I Stand With Israel

This essay by Oriana Fallaci, a former resistance fighter in WWII and today a powerful voice against Islamofascism, should be read by all those who take the war on the terrorists seriously. And with this new attack on Israel by the forces of darkness the message it holds is all the more relevant.

I find it shameful that in Italy there should be a procession of individuals dressed as suicide bombers who spew vile abuse at Israel, hold up photographs of Israeli leaders on whose foreheads they have drawn the swastika, incite people to hate the Jews. And who, in order to see Jews once again in the extermination camps, in the gas chambers, in the ovens of Dachau and Mauthausen and Buchenwald and Bergen-Belsen et cetera, would sell their own mother to a harem.

I find it shameful that the Catholic Church should permit a bishop, one with lodgings in the Vatican no less, a saintly man who was found in Jerusalem with an arsenal of arms and explosives hidden in the secret compartments of his sacred Mercedes, to participate in that procession and plant himself in front of a microphone to thank in the name of God the suicide bombers who massacre the Jews in pizzerias and supermarkets. To call them "martyrs who go to their deaths as to a party."

I find it shameful that in France, the France of Liberty-Equality-Fraternity, they burn synagogues, terrorize Jews, profane their cemeteries. I find it shameful that the youth of Holland and Germany and Denmark flaunt the kaffiah just as Mussolini's avant garde used to flaunt the club and the fascist badge.

I find it shameful that in nearly all the universities of Europe Palestinian students sponsor and nurture anti-Semitism. That in Sweden they asked that the Nobel Peace Prize given to Shimon Peres in 1994 be taken back and conferred on the dove with the olive branch in his mouth, that is on Arafat. I find it shameful that the distinguished members of the Committee, a Committee that (it would appear) rewards political color rather than merit, should take this request into consideration and even respond to it. In hell the Nobel Prize honors he who does not receive it.

New York Times Downsizing

Women and minorities hardest hit

Reuters is reporting in this story that the daft old lady is finding it difficult to survive in the age of new media, especially when the paper runs story after story attacking the nation's ability to defend itself by leaking classified secrets to the enemy. The Times will close one of its printing plants, located in New Jersey and fire the workers who have been employed there. But of course there will be no series of investigative reports into the cruel and unjust actions of a major corporation harming the working class or the massive salaries paid to the top executives who made the decision to put those workers out on the street. Nor will there be any reporting on the mismanagement that might have led to the mass layoff of people who had been working for the company for years. And there will be no full color pictures of weeping wives with their babies who now will have to eat dog food because of the cruel injustice of an uncaring and remote corporation concerned only with its profitable bottom line.

Meanwhile, Thomas Lifson takes a look at some of the underlying reasons that the New York Times has been in decline. In particular he examines the economic and business decisions which led to the loss of income for the paper and how it has limited the choices that the business now faces.

The Times is well known for its elitism and its unconscious condescension toward those occupying less lofty stations in life. Editor Bill Keller let slip a telling remark in remarks reported* by the AP:

“…this is a much less painful way to go about assuring our economic survival than cutting staff.”

The blue collar denizens of Jersey never quite made it being considered staff, after all. Not in the eyes of Bill Keller his colleagues in Manhattan. Not even close.

Event Horizon

The Elite Media Monoculture in a bubble

David Remnick wrings his hands and gnashes his teeth in this essay from the New Yorker in which he decries the tragedy which has befallen dinosaur media. That tragedy is, of course, that they are no longer able to maintain their old monopoly of information. They no longer are able to shape public opinion as they once were able. Now the ageing relics of a bygone age are only one among many available choices from which one can gain knowledge about the world. And the most grating facts to the David Remnicks' of the world is that an alternative view is being offered, and accepted by an American public that is quickly abandoning the sinking ship of old media.

The tall tales which they offer are of no interest to a public which now can listen to talk radio, watch Fox and read news and information from around the globe at the click of a mouse. The lies and distortions no longer fool the American people. Indeed, two thirds of the American public think that the recent stories from the New York Times, in which they disclosed vital national security information illegally and which have damaged our ability to defend ourselves from terrorist attacks in the future, are far over the line of what should be allowed. And is it any wonder? Americans with common sense know that leaks of these kinds, which compromise legal programs that are aimed at the terrorists, endanger all of us in the long run.

