Friday, December 31, 2010

The Viral Spiral of 2010; Yet another year full of bogus chain e-mails.

FactCheck.org  "Despite what you may have been told:
■It’s not true that the White House is planning to tax all credit card transactions.
■Muslims are not being exempted from the new health care law.
■President Obama did not order up a private jet for the family’s pet dog, Bo.
■Speaker Pelosi’s spending for liquor on congressional trips isn’t notably different than that of her predecessor. And Pelosi herself doesn’t even drink alcohol.
■The new health care law does not contain a 3.8 percent "sales tax" on the sale of all personal residences.
■Obama did not cancel the National Day of Prayer nor did he participate in a Muslim prayer event at the Capitol.

Waiting For the Ball to Drop

http://www.worldmag.com/editorialcartoons/

Republicans blast Obama for posting new Syrian envoy

Jerusalem Post  ""Making underserved concessions to Syria tells the regime in Damascus that it can continue to pursue its dangerous agenda and not face any consequences from the US," she said in a statement. "That is the wrong message to be sending to a regime which continues to harm and threaten US interests and those of such critical allies as Israel.""

Obama’s ‘Shocking’ Recess Appointment  "The president still regards al Qaeda as a mere criminal enterprise."
http://conservativeblogscentral.blogspot.com/

2010 a Banner Year for MSM’s Ministries of Mistruth

Pajamas Media  "In George Orwell’s 1984, set in a pre-computer era, Winston Smith, working in the misnamed Ministry of Truth, alters documents that contradict or conflict with his totalitarian government’s take on history, wiping out inconvenient truths or revising them to fit the current template.
"In 2010, the establishment press ramped up its propaganda role, acting as a collective of preemptive Winston Smiths."

Government by regulation. Shhh.

Charles Krauthammer  "Obama knows he has only so many years to change the country. In his first two, he achieved much: the first stimulus, Obamacare and financial regulation. For the next two, however, the Republican House will prevent any repetition of that. Obama's agenda will therefore have to be advanced by the more subterranean means of rule-by-regulation.
"But this must simultaneously be mixed with ostentatious displays of legislative bipartisanship..."
Lisa Benson; http://townhall.com/cartoons/

2010: The Entertainment Industry’s PC Year in Review

Big Hollywood  "For the entertainment industry’s practitioners of political correctness, 2010 was another banner year. Even as conservatives have made deserved headway in La La Land and other areas of the industry, there still aren’t enough conservatives to bring much needed patriotism, logic, and common sense to the scene. Sadly, the industry is still filled with those slavishly dedicated to anti-American tropes, left-wing blather, and self-hatred. From comic books, to music, to radio, TV and movies, PCism still runs rampant."
"Without further ado, here are (in no particular order) just a few examples of PCism from 2010 in music, TV, movies, and publishing."
Captain America proclaimed the Tea Party an enemy to America.

Speaking of which...The American Government Enables Worldwide Sharia by Censoring Critics of Radical Islam "...four “Swedes” and a “Dane” were arrested yesterday for planning a massive attack on the Jyllands-Posten building in Copenhagen as revenge for the Mohammed cartoons. They intended to make their operation a reprise of Mumbai, with as many innocent casualties as possible."

This must be "Sven", but I can't read Swedish


Poll: 2010 Obamateurism of the Year Final

Hot Air  "It comes down to these.  Thanks to extensive rounds of voting, we have our Final Four of Obamateurisms this year, and they’re all doozies.  Will it be Barack Obama’s famous finger-wag at the Supreme Court during the State of the Union speech on national television, in which Obama managed to prove he didn’t understand the case nor the ruling?  Making himself into the arbiter of income caps?  Misquoting something as basic as the Declaration of Independence — multiple times?  Or bailing out on his own press conference, leaving Bill Clinton to handle it, in order to attend a Christmas party?"

I know it’s MSNBC and everything, but...

Big Government  "...but I still had difficulty believing I actually witnessed this clip on Breitbart TV of a silly little man saying the Constitution is irrelevant and confusing because it’s, like, more than 100 years old."

