Lakefront Winter

Sorry it took so long

I'm back.

Back in the city where I was born. Back in the place where I belong. Back where I've been before. And this time I'm here to stay.

For a long time I was elsewhere. Not far away, mind you, but still outside the city limits in a place that I didn't really choose as much as accept. And I've wanted to come back for a long while, but I didn't have much control over that. Sometimes events have a way of exerting their own timetable on us and we have to wait until we are in a position to do what we want to do. Life has a way of throwing those red lights in front of us. Waiting for them to change can take some patience.

But this year the lights finally turned green and it was time to move. And so I found a place I could afford in an area of the city that I like and I bought it. Everything fell into place. No more renting. No more landlords. Ownership baby. Ownership.

I'm home.

And now, as I look out the front window, a gentle snow is falling from a gray midwestern sky to cover the streets and branches with a dusting of white. Cars roll by and people in jackets and hats walk their dogs along the city sidewalks, newly covered with a thin layer of snow, stopping here and there and then continuing on. The blue snow plows make their appearance. In the park, across the way, kids run and play; making snowballs to throw at each other and the sky grows lighter with the morning.

And I think of how lucky I am to be here. Lucky to have a home. Lucky to be in this city. Lucky to be back after all this time. And to enjoy the first of many more seasons here in this city of my birth.

And to see another lakefront winter.

A Nation of Dim Bulbs

Ban Everything Because lefties said so

Andrew Ferguson writes at The Weekly Standard about the new energy bill that takes away more of your freedom. In addition to the obvious decision to destroy what's left of Detroit by requiring them to manufacture only hemp-powered Yugos, there is that pesky ban on the light bulb that you may have grown accustom to having when the sun goes down.

On December 19, President Bush signed an energy bill that will, among many, many other things, force you to buy a new kind of light bulb. He did this because environmental enthusiasts don't like the light bulbs you're using now. He and they reason, therefore, that you shouldn't be allowed to have them. So now you can't.

Ordinary consumers may be surprised, once they understand what's happened. They probably haven't known that the traditional incandescent light bulb, that happy little globe shining so innocently from the lamp in the corner, has been a scourge of environmentalists for many years. With their stern and unrelenting moralism, the warriors of Greenpeace have even branded lightbulb manufacturers "climate criminals" for making incandescents, which are, they say, a "silent killer." In Europe and in a few individual states in the U.S., professional environmentalists have managed to persuade their colleagues in government to ban the bulbs altogether, on the grounds that incandescents use energy inefficiently.

Ninety percent of the energy a traditional light bulb uses, for example, is thrown off as heat rather than light. This waste contributes to the overproduction of energy from coal-fired power plants, which contributes to the emission of carbon dioxide, which contributes to global warming. Professional environmentalists prefer a different kind of bulb, the compact fluorescent light (CFL), which is much more expensive to make and to buy but also much more efficient in its use of energy.

American environmental groups have long called for an outright national ban on the old-fashioned bulbs. But then they came to the realization, as a spokesman for the Natural Resources Defense Council told the New York Times this spring, that such a ban might "anger consumers." "We've given up a sound bite, 'ban the incandescent,'" the spokesman said.

Instead the groups joined with the Bush administration this year in advocating a steady increase in federally mandated efficiency standards for light bulbs. The effect of the tightened standards is to make it illegal to manufacture or sell the inefficient incandescent bulb by 2014. So it's not a ban, see. It's just higher standards. Which have the same effect as a ban--a slow-motion ban that's not really a ban. Not surprisingly, in long, self-congratulatory remarks at the bill signing last week, Bush neglected to mention that he and Congress have just done away with the incandescent light bulb. Maybe most of us won't notice until he's back in Crawford.

The whole point of course is that it is none of the government's business whether you have incandescent bulbs, an SUV or a large toilet.

IT IS NONE OF THEIR BUSINESS. This cannot be stressed enough.

There is nothing in the constitution that allows any of this. The reality is that politicians and activists are slowing taking away our freedom bit by bit and ignoring the fact that they have no constitutional authority to do so. They are simply doing it.

The best way to allocate resources is the market. And the left hates the market. That is what this is about, not energy independence. If they wanted us to be energy independent, they would be in favor of nuclear power generation. We have enough domestic uranium to last for thousands of years. And breeder technology would extend that so far as to be practically without limit. But they are against that too.

What this is really about is control. They want control over all of us pesky Americans who keep voting against them when they offer to run our lives for us because they can do such a better job at it than we can. And since we have, for the most part, kept them out of power and refused their kind offer to run things, they have gone around us in order to get their agenda in place whether we like it or not.

It is just a pity that so few Republicans today, including the President, seem to understand the agenda here.

Sorry for the Light Blogging

Because I am in the middle of a major project I have not been able to blog nearly as much as I like, to say nothing about how busy we have been at work, but if all goes well, I should be back on track soon. In the meantime I will try to put up a post or two if I can. And perhaps I will even get a chance to write about what I have been doing lately, even though I generally don't write much about personal stuff.

It's Not Just Scott Beauchamp

At The American Thinker Randall Hoven puts together a pretty long list of Main Stream Media "journalists" who have been responsible for some of the most outrageous mistakes and outright fabrications that we have seen from MSM in the recent past. As Hoven points out, it has gotten to the point where you really need a scorecard when it comes to malfeasance from the Elite Media. Just as one scandal has started to fade from memory, another rises up to take its place. This fact motivated Hoven to put together a comprehensive list of the worst offences. And it is a long one.

Pajamas Media also has a good follow up on the meltdown at The New Republic.

Zimbabwe Faces Anarchy

This article in the London Telegraph tells the sad tale of just what happens when you put a power hungry leftist in charge of you country. Robert Mugabe put socialist style political and economic control into place when he took power in Zimbabwe and the results have been predictably horrific. A country that was once considered the breadbasket of Africa is now on the verge of starvation and civil war. Everywhere socialism has been tried it has been a failure, and the more dedicated the socialist, the worse the horrors that the people are forced to suffer.

For a historical look at how Mugabe came to power and how little jimmy peanut helped to hand over the population to this butcher, check out this article from The Weekly Standard.

New York Times to Iraq, "Drop Dead"

Victor Davis Hanson uses this essay in The City Journal to refute, point by point, the hysterical surrender monkeys at the New York Times who are all pining for the defeat of America at the hands of the Islamic Fascists. Make no mistake; the Times has come out on the side of the enemies, even going so far as to accept a genocide in Iraq, as long as George Bush is humiliated in the process.

Blank Out

In this article from The Washington Times, Diana West writes about the peculiar evasions that western elites must go through to avoid acknowledging that the terrorist jihad we face has anything to do with Islam. The Kabuki dance that they must perform is interesting to watch as a spectacle of amusement, but the reality of Islamic Fascism is a deadly serious business. Unfortunately, just as in the past, the aristocracy have shown that we cannot count on them for much of anything. And insofar as this is a war of ideas, those who value the history, traditions and freedoms of the West will have to take it upon themselves to do the heavy lifting that our more sensitive "intellectuals" are incabable of doing.

With the departure of Tony Blair from 10 Downing Street, we have lost one of the most visible leaders who has both a clear grasp of the nature of the problem as well as the ability to speak in clear and understandable terms about it. His replacement, Gordon Brown, is already demonstrating the jelly spined weakness that has come to dominate the intelligentsia in the West and against which the Loud People will have to fight. Ms. West describes the ways in which Mr. Brown has signaled his unwillingness to even name the problem or even recognize that it exists.

Indeed, the British government, under its new, more politically correct leadership, will be prohibited, as a mater of official policy, from even mentioning the words "terrorism" and "Islamic" in the same sentence, if they are mentioned at all.

