I’m down in the Central Valley right now. Went into a Foster’s Old Fashioned freeze (love their chocolate dipped vanilla cones) and saw, right on the counter, a packet of materials from the local Marine recruiter. Wouldn’t see that in Marin, that’s for sure.
Filed under: Uncategorized | 2 Comments »
I’ve been so isolated from the news this weekend I only just discovered that Van Jones withdrew. Of course, at the same time, my NYT reading husband first discovered that Van Jones existed, so I’m still ahead of some curves.
I might blog this morning, but I’m not optimistic. For now, consider this your “Happy Labor Day” open thread.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »
This has been in the works for a while, so it’s not a surprise to me, but I know it will be a surprise to you.
Effective immediately, I’m switching servers, so my blog will operate at a new address: http://www.bookwormroom.com/
Henceforth, all new posts will be at http://www.bookwormroom.com/
There are still a few glitches at the new site, and I’d appreciate your feedback as we work them out. Overall, though, the new site is, in my eyes at least, beautiful. It will also have features that I couldn’t access on my old site and that will, I think, benefit both me and my readers. From my point of view, it has user registration, which will cut down on the hundreds of spams I get (despite Askimet). I’ll also have an easier time linking videos and uploading images. From your point of view, the user comments can be previewed, which I know a lot of you would like. Also, I happen to like the template, since I think it’s easier to read than my old one. Anyway, check it out: http://www.bookwormroom.com/
A million thanks for this change go to the Web Administrator at Webloggin who was more generous with his time and resources than you can possibly imagine. He is, in the most profound Yiddish sense of the word, a mensch — a righteous, honorable, truly good human being.
By the way, if you have me in your blog roll, I’d very much appreciate it if you would update the link.
Filed under: Uncategorized | 6 Comments »
Later today, a government’s representative is going to make the following important announcements:
Western governments have “the moral imperative to intervene – sometimes militarily – to help spread democracy throughout the world.”
The same speaker says that “fostering democracy in the Middle East ‘is the best long-term defence against global terrorism and conflict.’”
He feels that keeping democracy alive is hard work and must be actively fostered: “After the end of the cold war it was tempting to believe in the ‘end of history’ – the inevitable process of liberal democracy and capitalist economics. Now with the economic success of China, we can no longer take the forward march of democracy for granted.”
Who is the speaker? John Bolton? George Bush? Nope, wrong, wrong, wrong. It’s the British foreign secretary, David Miliband, a representative of the Labour government. Some of his other pronouncements are even more rational and surprising:
Miliband’s broad-ranging speech reflects his deep concern that a combination of factors, including widespread distaste for the American neo-conservative movement, disillusionment at the practical failures in Iraq, and a feeling that some underdeveloped countries, such as Kenya, are simply too tribal for democracy, is storing up a powerful isolationist mood in Britain.
The foreign secretary, who has just returned from Afghanistan and Bangladesh, believes there is an urgent need to restate the case for the universal value of democracy.
He will argue that interventions in other countries must be more subtle, better planned, and if possible undertaken with the agreement of multilateral institutions. But “we must resist the argument of the left and the right to retreat into a world of realpolitik”.
Miliband believes that in the 1990s “something strange happened.
“The neo-conservative movement seemed more certain about spreading democracy around the world. The left seemed conflicted between the desirability of the goal and its qualms about the use of military means.
“In fact, the goal of spreading democracy should be a great progressive project; the means need to combine both soft and hard power. We should not let the debate about the how of foreign policy obscure the clarity about the what.”
This is not what one expects to hear from a Briton, nor from a member of the Labour party and, especially, a member of the Labour government. I wonder if he represents official government policy, if he is running ideas up a flag pole to see if any one salutes, or if he is that bizarre thing, a principled moralist in a politically-correct, Leftist government.
UPDATE: Welcome, American Thinker readers! Ironically, because I’m getting so many lovely hits here, today is the first day I’ve switched to a new server, so you can feel free to look around here or check out my new site, which not only has the old stuff, but also will move forward into the future with all my new material.
Filed under: Britain, England | Tagged: Britain, David Miliband, England, Foreign Secretary | 4 Comments »
I’m about to show my youth and ignorance here with regard to the Vietnam War (’cause even though I lived through it, I was truly a child then). But first, let me back up a bit. Mr. Bookworm rented Julie Taymor’s Across the Universe. If you haven’t heard of it, it’s a film with an interesting conceit: Ms. Taymor takes 33 of the Beatles songs and interweaves a story around them. As a musical, it’s pretty successful. Bucking trends in musicals for the last 40 years, she chooses actors who actually have really good singing voices. Also, showing her background in theater and puppet work, it’s a visually impressive movie, if you don’t mind that she goes over the top sometimes. That’s the praise.
