The Democratic plan...

The left HAS a plan after all!!!........T

Is The New York Times' NSA Story the Next Memogate?

"Just think what you all will be missing...you won't have Dan Rather to kick around anymore..." The MSM is at it again...T
It seems like a common pattern lately. A mainstream media outlet publishes a bombshell story, and within days, the whole thing unravels quicker than a cheap sweater swarmed by kittens. Such is beginning to look like the case for The New York Times' eavesdropping controversy, which is showing a lot of wear and tear for its age.

Wednesday wasn't a very good day for the ongoing health of this story, or for members of the media hoping that the recent revelations concerning National Security Agency espionage tactics could lead to impeachment proceedings against President Bush.

The day started with a former member of the Clinton White House voicing strong words of support for the Bush administration?s behavior. In a Chicago Tribune op-ed entitled "President Had Legal Authority to OK Taps," former associate attorney general John Schmidt refuted media protestations concerning the illegality of the National Security Agency eavesdropping on American citizens who are in contact with known members of al Qaeda without a court order allowing it to do so:

"President Bush's post- Sept. 11, 2001, authorization to the National Security Agency to carry out electronic surveillance into private phone calls and e-mails is consistent with court decisions and with the positions of the Justice Department under prior presidents." Click here for full article

Have The Democrats Walked Into a Trap......Again?

They are in for the same fate they suffered in the 2002 midterm elections. Remember Bush flying from city to city, pounding the podium demanding that the Democrats "stop holding up the creation of the Homeland Security department over union quotas!"...T
Not recognizing the political ground had shifted beneath their feet, Democrats continued to press forward with their offensive against the President. They've now foolishly climbed out on a limb that Rove and Bush have the real potential to chop off. One would think that after the political miscalculations the Democrats made during the 2002 and 2004 campaigns they would not make the same mistake a third time, but it is beginning to look a lot like Charlie Brown and the football again.

First, the Democrats still do not grasp that foreign affairs and national security issues are their vulnerabilities, not their strengths. All of the drumbeat about Iraq, spying, and torture that the left thinks is so damaging to the White House are actually positives for the President and Republicans. Apparently, Democrats still have not fully grasped that the public has profound and long-standing concerns about their ability to defend the nation. As long as national security related issues are front page news, the Democrats are operating at a structural political disadvantage. Perhaps the intensity of their left wing base and the overwhelmingly liberal press corps produces a disorientation among Democratic politicians and prevents a more realistic analysis of where the country's true pulse lies on these issues.

With their publicly defeatist language, John Murtha, Nancy Pelosi and Howard Dean reinforce these "soft on security" steroretypes [sic], a weakness that more sober-minded Democrats have been trying to mitigate since the late 60's and 70's. . . .

One of the major problems working against Democrats is many on their side appear to be rooting for failure in Iraq and publicly ridicule the idea that we actually might win. When this impression is put in context of the debate over eavesdropping or the Patriot Act, Democrats run the significant risk of being perceived to be more concerned with the enemy's rights than protecting ordinary Americans. This is a loser for Democrats. Click here for full article

ANGRY BUSH: CONGRESS MEMBERS WERE BRIEFED ON EAVESDROPPING -- A DOZEN TIMES...

So now it is revealed that Bush not only proudly authorized the surveillance, but that Congress has been briefed, DOZENS OF TIMES! Here's an idea, Sen. Spector, Sen. Kennedy, et al...how about a special prosecutor to probe who LEAKED this?! how about charging the NY Times with leaking classified government secrets? If Valerie Plame, a desk warmer, is fodder for taking out members of the administration, than what about activity that could reasonably be interpreted as...Treason!? These pompous stuffed shirts go on camera feigning outrage, while all the time knowing full well that they not only knew of this program, but approved of it...SHAME, Sen. Specter, Shame! Hugh Hewett put it best:" ...The Senate, hobbled by a hard left Democratic Caucus, can't even renew the Patriot Act, which will now lapse at midnight on December 31, 2005 thanks to a Democrat-led filibuster.In less than eleven months the country will get to vote on what it believes about the priority that ought to attach to national security. The past month has revealed the true nature of the Democrats: committed to defeat and retreat in Iraq, open borders, and a crippled intelligence system. The collapse of the Democrats' credibility on national security is complete. It isn't a political party anymore. It is a suicide pact...T
Here are President Bush's remarks from his Saturday radio address, broadcast live, in total:

In the weeks following the terrorist attacks on our nation, I authorized the National Security Agency, consistent with U.S. law and the Constitution, to intercept the international communications of people with known links to al Qaeda and related terrorist organizations. Before we intercept these communications, the government must have information that establishes a clear link to these terrorist networks.
This is a highly classified program that is crucial to our national security. Its purpose is to detect and prevent terrorist attacks against the United States, our friends and allies. Yesterday the existence of this secret program was revealed in media reports, after being improperly provided to news organizations. As a result, our enemies have learned information they should not have, and the unauthorized disclosure of this effort damages our national security and puts our citizens at risk. Revealing classified information is illegal, alerts our enemies, and endangers our country.As the 9/11 Commission pointed out, it was clear that terrorists inside the United States were communicating with terrorists abroad before the September the 11th attacks, and the commission criticized our nation's inability to uncover links between terrorists here at home and terrorists abroad. Two of the terrorist hijackers who flew a jet into the Pentagon, Nawaf al Hamzi and Khalid al Mihdhar, communicated while they were in the United States to other members of al Qaeda who were overseas. But we didn't know they were here, until it was too late.
The authorization I gave the National Security Agency after September the 11th helped address that problem in a way that is fully consistent with my constitutional responsibilities and authorities. The activities I have authorized make it more likely that killers like these 9/11 hijackers will be identified and located in time. And the activities conducted under this authorization have helped detect and prevent possible terrorist attacks in the United States and abroad.
The activities I authorized are reviewed approximately every 45 days. Each review is based on a fresh intelligence assessment of terrorist threats to the continuity of our government and the threat of catastrophic damage to our homeland. During each assessment, previous activities under the authorization are reviewed. The review includes approval by our nation's top legal officials, including the Attorney General and the Counsel to the President. I have reauthorized this program more than 30 times since the September the 11th attacks, and I intend to do so for as long as our nation faces a continuing threat from al Qaeda and related groups.
The NSA's activities under this authorization are thoroughly reviewed by the Justice Department and NSA's top legal officials, including NSA's general counsel and inspector general. Leaders in Congress have been briefed more than a dozen times on this authorization and the activities conducted under it. Intelligence officials involved in this activity also receive extensive training to ensure they perform their duties consistent with the letter and intent of the authorization.
This authorization is a vital tool in our war against the terrorists. It is critical to saving American lives. The American people expect me to do everything in my power under our laws and Constitution to protect them and their civil liberties. And that is exactly what I will continue to do, so long as I'm the President of the United States.

The Mask Slips

"MSM for Dummies!" Get it here now! Think about this before you casually open a copy of the NY Times at the airport...T
"The past year has seen a spate of shocking statements revealing hatred and contempt for President Bush and his supporters on the part of important media figures who claim objectivity and sneer at conservatives unafraid to characterize themselves as such. Regrettably, we cannot credit a sudden outbreak of honesty for this phenomenon, and thereby anticipate improved news coverage from these folks. A pathology is at work.
A sudden loss of status and influence is a profound shock to most people who have spent their lives aimed at the acquisition and enjoyment of socio-political standing. Relieved of the ability to shape the consciousness and behavior of others, a certain number unburden themselves of the inner restraints which kept them from openly voicing the condescension and scorn they have for those whom they regard as their social, intellectual, and moral inferiors.
The rise of alternate media- talk radio, Fox News, and the internet - has not simply allowed competing voices to be heard in the public square, it has robbed many media grandees of the ultimate reward of their striving after careers as shapers of mass opinion. Some have become unbalanced mentally, and emotionally overwhelmed by the loss. They strike out with blind fury at their "enemies" (the subjects whom they have covered as "unbiased" journalists), and thereby let the mask of objectivity slip from their faces, revealing spiteful, arrogant and bigoted visages. By dismissing those who disagree with them as unworthy of consideration, they expose to light the long-hidden dark vision of the rest of humanity that enables them to regard themselves as worthy."... Click here for full article

I am shocked - shocked!

A great article in support of my contention of the 60 + year anti-Americanism of the Left...T
Thanks to CornetJim for this one!