The David Remnicks' of the old media are, more and more, living in a black hole cut off from the rest of the American public and culture. Nothing reaches them, nothing changes them, nothing can save them from their invincible ignorance. Surrounded by their ever shrinking heard of fellow lemmings, they continue to rush headlong off of the cliff with no clue about their direction or how they ended up in their race to extinction. Keeping their eyes tightly shut and their ears covered, they can only race on towards the abyss.

The Subtexts of War

Culture, oil, and reckless dissent.

Victor Davis Hanson looks at some of the things which have not changed since 9-11 in this article from his website. The environmentalists of the Angry Left are still adamant against us using or developing our own oil resources that might make us more independent of Middle Eastern oil sheikdoms. The Angry Left is still wailing about how terrible America is and how Vice President Cheney is putting secret electrodes in their microwave ovens in the middle of the night. And Multiculturalists still are unwilling to see the difference between a radical Islamic movement that wants to take the world back to the 7th century and the modern Western world that respects the rights of different religions, ethnic groups and women. In short, the 5th column in America still has its head buried deeply in the sand.

The Tattooed Lady Cuts Bait

A dying career and a dying network

Over at the Majority Report blog the inmates are more depressed than usual to find out that the reports of Janeane Garofalo's failure to launch have indeed come to pass despite the stamping of little leftist feet. It seems that if you are a frustrated chic revolutionary who demands respect from the industry that you constantly complain about while at the same time making yourself completely unemployable, you end up being surprised that you can't seem to get your career to add up to anything important. And if you then get a job on an Angry Leftist radio network, you also end up being surprised yet again to find out that your choice of career moves is something less than stellar. And when your ratings go nowhere and the network hits the skids you find once again that you are on the wrong side of history and perhaps you should have stuck it out at college and gone into a more productive line of work where you would not have had to cover yourself in tattoos to get attention.

I like Janeane, but as she has said countless times before; she had some real problems growing up. She'll be 42 in September, half of her life gone and she is still begging for recognition by plastering tattoos all over her body. If she's wondering why her acting career is fading, there are not too many parts around for the Tattooed Lady in the circus. That's why she is always wrapped in tons of lose fitting clothes or Turtle Neck Sweaters on the screen.

There is no Grand Jury job, I have to admit that I initially fell for that one myself. After thinking about it, there's no jury greeter; what a load of crap.

Could be that new management is running her butt off. When all is said and done, AA is a business and she is simply not dependable. The new CEO sounds like he's going to pretty much clean house and Janeane may not be the only casualty. Good luck finding a job that will pay the bills in NYC, or for that matter, anywhere else today.

And of course these are the people who want to get back into power and run your lives because they think they can do it better than you can.

Oh, and by the way... I was listening to the radio on my way to work the other day. I turned on Rush and the substitute host was talking about the situation in the Middle East. I turned to Michael Medved and he was talking about the situation in the Middle East. I then turned on Al Franken and he was talking about.....The Norwegian Elections!!!

Can you say "out of touch?"

To My Arab Brothers: The War With Israel Is Over, And They Won

Youssef M. Ibrahim, a former New York Times Middle East Correspondent and Wall Street Journal Energy Editor for 25 years brings us this open letter to the Arab Jihadists who have tried and failed to destroy the "Zionist Entity" for three generations. The cost of that blind hate and resentment has been a failed state and the impoverishment of a people who could have had a real country, but who have instead chosen the path of self destruction.

If you plant ice, you harvest wind.

Dear friends, you and your leaders have wasted three generations trying to fight for Palestine, but the truth is the Palestine you could have had in 1948 is much bigger than the one you could have had in 1967, which in turn is much bigger than what you may have to settle for now or in another 10 years. Struggle means less land and more misery and utter loneliness.

At the moment, brothers, you would be lucky to secure a semblance of a state in that Gaza Strip into which you have all crowded, and a small part of the West Bank of the Jordan. It isn't going to get better. Time is running out even for this much land, so here are some facts, figures, and sound advice, friends.