Now for the criticism: The movie is set during the Vietnam War era and is totally anti-War. American soldiers are shown as brutal robotic types who work for a military that takes sweet, innocent young men and throws them into the maw of hell. Anti-war protests are shown as seminally important events that simultaneously reveal the grossness of American policy in Vietnam and that allow wholesome, moral young Americans to find a place for themselves in opposition to the evil war. In this regard, the movie is both a babyboomer nostalgia trip and a nudge-nudge wink-wink anti-Iraq War movie. So, even as the movie is beautiful to look at and lovely to hear, it offends me. It’s blithe acceptance of the 60s Leftist tropes is so facile as to be almost grotesque — but it did leave me thinking.
The street protest I mentioned above culminates with a speaker talking about American imperialist aggression and Americans as baby killers. What I wondered very much was how and where this angle on the war started. Truth to tell, it sounds precisely like the kind of talking points you can see brooded over by a handful of people attending some secret Communist meeting in a grimy NY basement apartment.
Looked at objectively, from the point of view of a whole nation, the “our nation is evil” idea is kind of fringey. That being the case, how did it gain so much currency? Why did Americans embrace this paradigm about the war instead of viewing the War — as John F. Kennedy, their hero, viewed it — as a necessary (for America) way to stop worldwide Communist aggression and as an act of decency to keep the Vietnamese free? Where did Americans get the idea, stated in this movie, that the Vietnamese wanted us to go? Maybe the North Vietnamese, who were Communist puppets did, but I was under the impression that the South Vietnamese were desperate for us to stay there and protect them from a Communist takeover — a takeover that, when we pulled out, was even more horrific than anyone had anticipated. (One of my most vivid pre-teen memories is of the extraordinary panic on the ground, amongst ordinary Vietnamese, when the Americans pulled out.)
In the current War, from the first second, the Leftists just leapt upon the Vietnam War template, dragging their old signs out, and replaying the identical scenario, with a sympathetic media to help out and spread it amongst people who normally wouldn’t give too much of a rat’s ass one way or another. It’s been like watching a re-run. But who created the original 1960s script, and how did it spread so rapidly and effectively that it became the accepted view that our American men and boys were brutal, imperialistic babykillers — end of story?
Did the original script come from the Kremlin, which was gleefully spreading misinformation, or was it an organic, homegrown Leftist process? Was it embraced so quickly because, after the Korean War, we were sick of getting involved in jungle fighting in the Far East? Or was the draft the problem, with articulate, well-read, generically liberal/Leftist students suddenly having a vested interest in saving themselves — and shooting further Left in the process? And if it’s the latter explanation — that is, the draft created self-interested young people who would rather attack their own nation and leave the Vietnamese in hell than put themselves at risk — why didn’t the draft create precisely the same problems with WWII?
I know I’m asking a lot of questions, but it suddenly occurred to me that, while I’ve always seen the end result of anti-Vietnam War agitation, I’ve never understand how the theme came into being and how it got a toehold in the American psyche and the American body politic.
UPDATE: I’ve switched to a new server, so you can feel free to look around here or check out my new site, which not only has the old stuff, but also will move forward into the future with all my new material.
Filed under: Anti-war, Vietnam | Tagged: Across the Universe, Anti-war, Vietnam War | 12 Comments »
Both of the following jokes come from an anthology published in 1950, the last year of Truman’s presidency.
First:
It was a day late in 1980, when socialized medicine had become the law of the land. A man was seized with a violent cramp in his stomach and sought relief at the modern white structure erected for the purpose in his home town. Upon entering the building, he found himself in a hall with two doors. One was marked “male,” the other “female.” Naturally, he entered the door marked “male.”
He found himself in a room with two doors. One was marked “Over 21,” the other “Under 21.” Since he was 52, he entered the door marked “Over 21.”
He found himself in a room with two doors. One was marked “Serious Illness,” the other “Minor indisposition.” Since he was doubled up with pain by this time, he staggered through the door marked “Serious illness.”
He found himself in a room with two doors. One was marked “Democrats,” the other “Republicans.” Since he had voted a straight Republican ticket all his life, he entered the door marked “Republicans” — and found himself out on the street.
Second:
Another anecdote aimed at the Democratic administration is this reputed report by a Kansas farmer: “The bugs got my berries, a hail storm ruined my garden truck, and the drought spoiled my wheat, but I’m doing mighty good on the crops the government paid me not to plant.
UPDATE: I’ve switched to a new server, so you can feel free to look around here or check out my new site, which not only has the old stuff, but also will move forward into the future with all my new material.
Filed under: Silly Stuff | Leave a Comment »
Tex Benecke and the Glenn Miller Orchestra are “In the Mood”:
Be sure actually to watch this video, not just listen, because the musicians’ shtick is great.
By the way, if it’s just the fabulous music you want to hear, go to this YouTube link, which has Glenn Miller and his band playing it, with great audio quality (but no video, just still photos).
