baldilocks

Danger Able Danger (re-edited)

Okay, Captain Ed and AJ Strata, I’m convinced. The Pentagon is trying to hide something in regard to the Able Danger situation, because this is just pathetic:

An officer who has claimed that a classified military unit identified four Sept. 11 hijackers before the 2001 attacks is facing Pentagon accusations of breaking numerous rules, allegations his lawyer suggests are aimed at undermining his credibility.

Ya think?

The alleged infractions by Army Lt. Col. Anthony Shaffer, 42, include obtaining a service medal under false pretenses, improperly flashing military identification while drunk and stealing pens, according to military paperwork shown by his attorney to The Associated Press.[SNIP]

Shaffer says he received a Bronze Star medal for work on a classified operation in Afghanistan in 2003. According to papers provided by Zaid, the military is now questioning whether he deserved it, including challenging whether at least one person who backed Shaffer's nomination for the medal had firsthand knowledge of his actions.

Shaffer says he showed his government credentials during two incidents in 1990, when he was drunk, and 1996, when he was pulled over by police. The military says he misused his credentials, but Shaffer says he was not told he should not have used them. [I’ve never heard of this either. –ed.] He also said he has joined Alcoholics Anonymous and has been sober for 13 years.

As for the pens and other office supplies taken, he blamed that on "youthful indiscretions" more than 20 years ago.

(Emphasis mine.)

I guess the Pentagon did a little data-mining of their own.

So if the MPs ask you for any of your government IDs and you happen to be drunk you’re supposed to tell them ‘no?(!!!!)’

And I’m sure that there are millions of government pens sitting in the pockets of GIs and civilians right now.

But the worst thing is that the earliest incident of drunkeness happened sixteen years ago and the Pentagon expects observers to believe that LTC Shaffer’s security clearance is being pulled for that and the 1996 incident, with some so-called irregularities involving his Bronze Star and petty amounts charged on his government credit card thrown in for good measure. And, to top it off, they throw in some ridiculous and insulting petty bovine excrement about twenty-year-old pens. (If LTC Shaffer such a "desperado," why did he get a security clearance in the first place and why did it keep getting renewed?)

Then they expect observers to believe that this has nothing to do with LTC Shaffer’s coming forward about Able Danger.

It’s one big, fat legal non-sequitur.

By bringing up incidents that should have been adjudicated when they occured (and probably were), the Pentagon is behaving like a kangaroo court of a military junta. And it’s pointless to boot. Says Captain Ed:

Why now? It looks like the Pentagon will not avoid dealing with the Senate hearings on Able Danger and wants to get out in front of the whistleblowers in order to minimize the political fallout. By discrediting the witnesses in petty ways, it makes them look like kooks before the American public gets a chance to see and hear their testimony.

Indeed it does.

Previous Posts:

Cover Up? Doubtful
Able Danger Officer Named
Mea Culpa?
Commission Retort
Commission Admission
Oh That Mohammed Atta
Placing Blame

Under Cover of Darkness

The Code Pink Protesters are still at it in front of the gate at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Maryland. For months, every Friday night they have taken their opportunity to “support” the wounded troops, demonstrating their lack of understanding of most people in the US military, lack of desire to understand and an abysmal level of sensitivity. Ever since their harassment became known to the right side of the blogging public, however, the Code Pinks have had some formidable company on the picket line. Go check out the excellent photos and commentary.

Previous post:

Dissecting Code Pink/Walter Reed Protesters

Common Sense

When someone is trying to save your life, don’t shoot at them; especially when you are massively outgunned.

NEW ORLEANS — The evacuation of the New Orleans Superdome was disrupted Thursday after a gun shot reportedly was fired at a military helicopter as thousands of National Guard troops poured into the Big Easy to boost security in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina (search). [SNIP]

One ambulance official overseeing the airlift rescue operations said a gunshot was fired at a military helicopter over the Superdome before daybreak.

"We have suspended operations until they gain control of the Superdome," said Richard Zeuschlag, head of Acadian Ambulance, which was handling the evacuation of sick and injured people from the Superdome.
Zeuschlag said the National Guard told him that it was sending 100 military police officers to gain control. "That's not enough," he said. "We need a thousand."

He also said that during the night, when a medical evacuation helicopter tried to land at a hospital in the outlying town of Kenner, the pilot reported that 100 people were on the landing pad, and some of them had guns.

When more people die than need be so, will these lawless cretins be blamed? Yeah, right. Guess who will get the blame.

You know what? If some government official breaks into a news report one day—say, Ahnuld or Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa—and says “evacuate LA,” he will only have to get out the syllables “evacu--” and I’m in the car and outta here with my great-aunt, water, canned food, changes of clothes, personal hygiene items and my CPU. As a matter of fact, I’m going to clean out my trunk today.

The goblins can have the place.

(Thanks to Lucianne)

Stupid Christians

First (this month), there was Pat Robertson.

Now there’s LA clergyman Reverend Lewis E. Logan II (no link available; if I'm wrong, I'll retract).

… it is no a coincidence that it is exactly 50 years from the time of (inaudible) lynching and murder. That it is not a coincidence that the storm’s name is a sister. Katrina. For she represents the collective cries of mothers who have lost their sons (applause) to the brutality (louder applause) and the murderous grip of this racist white supremacist American culture (frenzied applause).

So Katrina’s a black woman getting revenge for white supremacy, eh? Well Katrina must be a crack ho because she has committed a lot of black-on-black crime, if the faces of the majority of refugees in southern Mississippi and Louisiana are any indication.

Sheesh! It’s this sort of charlatanism that kept me out of churches for years; men with ‘reverend’ in front of their names saying demonstrably ignorant things, while more gullible sorts lapped up the BS because of the title.

Meanwhile, others are trying to alleviate suffering instead of pointing fingers at the dead.

(Thanks to Matt Szabo)

PETA's Website Display

Clueless PETA still has a display on its website comparing animals to black human beings. I guess novelist Alice Walker gave them the Famous-Black-Person permission slip. You know the permission slip I’m speaking of; the one which gives white leftists permission to treat black people in any manner as long as it's for "the cause," what ever the cause may be, as long as it's perceived as left-wing. This permission slip allows white leftists to call black republicans/conservatives things like Uncle Tom, Aunt Jemima, etc. Creepy old buzzards People like Harry Belafonte and Amiri Baraka hand those tickets out like candy.

Alice told PETA it was okay to compare black humans to animals even though we’ve been insulted in that manner nearly from the first European-African contact. Why did Alice do that? Because it’s perfectly okay to allow leftists to use black people for any purpose as long as it’s against the oppressive, right-wing, Christian, heterosexual, meat-eating MAN and his lackeys.

I guess Alice forgot to send out that memo, because it seems to me that those black guys up in Connecticut were ready to shut down PETA's New Haven display. With prejudice.

"You can’t compare me to a freaking cow," shouted John Darryl Thompson, 46, of New Haven, inches from [PETA’s director of special projects Dawn] Carr’s face. "We don’t care about PETA. You are playing a dangerous game."

I think PETA should feel the heat a little bit more.

(Thanks to The Black Male Blog)

Just Damn Dumb (UPDATED)

Oops. A big honkin' hairy oops at that.

NEW HAVEN — A two-hour animal rights demonstration on the Green Monday sparked outrage instead of sympathy from the public.

"This is the most racist thing I’ve ever seen on the Green. How dare you," roared Philip Goldson, 43, of New Haven at the protest organizers at Church and Chapel streets.

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, a national animal rights group, posted giant photographs of people, mostly black Americans, being tortured, sold and killed, next to photographs of animals, including cattle and sheep, being tortured, sold and killed.

"I think it is an apt comparison," said Josh Warchol, 26, of Wallingford, president of the Southern Connecticut Vegetarian Society, which is aligned with PETA.

So does that mean I’m practicing a form of cannibalism when I eat a hamburger, Mr. Warchol? (Hey, if you want to evoke one stereotype, you might as well not hold back.)

I think that this humongous misstep is more attributable to blinding stupidity rather than racism, though the two often go hand-in-hand.

Does this fiasco help make the case that pork chops contribute to IQ?

(Thanks to Avery Tooley)

UPDATE: Now featured at your local grocer's freezer: Long Pig just $2.99 a pound!

(Thanks to Uncle Sam's Cabin)

What's Wrong With This Headline?

Moderate Muslims Split on Suicide Bombings

Britain's largest Sunni Muslim group met in Birmingham on Sunday and issued a binding religious edict, or fatwa, condemning the suicide attacks that killed dozens on three London subway trains and a double-decker bus as the work of a "perverted ideology." The group's governing council said the Quran forbade suicide attacks and called such terrorism a sin that could send the perpetrators to hell.

But...

Underlining the sensitivity of the issue, Musawi's contention that attacks are justified against "occupiers" came only after a spokesman for the leaders read a carefully worded statement condemning the London attacks. Even so, none of the other scholars and imams at the event expressed disagreement with his stance.

