fear” of it, even that speech, as ridiculous as that was, was not a specific assault on the immediate preceding
government. Well, what happened on January 20th was not some coup, was not the successful conclusion of a war of
liberation. It’s a two party system, and Party A is out of power, and Party B is in power. But the acts taken in the
last year, as far as the world were concerned, were the acts of the government of the United States. And given that they were
generally successful for the citizens of the United States, I think this would have been a perfectly understandable speech
to give last summer when he was campaigning for president. But it’s a very weird speech, and a contemptible speech to
give right now.
HEWITT: Let’s get to the second cut, this on interrogation, cut number 14:
BHO: I know some have argued that brutal methods like waterboarding were necessary to keep
us safe. I could not disagree more. As commander in chief, I see the intelligence. I bear the responsibility for keeping this
country safe. And I categorically reject the assertion that these are the most effective means of interrogation. What’s
more, they undermine the rule of law. They alienate us in the world. They serve as a recruitment tool for terrorists, and
increase the will of our enemies to fight us, while decreasing the will of others to work with America. They risk the lives
of our troops by making it less likely that others will surrender to them in battle, and more likely that Americans will be
mistreated if they are captured.
HEWITT: Mark Steyn, there so many
falsehoods in this. Go ahead.
STEYN: Yes, there are, and I think first of all, one thing that is completely absurd
is this idea that somehow American interrogation techniques act as a recruitment tool for al Qaeda. This is nonsense. What
acts as a recruitment tool for the jihad in general is when it’s seen or perceived to be successful, and the jihadists
are seen as the coming men. The idea that some guy in Waziristan or Yemen is encouraged to join the jihad because of waterboarding
is preposterous. There’s no evidence for it whatsoever. He’s just concocted that out of his own head, and I think
actually betrays either the naïveté of this president, which is one thing, or what’s worse, is the cynicism
of him if he knows that this is nonsense and he’s saying it anyway.
Please take the time to click here and read the full transcript.
25 may 09 @ 7:46 pm edt
THERE'S A RIOT GOING ONIn yesterday's New York Post, they published a very important
article by Steven Emerson of the Investigative Project On Terrorism that looks at the problem of Muslim proselytizing
in our prisons. This is an under-reported problem that many officials have not wanted to confront in order to avoid
being labeled Islamophobes. With the arrest of members of a Muslim terrorist cell that was planning to bomb two Bronx
synagogues and try to bring down military planes, one would hope, finally, this problem will be addressed and changes will
be made to prevent such recruiting. Alas...the hopeychange vibe of our Fearless Leader doesn't encompass these kinds
of hope and change. In fact, given His lack of understanding of the threat we face from Islam, I would expect the recruiters
to feel emboldened. 'Brazen' will become the operative adjective for their actions.
A few highlights from
Mr. Emerson's article:
Radicalism in prisons is a problem that has been festering for
years. The Department of Justice's Inspector General issued a report in 2004 with a host of recommendations for tamping it
down, but there's little sign any action has been taken.
That President Obama now wants to transfer hundreds of
hardened jihadists into American prisons is a guarantee that they will serve as emissaries and proselytizers of jihad to the
thousands of prisoners they are exposed to. In virtually no time, it is all but certain - based on past patterns of radical
Islamic growth in jails that we have investigated - that we will witness the number of radical Islamic inmates multiply by
thousands, maybe more.
The Guantanamo prisoners will be looked up as jihadi rock stars and each one could potentially
produce a hundred new ticking time bombs ultimately walking the streets of America. Although the President tried to reassure
us that no inmate has ever escaped from a super maximum security prison, what about the newly indoctrinated jihadists among
the existing inmates who will be certainly released after their terms are up? In light of the massive damage and death that
only four converts to Islam in prison could have carried out as witnessed in the interdiction of the recent terror plot, one
cannot even begin to imagine the potential for damage and death a thousand times greater were there to be a whole new generation
of hardened jihadists walking the streets of the US with an agenda of nothing but murder and destruction. FBI agents with
whom I have spoke say that the transfer of prisoners to the US is insane, pure and simple.
And...