Democratic Implosion

You see, it's the anti-Americanism which I keep returning to. They want high gas prices (to be more like Europe), military failure anywhere we try, higher taxes, more welfare, having wept openly after the fall of the Soviet Empire (wanting, as they do, to be more Canadian/European-like in everything we do), to be defeatist in all ways (including kicking our foreign policy over to the crooks at the UN). It is exactly this anti-Americanism that has defined the liberal establishment, propped up by their MSM pimps for 60 years, which is the central focus of this page...T
... "In the background, old Vietnam-era themes provide the chorus for the growing antiwar sentiment: apparent disdain for the Iraqis, mirroring the way that liberals pooh-poohed anti-Communist Eastern Europeans, Cubans, and Vietnamese; endemic pessimism that does not match the rapidly evolving events on the ground; and political opportunity that an American embarrassment abroad might reverse a long-term and ongoing unfavorable political realignment at home.
...Instead the war, as wars almost always do, has morphed into something quite different than expected ? a regional referendum on Lebanon, the future of Syria, reform movements in the Gulf and Egypt, about-faces in Pakistan and Libya, and continued pressure on a soon-to-be-nuclear Iran. And despite the heartbreak of 2,100 deaths, we are not just winning in Iraq, but on the verge of something far larger, and more permanent: not a return to the ancient caliphate or another dictatorship, but the real chance for the birth of a new Middle East that takes its place at last among responsible nations.
...Contrast the Democratic reactions to respective advice offered by Congressman Murtha and Senator Joe Lieberman. The former is a respected but not nationally known Democratic figure; the latter ran for the vice presidency of the United States. The Democrats gushed over Murtha?s bleak Dean-like assessment that the war is essentially lost and that we must leave as soon as possible. But then when a vote was called on the issue, they voted overwhelmingly not to follow the congressman?s prescription.

In contrast, when Lieberman returned from Iraq and gave a cautiously optimistically appraisal that our plan of encouraging elections, training Iraqis, and improving the Iraqi economy is working both inside Iraq and in the wider neighboring region, he was shunned by Democrats ? who nevertheless by their inaction essentially agreed with Lieberman and so made no move to demand an immediate withdrawal. How odd to be effusive over the Democrat whose advice you reject while ignoring the spokesman whose advice you actually follow."...
Click link for full article

The Mad King and the Crazy Left

Edited and reshaped a bit here (read the whole article!) This analysis of Liberalism is as intellectually sound as Chambers' "Witness" was on communism...T
There seems to be a refusal among liberals to believe in reality these days. It is as if an entire segment of the population has lost their collective minds. Just what is happening?

An entire segment of the population has lost its collective mind. According to author Phillip K. Dick, reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away. Using this benchmark to judge the sanity of the Left, it becomes apparent that they have, indeed, lost their cats-eyes and pearly whites. The modern Liberal is madder than a haberdasher at a Lewis Carroll tea party.

We see it in the refusal of the Left to accept the results of the elections of 2000 and 2004, of their unwillingness to believe they are not in power. We see it in the standing ovation given by many Democrats to Michael Moore`s insane propaganda, in the "all about Halliburton"/"Bush lied to get us into war" view of Iraq. We see it in the attempt to equate running the air conditioning at Gitmo with Saddam`s torture chambers.

Liberalism has been King for a very long time. Liberalism has been the driving force in the West since the 18th Century, and gained almost complete ascendancy in the 20th, where it reigned almost unchallenged from the 1930s until the 1980s. The power of the Left derived from its control of the dissemination of information, and leftists' understanding of the value of propaganda has always propelled their Kingship. They have come to consider their rule as being by Darwinian Right, and grew smug in their assurance of power. To their utter amazement, the reign of the left has come to an end, and like poor King George III (after losing the colonies) they are suffering an acute mental breakdown.

What has happened to the Left? Like Teddy Kennedy, they seem to have driven off the bridge of sanity into the dark waters of madness, becoming incapable of grasping the reality of the world around them. We see evidence of this everywhere we look these days; from Dan Rather`s insistence that his National Guard documents were valid even though forged, to Senator Joe Biden arguing on Meet the Press to bring Iran in to help with Iraqi reconstruction, to the Democrats' hope for a "Merry Fitzmas", in the deification of Cindy Sheehan, the mad rantings of Dick Durban, and the backstabbing of former President Jimmy Carter. We see it in the "wrong war in the wrong place at the wrong time" comments by John Kerry and by the stubborn refusal to accept that we are actually at war...(Click Here for Full Article)

We Surrender, Mon Dieu!

Watch the GOP "White Flag-Dean-Pelosi-Kerry" video by clicking this link.
"Retreat & Defeat", yeah, worked well for the French, too...but I forgot, this is "Vietnam"...T

Oh, how they want us to LOSE! Oh, how they hate America!...T 

Deep Thoughts, Parte Quatre

"Economic ignorance is to politicians what idle hands are to the devil. Both provide the workshop for the creation of evil."

Walter Williams

A Moral War

The project in Iraq can succeed, and leave its critics scrambling.
...I have refrained from posting some redundant (in my opinion) articles lately. Yes, Bush's inevitable comeback is proceeding apace, and yes, the economy, the courts, and the war are all in great shape, the MSM notwithstanding (who listens to THEM anymore, anyway?). This Article is THE exception, and it "says it all".Please read, in it's entirety, and save it for reference!......T
..."Zarqawi and the radical Islamicists are slowly being squeezed as only a war at their doorstep could accomplish...what Iraq did is ensure that al QaedaÂ's Sunni support is being coopted by democracy. Jordan, the terrorists' old ace in the hole that could always put a cosmetic face on its stealthy support for radicals, has essentially turned on Zarqawi and with him al Qaeda. Syria is under virtual siege and its border sanctuary now a killing zone. Bin Laden can offer very little solace from his cave. And somehow Islamists have alienated the United States, Europe, Russia, China, Australia, Japan, and increasingly Middle East democracies like those in Afghanistan, Turkey, and Iraq, and reform movements in Lebanon and Jordan.
...The Left now risks losing its self-proclaimed moral appeal. It had trashed the efforts in Iraq for months on end, demanded a withdrawal -- only recently to learn from polls that an unhappy public may also be unhappy with it for advocating fleeing while American soldiers are in harm's way. Another successful election, polls showing Iraqis overwhelmingly wishing us to stay on, visits by elected Iraqi officials asking continued help, and a decreasing American footprint will gradually erode the appeal of the antiwar protests -- especially as triangulating public intellectuals and pundits begin to quiet down, fathoming that the United States may win after all.

Deep Thoughts, Parte Trois

"Isn't asking a San Francisco Democrat for strategy on the war like asking David Duke for strategy on protecting the civil rights of blacks?"

When France Polls America...

L'OH ! mon seigneur ! Ce ne peut pas être vrai ! Ce ne peut pas être vrai ! le whoa est est !..................T
Apparently the US media are not the only ones interested in manipulating US public opinion by biased polls. The French are doing it, too! In an article called “When France Polls America…” John Rosenthal reports that the lowest scores for President Bush are consistently found by the “AP-Ipsos” poll. Who is Ipsos? It just happens to be Jacques Chirac’s favorite pollster.

There’s now a mounting pile of evidence for deliberate Anti-US media manipulation by France. This is just another layer of the pile.

The US may not need to try for regime change in Paris. French voters have a say

Call them what they are -- TRAITORS

Traitors they are! When dead Americans serve one's craven political goals!...T
"Senators Harry Reid, Dick Durbin and Ted Kennedy have accused President George W. Bush of lying about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, insisting that he 'lied us into war.' Some Demo wing nuts are even floating the idea of impeachment. Their charges have no substance, of course; they're merely contrived to keep Republicans off balance through next year's midterm elections. In other words, Democrat Party leaders are using the gravely serious matter of the Iraq War for trivial political fodder -- and their politicization of our mission there has put our Armed Forces in the region in greater peril.
Let's be clear: There is nothing wrong with honest criticism of an American president; to the contrary, we have written extensively about President Bush's policy failures. The dishonest and politically motivated accusations of Kennedy, Reid, Durbin and their ilk, however, are nothing short of -- and we don't use this term lightly -- treasonous. "

403 to 3. The "Sound and Fury, Signifying Nothing" Democrats.

This from Hugh Hewitt yesterday, exposing the hypocrisy of the democrats. Look for the next article for more details!...T

The Murtha proposal for immediate withdrawal from Iraq was defeated 403 to 3 last night. So much for the idea of cut and run.
Many Democrats were emotionally undon by the exercise of having to confront their own rhetoric, and the anti-war left must be stunned this morning: Only three votes? All that work? All those marches? All those posts at the fever swamp bulletin board? For three votes?
The Dems have more excuses than a teenager: It wasn't the real Murtha resolution; it's a terrible political trick; I will not participate in the assault on Congressman Murtha etc, etc, etc.
But the talk around the turkey this week should review that the elections in 2002, 2004 and the vote on Friday night in the House underscore the county is committed to victory in Iraq, in Afghanistan, and everywhere else the GWOT is being waged. That talk should also dwell on the profound hypocrisy of the left and its Congressional representatives, "full of sound and fury, signifying nothing." They only believe what they believe when the country as a whole isn't watching. Supermen on the web, when Congress assmebled they went into their phonebooths/cloakrooms and came out as Clark Kent.
The Democrats took their walloping last year and instead of resolving to return to D.C. as an opposition party that would work to craft alternatives to domestic policies while remaining supportive of the GWOT and of the troops, have spent a year digging deeper and deeper into anti-war conspiracy theories and committing themselves to Vietnam Syndrome 2.0. The GOP abetted their descent by failing to do what happened yesterday: Call them on their nonsense and debate it, in full view of the public, and not in MSM-mediated soundbytes.
The Chamber was full and the tempers high --as they should be when a great party confronts its opposite over a serious issue. The Democratic Party is committed to retreat, but they hate to be asked to defend that inclination. The Republicans are committed to victory, but seem hesitant because of the high costs of the war, even though the costs of retreat would be much higher still.
If the GOP stays the course of clarity, and keeps its purposes front and center, the elections of 2006 will be another milestone in the Democrats road to Whigdom.