And...

[T]he recent reaction by Muslim leaders in Britain about suicide bombings could confuse some Muslims, given the cloudy definition of what constitutes "occupying forces."

Debates rage over whether the suicide bombings that target Westerners in Afghanistan, Russians because of Chechnya and Israelis in response to the occupation of the Gaza Strip and West Bank are permitted by the Quran. [SNIP]

Imam Ibrahim Mogra said he believed the widespread public opposition to the war in Iraq had played a part in the London attacks, which he criticized as murderous and unjustified.

Now, do you feel reassured? Me, neither.

(Thanks to Lucianne.com)

Give It Up

Here's more proof that the petty BS pushers have run out of new ideas for scandal-mongering: they are recycling the Plame issue.

(For background on the Plame fiasco, go here, here, here and here.)

First, we have two raging narcissists—the former covert agent, Valerie Plame, and the former ambassador, Joseph Wilson--married to each other and trying to live out/relive their political intrigue fantasies. The wife sees that the husband’s career is waning, so she uses whatever pull she has to give it a boost. However, because of his inability to tell a story and stick to it, the move backfires on him. And, like narcissists everywhere, he wants to point the finger at everyone but himself.

Particularly galling to the husband is the knowledge that everyone knows that he had to depend on his wife for the plumb position that he got (and fouled up). That’s got to be hard on a man’s self image. So in order to regain his manhood, Wilson has to cast himself as his wife’s protector; he must go on the “crusade” to find out who “put his wife in danger,” even if it reaches the “highest levels of power.”

However, before Wilson goes ballistic, no one can find a mention of his wife’s name in public except in Wilson’s entry of the 2003 version of Who’s Who in America, which was compiled and published in 2002 well before the so-called scandal.

(Click to enlarge.)

Leaving aside all of the other inanities in this waste of time, it’s interesting to note that, had Mr. Wilson not brought all of this attention to himself regarding the yellow-cake controversy, few, if any would know his wife’s name. Going further back, if his wife’s identity was such a well-guarded secret, why even name her in the short biography?

The only thing more pathetic than the Plames Wilsons themselves are the mainstream media types who continually try to pin the crime that didn’t happen on someone, anyone in the Bush Administration. This time, it’s the administration’s most hated and feared member, Karl Rove.

Meanwhile, the hordes are still intent on killing us all.

UPDATE: I wish I would have thought of this title.

Oliphant Knows Best

At Castle Arrgghh!!, InstaPilot fisks journalist Tom Oliphant as the latter was being interviewed by Hugh Hewitt this past Friday. (BTW, thanks for the link, Hugh!)

In various parts of his rebuttal, InstaPilot utters a Dean-like scream in the same places that I did after listening. That mark of frustration is provoked by more than Mr. Oliphant’s words; it was his attitude that made one want to reach into the radio and pull out something vital. Mr. Oliphant’s responses reeked of superiority, in spite of how patently ridiculous his answers were.

Even the terrorists are targets of his condescension; when they say what their motivations are, he doesn’t believe them. And, of course, he knows better about how to defeat any enemy than do the men and women who continuously study and train to do the same. It’s infuriating.

It's called solve [sic] the problem instead of politicizing it.

--Tom Oliphant

It’s a good interview and a good fisking. However, I wish someone would ask an individual like Mr. Oliphant what it is that black Sudanese Muslims have done to make Islamists murder and enslave them. I’d love to hear the answer because there can be only two honest ones. Either he will say that he doesn’t know or he will say that the black Sudanese have done nothing to incur the wrath of the Islamists except exist at the inconvenience of an evil force.

Just like the West.

Holy Cow

Here’s some outrage that needs no manufacturing on either side of the political spectrum; not if you’re a property owner.

The government can take your land and give it to another private party says the Supreme Court of the United States.

A city can take a person's home or business for a development project designed to revitalize a depressed local economy, a divided U.S. Supreme Court ruled on Thursday in a decision that could have nationwide impact taking by New London, Connecticut, of 15 properties belonging to nine residents or investment owners for a project to complement a nearby research facility by the Pfizer Inc. drug company.

Pfizer is a private company, not covered by eminent domain. So this means that the government can take your house and give it to you neighbor if it sees fit.

This is what those judge-appointee battles in the senate are all about. Life, liberty and property.

UPDATE: Here's what the fifth amendment says:

No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

(Emphasis mine.)

So I would assume that since the amendment specifies public use, that the five SCOTUS justices assumed that the gov't taking property for private use is okay. Is that the rationale, lawyers?

Africa's Woes: Blame Bush (UPDATED)

This is what I get for reading the LA Times.

Africa's Suffering Is Bush's Shame

Right. And Africa was paradise on earth before January 20, 2001.

President Bush last week brazenly brushed aside British Prime Minister Tony Blair's call for a doubling of aid to Africa. Blair and other European leaders have taken on the task of fighting extreme poverty — and Bush watches from the sidelines. To justify its dereliction, the Bush administration perpetuates a mythology that contributes to the premature deaths of millions of people each year.

That’s from Jeffrey Sachs,

Columbia University economist and special advisor to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan.

Well, that explains a lot.

Funny, according to my biological father, an honest-to-goodness African like Mr. Annan--and one of the vaunted journalist/Marxist class, not just some guy running around chucking a spear and boiling white people like Mr. Sachs for dinner--Europeans and Americans have done enough to foul his continent up and need to butt out and let Africa grow up. (Pops is not of the Mugabe mindset, however.)

There are lots of silly assertions in this editorial. Here’s one:

Malaria will kill up to 3 million children this year, overwhelming Africa's meager hospitals. Yet five measures could end this: long-lasting insecticide-treated bed nets (cost: $7 per net); effective medications freely available to the poor; community health workers trained in malaria control; medical diagnostic capacity at the local level; and indoor insecticide spraying where appropriate. The cost: $3 billion a year for the industrialized countries, $1 billion for the U.S. — about 10 times what's currently spent on malaria control.

What about the one sure-fire, cheap eradicator of malarial mosquitoes, DDT? Eh, forget it. Your type doesn’t want real solutions that actually save lives. That’s why the stuff was banned in the first place.

But when $20 billion is needed to keep the poorest of the poor in Africa alive and put the continent's economies on a path toward long-term growth, there's no money available.

One wonders how Africans survived for thousands of years before slavery and colonialism without other folks all up in their business handing out “aid” in order to ease their guilt.

My father may be a Marxist, but even he understands that handouts have infantilized many natives of his continent and, at the same time, enriched the crooked. He doesn’t deny what’s been right in front of his face for the last forty years.

Philip Ochieng thinks Africans are adults and Jeffrey Sachs thinks Africans are children, victims of that dreaded Bush who, apparently, can foul up a…well, you get the idea.

UPDATE: The European Union tries to "help" Africa.

Officials Warned About BTK Harassment

(Note to Senate Foreign Relations Committee: the following story is about real harassment and about how the harassed handle the grievance; right away, not ten years later.)

They say that there’s this thing called ‘woman’s intuition.’ However, a Kansas woman named Mary Capps didn’t need to employ it to know that something wasn’t right with her boss, a man named Dennis Rader, now thought to be the serial killer known as BTK. Before his arrest in February of this year, Dennis Rader, the accused BTK serial killer, had been accused by Capps of harassment and worse several times.

"Dennis was a very difficult person to get along with," said Capps, a 45-year-old single mother. [ed. note: BTK seems to have particular anger against single women and preyed upon them.] [SNIP]

She says he discriminated against her because she is a woman. With her lawyer, Tad Wagner, she is filing complaints with state and federal commissions alleging a hostile work environment.

Wagner said they also are investigating how she suffered a series of unexplained ailments while working for Rader in a two-person compliance office.

Wagner has requested records from Park City about purchases and use of tranquilizers in animal control, one of the duties of the compliance office.[SNIP]

In an interview with The Eagle this week, Capps said that starting in 2001, she began to suffer muscle spasms. She had trouble concentrating. She sometimes missed work.

It's possible some of her symptoms could be from work-related stress, Wagner said.

Capps said her ailments ceased Feb. 24.

Rader’s arrest was announced on February 26.

Ms. Capps had filed three complaints against Rader and was in the process of filing a fourth when Rader was arrested. She is also taking legal action against Park City, Kansas officials, whom she says did nothing about the situation between her and Rader.

Capps' lawyer, Ted Wagner, said Capps has filed a complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission against Park City "for their failure to respond to a hostile work environment." Another complaint is being prepared for the Kansas Human Rights Commission, he said.

Capps alleges that when she complained verbally about Rader to other city officials, she was derided as suffering from menstrual symptoms. Charming. This is the sort of stuff that keeps harassed women from coming forward.