Thursday, December 30, 2010

Obama on Vacation

Pat Oliphant, WaPo

Alan Caruba: Some of My Favorite Billboards

Warning Signs  "The following billboards began to pop up shortly after it became obvious to most people that Obama was some kind of terrible mistake that a majority of the voters made in 2008. This being America, they began to express themselves in many ways from town hall meetings to mass marches on Washington, D.C., to some wonderful billboards."
Warning Signs

Gitmo Is Not a Recruiting Tool for Terrorists

Karl Rove  "...President Barack Obama claimed that the Guantanamo Bay detention facility was "probably the No. 1 recruitment tool" for al Qaeda and its affiliates. ....
"But the president is wrong to assign such importance to Gitmo and, by implication, to suggest it would be a major setback to al Qaeda were he to close it, as he promised but failed to do by the end of his first year in office. Shuttering the facility would not take the wind out of terrorism, in part because it is not, and never has been, its "No. 1 recruitment tool.""
"...top al Qaeda leaders mentioned Crusaders ... 322 times, Palestine 200 times, Gaza 131 times, Jews 129 times, Israel 98 times and Zionists 94 times. Al Qaeda leaders also talked more about Afghanistan (333 mentions), Pakistan (331), Iraq (157), Somalia (67), Yemen (18) and even Chechnya (15) than they did about Guantanamo."

Club Gitmo
Rush Limbaugh





















Global, er, Climate Change, er...Climate Disruption

http://townhall.com/cartoons/henrypayne/

Mike Ramirez, IBD



The WikiLeaks War on America

Commentary Magazine  "It is telling that, for all the talk of Assange’s courage in taking on the American goliath, the truth is that his assault on the U.S. government has not put him at great risk. ....The truth is that both the Bush and Obama administrations have proved remarkably feckless and feeble in their response to the War Logs and, worse, in the latter’s failure to prevent the publication of the State Department cables it knew was coming."
....
"It would be interesting to see if Assange ever dares to take on the Russian FSB, the Chinese government, or even the French security services—all of which would have far fewer scruples about lethally punishing him than the American state he believes is so dangerous."

Feckless:–adjective
1. ineffective; incompetent; futile: feckless attempts to repair the plumbing.
2. having no sense of responsibility; indifferent; lazy.
Dictionary.com

California’s Central Valley: Zimbabwe West?

USA Today
Hot Air "Until recently, California’s Central Valley was one of the nation’s most productive agricultural regions. Not only did it feed itself, the state of California, and the entire country, it also produced exports to other nations. That kind of enterprise employed a lot of people in Central California, from farm hands to wholesalers, and created a high standard of living.
"That continued right up to the moment that the federal government got more concerned over the Delta smelt, a small, inedible fish, than feeding people."

 Fresno, Zimbabwe  "It's high time the greens who did this to the richest farmland in the country be held accountable. Far from bringing greenery, their disruptive agendas have left central California a wasteland."Emphasis added.

(Updated) So much for bipartisanship -- a slew of recess appointments

Rep. Peter King: Obama Recess Justice Dept. Appointment 'Shocking' 
“This may be one of the worst appointments by President Obama during his presidency,” King added, referring to Cole as a “left-wing ideologue who places terrorists in the same categories as drug peddlers."
"What he's talking about is an editorial Cole wrote for the Legal Times on the one year anniversary of 9/11 in 2002."  joshuapundit

Jennifer Rubin "On Wednesday, Obama shed any pretense of bipartisanship in making six recess appointments. As were his previous recess appointments, this batch included two individuals whose records are so controversial that they could not obtain confirmation even with 59 Democratic senators. Also included was Stephen Ford, nominated as ambassador to Syria and stymied as a forceful rebuttal to Obama's failed Syrian engagement policy."

Who Is James Cole? Why's He So Blase About 9/11?  "Sean Hannity warned about his views back on June 16:
All right, this president sure knows how to pick them. The Anointed One's nominee to be the number two at the Department of Justice thinks that 9/11 is similar to any other domestic crime. In a 2002 article James Cole wrote, quote, "Our country has faced many forms of devastating crime including countless acts of rape, child abuse and murder. The acts of September 11th were horrible, but so are these other things."

Morning Commentary

Alana Goodman  "It looks like President Obama has finally found some backbone in his diplomatic spat with Hugo Chavez. The Venezuelan president rejected the U.S.’s choice for ambassador to Caracas and dared Obama to cut diplomatic ties with the country. Today Obama responded by kicking the Venezuelan ambassador out of the U.S."

Obama Tricks Voters Like Enron Hoodwinked Public

Amity Shlaes  "I asked the biggest, baddest tax mind I know, former Congressional Budget Office director Douglas Holtz-Eakin, to tell what he thinks the top tax is. Even Holtz-Eakin approximated, texting back a formula that might serve as the theme song for tax year 2011: “39.6 + 2 (phaseout of pep and pease) + 3.8 (Medicare net investment income tax) = 45.4. Add in state-level taxes and 50 is easy to reach.”
"Holtz-Eakin is a genius. If he’s approximating, it’s because he can’t bear to feel the pain of the precise reality."