The new British prime minister, Gordon Brown, has directed ministers to omit "Muslim" when discussing (Muslim) terrorism. And forget the generic "war on terror"; even that pathetic phrase is off limits. (This has absolutely nothing to do with Mr. Brown's unctuously stated goal to make Britain "the gateway for Islamic finance.") The new Home Secretary, Jacqui Smith (love that "i" ending) refers to British Muslims as "communities" — maybe a prelude to not mentioning them at all. Both have done the "perversion of a great faith" dance to enlightened applause, taking cues from the unpublished "EU Lexicon," which reportedly nixes such "offensive" phrases as "Islamic terrorism."

British literary lions couldn't agree more. Philosopher John Gray and historian Eric Hobsbawm recently said on British television that even the word "Islamist" was "unfair" because "it implied a strong link to Islam." Never mind the link is doctrinally accurate. Better to accommodate mortal threat without identifying its Islamic roots. Instead of defending their nations — for starters, stopping Islamic immigration and, with it, the progression of Islamic law into Western societies — our elites have decided to pretend Islam isn't there at all.

In the media, the effort is misleading to the point of farce. Joel Mowbray, writing at the Powerline blog, noted that the New York Times has identified Britain's Muslim terrorists as "South Asian people" — which, considering Britain's largest South Asian population is Hindu, is beyond absurd. "Diverse group allegedly in British plot," the Associated Press reported, missing that unifying Islamic thread. "All 8 detainees have ties to health service," wrote the Toronto Star, "but genesis of terror scheme still eludes investigators."

Ayn Rand identified this peculiar habit of the left years ago as the "Blank Out". It is the deliberate intellectual evasion of facts which are clearly available to anyone with eyes to see and a functioning mind. The average person cannot help but notice the obvious here; namely that there is a cause and effect relationship between Islam and terrorism in the world today. Thus we can only conclude that the failure to see or to name it that is typical of our media and government elites is the result of that deliberate refusal to come to terms with the facts. It is a mental "Blank Out"; the conscious decision to not see that which is true in the hope that by refusing to name it, the existence of the problem will somehow go away.

Because They Can

Muslims continue to bully the West because we let them

Mark Steyn writes in this column on the way in which elites in the West, who are blinded by their leftist ideology of multi-culturalism, are unable to respond to Muslim mobs who demand the death of our civilization and put out hits on authors deemed un-Islamic. The Brits gave Rushdie a knighthood for his service to literature without understanding that he represents the deep divide in today's Arab world. Much of that world wants to stay in the 7th century and is willing to kill and conquer to stay there. On the other hand the rest of us kind of like having a modern life, but because we have been infected with the sickness of multi-culturalism, we just don't take the murderers all that seriously. Mark Steyn tells us that it is time to take the bad guys very seriously if we want to keep our own civilization.

Middle East Temper Tantrum

Victor Davis Hanson writes with his usual authority in this essay in which he looks at some of the root causes of Arab societal failure in the Middle East.

Failed societies don't end up that way by chance. Just as there are laws of physics, chemistry and electromagnetism, so are there laws of societal organization and human action. We humans did not invent these laws. Rather, they are ingrained in the universe in which we live. They are part of the fabric of the world and they are no more under our control than the weather. The success of the West can be explained by the fact that over the centuries we have learned more and more about how these laws work. Thus we have been able to order our society and culture to take advantage of these laws for our own benefit. Freedom, individualism and capitalism are not just lifestyle choices; they are how a human society must be organized if it is to function and move forward.

But the Arabs, and much of the rest of the world have yet to adopt these underlying principles that allow development and progress. Until they do, they are doomed to live lives which are poor, nasty, brutish and short.

Here's why much of the region is so unhinged - and it's not because of our policy in Palestine or our efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq.

First, thanks to Western inventions and Chinese manufactured goods, Middle Easterners can now access the non-Muslim world cheaply and vicariously. To millions of Muslims, the planet appears - on the Internet, DVDs and satellite television - to be growing rich as most of their world stays poor.

Second, the Middle East either will not or cannot make the changes necessary to catch up with what they see in the rest of the world. Tribalism - loyalty only to kin rather than to society at large - impedes merit and thus progress. So does gender apartheid. Who knows how many would-be Margaret Thatchers or Sandra Day O'Connors remain veiled in the kitchen?

Religious fundamentalism translates into rote prayers in madrassas while those outside the Middle East master science and engineering. Without a transparent capitalist system - antithetical to both sharia (Muslim law) and state-run economies - initiative is never rewarded. Corruption is.

Meanwhile, mere discussion in much of the region of what is wrong can mean execution by a militia, government thug or religious vigilante.

So, Middle Easterners are left with the old frustration of wanting the good life of Western society but lacking either the ability or willingness to change the status quo to get it.

Instead, we get monotonous scapegoating. Blaming America or Israel - "Those sneaky Jews did it!" - has become a regional pastime.

The Media Cornucopia

It’s a Golden Age of media—but not for long, if the Left has its way.

And speaking of new media, Adam D. Thierer at City Journal brings us this extended article which should be required reading for His Majesty Senator Lott in order to instruct him about the ways in which the media universe has changed. For those individuals in the Washington elite who have become disconnected from the regular people, this article should be very helpful. In it, we learn how the number of media choices has exploded in recent years. Where once there were but a handful of outlets for news and information, now there are more channels of information than anyone could possibly hope to use in a lifetime. Perhaps Senator Lott should start listening to some of them.

The emergence of new media is important because it allows the voice of regular Americans to be heard on an equal playing field with traditional liberal old media. Indeed, new media regularly goes up against old media and wins significant victories, such as when bloggers discovered Dan Rather's attempt to put forth forged documents in the Rathergate memo scandal. Were it not for the Internet and the rest of new media, that story would have been taken at face value and never questioned. But because of the existence of new media, a lie and a fraud put forward by old media was quickly brought to light and CBS was discredited and shown to be offering fabricated news as fact. In the new media age it is far more difficult for old media dinosaurs to put out lies and disinformation without being caught red handed.

Most importantly, new media allows opinion and ideas to reach the public in their pure form, unfiltered by the liberal censors and their agenda. In the past, liberal media could suppress those aspects of a story, or ideas associated with it, in such a way as to spin the news in the direction that they wished. Often what was left out of a story was critical to an objective understanding of it. But today, with the availability of new media, one can get all of the information that is available about a story or issue, bypassing the liberal filters that used to "protect" us from inconvenient information that undermined the leftist world view. The beauty of the new media is that it allows a level of detail that one needs to understand the complexity of issues that we face, and not just the short sound bites that the MSM feeds us to keep us from a full understanding of events.

Becoming an informed citizen has never been easier. You can get up in the morning and still read your (probably liberal) local paper and several national ones—say, the Wall Street Journal (right-of-center editorial page) and USA Today (more or less centrist). Walk to the newsstand and you’ve got political magazines galore, from the Marxist New Left Review to the paleoconservative The American Conservative. On cable and satellite television: CNN, MSNBC, CNBC, FOX News, PBS, local news, the big networks (at least for now), the BBC, C-SPAN, community access shows—all offer a wide variety of news and information options, some around the clock. Turn on the car radio and Rush Limbaugh or Sean Hannity booms out at you from the right; or maybe you can tune in to Sirius Left on satellite.

The Internet has done more to create the sort of media that scarcity critics claim to desire than any other technology. Every man, woman, and child can have a “newspaper” or broadcast outlet today—it’s called a website, blog, or podcast. It’s hard to imagine how the political blogosphere could be more diverse, ranging from the Daily Kos and the Huffington Post on the left to National Review Online and Power Line on the right to Andrew Sullivan, Instapundit, and Buzz Machine somewhere in between. A political junkie must hustle to keep up with what RealClearPolitics posts on its site every day.

