Garbanzo Toons

The Joke is on Whom?

2012-01-23T20:05:00.003-06:00

If we weren't currently suffering under our current administration, I'd ask, "Are you kidding?" Unfortunately we know that he's not.

The Taliban must promise to disassociate from international terrorism and affirm their desire to participate in tentative talks on a political settlement to the war in Afghanistan, a senior U.S. official said on Sunday.

The Taliban is only willing to negotiate the terms of our surrender. We are the infidel. The Taliban take the Quranic command to fight the infidel until all men acknowledge Allah as God and Mohammed as his prophet. Don't forget that it is written,

Chapter 9, verse 29 of the Qur'an reads:

"Fight those of the People of the Book who do not [truly] believe in God and the Last Day, who do not forbid what God and His Messenger have forbidden, who do not obey the rule of justice, until they pay the tax and agree to submit."

I'm sure in lieu of conversion, they will accept the jizyah. Either way, the sacrifice in American lives and bodies has been wasted. Men and women who were beyond the understanding of the petty, spineless schemers in Congress and the White House, have been sacrificed so that the base scum who inhabit the American halls of power can, Scrooge-like, keep their gnarled, morally diseased fingers on their ill-gotten gains.

Gibbon wrote of the Eastern Roman Empire in decline, a time when weak, ineffective, emperors ruled, one after another, watching the remains of a former great empire, built by great men at a time when great men were allowed to rise to the top, slowly get eaten away by foreign and domestic enemies they were too weak to effectively confront. The strong among the Greeks, if there were any, were silenced and ignored by court eunuchs and their followers who were more interested in keeping their plum positions than in doing what was best for their people.

And today we have the Democrats.

Ezra Levant eviscerates Obama

2012-01-22T13:15:00.003-06:00

Egad, here he goes again with the videos. Well, just one this time.

Ezra Levant is Canadian, but he is right on in this video. Obama, like the previous worst president in American history, Jimmy Carter has proven that he prefers thugs and dictators over democracies and the American people. We, the American people, have been thrown under the bus.

Videos for You

2012-01-15T19:07:00.002-06:00

The first two are shocking in their representation of Israeli apartheid. I found the third one entertaining.

Oh, Now I Get It

2012-01-07T14:47:00.000-06:00

It took me a while, but thanks to Sarah Schulman, writing in the New York Times, I finally figured it out.

Israel has become a world leader in technology, agriculture, including drip irrigation and desalinization of water, medicine, including advances in battling heart disease and cancer, environmental quality, renewable energy, and defense; ten Israelis have so far won Nobel Prizes. (To compare, Muslims, accounting for 20 percent of the world's population, have won 8) It's the destination of choice for Sudanese refugees who survive the life-threatening trek through Egypt. it's the only country in the Middle East that allows equal rights for all of its citizens regardless of race, gender, ethnic origin, religion, or sexual orientation; Muslims (especially female Muslims) in Israel have more rights than they do in any of the Islamic nations.

Israel opened the first field hospital in Haiti after their devastating earthquake, they assisted the Japanese after their recent earthquake and tsunami; Israel has sent humanitarian aid to more than 140 countries and authorities. Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians have been treated in Israeli hospitals, including children suffering from life-threatening diseases who would die if not for Israeli resources. Also bringing better health to the children of the world is the Israeli-based charity, Save a Child's Heart, an organization that brings children suffering from heart ailments to Israel from 42 countries where adequate medical care in unavailable.

All of this, I now know thanks to Sarah Shulman, is done to cover up Israeli oppression of the Palestinians.

Oh, those crafty Zionists!

The Progressive Inner City Classroom

2012-01-04T19:20:00.000-06:00

One of the problems of educating poor children in modern society is that the students who try to learn, to better themselves so that they can move up in society and become a contributor instead of a parasite, is the savage peer-resistance they face. Thomas Sowell has written about this pernicious influence in the United States among black students who accuse high achievers among them of "acting white." But it's not a racial issue. Theodore Dalrymple writes of the same pathology in British schools.

What did they mean by this apparent paradox? They meant that anyone who tried hard at school and performed well was wasting his time, when he could have been engaged in the real business of life, such as truanting in the park or wandering downtown. Furthermore, there was menace in their words: If you don't mend your ways and join us, they were saying, we'll beat you up. This was no idle threat: I often meet people in their twenties and thirties in my hospital practice who gave up at school under such duress and subsequently realize that they have missed an opportunity which, had it been taken, would have changed the whole course of their lives much for the better. And those who attend the few schools in the city which maintain very high academic standards risk a beating if they venture to where the poor white stupids live. In the last year, I have treated two boys in the emergency room after such a beating, and two others who have taken overdoses for fear of receiving one at the hands of their neighbors.

Peer pressure, especially when it's violently negative, as adults know, and as we try to encourage our own children to avoid, has a tremendous effect on a child's education. Study and hard work that leads to beatings and hospitalization is a powerful incentive for giving up. The future parasites do not allow anyone in their domain to rise above that setting. Everybody must remain equal, that is, equally stupid, equally poor, equally miserable, and equally a drain on society.

Among Progressives, we are being taught to abhor differences in wealth among Americans. The distribution of wealth, we are told, is too skewed in favor of the rich. This is something new and dangerous to society. This inequality is bad news. In the name of fairness, wealth needs to be redistributed. If you are too successful, and you make too much money, you can be threatened. If you are an oil executive, you can be hauled before Congress and paraded before the American public in a glorious show trial. And to Progressives, this kind of harassment is not only acceptable, but noble. Because some people are poor, and some work hard for very little money, those who make a lot of money must justify their wealth. Businessmen who have made an honest living and have committed no crimes can be vilified and threatened by our elected officials because they're not equal, because they've used their talents are resources to rise economically above the rest of us. As our president has told us, "I do think at a certain point you've made enough money." How much money is enough? He didn't say. But we can assume that above a certain amount, you qualify for a beat down.

The really perverse part of this mode of thought, is that I'm pretty sure that it's shared among Obama's wealthy supporters. We know though, that as long as they keep funneling a portion of their lunch money to Obama's reelection campaign and other causes that he supports, they can never make enough money. Some capitalist oppressors are more equal than others.

And if it's not the president bullying us into poverty, it's an environmental group. How much bullying does it take before the wealth creators give up and leave the rest of us to sink into equality? Once we have an entire society of parasites though, who does that society feed off of? We only have each other.

It's no wonder the Left sides so adamantly with Islamists. They to want equality, at least their Islamic version of equality, you know, Muslim males most equal, infidel females least equal . . .

I wrote all of the above back in August. And since then, I've ignored my blog. I started posting a comic strip, but once school started, I didn't have time to draw. Between school, tutoring, non-blog pro-Israel activity, and going to the gym, who's got time to draw?

But getting back on topic, the rise of the OWS movement has proven everything I've written. There is a sample here. Make sure you watch the video. My question at the beginning is, what are they so afraid of that they refuse to cooperate with a conservative web-based news service?

Am I back? Who knows? Who cares? If I have time (ha!) I will continue my amateurly drawn comic strip.

Never Forget

2011-09-09T20:48:00.000-05:00

Over at the NY Times there is a very moving photo exhibit on the Twin Towers' rise and fall. You've seen a lot of these 9/11 photos already, but we all need that occasional reminder, no matter how much it still disturbs us. We'd better never forget that the Islamofascists did this. They would do it, and more, again if we drop our vigilance. They're still out there, and still being welcomed into our country. They're on a 1400 year old mission to subjugate the entire world. All of the "outreach" in the world can't change that. Their holy text, The Protocols of the Elders of Islam - uh - I mean, the Qu'ran lays out their hideous task for them. We forget to our and our children's detriment.

We know, although we're impolite for bringing it up, that they will gladly give up their own lives in order to murder as many of us infidels as they can. They're convinced of a heavenly reward for the destruction of human life. Their religion is a Bizarro version of almost every other religion currently being practiced.

Normal human emotions mean nothing to the Islamofascists. They rejoice in the violent deaths of innocent women and children. They gloat at the pain they cause to people whose only crime is not sharing their belief system, even when their victims are other Muslims.

The only way to win against them is to fight them with all of our strength and technology. In this, thanks to the degradation of our society and the loss of belief in ourselves, we are failing miserably. Sure, we've stopped dozens of Islamic terrorists since then, but we're still letting them in. Our government is still reaching out. And we're still afraid to name the enemy. Who gets punished at every airport in the country? It isn't the imams pushing jihad.

Good Bye to Pete's

2011-08-22T14:16:00.007-05:00

You would think these would come out a lot more often than they do. I wanted to do four panels per day. That's obviously never going to happen. I think I'm averaging two strips per week. With school beginning in a couple of week's that could even slow down even more. This is one of those instances where patience is a virtue.

Let's Eat at Pete's

2011-08-17T11:49:00.007-05:00

Yes, I'm playing with color and adding more of it in hopes that added color will compensate at least a bit for my lack of drawing skills.

Defense Against the Dark Arts - I Mean the Left

2011-08-13T20:34:00.003-05:00

Barry Rubin is a pretty good political analyst. That's probably why he's not working for any of the big networks. Here is one of his latest.

The hardcore Obama supporter is not watching unemployment levels, the economy, the mess in Egypt and Libya, or the effectiveness of health care reform, His concern is that if he decides Obama is a terrible president it means he is one of “them.” This is a horror he can never accept. For the Jews among them—which explains their higher membership in this group—these factors are reinforced by the image of becoming the very Nazi Cossack Klu Klux Klan monster that is their worst nightmare.

The left isn’t doing this because it’s on the defensive or desperate. On the contrary, this is its main strategy. How else can you persuade about half the population, liberals and centrists, to support the most left-wing policy in American history? That’s why they need a strategy based on hate, fear, stereotyping, demonization of the “other,” rejection of diversity, and all those other things that supposedly Political Correctness and Multiculturalism supposedly oppose! What’s the response? I’m not going to tell you anything you don’t know but it might be useful to have it all in one place:

1. Avoid playing into these stereotypes whenever possible. Once you lose your credibility by being too extreme or not being able to present facts, it is very hard to regain it in this atmosphere.

2. Word of mouth, have the best arguments and point them out to people. Never doubt that no matter how confident many of these people appear to be they are having severe doubts about their policies and ideas working. Be able to argue on the other side’s own terms in order to show hypocrisy (see point in bold above).

Don't stop here. There are more tips. Collect them all.

Time to Eat?

2011-08-13T10:21:00.006-05:00

Burn - and Then?

2011-08-08T19:24:00.006-05:00

Since this one was supposed to come out yesterday, which was Sunday, I added color. A bit anyway. Let's face it. I'm still feeling my way, and I probably will be for a while. But I like color, so I will continue to play with it. With computers and home scanners though, putting this stuff up for people to ignore is easier than ever.

Converted

2011-08-03T19:39:00.008-05:00

I had hoped to put out four panels per day. It's summertime after all. We'll see how productive I am for the rest of the summer and we'll see if I can continue into the school year. Meanwhile, here's the next strip.

Test

2011-08-01T14:25:00.008-05:00

No, I can't draw. Not really. For a while I could. Many years ago I taught myself to draw using the book, Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain, by Betty Edwards. I hunkered down, followed the lessons step by step, and what do you know? I entered what I can only describe as a meditative state and actually drew things that looked like what I wanted them to look like.

That was a long time ago, and for many years I haven't drawn much of anything. When I do draw, the process isn't always pretty. I have comic strip ideas though, and they must be drawn. I can't promise that they're good ideas, but I'm going to draw them anyway. I tried getting others to draw for me, but that hasn't worked. The advice I've gotten from artists has always been, "draw your own." OK, I am drawing my own. But just remember, all of you people who can draw, but wouldn't draw my goofy ideas, this is your fault. You could have drawn these so that even if they were poorly written, at least they would look good. Perhaps over time, if I continue to fool myself into thinking I have something of value to say, and I work and practice real hard, my drawing skills will once again improve.

Until then, this is the first strip in a multi-strip story. When will the next page be done? Soon, I hope. It's already written. I'm going to start drawing right now.

Read it and weep.

UPDATE:Copyright 2011 by the Garbanzo Press

Islamophobia Rears its Ugly Head Again

2011-07-28T20:01:00.001-05:00

Actually, the only place you're going to find that awful potentially deadly malady, Islamophobia, is in the mainstream press. According to this article in USA Today, (and I'm guessing it's echoed across the MSM, we'd better all beware of the rising tide of anti-Islamic right wing extremism that's feeding off of all the anti-Jihad groups and blogs.

Some British mosques are boosting security after Norway's horrific massacre was traced to a man who fears Muslims are taking over Europe — an attack that exposed a failure to root out Islamophobia that has bled into the European mainstream.

European government leaders may even be feeding fears of Islam through measures such as bans on face veils on the streets, aimed at appeasing a non-Muslim majority wary about the continent's rising Muslim population.

Of course the over 17,000 Islamic terrorist attacks had nothing to do with Islam or the Qu'ran, just lone nuts perverting a religion of peace. It's only the pernicious anti-jihad writings that drive people to shoot up groups of young adults and blow up government buildings.

I complain about the double standard the MSM demonstrates when it comes to Israel, but it's not just Israel. It's anything that disagrees with their perverted world view. They've misinterpreted reality in order to minimize terror attacks by Muslims, while exaggerating the danger from those scary right wing extremists. In addition to the 17,000 deadly Islamic terror attacks since 9/11, there are also the ones that were broken up before they could come to fruition. I suppose those don't count, because the jihadists based their attacks on passages and commandments from the Qu'ran while ignoring or not even being aware of guys like Robert Spencer. Israel, in this case, is just a symptom of the problem. It's a lonely outpost of Western Civilization in the midst of Islamic barbarism. Since the Left romanticizes the barbarism that they don't have to live with, but only read about and excuse, Israel becomes the problem. It, like the rest of Western Civilization, ends up on the wrong end of the double standard.

The people who pass off Islamic terror attacks against Israel are in mourning over the terror attack in Norway. The irony is that the people who were murdered in Uyota were working to destroy Israel. While I think this massacre was a monstrous act committed by a truly evil individual, the victims too, were on the side of evil. They were destroyed by the same kind of monster they support when it's aimed at Israel. Check out the photo and article here. Glenn Beck was pilloried for comparing them to Hitler Youth, but their aim was the same.

We also have weasel words from the Norwegian ambassador comparing this massacre with anti-Israel terror attacks.

In an interview with the Israeli daily Maariv, Norway's ambassador to Israel Svein Sevje patiently explained that he wanted to "outline the similarity and the difference in the two cases."

Palestinians, the ambassador told Maariv, "are doing this because of a defined goal that is related to the Israeli occupation. There are elements of revenge against Israel and hatred of Israel. To this you can add the religious element to their actions."

"In the case of the terror attack in Norway, the murderer had an ideology that says that Norway, particularly the Labor Party, is forgoing Norwegian culture," Sevje said, referring to Anders Breivik.

"We Norwegians consider the occupation to be the cause of the terror against Israel," he said. "Those who believe this will not change their mind because of the attack in Oslo."

This came after Israel was one of the first countries to reach out to Norway after the attacks and offer its condolences and assistance.

I'd like to feel more sympathetic toward the Norwegians in their hour of trauma, but I can't. They've embraced the evil of anti-Semitism and they've taken sides against the West, allowing and almost welcoming the Islamic conquest of their country. They ignore the fact that their granddaughters will be forced to dress "modestly" and their grandsons will be dhimmi. That's some legacy to leave your family. But rather than look that far ahead, we can see degradation of Norwegian society in what's happening right now.

Every rape in Oslo the past 5 years, where the rapist could be identified, was committed by a male of non-western background.

In Oslo all sexual assaults involving rape in the past year has been committed by males of non-western background this was the conclusion of a police report published today. This means that every single rape assault in the last five years, where the rapist could be identified, he was a man of foreign origin.

Non-western, in this case meaning The Religion We're Not Supposed to Think About When Talking About Rape or Terrorism. And the problem has been growing. Back in 2001, only 2 out of 3 rapes were committed by Muslims. Of course, rather than expecting the invading Muslims - uh - I mean non-western immigrants to modify their antisocial behavior, Norwegians, descendents of the vikings (who would not have put up with this crap and are puking up their mead in Valhalla if they're looking down on their pusillanimous offspring), are being encouraged to modify their behavior.

The explosion in the number of rape charges in Oslo involved immigrant perpetrators, which were mostly Muslims. In 2001 a police study noticed that two out of three persons charged with rape in Oslo were “immigrants from a non-western background.” A glance at Norway’s population statistics shows between 3 and 4 times more immigrants living in Oslo than any other Norwegian city.

Yet Unni Wikan, a professor of social anthropology at the University of Oslo, said in 2001 that because Muslim men found their manner of dress provocative:

“Norwegian women must take their share of responsibility for these rapes.”

The professor’s conclusion was not that Muslim men living in the West needed to adjust to Western norms, but the exact opposite:

“Norwegian women must realise that we live in a multi-cultural society and adapt themselves to it.”

and

In a 2001 debate about the culture of rape amongst Muslim immigrants in Norway, Wikan said that Norwegian women were ‘blind and naive’ towards non-Western immigrants;

“I will not blame the rapes on Norwegian women, but Norwegian women must understand that we live in a multicultural society and adapt themselves to it.”
“Norwegian women must take their share of responsibility for these rapes” (for example, by not inviting into their homes Muslim men with little knowledge of Norwegian culture).

Once they allow themselves to be totally cowed, we might as well say good bye to their art and society. As long as Israel and the United States don't succumb to the same self-destructive mode of thought evident in Norway, there will still be a remnant of freedom left, although the Progressives will still be fighting against that freedom.

As for Norway, sorry, but you reap what you sow.

UPDATE: Read What Debbie Schlussel has to say too.

The Non-Profit AARP is Making a Huge Profit

2011-07-26T09:50:00.003-05:00

I never was really clear on how non-profits stayed in business. I never bothered to do the research. I just wondered, is it through donations? Government largesse? Or something sinister and malevolent? I now have my answer for AARP. Even though I've been receiving their mailings for years, I've never become a member. Not because I'm not old enough (I am), but because they're nothing more than another pressure and lobbying group, in this case for the elderly - and not quite as elderly as they think I am yet. The fact that they reside in Obama's back pocket, pimping for Obamacare, and then hypocritically getting a waiver to avoid participating in it, caused me to start sending back their self-addressed stamped envelope. Not that one 44 cent stamp will set them back very much when they're making millions secretly selling their members' information.

Susan Salisbury/ Cox Newspapers

West Palm Beach, Fla. — Most people think of AARP, the senior citizen advocacy group, as a way to get discounts on everything from dining and entertainment to insurance.

What is not well-known is that the nonprofit formerly called the American Association of Retired Persons makes more than $650 million a year in royalties for delivering its 40 million members to businesses, according to a congressional report issued in March.

In almost every case, the agreements are secret.

But a May bankruptcy of a retail hearing aid company based in West Palm Beach opened the door to just how lucrative these deals are.

According to documents obtained by the Palm Beach Post, in 2008 Hear-USA agreed to pay $7.6 million a year to become the sole provider of hearing aids to AARP's members. After further negotiations, that provision was eliminated and replaced with a requirement that it pay a $55 royalty fee on each hearing aid sold. That has amounted to more than $660,000.

In addition, the agreement required HearUSA to spend $4.4 million a year promoting the program, donate 1,000 hearing aids a year to disadvantaged people and donate $250,000 to AARP's education fund.

Fewer than three months ago, Stephen Hansbrough, then HearUSA chairman and chief executive officer, resigned, and the company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy reorganization. HearUSA is scheduled to be auctioned Friday.

Royalty payments with, primarily, insurance companies comprise 46 percent of AARP's income, according to a March report, "Behind the Veil: The AARP America Doesn't Know," issued by U.S. Reps Wally Herger, R-Calif., and Dave Reichert, R-Wash.

HearUSA officials would not talk about the AARP agreement.

AARP spokeswoman Elly Spinweber declined a request for an interview with AARP officials about the agreement, citing HearUSA's "ongoing legal proceedings."

Scum.

But wait! There's more! Yes, there's always more. This "non-profit", in reality makes a huge annual profit anyway. They also sell insurance. People complain about how sleazy insurance companies are, but they can't compare to the sleaziness of AARP.

The AARP made over a half billion in profits last year, selling ‘low cost’ insurance and other goodies to seniors. But that’s nothing.”

Martin went on to explain how Obamacare, which the AARP actively advocated for, damages the AARP’s biggest competitor, Medicare Advantage. He adds that the AARP is likely to make millions, if not billions, more dollars in the coming years because it can sell many more Medigap plans without competition.

“Now the cash register will ring even louder as these money-hungry merchants fleece the elderly,” Martin said. “AARP was the single most powerful organization supporting ObamaCare, yet now they want out of the relationship, so that they can make millions selling Medi-gap insurance to the very seniors they betrayed. If there is a more clear example of corruption and hypocrisy, I’ve yet to see it in my over seven decades on the planet. That’s why we call them the Association Against Retired Persons.”

Especially when it comes to being an Obamapal, it ain't what ya know, it's who ya know, and how willing you are to sell out the people who place their trust in you. Thank you, but I will support my sleazy insurance companies over these vile Obama-ite scum any day.

How Long Will This be Going On?

2011-07-19T18:58:00.000-05:00

“The danger to America is not Barack Obama but a citizenry capable of entrusting an inexperienced man like him with the Presidency. It will be far easier to limit and undo the follies of an Obama presidency than to restore the necessary common sense and good judgment to a depraved electorate willing to have such a man for their president. The problem is much deeper and far more serious than Mr. Obama, who is a mere symptom of what ails America . Blaming the prince of the fools should not blind anyone to the vast confederacy of fools that made him their prince. The Republic can survive a Barack Obama. It is less likely to survive a multitude of idiots such as those who made him their president.”
— This quote was translated into English from an article appearing in the Czech Republic as published in the Prager Zeitung of 28 April 2011.

So when does the United States get its balls back? And I ask that after being a good little citizen and not making a fuss when I wasn't allowed to accompany my 17 year old daughter into the airport. She'll be out of the country for a month, and I wanted to see her off. She's too old to be a minor, so I was out of luck. As I was walking out of the airport, I had the same thoughts that I'm sure millions of others have had - why? Why are we pandering to Islam like we weren't the most powerful nation the world has ever seen? Why are we expected to feel so guilty at being the recipients of generations of people who have, over the past two centuries created a society that has become the envy of the world so much so, that rather than try to emulate it and create wealth and plenty for all, these barbarian thugs work day and night to destroy it? And there are Americans who agree that we must tear it all down so that we can live as miserably as the poorest wretch in the in the most corrupt dictatorship we can imagine. What the hell happened to us?

Even those who don't want it torn down, still bow to the insanity of political correctness. What do we know about Islam and terrorism that we aren't allowed to say in public? And why aren't we allowed to say it? Oh yeah. We might humiliate the followers for the Religion of They're Not All Terrorists. So what?

Instead of admitting the well-documented, historically accurate, hysterically ignored connection, our government spends millions of dollars to create an airport security system specifically designed to humiliate the traveler. And they do it while apologizing to Muslims when one gets caught trying to game that system, by making it even more uncomfortable for the rest of us. Metal detectors? Sure. Take off your shoes? Of course. Only tiny amounts of liquids? You bet. Full body grope? Well . . . uh . . . I mean - Oh OK, it's for my own safety. I don't know much about Islamic humor (whether or not it's even allowed), but the imams and other Islamic authorities must laugh at us whenever they see an news article or an Internet photo of a young child groped, or a woman in a wheel chair being forced to remove her adult undergarment. Because, as we are repeatedly admonished, it's wrong to profile.

No it isn't. We force ourselves into this idiotic, suicidal situation for the express purpose of not humiliating the followers of Mohammed - who want us to abandon our freedoms and live under "enlightened" Sharia law. We could adopt the methods used by the Israelis at their airports. But that too would humiliate Muslims, wouldn't it? We wouldn't want that to happen. That would be Islamophobic.

But that's not the only problem. How many of us are buying appliances and cars dictated and designed by the environmental movement? Our children are being scared into believing that if they don't reduce their and our standard of living, the Earth will soon become uninhabitable and all the cute, cuddly animals (like polar bears) in the world will curl up and die. Politics of fear anyone?

And what happens when it does get hot outside? Take a day like today for instance? We get warnings. We have an ozone action day. We are advised how to dress and how to act while we're outside. Conversely, when the temperature dips low in the winter, we have cold advisories.