Win the war.

Confirm the judges.

Cut the taxes.

Control the spending.

MSM Missing Headlines!

...A new feature highlighting all the (good) news that's (not) fit to print in the world of the MSM...T

“US jobless claims fall to lowest level in 7 months”

The indigenous "French Cheese-Eating Surrender Monkey". Notoriously Xenophobic & Racist, it has long existed only in areas consistently dominated and warred over by other species. Although once numerous, they are widely believed to be in an advanced state of extinction.... 

Deep Thougts, Parte Deux...

"I would rather have a German division in front of me than a French one behind me." —General George S. Patton

"The only time France wants us to go to war is when the German Army is sitting in Paris sipping coffee." —Regis Philbin

An old saying: Raise your right hand if you like the French.... Raise both hands if you are French.

"OH mon Dieu ! Nous nous rendons ! Nous nous rendons!"
Yeah, this is for real. When at google.com, after entering the search phrase, enter "I'm feeling lucky", and this is the result. THEN, click on "defeats"....and open a bottle of cognac. You'll be in for some bed-time reading!......T

Stampede

Is the GOP in disarray or has the party finally gotten its momentum back?
In the same vein as the article posted below...great reason for optimism!..............T
"ALMOST EXACTLY one year ago, President Bush was reelected with more votes than had ever been cast for a presidential candidate, breaking Ronald Reagan's 1984 record. Not only did Bush sweep to victory by a three million vote margin, the Republicans increased their majorities in both the House and the Senate, the first time this trifecta had been accomplished since the Lyndon Johnson landslide of 1964."
...Most important, there are signs that Bush's decline in the polls has bottomed out. Some of the polls showing precipitously declining support are obviously flawed, to such an extent as to suggest that they were designed to produce that result. Polls that are administered consistently over time are starting to show a significant rebound in the president's standing. In the >Rasmussen Poll, Bush's approval rating hit its nadir in October, but has rebounded steadily since. Currently, it stands at a respectable 46 percent. More important than the number, however, is the trend: There can be little doubt that the administration is on the upswing. In order of importance, at least three factors have brought the party's conservative base, and some other voters, back into the president's camp: his nomination of Judge Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court; his counter-attack against the Democrats on Iraq; and the dashing of the Democrats' hopes for Patrick Fitzgerald's investigation of the Valerie Plame "leak."

That thundering sound in the distance might be a solid phalanx of elephants, on the move once more.

Politics, Puerto Rico style

Keep an Eye turned for this Barone's analysis. He ALWAYS gets it right, the old fashioned way: he works the numbers, on the ground............T
Politics, Puerto Rico style by Michael Barone Nov 14, 2005:
...The 2005 elections suggest that we have the same kind of Puerto Rican style politics we've had since 1995-96. If so, turnout will decide the outcome in 2006...

"Let them eat cake, mon amie!"

Cheese Eating Surrender Monkeys

Time for a little history Lesson (courtesy of "CornetJim")........................T
"The French have been here before, of course. Seven-thirty-two. Not 7:32 Paris time, which is when the nightly Citroen-torching begins, but 732 A.D. -- as in one and a third millennia ago. By then, the Muslims had advanced a thousand miles north of Gibraltar to control Spain and southern France up to the banks of the Loire. In October 732, the Moorish general Abd al-Rahman and his Muslim army were not exactly at the gates of Paris, but they were within 200 miles, just south of the great Frankish shrine of St. Martin of Tours. Somewhere on the road between Poitiers and Tours, they met a Frankish force and, unlike other Christian armies in Europe, this one held its ground ''like a wall . . . a firm glacial mass,'' as the Chronicle of Isidore puts it. A week later, Abd al-Rahman was dead, the Muslims were heading south, and the French general, Charles, had earned himself the surname ''Martel'' -- or ''the Hammer.'' "

Should Bush Fire Rove?

Exactly.......Fight back hard, we have the truth as our strongest ally......T
...No...Between the 2000 election and the 2004 election, Rove became the master of polarization politics. And now, with this year's ill-fated experiment in trying to govern from the middle surely over, polarization along ideological and party lines is a fact of life. Ethics classes won't ameliorate Democratic hostility to Bush. Nor will firing Rove. In fact, throwing Rove overboard--dropping the political adviser who has been with Bush during his past comebacks and greatest triumphs--will increase the sense of a White House in disarray and retreat.

...Keeping Rove; being unapologetic about the war; explaining why Saddam had to be removed, that there were terror ties between Saddam and al Qaeda, and why the war needs to be seen through to victory; fighting for Alito, and other well-qualified conservative judges at the appellate level; advancing pro-growth, pro-family tax reforms--this agenda won't enamor Bush to liberals. But it could lay the groundwork for a Bush comeback. The alternative is three long years of ducking, dodging--and defeat...

Deep Thoughts...

"We went to war because Bill Clinton told the truth. The Dems would now have us believe that we ought to consider everything Mr Clinton said was a lie. If Mr Bush lied, it was because he relied on the lies of Mr Clinton. Presidents rely on each other when it comes to protecting the homeland.
There you go. Said about as succinctly as can be said. Either Bill Clinton told the truth about WMD, and Bush believed him. Or he lied about WMD, and Bush believed him."

Liberal Democrats, So Hypocritical

Print it, frame it, carry it in your pocket, learn it! (And read "Witness" once more...). They are NOT just moronic, they are, in their hearts, traitors...and they have been for 70 years...T
"Conservatives are rolling their eyes watching the political left's outrage over the Valerie Plame identity controversy, wondering when it was exactly that liberals suddenly became the super patriots defending the virtues of the CIA. For a half-century the American political left has done everything in its power to undermine the national security of this country. Now we are to believe, as they wring their hands in agony and outrage - outrage, I say! - over Ms. Plame's outing, that they...care? This goes beyond rank hypocrisy. It is intellectual dishonesty.
Let's visit the left's record on national security matters. History is not kind. Where was the left when the Rosenbergs, communists both, fed our nuclear secrets to the Soviet Union? Both were deep-fried for the treason they'd committed. Liberals tut-tutted then and tut-tut now, and don't tell me there aren't hardened leftists who favored giving nuclear weapons to the Soviets to thwart what they considered America's imperial ambitions. What of Alger Hiss, another Soviet spy who also committed treason against his country? To this day he remains a darling of the political left. Up until the moment he died he was the left's poster child for American national security oppression."
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The Left's Cruelest Month

The recovery has been swift, complete and stunning.............T
"OCTOBER, 2005 will turn out to be the left's cruelest month since . . . well, in a long time. A couple of weeks in, it seemed so promising. October was going to be the month that would mark the meltdown of the loathed Bush presidency. Iraq was failing, gas prices were rising, a weak Supreme Court nominee was under assault, and the White House was under siege from a special prosecutor. What more could a Bush-hater want?
But it was a false dawn for the left."...