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tagged: Big Band, Glenn Miller | 2 Comments »
I found this in an anthology of humorous stories from 1950:
Quentin Reynolds calls attention to the fact that Montgomery’s campaign in the Near East altered a centuries-old custom of the natives in those parts. “Since time immemorial,” says Reynolds, “Arabian men rode majestically on the family donkey while their wives, laden with all sorts of burdens, trudged patiently behind on foot. After 1942, however, all that was changed. The wife was emancipated. She now walks in front. There are many unexploded lands mines. . . .”
UPDATE: I’ve switched to a new server, so you can feel free to look around here or check out my new site, which not only has the old stuff, but also will move forward into the future with all my new material.
Filed under: Uncategorized | 1 Comment »
We hear a lot about dead or wounded Palestinian children, each of whose death or injury is a tragedy. Funnily enough, though, the MSM falls silent when it comes to the Israeli children:
There were a lot of tears of sadness and pain on Monday at the convalescence wing of the Sheba Medical Center at Tel Hashomer outside of Tel Aviv, as Sderot Mayor Eli Moyal visited the two young victims of the recent Qassam rocket attack.
Osher and Rami Tuito are being hospitalized at Sheba after a Qassam rocket made impact just a few feet away from the two brothers causing serious injury. Osher, 8, had to have a part of his leg amputated and his older brother Rami, 19, sustained moderate injuries.
As I tried to make clear in my introductory paragraph, I’m not denigrating what happens to Palestinian children, since children are the true tragedy of every conflict. I am noting, however, that while they make headlines, Israeli children don’t even rank the back pages.
UPDATE: I’ve switched to a new server, so you can feel free to look around here or check out my new site, which not only has the old stuff, but also will move forward into the future with all my new material.
Filed under: Israel, Media matters | Tagged: Israel, media | 2 Comments »
Immediately after reading an email from Danny Lemieux in which he says it should be interesting if the loonies on the Left shriek hysterically about the proposed death penalty for the 9/11 terrorists, I read Cheat Seeking Missiles and saw that Laer made precisely the same point. I hadn’t thought about the subject at all (sick child at home today, plus work deadlines, precludes thinking) but having read what Danny and Laer think, I have to agree.
UPDATE: My friends were prescient — it has begun.
UPDATE II: I’ve switched to a new server, so you can feel free to look around here or check out my new site, which not only has the old stuff, but also will move forward into the future with all my new material.
Filed under: 9/11 | 3 Comments »
While fanatics fight, ordinary people try to live. In Hebron, a City with a sadly bloody history, a few good men have had the courage to try to achieve stability and some measure of harmony:
Heads of local Palestinian clans in Hebron met on Sunday with representatives from Israeli settlements in the area and discussed the easing of tensions between the two sides.
The settlers reported that sheikhs Abu Khader Jabri and Haj Abu Ahram Abu Sneina representing the city’s Arab Muslim population in the West Bank city met in Jabri’s home with the Kiryat Arba Regional Council head Tzvi Katzover, former Knesset Member Elyakim Haetzni and other settler leaders.
The commander of the IDF’s Hebron Brigade, Colonel Yehuda Fuchs, also took part in the meeting.
The Israelis said Sheikh Jabri told them during the meeting that “I do not regard you as settlers but as residents. This city is yours just as much as it is ours.”
The Jewish participants described the meeting as cordial, adding that the sides agreed to strive to live in peace with one another.
You can already anticipate the response that these Sheikhs’ humane, moral efforts received:
According to the Israelis, shortly after the meeting began, the al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades issued a proclamation throughout the city that called for dealing with the meeting’s participants “with an iron fist.”
And just to make it more likely that this threat will be put into action, Israel released more than 30 al-Aqsa Murderers back into the pond.
So, back to my original post title: How likely is it, do you think, that these decent men, men who clearly want their children to live a quality life, and to have their souls freed from the burden of religious and racial fanaticism, will still be alive even a week from now? I’ll try to keep an eye on the Israeli newspapers and see what happens.
UPDATE: I’ve switched to a new server, so you can feel free to look around here or check out my new site, which not only has the old stuff, but also will move forward into the future with all my new material.
Filed under: Israel | Tagged: al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigade, Hebron, Israel, Palestinians | 4 Comments »
It took me a while, but I finally figured it out. First, CNN explained to me the single greatest cause of global warming:
Cutting down trees is pretty much one of the worst things you can do when it comes to climate change. Deforestation, by varying accounts, contributes anywhere from 20 percent to 30 percent of all carbon dioxide (C02) emissions — around 1.6 billion tons.
Second, China explained the source of its sudden and extraordinary deforestation:
China has lost about one tenth of its forest resources to recent snow storms regarded as the most severe in half a century, state media reported Sunday.
A total of 17.3 million hectares (43 million acres) of forest have been damaged across China as the result of three weeks of savage winter weather, the China Daily website said, citing the State Forestry Administration.
More than half the country’s provinces have been affected, and in the worst-hit regions, nearly 90 percent of forests have been destroyed, according to the paper.
As of the end of last month, disastrous winter weather had levied a toll of 16.2 billion yuan (2.2 billion dollars) on China’s forestry sector, the report said, citing the most recent data available.