The first thing that needs to be done is to get the Bureau of Prisons to stop being able to stick
its head in the sand. The Department of Justice, which oversees the Bureau of Prisons, needs to immediately set national vetting
standards for all religious clergy - not just Muslim Imams but Rabbis and Priests - and all religious texts and propaganda
being allowed into federal prisons. Congress needs to impose new rules that force BOP to mandate and operate strict investigations
of those who preach in the prisons and the material they are allowed to import.
Wahhabist literature, Muslim Brotherhood
tracts calling for Jihad, Saudi produced Qurans that exude hatred for Jews and Christians - all of this continues to flow
into federal and local prisons unhampered.
To those who say this is a violation of the free practice of religion
or free speech, that is pure nonsense: Like government officials who are denied clearances based on background checks, Islamic
chaplains who do not pass certain clearance standards can also be denied the right to enter prisons. That does not stop them
from practicing their religion; it only stops them from spreading their ideology in government institutions. And, incidentally,
the Bureau of Prisons should not be allowed to set the criteria: We found out that in 2004, the way the BOP determined whether
an Imam was a radical was to simply ask them if they supported terrorism. If they said no - and of course they all all did
- they were granted admission.
I think Mr. Emerson does not go far enough: we have to ban all Muslim chaplains
from America's prisons. It is a core principal of Islam that it is permissible to lie to infidels, therefore, we cannot
trust anything any Muslim has to say—we must always be suspicious. Another factor in this: the vast majority of
mosques in this country receive monies from Wahhabist sources and are beholden to them. Islam is at war with us; it's
about time we recognized this fact and acted accordingly.
As for the 'freedom of religion' argument: any representative
of any religion that preaches anti-American philosophy should not be sanctioned by those institutions that represent America.
Freedom of religion does not mean we have to be so tolerant of treasonous sermonizing and recruiting that we place ourselves
in danger, most especially in wartime. Mind you, my ban as defined above would also include the Reverend Wright and
others of his ilk as well.
I urge you to please take the time to click here and read Mr. Emerson's full article.
Michelle Malkin also wrote on this subject on Friday instant. She rightly criticizes Barack The Unready's
lack of a mention of the arrests:
Not one word from the president on the jihadists’
intended victims, motives, or means.
No comfort for the reported targets in the Big Apple, still raw from the Scare
Force One rattling that so vainly and recklessly simulated 9/11.
No condemnation for the accused plotters.
Why? Because doing so would force Obama to abandon his cottony “extremist ideology” euphemisms and confront
the concrete truth. To borrow one of our obtuse president’s favorite clichés, “let me be perfectly clear”
about the reality Obama won’t touch: America faces an ongoing Islamic jihad at home and abroad. Not merely “man-caused.”
But Koran-inspired. Yet, Obama refuses to spell out the centuries-old roots of the war that he claims he’ll win faster,
better, and cleaner than any of his predecessors.
Supposedly this guy understands Islam; he's always mentioning
how he was brought up with a Muslim father. He should know the danger posed by these recruiters. At least, you
would think so given his wonderful, unique, and cosmopolitan upbringing.
Please take the time to click here and read her full column.
25 may 09 @ 6:35 pm edt
CREEPING FASCISMDr. Feelgood Obama-Welby and his minions in the Congress are moving as fast as
is possible to impose government-controlled health care on all of us. Now some of the Leftists on the Appellate bench
are joining in the fun. As the ever-vigilant Jeff Emanuel reports over at Pajamas Media:
Earlier this month, a panel of the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of three states
that filed suit to have final medical decision-making authority transferred from doctors to state bureaucrats.
In
March, as reported here at Pajamas Media, Georgia, Florida, and Alabama appealed U.S. District Judge Thomas Thrash’s ruling that physicians, not government
bureaucrats, were qualified — both legally and medically — to decide what was “medically necessary”
for their patients, regardless of bureaucrats’ opinions.
The thrust of the states’ argument in Moore
was summed up in the amicus brief filed by the state of Florida, which said, “Treating physicians … cannot
be trusted with this sort of decision. When left to their own devices, they advocate for their patients, and deem all manner
of unproven, dangerous, ineffective, cosmetic, unnecessary, bizarre, and controversial treatments as ‘medically necessary.’”
The “final arbiter” of medical decisions is and should be “the state,” said attorney Robert
Highsmith in March 24 oral arguments — and the panel of the 11th Circuit agreed.