Democrats' Desperation

No Fitzmas?!! Bwahh!, Wahh! Bwahhah!!!! ..............T
With Democrats' efforts to criminalize policy differences over Iraq having failed, they have turned in desperation to politics, led by Harry Reid, the Senate's minority leader. First, over the weekend, Reid demanded the resignation of Karl Rove, the White House's deputy chief of staff. By this logic, Reid also should resign, since he, like Rove, has not been indicted.
Then yesterday, Reid and Sen. Dick Durbin engineered a partisan publicity stunt. The Associated Press describes it:
Democrats forced the Republican-controlled Senate into an unusual closed session Tuesday, questioning intelligence that President Bush used in the run-up to the war in Iraq and accusing Republicans of ignoring the issue.
"They have repeatedly chosen to protect the Republican administration rather than get to the bottom of what happened and why," Democratic leader Harry Reid said. . . .
Democrats sought assurances that Intelligence Committee Chairman Pat Roberts of Kansas would complete the second phase of an investigation of the administration's prewar intelligence.
After about two hours, senators returned to open session having appointed a six-member task force--three members from each party--to review the committee's progress and report back to their respective leaders by Nov. 14.
Democratic senators are transparently playing to the party's moonbat base, who've been taunting them for years demanding that they "stand up" to the Bush administration and who were demoralized when they didn't get the indictment for the war that they wanted for "Fitzmas"--the Angry Left nickname for the day indictments were handed up in the Valerie Plame kerfuffle.
The problem with such base-rallying stunts is that they rally the other side's base too. President Clinton, an advocate of free trade, capital punishment and welfare reform, was never popular with the hard left of the Democratic Party, but they were his most fervent defenders once impeachment was on the table.
President Bush has just had a rough month with his political base; the Harriet Miers misstep brought to the surface disagreements over other matters such as spending and immigration. He repaired much of the damage with the excellent appointment of Sam Alito on Monday, and the Democrats now look to be finishing the job for him.
Republicans should welcome anything that rallies the bases of both parties, for two reasons. First, the Republican base is bigger (see election results, 2004). Second, the Democratic base is totally insane. These people are now, according to the Village Voice, touting Cindy Sheehan for president. Democrats love to mock the Republican base for believing the Bible is true. Democratic basemen believe "Fahrenheit 9/11" is true!
Searchlight's Harry Reid, who backed Iraq's liberation, may not be the brightest bulb on the Fitzmas tree, but surely even he is smart enough that he doesn't believe all this nonsense about how BUSH LIED!!!! Indeed, like John Kerry*, who also knows better, Reid is reduced to incoherence in trying to explain his putative position, as quoted by Fox News: "We know that there were no [weapons of mass destruction] now in Iraq. We didn't know it at the time. We know now that we didn't know at the time that there was no Al Qaeda connection. We know now that we didn't know then that there was no 9/11 connection. We know now that they had no plan for winning the peace. We didn't know that at the time." (Durbin, on the other hand, seems to be a true believer, to judge by his apparently sincere comparison of American soldiers to Nazis.)
Blogger Marshall Wittmann, a McCain Republican turned moderate Democrat, notes that pandering to the tinfoil-hat crowd carries dangers beyond a reinvigorated GOP base:
Will the American people have faith in and trust a party that claims that it was gullibly duped, or as George Romney claimed about another war--that it was "brainwashed"? Moreover, should the objective be re-fighting the reasons to go to war and making the Democrats the official anti-war party or should the goal be achieving reasonable success in Iraq? If you believe in the former than you would encourage more efforts like the one Senate Democrats undertook yesterday. If you believe in the latter, you want the opposition party to present a better plan for winning this war.
While the war is increasingly unpopular, the Democrats should be careful that they are positioning themselves as a party that is gullible, feckless and indecisive on national security.
The Angry left is right about one thing, though: Democratic politicians are wimps. After all, they won't even stand up to the Angry Left.
* The haughty, French-looking Massachusetts Democrat, who by the way has not been indicted for war crimes in Vietnam.

Nobody Does it Better...la-la-lala-la...

Printed here in it's entirety..too funny to breathe, too true not to sob...if only W. could speak with such force...........T
Fighting words: Calling Galloway's Bluff. The Senate uncovers a smoking gun.
By Christopher Hitchens
Just before my last exchange with George Galloway, which occurred on the set of Bill Maher's show in Los Angeles in mid-September, I was approached by a representative of the program and asked if I planned to repeat my challenge to Galloway on air. That challenge—would he sign an affidavit saying that he had never discussed Oil-for-Food monies with Tariq Aziz?—I had already made on a public stage in New York. Maher's producers had been asked, obviously by a nervous Galloway, to find out whether I had brought such an affidavit along with me. I replied that this was not necessary, since his public denial to me was on the record and had been broadcast, and since it further confirmed the apparent perjury that he had committed in front of the U.S. Senate on May 17, 2005. I added that I wanted no further contact with Galloway until I could have the opportunity of reviewing his prison diaries.
That day has now been brought measurably closer by the publication of the report of the Senate's Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. This report, which comes with a vast archive of supporting material, was embargoed until 10 p.m. Monday and contains the "smoking gun" evidence that Galloway, along with his wife and his chief business associate, were consistent profiteers from Saddam Hussein's regime and its criminal exploitation of the "Oil for Food" program. In particular:
1) Between 1999 and 2003, Galloway personally solicited and received eight oil "allocations" totaling 23 million barrels, which went either to him or to a politicized "charity" of his named the Mariam Appeal.
2) In connection with just one of these allocations, Galloway's wife, Amineh Abu-Zayyad, received about $150,000 directly.
3) A minimum of $446,000 was directed to the Mariam Appeal, which campaigned against the very sanctions from which it was secretly benefiting.
4) Through the connections established by the Galloway and "Mariam" allocations, the Saddam Hussein regime was enabled to reap $1,642,000 in kickbacks or "surcharge" payments.
(For a highly readable explanation of how the Oil-for-Food racket actually worked, see the Adobe Acrobat file on the site www.hitchensweb.com prepared by my brilliant comrade Michael Weiss and distributed as a leaflet outside the debate in New York.)
These and other findings by the subcommittee, which appear to demonstrate beyond doubt that Galloway lied under oath, are supported by one witness in particular whose name will cause pain in the Galloway camp. This is Tariq Aziz, longtime henchman of Saddam Hussein and at different times the foreign minister and deputy prime minister of the Baathist dictatorship. Galloway has often referred in moist terms to his friend Aziz, and now this is his reward. I do not think—in case anyone tries such an innuendo—that there is the smallest possibility that Aziz's testimony was coerced. For one thing, he was confronted by Senate investigators who already knew a great deal of the story and who possessed authenticated documents from Iraqi ministries. For another, he continues, through his lawyers, to deny what is also certainly true, namely that he personally offered a $2 million bribe to Rolf Ekeus, then the head of the U.N. weapons inspectors.
The critical person in Galloway's fetid relationship with Saddam's regime was a Jordanian "businessman" named Fawaz Zureikat, who was involved in a vast range of middleman activities in Baghdad and is the chairman of Middle East Advanced Semiconductor Inc. It was never believable, as Galloway used to claim, that he could have been so uninformed about Zureikat's activities in breaching the U.N. oil embargo. This most probably means that what we now know is a fraction of what there is to be known. But what has been established is breathtaking enough. A member of the British Parliament was in receipt of serious money originating from a homicidal dictatorship. That money was supposed to have been used to ameliorate the suffering of Iraqis living under sanctions. It was instead diverted to the purposes of enriching Saddam's toadies and of helping them propagandize in favor of the regime whose crimes and aggressions had necessitated the sanctions and created the suffering in the first place. This is something more than mere "corruption." It is the cynical theft of food and medicine from the desperate to pay for the palaces of a psychopath.
Taken together with the scandal surrounding Benon Sevan, the U.N. official responsible for "running" the program, and with the recent arrest of Ambassador Jean-Bernard Mérimée (France's former U.N. envoy) in Paris, and with other evidence about pointing to big bribes paid to French and Russian politicians like Charles Pasqua and Vladimir Zhirinovsky, what we are looking at is a well-organized Baathist attempt to buy or influence the member states of the U.N. Security Council. One wonders how high this investigation will reach and how much it will eventually explain.
For George Galloway, however, the war would seem to be over. The evidence presented suggests that he lied in court when he sued the Daily Telegraph in London over similar allegations (and collected money for that, too). It suggests that he lied to the Senate under oath. And it suggests that he made a deceptive statement in the register of interests held by members of the British House of Commons. All in all, a bad week for him, especially coming as it does on the heels of the U.N. report on the murder of Rafik Hariri, which appears to pin the convict's badge on senior members of the Assad despotism in Damascus, Galloway's default patron after he lost his main ally in Baghdad.
Yet this is the man who received wall-to-wall good press for insulting the Senate subcommittee in May, and who was later the subject of a fawning puff piece in the New York Times, and who was lionized by the anti-war movement when he came on a mendacious and demagogic tour of the country last month. I wonder if any of those who furnished him a platform will now have the grace to admit that they were hosting a man who is not just a pimp for fascism but one of its prostitutes as well.

(Gotta remember that quote!......................T)

The difficulty of intellectually engaging the Left

...Sigh....I found this to be true as far back as my college days, at IU, in 1979.......T
One of the more appealing aspects about being on the Left is that you do not necessarily have to engage your opponents in debates over the truth or falsehood of their positions. You can simply dismiss your opponent as "anti."
Anti-worker: It all began with Marxism. If you opposed communism or socialism, you were not merely anti-communist or anti-socialist, you were anti-worker. This way of dismissing opponents of leftist ideas is now the norm. Anyone, including a Democrat, who raises objections to union control of state and local politics is labeled anti-worker: "anti-teacher," "anti-firefighter," "anti-nurse," etc. This is how the unions are fighting California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's attempts to rein in unauthorized union spending of members' dues to advance leftist political goals. He is depicted as an enemy of all these groups.
...Anti-peace: The very fact that anti-war and "peace" activists have labeled themselves "pro-peace" and "anti-war" renders their opponents vulnerable to charges of opposing peace and even loving war. Again, no intellectual argument is needed. According to much left-wing rhetoric, those who support the war in Iraq do not love peace. Of course, there was no peace in Iraq prior to the American deposing of Saddam Hussein, and there would be far more bloodshed if America now left Iraq. But it is far harder to engage those arguments than to label those who make them "anti-peace."
...The "anti" arguments are effective. Conservatives have to spend half their time explaining that they are not bad people before they can be heard. But the Left has paid a great price. Because they have come to rely so heavily on one-word dismissals of their opponents, they have few arguments.

