Terri Schiavo Dies
NewsMax.com Wires
Thursday, March 31, 2005
PINELLAS PARK, Fla. - Terri Schiavo, the severely brain-damaged woman whose final years tethered to a feeding tube sparked a bitter feud over her fate that divided a family and a nation, died Thursday, her husband's attorney said.

Schiavo, 41, died quietly in a Pinellas Park hospice 13 days after her feeding tube was removed despite extraordinary intervention by Florida lawmakers, Congress and President Bush — efforts that were rebuffed at every turn by the courts.

People for the leftist, err, American Way are about to launch an ad campiagn in support of filibustering judicial nominees. RadioBlogger is on top of this and reports on their press conference, and has some things to say about their poster boy.

"Ted Nonini, a member of the Los Angeles Fire Department. I know you are getting weak in the knees, knowing a rank and file Republican firefighter is withdrawing his support for ending the Senate filibuster against judicial nominees, but let me add something to the mix that will shore up your support."

Nonini is the treasurer of local 112 of the IIAF. Do recall that the IIAF endoresed Kerry for President, without polling it's membership.

"Now here's what Mr. Nonini says in the new PFAWL ad:

That's the Mr. Smith who went to Washington filibustering the Senate to do what's right and fair. Hi. I'm a Republican. A common sense Republican. I like that my party controls the White House and the Congress. But I also know that our democracy works best when both parties are speaking out and being heard. Mr. Smith knew it, too. That's why he was using the filibuster. So that the other point of view could be heard. The filibuster has been around 200 years, and God knows our party used it whenever we needed it. but we're a two party system. And America works best when no one party has absolute power. It's plain common sense. So write your Senators today. Don't let anyone kill the filibuster."

As RadioBlogger points out, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington is fiction. Seems a great many of those on the left like their little fantasy world. I find this ad to be quite dishonest. This is not about doing away with the filibuster for legislative issues, it is about doing away with filibustering on judicial nominees. What filibustering judicial nominees is doing is keeping the voice of the majority from being heard as well as defying the will of the people. After all, it was the American people that sent a majority of Republicans to the Senate.

RadioBlogger concludes:

"This campaign is a sham. I don't believe Mr. Nonini is a true Republican for a minute. He may be registered that way, but I don't believe his position in the Union gives him standing as a "common sense" Republican. He certainly has enough of a conflict of interest that wasn't disclosed in the commercial.

If he would have said, "Hi. I'm a Republican, and I am an office holder in my local union. And I side with the Democratic activists this time," it wouldn't have had the same desired effect.

Press the button, Mr. Frist. If this is the best the Democrats have to defend it, press the button."

This indeed a sham brought to us by another organization involved in hoodwinking us on campaign finance reform. Listen to RadioBlogger and myself, Mr. Frist, push the damned button already! - Sailor

Another day and another deepening scandal at the UN. This time the outgoing UN Inspector General, Dileep Nair, claims that the second-ranking official at the United Nations of impeded his efforts to take his concerns about the Iraqi oil-for-food program to the Security Council. The Washington Times story by Betsy Pisik looks into this accusation.

"Mr. Nair, who is responsible for rooting out corruption and mismanagement through the U.N. Office of Internal Oversight Services (OIOS), said Deputy Secretary-General Louise Frechette had prevented him from sharing reviews of the oil-for-food program with the 15-nation council.

"I was blocked by the deputy secretary-general from putting my reports into the Security Council," said Mr. Nair, who himself is being criticized by investigators for his handling of the oil-for-food account.

"I wanted to put my reports to the Security Council so it will get visibility and accountability," Mr. Nair said. "But Benon [Sevan] turned it down. And Louise Frechette said no, I shouldn't do it." Mr. Sevan is the former administrator of the oil-for-food program."

Remember that Benon Sevan has had his legal expenses paid by the UN. Which makes one wonder if there was some quid-pro-quo here. Louise Frechette cannot remember ever talking to Nair. It could be some thing in the water at the UN that causes amnesia.

" Mr. Nair, of Singapore, was harshly criticized by the Volcker committee on Tuesday for hiring a special assistant using funds earmarked for management of the oil-for-food program.

The assistant, also from Singapore, estimates he spent less than 10 percent of his time on program-specific tasks.

Mr. Nair also has been under investigation for improper hiring and sexual harassment.

U.N. spokesman Fred Eckhard told reporters yesterday that the charges substantiated by the Volcker panel "supersede" the previous complaints, and vowed that still-unspecified disciplinary proceedings are "inevitable."
The accusations against Mr. Nair have been an embarrassment to Mr. Annan, who has spoken repeatedly of creating new accountability and transparency in the organization."

This could just be a false accusation by Nair to cover himself from the investigation of his involvement in the oil-for-food scandal and the sexual impropriorties. Either way, this does not bode well for the UN. - Sailor

Here is another item that is sure to make the leftists whine and gnash their teeth some more. The Financial Times is reporting that Paul Wolfowitz has gained the support of the EU as the new head of the Wolrd Bank.

"Mr Wolfowitz is expected to be officially elected on Thursday, following a vote among the 24-member executive board of the World Bank.

“I understand that I am, to put it mildly, a controversial figure,” he said. “But I hope that, as people get to know me better, they will understand that I really do believe deeply in the mission of the bank. It is a mission that is a unifying mission.”

Concerning future appointments to the bank, he added: “I intend to look for the best talent from all around the world and I look forward to having a truly multinational senior staff.”"

Looks like another international win for the Bush Adminstration. - Sailor

Once again, the ACLU is about to show their true colors come April 1st. That is the date that the Minuteman Project begins. The Minuteman Project will be sending groups to watch the Arizona-Mexico border and they will report any illegal activities to law enforcement. The ACLu dosen't like this at all. Seems they objuect to American citizens exercising their Constitutional rights. The ACLU is more concerned about the "rights" of those trying to enter this country illegally. Michelle Maklin has quite a few things to say about this in her article.

"In doing so, the Minutemen will be exercising their constitutionally protected freedom of speech, freedom of assembly and freedom to petition the government for a redress of grievances. Those would be fundamental civil liberties found in something called the, uh, First Amendment, of which the ACLU is supposed to be the foremost expert and champion. Or so the group and its celebrity supporters say. In sanctimonious new fund-raising ad campaigns, the organization features the likes of liberal actress Holly Hunter, who asks:

"Do you want to be heard without fear? I am not an American who believes that questioning or criticizing my government is unpatriotic."

Uh-huh. "Dissent is patriotic," the Left likes to preach. Except, apparently, if the questioning and criticizing deals with the government's abject failure to enforce immigration laws. Minuteman Project founder Jim Gilchrist has been harassed by open-borders activists at his home. The group is reportedly being targeted by savage illegal alien gangsters from Mara Salvatrucha (a.k.a. MS-13). Mexican government officials are lobbying American law enforcement officials to suppress the Minutemen's rights to speak and assemble.

But instead of coming to the defense of the Minutemen who are challenging our government, the ACLU has warned the 1,000 volunteers that it will send monitors to document the Americans' activities. Moreover, the ACLU has already threatened lawsuits against the American dissenters for exercising their rights."

There was a time when the ACLU stood up for everyone's First Amendment rights. Now it seems the ACLU has decided to become selective, thus staying within their political agenda.

" This bullying of pro-immigration enforcement activists comes as no surprise to those of us who have followed the ACLU's aggressive open-borders agenda -- from its support for driver's licenses for illegal aliens, to its opposition to detaining illegal alien terror suspects after 9/11 and profiling foreign visitors from terror-friendly countries, to its efforts to stop local and state law enforcement officers from helping federal homeland security efforts.

ACLU of Arizona spokesman Ray Ybarra argues that the mere presence of the Minutemen at the border constitutes "unlawful imprisonment" of illegal (excuse me, "undocumented") aliens (excuse me, "migrants"). Ybarra told the Washington Times that the ACLU will have lawyers on standby ready to file civil cases against the volunteers. He warned that the Minutemen could "come to our state as 'vigilantes' and end up leaving as 'defendants.'"

The Minutemen have made it clear on their website and in repeated statements that they "will not violate anyone's civil rights, and will not abuse anyone from any country. . . . We will alert border patrol to the location of illegals, and wait for [the Border Patrol] to come and pick them up. We will follow illegal aliens from a distance and continue spotting them until authorities answer our cell phone and/or back-pack radio calls. All spotting, calls for assistance, and the response from the appropriate authorities will be chronicled and provided to any media representative."

Contrary to the ACLU and mainstream media representations of the group as racists and immigrant-bashers, the Minutemen are a diverse volunteer group that includes Americans of Mexican, Armenian, Russian, Lebanese, Indian and Cuban descent; and black and Native American minorities. Also among the volunteers are 19 legal immigrants from Mexico, Peru, Russia, New Zealand, England, Australia and the Philippines."

The ACLU continues to hold to their leftist agenda. Some one needs to remind the ACLU, that American citizens have rights as well and that those attempting to enter this country illegally are breaking the law and thus, any American citizen has the right to relay this criminal activity to the appropriate authorities, which is exactly what the Minuteman Project has stated is it's intent. Michelle concludes with this:

" By recklessly linking the Minutemen to white separatists and casting them as outlaws, the civil liberties crowd engages in the very guilt-by-association smear tactics it has so loudly condemned. And in putting the protection of illegal aliens' rights over law-abiding Americans' civil liberties, the ACLU demonstrates on which side of the border its true allegiances lie."

So typical of the left, when they are opposed to a group, they resort to smears. Let's face it, the Minuteman Project is operating well within their legal and Constitutional rights. Those that call those illegally entering this country "undocumented workers", do not like that fact that others are calling them what they are, illegal aliens and law breakers. - Sailor

Investor's Business Daily has a few things to say about the fraud called Campaign Finance Reform and the involvement of Pew Charitable Trust and seven other liberal organizations. All the more reason for Congress to launch an investigation into whether Pew and their "co-conspirators" attempted to loby Congress, which would be quite illegal for them to do.

"Free Speech: Was the campaign for campaign finance reform just another big-money front? It seems that those who complain most about the corrupting influence of money in politics know whereof they speak."

A good deal of this money provided by George Soros' Open Society Institute.

"A tape obtained by Ryan Sager of the New York Post gives it away. Sean Treglia, a former program officer for tax-exempt Pew Charitable Trust, is heard on the tape telling students at the University of Southern California's Annenberg School for Communications last year that Pew essentially functioned as a money-laundering operation for large left-of-center foundations interested in the passage of campaign finance reform legislation.

"The idea was to create an impression that a mass movement was afoot," Treglia said, and that everywhere Congress looked, "people were talking about reform."

At another point Treglia said: "By law, the grantees always have to disclose. But I always encouraged the grantees never to mention Pew," with the purpose "to convey the impression that this was something coming naturally from outside the Beltway.""

Try and deny that this is fraud and it strikes me that it may be a violation of the law and money laundering as well.

"So what we have here was an attempt to use big money to manipulate the political process to pass legislation designed to prevent big money from manipulating the political process.

The passage of McCain-Feingold did nothing of the sort, however, since Soros and his cronies found a way around the law, with Soros alone funneling at least $24 million through a variety of issue advocacy groups known as 527s.

According the nonpartisan Political Money Line, Pew spent an average of $4 million a year over 10 years to promote campaign finance reform; of the $140 million spent to promote it in the last decade, $123 million came from eight left-of-center foundations.

Not only is this attempt to curb political speech transparently hypocritical, and borderline illegal, it is doomed to fail. As we have noted before on this page, money is like water. It finds its own level and if you dam it up in one place, it merely finds another route."

This appears to qualify as a conspiracy. In this case, a conspiracy to hoodwink the American people an Congress. If anything cries out for a full investigation, this does. By the way, where is the MSM on this? The silence from them is deafening. Of course, they are exempted from all of this reform, so perhaps they have a conflict of interest here. I continue to urge all of you to contact your Congressional representatives and demand a full investigation into this fiasco. - Sailor

Doc Farmer has another of his excellent and timely articles. I have wondered for some time why President Bush has not takenmore concrete action to stem the tide of illegal immigration from Mexico. To the usual leftists etal, these are not "undocumented workers", theu are illegal alieans. As such, they should be rounded up and deported. No ifs ands or buts about it. They should not be allowed any social services other then emergancy medical care, only in cases of life threatening emergencies. Once stabalized, they should be deported to their home country. As for Vincente Fox, listen up dude, get your economy moving, get rid of the corruption and take care of your people. We are tired of doing it for you. - Sailor

America's New Minutemen
Written by Doc Farmer
Wednesday, March 30, 2005


An estimate published by the Pew Hispanic Center last week gave a disturbing insight into how porous America's borders have become. Their estimate (more like a guesstimate, really) stated that we currently have 10.3 million illegal aliens roaming around our streets. That's UP from 8.4 million illegals only four years earlier, a 23% increase.

Think
about this for a minute. In the span of 1,461 days, around 1.9 million people broke the law and entered our country illegally. That's just about the population of the Cincinnati area, and just over the headcount in Kansas City. One Thousand, Three Hundred illegal aliens per day.

Now consider the fact that the numbers from Pew are almost certainly low. Very, very low.

America's population is hovering around 300 million. Assume that Pew's off by about half (it's probably more, but humor me). That means that we've got around 20 million illegal aliens in our country. So just under seven percent of our population would be illegals. Not "undocumented aliens" or "guest workers" or whatever politically correct (and factually incorrect) euphemism the lib/dem/soc/commies are shoving down our throats today. My dad
taught me to call a spade a spade - not a digging implement, not an entrenching tool, not even a shovel (there is a difference, believe me!). So let's call these people what they really are.

Criminals.

Think about the possibility that six or seven out of every 100 people in this country are criminals. Criminals you are paying for with your taxes. Criminals who are taking money out of your pocket every single day.

What are the folks in Washington, D.C. doing about this? Well, the 535 crooks we've got in Congress and the nine spokespersons for Depends Undergarments we've got in SCOTUS have been working very hard to make this situation even worse. Now, we've got President Bush (a guy I like and respect) who is actually pushing an ill conceived, insecure and frankly idiotic "guest worker" program here.

And then you've got us. Everyday Americans. The folks who have to pay for the mistakes (and in many cases, the
crimes) of all of the above. The folks who are pig-sick of having our government, during a time of war, actually aid and abet this not-so-gradual invasion of our country. The folks who will pay the price, in taxes or in their own blood, of having these felonious jerks wandering our streets.

Some everyday Americans are now saying "Enough!" They're tired of the lies, the false promises, the false hopes, the legal wrangling and the blatant stupidity that is our nation's policy regarding illegals. So, they are doing the only thing they can do. They're taking action. The action their government refuses to take.

On April 1st, around a thousand American Citizens will begin to monitor our southern border in something called the Minuteman Project. Like their namesakes of old, they will be ready to defend their country, their homes, at a moment's notice from the open invasion that their government is supposed to prevent. They will
monitor the borders at first, contacting local authorities when they see folks sashay over here from Mexico. They will not take direct action, nor do they plan to try to "do a Rambo" to capture illegals on their own.

And this has a lot of folks in Washington hopping mad. How DARE these people! The audacity to actually exercise their rights under the Constitution. What few they have left, that is. President Bush complains about the possibility of vigilantes. There's a difference between vigilantism and vigilance, Mr. President. These folks will not arrest. They are not a posse from the Old West. They are homeowners and ranchers and farmers and shopkeepers. They are people who are fed up to the back teeth of watching America bend over and grab its ankles for folks who are criminals, while they (the law abiding) are being abused by a government whose priorities,
in this case, are ass-backwards.

Some folks have decried the fact that some of the volunteers in the Minuteman Project might be (Shock! Horror!) ARMED. Apparently, if the ACFLU had been around in the late 1770s, we'd still be singing God Save the Queen. Those who choose to be armed have the legal right to do so, under both State and Federal law. Don't believe me? Check these words out -

"A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."

Ah, there's that pesky Constitution again. These folks have the right to keep and bear arms. They also have the right to form a well-regulated militia.
Most importantly, they have the right to defend themselves, their homes, and their country. Something Washington has failed to do as regards our borders. Failed, and failed miserably.

I'm sure, President Bush, you will argue that your "guest worker" program is not an amnesty. Well, sir, I can put lipstick and a bikini on a pig, but calling it Pamela Anderson won't make it anything other than a pig. Your plan is, not to put a fine point on it, foolish. A guest worker program will just create loads more bureaucracy, cost more money, and encourage more illegal entry. It won't secure our borders - indeed, it will make an already rotten situation even worse.

You've said that these "guest workers" will take jobs that American's won't take. Really? So, we're so much better than these illegals, eh? Americans will work if the jobs are out there, Mr. President.
Giving the jobs to illegals so that we can prop up a corrupt government and a crippled economy south of the border is not my idea of helping America. Which, if I'm not mistaken, is the FIRST duty of the President and Congress.

I don't really care how much you like Vicente Fox. I don't care if he shared his secret recipe for Goat Enchiladas with you or not. I don't give a rat's rump if he's promised all kinds of "reforms" and initiatives to stem the tide of illegals. He's as crooked as a dog's hind leg that's been run over by a semi. His second largest cash crop is sending illegals here (the first is pot). He's not going to give up that kind of revenue just because you think he's your chum. His government is actually providing INSTRUCTIONS on how to invade our country, sir.

And you're complaining about American Citizens who are exercising their legal and constitutional rights?

Time to get your priorities straight, Mr. President. It is time for you to support the Minuteman Project, effectively defend the borders of this nation, kick out every single illegal alien we can find, and tell Vicente Fox what he can do, along with the burro he rode in on. Your job is to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States. Not Mexico. Your duty is to safeguard America during this time of war. Not invite God-only-knows who to come in and put this nation at potential risk.

We're waiting, Mr. President.


About the Writer: Doc Farmer is a writer and humorist who is also a moderator on ChronWatch's Forum. He formerly lived in Saudi Arabia and Qatar, but now resides in the Midwest. Doc receives e-mail at docfarmer9999@yahoo.co.uk.

This Article Was First Published In ChronWatch At: http://www.chronwatch.com/content/contentDisplay.asp?aid=13772

In what has been a long time coming, Moderate Muslims are finally letting their voices be heard. Contrary to what some would have us believe, support for bin Laden is not universal in the Muslim world. An article in the Washingtion Times puts that myth to rest. One Islamic scholar has even gone as far as to say that this may be "a counter-jihad."

"In a recent interview with the Qatari daily newspaper Al-Raya, for example, Abd Al-Hamid Al-Ansari, the former dean of Shariah and law at the University of Qatar, urged his fellow Muslims to purge their heritage of fanaticism and adopt "new civilized humane thought."

Such humane thought, he said, "must be translated [into deeds] in educational ways, via the media, tolerant religious discourse, nondiscriminatory policy and just legislation."

"We must purge the school curricula of all sectarian implications and elements according to which others deviate from the righteous path and the truth is in our hands alone. We must enrich the curricula with the values of tolerance and acceptance of the other who is different [in school of faith, ethnic group, religion, nationality or sex]. "

This is positive sign that Islamic scholars are aware that the hatred spewed forth by bin Laden and extremist Muslim groups is hurting the Faithful and is a pervesion of Islam. Recently, the Islamic Commission of Spain issued a fatwa against bin Laden.

"A group calling itself al Qaeda in Iraq -- the name Jordanian-born militant Abu Musab Zarqawi gave his organization after he aligned himself with bin Laden -- mocked it in the familiar religious rhetoric. "Allah has promised us victory," it said in a posting on its Internet Web site. "... Terrorizing enemies of God is our faith and religion, which is taught to us by our Koran."

Nevertheless, the reaction to the Spanish fatwa astonished its authors, who were swamped with e-mail messages of congratulations.

"I couldn't even read them all -- there's at least a thousand, maybe more," said Mansur Escudero, secretary-general of the Islamic Commission of Spain. "The tone was nearly all the same: 'It's about time someone did it. Bravo!' "

Says Khaled Abou El Fadl, an authority on Islamic law at the University of California at Los Angeles: "The long and painful silence of moderate theologians and experts in Islam jurisprudence -- who had been bought off or intimidated into silence -- is finally starting to break apart. We are seeing signs of a counter-jihad.""

This will give the leftists and terrorist supporters and appeasers some thing else to upset their stomachs. - Sailor

A South Carolina politician is introducing legislation to impose criminal penalties on those who maliciously slander political candidates. Democrat Bill Elliott says, "something needs to be done to end over-the-top campaign tactics."

"Lawsuits are an option for people who feel slandered or libeled, but the standards for proving that are higher for public officials. But, Elliott said, if the person making the false charges has no assets, the slandered candidate would get nothing. His proposed criminal penalty would target those offenders.

He said people who demonstrate actual malice, knowing a statement is false or having reckless disregard for it being false, would face a criminal charge that could bring a $5,000 fine and up to five years in prison. A candidate still could pursue a civil lawsuit."

Now, who determines if malice is involved? The courts? We all know how subjective they courts can be. What if the person accused is found innocent? Will there be provisions in this law to punish the accuser? After all, if Elliott is so worried about slander, isn't bringing charges on this the same thing if the accused is not guilty?

""I understand his frustration, but it's a slippery slope you're starting down here," said Bill Rogers, executive director of the S.C. Press Association.

Courts have always protected political speech, he said. A criminal penalty could discourage people from raising issues that are true."

So it would be okay acording to what Elliott is proposing for the media to slander candidates. This is just another load of nonsense. Elliott needs to get a does of reality. - Sailor

If you rely on the MSM, you would have no idea that any progress is being made in Iraq. Along comes this article in the Washington Times with a little bit of good news from Iraq. The article, by Rowan Scarborough lloks at what some at the Pentagon are seeing as positive signs in Iraq.

"Military officials and analysts say the clearing out of enemy-infested Fallujah in November, the Jan. 30 elections and the increasing willingness of Iraqis to fight and die for a democratic country are contributing to the momentum.

"This is still a tough fight. We don't want anyone to think that it is not," said retired Air Force Lt. Gen. Thomas McInerney, a military analyst who strongly supports Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld. "But the momentum is in our direction." "

The Iraqi security forces are rising to the occassion as evidenced by their recent assaults on camps set up by the terrorists. These are not insurgents as the MSM loves to call them. Insurgents do not specifically target civillians. Terrorists and criminals go after civillians.

" A Pentagon official said the more that intelligence agencies analyze the insurgency, the clearer it becomes that a large part is criminal, not nationalistic.

Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein released tens of thousands of hardened criminals, including murderers, before the March 2003 invasion, meaning that as the ex-convicts are recaptured, insurgent leaders might have an increasingly smaller pool from which to recruit attackers.

"We have always realized there was a criminal element in the insurgency that wasn't driven by devotion to Saddam. The numbers may be higher than we first estimated," the official said."

More evidence that the Iraqi security forces are begining to hurt these bastards is the shift in attacks from American forces to Iraqi forces.

"An analysis by Reuters shows that U.S. combat deaths in March so far have averaged barely one per day, the lowest figure since February 2004. All told, 1,520 U.S. personnel have died in Iraq, including 1,164 killed in action.

"They're clearly going after Iraqi security forces more," Army Gen. George Casey, the top commander in Iraq, said earlier this month. "That's kind of a steady thing. And the attacks against coalition actually have dropped off." "

Even with the increased attacks and deaths, Iraqis are fighting back and appear determined to defend their new found freedoms.

"On Thursday, 11 Iraqi policemen were killed by a single suicide bomber, most likely a terrorist in the employ of Jordanian-born Abu Musab Zarqawi.

But Iraqis continue to sign up. After an even bloodier attack in January against Iraqis in line to apply for police jobs, a still-longer line formed the next day at the same spot, said a U.S. Army officer in Iraq.

And last week, merchants and residents on one of Baghdad's main streets joined the fight by using their own guns to kill three terrorists, who were firing on passers-by. "

In conclusion, Scarborough notes this:

"Lt. Col. James Hutton, Gen. Chiarelli's spokesman, said another promising development is the proliferation of Iraqi newspapers and radio and TV stations that avoid the anti-U.S. propaganda viewed on Al Jazeera.