When I was growing up, there were these beings known as mothers who made sure that we were dressed properly for the weather before they threw us out of the house to play. When it was hot, we wore shorts. We played in the pool. When there was no pool, we played in the sprinkler. When we got hot and the sweat was poring down our faces from playing baseball, or football, or riding our bikes, or just chasing each other up and down the street, we drank out of the hose or we went in for a drink. Then we were kicked back outside. In the winter, wearing jackets, gloves, long johns, and boots, even though it was cold to the touch, we played with the snow. Can you believe it? We made snow men. We made snowballs and threw them at each other. And we did many other dangerous things out in the heat and the cold. Somehow, between our mothers and us, we figured out that if we're sweating, it's hot, and if our nose hairs are stiffening up when we breath, it's cold.

I'm going to end this post on a positive note. Somebody sent me the following video as an email. There are some Americans who still have balls, but we need to work together in order to reinvigorate our nation. We need to walk proudly with the understanding that not everyone is going to like us, especially if they are citizens of the 57 states - holy Obama, Batman - I mean of the 57 countries of the OIC. The only thing they deserve from us is a one finger salute. Hold all foreign aid, stop infiltration - I mean immigration - no I was right with infiltration, from any and all of these nations.

It's time to dump the Democrats. They are killing us slowly, but they will be the death of our nation.

Barack Carter? Jimmy Obama?

2011-07-16T15:33:00.002-05:00

You watch. You decide. But make sure you watch. The worrisome part is trying to figure out which Republican can win the next election. So far, pickin's are mighty slim. Me? I'd go along with Ann Coulter in her quest to get Chris Christie to run, but the one I would vote for without holding my nose is Allen West, but he won't run in 2012. He's got this weird idea that he's beholden to his constituents to do the job they elected him to do. Now really, what planet is this guy from?

Peanuts on Freedom

2011-07-04T16:45:00.003-05:00

Maybe I'm reading too much into this cartoon, but this presents a perfect allegory for our country's present day condition.

"A man is likely to mind his own business when it is worth minding. When it is not, he takes his mind off his own meaningless affairs by minding other people's business."
Eric Hoffer

Gas Prices

2011-07-01T15:20:00.002-05:00

At their highest this Spring, gas prices around my neighborhood were a bit over $4.00 per gallon. Then they started going down. Last week they were $3.49, better, but still almost double what they should be.

So then, Barack "Smartest Man in the Room" "Don't Drill Here" Obama decided to release 30 million barrels of oil from the Strategic Oil Reserve, something that other presidents avoided doing even when prices spiked at $4.15 a gallon under the last Bush, but only releasing a few million barrels in response to Hurricane Katrina. Apparently those other presidents simply didn't have the mental agility, the sheer brain power that Mr. "Hope and Change" has when it comes to economic issues. Talking out of both sides of his ass, as always, we read,

Although the impending summer demand clearly has the Obama administration worried, the White House would not make any predictions about the effect that the release will have on prices at the pump.

“We’re not making predictions about market prices, which go up and down,” a senior administration official said. “This is about addressing the supply disruption and the prices will be what they are.”

Well, it's a good thing they didn't make any predictions, because back in my neighborhood, gas prices are now up to $3.79 a gallon. Thank you Barack Obama, Soooper Genius.

Now how about issuing some drilling permits so that the evil, greedy oil companies can get more oil to the market and perhaps knock down prices for us poor, beleaguered, overworked, underpaid, overcharged consumers.

EPA Admits Jobs Don't Matter

2011-06-30T12:11:00.003-05:00

Go ahead. Watch the video. Warning: you will have to laugh to keep from crying. This idiot is EPA Assistant Administrator Mathy Stanislaus. The EPA, as we know, is a government agency that functions to create havoc out of progress, and to hamstring society in its quest to create wealth. It works to raise the cost of everything so that we, the average tax payer and consumer get screwed coming and going. We pay taxes to support this life-sucking agency, and we pay higher prices to compensate for the higher cost of doing business thanks to the infinite and constantly expanding lists of regulations. The fact that we have this agency, created in 1970, gives us one more way to shoot ourselves in the foot, or if you want to get more extreme, as I did in my previous post, as a tool to bring down our society.

A Major U.S. Policy Shift Toward the Muslim Brotherhood Disguised

2011-06-30T12:02:00.004-05:00

This is actually by Barry Rubin. I was going to do the usual blog thing and copy some of it, then offer my own erudite comments. But I decided to show mercy on any readers I may still have and just reprint Rubin's piece. It really says it all.

Here’s the headline: “U.S. to resume formal Muslim Brotherhood contacts.” But that’s not true. In fact, as the Reuters article itself admits there have never been “formal” contacts before but only informal ones. Let’s examine the language, which stems from a “senior U.S. official” to see what the Obama Administration thinks about the Muslim Brotherhood.

“A step that reflects the Islamist group’s growing political weight but that is almost certain to upset Israel and its U.S. backers.”

Note how it is portrayed as an Israel-related issue. Won’t it upset people who care about U.S. interests? Won’t it upset Egyptian Christians? The Saudis and Jordanians and other relatively moderate Arab regimes? Won’t it upset Muslims who oppose revolutionary Islamism?

We are supposed to believe that only Israel and the Jews will be upset about the Obama Administration moving closer to a radical antisemitic, anti-Christian, anti-American, anti-Western, pro-terrorist group that wants to repress women, kill gays, and overturn pretty much every existing government in the region. But just those Jews and their friends will be upset. You know, just like in the 1930s when certain people said that opposition to the totalitarian threat of those years was just coming from the Jews.

Reuters portrays the Brotherhood, as do many, as “a group founded in 1928 that seeks to promote its conservative vision of Islam in society.” Conservative? You mean they are like the Republican Party? You mean they are for the status quo? And of course one of the things they did since 1928 was to ally with Nazi Germany and the Brotherhood continues to voice the same political line toward Jews that it did back then

We are also told that the Brotherhood “long ago renounced violence as a means to achieve political change in Egypt….” This is simply not true. The Brotherhood merely temporarily renounced violence within Egypt because they knew that any resort to it would get them wiped out by the regime and the army. They postponed using violence until the revolutionary era arrived. Of course, if they can take over Egypt without violence they are happy to do so.

But there’s more. Every day for decades the Brotherhood has supported violence against Israel. It has supported violence against Americans in Iraq, and on various other fronts. Why is this so hard to see?

“The result has been a dilemma for the Obama administration. Former officials and analysts said it has little choice but to engage the Brotherhood directly, given its political prominence after the February 11 downfall of former President Hosni Mubarak.”

That is arguably true but by recognizing the Brotherhood and having contacts with it, the Obama Administration also makes a unilateral concession encouraging the Brotherhood. People who know the Middle East understand how this works: Soon many Egyptians will say (as they said in Iran and as they now say in Turkey) that the United States wants the Islamists to win.

But, the article continues:

“U.S. President Barack Obama will surely face criticism for engaging with the Brotherhood, even tentatively.” And who do they go to, Middle East analysts who can explain why this is dangerous? No, to the head of AIPAC in order to perpetuate the theme that this is merely a problem with the Jewish lobby! And who is presented to refute this? Former American diplomats. So it is the people who know versus the Jews.

And what are we told about the Brotherhood’s goals? This:

“The group says it wants a civil state based on Islamic principles, but talk by some members of an `Islamic state or `Islamic government’ have raised concerns that their goal is a state where full Islamic sharia law is implemented. The group says such comments have been taken out of context.”

“Some members” include the leader and deputy leader of the group. It is apparently too much trouble to read and quote what Brotherhood officials say, or their publications openly state, or their political platform calls for. Never are these statements fully quoted. Always they are dismissed as insignificant, like the statements of the late Usama bin Ladin once were.

Moreover, Egypt under Mubarak could be reasonably said to be a “civil state based on Islamic principles.” And since “Islamic principles” are mandated by Allah democracy is ultimately unacceptable since no human vote could alter those principles. How can an elected parliament pass a law limiting a man to one wife, or accepting religious conversion, outlawing amputations, or maintaining peace with Israel—to cite just a few examples—since those are “Islamic principles,” at least under the interpretation of Islam held by the Brotherhood.

So we just can’t tell if the Muslim Brotherhood wants a radical Islamist state before it takes power” Just like it was presumably a mystery about what Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini wanted to do in Iran, the Taliban in Afghanistan, Hizballah in Lebanon, and Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

And finally the article doesn’t even mention the most important development in U.S.-Muslim Brotherhood relations during that group’s eighty-year history: President Barack Obama’s explicit (and uninvited) statement accepting the Brotherhood being in government. U.S. policy is paving the way for a radical, possibly Islamist, Egypt. It is a catastrophic strategy.

OK, one quick comment. There are many tactics being used, and many groups dedicated to the destruction of Western civilization. I believe Obama is allied with those groups, and he is using a variety of methods to make us slaves to Islamic barbarism. Things were bad enough under the Bush Administration, when it was forbidden to admit that the terrorist thugs who were our declared enemies were Muslim. Now, under Obama, we're set to recognize those terrorist thugs, who are dedicated to our downfall, and negotiate with them. No good can come of this.

Hate Crimes in Canada

2011-06-11T17:43:00.003-05:00

I saw the report, but I forget where I saw it originally, that in Canada, where Prime Minister Stephen Harper recently proclaimed and demonstrated his unwavering support for Israel, that 71 percent of hate crimes of a religious nature in 2009, were committed against Jews. While I appreciate Harper's principled stand on Israel, something needs to be done about the attacks against Jews in Canada. The first thing that needs to be done is to ask the simple question: who is doing the attacking? That was my first question. That was Barry Rubin's question too.

Now the figures for "hate crimes" in Canada have been issued and guess what? Like the FBI's statistics for the United States, the number one victims of hate crimes are...Jews. Indeed, 71 percent of the hate crimes in the religion category are against Jews. The Jewish proportion of Canada's population? Around 1 percent. That's 71 percent of the hate crimes on a religious basis against 1 percent of the population.

For Canada, 4 per cent of the crimes were motivated by race or ethnicity, 29 per cent by religion and 13 per cent by sexual orientation

Makes you think, right?

Apparently not. Because the report is vague about just who might be attacking Jews and why these numbers have tended to rise. Skin-heads? Neo-Nazis? Russian peasant pogroms? Crusaders? The Klu Klux Klan? Peronists? Anti-Dreyfusards? Know-Nothings? Knights of the Camellia? Republicans? Tea-Partiers?

Because if we don't know who did it, then how can the situation be improved? Was it Anglicans? Bahai? Catholics? Dunkers? Episcopalians (oh, wait, they're the same thing as Anglicans), Franciscan monks or Fire-worshippers? Greek Orthodox? Hawaiian traditionalists? Idolotors or Illerati or Inuit? Jacobites? Kansans? Lutherans?

Of course, we know that answer to the question. And for those who are still having difficulty admitting to the answer, let me help by asking, which religion do you desperately try not to think of when you read reports like this?

Right.

Exactly.

But to admit to anti-Semitic attacks by Muslims destroys the "Muslim as victim of Western Society" paradigm that must be upheld at all costs, no matter what kind of mental gymnastics are required to maintain that ridiculous idea. There are people who will fight tooth and nail to force that paradigm on others and battle fiercely against those who point out its falseness. And some of them aren't Muslims. They are the happy dhimmis.

Klavan's One-State Solution: Give the Middle East to the Jews

2011-06-04T10:25:00.002-05:00

Yeah, sure, it sounds silly, and it may even generate a few laughs. But if you think about it, Klavan's plan makes more sense than Obama's plan to effectively eradicate the Jewish state slowly while claiming to be a friend of Israel.

OK, so it really is silly and impractical. But it still faces the reality of the situation better than Obama.

We're Fighting Who, Where?

2011-06-01T20:16:00.004-05:00

So this "war on terror" is a big deal that's been going on ever since 19 Islamic jihadists, who were in our country legally, flew some airliners into some prominent buildings and murdered almost 3000 Americans in the name of Allah. In response, then President Bush sent our armed forces after the perps - well, the ones who didn't sacrifice themselves in the name of the Ummah, rather they went after the brains behind the attack, and thanks to the tenacity, training, and skill of our armed forces, got the suckers.

In addition, we've had troops battling jihadists in Afghanistan and Iraq ever since. Our soldiers have removed tens of thousands of these terrorist scum (or Michael Moore's minutemen depending on the accuracy of your moral compass) from polluting our Earth. So why, oh why, does our government, under both Bush and Obama continue to welcome them into our country?

Before being granted refugee status in the U.S. and settling down in Bowling Green, Ky., Waad Ramadan Alwan was allegedly a sniper and skilled bomb maker targeting U.S. forces who bragged that his "lunch and dinner would be an American."

Alwan is one of two Iraqi refugees who the Justice Department announced Tuesday had been charged for participating in an alleged plot to send cash, explosives and Stinger missiles to Iraq for use against Americans.

The men are among 56,000 Iraqis who took advantage of special programs to come to the U.S. for people who demonstrated they were in danger from militias in Iraq for their religious beliefs or because they were translators for U.S. government or media organizations.

Alwan was admitted into the U.S. even though his fingerprint was found in 2005 on an unexploded roadside bomb that was set to blow up a U.S. convoy in Iraq. The print was loaded into a Department of Defense database, but a search of that database was not then a part of the application process for refugee status in the U.S.

So all the jihadists have to do to survive the onslaught from American forces, is to claim their lives are in danger for proper and politically correct reasons and get relocated to a comfortable American suburb. Once acclimated to life in America and added to local welfare lists, they are free to resume their Jihad against the Great Satan.

Even better, if they're caught committing jihadist activities, rather than facing the business end of a Hellfire missile or a marine's rifle, and ending up as temporary decoration scattered over portions of the landscape, they get a jail cell, three meals a day, a Qu'ran untouched by infidel hands, (probably fan mail and marriage proposals) and a team of lawyers as dedicated to the overthrow of the United States as they are. And if they're convicted, they get a nice long prison stretch where they have years and years of access to the most deranged members of American society who they can convert to Islam in order to spread their poisonous message. Because some of them will get out and will be only too happy to engage in the same anti-social behavior that got them locked up in the first place. But this time, as a special bonus, their violence, any murder or mayhem they wish to engage in, is done in the name of Allah. For them it's win-win. Slaughter to their heart's content, and gain paradise because of the slaughter.

It's not so great for the rest of us, but I don't think that's of any concern to the DHS or State Department weasels who are supposed to be working in the interest of the American people, not phony Islamic refugees who are invited into Dar al-Harb to wreak havoc.

The Bin Laden backlash: Angry Muslims demonstrate outside Downing Street as Obama visits Britain

2011-05-24T21:34:00.002-05:00

Yeah, religion of peace misinterpreted by a few twisted lone individuals. That hypothesis is once again proven by this article in Great Britain's Daily Mail.

Muslim activists descended on Downing Street today in protest at Barack Obama's state visit to London.

As the president met David Cameron in Whitehall, an angry crowd of burka clad women as well as protesters from Muslims Against Crusades gathered on the streets outside.

They were joined by a number of prominent campaigners, including Anjem Choudary.The radical cleric said that President Obama has made himself a 'legitimate target' for Muslim extremists after the killing of Osama bin Laden.

He called for Mr Obama to be dragged before a sharia court over his role in the war in Afghanistan.

For a real treat, and to check out some of these lone defilers of Islam, make sure you follow the link and view the photos. Their numbers are small, and infidel Britons still have most of their rights, but they haven't fought back yet in response to any of the demands their Muslim overlords have placed upon them. Chances are they won't. I hope I'm wrong, but their yellow streak seems to get wider at every provocation.

Netanyahu Schools Obama - and Lord Knows Obama Needs to Learn Something About How the World Works

2011-05-22T19:04:00.002-05:00

Obama gave a speech. Here is an analysis of one of Obama's unnoticed bone-headed errors, not one of the big bold ones, but a tiny, telling one, that passed under most people's radars.

In doing his balancing act on Israeli and Palestinian fears and hostility, he says this:

“I'm convinced that the majority of Israelis and Palestinians would rather look to the future than be trapped in the past….We see it in the actions of a Palestinian who lost three daughters to Israeli shells in Gaza. `I have the right to feel angry,’ he said. `So many people were expecting me to hate. My answer to them is I shall not hate. Let us hope,’ he said, `for tomorrow.’"

That’s genuinely touching. But in the specific case Obama cites—that of Izzedin Abuelaish on January 16, 2009-- there is strong reason to believe that the three girls were killed because of Hamas, that is Palestinian, actions.

But what's a bit of misrepresentation of the truth when "evenhandedness" is at stake? Truth be damned in the name of moral equivalence, a favorite tactic of Israel bashers and enemies of Western Civilization. Netanyahu begins talking about 7 minutes in, and he politely fills Obama in on some relevant facts surrounding Israel and its neighbors.

But there's more. Obama either doesn't understand, or doesn't want to understand what the Israelis and by proxy, we in the United States, are facing. The Muslim world suffers from an "inner Nakba", a hatred so deep and so all consuming that it's the focus of their lives. We see it in the behavior of Hamas and Fatah in their refusal to stop the violence and the incitement, and we see it in the rest of the Islamic world in their war against Israel, in their overt Jew-hatred, and in their covert (or maybe not so covert, just not as pronounced as their Jew-hatred) hatred of Christians. For video evidence of the inner Nakba, watch this:

The lady is being honest, and a lot of people accept the fact that Muslims around the world are taught to hate Jews. When not accepted, it's rationalized. But if anyone even questions the claim that Islam is a religion of peace there are charges of racism and islamophobia. It's also accepted that Palestinians should get their Jew-free state. Ask for an Islamic-free state, and again, get ready for the name calling. Anyway, I'm rambling. The fact remains that when it comes to Israel, Obama is guided by ideology rather than facts. Israel should make no more concessions. Netanyahu needs to continue standing up to Obama. He needs to demonstrate loudly and clearly that the survival of the Jewish people is not open to compromise or concessions.

Where is the Injustice?

2011-05-17T18:36:00.003-05:00

According to Martin Gilbert, in his book, ISRAEL, A History,

Sir Horace Rumbold, who took up the questioning, asked Churchill whether there was not ‘harsh injustice’ to the Arabs if Palestine attracted too many Jews from outside? Churchill replied that even when the Jewish National Home became ‘all Palestine’ there was no injustice. ‘Why is there harsh injustice done,’ Churchill asked his questioner, ‘if people come in and make a livelihood for more and make the desert into palm groves and orange groves? Why is it injustice because there is more work and wealth for everybody? There is no injustice. The injustice is when those who live in the country leave it to be desert for thousands of years.’

With those who shall henceforth be known as Fakestinians clamoring to get "their land back", we would do well to recall the above quote. We should also recall that before lots and lots of Jews began moving in to what was then Palestine, much to the chagrin of the Arabs and the British, Palestine was very sparsely populated. There were Jews, Christians, and Muslims even though this was a backwater of the Ottoman Empire.

In order to be classified as a refugee after the founding of Israel, an Arab only had to prove that they'd lived in Palestine for two years. But, beginning in the late 19th century, after Jews began immigrating en masse, started improving the land and beginning to make the desert bloom so that it would support a greater population, lots of Arabs began moving in to take advantage of the Jews' work and to begin claiming a 3000 year lineage. No archeological, historical, or scholarly evidence? Well, then, it's obvious that the evidence is racist and islamophobic.

Now, of course, the Fakestinians want all of Israel so they can return it to its natural state of barren desert punctuated by malarial swamps. Some of them no longer even bother to pretend that they belong to a religion of peace. Of course, if Islam is truly a religion of peace, how does Islamic terrorism come about? I mean, how do the isolated individuals who make up the "tiny minority" of terrorists pervert "peace" into murder, terrorism, and "kill the Jews?"

But anyway, for anyone who still asks, no, they don't deserve a state. Past and current actions exclude them from having one. They've been sucking at the U.N. teat for the past four generations while they create hatred, worship death, and demand more, and more, and more. Watch the following video and then tell me that this rot doesn't permeate their entire vile, wretched, pathological society.

Something Really Wrong is Going On Here

2011-05-16T19:32:00.003-05:00

Read the following article, and you may agree that yep, something is absolutely wrong here. Here is a large portion of the article.

In the case of at Jose Guerena, the Marine who served two tours of duty in Iraq, a Pima County, Arizona SWAT team were serving a narcotics conspiracy warrant at his home earlier this month. Guerena, who had been sleeping just two hours after working his shift at a local mine, was awakened by screams from his wife when she observed an unidentified man with a gun outside of their home. She grabbed her baby and hid in a closet as Guerena grabbed a rifle and proceeded to investigate. He was shot dead inside the sanctity of his own home, in the U.S. and not by some sniper in Iraq. In total, seventy-one rounds were fired at Guerena.

To make matters worse - much worse, medical treatment was withheld by the SWAT team, according to his widow and verified by police and medical logs. At this point, it would appear that Guerena was startled awake and thinking he was protecting his family from a possible home invasion, stumbled onto a police raid. He never had a chance.

As a result of the lax border security at the hands of DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano, there has been a sharp rise in home invasions in Tucson over the last few years. Of course, one would not know that by the “cocky football spiking” Obama from his recent speech in El Paso, where he mocked and ridiculed anyone who dared to question the state of U.S.-Mexico border insecurity.

Now, consider the raid on a south Florida Mosque at about 6:00 a.m. Saturday, by dozens of heavily armed federal agents. They pounded on the door of the Masjid Jamaat Al-Mumineen mosque in Miami-Dade county, armed with warrants for Muslims who are suspected of a long-running conspiracy to murder, maim and kidnap people overseas in support of the Taliban. As morning prayers were in progress inside the mosque, the armed agents respectfully waited until the prayers ended, and then entered the mosque only after removing their footwear.

So how far are we supposed to bend over for the Islamofascists? And are we expected to also make whatever sound a goat makes? Will that be enough to show sensitivity?

More Nakba Mania

2011-05-15T17:30:00.002-05:00

I've been following the news reports coming out of Israel as the-pawns-who-call-themselves-Palestinians try to force their way into Israel from Lebanon and Syria. Are they kidding? When will this idiocy end?

Yeah, I know the answer to that last question. As long as there is a Jewish Israel, the surrounding Islamic nations will be bent on its destruction by any means necessary. I also know that their job is made easier by the increasing number of useful idiots, heirs of Western Civilization, who have no idea how good they have it because they were lucky enough to be born into the greatest civilization (even with its many flaws) the world has ever known.

Tomorrow Israel will be condemned, and the few Syrian rioters who demanded death from the IDF will be be all over the news while the hundreds of Syrian protestors who were murdered by Syrian forces will be forgotten or marginalized. Coptic Christians who are being murdered by Egyptian Muslims - uh - I mean pro-democracy will be promptly forgotten. Or the world press will play the moral equivalency game, because you know, some of the Copts were protesting against being murdered. And that's probably Islamophobic.

I have to ask: have we become so weak, has our belief in ourselves become so exhausted that we're willing to put up with a primitive culture of death that in thirteen centuries of existence has given nothing of value to humanity, and bow to its will? Have we allowed ourselves to become so soft and debased that we not only refuse to name the enemy but invite the enemy into our midst and then let them force their rules on us?

Tacitus, in his Histories, (but I forget where) states that men must always be at war to avoid becoming weak. The only thing Islam has given the rest of the world is war, terrorism, and slavery. But they are in constant warfare. Islam's bloody borders, like it or not, is a fact of life. They murder us. They murder each other. But they believe that they have that right. They execute Muslims who open their eyes, see Islam for what it is, and try to leave, or even suggest that it's time for reform in Islam. We, on the other hand, not only tolerate quislings, traitors, and vandals, some of the truly stupid among us afford them respect. I want to know how these twisted Western apologists for evil think they would do if they actually had to live in an Islamic society.

Israel has its share of useful idiots, but today they defended their borders. They will be condemned by the rest of the world, but as always, the world is wrong. Israel is right.

Happy Nakba Day

2011-05-15T12:07:00.006-05:00

This image was created by David Guy. At least he posted it on Facebook. He is very good at this kind of thing. He's done others in the past.

UPDATE: Yep, it was created by David alright. Here is the link to the page to get a larger view.

Kids Without Dads

2011-04-17T11:16:00.001-05:00

I've always been a sucker for advice columns. I don't know why. Maybe reading about other people who are so lame they have to write to a stranger to solve their personal problems makes me feel like I'm less of a loser when faced with my own problems. Maybe I'm just nosy. But when I read this question to advice columnist Carolyn Hax, I got angry.

I just found out I'm pregnant. I'm slowly getting to be very happy about this news even though it was not, ahem, planned.

My boyfriend wants to get married before the baby comes. But is a baby the right reason to get married? I've not always been supportive of marriage because I've seen what happens to friends when they divorced, and it wouldn't have been nearly as messy if that slip of paper were not involved and they could have just walked away. If it helps, we're both mid- to late-30s but haven't been together very long.

That question comes up a lot these days, doesn't it? Here is Carolyn Hax' answer:

With a child, do you really think either of you will be able to "walk away"? Would you want that?