Criminalizing politics

It's clear to all that this is a fraudulent witch hunt. It's speaks volumes, however, of the power still held by the MSM..........................T
"WASHINGTON -- Last Wednesday afternoon after Tom DeLay's indictment was announced, the caterwauling began among House Republicans about their own decision of Jan. 3. By reinstating a rule that a party leader must resign if indicted, Republican House members complained, they had placed a gun in the hand of a Democratic district attorney frantic to use it."
...The decision to reinstate the resignation requirement was the subject of Wednesday's closed-door conference of House Republicans. Rep. Steve Buyer of Indiana declared that the Jan. 3 decision had empowered Earle. He complained that moderate members of the conference had forced the reinstatement. Rep. Tom Feeney of Florida said it was like putting a red cape in front of a bull...
The party pressure on Earle to indict (Senator Kay Bailey) Hutchison was dwarfed by demands that he put DeLay in the dock. Texas Democratic politicians could not forgive DeLay for demolishing their last vestige of power in what has become a heavily Republican state: the gerrymandered congressional delegation. Earle impaneled five grand juries before finding a sixth to indict DeLay on a flimsy charge of conspiracy in financing his redistricting initiative. As recently as two weeks before the indictment, Earle was signaling that prosecution of DeLay was unlikely. According to Texas sources, Democratic leaders made clear this was simply unacceptable...
That most of Earle's prosecutorial targets have been Democrats does not mean he is a straight shooter. A majority consisted of routine cases, but the big ones were tainted by politics. Earle lost a 1985 case against State Attorney General Jim Mattox, a political rival who accused the DA of using the case as a "stepping stone." His 1992 prosecution that drove Texas House Speaker Gib Lewis out of public life was viewed in political circles as a hit job influenced by Gov. Ann Richards. Earle investigated but never brought an indictment against Lt. Gov. Bob Bullock, who once called the prosecutor "a little boy playing with matches."

Decline and fall

Oh my......It's hit outa da ballpark here! This should serve to remind us, that once this "news cycle" has passed, the political and historic tides remain heavily in our favor...........T
The sinister character Noah Cross in the movie Chinatown memorably claimed that "Politicians, ugly buildings, and whores all get respectable if they last long enough." Representative John Dingell of Michigan, unfortunately, disproves the maxim.
Rep. Dingell is soon to celebrate his 50th anniversary in Congress, a milestone even more striking when one considers that he succeeded his father in holding the seat. But to my intense sorrow, a man I once admired and liked has been dragged down by his party. Once an iconoclastic advocate for causes, like gun rights, dear to hearts of his constituents, he has been reduced to political hackery of the lowest sort. The arc of his career parallels the tragedy of the Democratic Party.
...Dingell's long career in the House square with the modus operandi of the Democratic Party: doing and saying anything in defense of anyone, no matter how criminal, for the sake of holding on to power, while simultaneously working to deny the most basic civil rights and privileges to those citizens whom they claim to defend. The present face of the Democratic Party is a sorry spectacle indeed and while it would have been difficult to say it just a few years ago, there is little to no difference today between the dean of the House and Howard Dean.

Spurning America

These next two columns represent a two pronged attack on America as an Idea, and as a society. They reveal treachery bordering on treason. Pleas read them, and you may never feel the same again..............T
"Most Americans feel a shiver when they hear 'The Star-Spangled Banner' played and reflect on the triumphs and tragedies that those serving under that flag have won and suffered over more than 200 years. You're part of something larger than yourself.
But not all of us cherish ties to past traditions. 'America's business, professional, intellectual and academic elites,' writes Samuel Huntington in his 2004 book, 'Who Are We?' have 'attitudes and behavior (that) contrast with the overwhelming patriotism and nationalistic identification with their country of the American public. ... They abandon commitment to their nation and their fellow citizens, and argue the moral superiority of identifying with humanity at large.' "
...This gap is something new in our history. Franklin Roosevelt spoke fluent French and German and worked to create the United Nations, but no one doubted that his allegiance was to America above all. Most Harvard professors in the 1940s, 1950s and early 1960s felt a responsibility to help the United States prevail against its totalitarian enemies.
But in the later stages of the Vietnam War -- a war begun by elite liberals -- elites on campuses began taking an adversarial posture toward their own country. Later, with globalization, a transnational mindset grew among corporate and professional elites. Legal elites, too: Some Supreme Court justices have taken to citing foreign law as one basis for interpreting the U.S. Constitution.
... "A nation's morale and strength derive from a sense of the past," argues historian Wilfred McClay. Ties to those who came before -- whether in the military, in religion, in general patriotism -- provide a sense of purpose rooted in history and tested over time. Secular transnational elites are on their own, without a useful tradition, in constructing a morality to help them perform their duties.
Most Americans sense they need such ties to the past, to judge from the millions buying books about Washington, Adams, Hamilton, Jefferson and other Founding Fathers. We Americans are lucky to live in a country with a history full of noble ideas, great leaders and awe-inspiring accomplishments. Sadly, many of our elites want no part of it.

Criminalizing Conservatives

The "Last March of the Left and the MSM has begun. It's gonna get ugly. Fight fire with fire!.........T
Fall of 2005 will be remembered as a time when it became clear that a strategy of criminalization had been implemented to inflict defeat on conservatives.
...Why are conservative Republicans, who control the executive and legislative branches of government for the first time in living memory, so vulnerable to the phenomenon of criminalization? Is it simple payback for the impeachment of Bill Clinton? Or is it a reflection of some deep malady at the heart of American politics? If criminalization is seen to loom ahead for every conservative who begins successfully to act out his or her beliefs in government or politics, is the project of conservative reform sustainable?
We don't pretend to have all the answers, or a solid answer even to one of these questions. But it's a reasonable bet that the fall of 2005 will be remembered as a time when it became clear that a comprehensive strategy of criminalization had been implemented to inflict defeat on conservatives who seek to govern as conservatives. And it is clear that thinking through a response to this challenge is a task conservatives can no longer postpone

Freeh at last!

Wow!!! God above, how I wish this man had been elected to the Senate in 94. What a breath of fresh air he would be in that stale, corrupt Oligarchy!.....................T
"Freeh believes Clinton abused the office in numerous ways. 'Bill Clinton and his lawyers seemed to be inventing some new executive privilege every fifteen minutes or so,' he writes. Freeh also takes great exception with Clinton's use of the president's power to pardon.
'I look back now on the 177 pardons and commutations Clinton issued as his final act of office, and I'm still stunned by the fact that neither the FBI nor the attorney general of the Department of Justice was ever consulted about a single one of them ... Just as he had tainted the concept of executive privilege through his frequent and inventive use of it, so Clinton now tainted the old and honorable tradition of presidential mercy by his inability to rein in his own instincts, by his penchant for excess.'
Freeh says he stayed on as FBI Director longer than he might have because he didn't want Clinton to name his successor. He says he came to that conclusion after the Khobar Towers bombing in Saudi Arabia in 1996, which killed 19 U.S. servicemen. In order to investigate, the bureau needed Saudi cooperation to get to the right witnesses. But only a personal request from Clinton to Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah would make it happen.
'Bill Clinton briefly raised the subject only to tell the crown prince that he certainly understood the Saudi's reluctance to cooperate. Then,' according to Freeh, 'he hit Abdullah up for a contribution to the still-to-be-built Clinton presidential library.'
Then six weeks after the bombing, Freeh reports that evidence was gathered that 'showed almost beyond a doubt that the Khobar Tower attacks had been sanctioned, funded and directed by senior officials of the government of Iran.' The evidence was taken to Clinton's national security advisor Sandy Berger, and upon reviewing it asked Freeh, "Who knows about this?" Instead of acting upon what had been learned, Freeh says, Berger devised a plan to prevent the evidence from leaking out.
Despite this wholesale indictment, the so-called mainstream media is not listening. If they are not attacking Freeh, they are ignoring him. But the public isn't. Sales of Freeh's book are brisk. The store at which my copy was purchased had dozens of copies already reserved and eager readers standing in line. Readers won't even have to finish the first chapter before they realize that a presidential legacy is a terrible thing to waste.

Mutiny of the bored

Ouch.....but think about it! It fits like a glove....................T
WASHINGTON -- To the excitement of all Washington, the hullabaloo over President George W. Bush's nomination of Harriet E. (and you can be sure the Senate Judiciary Committee will get to the bottom of this mysterious "E" in due course) Miers builds, picking up wails and execrations daily. What makes the excitement so irresistible is that conservatives have now joined with liberals in fuming over the president's judicial nominee. Well, as the philosopher Samuel Goldwyn was wont to say, "include me out." This hullabaloo is but another piece of evidence in support of my long held view that the greatest unsung force in history is boredom. Yes, the rise and fall of nations, the comings and goings of eminences and fads, can be attributed to the seven deadly sins, to mere chance, or to a potentate dallying too long over lunch. But more often than the historians would have us know mere boredom has been the yeast for great events. At some point in every president's life, especially as his presidency ages, he finds himself in a sticky wicket because the politically engaged have become bored.
...On the face of it none of this will happen. The conservatives have every right to be disappointed that a seasoned conservative of superlative intellect was not nominated by the president. But they are not going to throw the nominating process into chaos or rather into the control of primitive partisans such as Senator Patrick Leahy.
Washington's yearning for excitement is what actuates this hullabaloo. It also actuates the press's incessant coverage of it. This town is easily bored and boredom often sets in motion some of history's most frivolous events. Think back. Was it not general boredom that accounted for the election of Bill Clinton over the perfectly normal President George H. W. Bush?