"The Iraqi media is really thirsty for facts out on the street," said Col. Hutton, who made it a point to offer a weekly briefing to the Iraqi press that sometimes featured Gen. Chiarelli. "They want to expose corruption."

Gen. Chiarelli is also touting the carrot and stick. Attacks in the Shi'ite Baghdad slum Sadr City fell to nearly zero after Army units crushed insurgents and then quickly put hundreds of dwellers to work building basic comforts of home: water, sewer and electric service. "

All in all this psoitive news from Iraq is most welcome. Those who said that democracy could not flower in the deserts of Iraq are begining to be proven wrong. - Sailor

This is an article sure to turn the stomachs of leftists, terrorist supporters and appeasers and the rest of those that want to Iraqi democracy fail. Fatos Tarifa, the Albanian Ambassador to the US, tells why Albania stands with the US in Iraq. The good Ambassador reminds all that the US has always been on the side of freedom.

"Unlike people in other countries in Europe and elsewhere, the Albanian people have not forgotten what it is like to live under tyranny and repression. The Albanians for more than 40 years were held in thrall by the repressive forces of the communists, living like prisoners without rights in their own country. It was to the United States that freedom-loving Albanians looked for inspiration during those dark years, and the Americans have not let us down.

"We Albanians are a nation of freedom fighters who know something about living under oppression," Albanian Prime Minister Fatos Nano wrote in a letter to President Bush. "That is why we wholeheartedly support the American-led effort to free the people of Iraq. And though we are a small country with a small military, we are proud to stand side by side with our allies in the fight to end the reign of terror in Baghdad." "

Albania has sent some 120 of the Special Forces troops to Iraq. Remember that the population of Albania is something like 4 million. The Ambassador further reminds us that if it were not for the US, where would Europe be now?

"Although it is not fashionable to talk about it, the face of Europe would indeed be much different today were it not for the Americans who died storming the Normandy beaches.
Were it not for the Americans, there is a good chance there would be no France, nor a United Kingdom nor a Belgium, as we know them today. Were it not for the United States it also is very possible no Balkan countries would be free.

Upon committing Albania to the Coalition of the Willing, Prime Minister Nano urged his fellow European leaders to visit Normandy "to see for themselves what the United States has been willing to undertake in the name of freedom. We should all visit Normandy. We should pay homage to those brave Americans who stormed ashore at Omaha Beach and gave their lives for the freedom of others. The wonder of it is that the Americans are willing to do it again," Mr. Nano said.

And of course, it was the U.S.-led effort of NATO to rein in Serbian dictator Slobodan Milosevic and his ethnic cleansing campaign in Kosovo that proved to the world that, in the name of freedom, the United States was willing to fight for the freedom of the oppressed, regardless of religious belief."

It is refreshing to hear some one in Europe acknowlege that Europe would indeed be have had a much different future had the US decided not to come to the aid of Europe twice in the last century. Tarifa concludes with this:

"The difference between the United States and the Islamic terrorists is this: The terrorists export death. The Americans export freedom.

The surprise is not in Albania's decision to send more troops to fight for freedom in Iraq. The surprise would have been if Albania did not. "

If only more of our European allies understood this, they might be able to see past the Euros and understand that there is no cost too high to spread freedom to the people of this planet. - Sailor

Here is another example ofmediabias. I have posted on this already. but Fred Barnes of the Weekly Standard has some things to say in his article, which better describes how this latest bias was was presented.

"SENATE MAJORITY LEADER BILL FRIST never saw it. Neither did the Senate Republican whip, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky. The number three Republican in the Senate, Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, didn't get a copy. Nor did the senator with the closest relationship with President Bush, Judd Gregg of New Hampshire. And the senator with the familiar Republican last name, Elizabeth Dole of North Carolina, didn't see it or read it. The same is true of Senator Mel Martinez, the rookie Republican from Florida.

Yet the infamous memo that argued Republicans stood to gain politically by saving the life of Terri Schiavo was characterized by ABC News as consisting of "GOP Talking Points." True, a few paragraphs were of Republican origin. They had been lifted, word for word, from a Martinez press release outlining the provisions of his legislative proposal, "The Incapacitated Person's Legal Protection Act." This was the inoffensive part of the memo. The offensive part--it didn't come from Martinez--left the strong impression that Republicans are callous and cynical in their attempt to save Schiavo's life, ill-motivated in the extreme."

At best, this is just lazy journalism and at worst, which I believe it is, blatant bias. The only goal of this reported seems to be smearing the GOP.

"Supposedly the memo was distributed only to Republicans on the Senate floor. Ergo, it was a Republican document. ABC correspondent Linda Douglass first reported
its existence on March 18, saying the network "has obtained talking points circulated among Republican senators, explaining why they should vote to intervene in the Schiavo case." She mentioned the two offensive passages, and the memo was shown on the screen. The ABC website was explicit about the source of the memo: These were "GOP talking points on Terri Schiavo." Two days later, the Washington Post referred to it as "an unsigned one-page memo, distributed to Republican senators."

There wasn't a hint in these reports the memo could have any other source but Republicans. Yet there was no evidence it had come from Republicans. It was unsigned and had no letterhead or date. Nothing indicated it came from the Republican leadership or the House or Senate campaign committee or from the Republican National Committee or even from a stray Republican staffer. The only evidence was of a dirty trick--and there wasn't much evidence of that. Powerline, the influential blog, found a version of the memo with typos cleaned up on left-wing websites."

Along with the misspellings and typos, the alleged memo had the wrong Senate Bill number

"So rather than an example of aggressive reporting, the memo story turns out to be yet another instance of crude liberal bias, in this case against both Republicans and those who fought to have Schiavo's feeding tube restored. Naturally the memo had a second life when the story was picked up by other news outlets, pundits, and columnists. How did ABC and others get wind of the memo in the first place? It came from "Democratic aides," according to the New York Times, who "said it had been distributed to Senate Republicans." Not exactly a disinterested source."

This begs the question, of this was supposedly a Republican document, how did Democratic aides acquire it and pass it along to the media?

Barnes ends his article with a blurb about the ABC Poll that was certainly biased.

"Bias seeped into polling. An ABC News poll question said Terri Schiavo was on "life support" and has "no consciousness and her condition is irreversible." "Do you support . . . the decision to remove Terri's feeding tube?" A large majority said they did. But Schiavo was not on life support as most people understand the term, may have some consciousness, and some neurologists believe she has a chance of partial recovery. Given those facts, would you want to stay alive? ABC didn't ask."

It would seem that ABC constructed the poll questions in order to get the numbers they wanted, numbers that went against the effort to save Terri Schiavo. It is no wonder that the MSM continues to lose credibility. One would think that the MSM would have learned from the Danny Rather fiasco. Seems they did not. - Sailor

Mark Steyn asks many of the questions I have been asking about the Terri Schiavo issue. In his column, Mark delves into the issue.

"This is not a criminal, not a murderer, not a person whose life should be in the gift of the state. So I find it repulsive, and indeed decadent, to have her continued existence framed in terms of ''plaintiffs'' and ''petitions'' and ''en banc review'' and ''de novo'' and all the other legalese. Mrs. Schiavo has been in her present condition for 15 years. Whoever she once was, this is who she is now -- and, after a decade and a half, there is no compelling reason to kill her. Any legal system with a decent respect for the status quo -- something too many American judges are increasingly disdainful of -- would recognize that her present life, in all its limitations, is now a well-established fact, and it is the most grotesque judicial overreaching for any court at this late stage to decide enough is enough. It would be one thing had a doctor decided to reach for the morphine and ''put her out of her misery'' after a week in her diminished state; after 15 years, for the courts to treat her like a Death Row killer who's exhausted her appeals is simply vile.

There seems to be a genuine dispute about her condition -- between those on her husband's side, who say she has ''no consciousness,'' and those on her parents' side, who say she is capable of basic, childlike reactions. If the latter are correct, ending her life is an act of murder. If the former are correct, what difference does it make? If she feels nothing -- if there's no there there -- she has no misery to be put out of. That being so, why not err in favor of the non-irreversible option?"

Indeed why not err in the favor of life.

"Michael Schiavo is living in a common-law relationship with another woman, by whom he has fathered children. I make no judgment on that. Who of us can say how we would react in his circumstances? Maybe I'd pull my hat down over my face and slink off to the cathouse on the other side of town once a week. Maybe I'd embark on a discreet companionship with a lonely widow. But if I take on a new wife (in all but name) and make a new family, I would think it not unreasonable to forfeit any right of life or death over my previous wife.

Michael Schiavo took a vow to be faithful in sickness and in health, forsaking all others till death do them part. He's forsaken his wife and been unfaithful to her: She is, de facto, his ex-wife, yet, de jure, he appears to have the right to order her execution. This is preposterous. Suppose his current common-law partner were to fall victim to a disabling accident. Would he also be able to have her terminated? Can he exercise his spousal rights polygamously? The legal deference to Mr. Schiavo's position, to his rights overriding her parents', is at odds with reality.
"

This whole case seems to have defied reality. Why is Michael Schiavo in such a rush to see his wife die? Why did he stop any further medical evaluations AFTER he won his lawsuit?Steyn concludes:

"As to arguments about ''Congressional overreaching'' and ''states' rights,'' which is more likely? That Congress will use this precedent to pass bills keeping you -- yes, you, Joe Schmoe of 37 Elm Street -- alive till your 118th birthday. Or that the various third parties who intrude between patient and doctor in the American system -- next of kin, HMOs, insurers -- will see the Schiavo case as an important benchmark in what's already a drift toward a culture of convenience euthanasia. Here's a thought: Where do you go to get a living-will kit saying that in the event of a hideous accident I don't want to be put to death by a Florida judge or the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals? And, if you had such a living will, would any U.S. court recognize it?"

Who will be next? Some one suffering from Alzheimer? A parapalegic? The list goes on, on those whose lives may be inconvenient to others. - Sailor

So, as they say, the plot thickens. A Washington Post article by Colum Lynch, sites a UN reoprt that casts some light on the Syrian connection to the assasination of former Lebanese Prime Minister, Rafiq Hariri. It appears that Assad Jr. was not at all happy with Hariri's opposition to a constitutional admendment that would permit Assad Jr.'s puppet, Emile Lahoud, to stay in office 3 more years.

"The report, which calls for an international investigation into Hariri's death, describes an August meeting in Damascus at which Assad ordered the Lebanese billionaire to support amending Lebanon's constitution, according to testimony from "various" sources who discussed the meeting with Hariri. The amendment, approved Sept. 3, allowed Emile Lahoud, the Syrian-backed Lebanese president, to remain in office for three more years.

Assad said that "Lahoud should be viewed as his personal representative" in Lebanon and that "opposing him is tantamount to opposing Assad himself," the report states. Assad then warned that he "would rather break Lebanon over the heads of" Hariri and influential Druze political leader Walid Jumblatt "than see his word in Lebanon broken." "

Looks like Assad Jr. thinks he has a right to involve himself in internal Lebanese affairs. Of course, Assad Jr. also thinks he has a right to tule in Lebanon.

The UN report also condemns the Lebanese investigation into Hariri's assasination as inadequate at best, at worst a sham.

"The U.N. team, which was headed by Ireland's deputy police commissioner, Peter FitzGerald, charged that Syrian-controlled Lebanese authorities exhibited a "distinct lack of commitment" to conducting a credible investigation into Hariri's assassination by tampering with evidence and failing to pursue promising leads.

FitzGerald stopped short of accusing Syria and its Lebanese allies of detonating the 2,200-pound bomb that killed Assad's major political rival in Lebanon. But he charged that Syria "bears primary responsibility for the political tension that preceded" Hariri's assassination.

In the report, FitzGerald said that the international investigative team "would need executive authority to carry out its interrogations, searches and other relevant tasks." But he added that it was "more than doubtful" that an international investigation into the crime could succeed as long as the leadership in Lebanon's Syrian-backed security establishment remains in power."

It would seem that Assad Jr. needs to keep a pro-Syrian government in Beruit, no matter what the wishes of the Lebanese people are. He needs that to cover his ass. Perhaps this is one of the reasons that Assad Jr. has agreed to pull Syrian troops from Lebanon, in hopes of quieting down the international chorus for a full UN investigation. - Sailor

The FEC is ready to attempt to abridge the free speech rights of bloggers. An editorial in the Manchester Union Leader, points out the direction the FEC is planning on taking.

"In short, the six-member FEC shows no burning zeal for regulating Internet-based political speech made by private citizens who are not part of a political campaign. Its new rules are not intended to apply to independent bloggers. But there are two important catches.

The first is that the campaign finance laws compel the FEC to regulate speech that is made in coordination with a candidate or party. The question is, what might the FEC, Congress or the courts consider coordination when it comes to blogging?

Would a campaign volunteer or staffer have to report any blogging in support of his boss as an in-kind contribution? If a blogger works as a consultant on a campaign, as happened last year, would the blog be subject to FEC regulation?

The second catch is this: Now that campaign finance laws have infiltrated the Internet, what might Congress do to see that existing or new laws be made to silence criticism of candidates? The McCain-Feingold law was written explicitly to muzzle critics of Congress. There is every reason to expect that Congress would love to muzzle bloggers if at all possible. "

This is the first step down that slippery slope to the loss of free speech rights of bloggers. The editorial concludes with:

"The FEC is accepting comment on the proposed rules, which be read at The FEC . A letter opposing the expansion of campaign regulations to bloggers could help prevent that frightening scenario from ever happening."

Remember, if they can silence the blogosphere, how long will it be before they attempt to silence any critic? I urge you to tell the FEC hands off the blogosphere. Tell your elected officials as well. - Sailor

Hilary Clinton keeps making a move to the center, or so we are led to believe. Now that may have worked for Bill, but then again Bill is a great orator, Hilary is not. Hilary has those inside the Beltway convinced she has moved enough to the center, but let's face it, those inside the Beltway are some times clueless as to what happens outside of the Beltway. Peter A. Brown of the Orlando Sentinal says Hilary is being set up by her friends.

"Hillary Clinton is being set up by her political friends and news-media allies.

Some Washington pundits are rethinking their conventional wisdom. The result is an emerging belief inside the Beltway that she has successfully moderated her political image.

In their view, Clinton has convinced bumpkins in The Great Beyond that she's no longer a loony liberal, but has remade herself into a centrist Democrat."

Hilary would like to think this is true as well, but the people that the left considers to be stupid, are a lot more in tune with what is going on then the leftists know.

"Just because she appears to get along with her Senate Republican colleagues does not mean that, in the public's eye, she has become a moderate with a serious chance to win the White House in 2008.

The Hillary-as-centrist crowd believes that because:


She has adopted the technique pioneered by her husband of making a show of understanding the other side's point of view without changing hers -- in this case on abortion -- she can get the votes of social conservatives.


She is visiting Iraq and Afghanistan with GOP senators and recently has been relatively quiet in criticizing President George W. Bush's conduct of the war on terrorism, she can plausibly argue she is commander-in-chief material."

Hilary has a clear record on abortion and she cannot hide from it, no matter how much she seems to listen to those who are opposed to abortion. As for her qualifications as commander-inchief, she has none. Unless her contant criticizm of the Pentagon and they way she treated the military when she was First Lady count.

Brown concludes with this:

"Centrist Democrats, who can count electoral votes and don't believe she can convince Americans she isn't the liberal they had always thought, are crossing their fingers Hillary does the same.

They understand how difficult it would be for her to win any states that Kerry could not, and they realize that, without some states in 2008 that they lost in 2004, the Electoral College will continue to deny any Democrat seeking admission.

Republicans want her to run because they think the centrist Democrats are right.

If Hillary were to put her party's future ahead of her ego, she would listen to her enemies rather than to her friends."

Quite frankly I believe that some in the GOP are dying to get their hands on Hilary as a candidate. - Sailor

This comes as no surprise to me. The MSM will try and exert what ever influence they can to muzzle the blogosphere. That is I have said that the MSM can not be depended upon to protect the bloggers free speech rights. It becomes more imperative each day that we in the blogosphere continue to apply pressure to our elected representatives to provide legislation that will protect our free speech rights.

James D. Miller at Tech Central Station outlines the areas he sees where the MSM may try and take action to muzzle the bloggers.

"1. Campaign Finance Reform -- Blog entries in support of a candidate could be considered political contributions to that candidate. The danger for most bloggers would lie not in contributing more than the legally permissible amount to a candidate, but rather in having to fill out the paperwork necessary to report their "political contributions".



The MSM, of course, would never permit their editorials in favor of a candidate to be considered political contributions. So to use campaign finance reform against bloggers, courts would have to distinguish between bloggers and the "legitimate" media. Any definition of bloggers will be imprecise, but this won't stop courts because most legal categories already have fuzzy boundaries. To define a blogger, courts could simply use the "I know it when I see it" approach famously employed by Justice Potter Stewart to determine whether something constituted hard-core pornography.



2. Libel Law -- The MSM used to fight aggressively against any expansion of libel law, but I predict this soon will change. The MSM can handle the burden of defending itself from libel suits much more easily than bloggers can. By increasing the scope of libel law the MSM would impose costs on all journalists which they, but not bloggers, could absorb.



3. Copyright Law -- Blogs often use information from other sources and, from what I have observed, sometimes flagrantly violate copyright laws. Imagine if Congress increased the complexity and penalties of copyright laws. Non-lawyer bloggers could never be sure what constituted legal fair use of MSM stories and information. Enhanced copyright laws could have a chilling effect on blogging."

We already know of the move afoot to use McCain-Feingold to regulate political blogs. Since the majority of the MSM were supportive of this, they will likley continue to push for the FEC to make a ruling stiffling the blogosphere.

Using libel law expansion will put a severe financil burden upon bloggers, since most do not have to financial resources to fight back.

Copyright law is another approach, but I think by simply linking to those articles, there would not be a violation of copyright.

You can also expect that the dems will be onboard with the MSM here. Consider what John Kerry had to say:

"The Democratic Party will likely assist the MSM in their attack on blogs, not because most blogs are pro-Republican but because blogs are not as consistently liberal as the MSM. John Kerry, for example, is calling for the government to do something to protect the MSM. As he said in a recent speech:

"The mainstream media, over the course of the last year, did a pretty good job of discerning. But there's a subculture and a sub-media that talks and keeps things going for entertainment purposes rather than for the flow of information. And that has a profound impact and undermines what we call the mainstream media of the country. And so the decision-making ability of the American electorate has been profoundly impacted as a consequence of that. The question is, what are we going to do about it?""

One would hope that the Republicans will see this for what it is, another attempt to keep the MSM as the DNC's propaganda machine. I cannot stress enough the importance of fighting now before the MSM gets untracked and attacks. Free speech is our right! - Sailor

Here is a defense of the UN by by former Secretary-General, Boutros Boutros-Ghali. This is the fellow that as said that the US is a "totalitarian regime". I doubt that Boutros Boutros-Ghali would know a free society it it bit him. In the Reuters article, Boutros-Ghali had this to say:

""The American right has seized this scandal as a weapon against the United Nations. It's a scandal created ad hoc. It's not me asserting this, it's clear to everyone," he was quoted as saying in Italy's La Repubblica newspaper on Thursday. "

What is clear to most is that the UN is a scandal plagued and inept organization, supported by leftists, despots and assorted other socialists.

"Asked if he would testify in the inquiry into the scandal commissioned by Annan, Boutros-Ghali said: "Yes. I've prepared a defense document. I also want to dispel any doubt: It has nothing to do with me.

"The program was approved on Dec. 5, (1996). On Dec. 22, I had left the (post as UN secretary general)," he said."

Why the need for a defense? Of course, where there is smoke, there is usually fire.

"An interim report by Volcker's team last month found lax UN controls, a shortage of audit staff and political favoritism when the program was put in place in 1996. It found no pilfering of money from the UN administration of the program.

The best-documented figures to date show Saddam Hussein's government earned close to $2 billion from illicit trade and surcharges through the program, according to CIA adviser Charles Duelfer last September.
"

Time will tell how deep this scandal goes and who in the UN was involved. - Sailor

George Soros, the man befind campaign finance reform, has had his conviction on insider trading upheld by a French appellate court. He is facing a fine of $2.87 million, which is chump change for Soros and about 10% of what he spent trying to defeat Dubya. CNSNews.com is reporting Soros will continue to appeal his conviction.The article has some other bad news for old George:

"A Soros critic was quick to comment on Thursday's ruling. "This affirmation of Soros's criminal conviction adds to the doubts about Soros's credibility and business ethics," stated Peter Flaherty, the president of the conservative National Legal and Policy Center (NLPC).

"Soros is quick to find fault with those [with] whom he disagrees. During 2004, Soros spent millions bankrolling ads that challenged the honesty and truthfulness of other people. The French court action underscores Soros's arrogance and hypocrisy," Flaherty added.

Soros also misrepresented his original 2002 insider trading conviction while speaking at various anti-Bush campaign appearances last year, according to Flaherty.

Flaherty said that during his own questioning of Soros at an Oct. 19, 2004 political event in Harrisburg, Pa., the liberal financier denied that he had been convicted of insider trading or that he had been fined by the French court."

A classic example of do as I say, not as I do. Remember, this is the guy that funded a great deal of campaign finance reform, which is also under a cloud considering it was presented by an intentional fraud to Congress and the American People (see 'Buying Reform' and other posts here on this issue).

Further, the article has some other things of interest about Soros an possible additional legal problems.

"The insider trading conviction is not Soros's only legal headache. In January, the NLPC filed a formal complaint with the Federal Election Commission (FEC), alleging "extensive apparent violations by Soros of the Federal Campaign Act" for "fail[ing] to report significant expenditures related to his anti-Bush tour.""

Looks like Soros only wanted campaign finance reform for everyone else, but not his pompous, self important self. Also remeber Soros, through his Open Society group, is a major funder of the Reform Institute as well as moveon.org. - Sailor

You would have thought the MSM would have learned from Rahtergate that they can not just go off an try to pass off faked documents as genuine. But here we go again. Both ABC and the New York Times that a so called "talking points" memo was created by the GOP on the Terri Schiavo matter. Powerline, In the Agora, and Fishkite took the lead in debunking the memo. ABC has gone into spin mode on it. The Washington Post claimed that it had confirmed the document's provenance, but could not reveal the source. The American Spectator has a few things to say on this as well.

"Very quietly, Senate Republican leadership aides to both Sen. Rick Santorum and Sen. Mitch McConnell, as well as the Senate Republican Policy Committee, have been using the Senate recess break to reconstruct the purported distribution of a document that media outlets, including ABC News, the New York Times and a number of regional newspapers, identified as Senate "GOP talking points" on the Terri Schiavo fight that unfolded over the weekend.

"There is a process here for documents like this that are passed around down on the Senate floor, which is where the media claimed that the 'talking points' were being distributed last Thursday," says a Republican policy committee staffer. "There was a lot of stuff going on Thursday, but a document like this one was not being distributed. As far as we know, the only documents being handed out related to votes on a series of amendments being pushed through before the recess. Schiavo wasn't part of that package.""

It should be noted that Power Line has a copy of the "document" and it has no letterhead and the wrong Senate Bill number on it.

"The document, which was posted online by ABC News, as well as several Democratic-leaning websites, was unsigned, bore no Senate office letterhead, and was rife with errors, including the incorrect Senate bill number and the misspelling of Schiavo's name. For days, Republicans denied any knowledge of the document, and a number of Republican Senators claimed they had never seen it."

In addition the Spectator article goes on to say:

"However, Republican leadership staffers now believe the document was generated out of the Democratic opposition research office set up recently by Sen. Harry Reid, and distributed to some Democratic Senate staffers claiming it was a GOP document, in the hope -- or more likely expectation -- that it would then be leaked by those Democrats to reporters. In fact, the New York Times stated that it was Democratic staffers who were distributing the "talking points" document.

"Democrats have tried to pin this document on Santorum's staff, on [Sen. Bill] Frist's staff, on [Sen. Sam] Brownback's staff," says a Senate leadership staffer. "Watching the investigation underway on line has energized us enough up here to want to at least confirm that we weren't the source, and everything we have found would confirm that Republicans didn't generate this memo. This is just amateurish, and perhaps Democratic staffers think we put out work product like this, but it's laughable."