The slip of paper can be a nuisance, but it can also be an advantage. The image I have in mind is of a decorative border fence around a garden. A foot-high frill isn't going to keep anyone in or out, but having it there is usually enough to keep adult feet on the sidewalk and out of the flowers (dogs and children will ignore it, which fits the metaphor nicely). While my own view is that it's not necessary for a strong, committed relationship, a marriage can help a couple's mind stay focused on the commitment.

There is more to the answer, but the child is never mentioned again. I was surprised the child was mentioned at all outside of being an inconvenience to the mother and a possible financial drain to the father. I was going to write to her slamming both of the dopes in this situation, but it's none of my business, and there are millions of children born into that exact situation every year. And how many of those fathers walk away? Or run away? One letter from one disgruntled dope (me) won't change anything.

Part of the reason I get angry at people who are so cavalier about bringing a child into the world without any kind of family structure is that, where I teach, I meet many of those children. They don't know their fathers. Or they see their fathers occasionally, if ever. Some of their fathers are in jail. Some are just gone. I don't even know how many children in my school are growing up without fathers, but it is a majority. And it leaves a dad-sized hole in each one of them.

I was speaking to a mother of one of my students just the other day. Dad lives in another state. I assume he has another family. There is a step dad at home. I met Step Dad. He seems like a decent caring guy, but for this little girl, he's not Dad. Her grades are terrible, she's depressed, she misses her father. I've spoken to Father. He too seems like a decent caring guy. But how often does he see his daughter? Not nearly enough. Most of the time, he is a voice on the phone or an image on a computer screen. What will happen to this poor child as her mother panics over her grades and is worried that she will be retained? I don't know. But she's probably lucky in that her mother (and probably her father) care.

One of the other girls in my class reigns as bully supreme. She's not that big, about average sized, but she's willing to push just about anybody around - and then lie about it. With personal responsibility being so totally outmoded in the adult world, think about that lack among fourth graders. Nothing is ever her fault, because she didn't do it. Even the fruit-throwing incident, witnessed by the entire class, she didn't do it. It was somebody else throwing fruit at her.

She's gotten better over the course of the year, but recently has started backsliding. She smacked a first grader who kicked her on the playground after she insulted him. She had to hit him, because, after all, what would happen to her reputation if she let a little first grader get away with kicking her? And yes, that was part of her rationale for striking the kid. Her father is in jail. How long and for what, I don't know. I don't ask any more. In the past, I've gotten answers from kids about how their dads or uncles, or whomever in the family is locked away, was set up and is innocent. Or sometimes the kids just don't know. She's got a Stepdad too. Again, he seems like a caring fellow, but I don't know what goes on at home.

There are others this year. I recently ran into a former student. The last time I saw him, about five years ago, he was out playing with his toddler-sized son. I ran into him again recently. He's married now, with two more kids. To a different woman. She doesn't want him seeing the mother of his first child, so he doesn't. Where I may have respected him a bit for taking time with his son as a toddler, that respect is long gone. He's willing to let his first child become just another statistic.

I don't remember the circumstances he was raised under, but I do remember that he was part of a trio of trouble makers who the gym teacher and I, independently of each other, dubbed "The Three Stooges." Moe, Larry, and Curly were obvious to anyone who watched them interact with each other. This kid was Curly. Last I heard, Larry was in jail. Moe and his family moved to another state after the year he was in my class.

So the cycle continues; single moms, absent dads, kids who walk into the world already emotionally and intellectually damaged. But don't talk about responsibility. That's just plain old-fashioned, and has no place in today's modern world where the government is here to take care of all problems.

A New Campaign

2011-04-06T08:53:00.002-05:00

So Obama has officially announced his reelection bid for 2012. We know his campaign really began back in January 2008. Got to start that reelection cash flowing. He's going to need it.

I'm also starting a campaign for 2012. I'm calling it my HOPE FOR CHANGE campaign.

She Eats Senators for Lunch

2011-04-05T10:50:00.004-05:00

Through American Digest, I was introduced to Ann Barnhardt. Gerard posted the following two videos. I don't have much to say about them. Mostly I agree with them. Lindsey Graham is a jackass. He does not value freedom. I do. So, obviously, does Ann Barnhardt.

If he and Ann Barnhardt ever meet in person, I hope the meeting is videotaped and posted as a lesson to the rest of our political class that there are Americans who still care and are willing to forcefully and publicly defend our country and Western civilization from the barbarians both within and outside the gate. I will beg mercy for Senator Graham in that the cameras should not follow his sobbing retreat into the men's room. Even a spineless dhimmi like Graham should be afforded a little privacy after his humiliation.

Regarding the second video, I am obsessive when it comes to books, even bad books, and I do have problem with book burning. And using bacon as a bookmark would leave a nasty stain, so forget that. It is her book, though, and she has the right to do whatever she wants with it. And she's doing it to make an important point. My obsessiveness wouldn't allow me to do the same thing. If somebody is offended, they can make their own Youtube video to express their humiliation.

If the New York Times can endanger our country by printing the things they printed under the Bush Administration, then Lindsay Graham and the rest of the dhimmi class can shut up about burning Qu'rans. Actually, they can just shut up.

And is it my imagination that so many women are standing up publicly to defend Western Civilization as many of our "men" cower under the ruses of "showing tolerance", or "cultural sensitivity", or the avoidance of being called a racist or "islamophobe?"

Part two is longer than part one, and although it it repetitious, there is a point to the repetition. There are not merely a few evil passages in the Qu'ran that have to be diligently searched for. That is a book that is full of troublesome stories and advice to Muslims.

Here is an interview with Barnhardt. She says what she means and she means what she says.

iOTW – Your communication skills are pretty impressive, do you have a background that would have prepared you for this, or are you just a natural?

Ann – I have always been a good public speaker and writer. I do apply my talent by teaching seminars for cattlemen as part of one of my businesses, and have a DVD version of my seminar as well. I deliver one of the best five-hour economics lectures on the planet. Not that that is saying much, I know.

iOTW - Have you been a political activist in the past and were there particular issues, apart from Islam, that you focused on?

Ann – I am not a political activist. I am the owner of three small businesses who looked around two and a half years ago and said, “Oh, HELL no.” Politicians make me ill. I can never and will never be a politician. For the last two to three years I have been focusing heavily on explaining and exposing Marxism, Islam and the fraud that is Obama. But that is triple-redundant, isn’t it?

and

iOTW – Have you heard from Lindsey Graham’s office?

Ann – No. They haven’t come out of the men’s room yet.

Dirty, Filthy, Greedy Capitalists

2011-03-05T10:27:00.002-06:00

In the midst of the Obamacare debate, an astounding and possibly racist, imperialist discovery has been made. Capitalism is responsible for lowering medical costs. Can you believe it?

In some of the most significant changes in decades, hospital systems are beginning to post their prices publicly and offer a range of help, including big discounts to uninsured and underinsured people with limited household incomes.

Health insurers also have embraced the trend. Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan, Health Alliance Plan, Priority Health and Aetna are among those with improved Web sites that provide the average cost of a procedure. Some sites even zoom in on local prices when visitors type in their ZIP code.

"It's a fundamental shift" in how health care prices are set and publicized, said Stephen Hathaway, chief revenue officer for the Detroit-based Henry Ford Health System.

The changes come as Michigan's uninsured population has grown to 1.35 million, an increase of 200,000 between 2007 and 2009, the latest year of information available from the state health department.

Didn't Obama and his progressive minions assure us that only the government can bring down health care costs? And they insisted that only their preferred method, strong government intervention to the point of forcing all citizens to buy health insurance from from a government insurance provider )as private insurance companies are to be driven out of business) would insure that we Americans continue to enjoy some of the world's best medical care. This, of course, doesn't apply to the over 700 organizations (including labor unions who fought long and hard to encourage the passage of Obamacare) who have been given waivers so that they do NOT have to participate in Obamacare because it's driven up their health care costs. Huh? What? Driven costs up?

Wait. Did up become down, and down become up? Have I not been informed of Progressive changes in the English language? Or is somebody not being honest with the American public?

But seriously folks, now that it has been demonstrated once again that Capitalism and free markets are responsible for lower costs, greater wealth creation, greater freedom, increased innovation, a better standard of living by just about any honest measure you can choose, and that increased government control over the economy leads to the opposite, why are some people still clamoring for more government spending to "create jobs."

Do some people absolutely refuse to learn?

Update:
I found this article after I posted.

“It’s an industry that’s going through the roof,” said Mark Semple, president of Vancouver-based Passport Medical. “It’s wait times, it’s cost, it’s price, it’s quality and accessibility.”

Retired accountant Gary Davidge of Calgary started looking into hip replacements two years ago when they cost $45,000 U.S. in Arizona. When the arthritis pain in his hip intensified in December, a medical broker found him a price of $18,800 in Montana.

Although Mr. Davidge’s preference would have been to have his operation at home funded by Canada’s public health system, the average wait was a year to 18 months, and no one could tell him with certainty when the surgery would take place.

So, as others before me have asked, where do the Canadians go (and where do we go) to escape socialized medicine?

Interesting Links

2011-02-27T18:17:00.003-06:00

I usually post links I like over at the Garbanzo Annex on Tumblr, but today I thought I'd post them here too.

This one by Melanie Phillips is worth reading and so is the commenter who challenges the Israel bashers with this challenge,

How do you explain the whole Arab world raising against dictators, sacrificing lives in thousands.. everywhere except PA and Israeli Arab sector? - ..these ones are supposed to be first victims of "Zionist genocide".

Here it is, an awful secret. Netanyahu doesn't need to make peace with Arabs because de-facto peace is already established. Israel is not at war with those, even yesterday enemies, who have stopped hostility.

Taking into account the schizophrenic nature of "Arab street" there, and meagre prespectives for political stability, the factual peace is the best available option. And Arabs quietly accept this.

Of course, you should read what Phillips wrote. She is one of the best commentators writing today. And here is more proof of that.

The Times (£) reports that half the board of the Middle East Centre at the London School of Economics, which has received money from Libya among other Arab dictatorships, has called for a boycott of Israel, the one democracy in the Middle East.

It figures.

Now, apparently, there are some red faces:

The university has already been urged by its own dons to give up the £300,000 it received from a foundation headed by the son of Colonel Gaddafi. Howard Davies, the LSE director, is said to have told academics this week that he was ashamed of the institution’s links to the dictatorship.

Questions have been emerging about the LSE’s wider reliance on finance from authoritarian regimes. One of its lecture halls has been named in honour of a sheikh reputed to have promoted anti-Semitic material.

Hypocrisy on the Left? Who could have imagined that? I've always been assured that hypocrisy is an exclusive failure of conservatives, as are all failures.

As long as were talking about Progressives' willful blindness on Israel and the Middle East, here's a good one by Nick Cohen.

The Arab revolution is consigning skip-loads of articles, books and speeches about the Middle East to the dustbin of history. In a few months, readers will go through libraries or newspaper archives and wonder how so many who claimed expert knowledge could have turned their eyes from tyranny and its consequences.

To a generation of politically active if not morally consistent campaigners, the Middle East has meant Israel and only Israel. In theory, they should have been able to stick by universal principles and support a just settlement for the Palestinians while opposing the dictators who kept Arabs subjugated. Few, however, have been able to oppose oppression in all its forms consistently. The right has been no better than the liberal-left in its Jew obsessions. The briefest reading of Conservative newspapers shows that at all times their first concern about political changes in the Middle East is how they affect Israel. For both sides, the lives of hundreds of millions of Arabs, Berbers and Kurds who were not involved in the conflict could be forgotten.

If you doubt me, consider the stories that the Middle Eastern bureau chiefs missed until revolutions that had nothing to do with Palestine forced them to take notice.

What's really surprising is that this is from a British newspaper. I wonder how Cohen got away with this.

Next up is this piece by Alan Dershowitz, a member of that rare species of pro-Israel liberal, in which he exposes the ACLU's attempt at censorship.

The international campaign to prevent speakers from delivering pro-Israel talks at universities has been assisted by leaders of the American Civil Liberties Union—an organization that is supposed to protect freedom of speech for all. The method used to silence these speakers and preclude their audiences from hearing their message is exemplified by a now infamous event at the University of California at Irvine.

Michael Oren—a distinguished scholar and writer, a moderate supporter of the two-state solution, and now Israel's Ambassador to the United States—was invited to speak. The Muslim Student Union set out to prevent him from delivering his talk Here is the way Erwin Chemerinksy, Dean of the law school, described what the students did:

"The Muslim Student Union orchestrated a concerted effort to disrupt the speech. One student after another stood and shouted so that the ambassador could not be heard. Each student was taken away only to be replaced by another doing the same thing."

Oh well, since they're only censoring pro-Israel speech, maybe it's not really censorship. We'll have to await the ACLU ruling.

And now for something completely different, a disturbing video showing another reason why support for education is not the same as support for the MEA.

And teachers in the audience really cheered this speech? Is that what really what they believe? They'd better hope this video doesn't get the attention it deserves.

State of the Teacher's Union

2011-02-24T19:15:00.003-06:00

Like everyone else, I've been watching the madness in Wisconsin. Being a public school teacher, (yeah I may have mentioned that once or twice in the past) I'm disgusted with the teachers in Wisconsin. I understand not wanting to take a pay cut. I took one this year, and I have to pay more out of pocket for my insurance. It hurts. I hate it. But I also understand that the money has to come from somewhere, and if the money isn't there, cuts have to be made. (I'm a taxpayer tool, as much as I hate that). I also know that my school district has made some poor financial decisions in the past that I and other teachers are now paying for. Could we have done anything about that? Probably not. But that's another post, the one where I question why we have school boards.

But back in Wisconsin, how can teachers pretend that they have the best interests of the students at heart when they've abandoned their students or dragged them along to the demonstrations in order to save their own paychecks? Students are supposed to learn what from this? The benefits of mob rule? If the democratic process doesn't produce the results that you want, then it's time to hit the streets? The union has become the fourth branch of government? Why work when you can protest? Doctors are frauds who will write phony prescriptions for political purposes? Teachers are liars who will abandon the students that they've agreed to teach if they don't get their way?

I've watched some of the videos of the union protesters. It's obvious that civility is only expected from conservatives and Republicans. Union members, Democrats, and anyone else on the Left is free to make their own rules and be as rude and violent as they want. Who's going to care? The Press, who is on the side of the unions? The Obama White House corruptocrats, who are owned by the unions?

We're on February break this week, and if I believed in this madness, I could go to Lansing to protest too. I'd rather find a way to get some of my paycheck back from my union that spends my hard earned money on outrageous salaries for union leaders and sends money to organizations that I don't much care for.

Oh, and more money for education does not, as we have seen for years, improve the quality of education. We need vast curriculum changes for that.

Another absurdity that is subverting the democratic process and that is being given tacit approval by the Press and by the White House, is the childish and undemocratic tactic of the Democrat representatives in Wisconsin leaving town to avoid having to vote on Gov. Walker's bill. Had Republicans done this to avoid voting on Obamacare, they would have been tarred and feathered.

The whinyness and selfishness of the left, the fact that they are willing to sink as low as necessary and be as brutal as they are, and damage the country and the country's laws without a second thought in order to get their way is truly amazing. I do hope the grown ups are able to restore order at some point, and that students are able to go back to school.

CAIR Confronts Allen West

2011-02-23T19:26:00.003-06:00

Well, it seems that the terror apologists at CAIR (unindicted co-conspirators in the Holy Land Foundation trial) don't much care for Rep. Allen West. But then, they don't care much for anybody who has the temerity to point what various imams and other members of that tiny minority of extremist blah blah blah, have been telling us for years. Mainly that Islam is on the Earth in order to subjugate all others under the flag of Islam.

Rep. West shows his leadership qualities by not only not backing down or apologizing for telling the truth, but by having the facts that he needs at his fingertips.

Watch. Enjoy. Pass it on.

Palestinian Hypocrisy Week

2011-02-22T16:16:00.006-06:00

I've always liked ridicule as a weapon against the Israel haters. It's easy to do because they're so mired in hatred, that the jokes go right past them, kind of like the facts do. I found the poster here. I like this site, and as you can see, I'm now linked to it.

How to be Cheap

2011-02-20T20:03:00.001-06:00

Here are ways to save money (or be cheap). What the heck. I'm not ashamed.

Wounded Iraq vet heckled at Columbia University

2011-02-20T14:59:00.002-06:00

Read the whole sad, sickening story here.

Apparently civility and free speech only apply to one side at Columbia University – the anti-military side. Woe be unto you if you have the temerity to stand up in an open forum as a member of the Columbia University community and voice an opinion in opposition to that which is prevalent there.

A wounded Iraq war veteran found that out recently as he stood up – something he had to learn to do again after his wounds – and gave what the NY Post describes as an “impassioned challenge to fellow students on their perceptions of the military.” It occurred during the second of three meetings the University has scheduled to talk about ROTC and the possibility of bringing it back on campus.

The comment section is worth reading. As one commenter points out, they gave a polite reception to Iranian president and genocidal maniac, Mahmoud Ahmadinajad.

My greatest hope after reading about these brain-dead, elitist a**holes, is that I raised my own children with a functioning moral compass and the ability to differentiate between right and wrong, both on a personal and on a societal level.

Why I Like Rep Allen West

2011-02-19T19:55:00.000-06:00

A friend of mine emailed me the following video: "Colonel Allen West Answers a Marine's Question". By today's standards, at 3 minutes, 42 seconds, it's a pretty lengthy video. At my age though, I can keep my attention focused for extended periods of time. On really good videos, I've been known to watch uninterrupted for five or six minutes. But like I was saying, watch the video. I had never heard of West before, but now, I would give him my vote for president.

Here. Look.

Notice, if you will, that the man is (dare I say it?) honest. He pulls no punches in order to pander to the Islamic, or the progressive, or the delusions of peace vote. He understands the problem with Islam and isn't afraid to state it in public, on camera, without the cover of weasel words or quibbling politically correct speech. Honesty. From a congressman. It shouldn't be that surprising or unexpected. It's a shame that it is.

But wait! There's more. Read his Wikipedia page.

While serving in Taji, Iraq, on August 20, 2003, West was in charge of the interrogation of Yahya Jhodri Hamoodi, a civilian Iraqi police officer suspected of having information about attacks on American troops in the area.[citation needed] Interrogators had been informed the detainee knew about a planned ambush. When the detainee refused to talk, LTC West was asked to assist. Hamoodi continued to withhold information, and West was accused of firing his pistol past the prisoner's head, frightening him into talking. According to West's sworn statement,[5] the detainee told West:

[The attack] was to occur Friday morning in Saba al Boor vicinity of the police station by positioned snipers supposedly being brought in from Fallujah. [The detainee] was to ID my vehicle and myself for these rooftop firers. We took this information and the following day established flask CPs and used AH-64s overhead. There was no attack and no further attacks have emanated from the town since the apprehension of [the detainee] and his named associates.

At least one suspect was arrested as a result of the information obtained through the detainee's information. The suspect's home was searched, but no plans for attacks or weapons were found. West testified he did not know if "any corroboration" of a plot was ever found. He added: "At the time I had to base my decision on the intelligence I received. It's possible that I was wrong about Mr. Hamoodi."[8]

West, who had completed almost 22 years of active service, was charged with violating articles 128 (assault) and 134 (general article) of the Uniform Code of Military Justice. He was processed through an Article 32 hearing in November 2003, where he stated "I know the method I used was not right, but I wanted to take care of my soldiers" and was fined $5,000. LTC West accepted the judgment and retired with full benefits in the summer of 2004. Asked if he would have act differently if under similar circumstances again, West testified, "If it's about the lives of my soldiers at stake, I'd go through hell with a gasoline can."[9]

So along with honesty, we can add loyalty, bravery, fortitude, and fearlessness.

Of course, not everybody likes West. While I was watching this video again, I noticed a video with Keith Olberman and another with Ed Schultz, both denouncing West. These are denunciations that are easily expected. Schlutz has a history of respecting Al Sharpton, whom he has interviewed on a few occasions. And Olberman? I've read and listened to things that this hateful, hypocritical, pompous twit has said about his political opponents. He is everything that Leftists claim the Rush Limbaugh is. Both of these wise guys adore Obama, who embodies none of the qualities exhibited by West.

When it comes to honesty, we have documented examples of Obama lying about the deficit, the costs of Obamacare, his support for Israel, and other policy decisions he's made. I don't know if West has lied to get to where he is. If so, Olberman, and Schlutz, and Moveon.org, and the rest of the "Progressive" noise machine will ferret out any dishonesty. So far, from the few videos I've seen, the only thing they have is character assassination.

Rep. West was loyal enough to his troops to put his career in danger in a situation where he had to think fast to possibly save American lives. In hindsight, he may have been a bit heavy handed, but he didn't have the luxury of hindsight nor did he have weeks, months, and years to reexamine the situation from every possible angle in order to come up with the perfect solution that would please everyone and harm nobody.

Judging by the way Obama threw friends and family "under the bus" when they became hindrances, one would think that he and his supporters see loyalty as a character flaw. Under loyalty, I would include loyalty to one's country, you know that old fashion concept, the former virtue known as patriotism. West put on a uniform and trained to fight for his country against his countries enemies, both foreign and domestic. Obama can't even summon the fortitude to name our country's enemies, even when those enemies proudly declare themselves.

This is not to say that Obama or those on the Left are the only politicians I don't trust. I don't trust politicians in general, and chances are that if he were elected president, he would do something either during the campaign or during his administration to set me off. The difference with West is, that he's starting from a position of strength when it comes to his basic moral character and stance. It appears that he's putting his own personal power and status behind his need to do what's best for the country. And that's something admirable in anybody.

Comparing Refugees

2011-02-10T16:07:00.003-06:00

I got the photo above from Talking Tachlis. They copied it from a flyer for an Israel-bashing event. I was at the event. There were a lot of pro-Israel people there to ask tough questions and to let the Israel haters know that we will challenge them and their useful Jewish idiots every chance we get. It was clear that the moderators of this Anti-Israel hatefest were intimidated by having a large minority of Israel supporters in the audience.

During the Q & A, they asked that questions be written on postcards. They were forced to ask some of our more intense questions, rather than just the easy ones from supporters.

As for the photo: the two photos, side by side, are supposed to show the moral equivalence between the Holocaust and the Palestinian's "plight". The viewer, if properly trained by years of exposure to anti-Israel rhetoric, and rehashed and updated anti-Semitic libels, is supposed to see the poor beleaguered walkers in both pictures as equal in their victimhood. They are also supposed to take a leap of hate, with help from Hajo Meyer and his morally deficient crew, in order to blame Israel and Zionists for the Arabs (now officially Palestinians) who were either forced from their homes in a war of attempted genocide started by the Arab/Muslim nations surrounding the nascent state of Israel, or picked up and left on their own after being promised by their genocidal leaders that they could return to their homes and maybe even pick up a bit of plunder from the Jews, after the Jews were driven into the sea. Oops!

It's true, the Arabs, once they removed themselves from their premises in what is now Israel discovered, much to their chagrin, that their move was permanent. Bummer. But lets take a look at what happened to the people in both photos in the days, weeks, and years after those two photographs were taken. The Jews from the Warsaw ghetto were most likely reduced to smoke and ashes a short time after they arrived at Auschwitz, the destination of trains that they are most likely headed toward. Some may have lived longer, maybe as long as a few months, and a very few actually survived to tell their stories. And to have children and grandchildren.

The Arabs in the other photo, temporarily (they thought) fleeing their homes (maybe, we have to take the word of Jew-hating terror supporters) will grow up and have families of their own. They will live to see their children grow up to have children of their own. The fact that this will happen in "refugee camps" is the fault of their own feckless leaders, the UN, the Arab/Muslim world, and generations of useful idiots in the West. Any abuse they suffer will be at the hands of their fellow Arabs who will force them and their descendants to live as pawns in a war against Israel, one of the fronts of the world wide Islamic jihad.

As they fester in "refugee camps", they will be taught that it's all the fault of the Jews. They will grow up knowing nothing but hatred to the point that some of them will be willing to turn themselves into human bombs and blow up Jews along with themselves. Among the Muslim world, they will be called heroes and martyrs for trying to finish the job that was started back in 1930s Germany. Their fondest wish will be to murder the descendants of Jews who were fortunate to either live through the Nazi death camps or who were even luckier not to live in Europe during the Holocaust.

The point is that the Arabs we see walking down a dusty road through a picturesque countryside got to live their lives. The Jews being herded through a Warsaw street didn't. And there can be no moral equivalence between life and death.