Allah, Ahkbar!..............(please send check to HillaryPac2008)............T (Thank you, again, CornetJim, for this post!

Seized Letter Outlines Al Qaeda Goals in Iraq

Chillingly lays out the goals and strategy of the Islamo-Fascist movement. These facts cannot be contested. Any reasonable person cannot dispute the motives of our enemy, and hence, the critical importance of our mission in Iraq. Their goal is an Islamic Empire stretching from Indonesia to Spain, and eventually to include North America. Sound familiar, Trotskyites?!....................T
Al Qaeda's top deputy urged the leader of his Iraq branch in July to prepare for the inevitable U.S. withdrawal by carrying out political as well as military actions...Invoking the specter of the United States abruptly abandoning Iraq as it did to Vietnam, Zawahiri counseled immediate political action: "We must take the initiative and impose a fait accompli upon our enemies, instead of the enemy imposing one on us."
...Zawahiri urged Zarqawi in the letter to change that formula and refocus on politics. When the United States leaves, al Qaeda must be ready to claim as much territory politically in the inevitable void that will arise, he writes. Zawahiri called that stage the setting up of an "emirate," in as much of Sunni-dominated Iraq as possible, to be followed by the longer-term goal of a "caliphate," reuniting the historical Islamic empire centered in modern-day Egypt, Lebanon and Israel.

I see 60 Minutes did an "Agitprop" piece on Elian Gonzales. Comrad Fidel must be proud. Vive la Reagan Revolucion!................T

Only funny because it's true!...........T 

Ronnie Earle Should Not Be a Prosecutor

This excerpt says it all. Imagine, if you will. After what Clinton was able to do to Ken Starr, what they would do to Ronnie Earle if the tables were turned. We need to fight back aggressively........T
The abuses of power in the Tom DeLay case should offend Democrats and Republicans alike.
"If there is one thing liberals and conservatives ought to be able to agree on, it is this: Ronnie Earle, district attorney of Travis County, Texas, has no business wielding the enormous powers of prosecution.
One thing is sure, though, and it ought to make anyone who cares about basic fairness angry. The investigation of DeLay, a matter of national gravity is being pursued with shocking ethical bankruptcy by the district attorney -- by Ronnie Earle

And Ronnie Earle has flouted it in embarrassing, mind-numbingly brazen ways.
As Byron York has been reporting on NRO (see here, here, and here), Earle has partnered up with producers making a movie, called The Big Buy, about his Ahab's pursuit of DeLay. A movie about a real investigation? Giving filmmakers access to investigative information while a secret grand-jury probe is underway? Allowing them to know who is being investigated and why? To view proposed indictments even before the grand jury does? Allowing them into the sanctuary of the grand jury room, and actually to film grand jurors themselves? Creating a powerful incentive -- in conflict with the duty of evenhandedness -- to bring charges on flimsy evidence? For a prosecutor, these aren't just major lapses. They are firing offenses. For prosecutors such as those I worked with over the years, from across the political spectrum, I daresay they'd be thought firing-squad offenses.
Attending partisan fundraisers in order to speak openly about an ongoing grand jury investigation against an uncharged public official. As a moneymaking vehicle.
Penning a nakedly partisan op-ed (in the New York Times on November 23, 2004) about the political fallout of his grand-jury investigation of DeLay, then uncharged.
Settling cases by squeezing businesses to make hefty financial contributions to pet personal causes in exchange for exercising the public's power to dismiss charges.
Secretly shopping for new grand juries when, despite the incalculable advantages the prosecution has in that forum, the earlier grand jurors have found the case too weak to indict.
Ignoring the commission by members of his own party of the same conduct that he seeks to brand felonious when engaged in by members of the other party.
Such actions and tactics are reprehensible. They constitute inexcusably dishonorable behavior on the part of a public servant, regardless of whether the persons and entities investigated were in the wrong. They warrant universal censure.
If Congressman DeLay did something illegal, he, like anyone else, should be called to account. But he, like anyone else, is entitled to procedural fairness, including a prosecutor who not only is, but also appears to be, fair and impartial.
Ronnie Earle is not that prosecutor. He has disgraced his profession, and done grievous disservice to thousands of federal, state, and local government attorneys. Prosecutors of all persuasions whose common bond is a good faith commitment to the rules -- but who will now bear the burden of suspicions fostered by Earle's excesses.
The burden, but not the cost. That will be borne by the public."
-- Andrew C. McCarthy, a former federal prosecutor, is a senior fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies.

Don't misunderestimate Miers

Easy now, breathe in, breathe out. Breathe in, breathe out....there, that's better!....T
President Bush is a politician trained in strategic thinking at Harvard Business School, and schooled in tactics by experience and advice, including the experience and advice of his father, whose most lasting political mistake was the nomination of David Souter. The nomination of Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court shows that he has learned his lessons well. Regrettably, a large contingent of conservative commentators does not yet grasp the strategy and tactics at work in this excellent nomination.
There is a doom-and-gloom element on the Right which is just waiting to be betrayed, convinced that their hardy band of true believers will lose by treachery those victories to which justice entitles them. They are stuck in the decades-long tragic phase of conservative politics, when country club Republicans inevitably sold out the faith in order to gain acceptability in the Beltway media and social circuit. Many on the right already are upset with the President already over his deficit spending, and his continued attempts to elevate the tone of politics in Washington in the face of ongoing verbal abuse by Democrats and their media allies. They misinterpret his missing verbal combativeness as weakness.
There is also a palpable hunger for a struggle to the death with hated and verbally facile liberals like Senator Chuck Schumer. Having seen that a brilliant conservative legal thinker with impeccable elite credentials can humble the most officious voices of the Judiciary Committee, they demand a replay.

...A Tale of Two Cities...................T 

Anti-War, My Foot

Really, I thought winning the Cold War & 2 Reagan landslides had put these fools out of business.....keep dreaming, fruitcakes! Vietnam is never, ever coming back! Get a job! Cut your hair!.....................T
The phony peaceniks who protested in Washington. By Christopher Hitchens.
Saturday's demonstration in Washington, in favor of immediate withdrawal of coalition forces from Iraq, was the product of an opportunistic alliance between two other very disparate "coalitions." Here is how the New York Times described the two constituenciess of the event:
"The protests were largely sponsored by two groups, the Answer Coalition, which embodies a wide range of progressive political objectives, and United for Peace and Justice, which has a more narrow, antiwar focus."
The name of the reporter on this story was Michael Janofsky. I suppose that it is possible that he has never before come across "International ANSWER," the group run by the "Worker's World" party and fronted by Ramsey Clark, which openly supports Kim Jong-il, Fidel Castro, Slobodan Milosevic, and the "resistance" in Afghanistan and Iraq, with Clark himself finding extra time to volunteer as attorney for the génocidaires in Rwanda. Quite a "wide range of progressive political objectives" indeed, if that's the sort of thing you like. However, a dip into any database could have furnished Janofsky with well-researched and well-written articles by David Corn and Marc Cooper—to mention only two radical left journalists—who have exposed "International ANSWER" as a front for (depending on the day of the week) fascism, Stalinism, and jihadism.

This just in: Bush hates black-folk! call back Dan Rather!..............T 

The truth about global warming - it's the Sun that's to blame

Oh, the Left is gonna go Ape when they hear this one...turns out the Sun is (gasp) a Republican!!! (oh no! gasp)..............................T
Global warming has finally been explained: the Earth is getting hotter because the Sun is burning more brightly than at any time during the past 1,000 years, according to new research.
A study by Swiss and German scientists suggests that increasing radiation from the sun is responsible for recent global climate changes.
Dr Sami Solanki, the director of the renowned Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research in Gottingen, Germany, who led the research, said: "The Sun has been at its strongest over the past 60 years and may now be affecting global temperatures.
"The Sun is in a changed state. It is brighter than it was a few hundred years ago and this brightening started relatively recently - in the last 100 to 150 years."
..."The Sun's radiance may well have an impact on climate change but it needs to be looked at in conjunction with other factors such as greenhouse gases, sulphate aerosols and volcano activity," he said. The research adds weight to the views of David Bellamy, the conservationist. "Global warming - at least the modern nightmare version - is a myth," he said. "I am sure of it and so are a growing number of scientists. But what is really worrying is that the world's politicians and policy-makers are not.
"Instead, they have an unshakeable faith in what has, unfortunately, become one of the central credos of the environmental movement: humans burn fossil fuels, which release increased levels of carbon dioxide - the principal so-called greenhouse gas - into the atmosphere, causing the atmosphere to heat up. They say this is global warming: I say this is poppycock."

The big picture

Exactly..........................T
...isn't America hated around the world? By the elites and chattering classes of many countries, yes, and by much of the American elite and chattering class as well. But we are not competing in a popularity contest. In a unipolar world, the single superpower will always arouse envy and dislike. The relevant question is if we can live safely in the world; the French may dislike us, but we can live comfortably with France. The recent Pew Trust polls showing diminishing support for Islamist terrorism in Muslim countries indicate things are moving in the right direction. The increasing interweaving of China into the international economy suggests China may not be a military threat. A world spinning out of control? No, it is more like a world moving, with some backward steps, in the direction we want.