Hopefully all you high government officials out there will check it out thoroughly when someone says her boss is a jerk. It might save your city/state/etc. some money, not to mention saving a few lives.

A Big, Ugly Whoopsie

Guess what? A real-life version of a Captain Trips-type influenza virus really does exist and may be a threat.

WASHINGTON — A dangerous strain of the flu virus that caused a worldwide pandemic in 1957 was sent to thousands of laboratories in the United States and around the world, triggering a frantic effort to destroy the samples to prevent an outbreak, health officials revealed Tuesday.

Because the virus is easily transmitted from person to person and many people have no immunity to it, the discovery has raised alarm that it could cause another deadly pandemic if a laboratory worker became infected, officials said.

As a result, health authorities were working to make sure all samples are destroyed and to monitor anyone who may have come into contact with the virus for signs of illness, officials said.

“This virus could cause a pandemic,” said Klaus Stohr, the World Health Organization’s top flu expert. “We are talking about a fully transmissible human influenza virus to which the majority of the population has no immunity. We are concerned.”[SNIP]

The virus, known as an H2N2 strain, killed 1 million to 4 million people worldwide in 1957 and 1958, including about 70,000 in the United States. Because the virus has not circulated in the wild since 1968, anyone born after then would have no natural immunity to it. Since then the virus has been kept only in high-security biological laboratories.

Of course, the danger has its genesis in human error.

The problem arose when Meridian Bioscience Inc. of Cincinnati, a private company, sent a panel of virus samples to about 3,700 laboratories, some in doctors’ offices, to be tested as part of routine quality-control certification conducted by the College of American Pathologists.

An additional 2,750 laboratories, all in the United States, received the samples and were asked to destroy them, CDC spokesman Dan Rutz said.

The panel samples usually include only strains of the flu virus that are relatively benign, Stohr said. “We would consider this an unwise and unfortunate decision.”

The mistake came to light March 25 when the National Microbiology Laboratory in Winnipeg, Manitoba, identified the virus.

Stephen King: prophet? Or merely an accurate predictor of Murphy’s Law(s)?

After hearing about this on the TV news, I toyed with the idea of not posting about it. No need in contributing to panic. But my nieces and nephews were born well after 1968--heck, their parents were born after that—and so were most of your kids, readers, so I figure that knowledge is power even if the only power to resolve the situation is received from prayer.

Hubris?

What are the Republicans smoking these days?

Now we have Rep. James Sensenbrenner III (WI) suggesting that broadcasters who are accused of violating FCC decency regulations be tried as criminals.

Rep. F. James Sensenbrenner III, R-Wis., told cable industry executives attending the National Cable & Telecommunications Assn. conference here on Monday that criminal prosecution would be a more efficient way to enforce the indecency regulations.

“I’d prefer using the criminal process rather than the regulatory process,” Sensenbrenner told the executives.

Hey guy, aren’t you taking that so-called Republican mandate thing a little too far? Even people who don’t subscribe to and have no plans on subscribing to the triple X channels--or even HBO--think it’s stupid and dangerous to criminalize displays of compartmentalized forms of indecency. It isn’t as though broadcasters are planning to flash breasts from the humongous public TV screens.

“People who are in flagrant disregard should face a criminal process rather than a regulator [sic] process,” Sensenbrenner said. “That is the way to go. Aim the cannon specifically at the people committing the offenses, rather than the blunderbuss approach that gets the good actors.

When a specific violator of an FCC decency standard is fined, how are “good actors” affected by that fine?

Yes, broadcast channels should be regulated for decency and violators should pay in some manner—up to having the license suspended/revoked even--but criminalizing offenses that do not deprive individuals or groups of life, limb, liberty and/or property is a place where we do not want to go..

And before someone comments that Rep. Sensenbrenner is only target broadcast stations, look who else was in attendance.

Although cable and satellite TV are not covered by the indecency statutes, Sen. Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee, and Rep. Joe Barton, R-Texas, have said they want to bring multichannel programmers into the legal mix.

Stevens attended the convention Sunday, when he met with top cable industry executives, sources said. The executives hoped to persuade Stevens to back off, the sources said.

Senator Stevens has been talking up fining cable and satellite companies for indecency for a few months now.

In this country, adults should have the freedom to pollute their minds in their own homes and whoever may want to sell them that pollution should not have to suffer monetarily for it, much less be criminalized. I may think that this sort of thing is distasteful and even sinful, but guess what? As long as no children are seeing graphic programs and as long as the programs are not up for free public consumption, it’s not my business, nor is it that of the government.

I don’t have Republican congressional representatives, but many of you do. Write to them and tell them to ease up on this sort of thing.

Didn’t congress waste enough time and money on the steroid hearings?

(Thanks to Jeff Goldstein)

UPDATE: Joel of No Pundit Intended says that Rep. Sensenbrenner's intent is to criminalize *individual* offenders rather than broadcast/cable/satellite licensees. If true, I'd call that almost worse. Can you see individuals earning a criminal record for purposefully dropping the F-bomb on TV, as Shaquille O'Neal infamously did in an impromtu interview last season?

Some observers, even Republicans, lamented that it was dangerous for one party to hold the executive branch and both houses of congress. This kind of thing demonstrates why.

Berger's Slap on the Wrist

Okay, so maybe Sandy Berger’s booty didn’t have handwritten notes.

Some people won't let a bad conspiracy theory go. We're referring to those who loudly assert that former NSC adviser Sandy Berger was trying to protect the Clinton Administration when he illegally removed copies of sensitive documents from the National Archives in late 2003.

Okay, so maybe only copies were destroyed.

On Wednesday, we quoted Justice Department prosecutor Noel Hillman that no original documents were destroyed, and that the contents of all five at issue still exist and were made available to the 9/11 Commission.

One problem: we only have Mr. Berger’s word that all of the copies were destroyed. How many copies were there again?

Another problem: a copy of a classified document has the same information on it as does the original (obviously), so, guess what? It’s just as classified as the original; it’s essential considered the same as an original document, falls under the same rules and is handled in the same manner.

Yet another problem: it’s illegal to destroy classified material in an improper manner and without proper authorization. Cutting up classified material with scissors is definitely an improper manner. (Being a former national security adviser does not mean that one has proper authorization. One can’t merely do what one wants with items involving national security due to past office. One reason among many: a former NSA isn't all the way in the loop as to the current importance of all classified information.)

Now, I’m not saying that Sandy Berger sold the copies to Al Quaeda or Li’l Kim of North Korea. What I am saying is that he should have been handled in the same manner that the average soldier/sailor/airman/marine with a Top Secret security clearance would have been handled—whether the deed was "accidental" or not. He should have been jailed and/or stripped of his security clearance for much longer than three years; this is what would have happened to the lowly civilian analyst who had done the same thing.

Meanwhile, conservatives don't do themselves any credit when they are as impervious to facts as the loony left.

It may not be a leftwing (or rightwing) conspiracy, editors of the Wall Street Journal, but it stinks in much the same manner as former President Clinton's national security failures and oversights did. So, WSJ, while you're berating your readers for their tin-foil hatted theories, you might want to note that Berger's proposed sentence doesn't do much to make us normal folk believe in equal justice, especially those of us who have actually held security clearances.

Previous Berger Burglary Posts:

Berger Begs
Asking the Experts?
More on Berger

UPDATE: Linked to the Beltway Traffic Jam.

The Other Devils

Here’s proof that certain people live in a fantasy world in which they are the tragic, persecuted hero (heroine? some combo thereof?):

[Michael Jackson] he said he believes he is just the latest of several ''black luminaries'' to be unjustly accused, citing former South African President Nelson Mandela and former heavyweight boxing champions Muhammad Ali and Jack Johnson as others.

''I just want to say to fans in every corner of the Earth, every nationality, every race, every language, I love you from the bottom of my heart,'' Jackson said toward the end of the hour-long interview [with Jesse Jackson].

The Pied Piper of “love.” Isn’t that what the problem is?

Behold a nose that has snorted too much indulgence. (See, of all people, Varifrank expound on this theme.)

For the last twenty-five years, Michael Jackson has been trying to run from everything considered black (even his finances)—including the image that used to stare back at him from his bathroom mirror. Like O.J. Simpson before him, should accused child-molester Jackson be called not guilty in this rather bizarre trial, you can be sure that he will try to revert to his people. (The identity of his people is anyone’s guess, however.)

I’ll bet that even Jesse Jackson looked nonplussed when MJ mentioned the names of Muhammad Ali and Nelson Mandela in the same breath as his own.

Anyway, the jury gets to hear about all of the alleged other victims, besides this year's accuser. (Take a look at the size of Jackson’s hands. They look like bloodless albino ham hocks.)

SANTA MARIA – In a major setback for Michael Jackson's defense, a judge ruled Monday that jurors can hear evidence about five past allegations that the singer molested or groomed children for molestation, including actor Macaulay Culkin.