Egypt

2011-02-02T16:17:00.002-06:00

Everybody has a comment, or a prediction, or both, or more on Egypt and the current uprising there. I've been cogitating on their predicament, trying to decide what to say myself. I've been reading commentary from pundits that I respect. I think that once things settle down in Egypt, things will probably get much worse. What gives me that feeling is the following video:

These cannot be the only Egyptians who share this feeling. I'm guessing that it's pervasive throughout Egyptian society. And to go along with their irrational hatred of Israel, they now have a shiny new air force built with help from the United States, and billions of dollars transferred from American taxpayers to Egypt.

How many more Islamic dictatorships will be overthrown and replaced by a new generation of Jew haters whose first order of business will be the destruction of Israel?

State of the Obama

2011-01-25T20:54:00.003-06:00

I catch two minutes of the State of the Union speech (strictly by accident, this is not something I ever watch no matter who the president is), and what do I hear? Blame Bush: "this deficit spending began a decade ago." And then there is the famous trick of talking out of both sides of the mouth. You know, we MUST and WILL cut spending (paraphrasing), but not if it hurts vulnerable people. Yeah, right.

Rhetorical Question

2011-01-18T18:33:00.002-06:00

I discovered Hope n' Change Cartoons a few months ago. Whoever this person is, they rock!

Cyber Victory in Iran: Nobel Peace Prize for Stuxnet?

2011-01-18T18:14:00.002-06:00

I found this interesting. The more I learn about Stuxnet, the more fascinating it gets.

Three attacks on developing nuclear centers have occurred in the world, the most recent scant months ago. It is amazing that the year 2010, pegged universally as crunch time regarding Iran's atomic ambitions, ended with such a whimper, not a bang. It was to be a year characterized ultimately by a crippling counter-blow to Teheran's plans -with nary a peep from the media. No "top 10 stories of 2010" inclusions. Not even a Wiki-leak.

Considering the fact that the destruction of these nuclear centers had such huge implications for the world and that elusive concept dreamed of by so many, "world peace", you would think that these, especially the latest, would garner more attention. Stuxnet has slowed down Iran's dream of nuclear weapons, but not shattered it. Even if Iran's nuclear scientists and technicians are looking over their shoulders on their way to work, they're still plodding ahead.

I have to assume though, that Israel and other concerned parties are working on other ways to slow down the Iranian nuclear nightmare.

Outrageous Discrimination or Simple Sharia?

2011-01-11T19:01:00.003-06:00

From an article in USA Today,

According to Islamic bioethics, a Muslim patient's first choice of a doctor would be one who is also Muslim and of the same sex. Second choice would be a non-Muslim of the same sex, followed by a Muslim of the opposite sex and a non-Muslim of the opposite sex, Padela and his co-author write.

No big deal, right? After all, we must all reach out to our new Islamic neighbors and meet their every need, respond to their every whim, and generally succumb to whatever irrational and hateful demands they may inflict upon us. If a Muslim rejects a Jewish doctor because that doctor might be a - gasp - Zionist, we must, for some reason, accept that.

Wait. Did that come out right? Maybe, maybe not. But if my first choice of a doctor was based on religion, or ethnicity, or sex, I would be accused of being a hatemonger, or a racist, or sexist, or some other overused and increasingly meaningless label. But as some religions are more equal than others, this is merely a simple bit of information. So keep that information in mind the next time you or someone you know is accused of being intolerant due to a choice they or you make that is based on your feelings or self-interest.

Priceless

2011-01-06T21:35:00.002-06:00

Why Are You Protesting Against Israel?

2011-01-02T19:11:00.001-06:00

But They're Not All Terrorists

2011-01-02T14:09:00.003-06:00

I don't have to tell anybody which religion I'm talking about when I say that. Even the defenders who use that as their big talking point and try desperately not to think of Islam when they try to excuse each new terror attack can't help but think of Islam, because - do I really need to say it?

Besides the fact that "they're not all terrorists" is at best, damning with faint praise, and at worst, setting the bar embarrassing low, there are other pathologies to consider. Honor killings have been imported to the United States by members of the Religion of They're Not All Terrorists. Just to keep everyone happy, please allow me to admit that not all Muslim fathers murder their daughters, even if the daughters do become too westernized.

A homicide case that drew attention to so-called honor killings moves into the trial phase this month for an Iraqi immigrant accused of killing his daughter because he believed she was too Westernized.

Faleh Hassan Almaleki, 50, faces life in prison if convicted. In October 2009, he slammed his Jeep into Noor Almaleki, 20, prosecutors said.

The woman, who longed to live a normal American life, laid in a coma for two weeks before succumbing to her injuries, which drew outrage from people nationwide.

First question for the murderer: Why move to the West if you object to your children becoming "too westernized?" Second question: Have you stopped beating your wife, or would that make you "too westernized"?

In a stunning development, the Detroit News did, near the end of the article, mention that this whole concept of "honor killing" has been brought to our doorstep by the Religion Whose Depravity is Regularly Ignored or Excused. In reviewing past murders of Muslim women by their families,

In the Dallas suburb of Lewisville, Texas, Yaser Abdel Said, of Egypt, is accused of shooting his two Texas-born teenage daughters in the back of his taxi cab in 2008 in what the FBI calls an honor killing. Family members say Said felt the girls were acting too Western and had shamed him by dating non-Muslims.

In Buffalo, N.Y., Muzzammil Hassan is accused of beheading his wife in 2009, about a week after he was served with divorce papers. The body of Aasiya Hassan was found at the offices of Bridges TV, the station the Pakistan-born couple established in 2004 to counter negative stereotypes of Muslims.

Peoria police spokesman Mike Tellef said Noor Almaleki's killing raised awareness about honor killings in the U.S.

"Raising awareness," he says. Many of us have been aware of this pathology for years. How about if our law enforcement officers and our main stream media stand up for themselves and the people who depend on them, and stop kowtowing to CAIR, the multiculturalists, and the other enemies of Western Civilization. Maybe then, we could put a stop to this madness.

Response to Helen Thomas

2010-12-29T11:18:00.002-06:00

Even though the ruckus has died down and Helen Thomas is no longer in the news for her irrational comments, there are still things going on that relate to that wrinkled, demented gasbag.

The first thing is - most people weren't even paying attention. When I speak to people who are not obsessed (or even interested) in what is happening when it comes to our local Arab/Muslim community, they either have a vague idea of who Helen Thomas is, or the entire controversy passed right by them and they didn't even notice. I suppose that's normal. How many people's lives were impacted by Wayne State's "Helen Thomas Spirit of Diversity Award", and Wayne State's decision to pull it after Thomas' obnoxious statements? So why should they pay attention? I'll tell you why. Because, even when they don't know the facts, people still form an opinion. I do it. You do it. We all do it. Sometimes I get into arguments with people who operate on very little (or completely incorrect) information over Israel. Sometimes those opinions affect the way people respond to situations, the way they spend money, the way they treat people, the way they vote, and the way they let some people be abused. Example: Nobody is raising their voice anymore against the genocide in Sudan. We don't see it in the news, so it doesn't exist anymore.

The second aspect of this under-the-radar-but-still-ongoing situation, is the reaction of large portions of the Jewish community and our self-proclaimed leaders. At first, Thomas was roundly, logically, and accurately condemned, as she deserved. Of course, her partners in hate are trying to frame this as a free speech issue and an example of that all powerful Jewish conspiracy that shuts down any and all criticism of Israel. So how is it that they're able to foist these views in our local (allegedly Zionist controlled) newspapers again?

We have silence from the Jewish community over this article in the Detroit Free Press, where the writer, while supposedly writing about Muslims joining Jews to help Christians on Christmas, something the Jewish community has been doing for years (as part of the vast Zionist conspiracy, no doubt) turns it into another forum for Muslims to express their support for the Jew-hating Thomas.

When Micki Grossman of Farmington Hills read journalist Helen Thomas' comments about Zionists earlier this month, the Jewish woman was hurt. "It caused a lot of pain for me," she said.

"I also wish that we could have had more of our Muslim friends stand up and say, 'This was not appropriate.' "

But some Muslims and Arab Americans were upset that Jewish leaders pressured Wayne State University to remove an award in her name.

At the annual banquet this month of the local chapter of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, people wore buttons reading "Defender of Thomas," said regional director Imad Hamad.

And you can't accuse Imad Hamad or any of the other Thomas supporters of "not getting it." They get it. They're taking advantage of the fact that most people don't pay attention, and with the limited amount of information they have, they can be convinced that this is a free speech issue - if they can even be reminded who Helen Thomas is and what she said that was so offensive.

Instead of deluding themselves that our local Islamic community is truly interested in improving relationships with, and working side by side with the Jewish community, our "leaders" need to wake up and really listen to these schmucks. They need to understand that any compromise with this Islamic evil is a victory for evil. I would ask them when, in our 3000 year history, has compromise with evil ever worked in our favor?

Wait, let's extend that. When, in the history of human civilization, has compromise with evil ever worked to the benefit of humanity? I suppose it's possible. Maybe I missed it.

The larger problem here, as some people have recognized while others have buried their heads in the sand, is that Islam is a world wide problem. Whether or not we have personally had to face the hatred or terrorism personally, it has already affected our lives and will continue to reduce them as the evil coming out of Islam continues to be excused. You would think the Jewish community would understand that and would stand stronger in openly battling it. You would be wrong.

Last year, the Jewish community invited Muslims to help them volunteer on Christmas. The partnership was a historic first, with about 60 Muslims helping 900 Jewish volunteers. This year, up to 400 Muslims led by the Council of Islamic Organizations of Michigan will take the lead on Christmas.

"We have many similarities," Grossman said. "Let's look for the sameness rather than the differences."

Such partnerships are playing out across metro Detroit.

Similarities? Sure, there are some. But I challenge Jewish leaders to examine Islamic texts and attitudes as to our differences. I also challenge Muslim leaders to honestly explain and answer questions about some of the more unsavory portions of the Qu'ran and the hadiths.

That will never happen, because it would be impolite of our Jewish leaders to do so. They will be called "Islamophobic" and racist. Samuel Huntington, in his Clash of Civilizations was subjected to name calling because he made people pay attention to Islam's bloody borders. He's got the impolite, politically incorrect facts to back up his ideas, but when people refuse to face the facts, name calling becomes their substitute.

It's time for the Jewish community to face the facts.

Is Israel a Rogue State?

2010-11-16T18:28:00.002-06:00

No, I have not been paying much attention to this blog. Sometimes life takes over, and some things have don't get as much attention as you would like to give them. This argument by Gabriel Latner though, is amazing and is one of those posts that just might grow into an Internet phenomenon. I posted the entire speech, but you can refer to the link, if you want the introduction and the link to where it was originally posted, which strangely enough is an ugly, nasty, anti-Semitic site. I also posted it at the Garbanzo Annex, where I have been posting a lot of collected articles and videos. I don't feel obligated to offer any commentary at the annex, so it makes it easier on me.

Please forgive any spelling or grammar errors, this was an oral presentation. Square brackets denote impromptu comments that were added into the text after the fact. I may have strayed from the text at a few points, but this was the gist of it.

This is a war of ideals, and the other speakers here tonight are rightfully, idealists. I'm not. I'm a realist. I'm here to win. I have a single goal this evening – to have at least a plurality of you walk out of the 'Aye' door. I face a singular challenge – most, if not all, of you have already made up your minds.

This issue is too polarizing for the vast majority of you not to already have a set opinion. I'd be willing to bet that half of you strongly support the motion, and half of you strongly oppose it. I want to win, and we're destined for a tie. I'm tempted to do what my fellow speakers are going to do – simply rehash every bad thing the Israeli government has ever done in an attempt to satisfy those of you who agree with them. And perhaps they'll even guilt one of you rare undecided into voting for the proposition, or more accurately, against Israel. It would be so easy to twist the meaning and significance of international 'laws' to make Israel look like a criminal state. But that's been done to death. It would be easier still to play to your sympathy, with personalised stories of Palestinian suffering. And they can give very eloquent speeches on those issues. But the truth is, that treating people badly, whether they're your citizens or an occupied nation, does not make a state' rogue'. If it did, Canada, the US, and Australia would all be rogue states based on how they treat their indigenous populations. Britain's treatment of the Irish would easily qualify them to wear this sobriquet. These arguments, while emotionally satisfying, lack intellectual rigour.

More importantly, I just don't think we can win with those arguments. It won't change the numbers. Half of you will agree with them, half of you won't. So I'm going to try something different, something a little unorthodox. I'm going to try and convince the die-hard zionists and Israel supporters here tonight, to vote for the proposition. By the end of my speech – I will have presented 5 pro-Israel arguments that show Israel is, if not a 'rogue state' than at least 'rogueish'. Let me be clear. I will not be arguing that Israel is 'bad'. I will not be arguing that it doesn't deserve to exist. I won't be arguing that it behaves worse than every other country. I will only be arguing that Israel is 'rogue'. The word 'rogue' has come to have exceptionally damning connotations. But the word itself is value-neutral. The OED defines rogue as 'Aberrant, anomalous; misplaced, occurring (esp. in isolation) at an unexpected place or time ', while a dictionary from a far greater institution gives this definition 'behaving in ways that are not expected or not normal, often in a destructive way '. These definitions, and others, centre on the idea of anomaly – the unexpected or uncommon. Using this definition, a rogue state is one that acts in an unexpected, uncommon or aberrant manner. A state that behaves exactly like Israel. The first argument is statistical. The fact that Israel is a Jewish state alone makes it anomalous enough to be dubbed a rogue state: There are 195 countries in the world. Some are Christian, some Muslim, some are secular. Israel is the only country in the world that is Jewish. Or, to speak mathmo for a moment, the chance of any randomly chosen state being Jewish is 0.0051% . In comparison the chance of a UK lotto ticket winning at least £10 is 0.017% - more than twice as likely. Israel's jewishness is a statistical abberation. The second argument concerns Israel's humanitarianism, in particular,Israel's response to a refugee crisis. Not the Palestinian refugee crisis – for I am sure that the other speakers will cover that – but the issue of Darfurian refugees. Everyone knows that what happened – and is still happening in Darfur is genocide , whether or not the UN and the Arab League will call it such. [ I actually hoped that Mr Massih would be able speak about this - he's actually somewhat of an expert on the Crisis in Darfur, in fact it's his expertise that has called him away to represent the former Dictator of Sudan while he is being investigated by the ICC. ] There has been a mass exodus from Darfur as the oppressed seek safety. They have not had much luck. Many have gone north to Egypt – where they are treated despicably. The brave make a run through the desert in a bid to make it to Israel. Not only do they face the natural threats of the Sinai, they are also used for target practice by the Egyptian soldiers patrolling the border. Why would they take the risk? Because in Israel they are treated with compassion – they are treated as the refugees that they are – and perhaps Israel's cultural memory of genocide is to blame. The Israeli government has even gone so far as to grant several hundred Darfurian refugees Citizenship. This alone sets Israel apart from the rest of the world. But the real point of distinction is this: The IDF sends out soldiers and medics to patrol the Egyptian border. They are sent looking for refugees attempting to cross into Israel.. Not to send them back into Egypt, but to save them from dehydration, heat exhaustion, and Egyptian bullets. Compare that to the US's reaction to illegal immigration across their border with Mexico. The American government has arrested private individuals for giving water to border crossers who were dying of thirst – and here the Israeli government is sending out its soldiers to save illegal immigrants. To call that sort of behavior anomalous is an understatement. My Third argument is that the Israeli government engages in an activity which the rest of the world shuns -- it negotiates with terrorists. Forget the late PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat, a man who died with blood all over his hands – they're in the process of negotiating with terrorists as we speak. Yasser Abed Rabbo is one of the lead PLO negotiators that has been sent to the peace talks with Israel. Abed Rabbo also used to be a leader of the PFLP- an organisation of 'freedom fighters' that, under Abed Rabbo's leadership, engaged in such freedom promoting activities as killing 22 Israeli highschool students. And the Israeli government is sending delegates to sit at a table with this man, and talk about peace. And the world applauds. You would never see the Spanish government in peace talks with the leaders of the ETA – the British government would never negotiate with Thomas Murphy. And if President Obama were to sit down and talk about peace with Osama Bin Laden, the world would view this as insanity. But Israel can do the exact same thing – and earn international praise in the process. That is the dictionary definition of rogue – behaving in a way that is unexpected, or not normal. Another part of dictionary definition is behaviour or activity 'occuring at an unexpected place or time'. When you compare Israel to its regional neighbours, it becomes clear just how roguish Israel is. And here is the fourth argument: Israel has a better human rights record than any of its neighbours. At no point in history, has there ever been a liberal democratic state in the Middle east- except for Israel. Of all the countries in the middle east, Israel is the only one where the LGBT community enjoys even a small measure of equality. In Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Qatar, and Syria, homosexual conduct is punishable by flogging, imprisonment, or both. But homosexuals there get off pretty lightly compared to their counterparts in Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Yemen, who are put to death. Israeli homosexuals can adopt, openly serve in the army, enter civil unions, and are protected by exceptionally strongly worded ant-discrimination legislation. Beats a death sentence. In fact, it beats America. Israel's protection of its citizens civil liberties has earned international recognition. Freedom House is an NGO that releases an annual report on democracy and civil liberties in each of the 195 countries in the world. It ranks each country as 'Free' 'Partly Free' or 'Not Free'. In the Middle East, Israel is the only country that has earned designation as a 'free' country. Not surprising given the level of freedom afforded to citizens in say, Lebanon- a country designated 'partly free', where there are laws against reporters criticizing not only the Lebanese government, but the Syrian regime as well. [ I'm hoping Ms Booth will speak about this, given her experience working as a 'journalist' for Iran,] Iran is a country given the rating of 'not free', putting it alongside China, Zimbabwe, North Korea, and Myanmar. In Iran, [as Ms Booth I hoped would have said in her speech], there is a special 'Press Court' which prosecutes journalists for such heinous offences as criticizing the ayatollah, reporting on stories damaging the 'foundations of the Islamic republic' , using 'suspicious (i.e. western) sources', or insulting islam. Iran is the world leader in terms of jailed journalists, with 39 reporters (that we know of) in prison as of 2009. They also kicked out almost every western journalist during the 2009 election. [I don't know if Ms Booth was affected by that] I guess we can't really expect more from a theocracy. Which is what most countries in the middle east are. Theocracies and Autocracies. But Israel is the sole, the only, the rogue, democracy. Out of every country in the middle east, only in Israel do anti-government protests and reporting go unquashed and uncensored. I have one final argument – the last nail in the opposition's coffin- and its sitting right across the aisle. Mr Ran Gidor's presence here is the all evidence any of us should need to confidently call Israel a rogue state. For those of you who have never heard of him, Mr Gidor is a political counsellor attached to Israel's embassy in London. He's the guy the Israeli government sent to represent them to the UN. He knows what he's doing. And he's here tonight. And it's incredible. Consider, for a moment, what his presence here means. The Israeli government has signed off,to allow one of their senior diplomatic representatives to participate in a debate on their very legitimacy. That's remarkable. Do you think for a minute, that any other country would do the same? If the Yale University Debating Society were to have a debate where the motion was 'This house believes Britain is a racist, totalitarian state that has done irrevocable harm to the peoples of the world', that Britain would allow any of it's officials to participate? No. Would China participate in a debate about the status of Taiwan? Never. And there is no chance in hell that an American government official would ever be permitted to argue in a debate concerning it's treatment of prisoners at Guantanamo Bay. But Israel has sent Mr Ran Gidor to argue tonight against [a 'journalist' come reality tv star, and myself,] a 19 year old law student who is entirely unqualified to speak on the issue at hand. Every government in the world should be laughing at Israel right now- because it forgot rule number one. You never add credence to crackpots by engaging with them. It's the same reason you won't see Stephen Hawking or Richard Dawkins debate David Icke. But Israel is doing precisely that. Once again, behaving in a way that is unexpected, or not normal. Behaving like a rogue state. That's five arguments that have been directed at the supporters of Israel. But I have a minute or two left. And here's an argument for all of you – Israel willfully and forcefully disregards international law. In 1981 Israel destroyed OSIRAK – Sadam Hussein's nuclear bomb lab. Every government in the world knew that Hussein was building a bomb. And they did nothing. Except for Israel. Yes, in doing so they broke international law and custom. But they also saved us all from a nuclear Iraq. That rogue action should earn Israel a place of respect in the eyes of all freedom loving peoples. But it hasn't. But tonight, while you listen to us prattle on, I want you to remember something; while you're here, Khomeini's Iran is working towards the Bomb. And if you're honest with yourself, you know that Israel is the only country that can, and will, do something about it. Israel will, out of necessity act in a way that is the not the norm, and you'd better hope that they do it in a destructive manner. Any sane person would rather a rogue Israel than a Nuclear Iran. [Except Ms Booth]

More Pre-emptive Surrender to Islam

2010-10-17T18:53:00.003-05:00

This cartoon was was censored by the quislings and dhimmis at the Washington Post and lots of other American newspapers that have no problem running comics and articles that insult Christians and Jews. Suddenly though, they have developed their latent religious and cultural sensitivities. There were no protests, no threats of violence, even the folks at CAIR expressed no fuss. But, I'm sure that CAIR understands much better than the cowards in the Washington Post editorial department, that merely by asking for an opinion from the Hamas front group CAIR, that Muslims no longer have to make threats. Our MSM has surrendered. The first amendment has been replaced by Sharia law in the news room. The censorship of the cartoon proves the point of the joke, something else the dhimmis at WaPo didn't get. Repost it and pass it on.

UPDATE The captions are really hard to read so: The top one says,

Picture book title voted least likely to ever find a publisher

The bottom caption reads, Where's Muhammad?

Can She Be That Stupid?

2010-10-15T17:48:00.000-05:00

Helen Thomas, who wants all Jews to leave Israel and "go back home" - to their ancestral homelands of Poland and Germany, where - well you know, insists that she is not anti-Semitic. But then,

"I hit the third rail. You cannot criticize Israel in this country and survive," Thomas told Ohio station WMRN-AM

So whose fault is it that she lost her job after exposing herself so plainly as a Jew-hater that even her employer could no longer ignore it? Why, it's those Jews of course. But that doesn't make her anti-Semitic because . . . because . . . well, because she said so? Has the habit of blaming Jews for all the ills of the world become so commonplace that it's nothing more than a mindless cliche? I don't think so, and Thomas is a fool for not understanding her own hatred, or for trying to convince the world that she isn't something that she so obviously is.

Let's check the reality of the situation, you know, examine the facts, something Helen Thomas and her fellow travelers strenuously avoid, unless they are making up their own facts, which change as quickly as the weather, once the old ones are exposed as bogus. Some professional critics of Israel are making a fine living. Jimmy Carter, Mearsheimer and Walt, and other spiritual heirs to the Spanish Inquisition, Russian pogroms, Islamic massacres, and low grade thugs whose only function in life was to make life miserable for the Jews in their midst, are feted by elite news magazines, and treated to softball TV interviews as they push their Jew-hating books and complain that they are being silenced by a shadowy Zionist conspiracy.

This time Helen Thomas has pushed her agenda a little too far. I'm tired of this crap and now I'm pissed off. So let me just say to Helen Thomas (and believe me, others will follow) - Listen, and listen good lady, because now you've done it. You've pushed me over the edge. I am a member of that shadowy Zionist conspiracy that controls the Media and holds U.S. foreign policy hostage. Well, guess what. I'm stepping out of the shadows to let you know something. I'm going to be working with some of my co-conspirators, and when you wake up tomorrow morning, you are going to wish your name was Sleeping Ugly and that you could have slept for another hundred years. Because when you awaken, you are going to find that your house has been foreclosed on, your car repossessed, all of your credit cards canceled, your bank account frozen, your driver's license and passport revoked, your Facebook and Twitter accounts closed, and your birth certificate hiding in a place so obscure that hunters will find Obama's long before they find yours. You school records, even those from the "school of hard knocks" will disappear. You will become a nonentity. You will have ceased to exist in every data base in the world and in the lives of anyone you know or have ever known. Those who used to love you (if it was even possible to love a hideous wretch like you) will avoid your gaze and involuntarily cringe if you approach them on the street - which will be your new home. You will be brought so low that you will wish and beg to be allowed to rise to the level of a street person, one of those we used to refer to as "bums". They will pity you but want nothing to do with you.

Understand - you didn't criticize Israel. Criticism is honest. It takes into account the good and the bad. It's logical and based on facts. You showed your irrational hatred for 14 million people you only know as "Jews". You demonstrated your support for a Jew-free Middle East by way of ethnically cleansing Israel of its majority Jewish population. And even though you did this, and are now pegged as the next victim of the "Zionist Conspiracy," you will survive - in a way. But you're going to wish you hadn't. You are about to end up as a character in a Philip K. Dick novel. Enjoy your new "life", sucker!