So, if I understand this correctly, any future global warming will result from the violently cold weather in China that contributed to massive deforestation. I feel enlightened in an almost religious way at this point. It’s all so easy: terrible winters create endless summers.
UPDATE: I’ve switched to a new server, so you can feel free to look around here or check out my new site, which not only has the old stuff, but also will move forward into the future with all my new material.
Filed under: Climate change | Tagged: Climate change, Global Warming | 5 Comments »
I was trying to set up a post that selectively quotes from Melanie Phillips’ articles explaining the utter insanity behind the Archbishop of Canterbury’s muddled remarks about bringing sharia law into the British legal system — but I couldn’t. Each paragraph is so information-packed and important that (a) I couldn’t pick what to quote and (b) I couldn’t bear to dilute the impact of the articles in their entirety. I therefore urge you to read the articles yourself, which you will find here and here.
I do have a few words to add, though, about parallel private legal systems. We have them here too. Religious Jews have often resolved disputes through rabbis, not civil courts, and more and more people opt for private mediation or arbitration in the hope that those methods will be cheaper than litigation. With the Jewish disputes, it goes without saying that the law applied is Jewish law. (Phillips has a good description of these tribunals in Britain, and they’re much the same here.) As for the mediations or arbitrations, people can choose their law: they can pick the law of the state in which they live, or the state most favorable to the party in the stronger bargaining position. Heck, they could even choose the law of another nation entirely, assuming all parties agree. If the ultimate outcome of the religious tribunal, arbitration or mediation pleases the participants, that’s the end of the matter, and they go away happily, without the American civil litigation system ever being the wiser.
However, if they’re not happy, they do have recourse to the American litigation system. Sometimes the judge will simply tell the disgruntled party that he agreed in advance to the arbitration, the arbitration was conducted appropriately, and that’s the end of the story. Sometimes, though, the complainant will get to have his case heard and, in that case, American law, whether it be federal or state law, applies, as it would to any other similarly situated claimant. Additionally, if someone comes in complaining that the mediation, arbitration or religious tribunal resulted in an outcome that is antithetical to American law (for example, requiring him to sell his daughter into prostitution or to place himself into slavery), the American system will bring the alternative proceedings to a screeching halt. For all that I’m no fan of judges, only those who are mentally disturbed would allow their courts to be used for those purposes.
Rowan Williams muddled proposal, however, does not contemplate a system such as the American one, in which people can circumvent Civil Courts if they so desire (opting, say, for sharia courts), but if they don’t desire, they are bound by British law in British courts. Instead, he truly states a belief that the British courts should apply sharia law. As Melanie Phillips explains:
Dr Williams for some reason abandoned nuance altogether and left no room for doubt about what he was saying. Which was, in short, that although the
sensational reporting of opinion polls
recording large numbers of British Muslims who want to live in the UK under Islamic sharia law
clouds the issue,
the adoption of sharia law in the UK seems
unavoidable
and indeed desirable, since Muslims should not have to choose between
the stark alternatives of cultural loyalty or state loyalty.
So although
nobody in their right mind would want to see in this country the kind of inhumanity that’s sometimes been associated with the practice of the law in some Islamic states,
Muslims should be able to choose to have marital disputes or financial matters dealt with in a sharia court. Such courts should therefore be
incorporated into the British legal system
as a
constructive accommodation
with Islam.
There is no parallel for this in the American system or even in the British system. Both will enforce as judgments private agreements but, as I noted above, they will not do so if the outcome is inconsistent with fundamental principles of American or British jurisprudence. Woe to England if it backs down from its near universal outrage at Williams’ proposal and allows his ideas to become reality, whether actively or by default.
So, go read Melanie Phillips’ article and then say a prayer for England, for she sorely needs it. And if you’re in a reading mood about Williams, read this one too, at American Thinker.
UPDATE: I’ve switched to a new server, so you can feel free to look around here or check out my new site, which not only has the old stuff, but also will move forward into the future with all my new material.
Filed under: Britain, England, Islam, Law | Tagged: Britain, England, Jurisprudence, Law, Rowan Williams, Sharia | 5 Comments »
A repeated thread in the comments lately has been the claim that the reason the terrorists are mean to us is because we’re mean to them. If we behaved more “morally,” they would inevitably yield to our good example. My response to this kind of argument has always been the same (and I’ll quote from my own comment, because I’m too lazy to retype it):
Regarding Gandhi: His pacificism worked only because Britain was not a nation that was going to respond in a bloody, violent fashion. It wasn’t Gandhi’s morality that won India’s freedom, it was England’s. The same holds true for MLK’s non-violent protest. While the South may have had profound racist problems, it was the fact that America as a whole was a moral nation that his tactics work.
When one has an enemy that revels in blood and conquest, that makes no secret of its desire for world domination, and that is vocal in its hatred and disdain for you, whether that enemy is Nazi Germany, Iran, or your average Islamist, your restraint and morality is not only irrelevant, it is a red flag before that blood-thirsty bull.