Will they all lie? Surely, our ever-trustworthy court officials will be able to tell.

Why do I care? I care because, if all this stuff is true, M. Jackson needs to be imprisoned for a good long while; as is so for all of the poor, non-surgically-enhanced folks out there who rob children of their innocence and, often, their lives. Actually, now that I think about it, it may be a blessing that MJ is so well-known.

After all, were not MJ so rich and so famous, there might be a couple of dead children telling no tales. Just ask the Lundsford and Gage families.

Some kids are never found; like Jahi Turner. Remember him? Three years ago in San Diego, he disappeared right out from under his stepfather’s nose, while his mother—a US Navy sailor—was out to sea. He still hasn’t been found. He was two years old.

So, when we take a break from is snickering at the frail, simpering MJ who cries on cue and when we try to refrain from rolling our collective eyes at the media circus surrounding this latest clown, we should remember that there are kids involved here.

At least they're still breathing.

Alternate Universe?

Or split personality? Marty Johnson has an audioblog with a heck of a punchline.

Schiavo Two Cents

I haven’t done any posting on Terry Schiavo except to make glancing comments. There’s a reason.

My grandmother's (step dad’s mom) youngest was born with multiple birth defects. Basically, she was born the way Terry Schiavo became—probably with far less cognitive ability than Ms. Schiavo.

My aunt couldn’t walk or talk or feed herself. She could, however, laugh, cry and recognize familiar people. When she was born, doctors said that she wouldn’t live past one year and suggested that my grandmother institutionalize her. That, however, was out of the question, so she lived at home—for thirty-eight years. My aunt died only a few months after my grandmother did—probably from grief.

(When my aunt was alive, I knew that there would always someone else at home when I called Grandma’s house. Aunt was never left alone.)

What’s being done to Terry Schiavo is barbaric, criminal and evil. Plain and simple. All the talk is just that.

Blood For Stupidity (Almost)

My dad—who also voted for President Bush in both elections--urged me not to put my Bush-Cheney ‘04 sticker on my car. Though I really wanted to do it just to start something, cooler parental heads prevailed, however. Good thing, too.

This week… a Tampa woman learned that simple Bush-Cheney bumper sticker can bring trouble, if not danger, from a total stranger.

Police say Michelle Fernandez, 35, was chased for miles Tuesday by an irate 31-year-old Tampa man who cursed at her as he held up an anti-Bush sign and tried to run her off the road.
His sign, about the size of a business letter, read:

Never Forget Bush's Illegal Oil War Murdered Thousands in Iraq.[SNIP]

Police arrested Nathan Alan Winkler at his home on N Cleveland Street near Hyde Park within an hour of the incident.

After finding the antiwar sign in his car, they booked him into the county jail on one count of aggravated stalking, a third-degree felony punishable by up to five years in prison, Durkin said.

He posted his $2,000 bond and was released early Wednesday, jail records show. This was Winkler's first arrest in Florida, according to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement.

Winkler, listed in jail records as a contractor, could not be reached Wednesday. Durkin said Winkler told police officers he got upset with Fernandez because she "gave him the finger."

Fernandez told the Times Wednesday that "whatever gestures I made, I made them because I was trying to figure out why he was honking at me and pointing to his sign."

"At first I didn't know why he was screaming at me," she said. "Then it clicked."[SNIP]

"I was just almost run off the road by a man," she told the dispatcher at 5:14 p.m. She was taking her son, 10, and daughter, 3, to a ballfield.

The very flower of leftist “manhood” tries to drive a woman and her children off the road. How peaceful!

Here’s a helpful hint for Ms. Fernandez: put an NRA sticker right under your Bush-Cheney sticker. Not one of those little ones similar to the US Marine logo, but one of those big college-type tickers. Idiots may still mouth stuff at you, but if they can read, they’ll think twice about running you off the road.

(Thanks to Michelle Malkin)

UPDATE: Video.

Jordanites Push Back

Yes, two rants in a row.

Italian Hostage, Released in Iraq, Is Shot by G.I.'s

U.S. Fires on Freed Hostage

Freed Italian Reporter Hurt in Iraq Shooting-U.S.

Coalition Forces Shoot Released Hostage in Iraq

U.S. Forces Wound Freed Hostage in Iraq

Italian hostage, journalist Giuliana Sgrena was freed by her captors in Iraq on Friday. She ended up in a car with three other people and they headed to Baghdad, toward a military checkpoint. Now all of these articles explain what *really* happened, corroborating the DOD’s version of the incident.

New York Times:

The military did not know that the hostage was in the car, a State Department official in Washington said.
According to a statement released by the United States Army's Third Infantry Division in Baghdad, the soldiers tried to warn the driver to stop before firing at the speeding vehicle's engine block.

One man, an Italian agent, was killed in the resulting car accident.

"About 9 p.m., a patrol in western Baghdad observed the vehicle speeding towards their checkpoint and attempted to warn the driver to stop by hand-and-arm signals, flashing white lights, and firing warning shots in front of the car," the statement said.

Reuters:

"Multinational forces fired on a vehicle that was approaching a coalition checkpoint in Baghdad at a high rate of speed," Defense Department spokesman Bryan Whitman told reporters.

Speeding toward a checkpoint plus not head warnings to stop equals suicide bomber. So the soldiers shot at the car. (Believe me, if the soldiers were shooting at the occupants of the car with what they’re packing, all four would have been a few smears on the road.)

But did you notice anything about the headlines? They don’t say that the car was shot. They say that the journalist either was shot or imply that the soldiers were shooting at the journalist. And what will most readers notice? Not the details, but the headlines. You know it, I know it and, most of all, they know it.

In spite of the countless instances in which speeding cars have been used as weapons in the Iraq Theater of Operations, these people brandish Eason Jordan’s bogus weapon at those in life or death situations.

Every time I think I know just how much the mainstream media hate the US military, something new happens and a new low is reached.

In other news, UN troops still raping little girls.

(Thanks to My Pet Jawa)

Trouble in Paradise (Part Three)

And which one of US Senator Ted Stevens' (R-AK) advisers told him that this would be a good idea?

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Ted Stevens said on Tuesday he would push for applying broadcast decency standards to cable television and subscription satellite TV and radio.

"Cable is a much greater violator in the indecency area," the Alaska Republican told the National Association of Broadcasters, which represents most local television and radio affiliates. "I think we have the same power to deal with cable as over-the-air" broadcasters.[SNIP]

Stevens told reporters afterward that he would push legislation to apply the standards to cable TV and satellite radio and television. It could become part of a pending bill to boost fines on broadcasters who violate indecency restrictions or of an effort to overhaul U.S. communications laws.

I know this may surprise some of you who thought you had me pegged, but I think that such putative legislation is unconstitutional, dangerous and even immoral. Even God doesn’t impose belief in Him or adherence to His Word on us. (According to you-know-which-book, if you refuse to believe in Him, He’ll let you go your way.)

“Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” “Life, liberty and property.” Either way, Senator Stevens’ plan tramples on those concepts. It isn’t up to the state to define these concepts for its (adult) citizens; as long as those concepts don’t overlap the rights of another citizen, the state is supposed to butt out. If somebody thinks that watching (non-kiddie) pron in his/her own home will make them happy, so be it.

It’s this type of scheme, however, that causes people to brand us social/religious conservatives as fascists.

As Ace put it,

I wholeheartedly supported the position of the traditionalists and religious in our society who said: "That [Janet Jackson exposing her breast in during the 2004 Super Bowl half-time show] crosses a line."

I agreed with them-- that they had a right to watch broadcast TV, during the dinner hour, and be free of seeing dirty images, especially without serious warnings that the program would contain such images.
It's one thing if she had run a special at 10 pm with warnings about "strong sexual content." Anyone watching would have been warned. It's quite another thing just to pop out a mommysac to millions of unsuspecting viewers. [SNIP]

But that dispute, I thought, was one in which the religious right was resisting the imposition of the irreligious left's values on it -- through the public airwaves, during a program generally considered safe for family viewing, unwarned.

(Emphasis mine.)

That’s what I thought it was about also and why I objected to Ms. Jackson’s little stunt: anyone tall enough to reach the TV has access to network fare, such as it is.

Cable/Satellite subscriptions are a different matter, however. Most subscriptions come with the ability to lock out certain channels with a password, as is so with all the ISPs that I know of. If someone wants to pay for some R/X-rated program to be transmitted into their private home, it’s their prerogative--their right—to spend their money as they see fit. Moreover, cable and satellite companies have the right to provide these services to adults without having to be subject to punitive fines.

Jeff G says,

…these types of infringements upon personal freedom and choice are the very thing that drove me away from modern day “liberals” in the first place; for instance, to me, the idea that free speech on a university campus can only take place in pre-defined “free speech zones” (while the rest of the campus is a “tolerance” zone, or—more aptly—the land of bland, inoffensive generalities mouthed by frightened, confused adepts to a fundamentally un-American PC/Diversity culture) is a clear indication that “liberalism” had lost its moorings, and that modern “liberalism” or “progressivism” is simply a soft totalitarianism proscribed by self-appointed cultural elites.