The staffer added that while just about any House or Senate staffer with an email account could readily distribute a document, it was a huge stretch to believe that such a document would end up being widely distributed by or even to Senators in the cloakroom or in the well of the Senate. "This has all the telltale signs of a political dirty trick," says the staffer.

Other Republican staffers blame not only Democrats but also the mainstream media which once again put out a story to embarrass Republicans before checking all the facts first."

On it goes, the MSM trying to help the Dems they support by trying to make Republicans look bad, at any cost. No wonder so many are keen to see the blogosphere silenced. - Sailor

As I posted here earlier, Iraqi citizens have risen up and taken on these terrorists. The Christian Science Monitor in their editoral, adds some more opinion on this.

"As if the Jan. 30 elections in Iraq weren't enough of a message to that nation's insurgents to quit, now come reports of angry private citizens acting to stop a terrorist attack before it began.

Last Tuesday, a Baghdad carpenter named Dhia and his relatives saw a group of masked gunmen with grenades coming to their shop and quickly opened fire on them, killing three. Their mainly Shiite neighborhood has seen recent attacks by the mainly Sunni terrorists.

This preemptive citizen attack, done in the absence of a strong police presence, sends another signal that Iraqis really do want stability and not sectarian strife. It's a small sign that a measure of civil liberties in the Middle East may just work against jihadist terrorism."

It would seem that the Iraqis have had enough of this constant terror attacks on civilians, markets, schools and mosque. It is imperative that the Iraqi government continue to train and equip both military and police forces to cope with this terror threat. A good start was made just the other day when Iraqi forces, aided and backed up by US forces, killed some 85 of these terrorist bastards. - Sailor

Now that Ryan Sager has let the cat out of the bag on how campaign finance reform was bought and paid for by a few liberal organizations, more is coming out on this. John Fund at Opinion Journal has some more in his article on how liberal foundations fooled Congress into passing McCain-Feingold.

"What Mr. Treglia revealed in a talk last year at the University of Southern California is that far from representing the efforts of genuine grass-roots activists, the campaign finance reform lobby was controlled and funded by liberal foundations like Pew. In a tape obtained by the New York Post, Mr. Treglia tells his USC audience they are going to hear a story he can reveal only now that campaign finance reform has become law. "The target audience for all this [foundation] activity was 535 people in [Congress]," Mr. Treglia says in his talk. "The idea was to create an impression that a mass movement was afoot. That everywhere [Congress] looked, in academic institutions, in the business community, in religious groups, in ethnic groups, everywhere, people were talking about reform."

The truth was far different. Mr. Treglia admits that campaign-finance supporters had to try to hoodwink Congress because "they had lost legitimacy inside Washington because they didn't have a constituency that would punish Congress if they didn't vote for reform.""

Clearly this is an admission that there was a conspiracy amongst these organization to do what ever it took to influence Congress on McCain-Feingold.

"So instead, according to Mr. Treglia, liberal reform groups created a Potemkin movement. A study last month by the Political Money Line, a nonpartisan Web site dealing with campaign funding issues, found that of the $140 million spent to directly promote liberal campaign reform in the last decade, a full $123 million came from just eight liberal foundations. Many are the same foundations that provide much of the money for such left-wing groups as People for the American Way and the Earth Action Network. The "movement" behind campaign-finance reform resembled many corporate campaigns pushing legislation. It consisted largely of "Astroturf" rather than true "grass-roots" support."

So it looks like a phony movement was created, funded by some of the liberal organizations trying to frauduently get McCain-Feingold passed. One of the largerst contributors to this effort was George Soros.

"Mr. Treglia isn't talking to reporters about his remarks at USC. But he has released a statement saying "it is incorrect to suggest that [Pew] would attempt to deceive or mislead about its funding efforts. I regret that my comments have led to any confusion." Rebecca Remel, Pew's president and CEO, says that "any assertion that we tried to hide our support of campaign finance reform grantees is false." No doubt Pew did comply with the technical requirements of the law, but it also certainly didn't follow the kind of transparency standards it demands of politicians or corporations.

The successful stealth campaign by the eight liberal foundations means we now have to live in the Brave New World of McCain-Feingold. Bradley Smith, a Federal Election Commission member, made news this month by warning that bloggers could face federal regulation because a federal judge had thrown out their legal exemption from campaign finance regulations. The Internet has been burning up with concern that bloggers could be hauled into court for, as Mr. Smith puts it, "any decision by an individual to put a link [to a political candidate] on their home page, set up a blog, send out mass e-mails, any kind of activity that can be done." Mr. Smith warns that "it's very likely that the Internet is going to be regulated" by the FEC unless "Congress is willing to stand up and say, 'Keep your hands off of this, and we'll change the statute to make it clear.' "

McCain-Feingold did little in last year's elections to limit the influence of money in politics, but a great deal to benefit incumbents and harm true grass-roots politics. Its ban on using soft money to run issue ads in the 60 days before an election mean that such ads will run earlier, make campaigns longer and allow incumbents to avoid criticism of their voting records. David Mason, who serves with Mr. Smith on the FEC, says that the incredible complexity of the bill is likely to lead to "invidious enforcement, singling out disfavored groups or causes" and "subjecting regulated groups to harassment by political opponents." "

It looks like this fraud was successful enough to influence not only politicians, but the Supreme Court as well. Fund concludes with this:

"The next time Congress debates further "reform" of the rules for conducting elections, it would behoove all of us to learn who is really behind the effort, and what their true motives might be."

As Ryan Sager has said, "Show Me the Money". Unfortunately this is not some thing we can depend on the MSM to cover or investigate. As I have posted before, it is up to us to pressure our representatives into passing legislation protecting the free speech of bloggers and to demand an investigation into how these organizations were able to pull this fraud off. - Sailor

It would seem that the MSM is once again in a dilemna on whether ornottoreport facts that may not be in line with their agenda. The teen that went on the shooting spree in MN, seems to have several links to radical environut groups. Cybernet News Service is reporting that the teen in question, Jeff Weise, had posted on a neo-Nazi website run by the Libertarian National Socialist Green Party.

""The national press corps now faces a moral dilemma, as they see it either consciously or subconsciously, given this killer's apparent connection to and the Nazis' inarguable praise for green groups, even the so-called 'establishment' gangs at the NRDC (Natural Resources Defense Council) and Environmental Defense," Horner said."

Which means you can bet the ranch that the MSM will ignore the connection.

"Horner predicted that if the teenage shooter were in any way linked to conservative groups, the establishment media would have aggressively jumped on the connections.

"Things would have been so simple, and the gloves would be off immediately, were the shooter to have instead been found blogging on, say, a conservative political website linking to and praising the NRA (National Rifle Association) and anti-abortion groups," Horner said.

"Instead, despite the obvious issues, the killing spree now is likely destined for light news coverage instead of the frenzy of a competition for cover stories, serial reportage and in-depth worrying over troubling connections," Horner explained.

"So the story will now go without exploration and the press will soon return to Michael Jackson's courtroom wardrobe and spells of the vapors (a reference to fainting spells)" Horner added."

Simply stated, the MSN will not get into the details, less they have to expose the enviro whackos they give all that news space to. As Horner said, if this were a conservative website that Weise had posted on, the MSM would have gone into a feeding frenzy. Remember now, there is no media bias. But into that one and I have a bridge you may be interested in buying in Brooklyn. Sailor

Once again the MSM comes off as lazy, incompetent, agenda driven and/or just plain ignorant on their coverage of the Terri Schiavo case. Michelle Malkin provides some insight in her article.

"On a fundamental matter of life and death, the MSM heavyweights have proven themselves utterly incapable of reporting fairly. Take a widely publicized ABC News poll released on Monday that supposedly showed strong public opposition to any Washington intervention in Terri's case. Here is how the spinmasters framed the main poll question:

As you may know, a woman in Florida named Terri Schiavo suffered brain damage and has been on life support for 15 years. Doctors say she has no consciousness and her condition is irreversible. Her parents and her husband disagree on whether or not she should be kept on life support. In cases like this who do you think should have final say, (the parents) or (the spouse)?

A follow-up question asked:

If you were in this condition, would you want to be kept alive, or not?

The problem is that, contrary to what ABC News told those polled, Terri Schiavo is not on "life support" and has never been on "life support." The loaded phrase evokes images of a comatose patient being artificially sustained by myriad machines and pumps and wires. Terri was on a feeding tube. A feeding tube is not a ventilator. Terri can breathe just fine on her own.

And as many of her medical caretakers and parents have argued, if given proper rehabilitation, Terri could learn to chew and swallow on her own as well. She is disabled, not dead."

What really irks me is why the MSM has not asked why Terri Schiavo has not been afforded any therapies that may have helped her to regain some semblence of normalcy. As Michelle points out the woman is not brain dead, nor is she on life support. Why is the MSM continuing to push those points which are blatantly false? This is a travesty and the MSM once again has failed to bring any light on this matter. - Sailor

And it goes on and on. The FEC is still contemplating what to do about the Blogosphere and politcal speech. This all thanks to McCain-Feingold. You remember how thislaw was supposed to reign in all the big money donations and to date has failed miserably to do that. OpinionJournal.com has few things to say on this in their Review and Outlook piece, Will the FEC make bloggers kiss the First Amendment goodbye?

As far as I am concerned the blogosphere is the new town square. We have a right to free political speech, whether it is on-line or on a soap box.

Considering how McCain-Feingold was frauduently foisted upon us. (see my post, Buying 'Reform'), it is now more urgent that we bloggers and all Americans fight back and fight back hard. We need to demand a full Congressional invesigation into how McCain-Feingold was frauduently presented. I urge all of you to contact your Federal representatives and demand this now, along with legislation protecting our free speech rights.

This is how ludicrous the FEC may get:

"An idea kicking around the FEC a few years ago would require government to calculate the percentage of individuals' electricity bills that went toward political advocacy (we aren't joking). Another alternative would be to classify all bloggers as journalists, seeing as how the press is about the only entity exempt from McCain-Feingold. As much we enjoy our profession, we think a nation of journalists is overkill. "

They forgot to include the cost of the PC, (though that would have to be depreciable), and the cost of the Internet Service Provider. Let's takes this a little further. It would be in the realm of possibility that if you were to do the same things you do on-line in person, will the FEC want to do calculate your costs for say delivering a candidates position papers? Where does it end? This assault on free political speech must not be lost. - Sailor

Here is another example of what the far left really thinks about our Military. From the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Thistle, self-described as “an alternative news collective,” here’s a cartoon showing how much the far left “supports our troops:” Victory to the Iraqi Resistance.



So every time you hear one of these leftists terrorist supporters cry about how they support our troops, remember this cartoon. - Sailor

This from Little Green Footballs

Doc Farmer has a timely article on living wills. Do you have one? I do and mine is in an easily accessible place. - Sailor

Doc Farmer's Living Will
Written by Doc Farmer
Wednesday, March 23, 2005


By now, everybody in this country who is not living in a log cabin in the backwoods building explosive devices for delivery by the United States Postal Service has heard of Terri Schiavo. Commentators have been mispronouncing her name and, in most cases, misrepresenting her situation. Congress has asked the Federal courts to review her case, as is their right under Article III of
the Constitution. The courts should be reviewing this request under Amendment XIV (equal protection). So far, one district judge has seen fit to not take this request seriously, and after only the most cursory review has rejected her parent's petition. It's now in the hands of a higher court, and I'm sure that there will be more judicial ducking and diving and shucking and jiving as we head up to "The Supremes" for their say on the matter.

Personally, I'm on the side of life. From what I've seen in various media outlets, there are enough questions about Mrs. Schiavo's situation to warrant a further review. There is no doubt that she is profoundly disabled. The question is, can she obtain some level of recovery and rehabilitation? Her husband, who has been accused of causing Mrs. Schiavo's condition in the first place, wants her dead. Well, perhaps it is because he's genuinely concerned about her wishes. Perhaps it is because he wants to permanently erase any evidence of
wrongdoing. Or perhaps he's just a prick.

Mrs. Schiavo's parents want their daughter to live. Understandable for any parent. Are they deluding themselves as to their daughter's level of awareness? Or are they seeing things that others cannot? When working with the disabled, their actions and reactions can be very subtle. It's sort of like being around a person with a speech impediment. At first, you can't understand them at all. Gradually, however, you pick up on the nuances, and can comprehend what they are saying. This is true if the person has severe stuttering, or a cleft palate, or is profoundly deaf, or is from Alabama.

Naturally, the press looks for the "bad side" of the story, the most gut wrenching, or the most sensationalistic. Oddly, they've focused very little on Michael Schiavo's near-bigamy (he's got a "fiancée" and two kids), probably so they could promote Terri Schiavo's death. The media, which despite its denials is rabidly lib/dem/soc/commie, wants
Mrs. Schiavo to die. Apparently, their promotion of and complicity in the slaughter of over 40 million babies is not enough. Now they're gunning for the grown-ups. Except, of course, for those grown-ups who murder or rape - no, they mustn't be punished. After all, if the Hildebeast gets her way, they'll be her new voting bloc.

If any sort of "good" can be gleaned from this horrific situation, it is probably that people are now much more aware of the need to make clear their wishes regarding their care, or the cessation thereof, in the event of catastrophic illness or injury resulting in total mental incapacitation. Many of us have signed the organ donor card on the back of our driver's licenses (at least, I hope we have!), but few have outlined what to do if the next-to-worst happens.

So, I want to make my wishes plain.

Not just to my family
and friends, but to all of you as well. Perhaps it will help to prompt you toward documenting your desires regarding this serious subject.

First, let me make this statement. If I am brain dead - and I mean ACTUALLY brain dead - pull the plug. By brain dead, I do not mean what happens after a 96-hour C-SPAN marathon, either. There had better be CAT scans, PET scans, MRI scans and a Vulcan Mind Meld that prove beyond any doubt that the lights are on, but nobody's home.

Now, this brings up the question of "what is brain death?" Valid question. Brain death can be determined by the following -

• Destruction of the frontal, pre-frontal and parietal lobes, the cerebral cortex and the limbic system.
  
  
• Widespread disruption of neurochemistry in which neurotransmission has halted.
  
  
• Hypoxia (lack of oxygen to the brain) for more than 20 minutes in normal temperatures, or more than 4 hours in cases of extended hypothermia.
  
  
• My ever, ever, EVER getting married again!
  
  
• Voting for Clinton. Any Clinton.

If I am in a debilitated state, and there is absolutely no hope of recovery or rehabilitation (and I do mean NO hope), then it's time to say adios, muchachos. A debilitated state does not mean that the cash flow of the ex-wives require an injection of insurance money, either.

By the way, let me state now that if any (bleep)ing lawyers try to intervene in my case in opposition to my wishes, any of my family are fully authorized to shoot the bastards. Preferably often. This would come under the heading of "mercy killing" as far as I'm concerned. I know I'd certainly feel much better.

The only people who have authority to speak on my behalf on this subject shall be my parents, my sisters, and my children (when they reach the age of majority), and then only as regards my written instructions being carried out
to the fullest. Those who do not have any say in my demise would by the aforementioned ex-spouses, any (bleep)ing lawyers who (miraculously) survive the onslaught of familial gunfire, credit card companies, investors, insurance adjustors, morticians, coffin salesmen, Columbia Record House, political commentators, polling companies, (bleep)ing judges, and the guy who made me that really awful sausage roll at Lexy's Pizza in 1979.

If the circumstance arises where I must kick the bucket, shuffle off this mortal coil, run down the curtain and join the bleedin' choir invisible, I sure as hell don't want to be starved to death. Being on a diet at present, this does not come to the top of my list as a "way to go." Nor do I want to suffer other forms of tortuous expiration like a Paulie Shore movie marathon. No, just replace the oxygen tube with a good bong of Maui Wowie, shove about a dozen Twinkies
through the feeding tube, and don't do the IV push of narcotics until the last cut of "Dark Side of the Moon" slowly fades out.

Afterwards, strip me down for parts like an old Chevy, chuck what's left in a cardboard box, turn the temp to extra crispy, and load the ashes into a good-sized fireworks rocket. It'd be one last chance for everybody to go "Oooooh, Ahhhhhh" about me that didn't involve my world-famous lasagna recipe. Which, by the way, I'm taking to my grave.

Some might say that I'm making light of a serious issue. Quite the opposite is true. If Terri Schiavo had written her wishes down, no matter what those wishes were, they should have been respected. Having a less-than-reliable source communicating those wishes is what has caused such a conundrum for her, for her family, for the courts and congress. Now, at least, there is no doubt about what my
wishes are.

What are yours?


About the Writer: Doc Farmer is a writer and humorist who is also a moderator on ChronWatch's Forum. He formerly lived in Saudi Arabia and Qatar, but now resides in the Midwest. Doc receives e-mail at docfarmer9999@yahoo.co.uk.

This Article Was First Published In ChronWatch At: http://www.chronwatch.com/content/contentDisplay.asp?aid=13664

It is a popular misconception among leftists and assorted other kooks, that slodiers some how love war. It is the warrior that more then anyone else abhors war. He knows what war is and he is the one that sees the head of a friend explode like a watermelon.

Of course we keep hearing how these leftists only hate war and not the members of the military. Once again, their lies are exposed. In this article from the Syracuse Post-Standard. Army Captain Andrew DeKever, relates some of his experiences at Syracuse University.

"DeKever's welcome at home makes him wonder how bad Vietnam vets had it 30 years ago.

DeKever passes signs posted by students on campus that say, "Soldiers are baby killers," and "Soldiers are terrorists."

A classmate accused DeKever of loving war. The accusation brought to mind when he was preparing to go to Iraq. "

Once again the left shows it's true colors. Hat tip to grydth at ChronWatch. - Sailor

AP is reporting that after a group of terrorist thugs sprayed gun fire on a crowd of shoppers, Iraqi citizens returned fire and killed three of the bastards.

"BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - Shopkeepers and residents on one of Baghdad's main streets pulled out their own guns Tuesday and killed three insurgents when hooded men began shooting at passers-by, giving a rare victory to civilians increasingly frustrated by the violence bleeding Iraq.

The clash in the capital's southern Doura neighborhood erupted when militants in three cars sprayed bullets at shoppers, Interior Ministry officials said. Three people - a man, a woman and a child - were wounded.

The motive was unclear, but there have been previous attacks in the ethnically mixed neighborhood. Earlier in the day, gunmen in the same quarter killed a policeman as he drove to work, police Lt. Col. Hafidh Al-Ghrayri said."

I am sure this will spark more whining from the leftists and terrorist supporters and appeasers. This is just another example of how much the Iraqi people are sick of these attacks. - Sailor

I have been researching the whole Terri Schiavo issue for a few days now. During my research I found some quite disturbing information that has me wondering why people want this woman to die.

A world-reknowned neurologist, Dr. William Hammesfahr, examined Terri Shiavo back in 2002. In his report, Dr. Hammesfahr colcluded:

Impression:

The patient is not in coma.

She is alert and responsive to her environment. She responds to specific people best.

She tries to please others by doing activities for which she gets verbal praise.

She responds negatively to poor tone of voice.

She responds to music.

She differentiates sounds from voices.

She differentiates specific people's voices from others.

She differentiates music from stray sound.

She attempts to verbalize.

She has voluntary control over multiple extremities

She can swallow.

She is partially blind

She is probably aphasic and has a degree of receptive aphasia.

She can feel pain.

On this last point, it is interesting to observe that the records from Hospice show frequent medication administered for pain by staff.

With respect to specifics and specific recommendations in order to carry out the instructions of the Second District Court of Appeal:

From a neurological standpoint: The patient appears to be partially blind.

She needs a full opthamological evaluation and visual evoked potentials done to flash and checkerboard patters. The opthamological examination is to evaluate her retina and her ophthalmic nerve to try to determine the cause of her visual limitations and if any treatment exists. The evoked potentials looks at the nerve between the eye and the visual centers in the brain, to see if there is treatable damage and the type of damage, if any in these areas. This is important, as for individuals to interact with her, and possibly teach her better ways of communicating with others, they must know what sort of limitations she has. This even extends to whether she can see people or objects in specific areas of her vision, and what size objects need to be to be accurately seen. Additionally, if one were to properly examine her, it would help if one knew the full extent of these test results.

Communication: She can communicate. She needs a Speech Therapist, Speech Pathologist, and a communications expert to evaluate how to best communicate with her and to allow her to communicate and for others to communicate with her. Also, a treatment plan for how to develop better communication needs to be done.

Rehabilitation Medicine: The patient has severe contractures. She needs a specialist to evaluate these and develop a treatment plan.

Endocrine: The patient has clinical evidence of an abnormally functioning endocrine system. Her blood pressure is abnormally low. Many patients with severe neurological injury have low blood pressure due to an abnormally functioning endocrine system. The reason for this should be determined and corrected, as with a more normal blood pressure, she is likely to have even better neurological functioning. She has facial acne consistent with hormonal abnormalities.

ENT: The patient can clearly swallow, and is able to swallow approximately 2 liters of water per day (the daily amount of saliva generated). Water is one of the most difficult things for people to swallow. It is unlikely that she currently needs the feeding tube. She should be evaluated by an Ear Nose and Throat specialist, and have a new swallowing exam.

Mammography needs to be performed.

Spinal Exam: The patient's exam from a spinal perspective is abnormal. The degree of limitation of range of motion, and of spasms in her neck, is consistent with a neck injury. The abnormal sensory exam, that shows evidence of her hypoxic encephalopathic strokes (right side sensory responses are different from left) also suggests a spinal cord injury at around the level of C4. Her physical exam and videotapes also suggest a spinal cord injury is also present, as she has much better control over he face, head, and neck, than over her arms and legs. This reminds one of a person with a spinal cord injury who has good facial control, but poor use of arms and legs. It is possible that a correctable spinal abnormality such as a herniated disk may be found that could be treated and result in better neurological functioning. This should be looked for, as may be treatable. Thus, there may be an injured disk or spinal cord; the disk injury is more treatable, the spinal cord injury, if present without a disk injury, may be more difficult to treat. A person with a spinal cord injury and hypoxic encephalopathy will need different treatment and rehab recommendations than one who just has a hypoxic encephalopathic.

Interestingly, I have seen this pattern of mixed brain (cerebral) and spinal cord findings in a patient once before, a patient who was asphyxiated.

A urological consultation should be obtained: I disagree with Dr. Gambone's view that the patient's bacteria in the urine may be ignored. In my experience, colonization of the bladder can very distinctly affect the patient's neurological status and affect their rehabilitation. The patient needs a urological consultation both to examine the bladder issue, resolve if there are possibly colonized and kidney stones (that may be the source of recurring bladder infections). Also, one significant mechanism of diagnosing and finding and diagnosing spinal cord injuries is through sophisticated bladder EMG and other testing. This should be done.

The neurosurgeon who placed the implant should be contacted for recommendations. A neurological examination can only be carried out in the context of a complete understanding of the patient's physiology, including current blood tests. Thus the tests that Dr. Gambone did months ago, before we had access to the patient, should immediately be repeated.

EEG: I have reviewed the EEG recently obtained. The EEG has large amounts of artifact. The technician's attempted to remove artifact by filtering. Unfortunately, filtering also affects and reduces evident brain electronic activity. This EEG is not adequate and should be repeated. It should be repeated at the patient's bedside, with the patient in a non-agitated state.

SPECT scan: A SPECT scan prior to and after several days of Hyperbaric Trial should be obtained. Such a Hyperbaric Oxygen trial does not constitute treatment, as the length of time of such hyperbaric is inadequate to render any treatment. However, it is a useful technique to assess the likelihood of improvement using hyperbaric oxygen. I would defer to Dr. Maxfield on the specifics of testing, but believe that it is generally accepted by those in the field who have experience with hyperbaric treatment, that Dr. Maxfield's recommendations in this area are accurate.

This does not sound like the hopeless case it has been presented as by many.

This evaluation was done back in 2002. Why has no action been taken, other then to starve Terri Schiavo? Dr. Hammesfahr was nominated for the Nobel Prize for Medicine in 1999 for his work with patients like Terri Shiavo. He is not some run of the mill doctor.