Thank you, Bill Clinton, for Justice Breyer, who believes Scottish law is binding on our Constitution (not kidding, really!) and thanks to "Splugy" for finding this toon!.........T

P-gate: Finally a Scandal That Holds Water

Thank you again, CornetJim, my friend! I'd write a more interesting Intro, but I am too busy laughing!...................T
"Democrats are getting frantic. Time is running out. With all the trash they've piled on Bush, they STILL haven't come up with a viable impeachment issue with any bite, until now. I mean Bush has been dumped on so much; he's had to take out a permit as a landfill. Throughout Bush's political career, the left has deliriously persisted in its regularity in sending up impeachment trial balloons.

Here's a list of junk the Demos have tried to hang our duly elected president: "

1. Cocaine Gate— 30 years ago? What's the statute of limitations? Has Senator Kennedy accounted for his leaving Mary Jo Kopechne to drown while he swam and then ran away? His sole purpose was to save his sorry, never worked a day in his life, anti-USA, pro enemy, career as the Senate's backbiter in chief?
Anyhow, I hear Bush never inhaled. Diagnosis-DEAD.
2. AWOL Gate—Dan Rather stood by this phony story and it ruined his career. Did any Democrat object to President Clintons draft dodging? Diagnosis-DEADER than Dan Blather's legacy as a fair and unbiased reporter.
3. Immigration Gate—Could have legs, but Demos, like Bush are too afraid of losing the ever growing Latino vote. Diagnosis-Ignored and covered up by both sides.
4. Bush a "dumb chimp" Gate—Never could figure out how Demos STILL call Bush dumb, after he totally outmaneuvered them. How do you lose to the brain dead twice and still mock him for it? Diagnosis-DEAD, by political aneurism.
5. Stolen election Gate (part 1) —Supremes stole it! After 8 years of delirious happiness and terrorism preparedness by the Clinton Administration, why didn't Gore win in a landslide? Diagnosis-Settled Law.
6. Stolen election Gate (part 2) —I believe even c-BS has conceded Ohio. Diagnosis-Bush victory.
7. 9/11 Gate—A special place in American history when an ex-governor, Presidential Candidate, and now DNC head, Howie "THE SCREAM" Dean postulated that Bush knew about the WTC and Pentagon attacks IN ADVANCE…without a scintilla of evidence. Diagnosis-Downright Traitorous.
8. Rove/Plame/Wilson Gate—Valerie was exposed as CIA by Novak, not Rove. Bush not implicated. Wilson issued BS report on Saddam's try to buy yellow cake from Niger. Diagnosis-No frosting on that pastry.
9. WMD Gate—Saddam had 'em, used 'em, agreed to get rid of and account for 'em. He failed to account for them in the very least. Wonder where they are. Dems are totally oblivious. If Bush lied, then the Demos were lying from the late 90's through 2003. I've got the quotes to prove it. Diagnosis-The most hypocritically obnoxious charge of all.
10. Iraq Gate—Bush called it like he saw it. Congress backed him almost 100%. Americans didn't buy. They elected Bush over John "Reporting for Duty" Kerry, going away. Diagnosis-Dead.
11. War Gate—The war is being mismanaged. We needed a larger coalition. We need more/less -0- troops. Who knows? Senator Hagel? Senator Kerry?
Seems like a lot of hindsight to me. Should we have waited for a bigger coalition after Pearl Harbor? FDR declared war on Japan and de facto the REST of her allies within 24 hours after attack. The Germans and Italians hadn't assaulted us. BTW., 407,000 US Soldiers were killed during WW2 in the same time 1,900 US troops have been killed in the War on Terrorism, a 407 to 2 ratio. If we had waited for the bought off French, Germans or Russians, we'd be subject to suicide murderers in our cities EVERY DAY! Diagnosis-Only history will judge for sure, but I predict vindication.
12. Cindy Gate—Take the troops out of Iraq AND New Orleans! I'm sorry for her loss and I honor Casey, but this woman needs medical attention. Diagnosis-Delusions of grandeur, multiple personality disorder, (grieving Mom, patriot, traitor, love/hate Bush/America.) Get her a psychiatrist, meds and therapy. STAT!
13. Downing Street Memo Gate—What happened to those hearings Congressman Conyers? Racist politics serve you much better than the former. Diagnosis-Shredded.
14. Katrina Gate—Initial calls of Bush incompetence due to racism totally false and will be remembered by mid America in '06 and '08 elections. Fault now admitted by local officials and Bush. President will turn this poor performance into some of his finest moments. The man already has spent more on the poor and minorities than any President in our history. A gondola for every home? Diagnosis-will vie for highlight of Bush's political career. If anything, the conservatives may impeach him for his uncontrolled spending!
15. Abu Garib Gate—A NY Times orgy of pics and stories. Forget about those nasty beheadings against Jews, Americans and Coalition forces. The times focus is on evil America. Diagnosis-Could the headline, "THANK YOU OSAMA, WE DESERVE ANOTHER." Be too far away?
16. Saddam Gate—When we couldn't find him it was a major issue for the lefties. Now that we've found him, the Southpaws seem to want him back in power. How about a compromise? Make him editor of the NY Times. Diagnosis-That'll please the left and the right.
17. P-Gate—Finally, an issue that's so full of potential, it could burst a bladder. The Dems even have tradition with them. They got Nixon to resign because of Watergate. Imagine, the President of the United States needing a break for a normal body function. Why, we impeached a President for his uncontrolled bodily functions and the cover up. Was it a false alarm? Did Bush wash his hands afterwards? Did he stall excessively by splashing water on his face? Most importantly, DID HE PUT THE SEAT DOWN WHEN FINISHED??? We have a paper trail: http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/050914/ids_photos_ts/r2587077477.jpg (not toilet paper, although I hear Howie Dean is searching UN bathrooms for any and all evidence.) Now all libs need is a cover-up…and not the kind that sits atop toilet seats. Diagnosis-The best chance the sainted left has to pass this President right out of their systems. Too bad, Bush won't have a chance at a fair shake…if you know what I mean.

Even with fallen leader, GOP reigns

Time for the on-the-ground political (good) news. Things are in great shape, Cindy Sheehan & Evil-Republican hurricanes notwithstanding!............T
"Looking ahead to 2006, Barone sees good news for Republicans. He notes that Bush carried 31 states last year, compared to Kerry's 19. That means that if the trend toward polarization continues - 'red' states getting redder, 'blue' states getting bluer - the GOP has little reason to fear losing the Senate.

A similar GOP geography advantage holds true in the House. Barone counts 20 congressional districts that Kerry won with 80 percent of the vote, compared to zero for Bush. What that means is that Bush's vote was more evenly spread out; indeed, W. won 255 congressional districts last year, to Kerry's 180. So again, if Republicans can merely hang on to the Bush base, they can hang on to control.

For his part, the conservative Barone would like to see the GOP stay on top, Bush or no Bush. But he earned his reputation as an analyst, not as an advocate. Indeed, the data he has assembled in his new book speak louder than any partisan could."

Shhhh! don't let the secret out! If we didn't control global warming and the winds and ocean currents, we couldn't have achieved this tremendous triumph! Seig Heil!.........T 

Our Rock of Sisyphus

Excerpted here, please read the entire article by Victor Davis Hanson. Perspective is presented insightfully on the overall War on Terror......................T

How goes our hard labor in Iraq?

Where does the United States stand in its so-called global war against terror, four years after the September 11 attack? The news is both encouraging and depressing all at once.
...If on September 12, Americans could have been asked whether they were willing to make the sacrifices we have already tragically incurred to achieve the end of the Taliban and Saddam Hussein , the democratic stirrings in the Middle East, and the avoidance of another September 11, most would have reluctantly done so.
...But right now all this is in the hands of a brilliant U.S. military that must stabilize Iraq, train a viable military, ward off foreign intruders — and do that without losing very many more soldiers and in very little time. An impossible task for any other military — but just possible for ours.
...So I think we will accomplish all that, as we have pushed the rock almost to the summit. But it is heavier than ever and one or two more of our stumbles and it could come crashing back — just as it was ready to roll over the top and cascade down the other side.

Assigning blame

His wit is razor sharp, his economy with words, impeccable. Not to mention his humor...The author devastates the leftist idiocy so rampant at this moment.....................T
"In less enlightened times, there was no catastrophe independent of human agency. When the plague or some other natural disaster struck, witches were burned, Jews were massacred and all felt better (except the witches and Jews).
A few centuries later, our progressive thinkers have progressed not an inch. No fall of a sparrow on this planet is not attributed to sin and human perfidy. The three current favorites are: (1) global warming, (2) the war in Iraq and (3) tax cuts. Katrina hits and the unholy trinity is immediately invoked to damn sinner-in-chief George W. Bush.
This kind of stupidity merits no attention whatsoever, but I'll give it a paragraph."