Whether you or I or Senator Stevens thinks that stuff is smut and detrimental to the soul of the viewer is totally irrelevant. And were Senator Stevens to successfully push such legislation through Congress, it would be an ominous foreboding of things to come.

Sure, pron is an big, easy slow-moving target (no puns intended). But I am forced to wonder what other *legal* private activities and private business transactions will be regulated “for the good of the citizens?”

From the Pens of Babes (UPDATED)

In the imagined shadow of the Twin Towers that are no longer there, the students of teacher Alex Kunhardt’s social-studies class at Brooklyn’s JHS 51 send their regards to some soldiers whom they thought were stationed in Iraq:

Pfc. Rob Jacobs of New Jersey said he was initially ecstatic to get a package of letters from sixth-graders at JHS 51 in Park Slope last month at his base 10 miles from the North Korea border.

That changed when he opened the envelope and found missives strewn with politically charged rhetoric, vicious accusations and demoralizing predictions that only a handful of soldiers would leave the Iraq war alive.

They sent letters like this to the soldiers standing between the South Koreans and the nut Kim Jong Il?

Mr. (I assume) Kunhardt had no response to the New York Post regarding the letters, but the school’s principal, Xavier Costello, did:

"While we would never censor anything that our children write, we sincerely apologize for forwarding letters that were in any way inappropriate to Pfc. Jacobs. This assignment was not intended to be insensitive, but to be supportive of the men and women in service to our nation."

New Yorkers' tax dollars at work? Maybe. Then again, this might be the work of some of the parents. New York is mostly a Democratic state—in spite of NYC’s mayor and the state’s chief executive—and I doubt that the average eleven-year-old has it in for US Armed Forces personnel. The young “naysayers” were undoubtedly coached.

Fine. It’s a parental right to raise offspring with the values that he/she sees fit.

only a handful of soldiers would leave the Iraq war alive

But when one’s bequeathed values run up against one of the most valued assets of an Armed Force—its morale—then one is to be scorned. Not silenced. Scorned.

Question for both types of teachers of these children: do you want our military men and women dead? Then write your poisoned-penned letters yourselves. That would be the adult thing to do, rather than use your children as human shields.

(Thanks to reader and old friend Iron Mike)

UPDATE: More commentary:

WizBang

Joe Gandelman

Where's the Outrage?

This is still bothering me.

He [Dean] surveys the crowd of 150 crammed into the room [at the African American Caucus]. "You think the RNC could get this many people of color into a single room?" he marvels. "Maybe if they got the hotel staff in there."

(Emphasis mine.)

Granted, the vast majority of Americans who are black are Democrats and did voted for John Kerry in the 2004 presidential election, in spite of the conservative views that many black Americans have, such as those on abortion and same-sex marriage. Chairman Dean could have just left it at plain fact; that the Republicans can’t muster the sheer numbers of black Americans to their gatherings that Democrats can.

What was up with the ‘hotel staff’ comment, however?

Does he mean that Republicans would only invite the black hotel workers into their midst, rather that the hundreds of thousands of black physicians, lawyers, PhDs, engineers, executives, journalists, etc.?

Or does he mean that most blacks *are* hotel workers or equivalent--and honorably-employed--blue-collar types, rather than (formally) well-educated sorts?

Or does he mean that Republicans would only invite those blacks who were handy at the sort of place in which political gatherings are held (in this case, the Hilton Washington) and would “forget” to invite those who are *deemed* to be “smarter”? Does he think hotel workers aren’t intelligent and are “dumb’ enough to be “lured” into a Republican gathering merely because of simple proximity? (Believe me, many of the most intelligent people out there are among the ranks of blue-collar workers.)

Well, excuse me, but I can’t help but Forget the Rule, perhaps because I don’t subscribe to it in the first place. Why is newly-minted Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean being let off the hook for this extremely suspect statement?

Does the name Trent Lott ring a bell? Bloggers ran him away from the Senate Majority Leader position (so I’m told; this was a bit before I started following blogs). At least Senator Lott apologized.

Can we at least ask for a clarification from the good governor? After all, he is the face and voice of the Democrat party, not some poor previous-unknown guy from a fledgling news service.

Banana Trauma

Banana-rama.

Yes, we have no bananas.

No, we’ve got your bananas (well, I don’t, but many others do).

Sheesh! And I thought *my* banana trauma was damaging! (When I was a wee one, I loved bananas. But one day, I peeled one without looking at it and took a bite; it was rotten. I haven’t been near one since.)

But my ordeal pales—heh—in comparison to this one:

Just think of all the ways a man might use a banana to offend a woman.

Then you may imagine why some people leaped to the wrong conclusion when a woman complained about a Columbus police officer eating a banana at the Civic Center as people gathered for a Jan. 15 civil rights march.

The woman was deeply offended, she told police. The police were deeply bewildered.

The offense was not what you might imagine it to be. I imagined the officer shoving the banana into his pants pocket to make others point at it and say, "Hey, is that a banana in your pocket or are you just glad to be here getting paid overtime?"

But that was not what offended the woman, who hung up on people who couldn't figure it out.
Then she called Mayor Bob Poydasheff. He said she just started berating him about the police. He told her he'd heard only compliments about how officers handled the weekend march in which the Rev. Jesse Jackson and other longtime civil rights activists led 8,000 people from the Civic Center to the Government Center.

"She said, 'No no no no, when the buses pulled into the Civic Center, I saw a policeman eating a banana.' And I didn't know what to say," Poydasheff recalled. "I was stunned. I said, 'What's wrong with that? Police were on their feet for eight hours. They had to get potassium in their system.'"

He said the woman told him the banana "was an affront to me and to others, including a former state senator." She wouldn't name the senator.

Why was she offended?

Well, it seems that in the context of the march, she took the officer's banana eating to imply an analogous racial slur relating black people to apes.

Banana Trauma Extraordinaire! Therapy is in order for this poor woman! In more ways than one...

Seriousness to follow…

Last Thursday, Dennis Prager did a radio broadcast on the various conspiracy theories that proliferate among black Americans, especially regarding HIV. He seemed shocked and saddened to find out how many black people believe that the virus was created to wipe out black people.

Of course, I’m not shocked because I hear this sort of thing all the time and have nearly from infancy. And, unlike Mr. Prager, I can readily understand *why* such theories abound, even if I don’t subscribe to them: such things have actually happened. Tuskegee Experiment, anyone? Additionally, since Mr. Prager is Jewish, I wondered *why* he couldn’t understand the paranoia on a certain level. After all, people have been out to get rid of the Jews for a millennia (and some are still at it, as he well knows).

According to the Philly link above,

More than 20 years after the AIDS epidemic arrived in the United States, a significant proportion of African Americans believe government scientists created the disease to control or wipe out their communities, according to a study released yesterday by Rand Corp. and Oregon State University.[SNIP]

Nearly half of the 500 African Americans surveyed said that HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, was man-made.[SNIP]

A slight majority said they believed that a cure for AIDS was being withheld from the poor. Forty-four percent said people who took the new medicines for HIV were guinea pigs, and 15 percent said AIDS was a form of genocide against black people.

On one point, Mr. Prager was dead on: if one goes through life unceasingly looking over one’s shoulder, that person is likely to be the most miserable and bitter of beings. But, apparently, many black people do go through life like this. (And, of course, even if any of the above were true about HIV, there are sure-fire methods to keep from getting caught up in this particular web allegedly spun by “The Man.” We know what those are.)

Taking paranoia from the macro to the micro, one is likely to see hate and derision in simple everyday occurrences like a (presumably white) cop eating a banana at a civil rights demonstration.

I'll forego that "prerogative" and let the men and women in blue enjoy their potassium in peace.

(Thanks to Michael King, Michelle Malkin and Neal Boortz)

Denounced from the Hilltops

Red-on-red action between Opinion Journal and National Review regarding the resignation of Eason Jordan and the events leading up to it:
The Jordan Kerfuffle

It’s No “Kerfuffle”

Thoughts?

Here's one of mine: possibly, this incident would have been less damaging to Mr. Jordan and CNN had the tape and the transcript of the Jordan comments been release up front. As always, "the cover-up is worse than the crime."

And we're the progeny of Senator McCarthy, the KKK and every idiot-nutcase ever born now?

Take Bertrand Pecquerie, director of the World Editors Forum, the organization for editors within the World Association of Newspapers, please. Mourning Jordan's decision to step down, Pecquerie likened bloggers to the "sons of Senator McCarthy" and "scalps' hunters."