You hold keys, which you drag out for television interviews, to houses that do not exist or are inhabited by Israelis who have no intention of leaving Jaffa, Haifa, Tel Aviv, or West Jerusalem. You shoot old guns at modern Israeli tanks and American-made fighter jets, doing virtually no harm to Israel while bringing the wrath of its mighty army down upon you. You fire ridiculously inept Kassam rockets that cause little destruction and delude yourselves into thinking this is a war of liberation. Your government, your social institutions, your schools, and your economy are all in ruins.

Your young people are growing up illiterate, ill, and bent on rites of death and suicide, while you, in effect, are living on the kindness of foreigners, including America and the United Nations. Every day your officials must beg for your daily bread, dependent on relief trucks that carry food and medicine into the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, while your criminal Muslim fundamentalist Hamas government continues to fan the flames of a war it can neither fight nor hope to win.

In other words, brothers, you are down, out, and alone in a burnt-out landscape that is shrinking by the day.

Comunist North Korea Steals From Comunist China

In this interesting article from Stragety Page we find out that the failed worker's paradise of North Korea is in such poor economic shape that they are keeping the rail cars that China is using to send them the food they need to keep from starving. But Angry Leftists everywhere continue to insist that somehow socialism can be made to work. One wonders how long China's patience with their wayward client will last.

The Suicide Bomb Morality

Robert Tracinski writes this article from RealClearPolitics on the ethical difference between the values of the West and those of the Islamofascist suicide bombers. And indeed the principle which motivates our enemies should be clear to all.

Tracinski, like Ayn Rand, refers to this idea as the doctrine of self sacrifice. But in thinking about this I believe there is a more accurate way to characterize it. The idea of self sacrifice as it is commonly used in the West usually includes the idea of doing so to help others. Fire fighters, police and military people put their lives on the line to make life safe for their fellow citizens as well as for the payment they receive. And ordinary acts of heroism, like jumping in a lake to save a drowning person, are done with the value of life in mind. These kinds of acts are done in the service of life; with the implicit recognition that life is itself the motivating factor.

But the Palestinian suicide bombers, who Tracinski uses as an example, have an entirely different motivation. These people, and the culture they represent, act in the service of death. They value death and do not value life. They do not practice the ethics of self sacrifice as we understand it in the West. Rather, they are practicing the doctrine of Human Sacrifice, which is an altogether different sort of thing. They not only act to kill themselves, but they are willing to kill their own children if it means the death of the infidels can be accomplished. Indeed, they have chosen the death of their entire society rather than seek peaceful relations with Israel or the West.

When I think of these people I am reminded of primitive cultures such as the Aztecs, who commonly practiced human sacrifice in order to appease their gods. It occurs to me that Islam, when considered in its religious context as opposed to its political dimension, falls into this same category of a primitive mindset which requires victims and sacrifices of blood to appease a vengeful and malevolent god. The first explorers to reach the Americas were shocked to find this way of thinking among American Indian tribes such as the Aztecs and they acted as quickly as they could to stamp it out. In our battle against primitive Islam we should be no less pro-active in seeking the destruction of this horrific ideology of human sacrifice and death.

The Big-Bang Story of U.S. Private Business

At RealClearPolitics one of my favorite living economists, Lawrence Kudlow, brings us the latest economic numbers relating to investments, jobs and economic growth in the US. The picture is a very good one with all of the major indicators looking very solid. Jobs are up; the economy is hot; inflation moderate and investment booming. And of course you will hear none of this from The Elite Media Monoculture because it does not fit the liberal socialist template of capitalist oppression. Fortunately the Angry Left is not in charge of my money or yours. And thus we all get to keep more of the money we have earned from our own hard work.

Did you know that just over the past 11 quarters, dating back to the June 2003 Bush tax cuts, America has increased the size of its entire economy by 20 percent? In less than three years, the U.S. economic pie has expanded by $2.2 trillion, an output add-on that is roughly the same size as the total Chinese economy, and much larger than the total economic size of nations like India, Mexico, Ireland, and Belgium.

