The Arab Press on Wikileaks

Yes, the truth hurts "One question yet to be answered is whether the US can ever be trusted again. Will the leaks cause a major rift between the superpower and the rest of the world or will most countries try to play the controversy down? All that we know for sure is this: With a lot more secrets bursting to get out of the box, Obama and his administration are in for the rollercoaster ride of their lives."  Obama will probably just blame Bush, then go shoot some more hoops.

‘No evidence’ that WikiLeaks releases have hurt anyone   "The newspapers also communicated US government concerns to WikiLeaks to ensure that sensitive data didn’t appear on the organisation’s website.
"“After its own redactions, The (New York) Times sent Obama administration officials the cables it planned to post and invited them to challenge publication of any information that, in the official view, would harm the national interest,” The New York Times said in a story published on its website. “After reviewing the cables, the officials - while making clear they condemn the publication of secret material - suggested additional redactions. The Times agreed to some, but not all.”"

Reaction to WikiLeaks documents    "Several major media organisations have published detailed reports on a massive trove of leaked US diplomatic cables.
"The files address negative perceptions of various world leaders, repeated calls for US attack on Iran, and requests for US diplomats to spy on other countries' officials.
"Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, has said the release of the classified documents by the whistle-blower website will amount to a "diplomatic history" of global affairs.
"The leaks, so far, have drawn different reactions from mainly the western world."                                     ALJAZEERA

Just Another WikiLeak On An Already Sinking Ship

Heritage  "Leaks are not going to stop nations from cooperating with the U.S., or for that matter sharing secrets with us. Nations cooperate with the U.S. because it is in their interest to do so. And no leak will stop nations from acting in their self-interest.
"But what is in our best interest? This has not been a good month for the Obama Doctrine: The President came home empty-handed from Asia, North Korea fired artillery at South Korea just days after revealing nuclear facilities no one knew they had, and Obama failed to get the G-20 to take any action limiting trade imbalances. It was not supposed to be this way. After apologizing for all of our nation’s sins, the world was supposed to swoon at President Obama’s unparalleled charisma. As American military power withered away, President Obama would use soft power and the United Nations to manage world affairs. But like Woodrow Wilson and Jimmy Carter before him, this progressive foreign policy vision has failed."

US tries to contain damage from leaked cables   "None of the disclosures appeared particularly explosive, but their publication could become problems for the officials concerned and for any secret initiatives they had preferred to keep quiet. The massive release of material intended for diplomatic eyes only is sure to ruffle feathers in foreign capitals, a certainty that already prompted U.S. diplomats to scramble in recent days to shore up relations with key allies in advance of the leaks.
"At Clinton's first stop in Astana, Kazakhstan, she will be attending a summit of officials from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, a diplomatic grouping that includes many officials from countries cited in the leaked cables." Related: The leaked cables make it impossible for Hillary Clinton to continue as secretary of state.  Slate Magazine.

Big Peace.com has a wealth of links you can follow.

State Department Cables, Wikileaks, and Classification  "Part of the answer is probably better counterintelligence: Manning should have been seen for the obvious security risk that he was. He should not have had the access that he had, but that doesn't mean that soldiers in general shouldn't have access. It means we should be looking for people who have personal reasons to betray our trust. Just as we should be looking for bombers and not bombs in counterterror efforts, we should be looking for traitors in CI, not taking steps that would keep people who need to know this information from having access to it." Blackfive

Wikileaks Hath Spoken; Now Step Aside Or Get Stampeded By Journalists Seeking Pulitzers  "When Wikileaks becomes an equal opportunity leaker and starts thumbing its nose at Vlad Putin, for instance, then maybe we'll talk. The thing is, journalists and intelligence folks who run afoul of Vlad have a strange habit of getting dead. (One would think there would be a story to be leaked in there somewhere to the industrious folks at Wikileaks.)"  ThreatsWatch

Outrage Now, Back Then, Not So Much "At least we know the leak of 250,000 pages of sensitive documents and State Department cables weren't being used for blackmail. Of course we'll never know about the use of 700 raw data FBI files that just happened to be in the hands of the Clinton White House (do we all remember Craig Livingstone?)."

Max Boot on journalism and The Leaks

Challenge to the New York Times: Publish Your Internal Correspondence  "Reading the New York Times’s “Note to Readers” explaining why it has decided once again to act as a journalistic enabler of WikiLeaks, I wondered why, if the Times believes that openness is so important to the operations of the U.S. government, that same logic doesn’t apply to the newspaper itself."

Journalism That Knows No Shame "These are, after all, the sorts of people who, over a few drinks, would no doubt tell you that diplomacy is far preferable to war-making. But it seems that they have no respect for the secrecy that must accompany successful diplomacy either. That, at least, is the only conclusion I can draw from their decision to once again collaborate with an accused rapist to publicize a giant batch of stolen State Department cables gathered by his disreputable organization, WikiLeaks."

This related comment from American Thinker: 
Pious and hypocritical; media malpractice and Wikileaks: "The justification for it - nothing should be secret - rings hollow. When Wikileaks starts publishing Iranian or North Korean nuclear documents, then I will give them the benefit of the doubt. Until then, they are nothing but garden variety, hate America leftists who, like thoughtless children playing with gasoline, are looking to burn us down. Stuck as they are in 1960's perpetual adolescence, they are becoming a bore to grown ups who are once again forced to clean up after their mess. "....
"Who elected the New York Times to decide what constitutes a blow to national security and what is just a "diplomatic controversy?"
"Pious, hypocritical, arrogant fools."

