Jerry Brown’s Last Hurrah

Victor Davis Hanson "Both conservatives and liberals agree that Brown will probably do what California’s progressive voters elected him to do: keep government and its services big and find the necessary revenue from corporations and more affluent individuals to pay for it. The real debate is whether he can pull that off in recessionary times."

Missile Malpractice

Andy McCarthy   "On New START, as on many other matters, the Obama administration has demonstrated that it is not to be trusted. That’s bad — no matter who the president is, we want to be able to credit him on vital issues of national defense. Nevertheless, when we hear these incessant Democratic invocations of the Gipper’s bon mot, “Trust but verify,” we ought to be thinking Barack Obama, not Vladimir Putin."  Via National Review

Friday Morning at the Pentagon



The Pentagon

 Michael Yon  "They pass down this corridor of officers and applause, and then meet for a private lunch, at which they are the guests of honor, hosted by the generals. Some are wheeled along.... Some insist upon getting out of their chairs, to march as best they can with their chin held up, down this hallway, through this most unique audience. Some are catching handshakes and smiling like a politician at a Fourth of July parade. More than a couple of them seem amazed and are smiling shyly." 
Hat tip to Jerry Bentley, Lompoc, Ca.

 

Bozell Column: Shock Art and 'Social Dignity'

Newsbusters  "It's mind-boggling that the same people who so quickly screech at the first sign of a religion near a government building don't get the point that it should be equally wrong to have a sign of anti-religion in a government building.

"And don’t they see the richest irony of them all? There is that which they find offensive – a creche with the Baby Jesus on government property, and that which they celebrate and defend as “art” – a sacrilegious defamation of Jesus Christ, crucified. If it's wrong to promote the Christian religion with tax dollars, isn’t it many times worse to trash the Christian religion with tax dollars?

"Like the public broadcasters, the public gallery operators hunger to rise above the dreary, pedestrian tastes of those rubes in middle America who revere Jesus and aren’t captivated by the “creative resistance” of the gay artistic vanguard. They demand “equality” and “inclusion” for the gay lobby, but there is no inclusion for the rest of us when it comes to what art they will declare advances the cause of “justice.” Curators ought to be wise enough to know there are limits of government-funded art."

At Friday Prayers… Muslim Cleric Offers $6,000 Reward to Anyone Who Murders Jailed Christian Mother Asia Bibi

Gateway Pundit  " “Whoever kills Asia Bibi – he continued – will be given a reward of 500 thousand rupees from the Mohabat Khan mosque”. The imam said that if the appeals court judge Asia Bibi innocent, the mujahideen will kill her."

Any chance this guy will make Olbermann's Worst Person list?

WTC Minarets ...... New Turkish film highlights "America's paranoia with the Islamic world after 9/11" (Updated)

Atlas Shrugs  "Five Minarets in New York" ;   "Check out the trailer here (thanks to Philip). The movie is clearly an orgy of Muslim victimhood, complete with a villainous U.S. law enforcement officer (played by Robert Patrick) stalking into a mosque during prayers and making statements about Islam that no actual American law enforcement official has ever dreamed of uttering in today's hyper-PC environment.

"Interesting to note also Gina Gershon's and Danny Glover's presence in the film. Probably Hollywood's fashionable Leftism made acting in this America-hating screed seem to them to be a moral duty."

Clinton snubbed by Iranian foreign minister

The Hill  ""I got up to leave and he was sitting a couple of seats down from me and shaking people's hands and he saw me and he stopped and began to turn away," Clinton told reporters on her plane returning to Washington on Saturday, according to Reuters.
""I said 'Hello, minister.' He just turned away.""  Via Weasel Zippers

The Consequences of Bad Ideas; Advantage: Russia. Disadvantage: The United States. The Obama Way.

Bruce S. Thornton  "We all know the consequences of those two decades of disarmament — 50 million dead, Europe devastated, the Holocaust, and the Cold War. Yet here we are, nearly a century later, still risking our security by indulging a bad idea like disarmament, however much it is disguised as “reductions” or “limits.” Treaties and agreements that compromise our ability to create the military force and weapons that American citizens judge necessary will not strengthen our security. What will make us secure are the best weapons we can create, whether conventional or nuclear, and the flexibility to develop arms adaptable to whatever new threat that may arise. In short, we need to remember the old wisdom of the Roman military theorist Vegetius: If you want peace, prepare for war."

If Israel disarms... "Sixth, if Israel's enemies were to lay down their arms and stop terrorist and rocket attacks against Israel, there would be peace. Seventh, if Israel were to lay down its arms, there would be genocide. And eighth, when the Palestinian leadership and population want their own state more than they want there not to be a Jewish state, there will be a two-state solution. "  Alan Dershowitz

Some fat lip humor

Mike Ramirez and Chip Bok, World Magazine

Return us to a legislature made up of civilians

American Thinker  "In the 21st century we now have a vast bloated federal bureaucracy with departments and agencies our Founders never envisioned lead by career politicians who never experience the private sector yet govern over the largest economy in the world. Wealth is earned by hard work but is now redistributed by the government from the successful to those less fortunate. This redistribution of wealth is not only between individuals but also between states. Equal opportunity has been replaced with equal results, in spite of individual involvement or causation. The scope of our federal government, intentionally kept limited, has now evolved into a behemoth gobbling up more and more of our Gross Domestic Product. Our federal government, designed to arbitrate between states, has now evolved into a permanent class of professional politicians and bureaucrats ruling over the states."

Police think fire caused by arsonists; search for suspects

Jerusalem Post  "Police found a bike, a bag, and a wig inside near a fire center in Tzur Shalom on Friday, leading them to believe that the Carmel brush-fires raging across northern Israel are being caused by an arsonist or arsonists.
"Galillee police were spread out over the area searching for suspects."

Jawa Report  "New fire identified at Na'aman Junction
" Carmel fires death toll rises to 42, Army Radio reports
"Photo Gallery: Uncontrolled blazes in the North
"In an unprecedented wave of international assistance, foreign fire fighters pour into country to help battle Carmel forest fire."

Hezbollah overjoyed by fire " "The great Carmel fire embarrassed Israel's firefighting capabilities and proved its almost complete incompetence," a report by Hezbollah's al-Manar network said. The Lebanese station said the poor performance came despite Israeli claims regarding the IDF Home Front's full readiness to cope with any emergency and face the implications of an all-out war. " Via Atlas Shrugs

Meet WikiLeaks' Likely First Victim



 Le·gal In·sur·rec·tion  "Murr's denials likely will have little impact on Hezbollah, which already is suspected of assassinating former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Harriri. A likely indictment of senior Hezbollah officials in the Harriri killing has Lebanon gripped with fear of a renewed civil war, and possible Hezbollah takeover of Beirut.
"WikiLeaks has exposed Murr -- a friend of the United States -- to grave danger, and puts all of Lebanon at risk."
Photo: Reuters: Lebanon's Defence Minister Elias al-Murr (L) speaks to Commander Jean Kahwaji during an army drill in Roumiyeh, north of Beirut, August 14, 2010.