Talk Radio is Running America

And apparently he thinks that is a bad thing

Based on this story from Slate.com, I think we can conclude that Trent Lott deserves to be removed from the senate. The reason should be obvious; he no longer remembers who his rightful employer is. Instead, he thinks he has some sort of right to his job in perpetuity regardless of his job performance, or lack thereof. And like so many in the elites, he has become disconnected from the people who sent him to Washington in the first place.

Of course, talk radio is only one of several new media outlets that allow the voice of the regular people to be heard. And this new media world is, indeed, having an effect on the lives of those who, like Lott, used to be comfortable and complacent in their arrogance and aloof distance from the citizens in fly-over-country. Well, welcome to the new media world Mr. Lott. From now on, your employers will be keeping a much closer eye on you.

The Republican whip, Trent Lott of Mississippi, who supports the bill, said: "Talk radio is running America. We have to deal with that problem."

The Republicans’ Hispanic Delusion

Amnesty is not just wrong in principle, it’s bad politics

Heather Mac Donald brings us this article in City Journal in which she points out that Republicans are operating under a false assumption if they think that a massive new influx of Hispanic immigrants will somehow increase the numbers in the Republican party. The facts are otherwise. As demonstrated in California, there is little evidence to think that Mexican immigrants who are poorly educated and lower class will suddenly discover the wisdom of Rand, Hayek and von Mises when it comes to economics. Nor are they going to start reading The Federalist Papers anytime soon.

Indeed, one can't help but think that there is a false and unspoken assumption here about immigrants generally. Many people around the globe can see that America is a country that is wealthy and successful. And many people want to come here as a result of our economic success. But it is a mistake to believe, as many in the Republican leadership apparently do, that just because you want to come here, that you automatically understand the reasons why America has become the economic powerhouse that it is.

In my own personal experience I have met many Russian immigrants, for example, who when I question them, demonstrate that they have no real clue about the underlying free market principles that have made this country's progress possible. These Russians have instead brought all of their old intellectual baggage with them from their home country and thus do not see the cause and effect relationship between the ideas of liberty and economic freedom on the one hand, and the astounding level of America's economic progress on the other. They know that they are richer here than they were at home, but they have no understanding of the reasons for the difference, or even that there are underlying reasons at all. To them it an inexplicable mystery. As Rand would have said, to them it is as if America's wealth is a fact of nature, not to be explained or even investigated.

Thus, an individual who has been brought up in an atmosphere of soft Socialism or Marxism, which is so prevalent elsewhere around the globe, will be unlikely to develop a sudden interest in free market economics or the philosophy of liberty to which they have not previously been exposed. And this is even more true for those with little or no education. Republicans in the leadership who think otherwise have not spent enough time thinking through the implications of their assumptions or looking at the factual evidence at hand. Had they done so, they would not hold the views on this issue that they do, and they would not be so impatient to inject hordes of uneducated people with socialist sympathies into our system who are unlikely to understand our way of life, or maintain our country's institutions for future generations.

Grassfire

Well, they just don't want to give up. Once again our "leaders" in the Senate have gone behind closed doors to find a way to jam the amnesty bill down our collective throats. Grassfire has the details. I have made calls this morning to my senators as well as some of the Republicans who need to be reminded of just who is in charge. If you have not yet called to make your views known, now is the time. (HT: Michell Malkin)

I was just informed that the back-room plan is currently underway to bring Bush-Kennedy back and get it quickly passed through the Senate. I call it "amendments for amnesty."

Here's what's happening.

President Bush and the Amnesty Republicans are attempting to convince about a dozen Republicans to support "cloture" on Bush-Kennedy in exchange for a commitment that a set list of amendments will be considered -- thus, "amendments for amnesty."

Also, Bush and the amnesty leaders are strong-arming conservatives into accepting the "amendments for amnesty" deal or face being banished into Senate oblivion.

Amnesty Republicans have already submitted their list of amendments to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. Once the "amendments for amnesty" deal is finalized between Reid and the Republicans, the bill will be quickly brought back to the floor. The amendments will be defeated and amnesty passed...

...this is the FOURTH TIME our leaders have gone behind closed doors to work out some secret scheme to get this bill passed. Despite unprecedented and overwhelming grassroots opposition, they think they can still pull off their legislative, slight-of-hand trickery!

+ + Call to Action #1 -- Call these Senators and say you oppose this "Amendments for Amnesty" deal

Sen. Hagel (202) 224-4224
Sen. Nelson (202) 224-6551

Key Senators to call:

McConnell 202/224-2541
Lott 202/224-6253
Kyl 202/224-4521
Brownback 202/224-6521
Burr 202/224-3154
Chambliss 202/224-3521
Cornyn 202/224-2934
Hutchison 202/224-5922
Isakson 202/224-3643
Warner 202/224-2023
Webb 202/224-4024

Pew Poll: Some American Muslims OK With Terrorism

With the issue of the illegal alien amnesty bill jam down taking up so much time and energy of late, I did not get a chance to link to this report from The Pew Research Center. The report is titled in such a way as to make a claim about American Muslims that is designed to assuage concerns about home grown terrorism in the general public. Pew wants us to be docile. But if you look deeper at the numbers in the report a different and disturbing picture emerges. One third of U.S. Muslims are not concerned about the rise of extermism in America, even with the many instances of thwarted terrorist plots that we have seen recently. And even more troubling is the finding that 8 per cent of Muslims consider suicide terrorist bombings to be justified at least some of the time. Based on the studies own numbers, that would be 8 per cent of the 1.5 million adult Muslims in the country. That's a lot of terrorist sympathizers.

You can download the full report in pdf format here.

Squandering a Legacy

President Bush has torn the conservative coalition asunder.

Peggy Noonan writes in The Wall Street Journal about the ways in which Bush the elder and now Bush the younger have both failed to understand the great legacy of Ronald Reagan. Because of this lack of understanding they have, each in his own way, worked against the conservative base of the Republican party. The result has been needless damage done to the party by the abandonment of the conservative principles that gave the party its victories in the 80s' and early 90s'. The victory of the Clintons, for example, can be tied directly to the failures of the first Bush administration when it broke its pledge not to raise taxes.

The current President presented himself as a conservative in order to win election, but quickly ditched that camouflage as soon as it was convenient to do so. The result has been to put the party in a continuous crisis mode in a time when steady leadership would have been more advisable. Serious times require serious leadership, and preferably without unnecessary distractions. But this President has insisted on following a liberal agenda and hoping that it would set "a new tone" among the beltway elites. The tactic has been less than satisfactory.

Indeed, trying to make friends with the Angry Left is not possible, nor is it even needed in order to run the country, as long as one leads with conservative ideas. Reagan proved this by both word and example. But this President has squandered that legacy, and now the conservatives of the party are going to have to re-build it after the damage that these two Bushes have done. It will be difficult, but it is also unavoidable.

Patterico Says "Deport the Criminals First"

Blogger Patterico is running a series of posts in which he points out the utter folly of not using all of our available resources to deport illegal aliens who are also known criminals. In too many places such illegals are allowed not only to roam free, but to commit crime after crime without being forcibly removed from the country. "Sanctuary cities" prevent their own police from reporting these illegals to the government so that they might be deported. They do so because of a misguided do-gooder mindset and white guilt that prevents them from wanting to enforce the law. The result is that people are dying at the hands of these illegal aliens who would otherwise have been sent back to their home countries.

RNC Fires Phone Solicitors

The Washington Times reports in this story that donations to the RNC are drying up due to the hostile reaction of the party faithful to the amnesty bill being proposed by the President and some Republicans in congress. The result is that at the RNC the people who normally take donations from the regular members out in fly-over-country have lost their jobs since they have nothing to do. The top brass over at party headquarters is making a heroic effort to put the best face on this by claiming that it is due to the need for technical upgrades to their system, but I think we all know that the reality is a bit different.