Freezing Brits steamed over new green boilers

Phil Boehmke "Boiler manufacturers and installers enjoyed a boom as they removed perfectly good boilers and replaced then with the new eco-friendly units. Everything was going smoothly until frustrated consumers discovered that their new boilers didn’t work in really cold weather.
"To make matters worse, the new boilers typically last only 3-6 years and the costs of parts to repair the units are outrageously high. One of the bi-products of the condensation process is the creation of acidic water vapor from the dissolved nitrogen and sulfur oxides which corrode the delicate system components. Gee, the old boilers were very reliable and lasted 20 years on average."
I'm from the guvmint and I'm here to help you... 

Separating Terror from Terrorism

STRATFOR  "If the public will take a cue from groups like AQAP, it too can separate terrorism from terror. Recognizing that terrorist attacks, like car crashes and cancer and natural disasters, are a part of the human condition permits individuals and families to practice situational awareness and take prudent measures to prepare for such contingencies without becoming vicarious victims. This separation will help deny the practitioners of terrorism and terror the ability to magnify their reach and power."
Separating Terror from Terrorism is republished with permission of STRATFOR.

How to Respond to Terrorism Threats and Warnings  "If people live their lives in a constant state of fear, those who seek to terrorize them have won. Terror attacks are a tactic used by a variety of militant groups for a variety of ends. As the name implies, terrorism is intended to produce a psychological impact that far outweighs the actual physical damage caused by the attack itself. Denying would-be terrorists this multiplication effect, as the British largely did after the July 2005 subway bombings, prevents them from accomplishing their greater goals. Terror can be countered when people assume the proper mindset and then take basic security measures and practice relaxed awareness. These elements work together to dispel paranoia and to prevent the fear of terrorism from robbing people of the joy of life.
How to Respond to Terrorism Threats and Warnings is republished with permission of STRATFOR

Wednesday, December 29, 2010

The Joy of Teaching in Iraq

Inside Higher Ed . "So, what’s it like for an American educator to work with Iraqi college students in the classroom? Well, to be honest, they had me at "hello." From the first moments of my first class, I knew there was something different about these students, something special. "....
"Now, what’s so special about these Iraqi students? Let me give you a list:....

Liberals Give 'Til It Hurts (You)

Ann Coulter  "Liberals never tire of discussing their own generosity, particularly when demanding that the government take your money by force to fund shiftless government employees overseeing counterproductive government programs."....
"This week, we'll take a peek at the charitable giving of these champions of the poor."


http://townhall.com/cartoons/MichaelRamirez/

The ACLU's Unholy War on Catholic Hospitals

Michelle Malkin  "On Wednesday, the ACLU sent a letter to federal health officials urging the government to force Catholic hospitals in the U.S. to perform abortions in violation of their core moral commitment to protecting the lives of the unborn. They're counting on sympathetic Obama rationing czar Donald Berwick ...to dictate which religious principles hospital operators can and cannot follow.
The ACLU reiterated its call for a federal probe -- read: fishing expedition -- of Catholic hospitals nationwide that refuse to provide "emergency" contraception and abortions to women."

Catholic Hospitals Fight to Stay Pro-life "According to the Washington Post, the latest letter from the ACLU followed up a complaint in July from the group “asking for a federal investigation of similar problems at Catholic hospitals across the country, including refusals to provide emergency contraception to rape victims or perform abortions on women having miscarriages.”"

GROUND ZERO MOSQUE; THE SECOND WAVE OF THE 911 ATTACKS

Atlas Shrugs  "IF radical Rauf is speaking on his propaganda tour in your town, neighborhood or university, let us know. We'll be there to expose him and tell the truth. "

How Did All That Happen?

Victor Davis Hanson  "There are a number of improbables, anomalies, paradoxes, ironies, absurdities — call them what you wish – on the national scene that simply defy reason. We usually fault an ignorant media as culpable for creating narratives that have no basis in fact and yet are rarely questioned. Here are some of the glaring examples and you decide how the unlikely became the gospel."....
Lurking somewhere behind all these improbables is a rather small Western elite that is enormously influential in the media, government, the arts, universities, and Hollywood. And what it would like to believe, often simply must be believed — and so it usually is.

Not So Fast with the “1962” Allusions

Commentary  "The Iran-Venezuela situation of today is more complex; as it unfolds, its features will increasingly diverge from the profile of the 1962 crisis. Today’s impending crisis involves much more of Latin America. We should address it on its own terms. I don’t wish for a Kennedy-esque approach from President Obama. I’m apprehensive about what he would be prepared to trade away in missile negotiations with Iran."
J. E. Dyer

Is Israel assassinating Iran nuclear scientists?