Steve Lovelady, managing editor of the Columbia Journalism Review Daily Web site, blasted Jordan's Internet critics in an e-mail to New York University professor Jay Rosen's blog PressThink (available at journalism.nyu.edu/pubzone/weblogs/pressthink): "The salivating morons who make up the lynch mob prevail."

Also on Rosen's site, reader William Boykin fumed: "Jordan has just been tire-necklaced by a bloodthirsty group of utopian, bible-thumping knuckledraggers that believe themselves to be bloggers but are really just a street gang." And these unhinged heavy-breathers accuse bloggers of being a lynch mob?

Too much free speech for the unwashed, I guess.

Observe as a new meme is born: the right-wing blogger as First Amendment antagonist.

(Thanks to various Fellow Knuckle-draggers)

UPDATE: Mr. Lovelady drops a few comments at Vodkapundit. Nice to see someone schooling him as to the difference between 'friendly fire'--accidental fire on friendlies--and deliberate targeting of someone known not to be the enemy.

Little Trouble Among Big Leftists

I hate to intrude while my guest-bloggers are working it—ladies, gentleman, and Acidman, you are doing an EXCELLENT job—but I just had to post a comment on this. It is to laugh.

Dude. Dude. The reasons that the high-profile leftist bloggers are in a twist about this Jeff Gannon so-called scandal are so simple.

For the record Jeff Gannon (nee Guckert) was a reporter for Talon News—a small internet news service with a conservative bent. Mr. Gannon was allowed a daily pass to White House press briefings, as many reporters for many new services are. Turns out that Mr. Gannon is a homosexual and has some gay pornographic sites registered in his name.

So, the leftists are making a big deal of this. (Mr. Gannon has resigned from his position with Talon.)

They are doing so for one very serious reason: their misconception of the beliefs of right-wing conservatives, especially religious ones. See, some leftists think that we religious conservatives want to take away the civil liberties of all non-conformists—especially homosexuals--and hurl them into re-education camps. For that’s what some of them would love to do to us, where we not the majority of those who embraced the Second Amendment so fervently. Projection, you know.

So when a Republican administration doesn’t fulfill the leftists’ preconceived notion, but acknowledges the “non-conformist’s” right to ply his trade without being branded with the scarlet “H,” it’s, somehow, hypocrisy on the conservatives’ part. Call it the Straw-man Hypocrisy: “you’re not as evil as we’ve been saying you are, so you’re wrong, WRONG, WRONG!”

They are also doing this for a humorous and pathetic reason: they needed a big media scandal to rival the CBS-Bogus Memo scandal and the Eason Jordan (CNN) slander against the US Armed Forces.

This is the best they could come up with.

Bearing Fruit

Look at the racist, sexist crap that Michelle Malkin has to put up with, likely on a daily basis, for being a conservative who is not white. Much of it was received even before the Armstrong Williams disgrace. Crap like this would make me want to hunt somebody down.

[profanity edited]

Hi Self hating flat nosed Filipino [sic] B*tch! As we used to refer to your kind - little brown F*cking Machines. Looks like this little LBFM learned to whore in a different way to make some pesos. How sweet.

*****

You're just a Manilla [sic] whore shaking your ass and waiting for the Republican fleet to come in, aren't you? You've even got the lip gloss about right. Maybe if you love sailor long time, he bring you home to big American house? I don't think so. Just like in Manilla, [sic] Honey, they'll pass you around 'til they've all shot their load in you, and then they'll try to scrub off the stench so they can sail off in their crisp, white uniforms to the land of W.A.S.P.

(Probably written by the kind of guys so odious that even the bar girls wouldn’t go near them.)

Correct me if I’m wrong, but aren’t the democrat/liberal/leftist adherents supposed to be the very models of non-racist, non-sexist thought and behavior? (Relax all you non-racist, non-sexist Democrats/Liberals/Leftists. You know whether this applies to you or not.)

However, it seems to me that many of the covert bigots who do exist on the Left are feeling more and more free to come out of the closet, as it were, to unload their hostility upon prominent conservatives who aren’t white. The anonymity of email allows this.

Are left-leaners racist? Of course not; not even a majority of them, not even a large portion of them. The proportion is probably roughly similar to that of Republicans/Conservatives/Right-wingers.

Could it be that we, both conservatives and liberals, merely have differing ideas of how this country should best function? Undoubtedly, and reasonable people on both sides know this.

But Ms. Malkin’s correspondents aren’t reasonable people, of course. They are liberated nutcases; free to show their true colors (no pun intended) along with being too craven to express their “feelings” without the cover of obscurity.

But what to make of those public figures who also feel free to describe the Secretary of State and the National Security Adviser in terms reminiscent of the eras of American Slavery and Jim Crow? Why do they feel so free to give vent to their bigotry?

It’s because reasonable people on the left keep silent (I’m talking non-blogging prominent figures on the left here). People like Wisconsin radio talk show host John Sylvester take their cues from black Democrats/Leftists: he thought it was okay to refer to National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice as “Aunt Jemima” because, up to that point in time, no other prominent left-of-center person had suffered censure for describing black conservatives in racist terms.

I was very heartened to see former NAACP President Kweisi Mfume condemn Sylvester in very strong terms, partially making up for his previous remarks regarding black conservatives. (And one of the worst things about the Armstrong Williams/Bush Administration perfidy is that it makes it appear that the remarks had some basis in truth, regardless of the fact that Williams is just one man.) One guesses that it was the straw-camel syndrome, because both Dr. Rice and Secretary of State Colin Powell have been the targets of racist rhetoric virtually from the dates of their appointments. (Aside: I wonder if Mr. Mfume "quit" the NAACP position for straying from NAACP Chairman Julian Bond's narrative regarding black conervatives?)

Is it open season on minority conservatives? Do those on the left who have racist tendencies feel free to describe a nice, educated Christian woman like Malkin in the terms of a Filipina bar girl merely because Malkin (a native-born American, IIRC) and some bar girl in a foreign land who laughed at their equipment share an ethnicity?

If the answer is ‘yes,’ then I’d say that a climate was created and nurtured for such to discard their non-racist, non-sexist veneer. The seeds were planted by the likes of Harry Belafonte and Amiri Baraka, fed by men like Bond and, yes, Mfume and watered by silence.

All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.
--Edmund Burke

Come on, prominent Democrat/Leftist pundits and politicians who are good and reasonable. Don’t be so hesitant to verbally slap down and turn out those in your midst who only bring discord to the political dialogue.

Wealth of Knowledge

Jason of CounterColumn (the blog formerly known as Iraq Now) exposes NY Times columnist Bob Herbert’s horrendous ignorance regarding the function of that old oxymoron, military intelligence.

In the commentary, Mr. Herbert also takes a shot at Lt. Gen. William Boykin. You remember him, don’t you? He’s the deputy undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence who also happens to be a member of one of the most feared groups in the world: fundamentalist Christians. Mr. Herbert seems to think that membership in this group somehow disqualifies General Boykin from taking an active part in any endeavors regarding national security.

Tell me, Mr. Herbert, does the military have a regulation that specifies to which religion its intelligence personnel can adhere? Will accepting Jesus Christ as Savior prevent competence at intelligence collection and analysis? And has the military never been involved in intelligence matters in the past? Surely, you know the answers to these questions from your apparent wealth of knowledge on both subjects. (That's sarcasm, folks. I know the answer to all of them.)

When did fundamentalist Christians—who occasionally annoy—become more feared than Islamists—who occasionally cut off folks’ heads? And when did fundamentalist Christians, as a group, become generally known for not doing their appointed duties as military men and women?

But I won’t fully fisk the column, since Jason has already done an able job.

(Thanks to Instapundit, who also tossed me an Instalanche in the link)

Over A Barrel

Again, Mark Steyn gives a rundown of what it’s like to be the Monarch of your castle (or business) in the UK.

Four years ago, Shirley Best, proprietor of the Rolander Fashion emporium, whose clients include Zara Phillips, was ironing some clothes when the proverbial two youths showed up. They pressed the hot iron into her flesh, burning her badly, and then stole her watch. "I was frightened to defend myself," said Miss Best. "I thought if I did anything I would be arrested." There speaks the modern British crime victim. [SNIP]

In New Hampshire [where Mr. Steyn lives], there are few burglaries because there's a high rate of gun ownership. Getting your head blown off for a $70 TV set isn't worth it.

High rate of gun ownership in liberal New Hampshire? Whoda thunk it? Even here in the more liberal LA, one rarely sees a home invasion type burglary. Additionally, in my working/middle class South Central environs, the neighbors are very protective of each other and keep their eyes peeled for trouble. (Okay, there are security windows and doors all around, to boot.) And would-be armed robbers of fed-up American business owners and employees often find themselves on the wrong side--depending on your point of view--of the lead equation. If the crooks are well-armed, it only makes sense for the law-abiding contingent to be as well, as long as the government isn't permitted to hinder that.