Stalking the Wild

2010-10-14T20:00:00.000-05:00

Every year over Labor Day Weekend we go camping with a group of families from our synagogue. And every year I take a nature walk with my daughter and her camera. This year my wife came with us. My son, who always had better things to do, has, like many other of the children who used to come with us, aged out of camping. Once they hit college, they've got better things to do. In his case, it was work. That's good. He needs to work. The three of us did have a nice walk though, and my daughter got a few good photos.

I took another walk by myself. It was on another trail. This one butts up to a swamp at one point, or is it a bog? Or a wetland? I'm not sure. But there are frogs, turtles, dragonflies and other critters. It's full of lily pads for the critters to frolic around on, and under, and around, and it's not very big. The trail actually goes around the whole thing and is maybe a half mile long. There is only one point where you don't have to walk very far to get close enough to the swamp to get your feet wet. My daughter and I always stop at this edge and try to catch a look or two at the swamp inhabitants, but usually all we catch are the remains of the splash as they dart away from us. But we do tend to talk as we walk, and we are also usually swatting at mosquitoes. You would think the dragonflies would take care of that problem, but they don't. Sheer laziness, I tell you.

We had a cool Labor Day weekend in Michigan this year, so I was able to stand at swamp's edge and just watch without being bothered by little bloodsuckers. The first thing that happens whenever we walk up to the swamp is that we hear splashes of creatures swimming away. And then we try to catch glimpses of them as they swim about.

They splashed away as always, but as I stood without moving, they slowly returned to their normal activities. There were turtles swimming around, carefully and in a zig-zag pattern, making their way back to the shore. Some of them were even climbing back out of the water to sun themselves on logs. One tried a few times and kept falling off a stick that was too thin to balance on. I was being watched though. I shifted into a Gary Paulsen mode, trying to become part of the landscape so that the animals would ignore me enough so that I could watch them. A muskrat swam pretty close to me but took off when it realized that I was a big dangerous person. Frogs went back to their habit of just sitting there waiting for food to fly by. And I stood still, only moving my eyes for about a half hour.

It was fascinating being able to watch things that had been hidden from me before. I imagine that our ancestors who had to hunt for their food needed this type of patience every day in order to be able to eat. Animals who serve as prey are always on the lookout for predators or anything that shouldn't be there and might be dangerous, like the guy standing there in jeans, sweatshirt, and baseball cap. One never knows.

My main concern was somebody coming down the path and ruining my "nature time". It didn't happen, but finally I had to move. As soon as I did, all of the turtles and frogs that has worked their way close to shore dove underwater and scattered.

It was over. I went back to the campsite to read and chat with the other people we camp with every year. I'll do it again next year. Maybe my daughter will be patient enough to stand there with me.

More Thoughts on the Gulag

2010-09-19T18:22:00.001-05:00

I've gotten to the point where for the most part, I've become an opportunistic book buyer. I used to go looking for specific books and I would (mostly) buy the book I was looking for before buying anything else. Now, there are so many books that I want to read that unless it's by one of my rare "must have" authors, I don't bother until I find it cheap somewhere around town, whether it's in a used book store, or even better, at a yard sale. This week I picked up a nice paperback copy of Thackery's Vanity Fair. Eventually I'll read it.

I've already written about volume I of The Gulag Archipelago which I found as a paperback at the local YMCA's used book sale. Early this summer I found volume II in hardcover at a used book store. It's big, and it's heavy, and I'm guessing that very few people bought it, and even fewer people read it.

I am not like other people however, and I brought it to keep me company on the six hour train rides to and from Chicago. It is truly as fascinating as the first volume. As with the first volume, the irony and sarcasm keeps this book from making the reader suicidal.

With about 200 pages left to go, it suddenly hit me that a totalitarian society - as the USSR, as the other communist dictatorships, as the Third Reich, as Islamic countries are and always have been - suicidal. No, that's not right. They still survive. They are self-defeating. They can never rise up from the mud because they destroy their best and brightest. Solzhenitsyn writes of engineers, scientists, writers, composers, poets, artists, and others who should have been inventing and creating new products, and building the wealth, and forming the spirit of the USSR, being instead, forced to live as political prisoners and slave laborers in prison camps across Russia. Lenin had his opponents murdered, and the entire slave labor system began under his leadership. Stalin, in addition to imprisoning and killing the best and brightest Russia had to offer, purged his generals before WWII. Oops! And then there was China. How many brilliant, creative, hard-working people were murdered during the Cultural Revolution and the Great Leap Forward? Under Pol Pot in Cambodia, people with glasses were killed under the assumption that they were dangerous intellectuals. How many political prisoners has Castro imprisoned?

You want to talk non-communist dictators? How about Zimbabwe's Mugabe turning a net food exporting country into a nation of starving disease-ridden beggars? Yes, the Rhodesian apartheid system was immoral, but are Zimbabweans better or worse off now?

Islam, although it has conquered a large portion of the world, as its holy book, the Qu'ran instructs its followers to do, it doesn't allow Muslims to rise in the world in any meaningful manner. Jihad doesn't allow for excellence in fields that improve the lot of mankind, there is no incentive to create and nurture industry, medicine, art, literature, etc. It's all about conquest and control over the lives of Muslims - and non-Muslims. We are supposed to be tolerated as dhimmis. Not that Islam has contributed nothing, but considering 20 percent of the world's population is Muslim, it seems to me that if there were genuine freedom in Islam and in Islamic nations, we would hear more positive news and less of the kind that insists we in "dar al harm" ignore the pathologies of Islam; jihad, honor killings, terrorism, rioting over cartoons, teddy bears, literature, etc.

But back to the gulag. As I was dawdling with this post over days and weeks, I finished the book. Turns out it's also a philosophy book. And it's not that Solzhenitsyn just tacked some philosophical musings on at the end to give it a bit more kick. Due to the previous 12 to 1300 pages, it is an integral part of the book. It fills a need that the reader (or at least this reader) doesn't even realize needs to be filled until it is filled. He has built a philosophy built on pain and death and the horrors of a slave labor system that is as bad or worse than any other that has ever been conceived by human beings. And I'm not sure he's totally satisfied with this philosophy, but he doesn't excuse himself as a victim. He doesn't "go Obama" on us. He presents his own weakness and fallibility to the reader. (I can't pretend that I would have done any better in his situation. In fact, I don't think I would have lasted very long at all.) He doesn't offer himself as a hero, but merely as another innocent Russian unjustly imprisoned who happened to be lucky enough to survive. His survival amidst all of those who died forces him and the reader to continue to think about the validity of these final thoughts. It also reminded me of Tolstoy's story, God Sees the Truth, but Waits.

I hate to gush, but it you have some spare time, you should read this monster.

Commuting

2010-09-14T20:25:00.002-05:00

I started riding my bike to work. It's not a long ride, only two and a half miles. And I'm not doing it to save the planet or improve my health, even though I inadvertently may be doing both. I'm doing it because we have three drivers and only two cars. Well, four if you count my daughter who just got her driver's license. But she can walk to school, or - as she too has been doing, ride her bike to school.

After riding for only a few days, I've realized something that I've never thought of before: When you drive through an area, no matter where you're driving through, you're not really there. You can see everything that is passing by, but you are in your car. You may think you are in the area, city, or neighborhood that you see out your window. You may tell people you are or have been there, but even if your windows are open, from the time you pull out of your driveway until you reach your destination, the only place you are is in your car.

On my bike, I am where I am. I am a part of all the places I pass through. I can talk to people, pull up to yard sales, dodge rocks, sticks, and small critters, get rained on, either battle or work with the wind. I can pass students on their way too and from school. I can stop easily for impromptu conversations with strangers. I'm not encased in my automobile. Its a very different feeling. I'm much more aware of my surroundings - which I'd better be if I'm going to get to work and back home safely and without incident. No plugging into any digital musical devices for me while I'm riding. I need to hear those trucks sneaking up on me from behind.

I'll be riding until January when my son returns to college. After that, especially if they weather is dicey, I'm sure I shall return to the embrace of my cocoon. Or maybe not. My next door neighbor leaves his house around 5:30 every morning, no matter what the weather is like for his ten mile bike ride to work. It does give one pause.

Korea's kids just like ours, 100 years ago

2010-09-13T18:06:00.003-05:00

This is by Mitch Albom of the Detroit Free Press. It's about education. And it makes a lot of sense. How can I not reprint it?

SEOUL, South Korea -- "If they can do that in South Korea, we can do it right here in the United States of America."

President Barack Obama said that last year. He was talking about school. He was talking about hours. He was talking about how hard South Korean kids work, how long they study, how much time they put in -- more than a month longer per school year than their American counterparts.

I am writing this from South Korea, where I have spent a week, much of it speaking to high school kids. And I can tell President Obama pretty confidently that we can't do what they're doing here.

Because we don't believe in it.

South Koreans treat school like a full-time job plus a full-time marriage. They put in day hours and night hours, followed by weekend hours. It is not uncommon to see children in school uniforms walking home late at night. It is not uncommon to see them studying through weekends. There is private English education on top of the public education. Families split apart to improve a child's training. You hear stories about schooling that runs from sunrise past sunset, with breakfast, lunch and dinner being served in the building.

What you don't hear is cheerleading squads. What you don't hear is spring break trips to Cancún. What you don't hear is classes to boost self-esteem, to celebrate an ethnic group, to explore the arts. What you don't hear is "Glee" or "High School Musical" or other coolness-driven entertainment fantasies about high school fashion, sex, talent or jockdom.

How are our kids supposed to mimic these kids when this place doesn't look anything like the American school system?

It's funny, because most of the kids here want to be American.
Battling to get ahead in life

Not in the citizenship sense. They don't want to join our army. They want to be American in speaking English, in gaining wealth and status, in rising to the top. One of the questions I was asked by media here was, "What do our children have to do to become global leaders?" That's not a common question in the U.S. -- not to a visiting writer, anyhow.

There is an obsession with getting ahead here that begins with the classroom and permeates the adult workplace, where rigid hours and meager vacation days are the norm. The attitude mimics one you heard among American immigrants in the early 20th Century: "If you don't do well in school, you won't get to college, if you don't get to college you won't get a god job, and if you don't get a good job, you'll be a loser."

There is no shame in that lecture here. It is not viewed as corny or clichéd. It is part of the national pride, if not the national obsession.

How are American kids going to copy that? We're not disciplined enough, we're not hungry enough, and, most importantly, either parents don't say it enough, or if they do, kids ignore them.

That also doesn't happen in Korea. Respect for elders is paramount in Korean society. There are actually different words used to reflect deference to age -- a much older person is addressed one way, a slightly older person another.

They don't make comedies here where the 10-year-old is the brilliant family member and Mom and Dad are bumbling knuckleheads -- and divorced. The family dynamic is different. And as most educators will tell you, family is where future school performance begins.

Which, by the way, doesn't mean Korean kids are happier. It may be quite the opposite. Everywhere I went, I encountered teenagers in love with my book "Tuesdays With Morrie," because the teacher in it showed compassion and encouraged humanity, not just grades. Many kids told me, "I wish in my life I would meet a Morrie."

Many older kids wondered how you find meaning in your life if you are studying and working almost every spare hour.

And studies show that while Korean kids do amazingly well on certain standardized tests, those who come to America for college often drop out, unaccustomed the approach we take.

All of which suggests that Obama was a bit naive to think an extra month in school is going to put our kids on par with the high-scoring South Koreans. Their success runs much deeper than that. Their issues do, too.

Our kids laugh more, play more sports, express themselves more openly. The kids here are serious beyond compare, and they are driven to succeed. I'm not sure which system I'd prefer, but I know they are apples and oranges, and the length of a school year is only a tiny difference. It may take a village to raise a child. But it takes a country to educate one.

Islam Must Turn the Other Cheek

2010-09-13T17:53:00.002-05:00

This is by Nolan Finley from the Detroit News:

How absurd is it that the deranged pastor of a tiny Florida church can make the entire world hold its breath just by threatening to burn a book?

The Rev. Terry Jones of the Dove Outreach Center in Gainesville is a hate-filled nut, for sure. But nothing he's done or vowed to do in offering what can only be viewed rationally as a minor insult to Islam merits the paranoia in the West about a worldwide wave of bloodshed at the hands of offended radicals.

Jones was implored not to carry out his promise to burn a copy of the Quran by, among others, the United Nations, the pope, Gen.general David Petraeus and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates.

His back-and-forth deliberating was covered as if it was another Bay of Pigs stand-off and this scruffy preacher had his finger on the button.

Come on. Jones should have been entirely ignored. He's not an official of our government, nor is he a national leader in any fashion. He's an obscure redneck, or at least he was until the cameras showed up at his 50-member church.

That Jones captured so much attention is an indication of what the West is up against in its effort to coexist with Islam.

Yeah, I know -- all Muslims aren't mayhem makers. But the lunatic fringe is apparently wide enough to trigger an extreme overreaction from our nation's top offices to a silly little publicity stunt.

If Muslim sensibilities are so tender they can't ignore the bizarre rants of an insignificant American fanatic then this is a culture with a serious anger management issue, and one the West can't help with.

There's no way to head-off every potential slight to Islam. Last time it was Danish cartoons, this time it's a Pentecostal pew jumper who lays down his snakes to strike a match.

Tomorrow, an atheist in Italy may name his dog Mohammad, or a biker in Australia will have a likeness of the prophet tattooed on his backside.

The only answer is for Islam to grow up. Religion invites antagonism; get used to it.

Using the destruction of a book as an excuse to rampage is unacceptable and immature. A Quran, like a Bible, is a physical thing. What makes both books holy are the ideas and inspiration they contain, not the pages and ink. The religion won't be broken by taunts, or by bonfires.

Burning a Quran in the Florida swamps doesn't weaken the foundation of Islam any more than burning an American flag in Pakistan dents our nation's underpinnings, or coating an icon of the Virgin Mary with elephant poop, like that "artist" once did in Cincinnati, undermines Christianity.

Grown-ups shrug off such affronts for the ignorance they are, and move on. They don't go nuts, as the radicals did after the cartoon episode.

We've had the mantra "Islam is a religion of peace" drilled into us for the past nine years. But Muslims still have some work to do to make that case. Peaceful religions aren't so easily provoked to violence. Religions of peace turn the other cheek.

What more is there to say?

More Free Press Reaction

2010-09-11T17:44:00.006-05:00

In the previous post I forgot to mention that in one of the propaganda pieces the Free Press ran, someone gave the bogus analogy of Muslims being subjected to the same senseless discrimination that other ethnic groups were forced to endure when they first came to these shores. That is more fantasy. No other ethnic group came to these shores demanding that we give up our ways in order to follow their ways. And we have to do it for Muslims in order to remain sensitive to their needs, so we don't humiliate them, and because others have suffered in the past. Oh, and because if we don't, some misguided Muslim might, through a misinterpretation of that holy book of peace, tolerance, and love, the Qu'ran, become violent toward the United States.

So halal food must be served in schools that Muslim children attend. Prayer rooms and foot baths should be set up for Islamic usage - oh wait - anyone, not only Muslims, can use them, but the prayer rooms must be segregated by sex because you-know-which-religion demands it, and the foot baths - who else would really think of using them? During Ramadan we shouldn't eat or drink in the presence of a fasting Muslim. So we'd better be fluent in the Muslim calender. Health clubs and public swimming pools should have women only hours so that Muslim women aren't forced to exercise in the leering presence of a man.

When a Muslim or Muslims have launched or are caught preparing a terror attack we are strictly forbidden to entertain the slightest thought that it is a terror attack by Muslims. We are encouraged to suspect any person or any group on the political right. And once it is conclusively proven that Muslims were involved, we must agree, under the pain of being called an "Islamophobe" that the perpetrator(s) are either insane or perverting the teachings of yada, yada, yada . . .

They must be allowed to murder their daughters if their daughters stray from daddy's will. They can beat their wives. They are entitled to welfare as soon as they enter the country. (I think that is true of all new immigrants though). My grandparents had to work. And so did all of the other immigrants from all of the other nations of the Earth who came to the United States in search for a better life. And the only favor they expected was to be allowed to work in order to better their own and their children's lives. No accommodation were expected by them or made for them. Sensitivity to their old country cultural norms if one of their community was arrested? Yeah, right. They were expected to learn the language - English, that is - and become Americans.

So don't try and make me believe that Muslims are just like any other ethnic or religious group in this country. It simply isn't true. No other group in the history of this nation has demanded so much while contributing so little (well, except maybe for teenagers, but most people grow out of that.) No group has been so adept at developing unearned whining to the art form it has become. They've quickly learned to take advantage of the surfeit of liberal guilt that is eating away at the fabric of our nation. Responsibility for their actions? Forget it. It's always somebody else's fault.

Like others have said, Muslims, like everybody else are welcome to come to this country. But if they are going to become Americans, then they have to adapt to American society. Don't expect me to adapt to Islamic society because I will not submit.

Shills for Islam

2010-09-11T13:42:00.003-05:00

The Detroit Free Press has gone into full pro-Islamic propaganda mode today, the ninth anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. There are two articles and an editorial all about the strain on Muslims since that fateful day and about how members of all monotheistic faiths are coming together to promote tolerance, and battle intolerance, and to let the world know about the tiny minority of Muslims who pervert a religion of peace, and-. But let's face it. We've been force fed this crap for the past nine years, and it is still a load of crap.

The Free Press managed to interview people of differing religions to get their 9/11 stories, and wouldn't you know it, they all agree that because of that attack, innocent Muslims have been unfairly maligned, and these fine folk have gone out of their way to improve relations between themselves and people of other faiths. The deaths of the almost 3000 Americans murdered that day actually made the interviewees better people. Wasn't that a lucky break for them? And it helped make the United States a more moral nation - well, except for that war stuff, you know, when President Bush made that reactionary, non-progressive, non-enlightened decision to fight back. At least that's the way I read these interviews. Random quotes:

I'd like to think it's made everybody more aware in a better way. But I think in some way, the paranoia hasn't helped.

and

On a personal level, I became actively engaged in conversations with my Muslim neighbors. ... Upon moving to southeast Michigan, my opportunities to work closely with Muslims have only increased due to the much larger Islamic presence in this area. Yes, I do believe that 9/11 has changed me dramatically, and ironically I believe that on a personal level, that has been for the better.

and

Since 9/11, life has been filled with more work and blessed moments to enlighten others on my faith and culture. Immediately post-9/11, I found myself overanxious, more cautious of where I went, how I traveled and the people I associated with. I felt I had to constantly defend my faith, culture and fellow Muslim brothers and sisters who were being persecuted for the actions of a rotten few.

and finally

9/11 stoked our country's best and worst sides. As a country, we mobilized with incredible speed and unity. We paid beautiful tribute to the people who lost their lives and sacrificed themselves to save lives. We lost our way through wars and still have not found the courage or means to articulate the strength of our country to ourselves and the world. Our religious hostility and fear continue toward the Muslim world. We have not convincingly articulated America's strength, goodness and promise. ... Our country began chasing demonic enemies, instead of leading ... with integrity and hope.

Either the reactions I read are kind of bizarre and twisted, or I'm the one who is nuts. For some reason, I keep thinking that we should not be accepting the words of our local imams. I've read opinion pieces by some of them in our various local news rags, and based on these writings and interviews in these same rags, I don't trust them.

But there was an editorial in today's Free Press defending the peacefulness of Islam (because that's what the Qu'ran is all about, we are told) that had a line that I do agree with:

We need more dialogue, more reading of the Quran, both inside the Muslim community and out.

Yes, we should all read the Qu'ran. My son bought a copy, but it was translated by a non-Muslim. I'm not sure how accurate it is. I'd like to find one of the ones that CAIR passed out a few years ago. I've been checking used book stores. I tried reading my son's but it is a tough slog. The narrative is kind of weak, and it seems to be full of non sequitors. I can't let that stop me though. Read, I must.

When it comes to this claim in the editorial though:

The Quran is filled with such verses calling on Muslims to practice every kind of goodness. Yet most Americans know little or nothing about them. An August Pew Research poll concluded that 35% of Americans believe Islam is more likely to encourage violence than other religions, while 24% weren’t sure.

Of course, it’s not difficult to understand why. Approaching the ninth anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, we can’t forget the violence of that day. The really ugly truth: The 9/11 attackers, the Taliban and al-Qaeda are all doing far more harm to the Quran than Jones is by burning it. By distorting the verses of the Quran to justify their violent agenda, these terrorists and their sympathizers continue to breed hostility toward Islam and Muslims. Instead of spreading the Quran's message of peace, they are spreading their own message of hatred

I have to ask: how do you distort verses like:

Fight and kill the disbelievers wherever you find them, take them captive, harass them, lie in wait and ambush them using every stratagem of war.

and

Fight those who do not believe until they all surrender, paying the protective tax in submission.

and

So fight them until there is no more Fitnah (disbelief [non-Muslims]) and all submit to the religion of Allah alone (in the whole world).

and

When you clash with the unbelieving Infidels in battle (fighting Jihad in Allah's Cause), smite their necks until you overpower them, killing and wounding many of them. At length, when you have thoroughly subdued them, bind them firmly, making (them) captives. Thereafter either generosity or ransom (them based upon what benefits Islam) until the war lays down its burdens. Thus are you commanded by Allah to continue carrying out Jihad against the unbelieving infidels until they submit to Islam.

and

The infidels should not think that they can get away from us. Prepare against them whatever arms and weaponry you can muster so that you may terrorize them.

and I could go on and on, or I can recommend Prophet of Doom for more quotes from the Qu'ran and other Islamic sources that the apologists, and the imams, and the spreaders of "dawah" don't talk about and don't want us to talk about. We are supposed to ignore a vast body of Islamic teaching that is not as savory as the tiny verses of love and honesty, that may have even been revoked according to the the Islamic concept of abrogation.

In an attempt to polish Islam's image, Muslim activists usually quote verses from the Quran that were written in the early days of the Islamic movement while Mohammed lived in Mecca. Those passages make Islam appear loving and harmless because they call for love, peace and patience. Such is a deception. The activists fail to tell gullible people that such verses, though still in the Quran, were nullified, abrogated, rendered void by later passages that incite killing, decapitations, maiming, terrorism and religious intolerance. The latter verses were penned while Mohammed’s headquarters was based in Medina.

When speaking with people of Christianized/Western societies, Muslim activists deliberately hide a major Islamic doctrine called "al-Nasikh wal-Mansoukh" (the Abrogator and the Abrogated). This simply means that in situations wherein verses contradict one another, the early verses are overridden by the latter verses. The chronological timing in which a verse was written determines its authority to establish policies within Islam. Non-Muslims cannot afford to be ignorant about the full implications of the Abrogator and the Abrogated Doctrine (al-Nasikh wal-Mansoukh). When Islamic spokesmen say that Islam is a religion of peace and that the Quran does not support such things as human rights infractions, gender bias and terrorism, they are lying. This means that the Western politicians and liberal journalists, who continually spout that Islam is a noble religion of peace, are in reality propagating a deception that they have been deceived into parroting.

I'm sure they won't be discussing any of that today as the imams slide some more taqiyya past the gullible Christians and Jews, and these silly infidels won't care because they can engage in vast amounts of self-congratulation based on how tolerant, accepting, and enlightened they are. Rather than be part of that charade, I'll be thinking of those murdered in the 9/11 attacks and in all of the over 16,000 Islamic terror attacks since then.

I'm just not very enlightened.

Burn, Baby, Burn

2010-09-10T19:03:00.004-05:00

First of all, publicly burning a Qu'ran is a stupid thing to do. Being a book lover, I look at the burning of any book, even a lousy one, as a desecration. The "pastor" in charge of this fiasco needs to find a more intelligent way to make his point, like maybe doing some research into Islam so that he can spread that information. The more people who understand Islam and the terror and abuse it has spread, the brake it's put on freedom and civilization, the better we infidels will be able to battle it, along with its Leftist dhimmi enablers.

So far, the best commentaries on this silly episode come from Debbie Schlussel

Here’s what I view as far more offensive than the burning of Korans: that the outrage over this is more so than the outrage of any Islamic murder of Americans, any jihadist beheading videos featuring Westerners being slaughtered in the name of the Koran.

and Ann Coulter

Also, as I recall, there was no Guantanamo, no Afghanistan war and no Iraq war on Sept. 10, 2001. And yet, somehow, Osama bin Ladin had no trouble recruiting back then. Can we retire the "it will help them recruit" argument yet?

Michelle Malkin does a good job of reminding us that there are always Muslims somewhere outraged over something we in the West are doing or not doing.

I keep wondering when some big time pundit will point out that this tells us more about both Islam and the West than either their our our leaders are willing to admit. We are bombarded with worry warts insisting that this Qu'ran burning will be a tremendous recruiting tool for Al-Quaeda and the Taliban. These days it's hard to find any behavior from the West that isn't claimed as a propaganda coup for Islamic terrorists; cartoons of Mohammed, protests against the "Ground Zero Mosque", killing terrorists, the list is endless.