Haaretz  "The Telegraph also quoted Israeli officials as privately acknowledging the new U.S. administration is unlikely to sanction an air attack on Iran's nuclear installations and that President Barack Obama's offer to extend a hand of peace to Tehran puts any direct military action beyond reach for now.
"As such, the reported goal of Israel's covert campaign is to delay or interrupt the Iranian research program, without engaging in a direct confrontation that could lead to a wider war."

Iran's nuclear arms drive delayed. Iran: Mossad killed Iranian official "DEBKAfile's intelligence sources note that the current Israeli intelligence timeline for a nuclear-armed Iran was previously 2011. Yaalon did not go into the reasons for the delay, but our sources mention two:
1. His estimate represented the first official Israel evaluation of the scale of the destruction and havoc the Stuxnet malworm has wrought to Iran's most secret nuclear weaponization facilities. Up until now, only the nuclear reactor at Bushehr and the uranium enrichment plant at Natanz had been admitted to have been affected by the invasive virus.
2. The second factor seriously slowing progress is the tightening ring of sanctions which are keeping Iran from receiving the materials, replacement parts and new electronic and technical systems needed to bring its clandestine military nuclear program to fruition
What would America do without Israel to protect her?

The Top Three Tea Party Questions

American Thinker  "If you are a part of the Tea Party movement, you might sometimes wonder, "What can I do?" Well, you can memorize, or print out and carry in your pocket, these three questions:
1. Which article of the Constitution gives government the authority to do this?
2. How does this help reduce the deficit and balance the budget?
3. Why does this have to be mandatory and not voluntary?
"It matters not what the topic may be; these three questions are fundamental. Include them in every political conversation you have with your family, friends, neighbors, and especially with your elected representatives. Tea Party activists nationwide can lead the effort to make sure politicians will not step out of their offices without credible answers to these questions, on any issue whatsoever."

President Obama and Michael Vick

Thomas Lifson  "Obama did not call up the owners of, say, the Texas Rangers to congratulate them for giving Josh Hamilton a second chance. Hamilton led that team to its first World Series appearance in its history. But Hamilton made some bad choices in life, and had his early MLB career derailed by drug and alcohol addiction. The Rangers took a chance on him and it paid off: He was brilliant at the plate in the 2010 American League playoffs, to the point that the New York Yankees wouldn't even pitch to him in the ALCS. Where was President Obama's call to Nolan Ryan, congratulating him for giving Hamilton a second chance?"
Hmmmm.

Rush Limbaugh on "the Obama Curse": Rush observes that every time Obama calls some team before a game, that team loses.
I'm just sayin'.

How one of the world’s top educational performers turned around

Boston.com  "Finland is one of the few nations that have accomplished both a high quality of learning and equity in learning at the same time. The best school systems are the most equitable — students do well regardless of their socio-economic background. Finally, Finland should interest US educators because Finns have employed very distinct ideas and policies in reforming education, many the exact opposite of what’s being tried in the United States."  Hat tip to Neal Boortz

Obama Will Make You Pay More at the Pump

Heritage  "In 2008, then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) “blasted” the president for rising gas prices on his (and her) watch. In July 2008, ABC News asked the president what was his “short term advice for Americans about gas prices?” repeating a nearly identical question asked at a February 2008 press conference. In April 2008, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) said gas prices were “the number one issue facing America today.”
"You get the point. Yet, at the end of President Bush’s presidency, gas prices were 9% lower than when he took office (adjusted for inflation). So where have these outspoken critics been since Bush left office?"....
"All of this news would be less frightening if the White House were focusing on potential ways to lower energy prices. Instead, President Obama is admittedly fixated with raising them."

Tuesday, December 28, 2010

The Obamaites’ About-Face

Victor Davis Hanson  "...the Obamaites are simply channeling their commander-in-chief, who spent a near decade, from 2001 to 2009, pontificating on the illegality or superfluousness of the Patriot Act, renditions, tribunals, Predators, Guantanamo, and overseas wars, and then as president embraced or even expanded all of them — with not a word of remorse that his earlier demagoguing might have done great harm both to the efficacy of the programs and to the reputations of those involved in them, as well as to his country’s image abroad. I suppose we are all Orwell’s farm animals now, mystified but quiet as we wake to see the commandments on the barnyard wall crossed out and written over."  Emphasis added.