This is an extraordinary fact, although you may be reading it here first. Most in the mainstream media would rather tout the faults of American capitalism than sing its praises. And of course, the media will almost always discuss supply-side tax cuts in negative terms, such as big budget deficits and static revenue losses. But here's another suppressed fact: Since the 2003 tax cuts, tax-revenue collections from the expanding economy have been surging at double-digit rates while the deficit is constantly being revised downward.

For those who bother to look, the economic power of lower-tax-rate incentives is once again working its magic. While most reporters obsess about a mild slowdown in housing, the big-bang story is a high-sizzle pick-up in private business investment, which is directly traceable to Bush's tax reform. It was private investment that was hardest hit in the early-decade stock market plunge and the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist bombings. So team Bush's wise men correctly targeted investment in order to slash the after-tax cost of capital and rejuvenate investment incentives.

Protein Wisdom Attacked by Moonbat Leftist

Now they are threatening children with rape

Michelle Malkin and a number of other conservative bloggers have reported this very strange story in which a psychology professor at the University of Arizona has been posting threatening messages on the blog "Protein Wisdom" which is the blog of Jeff Goldstein. The Moonbat in question, one Deb Frisch, has been caught doing something quite illegal, not to mention unethical and as is usually the case with the Angry Left, she is trying to portray herself as the victim for having to endure the consequences of her own childish actions.

Typical.

Fight Back Against the Treasonous New York Times

If you don't want to allow the flagship of The Elite Media Monoculture to help the Islamofascists get us all killed, then make yourself heard. Write to the Justice Department and demand that lawbreakers be thrown in jail where they belong.

askdoj@usdoj.gov

How Much Does the New York Times Hate America?

Even more than ABC, it seems

The flagship of Elite Media Monoculture wants you to die so that they can make a profit.

The New York Times, and also the L. A. Times, have published stories about another secret (well it used to be secret) program that was used to trace money transfers of terrorists around the globe. The idea was that if you could trace the money, you might be able to catch a few terrorists. And in fact that is exactly what the program allowed us to do. Until now, that is.

The Times reporters Eric Lichtblau and James Risen as well as the executive editor Bill Keller apparently think that the election never happened and that it is up to them to decide what national policy will be and which laws they can break and when. Never mind all of that terrorist stuff; the really important thing is to make sure that the New York Times is the real government calling the shots and not that redneck hick in the White House who got the votes.

Viewed by the Bush administration as a vital tool, the program has played a hidden role in domestic and foreign terrorism investigations since 2001 and helped in the capture of the most wanted Qaeda figure in Southeast Asia, the officials said.

[The program] has provided clues to money trails and ties between possible terrorists and groups financing them, the officials said. In some instances, they said, the program has pointed them to new suspects, while in others it has buttressed cases already under investigation.

Among the successes was the capture of a Qaeda operative, Riduan Isamuddin, better known as Hambali, believed to be the mastermind of the 2002 bombing of a Bali resort, several officials said. The Swift data identified a previously unknown figure in Southeast Asia who had financial dealings with a person suspected of being a member of Al Qaeda; that link helped locate Hambali in Thailand in 2003, they said.

In the United States, the program has provided financial data in investigations into possible domestic terrorist cells as well as inquiries of Islamic charities with suspected of having links to extremists, the officials said.

The data also helped identify a Brooklyn man who was convicted on terrorism-related charges last year, the officials said. The man, Uzair Paracha, who worked at a New York import business, aided a Qaeda operative in Pakistan by agreeing to launder $200,000 through a Karachi bank, prosecutors said.

Isn't it interesting that they admit in their article that this program has been effective and has helped in the capture of some of the bad guys? But did that stop them from blabbing it all over the front page? Well, you already know the answer to that one. No, the real agenda here is anti-Bush, anti-Republican and most of all anti-American. And yes I am questioning their patriotism because I don't think for a second that they actually have any. They are not on our side; they are on the side of the terrorists. And I say this because it should be clear by now that that is the side they are helping by publishing all of these stories. The deaths of Americans does not bother them in the slightest. But when the Bush administration and the government actually catch some of the bad guys, well that can't be allowed because it might violate terrorist rights.

Check out the great articles on the subject from Heather MacDonald and Andrew McCarthy.