Rich Terrell, cartoonist:  at AfterMath

Politically correct Portland rejected feds who saved city from terrorist attack

BELTWAY CONFIDENTIAL "In 2005, leaders in Portland, Oregon, angry at the Bush administration's conduct of the war on terror, voted not to allow city law enforcement officers to participate in a key anti-terror initiative, the FBI's Joint Terrorism Task Force. On Friday, that task force helped prevent what could have been a horrific terrorist attack in Portland. Now city officials say they might re-think their participation in the task force -- because Barack Obama is in the White House."

.F.B.I. Says Oregon Suspect Planned ‘Grand’ Attack  "Mr. Balizan identified the suspect as Mohamed Osman Mohamud, 19, a naturalized United States citizen. He graduated from Westview High School in Beaverton, Ore., a Portland suburb, and had been taking classes at Oregon State in Corvallis until Oct. 6, the university said Saturday.
"Mr. Mohamud was charged with trying to use a weapon of mass destruction. “Our investigation shows that Mohamud was absolutely committed to carrying out an attack on a very grand scale,” Mr. Balizan said. "
Both posts via Lucianne

More evidence that liberals and pacifists can and have caused the deaths of many.


The tree lighting ceremony that was almost a mass-murder scene



Remembering Bob Clark, Director of "A Christmas Story"

Voice of Lillpop "Yet another Christmas has been made more joyful by being able to watch Bob Clark's delightful film, "A Christmas Story." ....

"Unfortunately for all who love Christmas, Bob Clark has not been around to celebrate Christmas in recent years. That is so because the prolific filmmaker, whose career spanned four decades, was killed in an automobile crash caused by a drunken driver in California in 2007.

"Hector Velazquez-Nava, an illegal alien from Mexico, had a blood alcohol level three times the legal limit when he claimed the lives of both Clark and his 22-year-old son, Ariel Hanrath-Clark."

Saudi king urged U.S. to attack Iran: WikiLeaks

Reuters "Saudi King Abdullah has repeatedly urged the United States to attack Iran's nuclear program and China directed cyberattacks on the United States, according to a vast cache of U.S. diplomatic cables released on Sunday in an embarrassing leak that undermines U.S. diplomacy.

"The more than 250,000 documents, given to five media groups by the whistle-blowing website WikiLeaks, provide candid, tart views of foreign leaders and sensitive information on terrorism and nuclear proliferation filed by U.S. diplomats, according to The New York Times."   Via Taegan D. Goddard's  PoliticalWire

Airport "Security"?

Thomas Sowell ""Security" may be the excuse being offered for the outrageous things being done to American air travelers, but the heavy-handed arrogance and contempt for ordinary people that is the hallmark of this administration in other areas is all too painfully apparent in these new and invasive airport procedures.
"Can you remember a time when a Cabinet member in a free America boasted of having his "foot on the neck" of some business or when the President of the United States threatened on television to put his foot on another part of some citizens' anatomy?
"Yet this and more has happened in the current administration, which is not yet two years old."

Wikileaks Completes Obama's Transformation Into Jimmy Carter

Le·gal In·sur·rec·tion "Have we lost our minds? Wikileaks is about hurting us, bringing us down, damaging our relations with others, rendering us impotent. This is not about open government policy, as if Wikileaks went a bit too far on its class project.
"Julian Assange should have been indicted by now, and if the law did not allow more punitive measures in this circumstance, then the law should have been changed after the first document dump. Assange is an enemy of our country and should be treated as such.
"Instead, we're writing letters and lecturing on accountable and open government.
"Stick a fork in Obama, he's Jimmy Carter."

Michael Moore Doesn’t Speak for Me

Alfonzo Rachel "I’m sick of white liberals like Michael Moore who patronize black people and try to stay in their good graces by falsely accusing white people of racism, and then try to further validate it with some bogus display of self effacement. This joker is a prime example of how white democrats feel that they’re the ones who are tuned in to the black community. They can speak for us. They know us, and where that notion comes from is due to them thinking that they own us."....
"You know? It should speak volumes that Obama got the youth vote, and not the vote of the matured. Hello! The matured have had some time to think through some things, live through some things, learn from some things."

Islamic Extremist Targets Facebook Users

Legal Project This is from a month ago but is submitted here for you to know how terrorists can operate.

"Court documents filed last week reveal Islamic extremists have obtained personal contact information on members of the defiant Facebook group "Everybody Draw Mohammed Day." Zachary Chesser, who provided the information, pled guilty to "communicating threats" and renounced jihad, but the damage was done. Prosecutors say he "seriously endangered the lives of innocent people who will remain at risk for many years to come."

"This lasting effect makes it all the more frustrating that authorities did not charge him sooner. He had made very similar threats against the producers of South Park weeks before. The case highlights the urgent need for better legal tools to protect free speech from extremist intimidation."
Photo from BareNakedIslam

The few, the proud, the foes of gays in military

Breitbart.com  "The Corps is the youngest, smallest and arguably the most tight-knit of the enlisted forces, with many of its roughly 200,000 members hailing from small towns and rural areas in the South.
"Marines are unabashed about distinguishing themselves from the rest of the military, with a warrior ethos and a religious zeal for their branch of service that they liken to a brotherhood."