Top 25 Left-Wing Films: #15 – ‘Born on the Fourth of July’ (1989)

Big Hollywood 
 "Using a true story or not, this is something Hollywood loves to do; haul out the template I call the He Who Believes In The Goodness Of America Template.
"And it goes a little something like this… When a character arrives on screen and makes clear that he believes in the goodness of America, Hollywood’s intolerant politics will only allow the arc of that character to rise in one of three ways:
1.He Who Believes In the Goodness of America will be revealed as the villain.
2.He Who Believes In the Goodness of America will be a liberal fighting evil conservatives.
3.He Who Believes In the Goodness of America will have that illusion shattered forever.
"I’m not sure how effective this formula is in the real world, but anti-American filmmakers use it all the time."

Mike Ramirez Cartoon

Warning Signs

Abbas promises apartheid Palestine state (Revised)

Ethel C. Fenig "Mahmoud Abbas, the expired term head of the mythical country of Palestine, has promised
"We have frankly said, and always will say: If there is an independent Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital, we won't agree to the presence of one Israeli in it," Abbas told reporters in Ramallah.
This space below is reserved for statements of condemnation from Hollywood and media persons:



Mental health care, Arab style  "Israel's late Prime Minister Golda Meir, of blessed memory, once stated that peace would end the Arab-Israeli war when the Arabs loved their children more than they hated Israelis. Sad proof that peace is not about to break out from Arabs soon is this horror story from the English edition of the Israeli Hebrew daily, Ha'aretz (the Land)."...Ethel C Fenig

Mallard Fillmore


http://www.jewishworldreview.com/strips/mallard/2000/mallard1.asp


Why we must stick with Obama's Afghan strategy

General Petraeus with General Abdul Khalil Bakhten.
Washington Post  "The U.S. presence in Afghanistan is driven also by our struggle with al-Qaeda senior leadership and the future of Pakistan. International forces stationed along the Durand Line are about 30 miles from many of the most dangerous centers of Islamist terrorism in Pakistan. From those positions, we can understand what is happening in Pakistan and, occasionally, take action. We should never underestimate the importance of this positional advantage. It cannot be replaced by technology, discussion with Islamabad or anything else. From the Afghan border we have a unique vantage point on the groups that most directly threaten the American homeland and the stability of the entire nuclear-armed subcontinent."
The shallow "we've been there almost a decade and it's time to end this" argument just won't wash in reality.
Frederick W. Kagan is director of the Critical Threats Project at the American Enterprise Institute. Kimberly Kagan is president of the Institute for the Study of War. They are independent military analysts who have conducted research for commanders in Afghanistan.


Max Boot: More Progress in Afghanistan  "...one of the more unsung good-news stories out of Afghanistan: the success that U.S. troops have been having in preventing catastrophic terrorist attacks in Kabul by the Haqqani Network."

Using Regulation Against The Will Of The People

Big Government  "Written into the Declaration of Independence is a simple imperative, “Governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.” Our nation was built on this concept, but the Obama administration is using its power to write regulation to circumvent the will of the people and advance its own agenda."

Shock Audio: New Black Panther Leader Reveals Collusion at NYC Meeting With Ahmadinejad to Build Alliance

Atlas Shrugs  "It is important to remember Obama's close ties to these haters and subversives. Louis Farrakhan and Obama have a long history, and it was Obama's Department of Justice that refused to prosecute the Black Panthers who were threatening white voters in Philly.
"This is a terrible thing, but it was expected. What makes it deadly is that Obama is in the White House."

Chinese Submarine Launched Missile Off California Coast-Unproven!

Truthorfiction  This was prompted by emails now circulating about the mysterious contrail being a Chinese "shot-across-the-bow" of the US.
"...offering his reasons why he did not think that this was a launched missile. He said that launched missiles increase their speed, travel East to West and do not alter course. He told reporters that the object in the sky had not changed its speed but was altering course and was travelling in the wrong direction. He also said that the contrails expansion at the bottom of the frame had given it an optical illusion of a water launch and since missiles go up into the higher atmosphere other nations would have reported a sighting on their radar."
Hat tip to Joy Roeder, Garibaldi, Oregon (my boyhood home).

Big Government Strikes Back

Heritage  "Last week’s events in Washington were a preview of lawmaking in 2011, but Congress was not where the real action was. While the media was distracted by the last breaths of a defeated leftist majority in Congress, it was the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) that gave true picture of how the Obama Administration will advance their agenda in 2011." (Emphasis added.)