Getting the message yet guys?

No money for a party that betrays the members who comprise the base. No money for a party that stabs us all in the back after all of our hard work to get you elected. No money for a party that rewards illegal aliens who broke the law to come here. No money for a party that holds the base in contempt.

Figure it out.

"Last year, my solicitations totaled $164,000, and this year the way they were running for the first four months, they would total $100,000 by the end of 2007," said one fired phone bank solicitor who asked not to be identified.

There has been a sharp decline in contributions from RNC phone solicitations, another fired staffer said, reporting that many former donors flatly refuse to give more money to the national party if Mr. Bush and the Senate Republicans insist on supporting what these angry contributors call "amnesty" for illegal aliens.

"Everyone donor in 50 states we reached has been angry, especially in the last month and a half, and for 99 percent of them immigration is the No. 1 issue," said the former employee.

The RNC spokeswoman denied that the committee has seen any drop-off in contributions.

"Any assertion that overall donations have gone down is patently false," Miss Schmitt said.

Terrorist Dry Run

The Washington Times writes in this article that the incident reported by Annie Jacobsen three years ago was indeed a probable dry run to test airline security for further terrorist attacks. In view of this new information should we not be taking any odd behavior by Muslims aboard airplanes, such as that of the "flying Imams", as a threat? Why should we be giving Muslims on airplanes, or anywhere else for that matter, the automatic benefit of the doubt?

The inspector general for Homeland Security late Friday released new details of what federal air marshals say was a terrorist dry run aboard Northwest Airlines Flight 327 from Detroit to Los Angeles on June 29, 2004.

Several portions of the report remain redacted. The release stems from a Freedom of Information request by The Washington Times in April 2006. The Times first reported on July 22 that this and other probes and dry runs were occurring on commercial flights since the September 11 terrorist attacks.

The President's Empty Political Rhetoric

Bush attacks his own base as ignorant manipulators and undermines the party

The Boston Globe brings us this article that shows us what the President really thinks of the conservative base of the Republican party. And the news is not at all good. It seems that the President considers the base of the party to be completely disposable as long as he has the votes of liberal Democrats and RINO Republicans who will keep the borders wide open. How could it be otherwise given his propensity to smear critics in the manner of a liberal rather than deal with the legitimate issues that they have raised? We expect more from someone who is the leader of the party and who should know better than to alienate the conservative base.

For a long time this President has shown that he has a tin ear when it comes to understanding the dynamics that got him elected and how to hold a party together. It was the conservative base that donated money, time and energy to make sure that the President won re-election. Bush seems to have forgotten that fact. On issue after issue he has strayed to the left. And time after time he has acted with disdain for the party base, apparently on the assumption that we had nowhere else to go.

He seems not care about the long term damage that will be the result if this bill should be passed into law over the objections of those people who worked so hard in the election of 2004. Reagan would never have been so arrogant and would never have made this sort of error. Indeed, it is the Reagan legacy that this President is abandoning for the sake of this amnesty bill. And the long term result will be serious, if not fatal damage, to the Republican party in addition to the damage it will do to the country. The conservative base will not soon forgive such a serious betrayal, nor will they give money or time to the party in the foreseeable future if they have no confidence in the party leadership. And that is the current situation.

Conservatives from across the nation have spent the last two weeks looking at this bill in extraordinary detail. From The National Review to The Heritage Foundation to just about every major player in talk radio to the entire conservative blogsphere, the critics have spent huge amounts of time and energy dissecting this bill and trying to determine, not only what the bill actually says, but the long term ramifications of putting it into place. Whether you agree with the position of the President or the critics, there can be no doubt that the base has given serious thought to the consequences of this bill. But the President, in his remarks reported in this story, shows that he is tone-deaf and out of touch with his party's base and has no real idea of what is going on in the heart of the country with regard to immigration.

Bottom Line: The base wants security first and they don't want amnesty. Get that Mr. President? Push this bill though at your own peril and the peril of the party. The base will not support you or the party in the coming election. Indeed, a major house cleaning is probably already a forgone conclusion given the way that the party leadership has failed to uphold conservative principles. Attacking the party base only serves to underline the need for new leadership and a return to Reagan conservatism. The end result will be that conservatives will stay home on election day rather than allow this to continue. Many of the current crop of liberal Republicans will be turned out of office and we will have to suffer for a while at the hands of Democrats. But there will be little other alternative. For one has to ask how our current situation is much different and why allowing it to continue would be better for the nation or for the party in the long term?

This administration has been liberal on most every issue other than defense. And even on the war, the President has been half hearted and unable or unwilling to intellectually defend the need for a strong defense policy. He has not gone after the media for leaking national security secrets. He has not prosecuted the leakers. He has not hit back against the critics of the war. He has been unwilling to play the kind of hardball that is the reality of Washington politics. He has projected, not strength, but continuing weakness and moral confusion. He might as well be wearing a "kick me" sign on his back. The result has been a slow, constant undermining of our defense on moral grounds. In the long run, that is a losing strategy. It seems clear that the time has come for a major house cleaning. We need to return our party to its conservative principles. We need a leadership that actually believes what it says about our ideas. And while it may take some time to achieve this, it will be better to have a President and a congress who are willing to defend America from both a moral and practical point of view, than the current crop of politicians who sell us down the river because they think it will get them the votes of illegal aliens.

This President has demonstrated that he is not a conservative and that he will throw the conservatives who elected him under the bus when he thinks it convenient. That is not strategy for long term success. It is not a strategy for the future of the nation and the party.

Time for a broom.

A Virtual City State

Bill Whittle at Eject! Eject! Eject! brings us another of his great thought provoking essays in which he looks at the prisoner's dilemma and how it is a lesson for all of us who wish to protect and promote the values and ideas of Western Civilization from the current onslaught that is being waged against them, and us. And while the enemies of civilization are indeed dangerous, we have for the first time in history a communications tool that allows us to organize and share information with all of the other people who are similarly inclined. You are using it at this very moment to read these words. And because of this extraordinary tool of communication, we have the possibility of working together to save Western Civilization even with the corruption and incompetence of our vaunted elites who seem to be oblivious to what is happening all around them.

Economist Freidrich Hayek won a Nobel Prize, in part, for pointing out that a free society is not really organized from the top down. While it is true that we have a framework of laws and customs, these are for the most part the result of time and tradition, which is another way of saying that they are the ways of living which have been found over time to be the ones that work the best and we have adopted them for that reason. But total top down planning is a feature of tyrannies, not of free societies. Even now, we still have a society which is mostly free and thus lacking in that kind of top down total control. The enemies of Western civilization see this and make the mistake of assuming that because we are not a top down society that we therefore have no organization at all. What they fail to see, as Hayek pointed out, is that we are indeed a very organized and planned system; it's just that most of the organizing and planning comes from the bottom up.

This bottom up planning requires a foundation of trust, honesty and other positive virtues in the vast majority of the population because to plan anything that is at all complex or long range also requires the cooperation of many people to accomplish. That we have such a culture makes possible the kind of societal achievements and economic progress that no other societies have been able to match, at least until such time as they have learned to adopt those same values.

Ultimately this bottom up approach is the real strength of Western Civilization, and the Internet allows those of us who wish to protect our way of life to self-organize in ways which were previously impossible and unimaginable. I think that process is now at work and the people who are motivated by their love for our culture will use this technology to fight back the forces of darkness. Bill Whittle thinks we will win, and so do I.

Go and read the whole thing.

Muslims; Enemies of the World's Great Art

Fjordman at Brussels Journal writes on the subject of how Western Art is different than that produced by other cultures and other times in history. And while I am tempted to comment on the superiority of Western Art in general, this essay makes another very important point that should be of concern to all those who value not only the artistic heritage of the West, but also art produced by other non-Western cultures. For it seems that wherever Muslims go in the world, they bring their destruction and hate with them. History shows that Muslims have no tolerance for the art of any culture and that they will go out of their way to destroy any cultural artifacts which do not conform to their primitive and backwards stone-age prejudice. If you value art, you must reject Islam and the savages who love to destroy beauty.