Gabriel Schoenfeld weighs in on the subject of whether the journalists at the high and mighty Times might be prosecuted. Personally I want them rotting in jail. Their actions have made it very likely that more Americans will die at the hands of Islamofascists than would have been the case before they wrote the story. For that they should be in prison along with the leakers in the CIA who called them up and told them national secrets they promised to keep under wraps when they took their oaths.

How Much Does ABC Hate America?

Enough to leak any sensitive information that helps the bad guys.

Over at ABC's blog "The Blotter," the "news" organization has put up a picture and story about one Ziad Khalaf Raja al-Karbouly who, they say, helped to provide information about how the currently decomposing Abu Musab al-Zarqawi could be found and targeted for his just rewards in virgin-land. BelmontClub argues that this intelligence was probably not recent enough to be a deciding factor. And that may indeed be the case, but I don't think the people over at ABC are smart enough to have thought about it in this fashion. I think they just wanted to help America's enemies once again by leaking sensitive information that would hurt our ability to gather intelligence and fight against the Islamofascists. And judging by the comments left at the blog by other readers, I am not alone in this assessment.

The Angry Left Celebrates the Demize of Zarqawi

Well, OK, not really...

And meanwhile back in the fever swamps of the drooling tinfoil hat left there is wailing and gnashing of teeth as one of the most prominent of Bush hating allies meets his end. This round-up of caterwaulling brought to you by bloggers Dr. Sanity and Mark Coffey who have waded through the slime so we don't have to.

The Two Worlds of the Liberal Blogosphere

They’re both on display at YearlyKos.

Byron York of The National Review takes a look at the most recent condensation of The Angry Left in the form of "The YearlyKos" get-together in Las Vegas. The moonbat fringe was on parade, but apparently not all is serene among the tinfoil hat conspirators. For there are some people who have noticed that every single one of the candidates who have been endorsed by the KosKids have gone on to flaming defeat. Could it be that most Americans, including many of those in the political middle, don't think that America is the enemy, don't think that we are living in a dictatorship, don't think that George W. Bush is Hitler, don't think that everything is the result of a dastardly evil Halliburton plot?

No, it must be that the Angry Left has not "gotten their message out".

Air America Deflates

The “progressive” radio network isn’t long for this world.

Brian C. Anderson brings us this short article showing the continuing collapse of the AirMoonbat radio network which is rapidly hemorrhaging listeners and will be losing its flagship station, WLIB in New York, later this summer.

All or Nothing

The quest for a moderate Islam may be futile.

Theodore Dalrymple writes about the myth of the moderate Muslim in this short essay from City Journal.

While there are undoubtedly those individuals of the Muslim faith who simply want to live their lives like any other people, the fact remains that a significant following in Islam is governed by the utopian promise of re-making the world through violent jihad. This does not mean that every single one of them is about to strap on a suicide bomb vest, but then again they don't all have to. It is enough that many "moderate Muslims" are willing to either support those that do with financial contributions and behind the scenes cheerleading or to simply look the other way while murder and mayhem are committed in the name of Allah.

It is this reality that is beginning to dawn on many people in the West who have not, up until now, followed the day to day news as closely as your average political activist, radio talk show listener or blogger. Stories such as the one from Canada about the suicide terrorists are starting to break though into the public consciousness even given the blackout of this sort of news in The Elite Media Monoculture. As time goes by, more and more people are discovering the fact that a large segment of Muslims make up "militant Islam" and are at war with us even if we do not recognize it. But of course, it is vital that we do see the truth so that we are free to act on it. Because you cannot defend against that which you do not choose to see.

The Ties That Bind 17 Suspects?

The Toronto Star is just baffled when it comes to identifying the underlying principle which binds together the 17 terrorists who were arrested in Canada over the weekend. Because as we all know, no liberal or multiculturalist would ever think to imagine that it might be radical Islam that is the root of terrorism. No, they must be "disaffected youths."

In investigators' offices, an intricate graph plotting the links between the 17 men and teens charged with being members of a homegrown terrorist cell covers at least one wall. And still, says a source, it is difficult to find a common denominator.