As a result of this ruling,
doctors within the 11th Circuit’s jurisdiction will no longer be “left to their own devices” to treat Medicaid
patients under their care. However, current events suggest the relegation of medical professionals’ recommendations
to the status of mere suggestions pending review by state bureaucrats isn’t likely to be limited to Medicaid cases alone
for long.
What makes America unique is rapidly disintegrating in a vast vat of Leftist acid.
The
whirlwind is turning into a tornado.
Please take the time to click here and read Mr. Emanuel's full posting.
25 may 09 @ 5:52 pm edt
OBAMA DON'T SURFSpeaking of our Divine Obamacus...
No Sheeples Here
offers this spot-on observation:
This errand boy, sent by grocery clerks, blames the
economic meltdown on GM's bad decisions and health care costs rather than government’s spending beyond its means.
QUESTION:Didn’t our Fearless Reader and The League of Doom, er, the Democrats derail any attempts to
put health care and social security on sound footing during the Evil One’s Administration? Now he’s stonewalling
to advance his spendthrift programs.
Staying with the Apocalypse Now theme: every night since last November when I first crawl into my bed, I lay on my back and half-whisper 'The
horror...the horror'. Every morning when I wake up and first open my eyes, I say 'Obama...shit'.
Please take the time to click here and read the full Sheeples's posting.
25 may 09 @ 5:31 pm edt
WILL THIS BE THE YEAR OF THE MUSHROOM CLOUD?While most of us were off enjoying the long weekend and remembering our fallen
warriors, the Certifiable Dim-Son of North Korea decided to test our Fearless Leader again. As might be expected, Barack The Unready gave a typical, for him, response which was, at best, wimpy [quoted in full]:
Today, North Korea said that it has conducted a nuclear test
in violation of international law. It appears to also have attempted a short range missile launch. These actions,
while not a surprise given its statements and actions to date, are a matter of grave concern to all nations. North Korea's
attempts to develop nuclear weapons, as well as its ballistic missile program, constitute a threat to international peace
and security.
By acting in blatant defiance of the United Nations Security Council, North Korea is directly and
recklessly challenging the international community. North Korea's behavior increases tensions and undermines stability
in Northeast Asia. Such provocations will only serve to deepen North Korea's isolation. It will not find international
acceptance unless it abandons its pursuit of weapons of mass destruction and their means of delivery.
The danger
posed by North Korea's threatening activities warrants action by the international community. We have been and will
continue working with our allies and partners in the Six-Party Talks as well as other members of the U.N. Security Council
in the days ahead.
I watched the President make this statement and it seemed to me he looked like he really
didn't want to have to deal with what, I'm sure, he considers an 'unwelcome distraction'. Expect him to act accordingly.
And mark me: when he is forced by our enemies to respond, he will overreact—the Left always does.
Over at The Corner, Michael Rubin was spot-on in his comments:
...The test is an indictment of more than 15 years of misguided diplomacy. Rather than
win diplomatic pause, we and our allies in KEDO have given North Korea billions of dollars in aid and subsidies while they
pursued this milestone unmolested and unabated.
...
The question now comes whether we will learn from
the failures of both engagement and multilateralism. The links between Pyongyang and Tehran are strong. The arguments made
now with regard to Tehran parallel those made 15 years ago with North Korea. The timeline won't be the same, however, since
North Korea has shown willingness to proliferate, selling technology to the highest bidder. Obama faces a real test with regard
to Iran. Desperation to engage and willingness to admit guilt for imagined sins while seeing innocence in an adversary is
not a strategy. Don't repeat the mistakes of the past three administrations: that of George H. W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and
George W. Bush failed miserably on Korea. Learn the lessons; trash the model.
Sadly, I think it more likely
that he will go in the exact opposite direction and enhance the model.
James Robbins picks up on something I, at first, didn't notice in the President's statement:
Is President Obama tracking the threat of nuclear proliferation? He denounced “North
Korea's attempts to develop nuclear weapons,” which strikes one as a little odd since Pyongyang is well beyond the development
stage and has moved on to testing. Our concern now should be estimating when they will deploy an operational nuclear force....
Hey...he's got more important things to do.