Forbearance cannot be a one way street. If all the pacifistic forbearance is on one side, and all the violence on the other, you simply end up with a bunch of dead pacifists — and, worse, dead pacifists who have engendered the slaughter of everyone else unlucky enough to be yoked to their sides.
The question in any war isn’t just your own nature, it’s your enemies’ as well. As Mike Devx pointed out in the same comment thread, while the British were initially somewhat violent in their response to the Indian riots, they pulled back, sickened by their own violence. The opposite was true for the Germans. Their tentative forays into aggression in the 1930s against Jews, Communists, homosexuals and the mentally ill excited their blood lust. Rather than pulling back, they accelerated the killing, and became ever more murderous and creative in their brutality. What finally ended the blood soaked orgy in which they’d engaged for more than a decade wasn’t their own horror at what they’d done, but the fact that America, once roused, had the military might to destroy that regime.
With that in mind, you should read Aaron Klein’s Schmoozing With Terrorists: From Hollywood to the Holy Land, Jihadists Reveal Their Global Plans to a Jew! or, at the very least, read the American Thinker’s review about the book (from which I quote, below). As the book’s title indicates, Klein, an Orthodox Jew, was able to talk to Islamists all over the world and they spilled their ideological guts to him. These guts show that, contrary to MSM and Progressive claims, they don’t want to live peacefully by our sides, their primary goal isn’t simply to clear the US out of Saudi Arabia, and they’re not at all interested in adopting Western values:
The Arab Palestinian leaders with whom Klein spoke are very candid about their dreams not only to wipe out Israel, but to establish a worldwide caliphate. Their plans for American society should awaken anyone who thinks the Arab terrorists are only Israel’s problem. And it should also smack awake all the moral relativists who equate Israel’s security measures with hegemonic brutality.
A deputy commander of Fatah’s al Aqsa Martyrs Bridade, Nasser Abu Azziz, explained to Klein that when sharia law is imposed in Western countries, “these sick people [homosexuals] will be treated in a very tough way,” explaining that the Islamic leadership will “prevent social and physical diseases like homosexuality.” All the terrorists whom Klein interviewed agreed that homosexuality would not be tolerated in the US once Islam rules.
And homosexuality is not all they condemn. The failure of western women to conform to Islamic standards of dress will reap harsh responses including, if necessary, torture. Sheik Hamad, a Hamas cleric, said those women who refuse to cover themselves in conformity with Islamic values would be punished either by imprisonment, whipping or stoning. And we aren’t just talking about Madonna’s bustiers: under the standard described by Klein’s interviewees, even Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg — who does in fact wear a robe — would be a target for stoning. She’s omitted the head covering.
[snip]
Klein’s interviews show that Palestinian leaders have also, and repeatedly, perpetrated a vile hoax on their acolytes. The myth of the seventy-two virgins in paradise who await each martyr is a theme echoed and believed by those who extol and consider suicide bombing an option. Klein’s subjects do not explain how the appetite for virgins fits with the love of Allah as an incentive for becoming a suicide bomber.
When asked about the source for the promise of the seventy-two virgins, Ala Senakhreh, West Bank chief of Fatah’s Martyrs Brigade, insisted such a promise was made in the Koran. When pressed about where exactly that promise could be located, neither Senakhreh nor any of his dozen henchmen clerics present could find such a passage. After much anxious searching, the Sheik became increasing hostile and Klein quickly left. He had apparently discovered the point at which the terrorists’ hospitality collided with their refusal to be questioned closely about their ideological weapons.
These are not good people, and wishing will not make them so. As Mike Devx pointed out, they are the modern equivalent of Nazis, people who embrace murder both as a vehicle to achieve their social and political goals, and as a pleasant pastime. They can be stopped only by brute force, not by peaceful example. And because everything veers back into American politics right about now, that fact alone is a good reason to vote for McCain over Hillbama.
UPDATE: Just so you can see the faces of the enemies of Western civilization.
UPDATE II: I’ve switched to a new server, so you can feel free to look around here or check out my new site, which not only has the old stuff, but also will move forward into the future with all my new material.
Filed under: Islam, Muslim violence, Palestinians | 11 Comments »
In my post about Philip Roth, I pointed out that he characterizes Republicans as “brutal” (unlike Democrats, of course). I just saw the same theme crop up in an article about the insanity that promises to envelope Berkeley’s town council meeting on Tuesday as the town considers rescinding its ill-thought out letter to the Marines. To begin with, there may be a lot of people there:
Hundreds of protesters from across the country and the political spectrum are expected to descend on City Hall with bullhorns, drums, banners and plenty of vitriol in anticipation of the City Council’s debate over the Marines’ recruiting station in town.
The ruckus started last week when the council voted to send a letter to the Marines, calling them “unwanted intruders” for opening the recruiting center on Shattuck Avenue last year. At the same time, the council granted Code Pink a parking space and a sound permit to make it easier for the peace group to conduct protests outside the center.