Frustration and Desperation

And we're not talking about the Angry Left

I meant to get to this story a while back, but things have been busy. Apparently, Centcom captured some terrorist correspondence in Iraq which shows that things are not going all that well for them and they are downright gloomy about it.

The Americans and the Government were able to absorb our painful blows, sustain them, compensate their losses with new replacements, and follow strategic plans which allowed them in the past few years to take control of Baghdad as well as other areas one after the other. That is why every year is worse than the previous year as far as the Mujahidin’s control and influence over Baghdad.

The Coming Muslim Takeover of Europe

Andre Zantonavitch writes this book review for The American Thinker concerning "While Europe Slept: How Radical Islam is Destroying the West From Within" by Bruce Bawer; which details the accelerating decline of Old Europe as it is taken over by the Islamofascist Muslim hordes. But it is vital to note that this is not a conquest as much as it is a suicide. Europeans invited in these masses of "guest workers" to do the dirty work that they themselves were to lazy and arrogant to do. (Sound familiar?) In the end the Jihadist Muslims will overtake the population of Europe and supplant them. In just a few generations Europe will become "Eurabia" as Bat Ye'or has predicted.

The sad fact is that Europe seems unwilling to do anything to stop this slow decline. They are unwilling to stop the influx of the disease nor to uphold their own civilizational values. In the end, Western Civilization will rest in the hands of Americans who will have to work very hard to defend it from all of the forces which will be arrayed to destroy it. Hopefully, Americans are up to the challenge, provided we are able to defeat the multiculturalists in our own country who would like nothing better than to see the same thing happen here.

Canada Police Use Sting in Terror Arrests

This article from the AP which appears in The Chicago Tribune reports on the capture of Islamofascist terrorists in Canada who had big plans to blow up things in the name of the Religion of Peace. The group consisted of various individuals from different economic backgrounds and ages, thus refuting once again the claim of the left that "poverty" is the cause of terrorism.

Interestingly, in another AP report from Beth Duff Brown, an Islamic cleric from a mosque that has been under surveillance attempts to play the Poor Muslim Victim of Racial Profiling Card claiming, in effect, that it all just a big misunderstanding and that it is just a crazy coincidence that all of those terrorist attackers over the years were Muslims.

Also at the court hearing was Aly Hindy, an imam of an Islamic center that houses a school and a mosque and has been monitored by security agencies for years. He said he knows nine of the suspects and that Muslims once again were being falsely accused.

"It's not terrorism. It could be some criminal activity with a few guys, that's all," said Hindy. "We are the ones always accused. Somebody fakes a document and they are an international terrorist forging documents for al-Qaida."

Terror Plot has Worldwide Links

And in a related story from Canada's National Post we learn that the plot had international links as well. Arrests have also taken place in the US, Britain, Bosnia, Denmark, Sweden and Bangladesh. Oddly though, the authorities continue to try to avoid naming the obvious. These people, who wanted to obtain more than three times the amount of explosives used in Oklahoma city, were all Muslims motivated by the death cult of radical Islam. Consider the quote below from Luc Portelance who is trying valiently not to name names or to assign blame to any particular "community or ethnic group".

“For various reasons, they appear to have become adherents to a violent ideology inspired by al-Qaida,” said Luc Portelance, the CSIS assistant director of operations.

“Any movement that has the ability to turn people against their fellow citizens is obviously something that CSIS is very concerned about.”

He called the investigation the largest since the Anti-terrorism Act was passed by Parliament in December 2001, in response to the 9/11 attacks in the United States.

“It is important to know that this operation in no way reflects negatively on any specific community, or ethno-cultural group in Canada,” he added.

The reason for this massive attempt to avoid naming the real cause of worldwide terrorism is, of course, political correctness, which holds that as long as we don't name a thing, it won't be real. And the terrorist sympathizers don't hesitate to use this form of relativism against us by mouthing it back to us.

“The police said they are cognizant of the fact that there could be a backlash and that they’ve taken all precautions to ensure that nothing like this happens,” Canadian Muslim Congress spokesman Tarek Fatah said Saturday.

“They are very conscious of the fact that this is a small group of criminals and they don’t reflect the vast Muslim community in Toronto.”