Mr. Robbins also reminds us of the North Korea-Iran connection:
The North Korean test should also increase the urgency with which we face the Iranian nuclear
threat. Iranian technicians reportedly were present at the 2006 North Korean nuclear test, and odds are they were involved
with this one as well. North Korea and Iran have long cooperated on nuclear and missile programs.... It is reasonable to assume
that Iran could use North Korea as another weapons-development basing area, leaving only the sticky problem of getting a completed
weapon back to Iran. For all we know the test today was on Iran’s behalf. President Obama would do well to focus seriously
on the emerging challenge in Iran, before Tehran settles the issue....
Well...maybe...if we get those unconditional
talks going???
David Pryce-Jones offers this succinct and true observation:
Time is running out. The more sincere Obama is, the more naïve he seems.
John Bolton, who predicted that a nuclear test was imminent last week, had this to say today to Fox News:
"I think we're at a moment of real testing for the Obama administration,"
Bolton said. "I think this incident really is that famous 3 a.m. call that the presidential candidates debated last year."
And our Fearless Leader slept through it.
25 may 09 @ 5:13 pm edt
|
|
Dispatches are archived by week; click on the links above.
 |
|
'This one was worth
the fight.
And it's only one fight in the battle, and we have to keep fighting.'
—Doug
Hoffman
The Restoration will not be televised; it will be blogged.
—Robert Belvedere
|
|
| Click The Picture Above For The Latest Updates/Linkage |
'Bob Belvedere may have the best compilationof IG-Gate information.'
—Robert Stacy McCain
'Robert Belvedere at The Camp
of the Saints appears to be maintaining the definitive index of all things PIG-gate...at TCOTS. ...This is an excellent resource.
We thank you, sir.'
—Smitty 'More great commentary and juicy
links on l'affaire IG from Camp of the Saints..'
—Paco
Captain Ohab:
'From hell's
heart I stab at thee; for hate's sake I spit my last breath at thee. Ye damned Fox News.'
I may be reached at
Robert.Belvedere AT gmail DOT com
FELLOW DHS-CERTIFIED
RIGHT-WING EXTREMISTS |
|
|
|
| 04 AUGUST 1790: The Founding of the U.S. Coast Guard |
|
| Please click on the image and visit the site. |
Please click here to read
Behind the ‘Not One Red Cent’ Rebellion
by ROBERT STACY MCCAIN
Click here and here to find out why I think
Robert Stacy McCain is
THE CONSERVATIVE
SHAFT
| MY KENYAN BIRTH CERTIFICATE |
|
|
| Please Click on the Image to View Full Size |
|
| Please click on the image above to learn more from Michelle Malkin. |
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
T E R M S
Let us make precise and clear-cut the terms we should be using.
Aristotle wrote that A is A; you may also call it B, but
it always remains A. A thing is what it is and, to say it is something else, is to deny reality. There is a lot of denial
of reality going around these days.
As John Adams wrote: 'Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes,
our inclinations, the dictates of our passions, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence'.
POINT 1: There is no "War in Iraq"
or "War in Afghanistan". Like the Pacific and Europe in World War II, Iraq and Afghanistan are
just parts of a larger war. Unlike them, they are not separate from each other. Therefore,
they are part of the Middle East Theatre of Operations [METO] as the Pacific was the PTO and Europe the ETO.
POINT 2: Many on the Left and some on the Right want to "end
the War". There are only two ways to end a war: (1) by achieving Victory or (2) by being Defeated.
A pullout, before Victory is achieved, is Defeat. They want Defeat. Pullout may
be the best policy―I am not arguing that here―but, leaving without achieving our objective is Defeat.
POINT 3: We are engaged in a War Against Islam.
The term is more correct than "War against Islamo-Fascism" or "War On Terror".
Islam has been at war with all non-Muslims since the
time of its founder, Muhammad [his name be cursed]. Like the Hundred Years' War, there have been periods
of peace in this long conflict, but the Muslim has never stopped believing that he is at war with all non-Muslims.
He can't: Allah commands that all of the world be conquered in his name and he must submit, in all things, to the
will of Allah [the word Islam means "submission", sometimes rendered as "surrender"]. Any
periods of peace we in the West have enjoyed have only occurred after we have dealt them such a devastating blow that they
have not been able to wage their jihad and then have pursued polices that have kept them subjugated. This
began to fade in the latter half of the 20th Century as we forgot the dangers posed by this militant religion and
as they regrouped under new and committed leaders.