As Mr. Steyn says, crooks are only stupid up to a point. That point ends where the barrel of Grandma’s well-maintained .38 begins.

(Thanks to Glenn)

UPDATE: Ugh! From Kim Du Toit, read this tale of a old man defending himself in Illinois. The ending is happy only in that the gentleman is still alive.

Straight Poop

Sorry Brian, but it ain’t that serious. And speak for youself.

According to CBS Marketwatch, at a post-election wrap-up session, when a fellow panelist "mentioned that bloggers had had a big impact on the reporting on Election Day, [Brian] Williams [set to replace Tom Brokaw as the NBC Nightly News anchor] waved that point away by quipping that the self-styled journalists are 'on an equal footing with someone in a bathroom with a modem.'"

Fight Night (Updated)

Well. I just saw something that I never thought I’d see in American professional sports: an all-out brawl between the National Basketball Association's Detroit Pistons, the Indiana Pacers and the fans in the Auburn Hills Arena (Detroit 45 miles north of Detroit; thanks, Solomon).

Beer, punches, bodies and epithets were flying all over the place. Blame the Pistons’ Ben Wallace for the first shot, but blame all of the others for their equal or worse lack of self-control.

Los Angeles KCAL9’s Pat Harvey suggested that both teams—all of whom violated the NBA’s up-off-the-bench rule—be suspended for the year.

I agree. Punish the guilty: both the players and the fans.

Don’t let our sports icons and fans become like those of the Europeans.

AFTERTHOUGHT: In addition to the season-long team suspension, fine all the players that were off the bench for $200,000, whether they make 600K or 16 million a year; and ban all the involved fans from any NBA games for two years. Prosecute the guilty, both player and fan alike.

Yes, all these clowns ticked me straight off. Grow up, "gentlemen."

UPDATE: The full report, so far. I would have linked to the Daily Recycler for the video, but the Ku Klux Klan seems to have invaded the comments section for the post. Somebody call Orkin.

This incident is what I get for ripping on Spanish soccer fans the other day. ;-)

(Thanks to Roger L. Simon)

UPDATE: Four players are suspended for the foreseeable future.

NEW YORK - Indiana's Ron Artest, Jermaine O'Neal and Stephen Jackson, and Detroit's Ben Wallace were suspended indefinitely by the NBA on Saturday for taking part in one of the ugliest brawls in U.S. sports history, a fight with fans that commissioner David Stern called "shocking, repulsive and inexcusable."

Good, but there must be someway in which Detroit fans can also feel the pain.

Reading the article further, Artest sounds like a candidate for a lifetime NBA ban.

UPDATE: The verdict: Artest suspended for 30 games, O'Neal and Jackson for 20 and Wallace for 5. The first three got off light, but Wallace's suspension was heavier than he deserved, in my opinion. After all, the sort of thing he did happens all the time in the NBA with the offending player usually being ejected from the game or being suspended for one game at most, along with being fined. True, his action was (arguably) the catalyst for the brawl. But how was he to know that the Piston fans and the three Pacers were going to lose their collective minds?

CORRECTION: Artest: rest of the season; Jackson: 30 games; O'Neal: 25; Wallace: 6.

Additional suspensions:

...Pacers guard Anthony Johnson got five games...[SNIP]

Four players were suspended for a game apiece: Indiana's Reggie Miller, and Detroit's Chauncey Billups, Elden Campbell and Derrick Coleman.

Come On Now

Look what I received in snail mail today.

(In case you can't read it):  "You have therefore been approved for a lump sum payout of US$815,960.00...." Of course "Euromillones Loteria International" wants all my bank info so they can do me the courtesy of direct-depositing all my winnings.

Would somebody clue the Spaniards in? It’s the twenty-first century and Spain is a “first world” country.  Get with the program, Spain: these types of swindles are conducted by email. Even dirt-floor huts in the slums of Lagos have DSL. Dang!

NOTE TO TYPEPAD:  Love the new and improved editing page, but it does have some bugs.  I'm sure you'll work it out soon.

Election Heard 'Round the World

Did you know that there are 59 million plus idiots in America? So says England’s Daily Mirror of the American voters whose choices corresponded with President Bush’s popular vote tally. (On my more cynical days, I estimate that about 5 million of that number are Southern California drivers, but never mind that.)

Oh, it gets even more fun. Can President Bush's qualities as a leader be measured by the the quality of his critics and their criticism? You be the judge.

This is Priceless

The latest OBL tape must be doing great damage to John Kerry's presidential aspirations.

(From Drudge)

Former CBSNEWS anchorman Walter Cronkite believes Bush adviser Karl Rove is possibly behind the new Bin Laden tape.

Cronkite made the startling comments late Friday during an interview [with Larry King] on CNN.

:recovering from ROTFL:

As far back as my memory goes (early sixties), there was Walter Cronkite: a stern yet trustworthy and fatherly sort; calmly and earnestly reporting the news on the venerated CBS.

Sometimes it sucks to grow up.

But I bet it doesn’t suck to be Karl Rove. That guy must have the largest ego imaginable.

So, liberals, leftists and Kerry Democrats: have we caught OBL or haven't we?

UPDATE: Transcript.

CRONKITE: Who's to blame for it really is the intensity of this campaign. Plus the fact that we have a preface to this in the last campaign. What year was that now?

UPDATE: Tim Blair has the email exchange between Gandalf Rove and The Dark Lord Sauron bin Laden. Hold on to your kidneys! Meant in two senses.

More is Revealed

'We have to get back to the place we were, where terrorists are not the focus of our lives, but [where] they're a nuisance.''

--Senator John Kerry

As I suspected.

In that sobriety, one finds out that there are things to take care of that have gone neglected during the binge. In our national sobriety, we find out that things aren’t what they seemed to be when were under the influence of a great many illusions: that we were safe from terrorists (at least on the home front), that France and Germany were two of our most trustworthy allies and that those same two countries were grateful to us for our role in WWII and for protecting them from the designs of the late Soviet Union. [SNIP]

In my opinion, Senator John Kerry would have this nation go back to the days when—drunk on our delusions--we thought that all of the above were true.

Nothing like the nuisance of getting blown up occasionally. Thank you, Senator, for giving us a better idea of who you are.

(Thanks to Wretchard)

Loose Lips (Updated)

Good show, Senator Kerry.

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) - Democratic Sen. John Kerry on Friday accused the Bush administration of hiding a plan to mobilize more National Guard and reserve troops after the election while glossing over a worsening conflict in Iraq.

"He won't tell us what congressional leaders are now saying, that this administration is planning yet another substantial call-up of reservists and guard units immediately after the election," Kerry said. "Hide it from people through the election, then make the move."

While you’re at it, why don’t you hand the enemy any other strategic information you’ve received from those intelligence briefings that the president has invited you to?

Oh, that’s right. You don’t have time for those. Well, thank the Lord for small (and large) favors.

Don’t forget to vote in November, folks.

UPDATE: One of LGF's regulars reminds me that units receive fair advanced warning when they will be required to provide personnel for large-scale deployments and it's not much of a secret that units presently in Iraq are due to rotate back to the states soon. Ergo, more call-ups.

So Senator Kerry isn't saying anything more earth-shattering than the average person couldn't figure out. What he *is* doing is using a normal process--normal as relates to wartime use of reserve assets--to push forward a certain mindset in the voting population: that President Bush is using the military for all sorts of secret and/or nefarious purposes.

What's This?

Look what Captain Ed found:

George W. Bush, you may be the president [sic]. But I know that you lied.

I know from your files that we have now reassembled, [--ed. Bold mine.] the fact that you did not fulfill your oath, taken when you were commissioned to "obey the orders of the officers appointed over you". I know that you not only lied to the American people in 1994…

This Bill Burkett op-ed piece is from August 25, 2004. Did Bill Burkett want to be caught?

Bill Burkett is a retired Texas Army National Guard lieutenant colonel with a beef against George W. Bush. On a deployment to Panama in 1997, LTC Burkett allegedly caught the disease meningoencephalitis. There was some dispute between the colonel and the Texas/US government as to whether the disease was contracted during the deployment (I don’t know if LTC Burkett won the dispute or not.)
However, also allegedly, LTC Burkett blames George W. Bush—Texas governor at the time--for the dispute. (In peacetime, the CinC for ANG units is the appropriate state governor. However, I’m wondering whether LTC Burkett’s CinC was actually then Governor Bush for the colonel's Panama sojourn. During his type of deployment—one in support of federal goals--I would think that the CinC would have been the POTUS—namely William J. Clinton.)

So LTC Burkett has motive, opportunity, (registration required), and has--possibly--confessed to being at least one of the authors of the likely forged documents that CBS and Dan Rather have set in front of the eyes of the American viewing public.

Inquiring minds want to know: what does meningoencephalitis do to one's thought processes, if anything?

Stay tuned.