Back to Business

Now, time for a reality check...the libs are in for a long, cold, winter..................T
"President Bush had a rough summer. That doesn't mean he's in for a fall."...
...But the simple fact of governing in Washington is that popularity is not a measure of power. In the late '90s, President Clinton's approval rating stayed well above 60%, even after he was impeached. But Mr. Clinton had almost no clout. True, this was partly because he faced a Republican Congress. A Bush aide was accurate (if self-serving) in drawing the distinction this way: "The difference is between polls in the 40s and changing history and being in the 60s and twiddling your thumbs. We'll take the 40s. That's our motto."

The Culture of Blame

Another great piece, passed on by our colleague "CornetJim". Great humor needs one thing more than any other to be truly funny: Truth. Read on, and be prepared to laugh while you are sobbing............................T

The Culture of Blame-on assigning blame for Hurricane Katrina: "Let me make this clear: Everything which has happened as the result of Hurricane Katrina is my fault. Mine. Alone. No one else's. Stop wasting energy pointing fingers and put your hands to work helping out. It was me. Got it? I was a United States Senator from Louisiana in 2001 when the levee at Lake Pontchartrain was declared unsafe and I didn't have enough clout with my Senatorial brethren to get sufficient money appropriated to fix it. It was my fault. Oh. I almost forgot. I was the Commander-in-Chief of all United States Armed Forces in the 1960s which includes the Corps of Engineers. The cost-benefit analysis? My fault. It is my fault that, as the Governor of Louisiana, I didn't foresee the need to have enough Louisiana National Guard troops--the vast majority of whom are NOT currently in Iraq, or Afghanistan or, for that matter, Indiana--pre-positioned and ready to preserve order. I, frankly, forgot that there is a portion of the population which will steal anything from anyone given any opportunity and then will blame it on me because I didn't--in spite of ample warnings by sociologists from large Eastern Universities--foresee the need to have 27" flat-screen television sets available to every family in the New Orleans city limits as soon as the electricity went out. That one WAS my bad. It is my fault that, as Mayor of New Orleans, I was boogying down Bourbon Street the night before the hurricane hit rather than being where I should have been--on the roof of the Superdome pounding in extra nails to hold the roof on. As the architect of the Superdome, it was my fault for claiming that the Dome could survive 200 mile-per-hour winds. It couldn't even handle a relatively gentle 160 mile-per-hour zephyr. Strap me to my drafting table and set me adrift. Global warming? My fault. Despite the fact that nearly every serious climatologist in America has stated over and over again that there is no clear evidence tying human-generated greenhouse gasses to global warming, and even if there were, there is no evidence tying global warming to hurricanes in the Atlantic basin, I was opposed to the Kyoto treaty and so it is my fault. It is also my fault that during the administration of Bill Clinton the U.S. Senate rejected the terms of the Kyoto protocols by a vote of 95-0. That would be zero, zilch, nada, nil, bupkis. As the Grand Poohbah in Charge of all TV Coverage, it is my fault that there is constant video of looters and almost none of humanitarian activities. I am the person who issued the statement: 'No more rescue footage UNLESS the person rescued complains about how long they had to wait or, if he shoots at the rescuers.' And, finally, as Chairman of the National Association of Gasoline Producers it is my fault that I had the bad judgment to put so much of my drilling, refining and transportation assets in a hurricane-prone area like the Caribbean basin. What...was...I...thinking? If I could re-do that whole thing, I would have put all that equipment in Lake Erie and Lake Michigan. There may not be any oil there, but hurricanes are very rare. So. There you have it. Everything that has happened is my fault. Now. Shut up and help."--Rich Galen

A War to Be Proud Of

Please do not fail to read the whole article (click on the link). Hitchens lays out the most compelling and detailed case for the war you will have ever come by. In painstaking detail, the author disarms the critics of the war effortlessly, and entirely. Print out a copy to use as a "Bible" when confronted by leftist cranks...........T
"The case for overthrowing Saddam was unimpeachable. Why, then, is the administration tongue-tied?
I am one of those who believe, uncynically, that Osama bin Laden did us all a service (and holy war a great disservice) by his mad decision to assault the American homeland four years ago. Had he not made this world-historical mistake, we would have been able to add a Talibanized and nuclear-armed Pakistan to our list of the threats we failed to recognize in time. (This threat still exists, but it is no longer so casually overlooked.)
The subsequent liberation of Pakistan's theocratic colony in Afghanistan, and the so-far decisive eviction and defeat of its bin Ladenist guests, was only a reprisal. It took care of the last attack. But what about the next one? For anyone with eyes to see, there was only one other state that combined the latent and the blatant definitions of both "rogue" and "failed." This state--Saddam's ruined and tortured and collapsing Iraq--had also met all the conditions under which a country may be deemed to have sacrificed its own legal sovereignty. To recapitulate: It had invaded its neighbors, committed genocide on its own soil, harbored and nurtured international thugs and killers, and flouted every provision of the Non-Proliferation Treaty. The United Nations, in this crisis, faced with regular insult to its own resolutions and its own character, had managed to set up a system of sanctions-based mutual corruption. In May 2003, had things gone on as they had been going, Saddam Hussein would have been due to fill Iraq's slot as chair of the U.N. Conference on Disarmament. Meanwhile, every species of gangster from the hero of the Achille Lauro hijacking to Abu Musab al Zarqawi was finding hospitality under Saddam's crumbling roof.
One might have thought, therefore, that Bush and Blair's decision to put an end at last to this intolerable state of affairs would be hailed, not just as a belated vindication of long-ignored U.N. resolutions but as some corrective to the decade of shame and inaction that had just passed in Bosnia and Rwanda. But such is not the case. An apparent consensus exists, among millions of people in Europe and America, that the whole operation for the demilitarization of Iraq, and the salvage of its traumatized society, was at best a false pretense and at worst an unprovoked aggression. How can this possibly be? "

Iraq's Federalist Papers

"The constitution empowers legislators, not clerics."
Finally, the truth begins to emerge. Iraq policy has been a great success. No attacks at home in 4 years now, historically the lowest casualty rate in any conflict in the history of the world, and now the Iraqi constitution ensures the viability of the new Iraqi State............T
Iraq's first freely elected government continues to vindicate the belief that the Mideast can be transformed, starting with Saddam Hussein's former tyranny. Its draft constitution, which appears headed for parliamentary approval tonight, reflects a remarkable spirit of compromise--and even enlightenment--among the country's political, ethnic and religious factions.

Whoa is us, we are evil Americans....(Vote Democrat! hee-haw!)...........T 

Of minds and metrics

The news (please click the link for the full article) we don't hear from the "MSM"!!!....................T
Two generations ago, Americans, at the cost of hundreds of thousands of deaths, changed minds in Germany and Japan. The Pew Global Project Attitude's metrics give us reason to believe that today's Americans, at far lower cost, are changing minds in the Muslim world.
George W. Bush has proclaimed that we are working to build democracy in Iraq not just for Iraqis, but in order to advance freedom and defeat fanatical Islamist terrorism around the world. Now comes the Pew Global Attitudes Project's recent survey of opinion in six Muslim countries to tell us that progress is being made in achieving that goal.
Minds are being changed, and in the right direction.
Most importantly, support for terrorism in defense of Islam has "declined dramatically," in the Pew report's words, in Muslim countries, except in Jordan (which has a Palestinian majority) and Turkey, where support has remained a low 14 percent. It has fallen in Indonesia (from 27 percent to 15 percent since 2002), Pakistan (from 41 percent to 25 percent since 2004) and Morocco (from 40 percent to 13 percent since 2004), and among Muslims in Lebanon (from 73 percent to 26 percent since 2002).

Liberals First, Americans Second: San Francisco No Longer Supports the U.S. Military

From the Subtle to the Sublime.Try to restrain your tears of laughter long enough to mourn the vicious anti-Americanism evident in this decision.............T
"Liberals often lamented, during the election of 2004, that the presence of war gave a natural advantage to Republicans. For some unknown reason, most Americans do not trust Liberals to run a war, or treat the military well, or even put America’s international interests above pet social causes.
The anti-war left responded to this belief with a set of standard talking points: Liberals oppose the war, but they support the troops. They hate the President’s policies, but they respect and honor the military and their sacrifice.
Somebody, however, forgot to send the memo to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, which last month stunned veterans groups, local businesses and even Diane Feinstein when it voted 8-3 to banish the USS Iowa from San Francisco Bay.
But the anti-military Government of San Francisco will not accept the ship, because the Supervisors oppose the Iraq war, do not wish to glorify the military and its “machinery of war,” and the manic gay rights movement is mad about the Clinton “Don’t ask, Don’t tell” policy on homosexuals serving in the military, a policy once hailed as a major gay rights victory. Also, San Francisco wishes to only build “Peace” monuments –you know, like Ho Chi Minh Park.
Because of the radical anti-military politics of eight of San Francisco’s Board Members, the city will be denied an attraction, veterans will be denied their memorial, and the men and women serving our country all over the world have been told that San Francisco no longer wishes to support them or their dreaded machines at all.
Apparently, “anti-war” now includes World War II as well. What’s next? Does the Board plan on officially removing the sailor from the “Village People?” Can San Franciscans still sing "In The Navy" without fear of being labeled fascists?"