If, as we are constantly assured by the apologists, that it is only a "tiny minority" of Muslims who engage in terrorism, where are they finding so many Muslims who are inspired to be terrorists at the slightest provocation? Wait - not provocation - it's any act that any Muslim finds distasteful. And if it isn't terrorism, there will be riots, lots of riots featuring burning American flags, screaming, ranting, and more than a few random murders from outraged members of what we are - again - constantly assured, is a religion of peace (just chock full of Ghandis don't you know) . . . as long as we follow their rules, you know, as long as we act as dhimmis. If they're as peaceful as the apologists claim they are, why are they so damn easy to provoke?

It's past time to let the Islamic world know that we aren't interested in being lorded over by misogynistic, insecure, tyrannical, parasitic, seventh century barbarians. But that's the problem, isn't it? Our spineless leaders, along with our mainstream media, is afraid to take that stand. Somehow, they continue to take the coward's way out and insist that - really, it really is a religion of peace, honest, and anyone who claims otherwise is an "Islamophobe." And this is from the leaders and elites of the richest, most powerful society ever developed by mankind. They have decided to wimp out. It's every infidel for himself.

The Roman historian, Tacitus insisted that in order to remain strong, a society needs to be engaged in constant warfare (but I can't find the exact quote). Stop fighting, and men become lazy and indolent. I've never been much of a fighter myself, but as I've gotten older, and had a family, and have finally come to the understanding that there are things worth fighting for, and sometimes one does have to stand up or be trampled on, I've become more willing to stick my neck out, raise my voice, and challenge the enemies of civilization. While I don't relish war, when you compare Islam to the West, not only are they willing to die (but for all the wrong reasons), they're willing to watch their children die too, if not murder them outright. Meanwhile, our children are learning that there is nothing worth fighting for, that's in morally superior not to fight, and if we just reach out to our enemy, not think of them as "the other" and try and understand their grievances against us, and compromise, we will all learn to love one another and live together in peace and harmony, if you accept slavery as peace and harmony.

I'm sure our wonderful elites would make great slaves. They could work and demonstrate their moral superiority at the same time.

The Media's Anti-Semitic Hate Machine by Daniel Greenfield

2010-08-27T16:31:00.004-05:00

When I read this article, I realized that it said a whole bunch of things that I'd been thinking. The fact that it was put into words by someone who actually knows how to write makes me happy. To say Greenfield "hits the nail on the head" would be a gross understatement. He hits many nails.

By linking Islamic terrorism to some form of Israeli provocation, and from there to the support for Israel by American Jews—the same media which would commit seppuku rather than blame Muslims for Islamic terrorism, instead blames Jews for Islamic terrorism. The steady drumbeat of such rhetoric, which exonerates Muslims but indicts Jews, for the actions of Muslims, is brilliantly perverse. And it also puts the lie to the media’s defense that it avoids attributing terrorism to Islam because it does not want to stoke bigotry. In reality, the media has no problem with using Islamic terrorism to stoke bigotry. It just has a different target in mind.

Behind the media’s long ugly history of misreporting terrorism against Israel, has been that one fundamental narrative, that it is not Muslims who are responsible for Muslim terrorism, but the Jews. When a Muslim terrorist attack happens in Tel Aviv, Madrid or New York—it turns out that the Jews are the ones to blame. It really doesn’t matter whether an Israeli soldier kills a Muslim terrorist, or a Muslim terrorist kills a Jewish father of four driving home from work, it is never the Muslim that is at fault. Always the Jew. Forget about even splitting the difference. There is never any difference to split. It is always Israel’s “humiliation” of Arab Muslims that is at fault for provoking their righteously murderous anger. A familiar theme that recalls Hitler’s constant invocation of “German humiliation” at the hands of the Jews.

Yeah, I know, the constant comparison of one's political political opponents with Hitler and Nazis gets tiresome, but here the comparison is apt, not overused hyperbole. Who was out to end the life of world Jewry back then? Who's, by their own admission, out to end it now? See?

All the media’s talk about Israeli disproportionate force in relation to Muslim terrorists in Gaza and the West Bank has nothing to do with it. Back when Israel was fighting wars for survival against enemies that vastly outnumbered it, the Jews were still to blame for humiliating their enemies by refusing to die. That is “Jewish Privilege”. To go on living, even when people who fancy themselves nobler and better, who have wonderful ideas about a Third Reich or a Pan-Arab or Pan-Islamic union want them dead.

It is a fairly lengthy article, but it is well worth reading. I already passed it on to the people on my email list and posted it at the Garbanzo Annex.

Like Minds

2010-08-22T20:10:00.003-05:00

Never let a crisis go to waste, right? So said Obama adviser, Rahm Emanuel. It turns out that there are other political operatives in the world who think the same way - the Taliban, for instance.

The floods tearing through Pakistan's breadbasket have further weakened the already unstable country, inflicting more economic pain on its people and threatening a key pillar of the U.S.-led war against Islamic militants -- who stand to gain from the misery.

and

Some of the worst-hit areas are strongholds of al-Qaida, the Taliban and associated groups and have long been used as recruiting grounds.

U.S. and Pakistani officials warn that extremists could get recruits and legitimacy by their actions in the flood zone and have called for more international aid. The U.S. has been the most generous donor so far.

Of course, I'm not making a value judgement, nor am I comparing the Obama administration to the Taliban. (Obama is a much snappier dresser.) If am only pointing out that they share certain tactics which some may consider cutthroat.

Not Hateful Enough for the "Human Rights" Advocates

2010-08-20T19:02:00.006-05:00

I'd read about the BBC's flotilla film, but I haven't seen it yet. According to CAMERA, it's actually a balanced look at the event. Coming from the BBC, with its well known anti-Israel bias, that was a surprise . . . to everyone . . . on both sides.

A BBC documentary screened this week that investigated the Gaza flotilla incident on May 31 is causing a storm of protest – from critics of Israel, who are furious that the program was not as hostile to Israel as they thought it should be.

The critics, including an activist from the Free Gaza movement who was aboard the Mavi Marmara, are organizing demonstrations on Sunday outside the BBC’s London headquarters and other BBC offices, and are calling for a mass campaign of complaints to the BBC in general and the program makers in particular.

Yep, forget such arcane concepts as freedom of speech and accurate reporting. According to the true hard core Israel haters, only one position is allowed. You are either with them in their hatred or you are silenced. At one time, I thought (because that's what the Israel haters kept preaching) it was only the Israel Lobby, with its Zionist tentacles that reach into all of the halls of power that could mobilize that kind of reaction, but now the hate-monkeys are in an uproar and the BBC is their target, so who knows what will happen next? This is one rabidly vicious group of people. And when they don't get there way, their tantrums can get quite evil. Unfortunately, these moral retards have been getting their way for much too long, aided and abetted by a mendacious mainstream media. Now that one of their allies has neglected to toe the line, their world is coming crashing down, kind of like that two year old upon hearing the word, "no" for the first time.

Free Gaza activist Ewa Jasiewicz said the whole tone and framing of the program was “utterly Islamophobic and racist and demonizing of Muslim activists.

They are also prone to exaggeration, moral inversion, and outright lying. But here's an act that gives an even deeper look into the twisted, diseased souls of these "activists".

Last month, Jasiewicz was part of a group of activists who spray-painted “Liberate all ghettos, free Gaza and Palestine” on a wall of the original Warsaw Ghetto.

Evil, base, loathsome, vile, repugnant - get out you thesaurus and try to find the word that accurately describes the depths of inhumanity these foul creatures have plumbed.

On the other hand, there is John Lydon, formerly known as Johnny Rotten, front man for the Sex Pistols, and currently the leader of Public Image Limited. Count me as one of those who was surprised to read that he's been married to the same woman for almost 30 years. Color me even more surprised to read this quote from Mr. Lydon on his planned concert in Tel Aviv amid the cultural war against Israel, supported by the usual hate-monkeys and those who just don't know any better:

I really resent the presumption that I'm going there to play to right-wing Nazi jews [sic]. If Elvis-f-ing-Costello wants to pull out of a gig in Israel because he's suddenly got this compassion for Palestinians, then good on him. But I have absolutely one rule, right? Until I see an Arab country, a Muslim country, with a democracy, I won't understand how anyone can have a problem with how they're treated.

I remember when the Sex Pistols and their scorched earth tour of the United States. I also remember seeing Mr. Lydon in a TV interview after the break up of the Pistols. He tried to be menacing, and maybe he was/is in real life. In this case though, he is on the side of right.

And then there is Obama: We can always trust Obama to consistently do the right thing, right?

How to Win the Clash of Civilizations

2010-08-18T20:33:00.002-05:00

Interesting article here by Ayaan Hirsi Ali on how to win the clash of civilizations. I suppose it would be a lot easier if our leaders were truly interested in winning this fight, or even recognizing that we are in a fight. Preemptive surrender seems to be their default position. But, Ayaan says,

The greatest advantage of Huntington's civilizational model of international relations is that it reflects the world as it is—not as we wish it to be. It allows us to distinguish friends from enemies. And it helps us to identify the internal conflicts within civilizations, particularly the historic rivalries between Arabs, Turks and Persians for leadership of the Islamic world.

But divide and rule cannot be our only policy. We need to recognize the extent to which the advance of radical Islam is the result of an active propaganda campaign. According to a CIA report written in 2003, the Saudis invested at least $2 billion a year over a 30-year period to spread their brand of fundamentalist Islam. The Western response in promoting our own civilization was negligible.

Our civilization is not indestructible: It needs to be actively defended. This was perhaps Huntington's most important insight. The first step towards winning this clash of civilizations is to understand how the other side is waging it—and to rid ourselves of the One World illusion.

I read Huntington's book a few years ago when it came out. It's a fascinating look at the world, and it seemed then and still seems that the paradigm he constructed is, if not absolutely correct, then a reasonable way to look at the current world situation. When I read reviews calling it racist, and insulting it because, like Ayaan says, it presents the world as it is, not as we wish it were, I liked it even more. Read it. It's good.

Oh, and I think we need new leaders.

Oppression of the Palestinians is Lightening Up

2010-08-17T15:21:00.006-05:00

Yes, that's right, boys and girls. Palestinians are now a bit less oppressed - in Lebanon. But who cares? That's right. Since neither Israel nor Jews are involved, who cares that there were a number of occupations that Palestinians were excluded from? We must acknowledge that that number has gotten smaller, but we must also understand that outside of the Palestinians truly being denied basic human rights, nobody cares. And we can't even refer to them as Palestinian Lebanese, because unlike in Israel, where they have rights and citizenship, Palestinians in Lebanon are kept separate from Lebanese society. Hey, that sounds a lot like - um - what's the word again - oh yeah! Apartheid!

Have any of the alleged supporters of the Palestinians even bothered to ask how many occupations Palestinians were excluded from?

Lebanon expanded employment rights for 400,000 Palestinian refugees Tuesday, changing a decades-old law that many have criticized for keeping the community impoverished and excluded from Lebanese society.

Palestinian leaders in Lebanon and human rights workers welcomed the move, but said it is only a first step toward improving the lives of stateless refugees who have been banned from all but the most menial professions for decades.

And yet, nobody has suggested sending them a flotilla of humanitarian supplies.

Tuesday's decision allows Palestinians to work in the same professions as other foreigners, one of the most serious efforts yet by Lebanon to transform its policies toward the refugees.

But the laws governing foreign workers here pose a unique problem for Palestinians, who are stateless.

Lebanese law restricts some professions only to Lebanese, while many other professions — such as law, medicine and engineering — require the employees to be members of the relevant professional association.

Shouldn't there be some kind of questioning of this policy? Let's round up some of those - agitated over the "plight of the Palestinians" - human rights advocates. They will certainly have something to say once they hear about this blatant discrimination. You know they would if it took place in that Jewish state just to the south, or if they could convince enough of their deluded followers that it does.

Ali Hamdan, an aide to Lebanon's parliament speaker, said Tuesday's vote will legalize much of the work that many Palestinians already are doing as well as open up positions in fields such as insurance and banking.

At least this will increase their status and popularity at parties. Everyone likes to spend time with insurance agents and bankers at social gatherings. Knock back a few chardonnay spritzers, work your way through complaining about your spouse and kids, tell a few poorly chosen off-color jokes, and actuary tables become fascinating. Palestinians in Lebanon now have it made.

The debate over Palestinians in Lebanon often goes beyond matters of civil rights and touches on the prospect of permanent settlement. Lebanon's population of 4 million is divided between 18 sects, including Sunni and Shiite Muslims, Christians and Druse, and every community is sensitive to anything that could tip the balance of power in a country with a grim history of sectarian strife.

So in the end, Lebanon is a wonderful demonstration on why we should embrace diversity and multiculturalism. Unlike the racist, sexist, zionist, homophobic, Islamophobic, phobophobic, zionist, oppressive, depressive, omnipressive, zionist Israeli Zionist country, where Palestinians have representation in the Knesset and are accepted in all areas of employment, we are free to see, Lebanon, the benefits of diversity and multiculturalism in bringing diverse segments of a multicultural society together to live in mutual hate and distrust. How inspiring.

What time did you say the flotilla was arriving?

Don't Blame Me

2010-08-15T18:01:00.000-05:00

This article from last week's Detroit Free Press kind of set me off. I don't care about your sexual orientation. It's none of my business who you decide to "be intimate" with or what that "intimacy entails. But, if you decide, even with all of the information that we have today about the consequences of unsafe sexual practices, that it is a good and proper practice to let anonymous men do things to you in your anal area that have been known to transmit awful diseases, do not ask me for money for a cure for what you have. And do not try to blame society (which I consider myself a part of) if you come down with one of those nasty diseases that are spread through these practices. Yes, I know that the sexual drive is strong, and if one has the opportunity to "release one's tension" in a way that feeds into that lustful component of the human brain, that the majority of us would jump right in, but it is still not my fault that you are now in a diseased state. And please, no "blaming the victim" nonsense, there is no longer any excuse for ignorance. We know that some ways of tension release are much safer than others.

No doubt, biases against gay people have worsened the stigma of AIDS and continue to help spread this deadly, incurable but completely preventible disease.

Bias against gay people has had nothing to do with the spread of AIDS. Not with the amount of publicity brought to the anti-AIDS fight by the gay community and by big Hollywood and musical stars for the past 30 years. This is an absolutely avoidable disease, unless you are still stupid enough to allow yourself to be buggered by strangers.

Detroit's politicians and community leaders, including pastors, must talk openly and with compassion, about AIDS and how to prevent its transmission. Mayor Dave Bing and others could help enormously by helping to lead this conversation, promoting testing and taking part in events like the annual AIDS Walk in Detroit, which no mayor since Dennis Archer has attended.

Don't depend on others. I'm sorry you got yourself into this unpleasant situation, but it did not have to happen. Take responsibility (and what ever else you need in order to avoid those unsafe sex practices) into your own hands to avoid the problem. Besides AIDS, there are other diseases that will lose prominence in the gay community. I hadn't thought much about it, but after reading this blog post, which led me to this rather lengthy but informative article, I increased my awareness of pre-AIDS illnesses which were spread through anal sex in the early days of gay liberation. Some of it makes for some grisly reading, but it it worth reading nonetheless. There were a lot of illnesses being spread before AIDS hit the scene. Did that stop anyone from indulging in promiscuity? It doesn't sound like it from reading that article.

When you're being told repeatedly that you have to take the blame for someone else's suffering when it was entirely due to their behavior, it's good to know the facts. Not that people listen to facts that contradict their beliefs, but after reading these articles, I can't be snowed as easily. I'm sorry if I sound callous, but I have other things to worry about, and unless you are a close family member, I'm not the one who has to worry about your self-inflicted disease.

Nobody likes to be told that their own bad habits are the cause of their problems. And the gay community was warned. Their reactions were very human - shoot the messenger. For example, gay writer, Larry Kramer faced informal ostracism for writing a story containing an uncomfortable truth.

For his literary effort, Kramer was shunned that summer at the gay resort of Cherry Grove, the scene of Faggots, concluding chapters on Fire island. Old friends looked him in the face at the Ice Palace, Fire island's hottest gay nightclub, and walked away without saying a word. His best friend stopped speaking to him. This ostracism went on for years.

In a December 21, 1981, letter sent to the New York Native, playwright Robert Chesley charged Kramer with homophobia and anti-eroticism. "I think the concealed meaning in Kramer's emotionalism is the triumph of guilt; that gay men deserve to die for their promiscuity. In his novel Faggots, Kramer told us that sex is dirty and that we ought not to be doing what we're doing.

"Read anything by Kramer closely. I think you'll find that the subtext is always: the wages of gay sin are death."

It wouldn't be until the actual discovery of the AIDS virus in 1984 that criticism of Larry Kramer or Joe Sonnabend by the gay community would die down. Very few people in the gay community could accept the idea that the sexual freedoms they had fought so long to obtain were suspect. Even when doctors such as Sonnabend began warning them in 1981 and 1982, few listened. The idea of sex causing AIDS was anathema to those who defined their liberation as gay people in terms of having as much sex with as many people in as many places in as many ways as possible.

Ironically, in describing his longing for love in gay life, for commitment between two individuals, Kramer was prophetic in his warning about promiscuity. In 1978, gays were already talking over dinner about the latest parasites to strike them and the latest medicines their doctors had prescribed. Over Sunday brunch, men were talking about their shingles and amebiasis. The year before it had been chlamydia and fungus.

They sounded like a group of retired seventy-year-olds in Century Village down in Florida complaining, over gin rummy, about their hearts and their operations and how they keep forgetting which pocket their nitroglycerine is in.

I remember those pre-AIDS days. I was working in a restaurant where about half the staff was openly gay and a large minority of our clientele was gay. I know at least two of them died from AIDS related illnesses. And sure, I cared because I knew them, but not well enough to be affected by their deaths.

There was a continuum of flamboyance amongst the gay waiters. It made for some entertaining nights. One night, one of our gay waiters came to work, and let us know immediately that if possible he was going to try and skate out early. He was exhausted. Why? He had had sex with four different men that afternoon. He was treated as hero and as butt (yeah, I know) of our jokes for the night. Now, in hindsight, I wonder if he lived through the 80s.

History of Environmenalism

2010-08-10T21:10:00.003-05:00

Found this one at House of Eratosthenes -

Teacher Concerns - or - More of My Same Old Complaints

2010-08-10T19:31:00.000-05:00

I was talking with my wife's cousin. He's a high school teacher. He teaches in a rural, predominantly white school district on the west side of Michigan. When it comes to education, we believe in many of the same silly things: learning to read and write properly - in standard English, and with all of the proper mechanics - speaking clearly, again in standard English with all of the proper mechanics - and teaching students the basics of English grammar, syntax, spelling, and usage so that they can think, and when called upon, to communicate their thoughts clearly and accurately. He gets frustrated because year after year, he has to teach remedial English skills to high school students. He has the same problems with his students that I have with my elementary school classes.

My wife is in college. She's going for her bachelor's degree. She has to write papers, which I proofread. According to her, many professors have given up on having their students write papers using the proper mechanics of the English language. If the paper is understandable, that's good enough. These post high school students never learned to write properly.

Now, since I am merely an elementary school teacher, and at the bottom of this educational ladder, I can hardly be called an expert. I've spent 21 years in the educational field, but it's all been in the classroom, not in the hallowed ivy halls learning the educational theories of Dewey, Piaget, etc. So what could I possibly know that these experts don't?

Well, one thing I think I know, or at least I have a sneaky suspicion of, is that what I do, and what my colleagues teach and don't teach down here at the bottom, affects students' abilities though the rest of their lives, including college. Just as I should not still be teaching students that proper punctuation must be placed at the end of every sentence, neither should high school teachers and college professors. I also spend a lot of time every year teaching students how to write a sentence, explaining how to recognize one, how to begin and end it, making sure it has a subject and a predicate, and expresses an idea. Most truly have no idea of any of this.

Rather than have students engage in "peer editing" when neither student editing each others' paper has any idea as to what's right or wrong with them, I try to read everything they write. And then I have to meet with as many students as possible to help them figure out the right way to express themselves in writing. This also includes insisting that they speak standard English in the classroom. I teach in an "urban" district, which means almost all of my students are black, so it's really tough in the beginning of the year. It's almost like teaching another language to them. I've had students give up when I insist that they phrase their question to me in the way I've told them to. I don't accept "Do we 'posed to . . ." or "What is you doin'?" or - well, you get the idea. For some students, it's very difficult to speak correctly. It gets easier, and by March, rather than restating the proper phrase, I can merely insist that they "speak English." But it does all work together: speaking, writing, reading, spelling.

But that's only my opinion based on years of classroom experience, and even more experience over the past 5 or 6 years tutoring students before and after school and during the summer. And it's also the opinion of parents whose children I have tutored, and who have done the work necessary to actually learn. I haven't had my theories reinforced in the great educational colleges of our nation, though. It's against their philosophy.

Part of the problem is that, as much as we talk about understanding the scope and sequence of grades K-12, each teacher in each grade, for the most part, only knows what they are required to teach with only a vague idea as to how it fits into the rest of the picture. And each new reading and writing program that comes along does nothing to change that. As I've written before, each new program is based on the previous programs that have been tossed aside. Today's reading and writing guru, Lucy Calkins, will be abandoned and forgotten in about three to five years. And somebody new will be acclaimed as the latest and greatest while teaching the same way, but with new bells and whistles. This has been the way it has been for the 21 years I've been teaching. And as long as teachers are forced to jump on these revolving bandwagons by their administrators, resource leaders, and consultants, it's not going to change.

The current fashion in reading has returned to a controlled vocabulary. The change from controlled to open and back is a longer pattern taking a generation or more to make that circle. Leveled books are the current panacea, and students are expected to write, as always, without worrying about mechanics, since as we are taught - concern for spelling and punctuation will only slow down their thoughts, and they will be bogged down, unable to even complete that first sentence. Teachers are instructed to give "mini-lessons" in the finer points of writing. Do the mini-lessons work? I don't know. You should ask the college remedial reading and writing instructors to find out.

Want to know what's really funny about this? At one of the first Calkins workshops I attended at our local intermediate school district, the consultants were discussing with us how to change the program so that it would be applicable to the remedial needs of our students. This is as chuckle-worthy as when we were being introduced and trained in the basal program we used previous to Calkins. After being shown all of the wonderful resources (thousands of dollars worth) some of our teachers angered the trainers by insisting that the remedial books were not low enough for our lowest students. And it wasn't just annoyance, these trainers were steamed.

I will be trained in the Calkins stuff, but I will continue to start students at the beginning as I always do. I will also continue to run my mouth at staff meetings and at workshops, especially when all of the teachers are well trained but still getting the same miserable results that we've always gotten. But the question still remains - how do these people keep getting by the same B.S. time after time?

But That Money Doesn't Look Jewish

2010-07-30T20:10:00.004-05:00

Found this at House of Eratosthenes:

As reported in the New York Observer,

Mike Grimm, a G.O.P challenger to Democrat Mike McMahon's Congressional seat, took in over $200,000 in his last filing.

But in an effort to show that Grimm lacks support among voters in the district, which covers Staten Island and parts of Brooklyn, the McMahon campaign compiled a list of Jewish donors to Grimm and provided it to The Politicker.

The file, labeled "Grimm Jewish Money Q2," for the second quarter fundraising period, shows a list of over 80 names, a half-dozen of which in fact do hail from Staten Island, and a handful of others that list Brooklyn as home.

"Where is Grimm's money coming from," said Jennifer Nelson, McMahon's campaign spokeman. "There is a lot of Jewish money, a lot of money from people in Florida and Manhattan, retirees."

There's more. Read it if you want. McMahon has gone into damage control. We know that there is a double standard, and had a Republican made this charge against a Democrat, all the major news organizations would have already labeled him as a Nazi, a hate monger, and even worse, as somebody who doesn't worship diversity or multiculturalism. All of the "leaders" of the Jewish community and of the major Jewish organizations would be putting out editorials demanding apologies, and calling for his head on a platter. He would be pilloried, hung from a gibbet, and forced to drop out of the race. He would be demonized, his children hounded at school, his wife thrown out of her social circle. His name would (until the next scandal) become a synonym for irrational, blind hatred.

McMahon is lucky to be a Democrat. This will blow over in a day or two, and all of the major news organizations will accept the firing of this Jennifer Nelson as proper penance for this minor indiscretion. They will accept the dubious claim that he had nothing to do with it, it was all the fault of Jennifer Nelson, and they will go back to their Obama-worship and looking for dirt on Sarah Palin and Rush Limbaugh. Jewish organizations will go back to condemning conservative Christians and hunting right-wing extremists.