Seems to me that there are a good many people with political agendas involved in this case. The only consideration should be Terri Schiavo. If the therapies mentioned by Dr. Hammesfahr can help her, why have they not been tried? Why is the judge in this case, Greer, ignoring this and so quick to want to starve Terri Schiavo to death? Why did her husband not push to see his wife at least try these therapies? I know had this been my wife, or even my ex-wife, I would have been willing to try anything to see her get well. These questions need to be answered. I will have more on this over the next few days. - Sailor

Isn't this just ducky. The leftist "vaunted" Canadian health care system, is now sending out letters with this:

"If the person named on this computer-generated letter is deceased, please accept our sincere apologies."

It is no wonder that many Canadians in need of diagnostic testing, such as MRIs, flock to the US every year. The article states:

"The patient wasn't dead, according to the doctor who showed the letter to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity. But there are many Canadians who claim the long wait for the test and the frigid formality of the letter are indicative of a health system badly in need of emergency care."

Considering how much Canada spends on it's health care system, one has to wonder where all that money is going to. On top of that, the system is going broke.

""Every day we're paying for health care, yet when we go to access it, it's just not there," said Pelton.

The average Canadian family pays about 48 percent of its income in taxes each year, partly to fund the health care system. Rates vary from province to province, but Ontario, the most populous, spends roughly 40 percent of every tax dollar on health care, according to the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.

The system is going broke, says the federation, which campaigns for tax reform and private enterprise in health care.

It calculates that at present rates, Ontario will be spending 85 percent of its budget on health care by 2035. "We can't afford a state monopoly on health care anymore," says Tasha Kheiriddin, Ontario director of the federation. "We have to examine private alternatives as well.""

Canadian official acknowlege that their are significant problems with their health care system.

"The federal government and virtually every province acknowledge there's a crisis: a lack of physicians and nurses, state-of-the-art equipment and funding. In Ontario, more than 10,000 nurses and hospital workers are facing layoffs over the next two years unless the provincial government boosts funding, says the Ontario Hospital Association, which represents health care providers in the province."

Of course, their are Canadians who believe that their Health care system is superior to our market driven one.

"Raisa Deber, a professor of health policy at the University of Toronto, believes Canada's system is one of the world's fairest.

"Canadians are very proud of the fact that if they need care, they will get care," she said. Of the United States, she said: "I don't understand how they got to this worship of markets, to the extent that they're perfectly happy that some people don't get the health care that they need."

Canada does not have fully nationalized health care; its doctors are in private practice and send their bills to the government for reimbursement.

"That doctor doesn't have to worry about how you're going to pay the bill," said Deber. "He knows that his bill will be paid, so there's absolutely nothing to stop any doctor from treating anyone."

Deber acknowledges problems in the system, but believes most Canadians get the care they need. She said the federal government should attach more strings to its annual lump-sum allocations to the provinces so that tax dollars are better spent on preventive care and improvements in working conditions for health-care professionals."

My only comment to that is when I needed an MRI, it did not takes months to get it scheduled, I had the MRI within 3 days of the doctor prescribing it. You can read the rest of the article, which I found to be very informative. - Sailor

It is time that President Bush's nominees for the Federal bench get an up or down vote by the full Senate. If is requires tthat the Republicans use the so called 'nuclear' option, then so be it. The Dems, led by Harry Reid are just continuing the same obstrutionist behavior that was started by foremer Senator Tom Daschle. Daschle was the first Senate leader in 52 years to lose a bid for re-election.

Senator George Allen (R-VA) presents the argument for doing away with the filibustering of judicial nominees.

Senator Allen writes:

"Mr. Reid and his leadership team would prefer that a supermajority of 60 Senators be required to approve the president's nominees for the federal bench. But this flies in the face of over 200 years of Senate history. Never before have filibusters been used in this manner on judicial nominees. And, it's about time we put an end to this irresponsible procedural tactic.

There's a lot of talk in Washington about Republicans using the so-called nuclear option to move forward with the president's nominees. This term really shows how out of touch politicians are in D.C. When you explain to normal people in the real world that these nominees have the support of a clear majority of senators — they don't see a problem. In reality, moving forward with these nominees should be characterized as the "constitutional option."

As senators, we have a constitutional responsibility to give our "advice and consent" regarding the president's judicial nominations and that responsibility is being thwarted by a minority of Democrats who don't agree with these nominees' ideological positions. No senator has an obligation to vote in favor of a nominee, but every senator should have the backbone to get off their haunches and vote yes or vote no on these nominees and explain their vote to their constituents. "

It is high time the Senate got to the businees of voting up or down on judicial nominees. To Harry Reid and the rest of the Dems, if you do not like the nominees, vote against them. If you want nominees that suscribe to your ideology, then get Senators elected that share that ideology. - Sailor

Much has been written and said about Bush's nomination to the UN and World Bank. The usual leftist suspects are all in a dither about them. Take for example, Peter Beinart, editor of the New Republic, writes in a Washington Post article that Bolton is the wrong man for the job.

"John Bolton owes his recent nomination as ambassador to the United Nations to an analogy. It goes something like this: In 1975, when anti-Americanism was on the march, Gerald Ford chose a distinctly undiplomatic diplomat, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, to represent the United States at the United Nations. Unlike his predecessors, who had listened politely while America was defamed, Moynihan denounced the tin-pot dictatorships running wild at the United Nations. And a new movement called neoconservatism -- of which Moynihan was a leading voice -- made its entrance onto the international stage. Six years later, Ronald Reagan gave the U.N. job to another prominent neocon, Jeane Kirkpatrick, and she proved equally blunt.

Bolton -- a fierce U.N. critic -- is the supposed heir to that tradition. When Condoleezza Rice announced his nomination, she specifically invoked Moynihan and Kirkpatrick. Numerous right-leaning commentators have done the same. To some members of Congress, sending a man who has repeatedly trashed the United Nations to be America's representative there seems perverse. But for neocons with a sense of history, that's precisely the point.

Problem is, the history's misleading. Moynihan and Kirkpatrick were effective because their oppositional styles suited the time -- a time when there was little the United States could do at the United Nations other than oppose. Today the United States has an opportunity to lead. And by choosing Bolton, the Bush administration may be squandering it."

No Peter, the UN is still the same as far as opposing the US. Only the names of the players have changed. Considering the recent UN scandals, tough liove is needed here, not the niceties of tea drinking diplomacy.

Fred Barnes, the editor of the Weekly Standard, in his article at OpinionJournal.com, has an enitrely different take on these nominations.

"Anyone shocked by the nominations of Messrs. Wolfowitz and Bolton doesn't understand the president's approach to multilateral organizations. The conventional idea is that these organizations are wonderful, though perhaps flawed and infused with too much anti-American sentiment. And the chief task of U.S. representatives is to get along amicably, not buck the system and cause problems. This idea is popular in the press, the State Department bureaucracy and diplomatic circles, and with foreign-policy "experts." But not with Mr. Bush.

The president's idea is simple: No more Mr. Nice Guy. He believes international organizations have failed largely and must be challenged and reformed. He was miffed when outgoing U.N. Ambassador John Danforth rushed to the defense of Kofi Annan in the midst of the Oil for Food scandal. Mr. Annan opposed the war in Iraq and even declared it illegal. More important, he's viewed by Mr. Bush as part of the problem at the U.N."

On Mr. Bolton's nomination Mr. Barnes has this to say:

"Mr. Bolton will bring a sharp focus to corruption, waste and left-wing ideology at the U.N.--precisely the matters the U.N. would rather not dwell on. His supporters insist he'll serve, once confirmed, in the tradition of Ambassadors Daniel Patrick Moynihan and Jeane Kirkpatrick, both sharp critics of the U.N. Mr. Bolton, however, is even more hostile to business-as-usual at the U.N. than they were, is considerably more conservative, and is a tough political operative besides."

The bottom line here is that the US has tried the "nice guy" diplomatic approach and has seen the UN spiral into a cesspool of non-action and scandal. It is time for a new apprrach, much along the lines that Moynihan and Kirkpatrick took. - Sailor

First, let me mention this to all the hand wringers, terrorist appeasers and assorted other leftists, this is NOT law enforcement, this is combat. In combat you do Not wait to read them their rights, which they have none of any way, if they do not stop when ordered to do so, they are a threat. In combat you kill threats, before they kill you. It is that simple.

Ilario Pantano did just that and is now facing an Article 32, which is premeditated murder. Pantano' like the Marine he is, has come out fighting after a long silence. In this article, which is the fourth in a series, Pantano speaks out on Dateline with Stone Phillips.

Pantano relates how this all began:

"On April 15th, his unit got a tip from some Iraqis in a town south of Baghdad, but the vigilant, wily Pantano says he smelled a set-up to an ambush. There were too many details in the tip – and even a map – all too good to be true.


"And the most critical clue was that the people who gave us this information drew a map," the officer told Phillips. "We had never had that kind of a windfall of information. So this thing smelled like an ambush immediately."


Trusting his instinct of pending danger, Pantano related how he reacted. "We went in heavy. We had machine guns with us because we fully expected we would be ambushed by some larger force as we had seen just days prior.


"In the process of starting [my] squads moving forward [toward the house identified by the tipsters], we saw a white sedan start pulling away from the house. And I - I ordered the vehicle to stop.


"We fired a couple of shots into the ground, and they knew to stop the car. I had to grab my radio operator and my corpsman and go after the car because it was now away from the target house down the road.


"I order my corpsman to do a - a search of the car. He looks, finds nothing.


"When I heard [over the radio] that there was this arms cache [found] at the house, I thought these guys are bad guys and that they know they've been caught.


"I wanted the car looked at more thoroughly, and I wanted them to do it. I wanted them to take the car to the bones, and I didn't want to risk one of my Marines, or my sailor, my corpsman, in this - what could be a dangerous procedure."


Armed with an M-16 semi-automatic rifle, Pantano watched the Iraqis as they began to search the car, one the front seat, the other the back. He says they began speaking to each other in muffled tones in Arabic:


"I give them a command in Arabic to stop. They continue, then there was this moment of quiet. I felt - I could feel like the oxygen getting sucked out of my lungs. I could feel this thing was happening. There was this beat, and they both pivoted to me at the same time, moving towards me at the same time. And in that moment of them, you know, of them disobeying my command to stop and pivoting to me at the same time, I shot them.



'I didn't Wait to See If There Was a Grenade'



"I didn't wait to see if there was a grenade. I didn't wait to see if there was a knife. And unfortunately, there are a lot of dead soldiers and Marines who have waited too long. And my men weren't going to be those dead soldiers and Marines and neither was I.


"There wasn't time for a warning shot. There was time for action, and I had to act. It becomes - it becomes very personal. It stops being about war and moving blue arrows and little pieces and big pieces and we'll hold this bridge and take this ground. These guys tried to kill me. That's what I'm feeling. And the language that's - that's going through my head at that point was ‘no better friend, and no worse enemy.'"

In my combat experienced opinion, Pantano acted properly and with the safety of those in his charge in mind. We are dealing with an enemy here, that is using any means to kill Americans. Lt. Pantano's job is to see that those in his charge do not become statistics to be broadcast in the MSM, much to the delight of terrorists appeasers, supporters and the American Military hating left. There is a petition of support for Lt. Pantano. I urge all of you to sign it. - Sailor

Time for a little humor. Hat tip to Missy at ChronWatch - Sailor

'GOIN TO THE SUPERBOWL....

George and Laura Bush and Bill and Hilary Clinton are
traveling by train to the Super Bowl.
At the station George and Laura each buy a ticket and watch as
Bill and Hilary buy just one ticket.

"How are the two of you going to travel on only one ticket?"
asks George W, astonished at what he is seeing.
"Watch and learn," answers Hilary.

They all board the train. George and Laura take their
respective seats but Bill and Hilary cram into a toilet
together and close the door. Shortly after the train has
departed, the conductor comes around collecting tickets.
He knocks on the toilet door and says, "Ticket, please." The
door opens just a crack and a single arm emerges
with a ticket in hand.. The conductor takes it and moves on.

The Bushes see this happen and agree it was quite a clever
idea, so after the game they decide to try a similar
plan on the return trip. When they get to the station they see
the Clinton's at the window buying a single ticket
for the return trip. To their astonishment, the Clinton's see
that the Bushes don't buy any ticket at all.

"Aren't you taking a terrible chance by traveling without a
ticket?" says Hilary.
"Live and learn," answers Laura Bush.

When they board the train the Bushes cram themselves into a
toilet and the Clinton's cram into another toilet just down the way.

Shortly after the train leaves the station, George W. leaves
their toilet and walks over to the Clinton's toilet, knocks
on their door and says, "Ticket, please."
(And you're still trying to figure out how the Democrats lost
that election?)

Here is a stunning indictment of socialism. Richard W. Rahn, in his article, sites facts and figures as to why socialism is a failed economic system, no matter who has tried it. He directly links the deaths of over 100 million people to socialist regimes.

"The "national socialists" caused the death of tens of millions of people. The communists in Russia, China, Cambodia and elsewhere caused the collective deaths of more than 100 million people and impoverished billions of others. (I happened to be at the Kremlin in Moscow in August 1992, when the Russia demographers announced they had determined there were 63 million "excess deaths" in the Soviet Union during Josef Stalin's reign -- 1923-53.)"

Those are staggering numbers!

"Back in the 1920s, the eminent economist Ludwig von Mises showed socialism it could not work because it could not provide a functional alternative to the price system to properly allocate resources. The Nobel Prize-winning economist, F.A. Hayek, provided the definitive proof of why socialism could not work in his last book, "The Fatal Conceit." The argument in essence is that if the whole world were socialist there would be no objective way to determine prices, thus no way to allocate resources efficiently."

We always here from the socialists in acedemia that socialism has failed because it has never been done correctly. They arrogantly want you to believe that they know how to do it right.

"People do not know the history of socialist disasters because the educational establishment and much of the news media have engaged in a massive cover-up."

Finally, Rahn closes with this:

"Perhaps the Internet will be our salvation, because it enables good people of conscience to get out the facts about the human misery caused by 200 years of socialist experimentation, without first being filtered by left-leaning information controllers."

All the more reason for the blogosphere to remain free of ANY government interference. - Sailor

One of the socialist European countries that the leftists and dems here ar so infatuated with, is looking to cutting taxes as a solution to their economic woes. German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, faced with an ailing economy and unemployment at 12.6%, is ooking to the Bush model to resusitate the German economy. Looks like Schroeder has not been listening to the dems in this country.

The tax cut proposal flies in the face of advice from liberals around the world, including Democrats in America. Last week, for instance, New York Sen. Hillary Clinton complained to Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan that the Bush tax cuts had caused the U.S. deficit to explode.

Of course, Hilary never did see a tax cut she liked. Read the rest of this short article. - Sailor

Mark Steyn wonders why the leftists.etc., would expect the President to appoint those that got it wrong to the UN and World Bank.

The assumption seems to be that, with things going Bush's way in Iraq, Lebanon, Egypt and Saudi Arabia, Bush needs to reach out by stiffing the counselors who called it right and appointing more emollient types who got everything wrong. Each to his own. But as I see it, the question isn't why Wolfowitz and Bolton should hold these jobs, but why Kofi Annan, Jacques Chirac, John Kerry and assorted others still hold their jobs.

This is a great question, considering all of the scandals plaguing the UN.

Mark has an aswer for the New York Times editroial mocking the President's selection of Bolton.

The New York Times wondered what Bush's next appointment would be:

"Donald Rumsfeld to negotiate a new set of Geneva conventions? Martha Stewart to run the Securities and Exchange Commission?"

OK, I get the hang of this game. Sending Bolton to be U.N. ambassador is like . . . putting Sudan and Zimbabwe on the Human Rights Commission. Or letting Saddam's Iraq chair the U.N. Conference on Disarmament. Or sending a bunch of child-sex fiends to man U.N. operations in the Congo. And the Central African Republic. And Sierra Leone, and Burundi, Liberia, Haiti, Kosovo, and pretty much everywhere else.

All of which happened without the U.N. fetishists running around shrieking hysterically. Why should America be the only country not to enjoy an uproarious joke at the U.N.'s expense?

Mark takes this a little further:

Yet the assumption behind much of the criticism of Bolton from the likes of Kerry is that, regardless of his government's foreign policy, a U.N. ambassador has to be at some level a U.N. booster. Twenty years ago, Secretary of State George Schulz used to welcome the Reagan administration's ambassadorial appointments to his office and invite each chap to identify his country on the map. The guy who'd just landed the embassy in Chad would invariably point to Chad. "No," Schulz would say, "this is your country" -- and point to the United States.

George Schultz had it axactly right: itis the interests of th US, not the UN or other countries that the US Ambassaodr represents. The leftists in this country have long ago lost sight of that.

Reporting on the Bolton appointment in the Financial Times, James Harding wrote,''Mr. Bush is eager to re-engage with allies, but is unapologetic about the Iraq war, the policy of preemption and the transformational agenda." "Unapologetic"? What exactly should he be apologizing for? The toppling of Saddam? The Iraq election? The first green shoots of liberty in the desert of Middle Eastern "stability"? When you unpick the assumptions behind Harding's sentence, Bush's principal offense is that he remains "unapologetic" about doing all this without the blessing of the formal transnational decision-making process.

Good for him. In recent years, I can find only one example of a senior U.N. figure having the guts to call a member state a "totalitarian regime." It was former Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali last autumn, and he was talking about America. Bolton's sin isn't that he's "undiplomatic," but that he's correct.

Do note the Boutros Boutros-Ghali quote that America is a "totalitarian regime." These are the type of people the leftists and dems want the President to kowtow to? Well, based on their rantings and ravings they likely agree with Boutros Boutros-Ghali. Read the rest of what Steyn has to say. - Sailor

John Kerry is still running for President. I suppose he still has his eyes set on 2008. While Johnny stays to the left, Hilary moves to the right. It will be an interesting primary season. kerry will have to be sure to stay left, since his puppeteers, Kennedy and Soros are there.

Kerry on the Bolton nomination:

Of Bolton, Kerry said, "It is very hard to commence a new initiative in foreign policy and then [appoint] somebody to the United Nations who has been so destructive and so clearly dismissive of the U.N. process itself."

John, the UN process is very broken. Can you say oil-for-food, sex scandals or Dafur? Some how I doubt you can since Soros will not allow you to.

Kerry on Wolfowitz:

Kerry said Wolfowitz, whose nomination must be approved by the World Bank board, was "as guilty as [Defense Secretary] Donald Rumsfeld" of major miscalculations about the war in Iraq.

Yes there were mistakes made. There are in all endeavors such as this. Of course, one of the reasons you lost, Johnny, is because you had no clue what to do in Iraq. The fact the 25 million people are now free and 8 million of them voted is testament to the success in Iraq.

Kerry goes on to take a few more potshots at the President. You can read the rest of his inane remarks here. - Sailor

For any of those that doubt Hilary Clinton is running for President, one only need to read Eleanor Clift's piece on why Condi's Candidacy is Doomed. Clift is a well known Clintonista apologist and shill as well as a part of the Clinton propaganda machine. In her article, Clift tries to use the example of the "West Wing" television show as part of why Condi is doomed. Typical leftist nonsense, using make believe to substitute for reality. - Sailor

The ACLU has been out of line for some time. Now they are defending the "rights" of non US citizens who are enemy combatants. For any of those who claim that the ACLU is not a leftist group, here is evidence to the contrary. Anil Adyanthaya explains. - Sailor

Oh those pesky French. A recent poll indicates that 51% of the French will vote no on the EU constitution. Even thought the French Solialist Party is on board, 59% of French socialists are opposed. A rejection by France of the EU constitution would create a major shockwave across Europe. EU Constitution opposition surges is a very interesting read. - Sailor

Ryan Sager has another excellent exposé into the campaign finamcelobby. As Sager points out, that is exactly what they are, a lobby. Sager reminds all to remember these four words - "show me the money". Ryan has found out that members of this lobby are very reluctant to list their donors, but they want everyone else to. it is up to all of us to see that this issue does not go quietly away. All of us need to start digging into where the money comes from.

Free Speech Needs Jerry Maguire. - Sailor

There goes Harry, running around the country, when he is not back in DC being an obstrutionist, talking about Social Security. According to Harry and the leftist dems, there is no SS crisis. Okay, then what do you call thae fact that in 15 years, SS will be paying out more then it takes in and by 2048 will be flat broke. Seems like there are some problems here that need fixing. Of course, Harry will likely be enjoying his eternal sleep by 2048 and I likely will be as well (being 95 by then). So then, what are Harry and the dems going to do, bsides trying to scare the shit out of seniors? The answer is nothing.

Michael Tanner of the Cato's Project on Social Security Choice lays out Harry's choices if nothing is done now. - Sailor

Here is a little tid bit from the Washington Post:

" President Vicente Fox said Wednesday that walls along the U.S.-Mexico border, such as one approved last month by the U.S. House of Representatives, "must be demolished" because they are "discriminatory" and "against freedom."

"No country that is proud of itself should build walls . . . it doesn't make any sense," Fox said at a news conference ahead of next week's meeting in Crawford, Tex., with President Bush and Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin. Border security and immigration will be main topics of the leaders' discussion, along with trade and commerce."

Now for Fox's plans for his southern border you can take a look at Mexico's 'Southern Plan': The Facts

A hat tip to Walter over at ChronWatch for that article. - Sailor

There is now a petition that will be sent to Chairman Thomas of the FEC. This one is truly bipartisan with bloggers from the left and right sponsoring this petition.

Sign the Petition

What are you waiting for? The Sailor has signed! - Sailor

Remember how those on the left fretted and whined about how the Arab and Muslim world could never embrace democracy? They went on and on how democracy could never grow in the sand. Time has proven them wrong as democracy has taken hold in Afghanastan and Iraq, where successful elections have been held. Lebanon has risen up against the Syrian occupation, Egypt and Saudi Arabia have made concessions to democratic reforms. Charles Krauthammer goes into the details. - Sailor

Once again, Oliver North brings up a topic that has been flying under the radar for sometime. While we have been looking at the Middle East, there is some thing going on the the south of the US that bears watching and more attention. Just what is Chavez up to? Oliver North explains. - Sailor

Here are two articles that are sure to raise your blood pressure. We keep hearing from the left how it is the war they hate, not the troops. For some time I have been saying that, that is so much bullshit. Michelle Malkin and Captian Ed of Captains Quarters provide some insight as to what went on at a Seattle high school. There was no support ofr our troops there. You can read both at FrontPage Magazine's Warblog. - Sailor

Doc Farmer gets all over the MSM and their blatant bias. Yes, Doc, we will have to look for the truth elsewhere, that is why more and more people are turning to the internet and the blogosphere. Perhaps that is why the FEC wants to muzzle the bloggers. All under the guise of extending McCain-Feingold to the internet. - Sailor

Media Ignores Media Bias -- Shocking, Ain't It?
Written by Doc Farmer
Thursday, March 17, 2005


Most Americans understand that there is some bias in media. How much depends on your own political leanings. Most lib/dem/soc/commies believe that Fox News is incredibly right-wing, while most rep/cons believe that the remainder of news organizations (the so-called ''mainstream'' media) are incredibly leftist. Books have been written about this subject (most notably ''Bias'' by Bernard Goldberg - an excellent read), websites are devoted to pointing out the perceived slants, and it's a good way to start an argument in a coffee shop if you are so inclined (and especially fun to do if you're frustrated having to pay $29.95 for a simple cuppa joe).

Naturally, I believe that the mainstream media is very lib/dem/soc/commie oriented when it comes to news. Not just the op/ed pages, mind you, but the actual NEWS they're supposed to be reporting. I watch Fox News, and I find that they generally live up to their ''fair and balanced'' moniker in the news arena. Their op/ed programs (O'Reilly, Hannity and Colmes, Beltway Boys, et al) present all sides of an issue. It seems to lean a bit more to starboard than to port, quite frankly, but considering the competition, it probably balances itself out over all of the news outlets in operation today.