If you
doubt that Islam is at war with all non-Muslims, keep in mind this:
Islamic apologists
often point out that Islam is not a monolith and that there are differences of opinion among the different Islamic schools
of thought. That is true, but, while there are differences, there are also common elements. Just as Orthodox, Roman Catholic,
and Protestant Christians differ on many aspects of Christianity, still they accept important common elements. So it is with
Islam. One of the common elements to all Islamic schools of thought is jihad, understood as the obligation of the Ummah to
conquer and subdue the world in the name of Allah and rule it under Sharia law. The four Sunni Madhhabs (schools of fiqh [Islamic
religious jurisprudence]) -- Hanafi, Maliki, Shafi'i, and Hanbali -- all agree that there is a collective obligation on
Muslims to make war on the rest of the world. Furthermore, even the schools of thought outside Sunni orthodoxy, including
Sufism and the Jafari (Shia) school, agree on the necessity of jihad. When it comes to matters of jihad, the different schools
disagree on such questions as whether infidels must first be asked to convert to Islam before hostilities may begin (Osama
bin Laden asked America to convert before Al-Qaeda’s attacks); how plunder should be distributed among victorious jihadists;
whether a long-term Fabian strategy against dar al-harb is preferable to an all-out frontal attack; etc. [Source: Gregory M. Davis, Islam 101, section
4g, found at http://www.jihadwatch.org/islam101/]
They have been at war with us for
centuries and we, therefore, have been at war with them. We are engaged in a War Against Islam whether
we want to say so or not. In an interview with a Pakistani TV network on 23 July 2008, Mustafa Abu Al-Yazid,
Al-Qaeda's No. 3 man and top commander in Afghanistan, has this to say: “Islam does not distinguish between the
American people and the American government, since both are in a state of war with Islam”. [Source: http://www.memri.org/bin/latestnews.cgi?ID=SD200008]
POINT 4: The term "Islamo-Fascism" seems
to have been created by Leftists. Since (1) they wrongly place fascism on the Right, (2) they believe [rightly]
Muslims want to establish a theocratic regime on Earth, and (3) anything political that has any connection with religion is
bad and emanates out of rightwing thinking, the term makes sense to them. Therefore, the term is nothing
but a way to associate Islam with the right-wing. Muslims believe in a totalitarian way of governing; in
submission [that word] to an all-powerful Islamic leader or leaders.
POINT 5: As to the term "War On Terror",
it is just plain silly: how can you wage war on a thing?
POINT 6: What is fascism? It is when a government
allows private property to exist, but controls and manages the use and disposal of property in all its forms. Citizens
retain all of the burdens and responsibilities associated with property ownership, but are not allowed to control and shape
its use.
As an economic system, fascism is socialism with a capitalist veneer. The word derives from fasces, the Roman symbol of collectivism and power: a tied
bundle of rods with a protruding ax. In its day (the 1920s and 1930s), fascism was seen as the happy medium between boom-and-bust-prone
liberal capitalism, with its alleged class conflict, wasteful competition, and profit-oriented egoism, and revolutionary Marxism, with its violent and socially divisive persecution of the bourgeoisie. Fascism substituted the particularity of nationalism
and racialism—“blood and soil”—for the internationalism of both classical liberalism and Marxism.
Where socialism sought totalitarian control of a society’s economic processes through
direct state operation of the means of production, fascism sought that control indirectly, through domination of nominally
private owners. Where socialism nationalized property explicitly, fascism did so implicitly, by requiring owners to use their
property in the “national interest”—that is, as the autocratic authority conceived it. (Nevertheless, a
few industries were operated by the state.) Where socialism abolished all market relations outright, fascism left the appearance
of market relations while planning all economic activities. Where socialism abolished money and prices, fascism controlled
the monetary system and set all prices and wages politically. In doing all this, fascism denatured the marketplace. Entrepreneurship was abolished. State ministries, rather than consumers, determined what was produced and under what conditions.
[Source: Sheldon Richman, The Concise Encylcopedia Of Economics,
Liberty Fund, found at http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/Fascism.html]
On the political spectrum, therefore, it is located between modern liberalism
and socialism.
POINT 7: What is socialism? It is when a government
allows no private property to exist, and controls and manages the use and disposal of property in all its forms.
Citizens are not allowed to control their lives and are subject to the whims of bureaucrats and officials. If they
retain freedoms and liberties, they do so at the discretion of them. On the political spectrum, therefore, it
is the next logical stage after fascism; some would argue that it lies between fascism and communism.