Somehow, I just don't have much patience for this sort of evasion any more. Terrorism purpetrated by a global network of Muslims is the most obvious threat we face today and has been a problem for decades, so why should we not suspect Muslims? It's not as though they have been anxious to distance themselves from the world wide Jihad movement. On the contrary, the official line repeated throughout the West is that all of this is the fault of the West and that it is we, and not radical Islam, that is to blame for the problem. Indeed, it is we in the West who need to apologize to Muslims for thinking that there might be any connection between their creed and their actions.

Despite recent warnings that Canadian-bred terrorists were operating in the country, Fatah said he was still surprised authorities had uncovered a plot in Toronto.

Fatah may be surprised, but then again I don't feel the need to take him at his word.

How Internet Monitoring Sparked a CSIS Probe

And this report from The Toronto Star will be sure to enrage already Angry Leftists as well as failed B-movie actresses on dying left-wing radio "networks" everywhere, or at least everywhere they have a 10 watt radio tower. For it seems that the terrorist plot of Canadian Muslims was uncovered by (GASP!!) DOMESTIC SPYING!!!!

Yes dear friends, the sacred civil rights of Islamofascists everywhere have been violated by this gross abuse of police power and it's undoubtedly all the fault of Bush, Rove, Cheny and Halliburton too. Never mind that these guys were from Canada; there must be a ChimpyMcHitler connection somewhere. And I'm sure that The Angry Left will find it soon enough.

The Agitator

Margaret Talbot tries her best in this New Yorker interview with Oriana Fallaci to downplay the warning against Islamofascism which dominates Fallaci's work since 9-11. But in the end Ms. Talbot is unsuccessful in her attempt to pretend that it is not a serious matter and a threat to all of Western civilization. Fallaci understands the meaning of Islam's attack on the West and is not at all shy about speaking the unvarnished truth regarding the threat we face and how similar it is to the evil which she fought long ago in the thirties against another manifestation of the same sort of tyranny. If you have not already done so, get yourself a copy of "The Rage and the Pride" so you can appreciate her sharp and unapologetic literary style.

Moussaoui Gets Life, the Terrorists Win

Mark Steyn writes in this column that our entire approach to the case of Zacarias Moussaoui has been off the mark and I have to say I agree. The Islamofascists should never have seen the inside of a courtroom. To allow them into civilian courts is to implicitly accept the premise that we are not in a war but rather are dealing with a criminal matter than can be settled by lawyers and judges. But of course, we had just that policy during the many years and decades leading up to the attack on 9-11. The truth of the matter is that we are dealing with people who have chosen to wage a real war on all those who do not share their political ideology. Unfortunately there are a large number of people in our own country, and particularly on the Angry Left, who are doing their best to deny the fact that this is so. And they are using all their power in the media to try to convince the American public that we should just go back to the days before 9-11 and pretend that everything will be fine as long as we hide our heads in the sand.

Democratic Security "Plan"

LTC John M. Kannaley does an admirable job of fisking the Democrat's "plan" for national security on which they intend to run in the upcoming elections.

Chavez Wants Vote on Governing Until '31

Christopher Toothaker of the AP writes that Hugo Chavez, like many communist dictators before him, has decided that he is indispensable to the well being of the socialist revolution and that, therefore, he should be President for as long as he wants to be. No need for further elections or for political competition. One maximum leader is all that Venezuela will need for the foreseeable future.

Pinch Gets Punched

Thomas Lifson wrote this article for RealClearPolitics in which he shows the declining fortunes of The Elite Media Monoculture's flagship, The New York Times. It seems that Arthur Sulzberger has been running the family business into the ground and that there is little that the stockholders can do to stop him.

It's a Buyer's Market

Tribune staff reporter Mary Umberger writes that in Chicago if you are a buyer looking into real estate, you are in luck. While other locations on the coast are still very expensive and out of reach of many people, the Chicago market is looking better and better for home buyers due to a glut of homes on the market and longer market times for those interested in selling.