Most people, if they are wise, no longer
depend on the ''Big Three'' (CBS, ABC and NBC) as their sole news source anymore. There are a number of news sources to choose from, and people are taking advantage of the end of this monopoly, as the ratings and market share of the Big Three has demonstrated over the last twenty years. Newspapers are still, by and large, incredibly biased to the left, but they are facing competition from smaller papers, the Internet, news radio, talk radio, satellite radio and a number of other niche cable channels. Overall, the playing field is beginning to level. Albeit slowly.

There's lots of kvetching out there to say that ''CBS Bad, Fox Good'' or ''Fox Bad, NBC Good'' - usually involving a lot of grunting, chest-beating, and throwing grass clippings in the air - but it is hard to come by scholarly studies of this issue. One was done a few years back that I rather enjoyed, known as the Groseclose-Milyo report. It showed the mainstream media were significantly left of center. It also
showed that Fox News Special Report and the Washington Times were more right-leaning. This is not a surprise to me. It does, however, seem to be a shock to the MSM. They claim, over and over and over, that they are indeed even handed, fair and balanced, etc.

There was a rather large report that came out this week, however. You probably haven't heard about it - if you're relying on the MSM for your news, that is. Seems that the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism did a study of last year's election for the group Journalism.org (go here). They looked at all the major media, and how they covered the individual candidates. Their conclusion in their State of the Media 2005 report was (surprise! surprise!) that the mainstream media covered Bush in a far more negative
manner than Kerry, while Fox covered Bush more positively than it did Kerry.

Now, I'm sure this doesn't come as much of a shock to most readers, as well as it should not. The MSM is the same crowd that gave us Rathergate, after all. They also gave us a lot of incorrect information about Bush, and Kerry, and a whole lot of other things that you and I need to know to be an informed electorate. We're used to the bias (from either side) and we've learned to sort the wheat from the chaff after all these years.

Sadly, however, it seems the MSM either ignores reports like this (I'm sure this has been the top story on ABC, CBS, NBC, PBS, etc., right?) or, worse, totally lie about the results.

Enter Editor and Publisher. They tout themselves as ''America's Oldest Journal Covering the Newspaper Industry'' although they also cover issues in the broadcast media. In a short analysis of the published report on Media Bias, E&B boldly proclaimed ''Study Finds No Media Bias on War, Hits Fox News As Most One-Sided.''

Huh?

Now, every other analysis of the numbers from the report shows a clear and present bias coming from the lib/dem/soc/commie media. The media generally had 36% negative reporting of Bush versus 12% negative reporting of Kerry. Conversely, they had 20% positive reporting of Bush and 30% positive reporting of Kerry.

How does E&P get around this disparity? They throw this bone to the huddled masses - ''A more limited analysis of campaign coverage found that Bush received more negative, and less positive, coverage than Kerry during the fall campaign.
Rosenthiel thinks this may be partly because a president in office always gets more criticism, and the setbacks in the war added to this.'' Apparently, the article, which was written by ''E&P Staff'' (must've been the team of Rather, Kerry and Franken) decided to gloss over the key finding of the report in order to massage the report numbers to their own ends.

It used to be the saying that there are ''lies, damned lies, and statistics.'' E&P's article seems to suggest that there's an even further depth to that statement than heretofore imagined. To salvage the continued lie of an unbiased media, they simply ignored the numbers they didn't like. In other words, they ignored the truth.

If this is the action of a supposedly august body of journalists who set the tone for the rest of the media, it's no wonder we can no longer trust them for anything approaching veracity. They lie to
themselves in order to continue a larger lie - that they can be trusted. That they can be fair. That they are unbiased.

Well, they can't be trusted. They are incapable of fairness. They are the epitome of bias.

Looks like we're going to have to look for truth elsewhere, folks. The Mainstream Media aren't interested in providing it.


About the Writer: Doc Farmer is a writer and humorist who is also a moderator on ChronWatch's Forum. He formerly lived in Saudi Arabia and Qatar, but now resides in the Midwest. Doc receives e-mail at docfarmer9999@yahoo.co.uk.

This Article Was First Published In ChronWatch At: http://www.chronwatch.com/content/contentDisplay.asp?aid=13589

Time to go over to Miscellaneous Objections for 3 more partial videos on Treglia's comments. One of them explains how their efforts would have been worthless had Congress fully understood its role in the push for McCain-Feingold. This is serious stuff! - Sailor

Looks like the usual suspects will be out protesting the war in Iraq. The lefists, terrorist appeasers and supporters, the usual anti-American crowd and other assorted tin foil hat wearers. Of course, they all claim to support the troops, but we know that is all so much bullshit. Michelle Malkin exposes them for what they are, Moonbats on Parade. - Sailor

This is a potential blockbuster. In his column, Ryan Sager, reports on a video tape he as obtained that Campaign-Finance reform has been an immense scam perpetrated on the American people by a cadre of left-wing foundations and disguised as a "mass movement."

If these allegations are in fact true, then indeed a massive fraud has been perpetrated on the American people and those responsible need to have their feet held to the fire.

There is a partial transcript of the tape in question. I urge you all to read it and then contact your representatives for an explanation. - Sailor

View Video Clips:

Treglia outlines how Pew created the impression of a "mass movement."
Treglia explains how Pew stayed within the law.

Treglia recounts how columnist George Will came close to exposing Pew.

Here is some more on the giant hissy fit being thrown by Susan Estrich et al. Burt Prelutsky has some insights into this in his article. One of the things I did note was that Estrich had assigned one of her classes to track this. I would think that law students have better uses for their time then being toadies for Estrich. Prelutsky also notes, as I have done, that there is a lack of conservative columnists at the LA Times. - Sailor

Looks like push is about to come to shove as the William Myers nomination comes to the Senate floor. All indications are that the demswill attempt to filibuster this nomination. Which will prompt the republicans to go withthe Senate rules change. Gail Russell Chaddock at the Christian Science Monitor has more on this.

Both Harry Reid and Mitch McConnell have issued statements.


Harry Reid goes on about this being an assault on Checks and Balances. Harry, you and the dems have had their chances to speak out on this. 82% of Americans say it is time to have an up or down vote on judicial nominees. By using the filibuster you are attempting to subvert the Senate's Advise and Consent obligations. All you and the dems are doing is being obstructionist. If you want to control who ascends to the Federal judicial bench, then get more of your party's Senate candidates elected. - Sailor

The unions continue to lose membership. The AFL-CIO Executive Council has decided to raise the dues it charges affiliate members in order to increase political spending. Most of that money will go to the support of dem candidates in the next two election cycles. Now consider this: 43% of union households voted for President Bush in 2004. One has to wonder if those 43% know how much of their union dues go to supporting dem candidates instead of being used for their benefit. Linda Chavez has a lot of things to say on this issue, along with some facts and figures. - Sailor

I have been remiss on some thing and I am correcting that now. For some time I have been a poster at ChronWatch, but I never added them to my blogroll. So, accept my apologies, Doc Farmer. Doc is a moderator at ChronWatch and a good friend as well as a fine writer. Some of you are familiar with Doc's writings as they are posted here. Please welcome ChronWatch to the blogroll. ChronWatch is a great source of articles and information as well as lively debate. I hope you will all visit. - Sailor

Things continue to be very confused concerning provisional ballots in King County. Democrat Christine Gregoire defeated Republican Dino Rossi in a hand recount by 129 votes out of more than 2.8 million statewide. Head on over to Sound Politics for more on this. - Sailor

The democrats, led by Harry Reid are throwing a collective hissy fit over possible Senate rules changes that would eliminate filibustring of judicial nominees. Now Reid and is cadre are threatening to hold up Senate business over this. It would seem that the dems have not learned the lesson that Tommy Daschle learned this past November. Here are a few links to news articles on this.

Democrats Warn on GOP Judge Rule Change In this article, Reid claims this is an abuse of power.

GOP sees momentum in ending judicial filibusters In this article, the GOP claims to have the botes necessary to end judicial nominee filibustering.

HARRY'S HYSTERICS There are a couple of blurbs here and some links to other articles on this issue.

Some interesting reading here. I expect next that the dems will whine some more and maybe even threaten to hold their collective breath until they turn blue in the face. - Sailor

As many of you know, I have been consistently posting on the outrages in academia. Academic freedom to them is they being permitted to promote their bilge without oppoition. This very attittude, that dissenting opinions are to be ridiculed, ignored and given poor grades has promted many states to enact Academic Freedom laws. In my travels, I have found a new ally in this struggle. studentcon.com lists the outrages of the academic left. That being said, welcome studentcon.com the the blogroll. Be sure to visit their site on a regular basis. - Sailor

Looks like the ACLU is up to no good again. This time the ACLU sent a letter to the Boy Scouts national headquarters threatening to sue any public school that sponsors a Boy Scout troop. It is time to take action. First donate to the Boy Scouts any amount you can. Donate Here Second, tell the Boy Scouts not to give in! Your feedback is crucial! Third, let the ACLU know exactly what you think of their attempt to prevent the Boy Scouts from being sponsored by a public school. - Sailor

The link to the story has been fixed. - Sailor

According to Chris Bowers, posting at MyDD, Senate Democrats have a mandate to oppose Bush. He comes to this conclusion based on some national election numbers showing dem Senate candidates garnering more votes then GOP Senate candidates. Talk about grasping for straws! Some one needs to keep reminding Mr. Bowers that the dems actualy lost ground in the Senate. I doubt Mr. Bowers would conclude that President Bush has a mandate based on those very same national election numbers. I guess you can file this in the 'losing is winning' drawer. - Sailor

The UAW's decision to rescind their previous banning of the Marines parking in their facility was turned down by the Marines. "I talked to Ron; I let him know that I understand he has rescinded his decision," said Lt. Col. Joe Rutledge, a top-ranking officer at the reserve infantry rifle battalion. "However, I've made my decision -- either you support the Marines or you don't." Read the full story. - Sailor

John O'Neill was interviewed by The American Entrprise magazine. On of the things that struck me was this question and answer:

TAE: How do you explain the media's response?



O'NEILL: The establishment media was very pro-Kerry. They were opposed to any story that was critical of Kerry, and I believe that they were captured by their own bias. We met with one reporter around that time. We told a story to him relating to Kerry's service. He acknowledged it was true and terribly important. And he told us he would not print it because it would help George Bush. That's when we began to realize we had a real problem on our hands.

You can read the transcript for yourself. - Sailor

Being the good capitalist the Sailor is, I have added Google Ad Sense and Search to the blog. They will actually pay me for clicks coming from here. Go figure. - Sailor

Once again the left shows it has lost complete touch with reality. This time praising Castro's human rights recod. A letter has been sent to the UN urging the top United Nations human rights watchdog to side with Cuba in an expected battle over the communist country's rights record. Among American signatories were actor Danny Glover, author Alice Walker and historian and activist Howard Zinn.

I do not see these three Americans rushing off to live in Castro's workers paradise anytime soon. - Sailor

Actually John McCain has not reformed at all. Jacob Sullum gives a little history on McCain starting back with the Keating Five scandal and getting into the current Campaign Finance Reform mess. Sullum says that: The Arizona senator hasn't changed since his Keating days. - Sailor

Looks like Kerry's 2008 hopes have taken another big hit. A recent poll shows Hilary seriously kicking his ass in his home state. Perhaps this is another reason the poodle will not sign that SF-180. - Sailor

Seems the heat got to be too much for the ingrates at the UAW. After allowing the Marine reservists to park in their lot, the UAW leadership decided that they did not care for some of the Marines choices of cars or their support for the President. So they banned them from using their parking lot. So much for the UAW bullshit about caring for the troops. Just like others on the left, they talk a good game, but in reality they could care less about the troops.

Now, as being reported on News 4 Detroit, the UAW has decided to rescind their ban. Guess they could not take the heat. - Sailor

It is always nice when an officer agrees with me. Lt. Col. Gordon Cucullu concurs that John Bolton is the right man for the UN job. He sees the whining, gnashing of teeth and the insults being hurled at Bolton by the dems,left and the usual appeasers as a good sign. So does the Sailor.

See the rest of Lt. Col. Gordon Cucullu's comments here. - Sailor

Looks like the Lebanese were out in force, despite warnings that they should not protest Syria's years old interference and occupation of Lebanon. Of course, AP's headline says thousands, but crowd estimates were close to 1 million. For the details, take the link. - Sailor

In the blogosphere, this Sailor is just a small mine sweeper. Larry Kudlow had John McIntyre, Roger L. Simon, and Jeff Jarvis, the big boys of the blogosphere on his show. RadioBlogger has the transcript. It is a definite MUST read! - Sailor

It has always amazed me how the federal courts interpret the US Constitution, especially the First amendment. Burning the US flag is protected political speech, but political blogging may not be. One of the core tenants of the First Amendment is free political speech, yet it seems that the campaign finance reformers want to curtail that right under some convoluted idea that political blogging is a campaign contribution. In my opinion, blogging is the electronic version of the old town square and as such is protected political speech. To me there is no convolution there. This is a simple issue being made complicated by McCain-Feingold, the Federal Courts and the FEC.

In his article, 'Dream Palace of the Goo-Goos', Scott Johnson looks into what these campaign finance reform zealots may actually want and how we got to this point. - Sailor

So the UN figures that they have a problem with support in middle America? What a shock! They will continue to have a problem with middle America as long as they try and cover up the Oil-for-Food scandal, keep appointing human rights abusers to the Human Rights Commission and do nothing to prevent genocide. I will not even get into the sex scandals. See here how the UN thinks they can win back middle America.

Just a note to the UN: Perhaps you can show a little good faith here by oredering the diplomats at the UN to start parking legally in New York City and also to pay up the millions in illegal parking fines. - Sailor

Ed Koch has a few things to say about the Bolton nomination. In the process he takes a few jabs at the UN and the New York Times.

I like Ed koch, he is forthwright and I do enjoy his candor. I do not, however, always agree with Ed, but in this particular case, I am with Mayor Koch. Read what the good Mayor has to say. - Sailor

Every time you turn around, some one in the education community is whining about needing more money. Ever wonder what happens to some of that money? Seems some of these education "professionals" in DC squandered a good portion of that money on retreats and unauthorized travel. According to Deborah K. Nichols of the Office of the District of Columbia Auditor, "No cost was spared."

Take the link for the full story. - Sailor

Time Magazine is reporting that Zarqawi may be planning an attack on soft targets in the US. This is based upon information obtained from a captured Zarqawi lieutenant.

I do not know why Time sees this as some major revelation. What is surprising to me, is that this has not already happened. Sadly, it will likely happen as some point in time. A free society is always vunerable to this type of terrorism.

You can view the Time article here. - Sailor

There was a major fuss from the left when Jeanne Kirkpatrick was nominated to be US Ambassador to the UN. There was much hand wringing and gnashing of the leftist's teeth when Daniel Patrick Moynihan said simply "It is a lie." when the UN passed its infamous “Zionism is racism” resolution. Or when the late Senator called Idi Amin a "racist murderer", after Amin addressed the organization and was granted the same respect and status as a democratic leader. So now the leftists continue their hand wringing, gnashing of teeth and their usual name calling over the Bolton nomination.

Andrew Sullivan has some comments over at timesonline. - Sailor

I had previously posted an article on how the GOP is making a concerted effort to reach out to the Black community. Dan Gilgoff, over at USNEWS.com has an article which adds more light onto this issue. The article notes that, Conservatives come calling, and blacks may be listening this time.

The articleconcludes with this paragraph:

"For now, these new outreach efforts are in their infancy; the Mayflower group won't have office space till next month. But analysts agree that the GOP needs only modest gains to make a big difference. "For us, 20 percent [of the black vote] would be the death knell of the Democrats," says Phyllis Berry Myers, a Mayflower founder. It doesn't sound like an outsize goal. For Democrats, that's a sobering thought."

For years the dems have been taking the black vote as a given. Perhaps those days are over. - Sailor

NewsMax is reporting that the New York Times has admitted that Iraq had WMD Stockpiles in 2003. In this article, 'Looting at Weapons Plants Was Systematic, Iraqi Says', the Times states that the sites were looted and the looted materials moved to other countries. Something that many have said in the past, only to be ridiculed by the Times and other leftist media outlets. - Sailor

This Sailor has mentioned before that Giuliana Sgrena is nothing more then a two bit reporter. Barbara Stock points out that Sgrena is so much the ideologue, she did not even notice that everything she had written in an article, was negated by the woman she has interviewed in that article. The Strange Case of Terrorist Hostage Giuliana Sgrena. - Sailor

For years the black civil rights establishment has been in the hip pocket of the democrats. Now there appears to be some cracks in that relationship. Black Americans in the one core base of the democrat party, that the democrats have taken for granted and basically done nothing more then pay lip service to. The GOP and the adminstration have been reaching out to the Black ministry, letting them know that the GOP is closer to their values then the dems. Now, The White House Thinks Black, and the dems needs to start being very concerned. - Sailor

Mark Steyn has a few things to say about the IRA and the White House snubbing them. - Sailor

This Sailor has posted, in a few places, a question on Giuliana Sgrena. It was, what makes her think that she is so important that anyone would want to assisnate her? After all, she is nothing more then a two bit reporter for a third rate Italian communist rag. Jack Kelly delves into that as well as a little more of Sgrena's tale. - Sailor

Ever wonder who financed the campaign finance reform movement? Ryan Sager has and lets the cat out of the bag. In this article, Sager reveals this:

"Consider a report just out from the folks over at Political Money Line, "Campaign Finance Reform Lobby: 1994 to 2004." Ignored by the media to date, it details how the supposedly grass-roots campaign-finance reform movement has been funded over the last decade to the tune of $140 million. Of that $140 million, the vast majority ($123 million) came not from retirees scraping together their last nickels for the cause of democracy, nor from schoolchildren collecting deposits on cans plucked from dilapidated playgrounds.

No, the money came from just eight ultra-liberal foundations (including the Ford Foundation and George Soros' Open Society Institute), the same folks who fund: the Earth Action Network, the NOW Legal Defense and Education Fund, People for the American Way, Planned Parenthood, the Naderite Public Citizen Foundation and the Feminist Majority Foundation."

It looks like a good deal of money is being spent but just a few, to silence free political speech. - Sailor

Is Social Security a pyramid scheme? Christopher G. Adamo says: "If Americans of all ages ever recognize the degree to which they've been conned by the proponents of failed government programs such as Social Security, they will likely respond in a manner reminiscent of the Boston Tea Party. And it is not hard to imagine a few career politicians floating in the harbor alongside King George's cargo."

Read more of 'Social Security and the Fleecing of America' - Sailor

Senator Orin Hatch took to the Senate floor to seek an end of filibusters of Judicial nominations. In his remarks, Hatch took both Robert (KKK) Byrd and Teddy (The Swimmer) Kennedy to task for their comments. Hatch said: "The Senator from West Virginia has long been this chamber’s leading expert on our history and procedure. For this reason, I was disappointed that he would fail to make such an important distinction between legislative and judicial nomination filibusters, a distinction based on both historical fact and constitutional principle."

It has been my opinion that using the filibuster is not what the Framers had in mind for the Senate's Advise and Consent role. - Sailor

What does it take to fire a tenured professor? Lying about ethnic origin on the application? Advocating violence as a solution to perceived ills? Applauding and standing up for terrorism and terrorists? What will it take for UC to just fire Ward Churchill? Maybe plagiarism? A Nova Scotia school sends UC a report on Churchill essay, which, in the opinion of the school's lawyers is plagiarism. I posted an article in which two lawyers laid out the case to fire Churchill. I said then tha UC did not have the balls to fire the phony Indian. I hope they have found them now. - Sailor

Sailor's Note" The link is now working.

I have always had reservations about AARP and exactly how much good they do for seniors. Wes Vernon has some intersting fact and thought on AARP, their support of big government and how AARP actually hurts Seniors in many cases. Here is just on example:

"Those "low-cost" deals at the AARP pharmacy are often not so "low cost." More seniors are finding better deals at local pharmacies.

I have posted on AARP before, specifically on how many mutual funds they offer. Yet, they are opposed to allowing younger folks invest some of their SS funds into mutual funds. Go Figure. - Sailor

Congrats to my BlogMom, Indigo, on the arrival of her 4th great grandchild. A sweet little red haired girl. This magnum of Korbel is for you, BlogMom! - Sailor

Oliver North has some advice for John Bolton on Bolton's Senate nomination hearings. Ollie is an expert at testifying before Congress. Who can ever forget Ollie's dressing down of several Congressmen during those hearings on Iran/Contra. Here is a little tease on Ollie's advice.

"-- Finally, remember that the guys trying to peel your hide are "tax and spend" experts. Ask 'em how the United Nations' madcap idea of taxing American citizens under its so-called "Millennium Development Goals" will go down with their constituents."

Go and read the rest of Ollie's advice. - Sailor

The International Atomic Energy Agency reported that Iran has refused to allow the inspection of the Parchin military site near Tehran. Further it appears that Iran has started building a heavy-water reactor near the central city of Arak. The AP has reported that Iran has constructed deep underground tunnels to store its nuclear components.

With all of this new information being revealed, guess who is the leading supporter of Iran in the EU. None other then the French. As with Iraq, the French are making a ton of money off Iran. Here is a little tidbit from the article:

"But France, whose commerce with Iran rose by 22 percent to 3.353 billion euros in the first 11 months of 2004,..."

Looks like France is putting money over preventing the proliferation of nuclear weapons. Sounds familiar, since it was the French that were the biggest backers of saddam at the UN. Of course, they may have ben bought off by saddam throught the Oil-for-Food scam.

Read more on the French connection. - Sailor

John Cornyn, U.S. Senator from Texas, takes the New York Times to task over their editorial, "The Senate on the Brink" (editorial, March 6). He reminds the Times of their past statement on filibusters:

""The Senate on the Brink" (editorial, March 6) supports the "historic role of the filibuster," which is a curious position for a newspaper that 10 years ago said filibusters were "the tool of the sore loser" and should be eliminated ("Time to Retire the Filibuster," editorial, Jan. 1, 1995)."

A bit of hypocricy at the Times?

Read the rest of the Senator's letter. - Sailor

Looks like some in the Muslim world are finally figuring out the Osama bin Laden is no friend of theirs either. This is from FoxNews and the AP:

"MADRID, Spain — Muslim clerics in Spain issued what they called the world's first fatwa, or Islamic edict, against Usama bin Laden on Thursday, the first anniversary of the Madrid train bombings, calling him an apostate and urging others of their faith to denounce the Al Qaeda leader"

You can read the rest of this article here. - Sailor

Hugh Hewitt went to Washington and interviewed VP Cheney. Head over to RadioBlogger for the transcript. Also, check out the posts on Robert (KKK) Byrd and Teddy (The Swimmer) Kennedy. - Sailor

Pejman Yousefzadeh tells why no one should be surprised at the thirst for democracy in the Middle East. Yousefzadeh opens his article with the fall of the Berlin Wall, linking that event to the current Middle East situation. Here is a little some thing from the article for the whiners and hand wringers of the left:

Of course, the people of the Middle East have been emboldened to fight back against the dictators of the region by American efforts to oust both the Taliban and Saddam Hussein. Lebanese militant leader Walid Jumblatt -- who in the past was known for his vehemently anti-American statements -- directly credits the removal of Saddam Hussein and the successful Iraqi elections for a transitional government with having inspired the movement for democracy across the Middle East. In Lebanon, pro-democracy demonstrators greeted the attempts of Syrian President Bashar Assad to offer half-measures designed to placate demands for a Syrian withdrawal from Lebanon by taunting him with slogans like "Bush sends his greetings!" -- a clear reference to the possibility that the United States may undertake to free the Lebanese people via military power if Syria does not withdraw. While there is almost no chance of such a thing happening, it is more than a little noteworthy that the Lebanese demonstrators seem gleeful at the prospect of American liberation -- or at the very least willing and clever enough to use the threat of American military might to force Syria to fully withdraw from Lebanon. And Assad seems terrified -- in a recent comment to the Turkish press, Assad asked his interviewer to "Please send this message: I am not Saddam Hussein. I want to cooperate." He should want to cooperate; the international coalition against Assad includes states like Saudi Arabia -- which historically has been more than willing to cooperate with the region's thugs and murderers so long as its own survival was ensured. And now, with both international forces and domestic upheaval threatening to transform Middle Eastern political and social institutions, the United States has decided to augment its support of Iranian democratic reformers as well; thereby increasing the creative tension in the region that may lead to genuine liberalization in the Middle East as a whole.