The worst part is that (and I really hope I turn out to be wrong here) his liberal Jewish supporters will pass over this blatantly anti-Semitic dirty trick. They will excuse it as "just politics" and nothing compared to what Bush did when he was president. (Yeah, I know. It's a non sequitur, but we've heard that argument before from progressives when they've lost the debate. Who needs facts when you have an insane alternate world view?) They have to forgive their Democrat, no matter how much this candidate demonstrates his disregard, or even his antipathy toward them. The alternative is unthinkable. No liberal Jew in their right mind wants the "nuclear option", you know, voting for a Republican.

And if you, like I do, think that is a ridiculous position for allegedly intelligent people to take, watch and see the large percentage of the Jewish vote Obama receives in 2012. Sure, he will lose some Jewish support, but I'm guessing he will still get over 70%.

The Humanitarian Crisis of the Gaza Mall

2010-07-20T20:51:00.002-05:00

Here is the video. I first linked to it at JIDF. It originated at Elder of Ziyon. Elder has more heartbreaking photos here.

Wow, That's Some Open Air Prison Ya Got There

2010-07-20T12:35:00.006-05:00

It seems that things are not as desperate as the Hamas-loving, human rights fraud, Israel-haters have been telling us. According to the folks at Jewish Internet Defense Force,

While Hamas continues to complain that Gaza lacks building materials, a luxury mall in Gaza City held its grand opening over the weekend. Among the goods on sale are Israeli men's clothing, and items from Turkey, France, and the United States.

and

A variety of stores sell cosmetics, clothing, office supplies, toys, shoes, appliances and more. The mall boasts air conditioning and a delivery service.

Hamas has often accused Israel of creating a “siege” by keeping its border crossings to Gaza closed. According to Hamas, Gaza lacks electricity and building supplies.

however

Despite the bargain prices, Israelis are advised that it is forbidden to enter Gaza.

Here is a photo of a portion of the mall.

Lovely, isn't it? Uh, I mean, look at the humiliating circumstances that Gazans are forced to shop under by those oppressive Israelis! Where is the food court for heaven sake? How are those poor oppressed Gazans supposed to gorge on elephant ears? Why, there probably aren't even fitting rooms in which to try on that special bomb vest they are out shopping for. Not that parents would buy them for themselves but as presents for their young martyr-in-training.

Read the rest of the article. It's short and it's got some good links.

UPDATE: What? You want more? Much more? Go see Tom Gross' media dispatches. Scroll down and read his posts, but more important, look at the photos he's taken of the abject suffering of ordinary Gazans in the mall, at the Olympic-sized swimming pool, on the beach, and in pricey restaurants. It will make you want to take action - against the lying turds who have inverted reality and morality.

Found a Joke

2010-07-13T20:30:00.002-05:00

Yep, found it on the Internet of all places. Rather than annoy everyone on my email list, I'm posting it here where very few people will read it. Maybe one of them will annoy their email list.

Pinocchio, Snow White, and Superman are out for a stroll in town one day.

As they walk, they come across a sign:
"Beauty contest for the most beautiful woman in the world."
"I am entering!" said Snow White.

After half an hour she comes out and they ask her, "Well, how'd ya do?"
" First Place!," said Snow White.

They continue walking and they see a sign:
"Contest for the strongest man in the world."
"I'm entering," says Superman.
After half an hour, he returns and they ask him, "How did you make out?"
" First Place!" answers Superman. "Did you ever doubt?"

They continue walking when they see a sign:
"Contest! Who is the greatest liar in the world?" Pinocchio enters.
After half an hour he returns with tears in his eyes.

"What happened?" they asked..

"Who the hell is Obama?" asked Pinocchio

The Gulag Archipelago - Parts I and II

2010-07-12T13:31:00.000-05:00

I've been meaning to for years, and I finally read it. I finally read the first volume of The Gulag Archipelago. I could have put it off longer, but I found a paperback copy for a quarter at a yard sale. Then I needed something for the trip to NYC. With all the time one spends at the airport these days when one flies, a hunk of good solid reading material is a must.

This is certainly good solid reading material and it kind of blows the lid off of any thoughts anyone may have of any kind of socialist utopia where "from each according to his ability, to each according to his need" is possible. And that line about "Workers of the world, unite. You have nothing to lose but your chains"? Forget it. It's more like, "Fools of the world, unite. Exchange your current manageable chains for chains that will drag your body down the same way you've dragged your mind down if you still don't understand that communism is a mug's game.!"

Under the circumstances, this could have been a hideously depressing book and impossible to read. In fact, judging from the heft of the book and the number of used copies I've seen over the years, my guess is that more people bought it than read it. A lot more. I also have to surmise that even fewer people bought or read the second volume containing parts III and IV. (I picked that up yesterday at one of our better area used book stores. It's on my book shelf now, and I'll get to it eventually.) Solzhenitsyn softens the pain considerably with his constant sarcastic tone. No, the reader doesn't laugh along with him, but the reader shares the frustration and the irony of a system that some people today still worship as the greatest hope for mankind, but that arrested millions of innocent men and women in order to maintain control over citizens and to feed the gigantic slave labor pool that was needed to build projects that wouldn't have been able to be built otherwise. Let's face it: a controlled economy is no economy and that's what the Russians had under communism. For some of the true believers who were arrested on trumped up charges or on no charges at all, it was the shock of being caught in the system they supported that gave them the realization that something wasn't quite right here.

As musician, poet, and philosopher(?) Sun Ra said,

If you do wrong, you have to pay,
But if you do right, you have to pay too;
Also, if you do nothing
You have to pay.

And it didn't start under Stalin, as some of the apologists would like us to believe. It built upon the prisons and police force of the czars. The inhumanity of the system was taken light years beyond anything the czars ever imagined. And it was taken there by Lenin and his henchmen.

Solzhenitsyn doesn't settle for merely telling his own story as a prisoner of the gulags. His is only one of hundreds that he shares. He also gives a history of the system, and a tour of the system, from his arrest to his arrival at some of his work projects. In between we get others' stories of both intentional and casual cruelty. While the conditions were almost uniformly horrible throughout the system from arrest, through transport, to prisons and work camps, Solzhenitsyn talked to other prisoners. Many of them, of course are long dead, having died somewhere along the way. Some prisoners, like Solzhenitsyn got lucky and were imprisoned in places where it was possible to not be worked to death.

While describing the horrors of the system, and according to him, Soviet jailers were much worse than Nazi jailers, as he met prisoners who were unfortunate enough to experience both, he also writes of the pleasures of talking to other prisoners, intelligent men and women who had important stories to share, of being able to read the occasional great book. He looked for and reported on the positive in a man-made hell.

By the time Solzhenitsyn was arrested the system had been functioning for years and ran like a well-oiled machine. Arrests were done at night so that the befuddled victim was less likely to fight back. Very few, including the author, did. From that point on, the cruelty built. Some of it, including interrogation and torture, was to break the prisoner in order to get false confessions and names of other "conspirators". And some of it was just to keep the system running more efficiently. Prisoners died at every step. Those who lived were moved to the next step, until finally he, or she, ended up at one of the gulags to, most likely, be worked to death.

I'm not sure a lesser writer could have pulled this off. The only part where it drags is in his review of many of the more notorious show trials. Other than that, it's a fascinating look into another facet of man's inhumanity to man.

In closing, I have to share a piece of advice from Solzhenitsyn. It's on page 591 of the paperback edition:

“Do not pursue what is illusory – property and position; all that is gained at the expense of your nerves decade after decade, and is confiscated in one fell night. Live with a steady superiority over life – don’t be afraid of misfortune, and do not yearn after happiness; it is, after all, all the same: the bitter doesn’t last forever, and the sweet never fills the cup to overflowing.

“It is enough if you don’t freeze in the cold and if thirst and hunger don’t claw at your insides. If your back isn’t broken, if your feet can walk, if both arms can bend, if both eyes can see, and if both ears can hear, then who should you envy? And why? Our envy of others devours us most of all. Rub your eyes and purify your heart – and prize above all else in the world those who love you and who wish you well. Do not hurt them or scold them, and never part from any of them in anger; after all, you simply do not know; it might be your last act and that will be how you are imprinted in their memory.”

Hamas Sends Patients to Israel for Care

2010-07-09T11:06:00.002-05:00

Yes, you read that correctly. According to the Israel National News, by way of Sassy Wire,

Ichilov hospital in Tel Aviv treats up to 100 patients a month from Gaza, and often Hamas takes the role of middleman between Gaza residents and the Israeli hospital, Ichilov Director Professor Gabi Barabash said Thursday. Barabash spoke to Deputy Minister Ayoub Kara, a resident of the Druze village of Dalyat El Carmel near Haifa, who was touring the hospital and viewing its care for foreign Arab patients.

In addition to caring for patients from Gaza, the Ichilov staff treats many citizens of foreign Arab countries, including those that have no diplomatic ties with Israel. They all receive dedicated care, and the relatives who accompany them are provided with free food and a place to stay, Barabash said.

Kara praised the hospital's care at the end of the tour. Ichilov treats all of its patients equally, he said, but it is not the only one, and hospitals throughout the country send hundreds of people home to Gaza in good health each month after they arrived in Israel suffering from serious ailments.

He condemned Hamas for benefiting from the arrangement while giving nothing in return. “The time has come for Hamas to give us something small in return,” he said, “to release a single son of ours, who has been held for four years with no medical care, in exchange for the hundreds of people whose lives Israel saves every month.”

Kara called on Arab countries to take action: “I call on those Arab countries that are aware of how much we give them when it comes to medicine to call for Gilad Shalit's release as well.” Shalit's release would “make the peace talks much more meaningful,” he added.
(IsraelNationalNews.com)

Will the world stand up and take notice? Will any of the world-wide league of bullies against Israel bother to acknowledge this?

For a while I was in correspondence with an anti-Israel mailing list. I was put on the list by an Israel hater who asked me never to contact her after I suggested that she read Dershowitz' book, The Case for Israel. I didn't object, but I did return comments in response to the Israel-bashing articles that were sent to me. I also sent unsolicited articles and forwarded emails to the list administrator. I haven't heard from them in a long time. If I still had the email address, I would forward this article. I think they're afraid of me, all 5'9", 145 arthritic pounds of me.

It's easier to hide than it is to face the facts.

Last Word (from me at least) on NASA

2010-07-08T11:51:00.004-05:00

As Debbie Schlussel points out, pandering, bowing, and scraping to the Muslim world did not begin with Obama. The difference is, Obama doesn't try and hide it. In this respect, he is much more honest than those presidents who served before him. Like Debbie says,

When I was an intern on Capitol Hill in the summer of 1985 and still in high school, Saudi Prince Sultan Bin Salman Bin Abdul Aziz Al-Saud held a giant party for all of the young interns on Capitol Hill. He and the Saudi Arabian Embassy rented out the Capitol Center and hosted free food, music, belly dancers, and other entertainment, trying to reach out to America’s future leaders and convince them of the modernity, hipness, and “appeal” of Saudi Arabia. The was the real purpose. But the ostensible purpose was to celebrate Prince Sultan’s trip into space, courtesy of NASA–Ronald Reagan’s NASA. While ultimately this was Reagan’s move, it was carefully orchestrated by then-Vice President George H.W. Bush, a close friend to the Saudi Royal family.

There were exhibits all over the Cap Center party honoring Prince Sultan’s space trip. And, at the time, everyone in the U.S. space program knew what a joke it was, what an obvious sop to the Saudis, given that the Prince didn’t have an iota of the years of training and skill it takes to become an American astronaut. He had the title of “payload specialist,” but the only payload for which he was actually skilled was “pay the lady.” Only months earlier, the Prince was the acting Saudi Information Minister and had zero space knowledge.

Everyone knew that this was a PR stunt that was outreach to Muslims in the form of fulfilling this spoiled Saudi Prince’s only unfulfilled Walter Mitty fantasy, courtesy of the Bush family that feted these people for decades. The real American astronauts laughed that the pretentious Prince Sultan insisted on wearing his Islamofascist get-up for the group picture of the STS-51-G Space Shuttle Discovery crew, yet he dressed in space gear for his individual shot. At the time, Sultan was the youngest person to fly in a space shuttle and not because he earned it. Even worse, U.S. taxpayer dollars helped finance Sultan’s launch and deployment of the Arab Satellite Communications Organization’s ARABSAT-1B satellite in space, the ostensible reason Sultan was aboard the flight. Yes, the Saudis supposedly paid a token amount. But it didn’t cover the overwhelming costs incurred. And that’s not the point.

Most of us weren't as aware of the pathologies of Islam as we are today. I was one of those who joked about it. Now, I'm a lot more serious, but there is still room for humor. Our sense of humor must never be lost. Then the terrorists (and their progressive supporters and enablers) will have won.

This Get Fuzzy comic has nothing to do with NASA or Islam, or anything of earth-shattering importance. But it's funny, and with me, funny counts.

Here is the dialogue in a more readable sized font:
ROB: Bucky, whether you like it or not, Soccer is the most popular sport in the world.

BUCKY: Well, with all due respect, I wouldn't go around usin' "The World" to make a point. "The World" is nuts.

ROB: Again, most popular game in the world? Soccer, A.K.A., Football.

BUCKY: Oh yeah? What did it edge out? Ethnic-Cleansingball? Malariaball? Fighting-Over-A-Patch-of-Dirt-Ball?

To Insanity and Beyond!

2010-07-05T21:43:00.003-05:00

We've come to expect scenes like this from the Religion of Peace. The insanity aspect is that so many self-proclaimed human rights advocates, and alleged fighters for equal rights have absolutely nothing to say about it.

Not long ago, when I watched British-Muslim actress Afshan Azad, 22 years old, glide into the Yule Ball at the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire as Padma Patil, a witch going to the ball with pasty, red-haired “Ron Weasley,” I thought to myself: Only in the world of fantasy could a Muslim proudly play a Hindu girl, learning magic and choosing a "non-believing" man from outside the faith so freely—and without censure.

Indeed, according to the BBC, Azad's father, Abdul Azad, 54, and his son Ashraf, 28, allegedly threatened to kill the actress this year, on May 21, in their Manchester, England, home, because she was heard talking on the phone to her Hindu boyfriend. At a hearing last Tuesday, the father and son were charged with the attack. Ashraf was also accused of assaulting his sister and charged with “assault occasioning actual bodily harm.”

Of course it's got nothing to do with Islam. Her parents were mentally ill. They've perverted the message of peace inherent in the Qu'ran. They're part of a tiny minority who are perverting a great religion. The whole episode was taken out of context. It could just as easily been a member of any religion. It's the fault of the Jews. It's because of the predicament of the Palestinians. Feel free to add any further ridiculous excuses that I may have forgotten.

Beyond insane is this - reprinted in it's entirety because you have to read it. And if you're like me, you still don't believe it. In fact, I'm hoping that tomorrow I'll have to retract this post because it was a silly prank.

NASA's new mission: Building ties to Muslim world
By: Byron York
Chief Political Correspondent
July 6, 2010

You'd be hard-pressed to find an American who doesn't know that the "S" in NASA stands for "Space." Since the race to the moon in the 1960s, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration has been one of the most storied agencies in the U.S. government. Now, under President Obama, its mission is changing -- and space isn't part of the story.

"When I became the NASA administrator, [Obama] charged me with three things," NASA head Charles Bolden said in a recent interview with the Middle Eastern news network al-Jazeera. "One, he wanted me to help re-inspire children to want to get into science and math; he wanted me to expand our international relationships; and third, and perhaps foremost, he wanted me to find a way to reach out to the Muslim world and engage much more with dominantly Muslim nations to help them feel good about their historic contribution to science, math, and engineering."

From moon landings to promoting self-esteem: It would be difficult to imagine a more dramatic shift in focus for an agency famous for reaching the heavens. Bolden's words left supporters of space exploration astonished. "Everyone had the same impression: Is this what he is spending his time on?" says a Republican Hill aide who tracks the space program. "A lot of people are very upset about it."

NASA is not getting out of the space business, at least not entirely. But Bolden's words, together with the president's decision to scrap much of NASA's mission and include the agency in the "Cairo Initiative" -- that is, the White House outreach program outlined in Obama's June 4, 2009, Cairo speech to the Muslim world -- show that the NASA of the future will be little like the past.

Obama released his plan for NASA a few months ago, and to many it seemed a blueprint for disaster. The moon program will be scrapped, replaced by a hazy hope to visit Mars. The space shuttle will die, too, leaving America with no way to put a man in orbit.

Obama's proposal stunned U.S. space heroes Neil Armstrong and Eugene Cernan -- the first and last men to walk on the moon -- who, along with Apollo 13 commander Jim Lovell, made a rare public statement denouncing the plan as a "devastating" scheme that "destines our nation to become one of second- or even third-rate stature."

Even John Glenn, the first American to orbit the Earth who later became a Democratic senator and Obama supporter, was dismayed by the president's plan to rely on the Russians to ferry American astronauts to the international space station. "We're putting ourselves in line for a single-point failure ending the whole manned space program," Glenn said.

The Muslim outreach at NASA is the result of the White House's preparation for Obama's Cairo speech. Staffers found that many Muslims admire American achievements in science and technology, so Obama used the speech to announce the appointment of U.S. "science envoys" and a new fund "to support technological development in Muslim-majority countries."

Obama appointed Egyptian-American scientist Ahmed Zewail as the first science envoy to the Middle East. Just last week, Zewail argued that the U.S. can build better relations with the Muslim world by "harnessing the soft power of science in the service of diplomacy." The NASA initiative is part of that.

Last month, Bolden himself traveled to Cairo to mark the first anniversary of Obama's speech. In an address at the American University, Bolden cited Zewail's work and stressed NASA's role in improving relations with Islamic nations. Beginning with a hearty "Assalaamu alaykum," Bolden explained that in the past, NASA worked with countries that were capable of space exploration, but now Obama has "asked NASA to change ... by reaching out to 'nontraditional' partners and strengthening our cooperation in the Middle East, North Africa, Southeast Asia and in particular in Muslim-majority nations."

"NASA is not only a space exploration agency," Bolden concluded, "but also an Earth improvement agency."

At the same time, Bolden gave a bleak assessment of the space part of NASA's mission. More than 40 years after the first moon landing, he told al-Jazeera, the U.S. can no longer reach beyond Earth's orbit without assistance from abroad. "We're not going to go anywhere beyond low Earth orbit as a single entity," Bolden said. "The United States can't do it."

Its space initiatives junked, its administrator rhapsodizing about helping Muslims "feel good" about themselves: That is the new NASA.

What exactly have Muslims contributed to the world in the past 500 years? Even if we go back to the beginning of Islam, and factor in the "golden age" of Islam, when they were more advanced than Europe, they still haven't given the world much in the way of real progress, advances for humanity, boons to civilization. Someone correct me if I'm wrong. Islamic scholars decided centuries ago that if it's not in the Qu'ran, they've got no use for it. They haven't been interested in advancing knowledge in the way the West has. Sorry, but that's the way it is.

When Obama was elected, many of his sycophants were upset because Rush Limbaugh hoped that he would fail. I wish they were as upset that Obama wants the United States to fail.

Videos for You

2010-07-05T18:59:00.003-05:00

First, here's one featuring Bret Stephens, challenging liberals on their view of Israel.

Next up, we have a short piece on the Gaza flotilla.

For people with lengthy attention spans that still haven't been whittled down to nothing by constant computer usage, here's an interesting discussion about Ronald Reagan with Mark Steyn and Rob Long.

And finally, here's some Daffy Duck, because sometimes Daffy is the only one who makes sense in the world.

Fourth of July Thoughts

2010-07-04T13:41:00.003-05:00

In today's Detroit Free Press, Stephen Henderson offered his views on the Fourth of July. Being an editor at the liberal Free Press, Henderson is no simple-minded cheerleader for America. Sure, we can celebrate, but we also have to acknowledge those less than savory episodes in our country's history.

But the Declaration's principal author, Thomas Jefferson, and its signers in the Continental Congress were clouded by a much more complex morality, principally hobbled by their inability to ensure that the independence they were asserting for themselves would apply to everyone.

and

There are, for example, our historic struggles with gender equality and the current debate over equal protection for gay Americans. You can see it in arguments over how we treat our enemies in the war on terror and how a nation of immigrants welcomes -- or shuns -- those who want to share in our freedom.

Of course, he's going somewhere with this. And it's his next sentence.

America is a journey toward perfection, defined by its struggles to overcome the frailty of human imperfection.

Perfection? Understanding that all we have to work with in this country, and on this planet, are imperfect, fallible human beings, the quest for perfection is strictly for suckers. I think we have to understand that first, and look at the other plans throughout history that sought perfection, but found instead slavery, fascism, and death.

I began rereading volume II (out of 3) of Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (my summer reading project) and came across the following quote:

A people who still remembered that their ancestors had been the masters of the world would have applauded, with conscious pride, the representation of ancient freedom, if they had not long since been accustomed to prefer the solid assurance of bread to the unsubstantial visions of liberty and greatness.

And then there was this, by Nolan Finley in today's Detroit News:

Voters in Port Chester, N.Y., went to the polls last month carrying six votes each to cast in the village board election. They could spread them out among multiple candidates, or plunk them all for one favorite. They were also allowed to cast ballots over a five-day period.

The hope of federal Judge Stephen Robinson was that Hispanics, who make up nearly half the Port Chester populace, would target their six votes each at Hispanic candidates, thus achieving his goal of crafting a board more demographically in line with the local population.

Robinson ordered the scheme, called cumulative voting, under the federal Voting Rights Act, which has turned into one of the greatest perversions of democracy ever imagined. The judge acted on complaints that despite their large presence in the community, Hispanics had never managed to win a seat on the board.

There was no evidence that Hispanics were being kept from the polls or discouraged from voting. Nor was there anything stopping Hispanic citizens in the past from pooling their considerable single votes behind one Hispanic candidate. But the fact that a Hispanic hadn't been elected was evidence enough for the judge to determine racial discrimination was at work.

Even some Hispanic voters found the solution unnerving.

With that kind of voting, why do we need people to vote at all? Our wise progressive judges can let us know who the winners should be, and then votes can be appropriately divided so that the correct candidate wins. All candidates will receive at least some of the votes. Self-esteem of the candidates must also be a consideration . . . mustn't it?

Off to the barbecue!

European Anti-Semitism

2010-07-02T14:55:00.005-05:00

Did anti-Semitism in Europe end with the demise of the Third Reich, only to be reborn with increased Islamic immigration to Europe? Or did it merely go underground, seething and waiting until the time was right to once again take prominence in the minds of the European populace? I don't know. But I know that if I were a Jew living in Europe, even one of the supposedly free and democratic western European countries, I would pack up my family and make Aliyah. The reaction of European governments to the recent Gaza flotilla was monstrous. It has also been noted that England, the country, that thanks to Winston Churchill, stood fast against the Nazis in Europe's darkest hour, had strict quotas for Jews and rather than admit them during the dark days of the Shoah, sent Jews trying to escape the Nazis back to the continent to be liquidated. And of course during the 30s and 40s they tried to keep Jews out of the holy land.

England hasn't changed much since then, except for the worse. With all the fuss they made over forged British passports used to assassinate a Hamas terrorist in Dubai because they assumed the Israelis made the hit, they're strangely silent on the use of forged British passports used by Russian spies. As they continue to bend over further and further on their journey to dhimmitude, their natural animus against Jews has returned. How bad is it? Let Debbie Schlussel fill you in on the latest.

So, it’s no surprise that a British judge and jury said that vandalism–destruction that could have killed many and cost hundreds of thousands of dollars–is okay . . . so long as it’s against the Jews or Israel (or someone doing business with or helping them). It’s really not too different than laws the Nazis had in place. And that’s no hyperbole.

The ends justifies the means, Judenrein-style. Yup, 1940 Europe repeats itself 70 years later. Today, they use the euphemism “Israel” as their excuse, but tomorrow, they’ll openly use the word “Jew”:

Five activists who caused £180,000 damage to an arms factory were acquitted after they argued they were seeking to prevent Israeli war crimes.

The five were jubilant after a jury found them not guilty of conspiring to cause criminal damage to the factory on the outskirts of Brighton.

Yeah, go read the whole thing. And remember, this is Great Britain. There have been a few times in the last few years when I thought that England would wake up from its slumber and fight the enemy in its midst. I don't think so any longer. At some point, leftists in the United States who didn't care what was happening over there will be trying to bargain with the British Islamic mullahs in order to have the art treasures (more important than people to some) of the various British museums kept out of harms way, and perhaps moved to a safe (for the moment) haven in the U.S.

Some people have been trying to figure out why Europe hates Israel.

The Europeans' vicious attacks on Israel are animated less by the Jewish state's foreign policy than by Europe's ongoing fixation on the Holocaust. What else could explain the presence of posters equating Israel with Nazi Germany at pro-Hamas demonstrations in Vienna? According to one recent German university study, 45.7 percent of the European respondents supported the contention that "Israel is conducting a war of extermination against the Palestinians."