Arlen Spector Still Ignorant of Economics

Just like the Democrats

In this article from Bloomberg News we find that RINO Arlen Spector is still just as befuddled about basic economics as his Democratic friends in the Senate. In this sad story we find that leftist Senators, and some gullible Republicans, have learned nothing from our experiences with Democratic energy policies put into place by presidential failure Jimmy Carter.

It seems these Senators believe that the way to solve our energy problems is to make profits a crime and to punish those companies that manage to make them, despite the maze of regulatory red tape designed to prevent them from being productive and efficient. But this is, of course, an admission that one does not understand the most basic principles of economics 101.

There are, in fact, a couple of reasons that energy is more expensive than it use to be, even if we put aside the ridiculous red tape coming out of Washington. The first is that other large countries are finally starting to create developed economies of their own and as a result they need more energy. China and India in particular have very large populations and are both joining the ranks of the developed nations. This increased demand would put upward pressure on energy prices no matter what we do.

In addition, the environmentalists of the Angry Left have done their best over the last thirty years to prevent American businesses from developing our own domestic energy sources. We have not built a new oil refinery in over a generation. We have not built a new atomic power plant in thirty years. The environmentalist nutters don't want us to drill for oil in ANWAR, or off the coast of Florida, or the coast of California or on the continental shelf. They don't want us to explore oil shale or to use coal or to build wind farms that might spoil the view from the Kennedy palace.

All of these things would help us to become more energy independent and all of them are opposed by the Angry Left. In the meantime our energy needs have grown as our population has increased and our nation has become more productive. It is a common complaint among the Angry Left that we use a significantly greater amount of energy that our population percentage of the world would indicate. But this socialist notion is predicated on the assumption that you will forget that we are also the most productive nation on the planet. Recycled chicken droppings and tie-dyed hemp-powered mini-vans are not the answer to our energy needs.

We are the world's primary economic engine and most of our energy goes to this high level of production. And the same is now going to be true of India and China as their economies ramp up. Energy is the key to productivity and economic production cannot take place without it. The Angry Left wants you to forget this fact and to punish you for your greater level of productive effort. But of course the solution to this problems is to start to develop more energy resources, such as the ones named above, in order to put more energy at lower prices into the hands of Americans, who remain the most productive and efficient people on the face of the earth.

The Pravda Post

And while we're on the subject, The National Review Media Blog points out this rather interesting use of political propaganda at the Washington Post regarding the Mary McCarthy story. Leaving the content of the article aside for just a moment, do you notice anything a bit funny about this web page? That's right. Just look at all of those surrounding stories about Scooter Libby.

What does Scooter Libby have to do with the Mary McCarthy classified leak story? Well, nothing. It's just that the Washington Post wants you to think it does and so surrounds an uncomfortable story about media lawbreaking with a bunch of unrelated stories to make you think that they might be related. They even use "The Plame Investigation" at the top of the column. But remember, there is no media bias. Heh.

Nothing Sprouts from Brussels

A paralyzed Europe.

John O'Sullivan writes about the economic paralysis which grips Old Europe. In recent days we have seen the French rioting in order to keep their lifetime first jobs rather than get better ones. I don't know about you, but I wouldn't want my first job to be the only one I had for twenty years. Here in America we have a far more dynamic economy where people can, and do, move from job to job at a rapid pace. This is what keeps our economy moving. We allow adaptability and flexibility.

But in Old Europe the thicket of laws, regulations and taxes traps the people there into a permanent state of economic stagnation. And the people of Old Europe have grown so used to their lethargy that now they protest when anyone comes along who might upset the status quo. The result is that Europe is falling father and farther behind the rest of the developed world. But as Ayn Rand once wrote, there is no divine right of stagnation. The rest of the world will pass Old Europe by and leave them in the dust if they do not reform their system. And as that happens it will be progressively more difficult for them to fix their problems and the solutions will become more and more painful to enact.

Paperless News is Doing Just Fine

And speaking of media bias, Hugh Hewitt explains that there is plenty of news to be found on the Net which provides the substance and variety that many outlets of The Elite Media Monoculture lack. Thus while the fortunes of The New York Times may be in decline, Americans are able to get more news than ever before and, more importantly, to get more than one side of a story. The bad news for old media is that advertisers are starting to notice this fact.