All in all a very interesting and timely article. - Sailor

Media outlets are expressing their opinions on the Bolton nomination to be US Ambassador to the scandal plagued UN. There are eight media outlets that I will comment on and provide links to.

USAToday is not at all happy about this nomination. They seem to think that Bolton may not be "sensitive" enough for this position.

"Maybe so. But President Bush's nomination of the self-described bomb thrower to the sensitive diplomatic post raises new doubts about his administration's second-term commitment to repairing international alliances."

The New York Times goes off on a rant, as one mught expext. In their editorial, 'The World According to Bolton', they proceed to whine about Bolton's tough rhetoric. And seems as their habit over the last few years, they conclude by mocking the Bush Administration.

We certainly look forward to Mr. Bolton's confirmation hearings, and, after that, his performance at the United Nations, where he will undoubtedly do a fine job continuing the Bush administration's charm offensive with the rest of the world.

Which leaves us wondering what Mr. Bush's next nomination will be. Donald Rumsfeld to negotiate a new set of Geneva Conventions? Martha Stewart to run the Securities and Exchange Commission? Kenneth Lay for energy secretary?

New York Newsday comes out directly and prints; Bad choice for UN, Senate should reject Bolton. Newsday says:

"There never has been much love lost between the Bush administration and the United Nations. Relations have been chilly at the best of times. But for President George W. Bush to select John Bolton as the next U.S. Ambassador to the UN is an egregious slap in the face of the world body. It would be hard to imagine a more inappropriate choice."

Perhaps it is time some one did give the corrupt, scandal plagued UN a slap in the face, it might do some good.

The Baltimore Sun calls this 'Lightning-rod diplomacy'. The appear to be concerned over this: "" The Algerian ambassador to the United Nations said Mr. Bolton was inclined "to throw rhetorical grenades," a reputation the nominee unapologetically embraces by keeping a bronzed hand grenade in his office." They conclude with this:

"If confirmed, Mr. Bolton should be vigilantly careful of his utterances on the world stage. Balancing thoughtful restraint and necessary bluntness will help him negotiate a body known for massive bureaucracy and large egos. Becoming skilled in the art of cooperation and equanimity, and losing his well-honed confrontational ways, would also better serve the United States' interests"

Sounds like to this Sailor that the Sun wants Bolton to suck up to the UN.

The Boston Globe is very concerned that Bolton is No friend of the UN. Of course I suppose that it never occurred to the Globe, that just maybe the UN is ~gasp~ no friend of the US.

The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review calls The Bolton nomination: A Paine 'diplomatist'. The Tribune-Review goes on to say:

"Bolton is the straightest of straight-talkers. He called Kim Jong Il a "tyrannical dictator" whose rule has resulted in "a hellish nightmare" for the North Korean people. He took China to task for allowing the sale of missile technology to rogue states. And he has been a consistent critic of the United Nations, a broken and corrupt organization."

The Washington Times editorial calls the Bolton Appointment a good one. The editorial concludes with:

This is a debate the administration should welcome. U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan no doubt sat up straight on word of the Bolton nomination, maybe even as straight as some of the dictators and kleptocrats in the General Assembly. With a certain understatement, Miss Rice announced the appointment with the assurance that "He will be a strong voice for reform." We agree.

The New York Post calls the Bolton nomination A Lightening Bolt(on) at the U.N. The Post sees this as:

"Bolton, now the administration's arms-control expert, brings a distinguished record to the ambassador's job — albeit one the media are labeling "hard-line."

His selection also signals that while President Bush means to repair America's relationship with the international community, he will not do so on bended knee or by compromising his principles."

Considering all the whining and gnashing of teeth by the left and their media outlets, this Sailor is very convinced that Bolton is exactly the medicine the UN needs. - Sailor

FoxNews and AP are reporting that Iraqi police have discovered 41 bodies near the Syrian border. According to the reports, some of the bodies were bullet riddled and some beheaded. The killers did not concern themselves with whom they killed, men, women and children were murdered. This from the article:

Twenty-six of the dead were discovered in a field near Rumana, a village 12 miles east of the western city of Qaim, near the Syrian border. Each body was riddled with bullets. The dead were found wearing civilian clothes and one was a woman, police Capt. Muzahim al-Karbouli said.

The other site was south of Baghdad in Latifiya, where Iraqi troops found 15 headless bodies in a building at an abandoned army base, Defense Ministry Capt. Sabah Yassin said.

The bodies included 10 men, three women and two children. Their identities, like the others found in western Iraq, were not known, but insurgents may have viewed them or their relatives as collaborators.

Remember now that these murderers may well be the same people that the Italians paid off for the release of Giuliana Sgrena. Just a short note to Michael, (Fat Mikey), Moore; This is the scum you and Sgrena call "freedom fighters". This Sailor hopes you are real proud of them, you fat dimwit. - Sailor

For those of you that may not have been able to take the link to Doc Farmer's article Wednesday morning, here is the article in full. I have posted some other insights and opinions on this. - Sailor

Shooting The Messenger - Bloggers, McCain-Feingold and the FEC
Written by Doc Farmer
Wednesday, March 09, 2005


As a columnist, I'm pretty much in favor of the constitutional concept of Freedom of Speech. For those unfamiliar with the Constitution (see also: damn near all Federal Judges), let me refresh your memory:

Amendment I

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Freedom of Speech does not equal license to lie, of course. That's why we have laws against libel and slander. It also does not permit us to yell ''Fire'' in a crowded moviehouse (or ''Movie'' in a crowded firehouse). Freedom of Speech is not an issue if you commit perjury - in fact, unless you're a certain former president you can go to jail for it. However, when it comes to issues of politics or government, Freedom of Speech is our most cherished right.

Or at least, it used to be.

In the name of campaign
finance ''reform'' we were handed a piece of legislation known as the McCain-Feingold Act. The initial intent (or, more accurately, the bill of goods we were sold by Congress) was to clean up the ''big money'' and influence peddling that was part and parcel of Federal politics. Donation limits would be put in place, records would be kept, etc., etc., etc. However, there was some rather disturbing stuff tucked away in that bill. For example, you couldn't run ads against an opponent within x number of days of a primary or general election. So, this bill actually limited the freedom of speech we as Americans held dear. Note again the beginning of the First Amendment - Congress Shall Make No Law. Well, looks to me like they did just that.

Now, it would appear on the surface that this is a simple issue to fix. Take it to federal court, and they'll strike the law down as unconstitutional. Except an amazingly stupid thing happened. The Supreme Court of the United States, in an act
that must have made even the Florida Supreme Court shake their collective heads in wonderment, decided that the law was just peachy-keen and okey-dokey. Which means, of course, that they found the Constitution to be, well, unconstitutional.

Well, we somehow survived the 2004 election, despite the kvetching of the lib/dem/soc/commies, who while complaining vehemently about Campaign Finance Reform spent most of their time and money violating it. Still, they lost, which should prove that even when they break the rules, they still couldn’t find their backsides with both hands, a map, a GPS locator and a radio-bloody-telescope.

Now, despite all of this, we've generally gotten information about both candidates that gave Americans the ability to make a decision about who they wanted to run the Free World for the next quadrennial. A lot of the information we received came not from the ever-so-slanted mainstream media, but from the
so-called ''alternative'' media. In fact, the alternative media pointed out some rather glaring ''mistakes'' (see also: intentional forgery, journalistic malfeasance, electoral tampering, attempted insurrection, etc.), which ended up with the downfall of a few chosen sacrificial lambs from a certain television network. These and other facts were dug up by a dedicated group of men and women who decided that the truth was something they'd not receive from the likes of ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, PBS, NY Times, LA Times, Washington Post, et al. At their own expense, they created ''web logs'' where folks on the Internet could share information, ask important (and, to the minds of most lib/dem/soc/commies, impertinent) questions, and generally be a thorn in the side and a pain in the ass of the Mainstream Media.

''Web Log'' was shortened into ''blog'' and those who participated became a new word in the American language - ''bloggers.''

What they did to news was something unheard
of in decades. They became a watchdog for the truth - something the news media was supposed to be, instead of cheerleaders for their chosen candidate or (in some cases) blatant liars. The Mainstream Media berated the bloggers, belittled them, called them names like the ''pajamahadeen'' and tried their best to ignore the fact that, for them, the jig was well and truly up.

The odd thing is that despite the fact that bloggers are not ''journalists'' per se, they seem to have a lot more journalistic integrity than the members of the MSM. If they're wrong, they are found out rather quickly, and most of them will raise their hand, say ''oops,'' and correct the error. They share information and look to a variety of sources and ask for input from the folks who might have more expertise than they in various areas - for example, document authenticity. Bloggers aren't perfect, and they generally have an opinion about what they're reporting on,
but they make that opinion plain. They're up front with their biases, but they still provide useful information that is making the Mainstream Media run scared.

Unfortunately for the bloggers, however, it would seem that those in power in the ivory towers of newsdom have run scared right into the arms of the Federal Election Commission. Because of that, there is a move afoot by at least one member of the FEC to put a muzzle on the bloggers, making the Mainstream Media again ''the only game in town.''

Bradley Smith, one of six FEC Commissioners, has decided to lower the boom on the bloggers. According to a report posted on the web by Declan McCullagh, Smith has warned that ''bloggers and news organizations could risk the wrath of the federal government if they improperly link to a campaign's Web site. Even forwarding a political candidate's press release to a mailing list, depending on the details, could be punished by fines.'' I'm only guessing here, but I'd wager
that Smith is feeling his oats since Michael Powell left the FCC - apparently, he must feel that Powell's departure meant he could ride roughshod over the law, the truth, and the ''little guys'' who don't wear Brooks Brothers suits in the beknighted towers of the Mainstream Media.

Someone should perhaps send a letter to Bradley Smith and the other FEC Commissioners, and remind them that there's this little thing called ''The Constitution'' that they are in danger of violating.

If you'd like more information on this particular threat to Freedom of Speech, please go to http://mccain-feingold-insurrection.blogspot.com/ and let your voice be heard. While you still can.


About the Writer: Doc Farmer is a writer and humorist who is also a
moderator on ChronWatch's Forum. He formerly lived in Saudi Arabia and Qatar, but now resides in the Midwest. Doc receives e-mail at docfarmer9999@yahoo.co.uk.

This Article Was First Published In ChronWatch At: http://www.chronwatch.com/content/contentDisplay.asp?aid=13474

The Wall Street Journal has an editorial that makes the case for Rome aiding and abetting terrorism. By paying ransoms for the likes of Sgrena, the Italians add to the coffers of the terrorists. There is also some on Sgrena's Tale there. Read Italy's Ransom. - Sailor

My good Marine friend, GOC in NC, over at Obnoxious Droppings alerted the Sailor to this absurdity. Seems Schenectady school officials have determined that red, white and blue are now gang colors. Head over to Stark Truth for the details. - Sailor

PS: Please welcome Stark Truth as the newest addition to the Sailor's BlogRoll.

Some have weighed in on the FEC/Blogger mess. First are Senators McCain and Feingold. Seems the Senators say that it is not their intent, nor the intent of the FEC or Federal courts to interfere with private citizens on the internet. The statement issed by McCain and Feingold concludes with this:

"This issue has nothing to with private citizens communicating on the Internet. There is simply no reason - none - to think that the FEC should or intends to regulate blogs or other Internet communications by private citizens. Suggestions to the contrary are simply the latest attempt by opponents of reform to whip up baseless fears. BCRA was intended to empower ordinary citizens, and it has been successful in doing so. We will continue to fight for that goal."

Richard Hanson at The Personal Democracy Forum, gets into a bit of an in depth analysis of what types of blogs may be impacted by McCain-Feingold. He concludes with this:

"At bottom, the question is whether regulation of Internet-based political speech serves the goals of the campaign finance laws. If we are worried about corruption and circumvention of contribution limits, Internet-based activity does not even become a problem unless significant sums of money are involved. Even then, in some instances, Internet-based news and commentary is enough like mainstream media so that the media exemption needs to be extended."

Allen Mutter over at Reflections of a Newsosaur, ties the fortunes of journalists to those of the bloggers. Allen also lays out the threat. He sums up:

"With professional journalists nowadays as much at risk as citizen journalists, we all had better hang together. Or, as Benjamin Franklin said, assuredly we shall all hang separately."

Eugene Volokh, of The Volokh Conspriacy fame, goes into detail how blogger's speech should be protected. He brings up the proposed Free Flow of Information Act that is discussed on Michelle Maklin's blog. The proposed Act does not include bloggers.

We must not grow complacent, nor should we lay back and let others decide this issue. Keep up the fight, until we are assured that the right of free speech will not be stiffled. - Sailor

In a poll conducted recently by the Marist College Institute for Public Opinion, John McCain topped Hilary Clinton by 12 points. This certainly cannot be good news for the Clinton camp as Hilary has done a good deal to appear to move to the middle. - Sailor

Italy is now conceding that the incident involving Giuliana Sgrena was an accident. Though this Sailor is wondering why the Italian Foreign Minister is calling for pounishment for the Americans involced before the investigation has determined what exactly occurred. Read the article from the Washington Post. - Sailor

Charles Krauthammer says "Three Cheers for the Bush Doctrine". He points out that "History has begun to speak, and it says that America made the right decision to invade Iraq" and proceeds to explain why. - Sailor

Clarence Page writes about the efforts the GOP is making to reach out to black voters. The dems need to be very concerned about this ourtreach. - Sailor

The Sailor posted 'Join the Insurrection' over at ChronWatch. My friend Doc Farmer saw it and the seed of an article germinated in his brain. Fortunately, Doc is far more eloquent then this Sailor. Read the fruits of his mind here. - Sailor

I did come up with a couple of flags for the insurrection:

There has been some controversy over the intial pictures of the car Sgrena was in that were released by the AP. Of course the left wingers all started claiming that the right wing bloggers faked them. There were pictures that were release by AP. As soon as it became known that they were in fact not the car that Sgrena was in, the bloggers made their retractions. In fact, they were quicker to do so then the AP was.

Today, Little Green Footballs has the corrected pictures released by AP and shown on the Italian RAI TG1 national television network. LGF also has an interesting article by a Danish reporter, who is less then sympathetic to Sgrena. - Sailor

The assualt on political speech starts in earnest now. The FEC will be coming after the blogosphere and with a vengence. This is all the more reason that McCain-Feingold needs to be repealed and/or modified. The FEC, which refused to make a ruling on the 527's last year, is also not of a mind to appeal U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly's ruling that the internet needs to be regulated under McCain-Feingold.

This is a nothing less then an attempt to stiffle free speech. Free political speech was a founding tenant of this country. While one can argue the merits of whether or not donating significant amouts of money to a political campaign is a free speech issue, there can be no arguement that what occurs in the blogosphere is speech. There are those that are concerned that the Patriot Act would take away freedoms, they need to also be very concerned about this attempt to muzzle the bloggers.

Join the Insurrection! - Sailor

A few more commentaries on the Bolton nomination to be US Ambassador to the UN.

David Corn writes that Bush Gives the UN the Finger. Corn also calls Bolton a "hard ass". Of course, Corn being as far left as he is, is another woshipper of the scandal plagued UN. Be warned as you read that you will have to endure plugs for Corn's blog and book.

The New York Times writes the Bolton is a weapons expert. The Time goes on to quote various politicians and diplomats. There is ths from Harry Reid:

""This is a disappointing choice and one that sends all the wrong signals," said Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the Democratic leader."

This sailor is wondering just what signals Harry would want sent to the UN? That their corrupt business as usual is fine?

Frank J. Gaffney Jr.at National Review Online, calls the Bolton nomination A Bolt of Good Sense. He concludes with this:

"In short, it would appear that the U.N.’s admirers recognize not only that George W. Bush is determined to shake things up on the East River, but that such a shakeup is in order. The savvier of them may also appreciate that John Bolton is uniquely capable of persuading the Republican majority in Congress that such an effort is worth making — and that it has a reasonable chance of rebuilding the United Nations into an institution worthy of further, generous American support and involvement. The price may be a sustained dose of tough love, but it is one that must be paid."

On the whole, considering those that are upset with this nomination and their reasons for being so, the Sailor is convinced that this is the right man for the job. - Sailor

Neal Boortz has a few things to say on some of the subjects the Sailor has commented on. Head on over to Nealz Nuze to see what Neal has to say. - Sailor

Welcome The McCain-Feingold Insurrection to the Sailor's blogroll. If you are a blogger, you need to join the cause! So hoist the flag as the Sailor has done! - Sailor

As the Sailor suspected there are divergent opinions on the nomination of John Bolron as US Ambassador to the UN. The Wall Street Journal sees Bolton as the measure of "tough love" the UN needs.

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution contends that Bolton is a loose cannon. Which is what one can expect from another of the DNC's propaganda outlets.

The New York Daily News is on board with the Bolton nomination. The News believes that Bolton is the right man for the job, considering the sorry state of the UN.

Already you can see that the left, the dems and the usual suspects are lining up against the Bolton nomination. Just a word to that group; the American people already have a low opinion of the UN. John Bolton is just the medicine the UN needs if it is to ever become relevant again. - Sailor

Another update on Sgrena's Tale. This time a commentary from the Chicago Sun-Times. The Sun-Times also notes a couple of other conspiracy theories that are still around. - Sailor

So Lynne Stewart, radical lawyer and convicted terrorist accompliss is crying she is a martyr. She is whining that she does not deserve to go to jail. Also of interest is who has been a big financial supporter of her defense, none other then George Soros. Naturally, Stewart claims that the US government has it out for her for all of her past activities. Woe is the victim! - Sailor

It looks like a group that espouses Senator Jon McCain's viewpoints has been the recipient of some substantial donations from Cablevision. McCain is one of those that wants to get the big soft money out of politics and yet a group, which he claims to only be an advisor to, takes some large donations from Cablevision. Is it just a one of those things that Cablevision appeared before McCain's Senate committee and that McCain wrote letters on their behalf? Have a read for yourself. - Sailor

It has been revealed that the car AP claimed carried Sgrena form her captivity was not the one. All of the bloggers have reported that fact. It is not known if AP has made a retraction yet.

Seems that Italy didn't plan safe escape for hostage. They never bothered to inform the US Military of their escape plans.

Sgrena's tale becomes more absurd with each statement she makes. More updates will come as new information becomes available. - Sailor

Canadian PM Paul Martin had announced that Canada was pulling out of the missile defense system with the US. He also said something about the US needing Canadain permission to shoot down any incoming missiles over Canada. The Sailor seriously doubts any US President is going to take the time to do that. He can always say sorry AFTER the threat is neutralized.

Rachel Marsden makes the case for why Canada Needs Missile Defense Program. Take a read. - Sailor

President Bush has nominated John R. Bolton to be US Ambassador to the UN. Seems Bolton is a hard nosed type and has already pissed off North Korea and China. Two years ago, Bolton denounced North Korean leader Kim Jong Il as a "tyrannical dictator" and described life under the ruler as "a hellish nightmare." A North Korean spokesman fired back that "such human scum and bloodsucker is not entitled to take part in the talks" on North Korea's nuclear weapons program. The Sailor likes this guy already! The usual leftists and dem suspects are whining about this appointment. So expect a fight during confirmation. Fred Kaplan, over at Slate has this headline: Bush to U.N.: Drop Dead. It would seem Fred does not care for Bolton. I am sure I will have more on this later tonight or early tomorrow morning. - Sailor

The third in the series on Marine 2nd Lt. Ilario Pantano has been released. Both Michael Savage and Congressman Walter B. Jones have come to Pantano's defense. Read the update here. - Sailor

Remember way backin 1997, when the British touted their massive firearms ban as the cure for violent crime? Well looks like they were wrong. Along with Canada and Australia, England is experiencing a huge increase in crimes committed with firearms. Of course you did not see this reported in the MSM, since gun contol is on their agenda. Read about the surge in crime here - Sailor

FoxNews is reporting that embattled UC president, Elizabeth Hoffman has resigned. Between the football recruiting scandal and the Ward Churchill fiasco, it is surprising it took this long for her to resign or be fired. Now, UC should fire Ward Churchill. Read it here . Some more on this at Moonbat Central. - Sailor

Well looks like Teresa Heinz is still in denial. Now she is claiming the voting machines could have been hacked and that is why Bush may have been re-elected. See the story here. - Sailor

Seems now Giuliana Sgrena is claiming there was no checkpoint, that a US tank just drove up along side and opened fire. Neal's Nuze has more on this, including a link to an English language translation of Sgrena's article in Il Manifesto. It should be noted that Il Manifesto is an anti-American, Marxist/Leninist publication. Not that you would know that from the MSM

Sgrena also claims that some 300 to 400 rounds were fired. This is the armament of an Abrams sans the 120mm smooth bore gun:

The commander has a 12.7mm Browning M2 machine gun and the loader has a 7.62mm M240 machine gun. A 7.62mm M240 machine gun is also mounted coaxially on the right hand side of the main armament.

Take a trip to Little Green Footballs for a picture of the vehicle Sgrena was riding in. Do note the intact windshield.

This story of Sgrena's is begining to smell like 3 day old pesci! - Sailor

We all saw what Senator Robert (KKK) Byrd had to say about the so called "nuclear option". Of course, it was not widley mentioned that Byrd was the architect of a similar option back when the dems controlled the Senate. OpinionJornal.com looks at what they think should be called the "Byrd option"

You can read it here.

Sailor

A clearer picture of who and what Giuliana Sgrena is begins to take shape. A full investigation is needed here. The Sailor is begining to smell a set up here. - Sailor

Sunday, March 6, 2005 8:12 a.m. EST
NewsMax.com
Sgrena: U.S. Troops Are War Criminals

Giuliana Sgrena, the Italian reporter who is accusing U.S. troops of firing on her vehicle for no reason after being released by Iraqi terrorists on Friday, is a harsh critic of the U.S. liberation who has written dozens of reports accusing American soldiers of war crimes, torture and massacring Iraqi civilians.

Covering the Iraq war for Italy's communist newspaper, Il Manifesto, Sgrena painted a sharply negative picture, for instance, of last November's U.S. assault on Fallujah.


"Fallujah is dying under the criminally indifferent gaze not only of the United States, but also of the Iraqi government, or at least the interim Prime Minister Allawi," she complained, in reports still available on Il Manifesto's English language Web site.

As U.S. Marines risked their lives in dangerous house-to-house searches designed to protect innocent civilians, Sgrena wrote: "The massacre in Fallujah continues."

The Il Manisfesto reporter made a specialty of interviewing Iraqis who claimed they had been tortured by U.S. troops, often relying on anonymously sourced secondhand accounts to spread the wildest charges.

One of her interview subjects claimed that women and children were being systematically tortured at Abu Ghraib by Americans, who, she said, repeatedly hurled one Iraqi woman against a wall and forced another "to separate faeces from urine, using her own hands."

"And what about children, how were they treated?" Sgrena asked. "We heard them screaming. They were tortured too. Mostly dogs were set on them," her source claimed.

The Italian reporter seldom sounded as outraged over the attacks by Osama bin Laden's operational chief in Iraq, Abu Musab al Zarqawi - who personally beheaded kidnap victims and killed hundreds with car bombs.

"Zarqawi, the man the US claims they are destroying Fallujah in order to capture ... obviously is not among those pinned to the banks of the Euphrates by American forces," Sgrena reported, before passing along the top terrorist's latest Internet message.

"[He] urged the rebels to fight on: 'Heroes of Islam in Fallujah, may your holy war be blessed. ... We have no doubt that the signs of Allah's victory will appear on the horizon.'"

After her release and medical treatment for wounds sustained when her car attempted to run a U.S. checkpoint on Friday, Sgrena praised her terrorist captors for treating her humanely.

"I was never treated badly," Sgrena told her colleagues at Il Manifesto upon her arrival in Rome, according to Bloomberg News.