POINT 8: What is pragmatism? It is a tool used by Leftists,
or those operating under the influence of Leftist logic, to achieve Utopian ends—heaven on earth through social, political,
cultural, and spiritual engineering. It is merely a tool of ideology, part of the means to an end.
POINT 9:The Big Lie - When confronted with truths that reflect
unpleasantly on them, the Leftists deflect it buy claiming over-an-over ad nauseum that these truths apply to and are products
of the Right. This practice is known as The Big Lie. It has been successfully practiced by the
Left since, at the very least, the French Revolution. Thus, we have the now-widespread belief that the Nazis and the
Black Shirts of Italy were right-wingers when the reality-the truth-is they were both people of the Left. I suspect
the violent objections from the Left to conservatives use of the term 'fascist' arise from the fact that they have spent well
over seventy years trying to convince the world of The Big Lie that it is not and never has been a Leftist
ideology.
How does one practice this distortion truth and why is it effective? In a report issued during
World War II by the OSS, the author provided an explanation for all practitioners by describing how Hitler practiced it:
His primary rules were: never allow the public to cool off; never admit a fault
or wrong; never concede that there may be some good in your enemy; never leave room for alternatives; never accept blame;
concentrate on one enemy at a time and blame him for everything that goes wrong; people will believe a big lie sooner than
a little one; and if you repeat it frequently enough people will sooner or later believe it.
By repeating
their lies over and over, the Left creates a false reality that supplements the real world. In this false reality, the
lie is the truth, the truth is the lie. A is not A. [But we know that A must always be A.]
The Left
also practices a variation of The Big Lie that I like to call The Big Deception which involves
a Big Deflection away from the reality of the situation. None of their policies or actions can survive
direct questioning, so the Leftists must turn the tables on the questioners and make it seem as though the inquisitors have
bad or evil intentions. Overtime and after constant and unrelenting hectoring, the Left's way of thinking triumphs.
They successfully infect enough people so that this diseased mode of thinking becomes chronic, deep-rooted, instinctual. If
the Devil's greatest triumph was that he convinced people he did not exist, the Left's greatest triumph has been to convince
people that the Leftist way of thinking is normal. It is not. It is a perversion of reason and a horribly mutant
form of logic. It is antithetical to human life. Nothing but decay and destruction are left [pun intended] in it's wake.
What They're Saying
About
BOB BELVEDERE &
The Camp Of The Saints... 'Sir Bob of Belvedere'
—Smitty—
'So many good things at Camp of the Saints that you need to just click and keep scrolling.'
—Paco—
'Go, read it, fine stuff over there!'
—GatorDoug—
''Belvederus Maximus'
—Smitty—
'You are contributing to a noble yet futile cause -- the butchification of metrosexuals.
TCOTS
roolz!'
—Red—
'[H]e takes retro dame blogging to a new, narrative noir level.'
—Smitty—
'Staunch Rule 5 aficionado Bob Belvedere, is shameless indeed (I have so much respect for this man)!'
—The Classic Liberal—
'Who knew he was such a fan of the undead?'
—Smitty—
'We need fighters, and I suspect Beck will fight 'til ev'ry foe is vanquished.
Bob Belvedere gets it. Phyllis Chesler gets it.
We defend truth and
liberty against lies and tyranny. Every eye is upon us and we are surrounded by enemies as numerous as the grains of sand
on the shore. Let us determine to die here, and we will conquer.
WOLVERINES!'
—Stacy McCain—
'Bob Belvedere, you're a nasty piece of work.'
—Anonymous—
'you charming rogue'
—Robert—
'The sad decay of Bob Belvedere into a Rule 5 junkie saddens us all.'
—Smitty—
'Belvedere went slightly crazy on us.'
—Smitty—
'And thank you, Dr. Belvedere, for setting me straight on Rule 5! I tell ya, that Belvedere Dude
is Funny!'
—Irish Cicero—
'Kevin Binversie is not nearly so shameless a blogwhore as Troglopundit . . .
but then again, nobody really is. OK, maybe Bob Belvedere, as if anyone could compete with Bob.'
—Stacy McCain—
'Lord Fatheringay von Whoopsie of the Dung Heap Hooter'
—Anon. —
|