Stop the State Bailouts Before They Start  "California already came to Washington asking for an $8 billion bailout last year. The spendthrift 111th Congress said no. At a bare minimum the 112th Congress should hold the line and refuse to bailout any state government. Instead, Congress should consider a way for states to file for bankruptcy or its fiscal equivalent. While such a law would raise some serious federalism issues, as long as states are allowed to enter into bankruptcy voluntary, it could be constitutionally acceptable. But David John warns"...
http://terrellaftermath.com/

Monday, December 27, 2010

Regulated To Death By ObamaCare?

Investors.com  "A post at the time by former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin on her Facebook page fueled opposition to funding end-of-life counseling by discussing openly what many privately fear and something we have written about before — that end-of-life counseling and efforts to measure cost-effectiveness of treatment will combine in a perfect storm to ration care in a way that lets government bureaucrats decide who lives and who dies.
""The America I know and love," Palin wrote, "is not one in which my parents or my baby with Down Syndrome will have to stand in front of Obama's 'death panel' so his bureaucrats can decide, based on a subjective judgment of their 'level of productivity in society' whether they are worthy of health care.
"Such a system is downright evil."


Has Regulation Put An End To Rule Of Law?  Thomas Sowell:  "The Constitution of the United States begins with the words "We the people."  But neither the Constitution nor "we the people" will mean anything if politicians and judges can continue to do end runs around both.
"Bills passed too fast for anyone to read them are blatant examples of these end runs. But last week, another of these end runs appeared in a different institution when the medical "end of life consultations" rejected by Congress were quietly enacted through bureaucratic fiat by administrators of Medicare."

.....But Not Gilad Shalit

Atlas Shrugs  "U.N. to investigate treatment of WikiLeak traitor spy Bradley Manning, but not of the brutalized, kidnapped Gilad Shalit."

Who is Gilad Shalit? "Gilad Shalit (Hebrew: גלעד שליט‎, born 28 August 1986) is an Israeli soldier who was captured on 25 June 2006 by Hamas in a cross-border raid." Wikipedia.

Petraeus: NATO, Afghan, Pakistani Forces to Coordinate More Operations

GlobalSecurity.org  "Petraeus also praised Pakistan for its counter-insurgency efforts in the past two years in areas near the Afghan border where the Taliban and other militants seek shelter. He said Pakistani forces have conducted "impressive" operations in the Swat Valley, the North West Frontier Province and northwestern tribal regions."

Taliban claims responsibility for Pakistan deadly blast  "The Pakistani Taliban has claimed responsibility for Saturday's suicide bombing in the country's northwest tribal area, which killed at least 43 people and injured 90 others, CNN said.
"A suicide bomber attacked a crowd of people waiting for food aid in the Bajaur region bordering with Afghanistan. The explosion took place about 600 meters from a U.N. World Food Programme distribution point in the town of Khar, a spokesman for the agency was quoted by CNN as saying."

Napolitano: Clapper's ignorance of U.K. arrests a PR failure

http://townhall.com/cartoons/chipbok

Politico  "Napolitano's sympathy for Clapper is understandable: she had a high-profile gaffe of her own last holiday season when she tackled a question about an attempted Christmas bombing of an American aircraft by declaring that "the system worked."

Clueless clapper   "At least the White House has finally outlined its true security strategy. "
Step 1: Pretend radical Muslims aren't at war with the US. When that fails . . .

Step 2: Close your eyes.
 

PC Christmas, er, holidays

’Tis the Season to Be Politically Correct  "With that in mind, I offer the following exchange of emails to readers. It was sent to me by one of the parties to the exchange, a doctor who has suffered through the increasingly intolerant and politically correct atmosphere of a large Midwestern medical practice. Our story opens with a seemingly innocuous invitation to a “holiday party” a couple of days ago:"  Roger Kimball

Christmas Greetings, and the World Is Insane  "This agnostic has had just about enough of PC Christmastime."

ACLU Warns Schools to Say "Holiday" vs. "Christmas"  "School superintendents across the state were reminded by the ACLU this week that holiday celebrations focusing primarily on one religious holiday amount to an unconstitutional endorsement of religion.
"The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) letter, addressed to 137 public shool leaders across the state, stated that it was responding to a number of complaints from families about school party activites this Christmas season."

Palestinians: Obama no longer backs Palestinian state within 1967 borders

DEBKAfile  "Palestinian leaders in Ramallah, including Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas and Prime Minister Salam Fayad, are sunk in gloom over what they perceive as US President Barak Obama repudiation of his promises to them and greater sympathy for the Netanyahu government's side of the Middle East dispute. They also see a spreading push in Europe, the Arab countries and Moscow for them to bite the bullet and reconcile themselves to partial or interim accords, since no feasible solutions are visible on the outstanding core issues of borders, refugees and Jerusalem."