(Thanks, ad infinitum, to the Creator of Investigation)

Blowing Smoke

This weekend, it was reported that North Korea detonated *something* last week that allegedly produced a smoke plume in the shape of your basic mushroom. And, right on cue, comes Senator Kerry with something nonsensical.

Democratic presidential candidate Sen. John Kerry (news - web sites) accused the Bush administration of letting a "nuclear nightmare" develop by refusing to deal with North Korea (news - web sites) when it first came to office.

In a telephone interview with The New York Times, published on its Web Site late Sunday, Kerry said the current fear that North Korea may be preparing to test a plutonium bomb was a consequence of President Bush (news - web sites)'s preoccupation with Iraq (news - web sites).

Aren’t you forgetting something, Senator?

Two presidents belonging to your party tried to appease the North Koreans by bribing them into halting their nuclear aspirations. Well, the money got transferred and spent, the oil got used, the food got eaten—presumably by very few average North Koreans--but the cessation didn’t happen. The North Korean government may not be too up on feeding its “constituents” or developing its economy, but they certainly know a couple of marks when they see them.

These are the results of negotiating with a basket-case states with nuclear capability; terrorists, by another other name. As is so with Islamist terror, President Bush must also clean up after the botched policies offered in this area by leaders of your party, Senator. However, you and your party are not one in the same. So, since we know from observation that appeasement doesn’t work on madmen, it would please us, the American voting public, to know what your third way might be.

Oh. Never mind.

Asked about how he would handle the threat of a North Korean nuclear test if he became president, Kerry replied that the issue would likely have to be taken to the United Nations (news - web sites) Security Council.

So let me see if I have this straight. President Bush is “bad” because he “refuses” to deal with the North Koreans and hands the situation off to the regional players (the PRC, Japan and South Korea), but your way is “good” because you’d hand the situation off to the UN Security Council?

I suspect that anything that just a little too tough for John Kerry to handle would be punted to the UN. If that doesn't freeze your blood, then nothing will.

What They're Holding

This woman certainly does have an active (and perverted) fantasy life:

"Imagine a way to erase that night four years ago when you (President Bush) savagely raped every pandemic woman over and over with each vote you got, a thrust with each state you stole," [poet Molly] Birnbaum said from the [NOW event] podium. (If something is pandemic, it affects many people or a number of countries.)

"A smack with each bill you passed, a tear with each right you took until you left me disenfranchised with hands shackled and voice restrained. Thanks for that night, Mr. President, I can barely remember my tomorrows," Birnbaum said to applause.

Barf! Must everything boil down to penis-vagina metaphors? Must any outcome that certain leftists don’t like become akin to having one’s virtue—such as it is—violated?

Read the rest of the article for more eyeball-rollers.

Playing With Fire

Now isn’t this charming?

Until Thursday afternoon, the little toys were on sale to kids around Central Florida -- two towers with a jetliner in between that appears to be crashing into one of the buildings. They come in packages along with candy. [SNIP]

…there is no mistake what the toy represents, especially when you look at the product number on every single toy: 9011. [SNIP]

A company called Lisy Corporation distributes the candy bags. They said they are also offended by the toy and have pulled 17,000 of the toys. [SNIP]

Lisy says they bought the toys, sight unseen, from L and M Import/Export of Miami.

According to the WFTV reporter, L and M’s representative doesn’t see what the fuss is about.

We talked to L and M and they say they have no problem at all with the toy and don't consider it offensive at all.[SNIP]

For the second day in a row, the importer of the toy, L&M Import and Export refused to comment. But, they told Channel 9 they didn't think it was a big deal, saying they consider it just a toy for children and don't think it's inappropriate.

You know, I usually have some scalding commentary for things like this. However, L and M’s attitude toward this matter speaks for itself.

(Thanks to Feste)

Dinner Bell

Now here’s some meat, suggesting how John Kerry might think/behave in an executive position.

As Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts, John Kerry authored an executive order that specifically made no provision for the civil defense of the citizens of his state.

Whereas the existing and potential strength of nuclear weapons is such that nuclear war can neither be won nor survived, it can only be prevented; and Whereas the only effective defense against the horrors of nuclear weapons lies in their elimination and in the prevention of nuclear war or attacks, [the Commonwealth of Massachusetts] shall seek to ensure the safety of its citizens by pursuit of policies reflecting a serious commitment to prevention of nuclear war.

Such policies shall include education of citizens concerning the real nature of nuclear war and efforts to influence national policy towards negotiation of an end to the nuclear-arms race.

"No funds shall be expended by the Commonwealth for crisis relocation planning for nuclear war."

So in case of nuclear attack, Massachusetts' surviving citizens--and there would be some--should simply bend over, put their heads between their legs and kiss their butts goodbye, while the state's surviving politicians do what? Hit that bunker under the state house?

Remember that Senator Kerry jumped on the Michael Moore bandwagon and suggested that he would have reacted differently than President Bush in the wake of the 9/11 attacks had he been president.

Well, it appears to me that he was telling the truth.

Which is worse? Waiting a few minutes to allow your secret service detail to have their stuff together to get you out of there? (That’s what President Bush was doing in those seven minutes.) Or suggesting that your surviving constituents be abandoned in case of another sort of attack?

This is the type of fact that should be considered when making that voting decision.

(Thanks to LGF)

NOTE: I realize that some have problems with NewsMax and its authenticity. I'm searching the web for a corroborating source. However, such an executive order is difficult to fabricate out of thin air.

UPDATE: Check this source from the Massachusetts Trial Court Libraries (Thanks, David!)

MORE: Check out Massachusetts Executive Order 31, the law that was superceded by the one above.

UPDATE: As usual, Allah gets to the point much quicker than I do.

Do Men Act This Way?

The Moore Effect:

Addressing minority journalists in the nation's capital, Kerry was asked what he would have done as president the moment he received word of the attacks on the World Trade Center. Bush spent seven minutes listening to "The Pet Goat" being read at a Florida elementary school after his chief of staff, Andrew Card, whispered, "America is under attack," as televisions cameras recorded the anxious scene.

"I would have told those kids very politely and nicely that the president of the United States had something that he needed to attend to," Kerry said before flying to Missouri to resume his cross-country campaign trip. "And I would have attended to it."

What’s the big deal about President Bush doing nothing in the seven minutes after getting word about the terrorist attacks on 9/11? And what would nit would you be picking now, Senator Kerry if the president had done what you suggested?

"OOOh, he got up and ran out of the room! He panicked and scared the children! He was totally incognizant of his role as president, endangering himself in a perilous time," or something like that. Right? Of course, you would.

President Clinton did nothing in eight years after..what, five six terror attacks on Americans?...and nobody gave a rat’s rabid back end about that.

This is the most petty, childish crap I’ve witnessed since high school.

In the meantime, the War on Terror continues.

UPDATE: Rudy ain't havin' it.

Operation Give Gets Taken

Now that all of you wonderful people have helped me, you can help out Chief Wiggles. “His” kids need it a lot more than I do.

And it appears that someone is trying to take Operation Give for a ride.

Insecurity

How classified material from the National Archives ended up in Clinton Administration National Security Adviser Sandy Berger’s pockets and down his pants inadvertently is difficult to fathom. How such a formerly highly placed person wouldn’t know that he was been watched while placing such documents in such a strange place is even more difficult to fathom.

Additionally, he claims to have discarded some of the “borrowed” documents.

Please.

It appears to me that he purposely and knowingly did the deed, got wind that it had been discovered and—along with his legal representation--crafted this incredibly implausible story of incompetence and forgetfulness to cover himself.

Well, it’s a pretty thin cover, if you ask me. In fact, you don’t have to ask me, even though, at one time, I handled many classified documents and, somehow, none of them managed to end up on my person. Ask the thousands of military personnel who have been tasked to handle and protect like documents. Ask them what would have happened to them had classified documents ended up growing legs and walking out under their supervision. Ask them what would have happened to them were they to tell investigators that it was “inadvertent.”

Laughter would be the response and Fort Leavenworth would be their new home. Civilians have more legal leeway, for good or ill.

Will Mr. Berger be prosecuted? I doubt it. Fawn Hall wasn’t and she was just a secretary. (For the record, she was granted immunity from prosecution to pry her information from the cover of the Fifth Amendment. I have mixed feelings about that: immunity is granted to many people for this reason, but the unauthorized destruction of classified material should carry some penalty with it. Ms. Hall deserved incarceration more than Martha Stewart does. To be fair, military personnel have Fifth Amendment rights as well, but I wonder how often they are offered such deals.)

Notice, however, the word “security” in the informal title “National Security Adviser.” That means that Mr. Berger was the go-to guy for national security issues in the Clinton Administration. That a person in such a position could mistakenly treat classified documents in such a cavalier manner boggles the mind. Either he was/is incredibly stupid or incredibly venal. I vote both.