On Monday, Councilwomen Betty Olds and Laurie Capitelli introduced an item for this week’s meeting, asking the city to retract its statements about the Marines and clarify that the city is against the war, not against the armed forces.
“We’re starting to get people coming in from all over the U.S.,” said Catherine Moy, executive director of Move America Forward, one of several pro-military groups planning an all-day protest Tuesday at Maudelle Shirek City Hall. “People are pretty upset. We want to avoid clashes, but it could be really, really big. We don’t really know what’s going to happen.”
In other words, conservatives want to be there to exercise their free speech rights and they want to keep it peaceful. But that’s not how liberals see the fellow-Americans they’ll be facing across the picket lines:
Peace groups, disgusted that the council would cave in to pressure from the pro-military groups, plan to host their own rally, an “emergency 24-hour peace-in vigil,” complete with singing, drums and dialogue.
“We want to protect our city from the onslaught of the right wing,” said Code Pink spokeswoman Zanne Joi. “We’re facing people who are willing to kill or send other people’s children to kill to get what they want. We understand the reality of that, and we’re prepared to face that in a nonviolent way.” (Emphasis mine.)
We’ve gone beyond Roth’s “brutes” into Code Pink’s killers. As I pointed out in that same Roth post, though, while violent rhetoric does emanate from both sides (the same article mentions the obligatory death threats), the trend has been for the violent acts to emanate from the left, not the right. I wonder what Tuesday will bring.
UPDATE: I’ve switched to a new server, so you can feel free to look around here or check out my new site, which not only has the old stuff, but also will move forward into the future with all my new material.
Filed under: Free speech | Tagged: Berkeley, Free speech, Political Violence | 5 Comments »
When Hillary cried the first time, it apparently humanized her for some. When she cried the second time, she began to look a little weak and self-centered. And now that she’s cried the third time (this time, wisely, for someone other than herself) it seems to me she’s feeding into the worst old-fashioned stereotypes of what happens when you place women in politics. This is starting to look like an old I Love Lucy episode only, instead of Lucy trying to wiggle out a tough spot with a sob and and “Oh, Ricky,” we’re getting Hillary doing dong the wiggling, with a pathetic “Oh, media! Look at me. I’m human.”
UPDATE: I’ve switched to a new server, so you can feel free to look around here or check out my new site, which not only has the old stuff, but also will move forward into the future with all my new material.
Filed under: Hillary Clinton | Tagged: Hillary Clinton | Leave a Comment »
I like my Pandora radio, and was sufficiently curious about one of the repeating ads for a new TV show, Eli Stone, to track it down. At the website, I discovered that if you’re an evil corporate attorney, but have a brain aneurysm that causes you to become a prophet, you magically transform into a radical liberal who goes after big drugs. Who knew?
UPDATE: I’ve switched to a new server, so you can feel free to look around here or check out my new site, which not only has the old stuff, but also will move forward into the future with all my new material.
Filed under: Hollywood | 3 Comments »
UNIFY ALL PRO-VICTORY REPUBLICAN IRAQ VETERANS RUNNING FOR CONGRESS IN 2008
Whether Soldier, Sailor, Airman, or Marine, we all shared a common goal in Iraq: victory. As Republican candidates for Congress we share a vision for America’s future, her security, and that of future generations. We are unified in our commitment to relieve the Democrats of their command of Congress.
Voters want to restore leadership and honor back to Washington. Who better to accomplish that mission than our generation of warriors?
All veterans whose service to the United States brought them first to Iraq and now to a run for the House as pro-victory Republicans are welcome to become part of Iraq Veterans For Congress.
United we are capable of sending to Congress a squad-size element of Iraq vets to keep us on offense in the War on Terror and counter calls for defeat.
In short, unification of all Republican Iraq Veterans will be a powerful force multiplier. By joining forces we will generate crucial nationwide grassroots support while sharing ideas and strategies.
If you’re interested in making this a “mission accomplished,” go here and help out in the main way that counts: money, although your enthusiasm and moral support will undoubtedly count too, and count a lot.
There are a lot of vets to choose from — maybe some in your district. I, of course, am represented by Lynn Woolsey, whose only virtue is that she’s ineffectual.
Hat tip: Democracy Project
UPDATE: I’ve switched to a new server, so you can feel free to look around here or check out my new site, which not only has the old stuff, but also will move forward into the future with all my new material.
Filed under: Congress | Tagged: Iraq Veterans for Congress | 5 Comments »
Prison officers are struggling to control a group of al-Qaeda terrorists who are clashing with other serious offenders in one of Britain’s high-security jails.
Frankland Prison, County Durham, holds an estimated 20 al-Qaeda members and sympathisers, serving long sentences for planning atrocities in the United Kingdom and abroad. They include Dhiren Barot, who was jailed for 30 years, and Omar Khyam, jailed for at least 20 years, for plotting to blow up the Bluewater shopping centre and the Ministry of Sound nightclub.