The great Bamiyan Buddhas in Afghanistan were demolished by the Taliban regime in 2001, who decreed that they would destroy images deemed "offensive to Islam." The Taliban Information Minister complained that "The destruction work is not as easy as people would think. You can't knock down the statues by dynamite or shelling as both of them have been carved in a cliff. They are firmly attached to the mountain." The statues, 53 meters and 36 meters tall, the tallest standing Buddha statues in the world, turned out to be so hard to destroy that the Taliban needed help from Pakistani and Saudi engineers to finish the job. Finally, after almost a month of non-stop bombardment with dynamite and artillery, they succeeded.

Judging from the experiences with the Bamiyan Buddhas, it is tempting to conclude that the only reason why the pyramids of Egypt have survived to this day is because they were so big that it proved too complicated, costly and time-consuming for Muslims to destroy them. Had Saladin's son Al-Aziz had modern technology and engineers at his disposal, they might well have ended up like countless Hindu temples in India or Buddhist statues in Central Asia.

Heritage Foundation Immigration Bill Analysis Part II

The Heritage Foundation's Robert Rector has done an in-depth analysis of the financial costs of illegal immigration to the U.S. taxpayer. This is a long article with many details, but the bottom line is that many of the illegals in the country now, who would be made into permanent citizens through the amnesty bill, are a net drain on the rest of the country. The math is relatively straightforward. The illegals who we are talking about are often high school drop outs with few marketable skills and little education. And interestingly, the fact that they are working most of the time makes no difference in the overall picture. The problem is that the jobs which illegals are likely to have are low skill and thus low paying ones. And because of the nature of the jobs which illegals are likely to have given their low educational levels, they pay much lower levels of taxes back into the system. In fact, according to Rector's analysis, the average illegal will take out nearly twenty thousand more than they put into the system, creating a huge fiscal deficit which will be felt for decades to come. Read it yourself to see the devastating impact which is to come on our nation and your pocketbook.

The net fiscal deficit of a household equals the cost of immediate benefits and services received minus taxes paid. As Chart 5 shows, if the costs of direct and means-tested benefits, education, and population-based services were counted, the average low-skill household had a fiscal deficit of $19,588 (expenditures of $30,160 minus $10,573 in taxes).

At $19,588, the average annual fiscal deficit for low-skill immigrant households was nearly twice the amount of taxes paid. In order for the average low-skill household to be fiscally solvent (taxes paid equaling immediate benefits received), it would be necessary to eliminate all Social Security and Medicare, all means-tested welfare, and to cut expenditures on public education roughly in half

Media Traitors Expose Another Defense Secret

The mavens of The Elite Media Monoculture have once again demonstrated their hatred of America by publishing critical intelligence information about the administration's plans to undermine the theocratic tyrants in Iran. The methods that would have been used were those short of actual military force or invasion. And because the elites at ABC are so much smarter and wiser than all of the rest of us or anyone in the administration, they took it upon themselves to go ahead and alert the Iranians and the whole world to the existence of this secret plan. Well, I guess it's not so secret any longer, is it? My question is, when are these journalists going to be taken out and shot for treason?

The CIA has received secret presidential approval to mount a covert "black" operation to destabilize the Iranian government, current and former officials in the intelligence community tell the Blotter on ABCNews.com.

The sources, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the subject, say President Bush has signed a "nonlethal presidential finding" that puts into motion a CIA plan that reportedly includes a coordinated campaign of propaganda, disinformation and manipulation of Iran's currency and international financial transactions.

Of course The Angry Left has been howling for some time about the administration's "aggressive" policies towards Iran and there has been plenty of speculation about plans for an attack. The irony here is, of course, that this leak makes such an attack more, rather than less, likely. Being able to undermine the mullahs without having to use a military attack would certainly be much better for everyone involved if it were possible. But with the release of this information it makes such a strategy all but impossible and takes away one of the options that we had. When will this administration start taking these attacks on America's defense capability by the Elite Media seriously and start prosecuting?

Heritage Foundation Immigration Bill Analysis Part I

The Heritage Foundation has taken a look at the proposed immigration bill and done some digging to find just what is buried in it. The list of horrors is a long and sad one. I'll be reading these over the next few days, but you can take a look at part 1 here in which they look at how the bill undermines the rule of law.

The bill would make it extremely difficult for the federal government to prevent criminals and terrorists from obtaining legal status. Under Section 601(h)(1), the bill would allow the government only one business day to conduct a background check to determine whether an applicant is a criminal or terrorist. Unless the government can find a reason not to grant it by the end of the next business day after the alien applies, the alien receives a probationary Z visa (good from the time of approval until six months after the date Z visas begin to be approved, however long that may be) that lets him roam throughout the country and seek employment legally.

The problem is that there is no single, readily searchable database of all of the dangerous people in the world. While the federal government does have computer databases of known criminals and terrorists, these databases are far from comprehensive. Much of this kind of information exists in paper records that cannot be searched within 24 hours. Other information is maintained by foreign governments.

The need for effective background checks is real. During the 1986 amnesty, the United States granted legal status to Mahmoud "The Red" Abouhalima, who fraudulently sought and obtained the amnesty intended for seasonal agricultural workers (even though he was actually employed as a cab driver in New York City). But his real work was in the field of terrorism. He went on to become a ringleader in the 1993 terrorist attacks against the World Trade Center. Using his new legal status after the amnesty, he was able to travel abroad for terrorist training.

McCainiac

The New York Post reports that THE ALL KNOWING AND OMNISCIENT LIGHT OF THE UNIVERSE, HIS MAGNIFICENT WONDERFULLNESS JOHN McCAIN dropped in on the Senate recently to help guid the passage of the new "immigration reform" bill. In a brief departure from HIS glorious and resplendent campaign, HE attempted to explain to the other lesser Senators there that HE was far better informed and aware on the subject of immigration "reform" than any other sentient being in the universe. When John Cornyn "the insignificant" posed certain presumptuous questions to HIS HIGHNESS, THE MOST BRILLIANT JOHN McCAIN, he was rebuffed by THE MOST WISE AND WORTHY JOHN McCAIN for daring to impertinently ask such questions that might slow the progress of THE MOST IMPORTANT LEGISLATION IN THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD, which was crafted with such care and wisdom by JOHN McCAIN THE SPECTACULAR.

Those wishing to abase themselves further should call the office of THE MOST MAGNANIMOUS AND SUBLIME SENTATOR JOHN McCAIN should they wish to be instructed to shut up and do as they are told.

The Empire of Lies

The twenty-first century will not belong to China.

Guy Sorman shows us in this essay, that despite cosmetic changes on the surface, China is still in the grips of a hard leftist communist government and that it therefore suffers from all of the problems that are typical of such a brutal and oppressive regime. Indeed, reading this article, one is struck by the similarities to the old Soviet Union in terms both of lack of economic freedom as well as the overriding arrogance of the political elites who cling to power in China regardless of the dire consequences that affect most of the population Of course we must exclude those who are politically connected. As in the Soviet Union, the politically connected are a different class and thus gain what rewards are available under such a system. And as was the case in the Soviet Union, most of the regular population is exploited for the benefit of that few.

Hayek pointed out in his writings why this must be the inevitable result in a system which is not free politically or economically. In fact, there are a wealth of books by the major free market economists of the 19th and 20th century that go into great detail about the results that can be expected from socialist systems. It is no accident that not only have all of them failed, but that they follow the same pattern of failure. The very existence of such a pattern should be an indication to those on The Angry Left that there are immutable economic laws at work in our universe and that they can no more be ignored than can the laws of physics or chemistry.