Could it be that Dan Rather's career started with him taking credit for some thing he did not do? This makes for quite an interesting read. Do note that a veteran CBS newsman says that CBS's election 2004 was a "gut job" on Bush. - Sailor

Wrong from the Beginning
From the March 14, 2005 issue:

Even in 1963, Dan Rather was a poor excuse for a newsman.
The Weekly Standard
by Philip Chalk
03/14/2005, Volume 010, Issue 24


WHEN CBS ANNOUNCED THAT IT will smile through the pain of Dan Rather's dying credibility with an hour-long retirement tribute in early March, the network released an image of a young Rather posing in front of the Texas School Book Depository, looking gravely into the distance. While a little nostalgia was understandable--what, no photo of Rather huddled over a fax machine last October?--CBS still managed to remind those who knew the anchor during his salad days in Texas how tendentious and unprincipled he was even then.

Eddie Barker, for one, remembers. The news director for CBS's radio and TV affiliates in Dallas at the time of President Kennedy's November 22, 1963, assassination, Barker is widely credited with first reporting on the air that the president was dead, having received word through a doctor acquaintance directly from the hospital ER. Rather, then based in Dallas as a reporter for CBS's national news broadcast and working out of Barker's newsroom, later took credit for the scoop, Barker says. The error is repeated in historical accounts often enough to annoy the now-retired Barker, though he says the falsehood was later acknowledged by Rather.

It was a different lie--one delivered on national news, and at the expense of children--that caused Rather trouble at the time. As reporters from around the world descended on the Texas city, Rather went on the air with a local Methodist minister who made a stunning claim: Children at Dallas's University Park Elementary School had cheered when told of the president's death.

The tale was perfect for the moment, reinforcing the notion among distant media elites that Dallas was a reactionary "City of Hate." It slyly played to a local audience, too: The school named was in upper-income University Park, one of two adjacent municipal enclaves that shared a school district and a reputation for fiercely protected, lily-white privilege. Finally, for the ambitious Rather--a native Texan and then a Dallas resident--the account represented the very sort of revealing, local dirt that the throngs of out-of-town competitors would have to work far harder to get.

Except that it wasn't true, and Rather knew it, Barker says.

Approached earlier by the same minister with what was a second-hand account, Barker himself had run the story by the school's principal and some teachers, all of whom denied it outright. Because of the shooting, which took place at 12:30 p.m., the principal had decided to close the school early, though without telling the students why. The children at the school--including three of Barker's own--were merely happy to be going home early, he was told. There couldn't have been any spontaneous cheering at the news of Kennedy's murder, because no such news had been announced.

Undaunted, the dogged minister--"a very, very strong liberal and a very, very strong Kennedy supporter," Barker says--moved on to Rather.

"Rather came to me, and I said, 'My kids are in school there, and I checked it out, and there's not a darn thing to it,'" says Barker. "He said, 'Well, great--I'll just forget it.' But instead of forgetting it, he went out and did this gut job on Dallas and its conservatism," with the preacher's story at the center of his report.

With the discredited account likely to be challenged by the local affiliate's editors before being fed to New York, Rather sidestepped a customary film-editing session with Barker and arranged to file the report live instead, Barker says. "And so here's Dan with the preacher, telling this story about kids at UP cheering when told the president was dead."

Livid at being lied to, Barker laid into Rather as soon as he returned to the newsroom, expelling the reporter and all his national-news colleagues from the building on the spot. "I said 'Get the hell out of here--you and this whole damn bunch!'" he says.

Barker's local TV and radio crews scrambled to arrange on-air interviews with teachers to rebut the story, but the lie had already traveled halfway around the world and would become an enduring part of JFK assassination lore. In the meantime, CBS was threatening to pull its affiliation with the two local stations for having given Rather and his colleagues the boot.

"The next day I let him back in," Barker says. "But I wanted to make darn sure that he knew he couldn't pull that kind of crap with me."

While well-known in broadcast-news circles, the incident did nothing to slow Rather's rise; his Kennedy coverage was decisive in his eventual move up to CBS's New York headquarters. "You have to give him credit," says Barker. "He's a very aggressive guy."

Aggressive to a fault, as the ignominious end of his four-plus decades at CBS makes plain. As Barker himself--a CBS newsman for most of his career--says, "Anybody who followed CBS's coverage last year knows that they were doing a gut job on the president."

Philip Chalk, member of the University Park Elementary class of 1974, is production director at The Weekly Standard.

"Rescued" Italian journalist, Giuliana Sgrena, claims that from 300 to 400 rounds were fired at the car she was in. All of the rounds, she claims were from an armored vehicle. My question is; how in the hell did she survive this? You may find the asnwer over at Little Green Footballs. LGF as a picture of the "bullet riddled" car there. So hop on over using the link from the Sailor's blogroll. One other thing here that the MSM have failed to mention; Giuliana Sgrena is a reporter for the Marxist/Lenonist paper called Il Manifesto.

Also drop by Obnoxious Droppings, also accessable from the Sailor's blogroll. GOC in NC has a link to Michelle Malkin's article on this.

Some thing is begining to smell here and it is not the calamari. - Sailor

Seems the world is waking up to a new era and it all may be becasuce of President Bush. Well, at least the Chicago Tribune may be seeing it that way. - Sailor

Um, `Could Bush be right?'

Published March 6, 2005
Chicago Tribune Editorial


Who on Earth wants to be known as the last foe of freedom?

Not Crown Prince Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, who Thursday joined a chorus of leaders telling Syrian President Bashar Assad to end his nation's three-decade occupation of Lebanon.

Not Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, who abruptly announced plans to hold the first free, multiparty election in his country's history.

Not President Mahmoud Abbas, whose path to Palestinian independence is now blocked less by Israel than by peace-averse militant groups such as Islamic Jihad and Hamas.

And certainly not the brave peoples of Afghanistan, of Georgia, of Ukraine, of Iraq, who have raised loud their voices for freedom, often at peril to their lives. Each day, new tremors signal populist demands in lands where freedom has not thrived. This is, then, one of those explosive moments when history is written not in books, but screaming headlines.

Now it is Lebanon's turn, with citizens by the millions heralding a "cedar revolution." Is it possible that Iran, with its repressive and unpopular mullahs, could be next? And in sclerotic Syria, who today would buy Assad futures?

That, of course, is the dilemma dictators face in these moments of tumult: When history lurches, where will it next land?

For that matter, why does it lurch? Why is this happening now?

The prophet pro tem of the world's spreading freedom movement is Walid Jumblatt, the influential patriarch of Druze Muslims in Lebanon. He has long been a critic of the U.S. and Israel, but of late has been a thorn to the occupying Syrians. Since he spoke to a Washington Post columnist on Feb. 23, his assessment--heresy to many listeners--has resonated around the globe:

"It's strange for me to say it, but this process of change has started because of the American invasion of Iraq. I was cynical about Iraq. But when I saw the Iraqi people voting three weeks ago, 8 million of them, it was the start of a new Arab world. The Syrian people, the Egyptian people, all say that something is changing. The Berlin Wall has fallen. We can see it."

On the same evening Jumblatt spoke, a hitherto unthinkable headline--it, too, continues to ripple around the world--erupted on the Web site of the German newsmagazine Der Spiegel: "Could George W. Bush be right?"

Beneath that radical thought, writer Claus Christian Malzahn likened Bush's then pending visit to Germany to President Ronald Reagan standing before the Brandenburg Gate in 1987: "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall."

In January, setting the tone of his second term, Bush had told reporters: "I believe democracy can take hold in parts of the world that have been condemned to tyranny. And I believe when democracies take hold, it leads to peace."

The response in Der Spiegel: "Bush's idea of a Middle Eastern democracy imported at the tip of a bayonet is, for [German liberals], the hysterical offspring of the American neo-cons. Even German conservatives find the idea that Arabic countries could transform themselves into enlightened democracies somewhat absurd. ... Europeans today--just like the Europeans of 1987--cannot imagine that the world might change. ... We Europeans always want to have the world from yesterday, whereas the Americans strive for the world of tomorrow."

In a follow-up article posted Friday, Der Spiegel asked, "How quickly can the virus of democracy spread?"

That is the question for other despots as they contemplate the likely fate of Saddam Hussein. They're trapped in their own spider holes. No longer can they survive solely by stoking public hatred of the Great Satan. As citizens who witness democracy in neighboring Iraq and upheaval in Lebanon ask, "Why not us?" the enemy of the tyrant becomes not so much the United States, but the aspirations of his own people.

No movement has only one catalyst: Palestinians, for example, needed to be free of Yasser Arafat before independence could emerge as an option. But Washington's muscular diplomacy unarguably is playing a crucial role throughout the Mideast. For one repressive regime after another, the sight of American soldiers at long last enforcing United Nations resolutions--and bestowing democracy on a subjugated people--surely must concentrate the mind.

History written in headlines can reverse course just as fast. We are a long way from knowing whether the still unfinished liberation of Iraq helps transform a troubled region. But for the foes of freedom, the Mideast must feel like a suddenly smaller place.





Copyright © 2005, Chicago Tribune

'NON-NEGOTIABLE'

New York Post
Interview with President Bush


March 6, 2005 -- THE PRESIDENT: Freedom is on the march, and that's good for the world and it's good for America. That's what I believe. You know, the elections in Afghanistan, the elections in Iraq, the elections for the Palestinian people, the elections in Ukraine, street demonstrations in Beirut demanding the removal of Syrian troops and intelligence services — things are happening. And the United States of America is glad to be a part of it.

Q: When you were standing at Ground Zero, did you imagine that . . . progress was going to come this quickly and this profoundly?

President Bush: When I was standing at Ground Zero, I was so overwhelmed by the moment that my vision was focused on preventing this from happening again and bringing to justice those who did us in, did the buildings in. It took me a while to fully understand . . . out of this evil will come some good.

It was hard to envision the tremendous change that would take place as a result of democracies taking hold in a place like Afghanistan. Our first mission was to rout out the Taliban. [Then I] began to really fully understand the possibilities . . . when I met [Afghanistan's then-interim President Mohammed] Karzai, for example, it was absolutely convincing to me that a democracy would take hold in Afghanistan . . . .

I believe that individuals can help shape the course of events. Leadership matters; courage matters. And I was beginning to get a sense of that courage when I met these people who love freedom . . . . And the possibilities became real, were confirmed by the first Afghan elections.

[But] no, at Ground Zero then, it was very emotional. It was hard to be clear-visioned on September the 14th.

Q: But touching on Ground Zero, it was an emotional moment — an important moment . . . people were still in deep shock and — the words of your leadership. Because of that moment and how important it was for your presidency and important it was for a lot of your constituents, [do] you still take a keen focus on the redevelopment of that site?



President Bush: New York is a fabulous place. It is a resilient, brave city, and I'm confident that what will be built there will be a fitting tribute to freedom . . .

[I was] standing up there, and [I said] "I hear you and the world will hear us" — it was just one of those things that just popped right out. It wasn't something somebody handed me [on] a nice little note; And maybe — that's probably why it had the impact it had, because it wasn't viewed as scripted, because it wasn't.

Q: Mr. President, [when New Yorkers criticize] United States foreign policy, particularly with regard to Iraq and the Middle East, I tend to remember your words, that many of us will not live to see the result of this, if I can paraphrase.

President Bush: Yes.

Q: [Has] the rapidity of events in that part of the world changed your view, that maybe there will be tangible results before our time is over?

President Bush: That's an interesting question. I think it's very important for me to not get completely swept up with the rapidity of things right now and recognize that it does take time to change culture and habit.

One of the problems we face in this world is that the expectation of things happening quickly is large. You know, it hasn't been a year since we passed sovereignty in Iraq, and that's not very long.

Certain countries can't move as fast as we'd like. But nevertheless, it is easier to imagine now that maybe things will happen quicker than I thought. But I'm not going to allow myself to get too enthusiastic, because we're talking about substantive change after years of public foreign policy that really didn't — was kind of: We'll let the tyrant stand, in hopes that we achieve a short-term objective.

So I think — I'm going to be — I'm excited about the events, but I recognize I need to be patient. And it's very important for the president to have a sense of realism when it comes to what's possible and not, so that you don't create expectations amongst the citizens of our country, as well as the world.

What's interesting right now, the subject that is most on my mind, is getting Syria out of Lebanon. And I had a very good visit with Jacques Chirac on that subject, because he agrees.

And I don't mean just [some of ] the troops out of Lebanon, I mean all of them out of Lebanon, particularly the secret service — the intelligence services, which are embedded in the Lebanese government. Lebanon is a democracy, and we need more democracies in the Middle East. We need more beacons in order to lay the foundation for substantive change for generations to come.

And so I think we've got a very good opportunity to speak with one voice — America, France and others — to make it clear to Mr. Assad: This is non-negotiable; it is time to get out.

Q: He's not in a position to resist for any long period of time, right? You effectively isolated him.

President Bush: I think we've got a good chance to achieve that objective, and to make sure that the May elections are fair. I don't think you can have fair elections with Syrian troops there.

The reason I bring that up is, part of the question you asked, things are happening. That happened a lot quicker than you and I thought. But it's a moment for the world to then say, wait a minute, we are for democracies, here's a democracy, let's make sure that democracy works.

Q: Mr. President, you know, freedom being on the march, the one area where it may have gone backward is Russia. And I'd be interested to know, after your trip to Europe — when you shook Mr. Putin's hand and looked him in the eyes, was he still a man you feel you can trust?

President Bush: I think the relationship is good, person-to-person. In other words, he tells me what's on his mind, I tell him what's on my mind. And that's an important relationship to have. Because when I spoke publicly there in Bratislava, I did explain to the press corps there that Mr. Putin and I were alone for quite a period of time — at his request — and I expressed my country's love for democracy, and all aspects of it, including a free press, and free religion, and the ability of people to congregate, and that it is important for our friends to embrace those very same principles.

I've had a relationship where, when he tells me something I believe him. He's been straightforward with me, and I'm very straightforward with him. Obviously, I've expressed concerns about some of the decisions he has made, and it's very important that our friends around the world continue to say to Vladimir, your interests lie West, Russia is a European country, and as a European country there are certain values we share.

Now, Putin did say two interesting things that I thought were important. [He said] we're a democracy, we're not going back; and there are not two types of democracies — which I thought were revealing comments.

Russia is a really important country. It spans eight time zones; it touches a lot of borders of other countries. I've told Vladimir Putin that I believe it's in his country's interest that he be surrounded by democracies, which are peaceful, and that it's best that all of us work together to help fledgling democracies succeed. And he took it aboard. And I'm going to see him again in May when I go overseas for the 60th anniversary of the end of World War II.

Q: We've all been sort of in awe of the Secretary of State, watching her travel around the world.

President Bush: Yes.

Q: Do you think she'd be a good President?

President Bush: Look, if I catch her thinking that way [laughter] I'm going to remind her I picked her to be the Secretary of State because I'm confident that she can do a good job. Listen, Condi Rice is a remarkable woman. She is bright, talented, firm and clearly sees where the world is going. And she's going to do a very good job.

She and I are very close. We were close during four interesting years, and we spent a lot of time together. And she knows how I think, and I know how she thinks. Every problem in the world comes to this desk. It's an interesting thing, isn't it? Which means the relationship between Condi and me and between Hadley and Condi — Steve is the National Security Adviser — and Rumsfeld and me, key players in the national security team, have got to be close and there's got to be an understanding, there's got to be frank discussion.

You know, Condi could march right in here and say, you know, hey, Mr. President, you have to think this way, why are you thinking this. She'll lay her opinions flat out. She is a confident person, and that's what I want. I want somebody to come in here and say, you know, have you thought about this, or, you can't do it that way, in my judgment. However, she's also the kind of person, when I make up my mind, it's, yes, sir, Mr. President, I'll put it in place.

To all the leftists, whiners and illegal immigration supporters, the Sailor has highlighted a section of this article. Now, one or more of you go right ahead and try what is being suggested there. Let the Sailor know how you make out. We will keep a light on for you - Sailor

One Reporter's Opinion – Commonsense Immigration Policy
George Putnam
Friday, March 4, 2005
NewsMax.com

It is this reporter's opinion that when President Bush holds his three-way meeting with Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin and Mexican President Vicente Fox, he will have a golden opportunity to reach agreement on a problem that faces all three nations: illegal immigration.

Violence against one of our nations is truly against all of our nations. Our president received a serious warning February 17 in testimony before the Senate Intelligence Committee. On that occasion, CIA Director Porter Goss, FBI Director Robert Mueller and Admiral James Loy, deputy secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, all warned that al-Qaida and other terrorist organizations would use our poorly guarded porous border with Mexico to launch another lethal attack. Meanwhile, Osama bin Laden is enlisting Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi, his top operative in Iraq, to plan attacks.


Another item to be discussed will be that Martin decided not to take part in a continental missile defense shield, which is a snub to Bush. The missile defense is a system designed to shoot down ballistic missiles from such adversaries as North Korea. However, our president will go to the trilateral meeting with his plate full.


Bush obsessively pushes for CAFTA, an enlargement of the ill-fated NAFTA, the GAT and the WTO. The president is determined to press for a plan that would extend amnesty to 500,000 Mexican agricultural workers in the United States. His totalization agreement plan extending Social Security benefits to Mexican workers and his determination to reform Social Security at the same time, all but ignoring our own No. 1 crisis, Medicare - 50 million Americans still struggling without health protection - seem to this reporter as if the president has forgotten his real priorities.


We receive letters from our audience, Mr. President. One such listener over the past weekend sent us a thought-provoking piece, in the form of an obituary, making its rounds on the Internet. May I share it with you?


Today we mourn the passing of a beloved old friend, Mr. Common Sense.


Mr. Sense has been with us for many years – no one knows for sure how old he was, since his birth records were long ago lost in bureaucratic red tape.


He will be remembered as having cultivated such value lessons as:


knowing when to come in out of the rain

why the early bird gets the worm

life isn't always fair

Common Sense lived by simple, sound financial policies – don't spend more than you earn, reliable parenting strategies, adults, not kids, are in charge.


Common Sense's health began to rapidly deteriorate when well-intentioned but overbearing regulations were set in place:



reports of a 6-year-old boy charged with sexual harassment for kissing a classmate

teens suspended from school for using mouthwash after lunch

a teacher fired for reprimanding an unruly student, which only worsened his condition

Mr. Sense declined even further when schools were required to get parental consent to administer aspirin to a student but could not inform the parents when a student became pregnant and wanted to have an abortion.


Finally, Common Sense lost the will to live as the churches became businesses and criminals received better treatment than their victims.


Common Sense finally gave up the ghost after a woman failed to realize that a steaming cup of coffee was hot. She spilled a bit of it on her lap and was awarded a huge settlement.


Common Sense was preceded in death by his parents, Truth and Trust; his wife, Discretion; his daughter, Responsibility; and his son, Reason. He is survived by two stepbrothers, My Rights and I'm a Whiner.

Not many attended his funeral, so few realized that he was gone. But if you still remember Common Sense, pass this on to your friends. If not, join the majority and do nothing.


As long as we're talking common sense, how about considering what would happen if we gave Mexico a taste of its own medicine.

Try this sometime: Enter Mexico illegally. Never mind immigration quotas, visas, international law or any of that nonsense. Once in Mexico, demand that the local government provide free medical care for you and your entire family. Demand bilingual nurses and doctors. Demand free bilingual local government forms, bulletins, etc.


Procreate abundantly! Deflect any criticism of allegedly irresponsible reproductive behavior with "It's a cultural United States thing! You wouldn't understand it, pal!"


Keep your American identity strong; fly Old Glory from your rooftop. Proudly display it in your front window or on the car bumper. Speak only English at home and in public and insist your kids do likewise. Demand classes on American culture in the Mexican school system. Demand a local Mexican driver's license.


This will afford other legal rights and will go far to legitimize your unauthorized, illegal presence in Mexico. Insist that local Mexican law enforcement teach English to all of the officers.

Good luck, my friend. You'll either be demanding for the rest of time or you'll soon be dead. It will never happen. It will not happen in Mexico or any other country in the world except right here in the good old USA – in the land of the naive. Try it sometime.

The case is nicely built for CU to fire Ward Churchill. The question is; Does CU have the balls to do it? - Sailor

Churchill's active advocacy of violence demands his firing
By Dan Caplis And Craig Silverman
March 5, 2005

'Why, by the way, did it take Arabs to do what people here should have done a long time ago?" CU professor Ward Churchill asked his Seattle audience during a recorded discussion of the 9/11 attacks (Aug. 10, 2003).

There is a concerted effort by Ward Churchill and his supporters to limit the current debate to a discussion of his outrageous correlation of World Trade Center victims to "little Eichmanns." Such strategy is logical because, as grotesque and indecent as that analogy was, it would not alone warrant dismissal.

Read further in that Churchill essay, and he states that terrorists may next deliver a "dose of medicine" in the possible form of anthrax, mustard gas, sarin and/or a tactical nuclear device in order to "push back" and teach evil America a lesson. "As they should," professor Churchill proclaimed. "As they must."

For the intellectually curious, this was an invitation to explore further the professor's teachings. We promptly obtained and reviewed the prolific writings and recorded speeches of professor Churchill.

Colorado's public records laws were immediately utilized to gain access to nonprivileged information from CU.

Our investigation has led to inescapable conclusions. Churchill has made things up to put himself in a position to incite and actively advocate violence against the U.S. and its citizens.

Churchill stands credibly accused of ethnic fraud, grade retribution, falsification of the nature of his military service, academic fraud, plagiarism, selling other artists' creations as his own and falsely accusing Denver Post columnist Diane Carman of inventing incendiary quotations.

All this provides ample justification for termination pursuant to accusations of incompetence and lack of integrity. But it is Churchill's instructions on violence that demand immediate suspension followed by termination. Due process must be provided, but unless this accused can somehow suppress his own statements, he should ultimately lose his job.

Here is what Churchill preaches: The U.S. is fascist and Nazi-like. Genocide has been and continues to be perpetrated by our government here and abroad. America was illegally colonized by non-natives who now should be killed (One example of him saying this: "Killing the colonizer is a figurative proposition, it is a literal proposition, but either way, and by all available means, the proposition has to be fulfilled.")

According to this CU professor, violence is necessary to dismantle the illegal entity that is the U.S. Churchill's recorded reactions to 9/11 were "Right on!" and a statement that "The action was correct." On April 19, 1995, according to one former student, Churchill praised and celebrated the Oklahoma City bombing during his CU class.

Colorado law has long required teachers at state schools to execute an oath to uphold the U.S. Constitution. In 1969, CU professors sued to avoid the necessity of signing such a loyalty oath.

In upholding the law, the Honorable William Doyle, a CU grad and JFK appointee, wrote an opinion affirmed by the U.S. Supreme Court: The oath is an almost universal requirement of all public officials, including lawyers and judges, so it cannot be said that teachers are being picked on. Teachers would, however, be the first to admit that they work in a sensitive area in which they can shape the attitudes of the students with whom they come in contact. The state has a vital concern in the educational process and has the right not only to screen teachers as to their fitness, but also to be concerned about possible advocacy of overthrow of the government by force and violence.

Churchill has gone further than the prohibited advocacy of force and violence to overthrow the government. During a Q&A after the above-referenced August 2003 Seattle event, a white man asked how he could commit a terrorist act without alerting the target, eliciting the following response from the CU professor: "You carry the weapon. That's how they don't see it coming. You're the one. They talk about 'color blind or blind to your color.' You said it yourself. You don't send the Black Liberation Army into Wall Street to conduct an action. You don't send the American Indian Movement into downtown Seattle to conduct an action. Who do you send? You! With your beard shaved, your hair cut close and wearing a banker's suit."

This recording is available at www.khow.com.

Such direct instruction on methods of violence may expose its author to civil liability. Now that CU is on notice, the 1997 case of Rice v. Paladin Press should cause every Colorado taxpayer to worry about vicarious liability if Churchill's instructions result in the violence he advocates.

The ongoing employment of Churchill is a catastrophe for CU. The U.S. Supreme Court has held that a government employer can terminate an employee whose speech impairs its mission and reputation.

We do not seek to silence Churchill. Indeed, we have had him as a guest on our show and have invited him back for further discussion. We will even give him a half-hour of uninterrupted airtime if he will agree to answer our questions for the following half- hour.