Photo: http://www.palwatch.org/
Beautiful virgins await Muslim Martyrs in Paradise  "A music video on official Palestinian television (2000-2010) is designed to promote the desire among Palestinian males to be killed in the conflict with Israel in order to achieve the reward: beautiful virgins in Paradise. The video shows a woman being shot dead and joining other virgins in Paradise. Afterwards a man is killed and he is greeted by all the virgins who have been awaiting him. "

Peeling Back Congressional Overreach

Photo: http://freedomist.com/
Heritage   "Americans are all too familiar with the federal government’s intrusion into our daily lives. It sometimes seems that the feds have their hands in nearly every aspect of our daily life: what we drive, how we educate our children, down to the very food we eat. Unfortunately, Americans are less familiar with how the federal government is able to justify such intrusions.
"They should look no further than the Commerce Clause of the U.S. Constitution, which is embodied in: Article I, Section 8, Clause 3 ."   Hat tip to The Freedomist

NYC Russians Flock to GOP – Say Democrats Are “Too Socialist”

Gateway Pundit  "Many New York City Russians are reportedly flocking to the Republican Party, claiming that the national Democrats’ “socialistic” policies remind them too much of Mother Russia’s top-down oligarchy they fled from in the past."
They have tasted and seen what American liberals cannot imagine.

An ex-Soviet immigrant goes Socratic on his liberal American critics.  "Question Insanity: What to Ask Progressives":

"Dear Americans, these are some questions I have collected in 16 years of living in your country. Please see if you can answer them for me:"...


Obamacare Criminalizes Medicine

The Daily Beast  "The president's health-care plan is one big entrapment scheme, argues Shikha Dalmia of  Reason Foundation —one that will turn both patients and providers into criminals, pushing some families to fudge their tax reports to receive better care."

Obama Returns to End-of-Life Plan That Caused Stir  "When a proposal to encourage end-of-life planning touched off a political storm over “death panels,” Democrats dropped it from legislation to overhaul the health care system. But the Obama administration will achieve the same goal by regulation, starting Jan.1."

Palin's Food Fight

Wall Street Journal  "Mrs. Palin would be more effective if she made some distinctions among the Obama policies that really are worth opposing. ObamaCare further redistributes the cost of obesity and other lifestyle ills by forcing individuals to buy the insurance that Washington says is for their own good, and then subsidizes the cost for some at the expense of others. That really is an affront to liberty. Telling kids to eat their vegetables and run around the block is merely instructing them to take responsibility for their own choices."

Palin’s Counterproductive Complaint "Mocking the First Lady and portraying her anti-obesity campaign as several steps on the Road to Serfdom is exactly the type of thing that will turn the public against the legitimate efforts by conservatives to rein in the reach and scope of government. Ms. Palin might consider this before she takes yet another unfair shot at Mrs. Obama."  Peter Wehner

Obama's new start

Charles Krauthammer  ""Harry Reid has eaten our lunch," said Sen. Lindsey Graham, lamenting his side's "capitulation" in the lame-duck session. Yes, but it was less Harry than Barry. Obama came back with a vengeance. His string of lame-duck successes is a singular political achievement. Because of it, the epic battles of the 112th Congress begin on what would have seemed impossible just one month ago - a level playing field."

START the Damage Control  "Last week’s rushed vote on New START in the lame-duck session of the Senate represented that body’s abandonment of its constitutional obligations to provide to “advise and consent” on treaties, despite the best efforts Sen. Jon Kyl and some of his colleagues to prevent the Senate from being reduced to such a “rubber stamp”. The vote cannot be undone, but the damage can be mitigated if our leadership exercises the political will to do so."

So You Lost Your Election

Iowahawk  "A[n] outplacement transition guide to life beyond Washington for former members and associates of Congress"  H/T to American Thinker.

Jennifer Rubin: Interview with Israeli ambassador Michael Oren







Part One:  "...the ultimate test is whether Iran will cease enrichment on its soil." What about the use of force? He said, "The position of both the U.S. and Israel is that all options remain on the table. But it is important for Iran to take that seriously, to lend that credibility." He declined to offer a specific way of enhancing the credibility of a military option, saying only, "There are ways to communicate that [a military option is real] to the Iranians." "

Part Two:  "...Oren discussed the onslaught Israel now faces -- not on the battlefield, but in the court of public opinion and in international bodies. In recent years, efforts to delegitimize the Jewish state, that is, to challenge its legitimacy as a state and ability to act in its own interests, as does every other country, have increased dramatically."