But leftists are uninterested in the evidence provided by the history of the 20th century. Over one hundred million deaths can be attributed to socialist and communist systems in the last century. That should be ample evidence for anyone. But the left continues on without so much as taking a breath. They simply keep on repeating the same tired slogans over and over again as if doing so would somehow make them true. But the laws of reality do not change just because they are politically inconvenient.

I’ve been to many Chinese villages, and everywhere I have encountered the peasantry’s feelings of helplessness and anger when dealing with the Communist authorities. When in late 2006, I reached one village in the heart of the Shaanxi Province, after a 40-hour journey from Beijing by train, car, and tractor, I saw no trace of the uprising that had taken place a month earlier. Alerted by a text message sent from the village, the Hong Kong press had reported a violent clash between the peasants and the police, leaving people injured and missing—or even dead, with the authorities spiriting away the bodies. I stayed in the house of a taciturn widow, who kept feeding me fresh walnut kernels—ideal, she said, for those doing intellectual work. The kernel looks like the brain; traditional Chinese medicine bases itself on such morphological approximations.

I pieced together the very ordinary reasons that had provoked the uprising from bits of information divulged by the children rather than the adults. The village had a dilapidated school, without heating, chalk, or teacher. In principle, schooling is compulsory and free, but the Party secretary, the village kingpin, made parents pay for the heating and chalk. Then a teacher came from the city. He held that his government wages weren’t commensurate with his status and demanded extra money from the parents. Half of the parents, members of the most prosperous clan, agreed to pay; the other half, belonging to the poorer clan, refused. A skirmish erupted between the two clans, and the teacher fled. The Party secretary tried to intervene and was lynched, the Party office plundered. Then the police roared in with batons and guns. The school has reopened, the teacher replaced with a villager who knows how to read and write but “nothing more than that,” he admits.

The government puts the number of what it calls these “illegal” or “mass” incidents—and they’re occurring in the industrial suburbs, too—at 60,000 a year, doubtless underreporting them. Some experts think that the true figure is upward of 150,000 a year, and increasing.

Building A Compassionate Disaster

Or how to piss off you entire base and destroy the country at the same time for a few votes

Katherine Jean Lopez at The National Review reports on the looming catastrophe that is the congressional immigration putsch that will grant immediate amnesty to 12 million illegal alien lawbreakers and open the door wide for lots and lots more. This bill is a huge neon sign at our borders that screams "COME ON DOWN", and don't worry about all of that legal stuff we have written on the books about having to go through a process to become an American citizen. No siree, you just have to sneak across the border without getting caught and those nifty folks in that thar Washington D.C. place will make you feel right at home with all of the wonderful money transfers that all of our own domestic indigent population has come to expect as a matter of right.

This bill, if it is enacted, will be nothing short of a disaster for the republic. We cannot deal now with the numbers of illegal aliens who have come into the country. We don't know where most of them are and even when we do, our leviathan government seems unable and unwilling to do anything about it at all. Now the elites in Washington want to put in place a program which will act as a magnet to millions more. Those who cross over illegally will not only not pay a price for breaking our laws; they will be rewarded with all of the benefits of instant citizenship at no cost.

And all of those "triggers" in the bill? Does anyone really imagine for a moment that they will really be enforced? They certainly have not been in any of the similar bills in the past. The only result has been more and more illegal immigration. Michelle Malkin brings us the lowdown on that nasty piece of business:

There have been seven illegal alien amnesties passed into law since 1986:

The 1986 Immigration and Reform Control Act blanket amnesty for an estimated 2.7 million illegal aliens

1994: The "Section 245(i)" temporary rolling amnesty for 578,000 illegal aliens

1997: Extension of the Section 245(i) amnesty

1997: The Nicaraguan Adjustment and Central American Relief Act for nearly one million illegal aliens from Central America

1998: The Haitian Refugee Immigration Fairness Act amnesty for 125,000 illegal aliens from Haiti

2000: Extension of amnesty for some 400,000 illegal aliens who claimed eligibility under the 1986 act

2000: The Legal Immigration Family Equity Act, which included a restoration of the rolling Section 245(i) amnesty for 900,000 illegal aliens]

Guess what? None — not one — of those amnesties was associated with a decline in illegal immigration. On the contrary, the number of illegal aliens in the U.S. has tripled since President Reagan signed the first amnesty in 1986. The total effect of the amnesties was even larger because relatives later joined amnesty recipients, and this number was multiplied by an unknown number of children born to amnesty recipients who then acquired automatic US citizenship.

What is the reason for this? The answer is simple. This administration, as well as the liberal Democrats, do not want the law to be enforced. They want massive immigration. Republicans want it because big business wants cheap labor and Democrats are just drooling over vast numbers of new, welfare dependent voters to keep them in office. The Republican leadership is selling us all down the river and destroying the last of the Reagan legacy that they have squandered. If this bill passes you can kiss the election of 08 goodbye. Conservatives in the party will stay home on voting day and that means victory for the socialist Democrats.

Hugh Hewitt keeps trying to blame this on Tom Tancredo, but he is dead wrong. The problem is that we no longer have a conservative party in the Republicans and our President is a liberal on virtually every issue other than Iraq. There is no putting lipstick on this pig. Republican is not the same thing as conservative. But Hewitt is right when he talks about the GOP's collective contempt for the voter base and in particular he accurately translates John McCain's wonderful me-ness statement of solidarity with himself:

Deal's done. I am the guy. I made it happen. My opinion mattered, not yours. What I do in the middle of a campaign for president has nothing to do with politics. My critics are all motivated by politics. Since I have already made up my mind, no debate is necessary, so shut up. Republicans especially shut up. This is how things get done in D.C.: You roll over for Democrats. And by the way, cutting half the fence and leaving the other half subject to the whims of the anti-border security bureaucracy equals protecting national security, just like the Gang of 14 was good for the confirmation process and McCain-Feingold good for the First Amendment. So, if you didn't hear me the first time: Shut up. Sit down. I'm your nominee.

The current Republican party is a dead horse no longer worth beating. Time to get rid of the old nag and replace it with a young colt that can actually cross the finish line.

Fortress America's Gate is Open

Mark Steyn writes in The Chicago Sun Times about how the massive problem of illegal immigration that we now have in this country is a national security problem and not just one of economics. For it is not just Mexican people coming over our borders to find a job and send money back home. Our borders are wide open and terrorists are taking advantage of it by crossing into America and moving into the already vast network of illegals who are already here.

The three Duka brothers were (if you'll forgive the expression) illegal immigrants. They're not meant to be here. Yet they graduated from a New Jersey high school and they operated two roofing companies and a pizzeria. Think of how often you have to produce your driver's license or Social Security number. But, five years after 9/11, this is still one of the easiest countries in the world in which to establish a functioning but fraudulent identity.

Consider, for example, the post-9/11 ritual of airline security. You have to produce government-issued picture ID to the TSA official. Does that make you feel safer? On that Tuesday morning in September, four of the killers got on board by using picture ID they'd acquired through the "undocumented worker" network in Falls Church, Va. Half the jurisdictions in the United States issue picture ID to people who shouldn't even be in the country, and they issue it as a matter of policy. The Fort Dix boys were pulled over for 19 traffic violations, but because they were in "sanctuary cities," any cop who suspected they were illegals was unable to report them to immigration authorities. Again, as a matter of policy.

So far we have been able to avoid another serious attack on our shores, but the current dynamic can't be working in our favor. There are only so many law enforcement resources to go around and as more and more illegals come here those resources must, by definition, become more and more stretched. Moreover we have, for reasons of political correctness, refused to really address the issue in a serious sort of way. We need to have real control of our borders and to know who is coming into the country. The current policy of ignoring the problem only makes another attack more likely.