In recent weeks three disturbances have taken place at the prison. The Prison Officers Association (POA) said many of those involved had been moved to Frankland from Belmarsh Prison in London. ‘They don’t want to be in Frankland; they want to be in Belmarsh with their friends. They are getting more organised and want to be together in one place, which is scary,’ said Steve Gough, vice-chairman of the POA. (Emphasis mine.)
Gough warned that the increasing regularity of the disturbances was becoming a serious problem. ‘We are struggling to contain it,’ he said. ‘It’s having an effect on other prisoners.’
But don’t worry. It’s not just the jailers. The prisoners have their grievances, too. They say it’s not fair that their jailers are white:
Arani [an attorney for one of the Al Qaeda prisoners] added that 99 per cent of the staff at Frankland are of white origin: ‘This extreme imbalance across the board foments intolerance, racial hatred and white supremacist behaviour from a large percentage of inmates as well as some of the officers, too.’
What’s amazing is that the prisoners are still freely allowed to stir up trouble outside the walls, as well as in. Thus, Barot, who planned to blow up hundreds of people, is whining on websites:
In a lengthy email to an Islamist website, Barot recently outlined his concerns about what he called ‘oppressive conditions’ in Frankland. He said he was subject to three intensive cell searches in a fortnight and two visits to the segregation block in a week because he was suspected of having a mobile phone.
He said he had also been denied ’suitable’ Islamic literature and CDs.
‘Any time the prison feels that I may have found a “friend” that I may be “overly” socialising with, more often than not the individuals concerned are promptly shipped out to other establishments. Why? For irrational fear of “sermonising” or “talent-scouting”,’ Barot told Ummah.com. ‘Not only have I been subjected to mentally tortuous surroundings… but now physically, too, in order to break my psyche.’
You can read the rest here, but only if you want to depress yourself.
UPDATE: I’ve switched to a new server, so you can feel free to look around here or check out my new site, which not only has the old stuff, but also will move forward into the future with all my new material.
Filed under: England, Muslim violence | Tagged: Al Qaeda, England, Gaol, Islamists, Jail, Prisons | 3 Comments »
It appears that Toledo, Ohio — or, at least, the mayor in Toledo, Ohio — is giving Berkeley a run for its money:
Mayor Carty Finkbeiner on Friday ordered some 200 members of Company A, 1st Battalion, 24th Marines from Grand Rapids, Michigan, out of Toledo just before the unit was suppose to start a weekend of urban warfare training downtown.
The mayor’s spokesperson Brian Schwartz said, “the mayor asked them to leave because they frighten people. He did not want them practicing and drilling in a highly visible area.”
Toledo police said they knew about the training and had approved the unit’s use of the Madison Building and the Promenade Park area. The training was scheduled to start Friday afternoon and last until Sunday. Police said the unit’s presence would have a minimal impact on the city. Police issued a press release earlier in the week saying the marines would be wearing green camouflage uniforms, operate military vehicles, carry rifles, perform foot patrols, and fire blank ammunitiion during the exercise.
Schwartz said there was a breakdown in communication between police and the Finkbeiner administration that led to the mayor’s action.
“The marines drilled here three times during the Ford administration and once under the Finkbeiner administration. After the last visit, the mayor told then police chief Jack Smith, that he did not want the marines back. Smith failed to inform the current police administration of the mayor’s feelings,” Schwartz said.
NBC24 spoke to Jack Smith who recalled that after the marines last visit, he and the mayor had a heated exchange about the training.
“He told me he did not want them, as he put it, “playing war in Toledo’”, Smith recalled. I told him, as a former marine, “that if one young marine’s life is saved because of training he or she received in Toledo, Ohio, then it was worth the inconvenience.”
You the rest here.
It’s a fairly long and detailed article, that describes much of the horse trading surrounding the mayor’s ultimate decision. There’s really only one pertinent piece of information you won’t find in the article — the mayor’s political affiliation. If you are wondering, he’s a Democrat. He is, apparently, also something of a kook, which makes Toledo’s loyalty to him impressive. Even his accomplishments don’t seem to set off adequately the fact that the man is a loose cannon.
UPDATE: I’ve switched to a new server, so you can feel free to look around here or check out my new site, which not only has the old stuff, but also will move forward into the future with all my new material.
Filed under: Military, Silly Stuff | Tagged: Carty Finkbeiner, Marines, Toledo, USMC | 6 Comments »
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tagged: Racism | 27 Comments »
If Berkeley wants to secede from the United States, I’m willing to let it go. But as Senator Jim DeMint makes clear, that action of secession should bear a few minor consequences, such as the loss of all federal funds. If Berkeley wants to eat its cake, let it. But having dined in style on a rich cake made up of loony conspiracy theories and radical politics, it certainly shouldn’t be able to claim a subsequent entitlement to a nice, rich cake made of up of taxpayer cash:
Hat tip: Hot Air
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tagged: Berkeley | 6 Comments »
I have no comment for this one, ’cause you know what I’m thinking (not to mention the fact that I’ve already discussed this risk occurring long before the NY Times and the rest of the public figured it out):
Almost all biofuels used today cause more greenhouse gas emissions than conventional fuels if the full emissions costs of producing these “green” fuels are taken into account, two studies being published Thursday have concluded.