In their eyes, apparently, maintaining a naval blockade against a government sworn to destroy you – while providing the unfortunate people living under that government with tens of thousands of tons of supplies and humanitarian aid – now equates to looting and butchering six million people.
Click here to find out more!

Wolfgang Benz, the controversial director of the Berlin Center for the study of anti-Semitism, neatly summed up this incongruity on German television when he insisted that "anti-Semitism is different from anti-Zionism."

Benz embraces the European wish to alleviate guilt by denying the weight of the Holocaust. (As the head of a center for the study of anti-Semitism, he's a particularly strange case; the German political scientist Clemens Heni discovered that Benz's beloved academic mentor was the now-deceased Karl Bosl, an outspoken Nazi who contributed enormously to spreading Hitler's ideology.)

Of course, nothing Israel has ever done can even begin to compare to the crimes of the Shoah. But to help alleviate their feelings of guilt, Europeans delegitimize Israel, ignore modern anti-Semitism, and portray Muslims – who number over one billion and whom no one seeks to eradicate from the earth – as the new persecuted Jews of Europe.

Some of that may be true, but after 1500 years of persecution, I think it has become ingrained into the European psyche. And then there's the new European (and generally Western) secular cowardice. Their ancestors unapologetically conquered the world and forced their morals and ethics - for good or bad - on those they conquered. Some of that conquest was done in the name of Christianity. So what. No matter how much anyone insists that there is, there is no moral equivalence between Western/Christian imperialism, and Islamic imperialism. That should be clear by looking at the results of both. The fruits of one over time is freedom and prosperity. The other has only spread barbarism and intolerance.

The secular descendants of European warriors quiver in fear, because to admit that unassimilated Muslim immigrants are destroying the Western freedom that their brave ancestors fought for and bestowed upon them, would be seen as racism and "islamophobia". They never had to work for their own freedom. It was unearned and so it means nothing. Until it's gone. Then it will be mourned by some. They will wonder what happened. But, it's better to shut up and be conquered without fighting back than to be thought a racist. Besides there are always the Jews to blame.

UPDATE: I almost forgot this article about the situation and the possible use of "decoy Jews" in Brussels.

In an effort to arrest the culprits who terrorize Jews, the Amsterdam authorities have ordered police officers to walk the streets disguised as Jews. The Dutch police already disguise officers as “decoy prostitutes, decoy gays and decoy grannies” to deter muggings and attacks on prostitutes, homosexuals and the elderly. Apparently sending out the decoys has helped reduce street crime. The “decoy Jew” has now been added to the police attributes.

Go ahead, read it and weep - or laugh. I mostly laughed at the insanity of it all. I'm sure decoy Jews will help solve the problem. Actually, if everybody dressed up as orthodox Jews . . .

Bad Dads

2010-07-01T20:32:00.003-05:00

Neil Steinberg is a good dad. He's taken for granted. That's probably normal. The wife and kids are used to having him around. I know my family is used to me - and my paycheck - and the occasional tutoring money - and rides when needed - and fixing things around the house - and being the one to be woken up when the kids have to puke in the middle of the night. (I don't know why it was me, but thankfully we're past those days). But that's just me being a dad. Millions of us do it. Other men don't. Steinberg calls them "bad dads." I have other names for them. I end up teaching their children while they're off doing whatever it is the scum of the earth do.

That’s why I feel a certain irrational envy for bad dads. You know the kind — shifty, gimlet-eyed petty criminals in plastic windbreakers who are forever hopping freight trains. Kids worship that kind of dad, mostly in the movies, but sometimes ]in real life. Look at Barack Obama. He was with his dad for what, a week after age 5? And he wrote Dreams from My Father.

and

All a bad dad has to do is arrive semi-sober at the big game — slipping into the stands at the last second — then give a thumbs-up and a toothless grin of encouragement to junior as he comes to the plate, and all is forgiven, the credits roll, and the music swells. A happy ending.

In a way, Steinberg is right. I've known kids who worship their dad who abandoned them. Sometimes the worship wears off though. I had a student this year, a fourth grader, who told me that he cares nothing for his father. His mother was getting married, and that was fine with him. I had another student a few years ago who was angry at her jailed father. She thought he was stupid. Her step-father was in the picture, so there was a male figure for her. She was happy with him.

I get students year after year, as do all of the other teachers I work with in this "urban district", who spend day after day mourning the loss of something they've never had but instinctively know they should have, a father. Some fathers just leave, or never show up in the first place. Others split at some point because they leave the mother. However it happens, those children are damaged, some more than others, but they all carry their psychic scars.

Situations arise that would never happen to a child in a stable two parent family. My first year of teaching, the music teacher kicked one of my students out of class for some misbehavior. The rest of the class laughed. She tried to calm them down and show them how unfeeling they were by scolding, "Stop it! How would you like it if your mother was a drug addict and you didn't know who your father was?" That didn't help matters at all.

Another time, a little boy was waving goodbye to his father. A little girl standing nearby told us that was her daddy too. The boy's response: "That's only because your momma's a 'ho', and my daddy did her."

I've seen big tough boys cry like babies because their fathers couldn't visit them the coming weekend - again. I've had missing fathers show up after not contacting their children for years in order to establish a relationship. And wouldn't you know it, it's always the mother's fault. Dad tells me about the mother's drug or alcohol use, or endless partying, and he is concerned for his child. And all of that may be true. But there were certain decisions made years ago that placed that child into this situation.

I did have a dad step up to the plate this year after I couldn't contact mom and grandma, who insisted that all of the problems were due to dad. After dad surprisingly demonstrated that he was a responsible parent, mom showed up regularly. Suddenly she was concerned and was going to do everything she needed to do in order for her daughter to succeed. Well, almost everything. It would have been nice had she had her daughter in school more often.

I saw one of my former students with his young son. It was good to see him taking an interest. (Who knows if he still does?) When I taught him, he was tight with two other young fellows. I was not the only one who saw them as Moe, Larry, and Curly. This was Curly. He seemed to have grown up.

I recently found out that another former student knocked up his fifteen year old girlfriend, a perfectly normal occurrence in the neighborhood where I teach. I can't offer any congratulations. I know what's coming.

I know two things about this situation. It's no longer a function of "ghetto culture." It has seeped into the mainstream, and single motherhood is no longer the scandal it used to be. It's almost accepted that "dad" will fade off into the sunset leaving mom with damaged kid - or kids. And the only thing I can do about it is to raise my children to understand that it is proper, acceptable, and the only right way to bring children into the world by first being married.

Dry Bones - Thinking Outside the Box

2010-06-29T13:34:00.000-05:00

Arguing with the New Anti-Semites

2010-06-29T13:31:00.001-05:00

As I related in an earlier post, I stopped to engage some New York City terror supporters in debate. My wife and I were in New York, you see. (This was back in early June.) We were strolling down the avenue, way down the avenue, from midtown down to Chinatown. Along the way we stopped to look at things, and to rest. It was a really hot day. We took the subway back uptown from Chinatown, and in Chinatown, we watched some fascinating musical performances, from, what I assume were traditional Chinese musicians. But that's not what I'm concerned with today.

Passing through Union Square on our way down, I noticed a Palestinian flag and a small crowd protesting Israel. This was after the flotilla debacle, but long enough afterward to know the facts, you know the ones that clearly demonstrated that these were not "peace activists", but terrorists looking for trouble.

This was the usual bunch of moral retards demanding that the U.S. end its support for Israel, and that we all boycott Israel and Israeli products, you know, like the Nazis urged their followers to boycott Jewish owned businesses . . . not that I'm trying to connect the two anti-Jewish causes. They've done that on their own.

Seeing these idiots made me angry. I was in a fine mood up until that point, but now I could feel the bile rising and the need to do something. I tried to keep walking. I told my wife I was angry. She knows how I get when I see things like this. I didn't want to mess up her day though by getting into a tussle with the terror supporters, but we discussed it for a minute and she let me stay for a few minutes, not for a long time, but just enough time to get out some of my anger.

One of the participants offered me one of their flyers. I skimmed it as he held it out. I was mostly trying to formulate the correct response. Maybe it was the heat, the long walk, or just the inner anger, but I gave the the wrong one. I told him that I didn't support their Nazi inspired hatred against Israel - or something to that effect. Yes, I established my point, and let him know where I stand, and it began the argument, but thinking about it later, and realizing that I began incorrectly, I asked myself, "What would Michael have done?" He's great at this kind of stuff.

Michael would have asked this enemy of civilization to defend his positions. He probably would have, as I should have, asked what makes Israel an "apartheid state". I've noticed that once these dopes start trying to defend their inaccurate and illogical claims, they're easy to refute. They go from one ridiculous claim to another as each one gets shot down, or they try to make you feel like you don't know the facts. Or, like one woman I argued with a while back, they go off on a tirade of non-sequiters. This particular woman started yelling about how we in the U.S. live in a fascist state. Since they're usually only familiar with their own talking points, they have to assert new points as each one gets shot down, or try to change the discussion altogether.

Eventually (usually) they get to the point where they either call you names, agree to disagree, or walk away. This guy ended up walking away as I was able to shatter his claims, but I could have done it more easily and with more panache, had I required him to defend his position. Plus, it would have taken him longer to understand that I was working against him and may have thrown him off once he realized that he was talking to someone hostile to his view of a Jew-free Middle East.

I found another person to argue with, but my wife was starting to walk off, so I went to join her. I merely let the woman who was trying to hand me a flyer know that I was a supporter of Israel. I know I didn't convince anyone of anything that day, but I did let them know that there are those of us battling their neo-fascist agenda.

Interesting Articles

2010-06-28T14:41:00.004-05:00

While digging around the Internet for the previous post, I stumbled upon two articles at The Religion of Peace. Here is a disturbing piece on the popularity of kiddie porn in Pakistan.

Google, the world’s most popular Internet search engine, has found in a survey that mostly Muslim states seek access to sex-related websites and Pakistan tops the list. Google found that of the top 10 countries - searching for sex-related sites - six were Muslim, with Pakistan on the top. The other Muslim countries are Egypt at number 2, Iran at 4, Morocco at 5, Saudi Arabia at 7 and Turkey at 8. Non-Muslim states are Vietnam at 3, India at 6, Philippines at 9 and Poland at 10.

and

Just in case anyone argues that the data could refer to innocent searches made by developmental psychology students, Google Trends shows that when the term “child f***ing” is examined, across all years from 2004 until now, the highest amount of searches for this term came from Pakistan. Similarly, of all global Google searches for “naked child” from 2004 till now, Pakistan still tops the list. Google Trends reveals that of all global Google searches, from 2006 to 2010, for the term “child sex video” Pakistan was second in the world, only being outdone by Bangladesh (a country that was once officially part of Pakistan).

If you insist on reading the whole article, feel free, but be warned, it gets more disturbing.

Our second article should be a firm reminder to those of us who only associate Islam with terrorism. Islam is also clearly associated with obsessive repression of any human activity that can be seen as enjoyable by any living human being. I will try not to forget that when discussing Islam from now on.

Hizbul Islam had previously banned all forms of entertainment considered un-Islamic under a strict interpretation of shariah law. There was to be no video gaming or watching sports in public. They shuttered movie theatres that showed major sporting events to residents, most of whom are too poor to own their own televisions, let alone a satellite dish that permits them to get around Hizbul Islam's control of local broadcast television.

These extremists also have ordered aid agencies out of the regions of Somalia they control. Their official rationale was that the aid groups were raising millions from around the world without providing Somalis with any benefits. The charitable agencies believe, though, that what Hizbul Islam truly feared was ordinary Somalis seeing the kindness of the mostly Western relief workers and ceasing to believe the anti-Western propaganda their political masters spew.

Like any fascist dictatorial system, the Islamists fear anyone going "off message" and engaging in any activity that would detract from total obedience to the official tyrant in charge. They have to have total control of the populace right down to people's own thoughts. But like fascist dictators, they are also complete hypocrites.

In the July/August issue of The Atlantic, David Byman, a Middle East expert at the Brookings Institute, and Christine Fair, an assistant professor in peace and security studies at Georgetown University, say that porn is amongst the most common content on laptops seized from al Qaeda operatives and other extremists. U.S. officials claim also to have video of would-be terrorists having it on with barnyard animals and one another.

Now, one could say that people (I don't want to say "men", that would be stereotyping, wouldn't it?) of all religions view pornography and even some who condemn its insidious nature are drawn to it and thus, are hypocrites. But then, one must ask, as one must always ask when pointing out the pathologies of Islam, how many members of other religions are murdering their followers for watching a soccer game, and and how many are telling their members how long their beards must be to avoid punishment?

Yep, none. That's right. Only among the "pure" Islamic societies is this sort of barbarism tolerated by those who fancy themselves as "progressive."

Getting It and Not Getting It

2010-06-28T14:35:00.001-05:00

I meant to post this many weeks ago. I meant to do a lot of things weeks ago, but as we all know, sometimes life has other plans. Nothing major happened, except for my wife's appendectomy a week and a half ago, but just a lot of little things. So while the articles I'm referring to are a bit dated, they're still valuable because they still speak for certain portions of our population and distill their thought processes.

Leonard Pitts is an obviously intelligent writer who, along with millions of others in the Western world, find myriad ways to avoid admitting the truth. You know the truth I speak of. It has to do with Islam and terrorism, that unavoidable connection between the two. The connection that can't be admitted if one is a member of the "What, me islamophobe?" community. Here is Pitts' most recent obfuscation.

Even after Oct. 1, 1910, when a bomb destroyed the Los Angeles Times building and killed 20 men.

And Nov. 24, 1917, when 10 people died in the bombing of a police station in Milwaukee.

And Sept. 16, 1920, when 38 people lost their lives in a bombing on Wall Street.

And May 18, 1927, when 45 people, most of them children, died in a school bombing in Bath Township, Mich.

And Sept. 15, 1963, when four little girls died in the bombing of the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in Birmingham.

And Feb. 26, 1993, when a bomb in a basement of the World Trade Center left six people dead.

And April 19, 1995 when a truck bomb destroyed a federal building in Oklahoma City, claiming 168 lives.

And Sept. 11, 2001, when nearly 3,000 people were killed by hijackers who used captured jetliners as guided missiles.

Read more: here.

But notice how far back in time Pitts has to travel in order to find his non-Islamic terrorist (or should I say "extremist", or "militant", or "activist"?) attacks. He is unwilling to face the fact that since 9/11, there have been over 15,000 terrorist attacks by "a tiny minority" of members of the Religion of Peace. Does it make a person "islamophobic" to keep track of these attacks? Or even to notice them and point them out? Apparently to Pitts, it does. And it also destroys the moral equivalency argument that so many on the left who don't want to slight the Muslim community for excusing or ignoring the terrorists in their midst.

On the other hand, there's Mark Steyn. He is brave enough to even face Obama.

Like a lot of guys who’ve been told they’re brilliant one time too often, President Obama gets a little lazy, and doesn’t always choose his words with care. And so it was that he came to say a few words about Daniel Pearl, upon signing the “Daniel Pearl Press Freedom Act.”

Pearl was decapitated on video by jihadist Muslims in Karachi on Feb. 1, 2002. That’s how I’d put it.

This is what the president of the United States said: “Obviously, the loss of Daniel Pearl was one of those moments that captured the world’s imagination because it reminded us of how valuable a free press is.”

Now Obama’s off the prompter, when his silver-tongued rhetoric invariably turns to sludge. But he’s talking about a dead man here, a guy murdered in public for all the world to see. Furthermore, the deceased’s family is standing all around him. And, even for a busy president, it’s the work of moments to come up with a sentence that would be respectful, moving, and true. Indeed, for Obama, it’s the work of seconds, because he has a taxpayer-funded staff sitting around all day with nothing to do but provide him with that sentence.

Instead, he delivered the one above. Which, in its clumsiness and insipidness, is most revealing. First of all, note the passivity: “The loss of Daniel Pearl.” He wasn’t “lost.” He was kidnapped and beheaded. He was murdered on a snuff video. He was specifically targeted, seized as a trophy, a high-value scalp. And the circumstances of his “loss” merit some vigor in the prose. Yet Obama can muster none.

But then, Obama gets it about as well as Pitts does. The tragedy of Obama not getting it is that he is the leader of the free world.

Of course, Steyn has paid for being politically incorrect, for pointing out that, not only is the emperor wearing no clothes, but the terrorists are wearing Islamic garb. He was sued by a Canadian Muslim organization and brought up on charges by the misnamed Canadian Human Rights Commission. That's what you get when you refuse to submit, and when you refuse to exchange the truth for lies and then believe the lies and condemn the truth.

But those are the people we need to get us through these troubled times . . . and into the next troubled times.

Missionaries arrested at Arab Festival in Dearborn

2010-06-20T08:31:00.003-05:00

Nope, I'm not going to comment on this. There is no need.

Four Christian missionaries trying to convert Muslims were arrested and jailed Friday for disorderly conduct at an Arab festival in Dearborn, police said.

"We did make four arrests for disorderly conduct," Dearborn Police Chief Ron Haddad said Saturday. "They did cause a stir."

Nabeel Qureshi of Virginia and David Wood of New York, both with a Christian group called Acts 17 Apologetics, were arrested with two others after they were said to be causing disruptive behavior, police said.

The four, who were at the Dearborn Arab International Festival, were later released on bail.

Qureshi described the arrest on the Acts 17 blog at www.answeringmuslims.com.

You should read the whole article. You should also go to the website.

Just for Laughs

2010-06-19T19:29:00.001-05:00

You may have already seen these as an email.

Senior Bumper Stickers, etc.

Someone had to remind me, so I'm reminding you too. Don't laugh.....it is all true.
Perks of reaching 50 or being over 60 and heading towards 70!

1. Kidnappers are not very interested in you.

2. In a hostage situation you are likely to be released first.

3. No one expects you to run--anywhere.

4. People call at 9 pm and ask, did I wake you?

5. People no longer view you as a hypochondriac.

6. There is nothing left to learn the hard way.

7. Things you buy now won't wear out.

8. You can eat supper at 4 pm.

9. You can live without sex but not your glasses.

10. You get into heated arguments about pension plans.

11. You no longer think of speed limits as a challenge.

12. You quit trying to hold your stomach in no matter who walks into the room.

13. You sing along with elevator music.

14. Your eyes won't get much worse.

15 . Your investment in health insurance is finally beginning to pay off.

16. Your joints are more accurate meteorologists than the national weather service.

17. Your secrets are safe with your friends because they can't remember them either.

18. Your supply of brain cells is finally down to manageable size.

19. You can't remember who sent you this list.

And you notice these are all in Big Print for your convenience.

Forward this to everyone you can remember.

And Never, under any circumstances, take a sleeping pill and a laxative on the same night.

The Three Terrors

2010-06-19T11:08:00.002-05:00

Youtube pulled the "We Con the World" video. Must not upset those jihadists, you know. That would be islamophobic. So watch this one and pass it one before it too gets censored by Youtube.

School of Hard Knocks

2010-06-14T18:17:00.002-05:00

Some of us need to be hit in the head before we adjust our world view so that's in more in line with reality. Others need a good swift kick in the pants. Then there are those who need who, unfortunately need to have their reality rearranged by having their family jewels attacked. Yes, I'm speaking of the rabbi who conducted that recent ill-fated interview with the aged anti-Semitic Helen Thomas.

During an interview on CNN’s Reliable Sources on Sunday, Rabbi David Nesenoff, known for exposing Helen Thomas’s anti-Semitic views, informed viewers that, up until now, he has considered himself to be a liberal Democrat – who even opposed the Iraq War and supported Barack Obama – but now asserts that "I have to really reevaluate liberal and conservative and really find out where I stand because I think I've been a little blind."

A little blind?

As Nesenoff recounted that he had previously agreed with Thomas in her opposition to the war in Iraq, and her challenging of President Bush on the matter, he now sees himself as unknowingly being allied with people who think that "Israel and the Jewish people don't have a connection." Before being interrupted by host Howard Kurtz, Nesenoff began to explain his evolution of thought:

He is one of the reasons that when it comes to backing Israel, I trust conservative evangelical Christians more than I trust liberal Jews, even liberal Jewish rabbis. It's not so much that his eyes have been opened, but he's been forced to reevaluate his willful blindness to the anti-Israel agenda.

I have to wonder if the rabbi is part of an interfaith group that is involved in outreach to local mosques. After all, the liberal belief in dialogue with "the other" is a core orthodox (liberal) belief. If so, he would do well to read and reread this article.

Jewish residents in Malmo are furious after the Swedish town's mayor, Ilmar Reepalu, equated Zionism to anti-Semitism in an interview published on International Holocaust Remembrance Day.

During the interview with Skanska Dagbladet newspaper, Reepalu was asked whether he considered a public condemnation of anti-Semitism in Malmo. The mayor responded that "Malmo does not accept anti-Semitism and does not accept Zionism," charging that both adopt extreme positions towards certain groups.

Reepalu added that local Jews bear some responsibility for the attitude towards them, noting that "they have the possibility to affect the way they are seen by society." The mayor then urged Malmo's Jewish community to "distance itself" from Israeli attacks on Gaza's civilian population.

"Instead, the community chose to hold a pro-Israel demonstration," he said, adding that such move "may convey the wrong message to others."

He (and you) need to read the whole thing, and then read some more about the current wave of unapologetic anti-Semitism sweeping Europe. Never again? Don't you believe it. It will happen again in Europe. It's already started.

Helen Thomas

2010-06-13T20:16:00.003-05:00

You really have go beyond the pale to get the mainstream media to notice anti-Semitism these days, since, as we're told, those Jews are always playing the anti-Semitism card. And of course, if you aren't as deferential to Israel as the Israel Lobby wants you to be, well then, the Jew-controlled media bounces your butt out the door. Just ask Glen Greenwald and his fellow hate monkeys. Others noticed Helen Thomas' tendencies years ago.

Call Me Islamophobe

2010-06-08T20:36:00.005-05:00

Yes, I do agree with the fellow in the photo.

And I would laugh harder at this cartoon if it weren't so true . . . and if 78% of American Jews hadn't helped create this suicidal situation.

Update: I forgot to mention that the above photograph was liberated from The People's Cube.

Random Takes on Israel

2010-06-07T16:19:00.004-05:00

Oh, those poor, poor Gazans! Or at least that's the story we're told.

But in reality,

* While prominent Western media continue to lead their viewers and readers astray with accounts of a non-existent “mass humanitarian catastrophe” in Gaza, fancy restaurants (video below) and an Olympic-size swimming pool open there

* Most Israeli towns don’t have Olympic-size swimming pools

* Many Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza live a middle class (and in some cases an upper class) lifestyle that Western journalists refuse to report on because it doesn’t fit with the simplistic story they were sent to write

* If you drop into the Roots Club in Gaza, according to the Lonely Planet guidebook, you can “dine on steak au poivre and chicken cordon bleu” (video, photos below)

Check this out for the promised videos and photos.

And while this video was done for laughs, (make sure you watch the song parody that begins about half way through) there is truth in it. That's what makes good satire.

And finally, here is a Democrat I would vote for if I lived in his district.

Rep. Brad Sherman (D-Calif.) — one of Israel's staunchest defenders in Congress — wants Americans who were aboard the Gaza flotilla ships prosecuted.

On a conference call organized by The Israel Project on Friday, Sherman said that any U.S. citizen aboard the ship should be considered aiding Hamas, an Islamic extremist organization that controls Gaza. The U.S. State Department considers Hamas a foreign terrorist organization.

The online foreign policy publication Lobelog reported:

On a press call hosted by a pro-Israel organization, Rep. Brad Sherman, Democrat of California, told reporters that he intends seek the prosecution of any U.S. citizens who were aboard or involved with the Freedom Flotilla.

“The Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 [PDF] makes it absolutely illegal for any American to give food, money, school supplies, paper clips, concrete or weapons to Hamas or any of its officials,” Sherman said on the Israel Project call, conflating Hamas and Gaza’s civilian population. “And so I will be asking the Attorney General to prosecute any American involved in what was clearly an effort to give items of value to a terrorist organization.”

Sherman also said that he plans on working with the Department of Homeland Security to make sure that any non-U.S. citizen involved with or aboard the Flotilla are excluded from entering the U.S.

The one from my district has been in Congress much too long and I have to wonder if he is supporting this stance.

My wife and I were in New York City over the weekend. We walked past an anti-Israel demonstration in Union Square. I was trying to be a good husband and walk right past these Hamas-supporting tools. My wife was a better wife than I was a husband as she let me stop and argue with them for a bit. I didn't press it. I cut my confrontations much shorter than I wanted to. But I appreciate the fact that she let me release some of my anger at these morally deluded fools who have no idea what freedom is, what it isn't, and what we need to do to keep it.