Jefferson Versus the Muslim Pirates

Christopher Hitchens writes in City Journal about America's first encounter with the arrogance of the Islamic world in the form of the Barbary Pirates. Millions of Europeans and Americans were enslaved after being captured on the high seas until America's new navy put a stop to their predations.

Let us not call this view reductionist. Jefferson would perhaps have been just as eager to send a squadron to put down any Christian piracy that was restraining commerce. But one cannot get around what Jefferson heard when he went with John Adams to wait upon Tripoli’s ambassador to London in March 1785. When they inquired by what right the Barbary states preyed upon American shipping, enslaving both crews and passengers, America’s two foremost envoys were informed that “it was written in the Koran, that all Nations who should not have acknowledged their authority were sinners, that it was their right and duty to make war upon whoever they could find and to make Slaves of all they could take as prisoners, and that every Mussulman who should be slain in battle was sure to go to Paradise.” (It is worth noting that the United States played no part in the Crusades, or in the Catholic reconquista of Andalusia.)

Ambassador Abd Al-Rahman did not fail to mention the size of his own commission, if America chose to pay the protection money demanded as an alternative to piracy. So here was an early instance of the “heads I win, tails you lose” dilemma, in which the United States is faced with corrupt regimes, on the one hand, and Islamic militants, on the other—or indeed a collusion between them.

It seems likely that Jefferson decided from that moment on that he would make war upon the Barbary kingdoms as soon as he commanded American forces. His two least favorite institutions—enthroned monarchy and state-sponsored religion—were embodied in one target, and it may even be that his famous ambivalences about slavery were resolved somewhat when he saw it practiced by the Muslims.

Fat Ugly Diseased Cow Leaving "The View"

ABC news brings us this story about Rosie "Side-O-Beef" O'Donnell, who will be leaving the ABC morning program "The View". The article is written in such a way as to give the impression that the main issue was financial, but frankly I'm not buying it. Rather, I think that ABC probably got tired of the constant stream of bad publicity which has been coming from the rotund anti-American loser and they put their foot down and said "enough is enough". And it is not, of course that the establishment media really disagrees with her all that much. But there are limits even for ABC and we seemed to have reached them, at least for now.

ABC executives weren't the only ones unable to agree on "key elements" with O'Donnell. O'Donnell has been the subject of recent headlines for her ongoing feud with real estate mogul Donald Trump and a dispute with Bill O'Reilly over the war in Iraq.

Trump and O'Donnell butted heads when O'Donnell called him a "snake oil salesman," after he announced he would not fire scandal-plagued Miss USA Tara Conner. Trump threatened to sue O'Donnell, but later backed down. Conner's crown was in jeopardy after a bout of underage drinking and substance abuse, but Trump gave her a second chance.

Trump pushed Walters to fire O'Donnell for her wayward comments, even saying, "And here's my prediction. She will have a huge fight ultimately with Barbara Walters, and she will be fired."

Dim Harry Proclaims War is Lost

3rd rate senator promotes himself to general

Fox news reports that Harry Reid is clamoring to get attention for himself just as fast as he can wave his spindly little arms. The attention starved senator has chosen to abandon the troops and proclaim defeat as the means to this end. Naturally this has had the effect of attracting every Elite Media Monoculture reporter with a camera within 100 miles of Washington and of emboldening our enemies whilst simultaneously demoralizing our troops on the ground in Iraq who were under the impression that they were actually doing pretty well.

General Reid pushed his way onto the national stage this week with the pronouncement that America is the weakest superpower in history and that it cannot win a fight against a bunch of guys armed only with basic weapons and copies of the Koran. And right on cue every "journalist" who works for a liberal paper is pronouncing this a wise and progressive viewpoint, regardless of the Defeatocrats lack of a plan which does not include impeaching the President.

WASHINGTON — Republicans blasted Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's comments that the Iraq war is 'lost,' saying it sends the wrong message to U.S. troops fighting in Iraq.

"What a terrible message for our troops fighting this very minute," Rep. Kay Granger, R-Texas, said on the House floor Thursday night. "Instead of a roadmap to success, we are being asked to support a plan for defeat. We're being asked to announce to our enemies a date for surrender."

Reid, D-Nev., said Thursday that the war in Iraq is lost and President Bush's plan to send more troops there to respond to sectarian violence won't work.

"I believe myself that the secretary of state, secretary of defense and — you have to make your own decisions as to what the president knows — (know) this war is lost and the surge is not accomplishing anything as indicated by the extreme violence in Iraq (Wednesday)," Reid said.

Meanwhile, Victor Davis Hanson replies to the tiny senator here.

The reality is, of course, that the Democrats are grandstanding for the benefit of their hard-left-wing party base. The Angry Left cannot stomach George Bush and thus they hate any policy of the administration, even one which is intended to defend the country against enemy attack. The Kos wing of the party wants America defeated in Iraq because it means the defeat of the President and of his party. The left does not care about the long term consequences of defeat; they don't care that it puts the country in danger; they want America out of Iraq now.

If the Democrats in the leadership of the party really believe that the war cannot be won, then the logical course of action is for them to simply pull the funding right now. They have the constitutional authority to do this at any time they wish. And there can be no doubt that if all the Democrats agreed with such a policy, they would have the votes to pass legislation out of the house.

The Democrats are not doing this, however, because they know that there is a stiff political price to pay for such action. The American people do not want to simply give up and go home, even if many of them are troubled by the length and difficulty of this fight. Many certainly wish that it was over, but they also know that simply running away, when we have the means and ability to fight, is bad policy and sends a very bad message to the terrorists and their state supporters. And while it might satisfy the hard left base of the party, they do not have enough votes to assure victory in the next election. For Democrats to win, they must attract the voters in the middle of the political spectrum. But whether they can do so by virtue of out and out surrender to the terrorists is doubtful.

Thus the Democrats play a dangerous game of demoralizing our troops, who they hope will not be able to win and make the President's plan a success, while emboldening the terrorists to greater violence against us, while at the same time hoping that the vast middle does not notice the red meat that they have tossed to their rabid left wing base.

Out Damn Spot

Hugh Hewitt brings us the views of several journalists of both the left and the right in their condemnation on NBC's decision to air the Cho death video on their nightly news broadcast. The opinions are pretty similar across the board. The network was remarkably irresponsible in airing the video and deserves condemnation. Hugh seems to think that they should be sued as well, which as Patterico says is just silly. Still, it is hard to excuse the executives given that they are a law unto themselves and clearly did not consider the wider effects of their actions. At the very least, I would say don't bother watching them any more, assuming that you are still watching them at all. The networks are on the way out in any case. This is just a desperate attempt to prolong their existence before the ship sinks beneath the waves. They don't deserve a lifeboat.

Nifong Bitch-Slapped

Not to mention the accuser, and the Duke faculty members who all lined up on the side of a proven liar.

I have not really blogged on the subject of the Duke rape case as others have been doing a far better job of reporting on it than I could do. But, like many people I have followed the events in question and have looked with some trepidation at the actions of Mike Nifong as well as all of the usual suspects who have a tendency to line up on the side of the perpetually aggrieved whenever the manufactured charge of racism rears its ugly head. And there is little doubt that The Angry Left loves to complain about any perceived insult or grievance. Well as you may have just seen, the Attorney General has just cleared the Duke players and suggested, in no uncertain terms, that the whole case was an abomination, and that apologies are due from many people to the real victims in this case.

I cannot help but wonder if all those on The Angry Left who screamed "racism" will apologize to the Duke lacrosse players now that they have been shown to be utterly and completely innocent of all charges.

I wouldn't hold my breath.

RALEIGH, N.C. - Prosecutors dropped all charges Wednesday against the three Duke lacrosse players accused of sexually assaulting a stripper at a party, saying the athletes were innocent victims of a "tragic rush to accuse" by an overreaching district attorney.