The benefits of biofuels have come under increasing attack in recent months, as scientists took a closer look at the global environmental cost of their production. These latest studies, published in the prestigious journal Science, are likely to add to the controversy.
These studies for the first time take a detailed, comprehensive look at the emissions effects of the huge amount of natural land that is being converted to cropland globally to support biofuels development.
The destruction of natural ecosystems — whether rain forest in the tropics or grasslands in South America — not only releases greenhouse gases into the atmosphere when they are burned and plowed, but also deprives the planet of natural sponges to absorb carbon emissions. Cropland also absorbs far less carbon than the rain forests or even scrubland that it replaces.
Together the two studies offer sweeping conclusions: It does not matter if it is rain forest or scrubland that is cleared, the greenhouse gas contribution is significant. More important, they discovered that, taken globally, the production of almost all biofuels resulted, directly or indirectly, intentionally or not, in new lands being cleared, either for food or fuel.
Read the rest here and repeat after me: ANWR.
Filed under: Climate change | Tagged: Biofuels, Climate change, Global Warming | 2 Comments »
The BBC presenter who was charged with rape was acquitted, when the judge concluded that there was no evidence of anything other than rough consensual sex (aided by admitted illegal drug use). The whole thing is sordid, sordid, sordid, and still stands for the principle I advanced when I first mentioned the trial, which is that the media is every bit as bad as Iowahawk said it is (using tried and true NY Times statistical techniques).
Filed under: BBC | Tagged: BBC | Leave a Comment »
If you suffer from migraines, read this from a fellow sufferer. You may well see yourself in the opinion piece, although I’m grateful that I never suffered migraines as severe as those that affected Ms. Hustvedt. Certainly, though, I suffered from the enough to make parts of my life really hellish, and had headaches with greater frequency than the author did, but I avoided the seizures! Migraines are a curse and sometimes the only relief is to know that you’re not alone.
Filed under: Health | Tagged: Migraine | 9 Comments »
We now know that the Gazans instant collapse into existential despair the last time Israel reduced their electricity flow was a carefully choreographed dance that served two purposes: it enabled Hamas to knock down the wall Egypt had built (a wall about which no one in the West ever complained) and it gave photo ops to the useful idiots in the Western press. It looks as if the whole grotesque dance is starting all over again:
Israel began reducing the amount of electricity it sells to Gaza as part of sanctions against continued rocket fire, Israeli officials said on Friday. The move prompted a warning from the United States not to “worsen the humanitarian situation” of the civilian population in Gaza, and was followed by the firing of yet more rockets at Israel by militants there.
Israel began reducing its electricity flow into the Gaza Strip by less than one percent late Thursday night. By Friday afternoon, 21 rockets had been launched against Israel, an Army spokeswoman said, with several landing in and around the Israeli border town of Sderot and in open areas south of Ashkelon, a larger Israeli coastal city north of the strip.
Israeli officials said the electricity had been cut by about one megawatt out of the 124 megawatts that Israel provides to Gaza, and that an additional megawatt could be cut each week depending on the security situation and the needs of the Gaza population. Israel said it would continue to provide the necessary minimum to prevent harm to the safety or health of the residents.
Has there ever been a time in the history of the world when Country A repeatedly states its wish to destroy Country B and then acts upon that wish, only to have Country B continue to keep vital material flowing into Country A? I’d like to say that it’s gotten to the point that Israel is too stupid to deserve the gift of national survival, but I won’t. It’s true that the Israelis, for reasons unclear to me, keep the amazingly ineffectual Olmert in office, and it is true that the Israeli peace movement could more aptly be named the National Suicide Pact, but there’s more to it than that.
The fact is, Israel inadvertently made a pact with devil when she began to rely. Because America is a necessary part of the Israeli war machine and the Israeli economy, Israel can’t afford to alienate her — that would be a suicidal act as sure as just opening the borders and letting in the Palestinians. So as long as the US has this bizarre “let’s make nice with your killers” attitude, Israel is completely handicapped. She cannot fight a war against her open enemies and, instead, ends up subsidizing them as they fight a war against her.
It always was a Catch-22, of course, because Israel could never have survived as long as she did without US aid. It’s like steroids I guess: first they make you stronger, then they destroy you.
UPDATE: While Israel is forced by world pressure to support her enemy, fellow Arabs have no such constraints. As James Taranto describes:
Arabs love Palestinians in the abstract–as a symbol of the putative evil of the hated Jews. But they’re not so crazy about Palestinians as actual human beings. Here is a prominent Egyptian who is so averse to Palestinians that even their money isn’t good enough for him.
Filed under: Hamas, Israel | Tagged: Gaza, Hamas, Israel, Palestinians | 7 Comments »