The 22nd Annual Awards for the Year's Worst Reporting

Media Research Center  "Welcome to the Media Research Center’s annual awards issue, a compilation of the most outrageous and/or humorous news media quotes from 2009 (December 2008 through November 2009).
"To determine this year’s winners, a panel of 48 radio talk show hosts, magazine editors, columnists, editorial writers, and media observers each selected their choices for the first, second and third best quote from a slate of five to eight quotes in each category."  More from MRC:

Rick Moran at American Thinker has this comment: "The rest of the list will no doubt bring back fond memories of liberal cluelessness and lefty doltishness."

Rich Terrell: The Obama Infrastructure Plan

http://terrellaftermath.com/

Sunday, December 26, 2010

Happy Hol...er, Merry Christmas!

http://www.worldmag.com/editorialcartoons/

Glossy al-Qaida magazine focuses on how-to tips, politics

 Raymond Ibrahim.com  "An English-language jihadist publication released online this month is another sign that al-Qaida or copycat groups are becoming increasingly adept at packaging their message for a young western audience, experts say.
In case you access it for the pictures and
not the articles, here's Mr. January
"The magazine, called Inspire, includes content that advises young people of what to expect when joining a jihad, or holy war, instructions on how to make bombs with household ingredients, messages from Osama bin Laden and al-Qaida leader Ayman al-Zawahiri, and even delves into the debates on the Muhammad-cartoon controversy and the banning of the niqab face veil in France."
 

A Contest: Which Local Government Deserves a Lump of Coal?

Big Government  "This post could be entitled, “So many dumb bureaucrats, so little time,” but let’s have some fun and turn it into a contest. Which bone-headed decision by a local government best exemplifies mindless bureaucracy, politically correct nonsense, and government waste?"

2011 Politically-Incorrect Resolutions

Victor Davis Hanson  "We need to create a shame culture in which the worst sort of social transgression (far worse than smoking) is to burden the public schools with children that were neither raised nor tamed.
"As a small start, might we end anonymity and return to the old shame culture of identifying youths by name, at any age, once they come into contact with the criminal justice system? As in: “David Smith, age 15, of 302 Broad Street, Selma, was arraigned today on charges of aggravated assault.” "

A Cause Hollywood Ignores: ‘Harry Potter’ Actress In Hiding From Violent Islamists

Big Hollywood  "Afshan Azad, 22, who plays Padma Patil in the “Harry Potter” film series remains in hiding. She refused to appear in a London court and press charges, no doubt because she knows there’s no way the British police can protect her. It is open Islamic season on Ms. Azad.
"What has she done to bring down the wrath of Allah? Ms. Azad’s boyfriend is Hindi, a non-Muslim."

CHANGE! Obama Adminstration Approved Business With Blacklisted Nations

Gateway Pundit  "We’re starting to see a pattern here…
"When the Iraqi people were being slaughtered in the street Obama said genocide was preferable to continued US presence in the region.
"When the Iranian freedom protesters were being shot at from rooftops, he turned his back on them.
"When the Honduran people rose against their socialist tyrant, he supported the tyrant."

Saturday, December 25, 2010

A Christmas Carol from Paul (The apostle)

American Thinker "A case can be made that the greatest Christmas song ever written is one with no familiar music. The tune is no longer available to us. But the lyrics -- ah, those lyrics -- well, they're actually inspired. As the Apostle Paul was writing to young Pastor Timothy about everything from order in the church to the dangers of greed, he gave us an easily overlooked but enduring Christmas nugget.

Blog of Leonardo da Vinci


VICTORIOUS ATLAS ACTION -- SEATTLE TRANSIT REFUSES ANTI-ISRAEL BUS ADS!

Atlas Shrugs2000  "Objective achieved: Jew-hate ads dropped after Atlas exposed their hypocrisy.
"But wait. It gets better. They have changed their ad policy. Isn't that special? They refused AFDI's pro-Israel ad. This is the heckler's veto. Truth is hate speech. This is actionable, legally actionable, IMAO. They were down with the Jew-haters until we responded with fierce truth. And then they say, never mind. "...

"Despite unprecedented efforts to avoid civilian casualties—including hundreds of thousands of leaflets, telephone calls and non-lethal, noise-making warning bombs—some civilians were killed, because Hamas deliberately hid behind civilians, using them as shields, when they fired rockets at Israeli civilians."
seattlepi.com
 And the left loves these people because...?

PRO-ISRAEL BUS ADS TO RUN IN SEATTLE COUNTERING THE HATERS