"There were many points in the case where caution would have served justice better than bravado," North Carolina Attorney General Roy Cooper said in a damning assessment of Durham County District Mike Nifong's handling of the sensational case.

Cooper, who took over the case in January after Nifong was charged with ethics violations that could get him disbarred, said his own investigation concluded not only that the evidence against the young men was insufficient, but that no attack took place.

A Pratfall in Damascus

The Washington Post, not known for being a conservative bastion, brings us this view on the latest antics of The Silly Party and one of its most fearless leaders, Nancy Pelosi. In case you missed it, the famed plastic surgery victim shoved her way into the nation's foreign policy arena, which is constitutionally the domain of the executive branch of government, and immediately fell on her posterior in a vain attempt to appear competent. Because the Democrat party has devolved to a level which is now beneath comedy, the witless wonder was unable to distinguish fantasy from reality on her appeasement quest to Syria. She made up a fake message from the leader of Israel, Prime Minister Olmert, and delivered it to the murdering dictator. Naturally, the rest of us were not amused. The Washington Post comments:

Only one problem: The Israeli prime minister entrusted Ms. Pelosi with no such message. "What was communicated to the U.S. House Speaker does not contain any change in the policies of Israel," said a statement quickly issued by the prime minister's office. In fact, Mr. Olmert told Ms. Pelosi that "a number of Senate and House members who recently visited Damascus received the impression that despite the declarations of Bashar Assad, there is no change in the position of his country regarding a possible peace process with Israel." In other words, Ms. Pelosi not only misrepresented Israel's position but was virtually alone in failing to discern that Mr. Assad's words were mere propaganda.

Imagine, if you can, the absolute narcissism which would be required for a member of the congress to not only attempt to take over the responsibilities of our own executive branch of government, but those of a foreign nation. The arrogance is difficult to even quantify. But this is now the normal behavior of the Democrat party. It is today a party run by spoiled children who never grew out of their childish 60s' fantasy role playing and is determined to foist it on the rest of the world in a pompous attempt to justify their own irrational self-indulgence.

A River Runs Through It

In this story from Reuters we learn about the collapse of a reservoir wall that allowed a flood of sewage to overwhelm a village in northern Gaza. The flood killed a number of people and destroyed homes in the area. Of course one has to point out the sad fact that the Palestinians deserved this. In poll after poll the vast majority of the Palestinian people have shown their desire for the continuation of terrorism against the Jews of Israel and their hatred of the west. They voted to put a terrorist government into power. And the primary purpose of that government is not to take care of its people or the infrastructure on which they depend. It is, rather, in power to kill the Jews.

Their thirst for blood is so great that they have been willing to allow the decay of their own lands if it means that they will be able to strike their foes. All of their energy and resources are given over to their hate of Israel with nothing left over for the building of a productive society. They would rather spend their time and money on the destruction of Israel than pay attention to the plumbing. Thus their world collapses around them.

The Real Target of the 6 Imams "Discrimination" Suit

Making America safe for hijackers and terrorists

In this story from Katherine Kersten of the Star Tribune, we find that members of "The Religion of Peace" are suing people for the crime of wanting to be safe from Islamic hijackers. You may remember that not too long ago 6 Islamic "clerics" were removed from a US Airways flight for engaging in suspicious behavior and failing to obey the orders of the flight crew. We know that prior to 9-11 several of the terrorists that later hijacked those planes, engaged in test runs on flights to evaluate the security on board as well as to test their procedures. It does not take much imagination to see that these "clerics" were performing much the same function by testing the limits of what the flight crews and non-muslim passengers would tolerate.

Of course, they are now suing the airline for "discrimination". Apparently if you belong to a permanently aggrieved group from which have come virtually all of the terrorist attacks on the civilized world, you get to show your displeasure that other people might have noticed that there is a problem. But what is more troubling is that the 5th column "clerics" and their agitation lobby, CAIR, are now going to sue the passengers as well for having noticed the suspicious behavior and reporting it to the proper authorities. I guess that if you are a Muslim follower of the pederast prophet, it is just peachy to slit the throats of flight attendants and crash planes full of civilians into buildings, but if you object to that kind of treatment, well you must be some kind of racist criminal who deserves to be hauled into court by the ACLU.

But the most alarming aspect of the imams’ suit is buried in paragraph 21 of their complaint. It describes “John Doe” defendants whose identity the imams’ attorneys are still investigating. It reads: “Defendants ‘John Does’ were passengers ... who contacted U.S. Airways to report the alleged ‘suspicious’ behavior of Plaintiffs’ performing their prayer at the airport terminal.”

Paragraph 22 adds: “Plaintiffs will seek leave to amend this Complaint to allege true names, capacities, and circumstances supporting [these defendants’] liability ... at such time as Plaintiffs ascertain the same.”

In plain English, the imams plan to sue the “John Does,” too.

Who are these unnamed culprits? The complaint describes them as “an older couple who was sitting [near the imams] and purposely turn[ed] around to watch” as they prayed. “The gentleman (’John Doe’) in the couple ... picked up his cellular phone and made a phone call while watching the Plaintiffs pray,” then “moved to a corner” and “kept talking into his cellular phone.”

In retribution for this action, the unnamed couple probably will be dragged into court soon and face the prospect of hiring a lawyer, enduring hostile questioning and paying huge legal bills. The same fate could await other as-yet-unnamed passengers on the US Airways flight who came forward as witnesses.

The Coming War with Islam

Solly Ganor writes at FrontPageMagazine about his chance encounter with a Christian Arab and the conversation that they had about the coming conflict between the Western world and the Islamic world. It is an essay worth reading because most Westerners still do not understand the fact that the Islamic world is at war with us and intends to wipe us out. And it is crucial to understand that this is not really a fight we have a choice about. They are going to continue to attack us whether we acknowledge its reality or not. Moreover, most Americans also do not yet understand that this is an existential threat to our very survival, just as the second world war was in the last century. The momentum in this fight is still building, and while we have escaped being attacked since 9-11, the chaos in the rest of the world is spreading. How long will it be before it reaches our doors once again?

“As a matter of fact, the whole Moslem world, not only the Arabs, simply couldn’t believe that the mighty Israeli Army that defeated the combined Arab forces in six days in 1967, and almost captured Cairo and Damascus in 1973, couldn’t defeat a small army of Hezbollah men. As usual the Moslems see things the way they want to see things. Most think that the present generation of Israelis have gone soft and can be defeated."

“The American bungling of the war in Iraq only added to their conviction that victory not only over Israel but also over the West is not only possible, but certain. The ramifications of these two bungling wars may bring an Islamic bloody Tsunami all over the West, not only in Israel. The sharks smell blood and these two wars gave them the green light to attack sooner than they had in mind. Your problem is that you are on the defensive and they have the option to choose the time and the places when and where to attack and there is nothing much you can do about it. When will you Westerners realize that half measures don’t work with people who are willing to die by the thousands for Allah to achieve their goal? In their eyes the Western World is simply an abomination on earth that has to be wiped out.”

He spoke quietly and I could just picture him in the school giving his students a lecture. I poured him another cup of coffee and encouraged him to continue.

“The Americans, the Europeans, and even you Israelis really don’t know what it is all about, do you? During the last generation hundreds of thousands of children have been taught all over the Moslem world in Madrass schools to become martyrs for Allah in order to kill the infidels. These youngsters not only are ready to do it, but are actually in the process of doing it. Bombs are going off all over the world killing and maiming thousands of people, not only on 9/11 in the US, in London Madrid and Bali, but in Africa, India, Bengladesh, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and many other places. The first signs of the Islamic Tsunami is already here, but the West doesn’t understand, or doesn’t want to understand what is coming."