As attorneys and radio talk-show hosts, we treasure free speech. From our divergent political perspectives, we vigorously debate the great issues of the day. Some issues are a matter of left vs. right. The Churchill controversy is a matter of right vs. wrong.

It is wrong to allow Churchill to continue as a CU professor. The credibility, platform and opportunities that attach to that position should be removed. The law and the facts support that conclusion.

Dan Caplis and Craig Silverman are veteran Denver trial attorneys and co-hosts of Caplis and Silverman on KHOW-AM (630), Monday-Friday 3-7 p.m.

My friend GOC in NC is going to love this one. Mark Steyn smacks the usual bunch of leftists around with a few facts. Mark does this in the way only Mark can. - Sailor

The right side of history
Mark Steyn
The Spectator UK

Mark Steyn admits that he’s been wrong about a lot in the past three years — but not about the big things


New Hampshire

The other day in the Guardian Martin Kettle wrote: ‘The war was a reckless, provocative, dangerous, lawless piece of unilateral arrogance. But it has nevertheless brought forth a desirable outcome which would not have been achieved at all, or so quickly, by the means that the critics advocated, right though they were in most respects.’

Very big of you, pal. And I guess that’s as close to a mea culpa as we’re going to get: even though Bush got everything wrong, it turned out right. Funny how that happens, isn’t it? In a few years’ time, they’ll have it down pat — just like they have with Eastern Europe. Oh, the Soviet bloc [the Middle East thugocracies] was bound to collapse anyway. Nothing to do with that simpleton Ronnie Raygun [Chimpy Bushitler]. In fact, all Raygun [Chimpy] did was delay the inevitable with his ridiculous arms build-up [illegal unprovoked Halliburton oil-grab], as many of us argued at the time: see my 1984 column ‘Yuri Andropov, The Young, Smart, Sexy New Face Of Soviet Communism’ [see the April 2004 Spectator column ‘Things Were Better Under Saddam: The coalition has destroyed Baathism, says Rod Liddle, and with it all hopes of the emergence of secular democracy’ — and yes, that really ran in these pages, on 17 April, not 1 April.]

By the way, when’s the next Not In Our Name rally? How about this Saturday? Millions of Nionists can flood into Trafalgar Square to proclaim to folks in Iraq and Lebanon and Egypt and Jordan and Saudi Arabia and the Palestinian Authority that all the changes under way in the region are most certainly Not In Their Name. Among the celebrity Nionists, Harold Pinter should be available to denounce Blair as a ‘war criminal’ and a ‘hired Christian thug’ one mo’ time. For as the Guardian reported this week, the great man announced that ‘he has decided to abandon his career as a playwright in order to concentrate exclusively on politics’.

That’s great news, isn’t it? One of the reasons Mr Pinter was right only ‘in most respects’ (as Martin Kettle would put it) is that he had to fit being right about everything in between composing 11-minute plays. Now he can devote his energies to it full time I’ve no doubt he’ll be right in all respects.

As for me, I got a lot of things wrong these last three years, but, looking at events in the Middle East this last week, I’m glad that, unlike the Nionist Entity, I got the big stuff right. On 8 May 2003, a couple of weeks after the fall of Saddam, I wrote in the Speccie’s then sister paper the Jerusalem Post:

‘You don’t invade Iraq in order to invade everywhere else, you invade Iraq so you don’t have to invade everywhere else.’

And so it’s turned out.

Some of the reasons for starting the remaking of the Middle East in Iraq were obvious within a day or two of 11 September. As I said back then, by his sheer survival, Saddam Hussein had become a symbol of America’s lack of will. As long as he was around, the message to Gaddafi, Arafat, Assad, Mubarak, the House of Saud and the rest of the gang was that we were still in a 10 September world. But the other reasons for starting in Iraq weren’t all so clear. After the liberation, the doom-mongers dusted down the old Bumper Boys’ Book of the British Empire and rattled off a zillion pseudo-authoritative backgrounders beginning, ‘Iraq was a new country cobbled together from several former Ottoman provinces, its lines drawn by the Europeans.’ That was Mark Mazower in the Independent. You get the cut of his jib: phony state, the slapdash creation of the Colonial Office, you can never make it work.

In fact, the artificially cobbled together country is one reason it’s worked so well. The Shia are the biggest group, but, even if they were utterly homogeneous, which they’re not, they’re not so big that they can impose their will easily on the Kurds and the Sunni. When the West’s headless chickens were running around squawking that there were more than a hundred parties on the ballot, it was all going to be one almighty mess, they failed to understand that the design flaw of Iraq is paradoxically its greatest strength: the traditional Arab solution — the local strongman — was not available. Instead, in the run-up to the election and in the month since, we’ve seen various groupings come together, hammer out areas of agreement, reach out to other coalitions, identify compromise positions, etc. — in a word, politics. The sight of eight million Iraqis going to the polls was profoundly moving to their neighbours in Syria, Lebanon, Egypt etc. But it was all the pluralist multi-party smoke-filled-room stuff that caught the fancy of the frustrated political class in those other countries. It would have been possible to find a friendly authoritarian Musharraf type and install him on one of Saddam’s solid gold toilets, but it would have been utterly uninspiring to the world beyond Iraq’s borders. It would have missed the point of the exercise.

I can understand why the transnational jet set — the EU, the UN, the NGO neo-imperialists, the foreign correspondents for CNN, the BBC and so forth — have a preference for strong, centralised states. The State Department was still in favour of keeping the Soviet Union together even after the Soviets had given up on it. It’s a pain in the neck to have to update your Rolodex every half-century or so, and when you do, you want to be able to write ‘President-for-Life Sy Kottik, also Defence Minister, Foreign Minister, Oil-for-Food Programme Director, Press Accreditation Supervisor, the one-stop shop for all your government-contacts needs — call Baghdad 001’. It’s a real nuisance to have to pencil in the Kurdish guy, and the Kurdish opposition guy, and the Sunni rejectionist, and the Sunni accommodationist and the secular Shiite and the theocrat Shiite; and that’s just for Kirkuk municipal council.

But it’s grossly condescending to assume that the Iraqi people would share your priorities. All through the worst moments of the insurgency — the real horrors in Fallujah, not the second-hand Nissan set alight on the edge of the Green Zone so the herd of foreign correspondents can film it from their hotel balconies — all through that darkest period, a few of us insisted that between two thirds and three quarters of Iraq was up and running smoothly with functioning government institutions and nascent political parties. And we were right. Don’t take my word for it — ask King Abdullah, who’s planning to duplicate some of Iraq’s political structures in Jordan.

A couple of years back, I went to hear Paul Wolfowitz. I knew him only by reputation — the most sinister of all the neocons, the big bad Wolfowitz, the man whose name started with a scary animal and ended Jewishly. In fact, he was a very soft-spoken chap, who compared the challenges of the Middle East with America’s experiments in democracy-spreading after the second world war. He said he thought it would take less time than Japan, and maybe something closer to the 1989 revolutions in Eastern Europe. I would have scoffed, but he knew so many Iraqis by name — not just Ahmed Chalabi, but a ton of others.

Around the same time, I bumped into Dominique de Villepin, the French foreign minister and man of letters. He was just back from Egypt, where he’d been profoundly moved when he’d been asked to convey the gratitude of the Arab people to President Chirac for working so tirelessly to prevent a tragic war between Christianity and Islam. You don’t say, I said. And, just as a matter of interest, who asked you to convey that? He hemmed and hawed and eventually said it was President Mubarak. Being a polite sort, I rolled my eyes only metaphorically, but decided as a long-term proposition I’d bet Wolfowitz’s address book of real people against Villepin’s hotline to over-the-hill dictators. The lesson of these last weeks is that it turns out Washington’s Zionists know the Arab people a lot better than Europe’s Arabists.

Islamism, with its plans to destroy America, take back Europe, colonise Australia and set you up with 72 virgins, may be bonkers but it’s a big idea. And you can’t beat it with a small, shrivelled idea like another decade or three of Mubarak or Assad or some such. The Bush administration decided that the only big idea they had to sell was liberty. The Europeans and the Europhile US media mostly scoffed. They’d been here before. Back in the Cold War, the Americans were able to use the phrase ‘the free world’ without irony; the French, Germans and even the British never were. This time round, the media assured us that what Iraqis wanted was not freedom but ‘security’. They didn’t all go as far as Rod Liddle, pining for the smack of firm Saddamite government, but they subscribed to the same general thesis: freedom is some airy-fairy illusion; in Saddam’s day, the streets were safe and there was no crime, apart from the ones he was committing. All wrong, as wrong as the ‘brutal Afghan winter’ and all the other media fictions. On 30 January, Bush’s big idea squared off against the head-hackers’ big idea — you vote, you die — and we know which one the Iraqi people chose, and which the rest of the region, to one degree or another, is following.

Here’s another line of mine that looks pretty good this week — my claim back in January that this is ‘the most important year in the region since Churchill drew the map of the modern Middle East in 1922’. I’ll stand on that one. But what I’d like to know is this: when Martin Kettle says he and the Nionists were right ‘in most respects’, which respects is he thinking of? What exactly did the Nionist Entity get right? That the seething ‘Arab street’ would rise up? Well, after three and a half years they finally did — in Beirut. There never was an ‘Arab street’: that’s part of the same reductive thinking that leads Dominique de Villepin to pass off some feeble schmoozing from Mubarak as the voice of the Muslim people. The entire concept of the ‘Arab street’ was lazy and condescending.

With hindsight, the fellow travellers were let off far too easily when the Iron Curtain fell like a discarded burka. Little more than a decade later, they barely hesitated a moment before jumping in on the wrong side of history yet again — and this time without the excuse that the ideological virtues of communism had merely gone awry in practice. It’s hard to make that argument about Islamism or Baathism, though Rod Liddle gamely gave the latter a whirl. But personally I hope if ever I find myself one of the unfortunate subjects of a totalitarian dictatorship, that it’s Bush and the Republicans who take up my cause rather than the Left.

The other day I found myself, for the umpteenth time, driving in Vermont behind a Kerry/Edwards supporter whose vehicle also bore the slogan ‘FREE TIBET’. It must be great to be the guy with the printing contract for the ‘FREE TIBET’ stickers. Not so good to be the guy back in Tibet wondering when the freeing thereof will actually get under way. For a while, my otherwise not terribly political wife got extremely irritated by these stickers, demanding to know at a pancake breakfast at the local church what precisely some harmless hippy-dippy old neighbour of ours meant by the slogan he’d been proudly displaying decade in, decade out: ‘But what exactly are you doing to free Tibet?’ she demanded. ‘You’re not doing anything, are you?’ ‘Give the guy a break,’ I said back home. ‘He’s advertising his moral virtue, not calling for action. If Rumsfeld were to say, “Free Tibet? Jiminy, what a swell idea! The Third Infantry Division go in on Thursday”, the bumper-sticker crowd would be aghast.’

But for those of us on the arrogant unilateralist side of things, that’s not how it works. ‘FREE AFGHANISTAN’. Done. ‘FREE IRAQ’. Done. Given the paintwork I pull off every time I have to change the sticker, it might be easier for the remainder of the Bush presidency just to go around with ‘FREE [INSERT YOUR FETID TOTALITARIAN BASKET-CASE HERE]’. Not in your name? Don’t worry, it’s not.

Here is an editorial from a major US Newspaper, weighing in on the assault on free speech in the blogosphere. - Sailor

Excesses in McCain-Feingold
Washington Times Editorial
March 5, 2005

The 2004 presidential campaign gave the lie to the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002 -- otherwise known as McCain-Feingold, whose intent is to keep "big money" out of politics. Billionaire George Soros is probably still chuckling about that. Now, Federal Election Commission commissioner Bradley Smith warns that legally it could be used to stifle free speech on the Internet.

Here's how: The law regulates political advertising coordinated with political campaigns that appears on "any broadcast, cable or satellite communication, newspaper, magazine, outdoor advertising facility, mass mailing or telephone bank to the general public, or any other form of general public political advertising." In 2002, the FEC decided (4-2) that the law, as expansive as it was, did not apply to the Internet.

But last September U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly overturned the decision, arguing that the "commission's exclusion of Internet communications from the coordinated communications regulation severely undermines" the law's purpose. Interpreting this, Mr. Smith told CNET News that "any coordinated activity over the Internet would need to be regulated, as a minimum." This includes, but is not limited to, blogs and other sources of political news and opinion that might link to a candidate's Web page. This leaves bloggers and online news sources in a state of regulatory limbo. "Would a link to a candidate's page be a problem?" Mr. Smith asks. "If someone sets up a home page and links to their favorite politician, is that a contribution?"

Good questions. Many blogs link to a particular candidate's Web page not for contribution reasons, but to cite a candidate's comments or positions. For instance, the primary purpose of National Review Online's the Kerry Spot was to track John Kerry's presidential campaign, and the site linked to the campaign's Web site hundreds of times. By the standards of McCain-Feingold, as interpreted by Judge Kollar-Kotelly, the Kerry Spot was contributing to Mr. Kerry's campaign. So far, the law has not been used this way, though both Sens. John McCain and Russ Feingold believe it should. Judge Kollar-Kotelly's decision also may be right.

Considering the ever-increasing influence the Internet is having on politics, it's not a stretch to imagine a day when a battered politician finally forces the FEC's hand. It's up to Congress to check the law's excesses and reaffirm its commitment to the First Amendment.

Mike Rosen has a few thhings to say about Colorado University and the Ward Churchill debacle. - Sailor

Rosen: CU is worth fighting for
Rocky Mountain News
By Mike Rosen
March 4, 2005

Thank you Ward Churchill! As the poster child for so much of what's wrong with higher education today, you moved this issue from the back burner to the front burner of public policy. Whether you stay or go is merely another battle. This is about the war of ideas.

Richard Rorty is a philosophy professor at the University of Virginia. He's also editor of an unabashedly socialist magazine, Dissent, and a hero of the academic left. Here's his political assessment of academe: "The power base of the Left in America is now in the universities, since the trade unions have largely been killed off. The universities have done a lot of good work by setting up, for example, African-American studies programs, Women's Studies programs, and Gay and Lesbian Studies programs. They have created power bases for these movements."

Movements? If you had any illusions that these programs were simply "studying" these areas, now you know better. Like Churchill's Ethnic Studies program, they're all "movements." And American universities have become "the power base of the Left."

The debate stimulated by the Churchill affair has escalated into a long overdue exploration into the politics and processes of higher education. The sacred cow of tenure is under review, along with the limits of academic freedom and the shameful lack of ideological balance within college faculties. It's like peeling off the outer layers of an artichoke to get to the heart of the issue.

And this is it:
1) Ideology and politics. As Rorty proudly proclaims, the Left has taken over academe. We want it back.
2) Accountability. Self-important academics believe themselves to be beyond reproach, sitting as philosopher-kings, dispensing their wisdom to the ignorant masses. Nonsense. They're ordinary people, government employees dependent on their customers and the taxpayers for their income, and ultimately accountable to their bosses and the citizens who elect the Board of Regents. Academic freedom is not absolute.

One hundred ninety-nine CU faculty members, in an ad in the Boulder Daily Camera, have "demanded" that the investigation of Churchill be "stopped immediately." They argue that inquiries into his alleged plagiarism, misrepresentation of sources cited in his "scholarly" writings, false claims of Indian status in his affirmative action job application, and incitements to commit violence should be inadmissible because he had originally been criticized only for his ideas. Please. This is like saying a fugitive serial killer should be released because he was originally stopped by the police for making an illegal left turn. Churchill's potty mouth is what got him noticed.

Some of his apologists have resorted to playing the "McCarthyism" card. Nonsense. This implies that Churchill is being unjustly hounded for things he has not done or things that cause no harm.

On the contrary, Churchill's misdeeds appear to be quite tangible, deadly serious and extremely harmful. That's why there's an investigation. Let's see what it concludes.

Professor Charles Braider, director of the Center for Humanities and Arts, says the Churchill investigation has caused a "chilling effect" on curriculum and is "affecting the very life of the university." Good. It's about time. I'd prefer to call it a remedial, correcting effect.

Whatever the outcome for Churchill, the battle lines have formed and are hardening. Here's what many of us, I hope most, would like to see: substantive change, a revolution even, at the University of Colorado. It must start with electing regents who have a commitment to restoring real, intellectual diversity and an evenhanded exchange of ideas. That means hiring conservative professors to balance the now left-lopsided scales.

It means ending politically correct speech codes for students and the "diversity" and "sensitivity" re-education camps freshmen are forced to attend. It means a housecleaning of administrators, starting with President Betsy Hoffman. It means hiring new administrators with sufficient backbone to take on the entrenched, leftist faculty with knowledge that the regents will stand behind those administrators. If the changing culture disturbs some in the tenured left who preferred their monopoly, let them leave, and good riddance.

We're told that applications from out-of-state students - who subsidize Colorado students by paying six times the resident tuition - have fallen off sharply. Here's the perfect remedy: Convert CU into a bastion of conservative thought, making it the only big-time state university in the country of that kind. The pent-up demand for such a school is overwhelming.

Multitudes of students would beat a path to our door.



Mike Rosen's radio show airs daily from 9 a.m. to noon on 850 KOA.

This is the second article the Sailor has found where an member of theFEC has reservations on stiffling the blogosphere. The FEC needs to appeal this judge's ruling and soon. The Sailor is always amazed how judges can find stuff in laws that is not in the law. - Sailor.

Monday, 14-Feb-2005 9:40AM
Story from United Press International
Copyright 2005 by United Press International (via ClariNet)

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
WASHINGTON, Feb. 14 (UPI) -- The Federal Election Commission will soon look at ways to tighten restrictions on political activities in cyberspace, Roll Call said Monday.

The idea make some FEC members uneasy.

"I don't think the FEC should do anything that restricts or interferes with the ability of citizens at the grass-roots level to use the Internet or support the candidates of their choice," FEC Vice Chairman Michael Toner said.

Under U.S. law, coordinated communications are considered campaign contributions subject to strict limits. Regulations adopted in 2002 carved out an exemption for coordinated political communications transmitted over the Internet, which is exactly the sort of thing the FEC now wants to review.

Toner said there is no evidence Congress intended to regulate the Internet when it enacted the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act.

"Congress is clearly familiar with the fact that the Internet is an increasingly important tool in politics and yet did not mention it in the McCain-Feingold law so I still see no evidence that Congress intended to regulate the Internet at all," Toner said.

All across the Middle East, democracy is coming into bloom. Iraq, Lebanon, Egypt and yes, even Syria. Here at home the leftists and the democrats are running around, whining, gnashing their collective teeth and generally running amok with hate and their usual brand of intolerance. - Sailor

Good Collateral Damage

By Bryan Preston
Published 03/04/2005
Tech Central Station

No matter how careful you are, whenever you go to war you will inevitably injure or even kill someone other than your enemy. It's called collateral damage, and the United States goes far out of its way to minimize it as much as possible. Collateral damage can wreck our moral standing in the eyes of the world and undermine our cause, no matter how just. But, depending on your perspective, not all collateral damage is necessarily bad. In toppling the Soviet Union to win the Cold War, for instance, positive collateral damage fell on the entire East bloc, freeing millions whom Communism had enslaved. And we're now seeing the building of a wave of positive collateral damage in the Middle East, helping us defeat the insurgents in Iraq and win the broader war.


Across the entire Middle East, protests and movements toward freedom are building pressure on the brittle, one-man-rule governments there. In Lebanon, thousands protesting in the streets brought down the Syrian-backed government and may yet push the Syrians entirely out of that country. The Syrians now face a choice, to either crack down the way the Soviets did during the 1960s or to let Lebanon go its own way, similar to the way the Soviets let Eastern Europe spin out of their orbit in 1989. A crackdown with American forces just over the border in Iraq invites intervention, which could lead to the end of the Assad regime. Letting Lebanon go could produce the kind of groundswell within Syria that could also lead to the end of the Assad regime. The war in Iraq was not primarily about getting terrorist-supporting tyrant Bashar Assad booted from his throne, but he may become positive collateral damage. The war in Iraq was also not primarily about getting terrorists out of Lebanon's Bekka Valley, but getting Syria out of Lebanon will probably put the terrorists Syria keeps in the valley out of business. That collateral damage helps Israel, which has been plagued by those Syrian-backed terrorists for decades.



Meanwhile in Egypt, President-for-life Hosni Mubarak's recent arrest of a political dissident has led, oddly enough, to Mubarak calling for free, or at least free-er, elections. Calling for free elections was among the things that got the dissident arrested, yet now the same call is coming from the man who ordered his arrest. It's another example of the beneficial collateral damage spreading across the Middle East. A deposed Taliban and a vanquished Saddam, coupled with a failed al Qaeda insurgency and added to the Bush administration's pro-democracy assertiveness are combining to collaterally damage all sorts of things that weren't necessarily targets of the war but weren't helpful to our cause, either.



Before leaving the Middle East, it's worth noting two other examples of collateral damage, one in the bag and the other on its way there. Libya was once enemy number one, but today its nuclear weapons program is crated up in Tennessee, shipped there after the invasion of Iraq convinced Ghaddafi that might end up in a spider hole if he didn't get on America's good side. And the House of Saud recently allowed the first municipal elections in the kingdom's history. Though only men were allowed to vote, one of that country's bazillion princes promised that women will get to vote in the next go-round. He even said he thought women made "more sensible" voters than men. That is coming from a kingdom that doesn't even allow women to drive and would not allow American servicewomen serving there to, well, do much of anything in the presence of a Saudi man. Yet women will soon vote in elections there. Both the Libyan nuclear program and the House of Saud's misogynistic grip on power have suffered collateral damage from the war on Iraq.



With all of this happy collateral damage going on, the sensible thing for the Bush administration's domestic opposition to do would be to lend credit where it's due while drawing distinctions on policies that effect the American pocketbook. By doing that they could work the foreign policy successes to a draw and start making inroads on the other issues where they might press an advantage. But as a party the words "Democrats" and "sensible" probably don't even belong in the same sentence anymore. That party appears determined to destroy itself flailing against obvious administration success while promoting no useful policies of its own. Thus all around Democrat-dominated Vermont this week, fifty towns voted on whether to support the war in Iraq that began nearly two years ago and is on its way to a successful end. Thus on Jon Stewart's Daily Show the other night, former Clinton aide Nancy Soderberg actually hoped that the Arab street that has been busy of late rising up against local tyrants and terrorists will instead turn on George W. Bush and the American troops in the region on his orders. And thus this week Senator Robert Byrd compared a proposal to change an arcane Senate debating rule to the legal machinations of Adolph Hitler. And thus the new chairman of the Democratic party, Governor Howard Dean (he insists that his new staff at the DNC call him that) describes the usual tussle between his party and the Republicans as "a struggle of good and evil." He added, somewhat defensively, "And we're the good." If you have to add the latter sentence, it's because you either think your audience may not know which side is which, or because you doubt it yourself.



We are seeing not a party that believes it has any chance of regaining lost power, but a party bent on preaching to an ever-shrinking base of its true believers. It may well be the last gasps of a dying political force. If the Democrats keep going they way they are going, they too will become collateral damage in this war. The war against Saddam Hussein, Osama bin Laden and the rest of the Middle East's worst and dimmest will have inadvertently destroyed America's oldest political party.



Bryan Preston is a multimedia producer and freelance writer, as well as author of JunkYardBlog.

It is nice to note that at least one journalist thinks that the blogosphere is a good thing. - Sailor

The Best Thing That Has Ever Happened to Journalism

By Ralph Kinney Bennett
Published 03/04/2005
Tech Central Station


Bloggers are the best thing that has ever happened to journalism.

They make a good reporter look better. They expose the phonies, the poseurs, the fast-writing conmen, with the speed of light.



They give the journalist a greater access to more information and informational context than ever before.



They provide swift exposure to varied points of view, and, most importantly, a constant, sometimes rough, but always important gauge of a reporter's skill, judgment, industriousness and integrity.



Never before has weak reporting, biased reporting, dishonest reporting, or lazy reporting been more swiftly exposed.



Indeed, the whole idea of whether journalism is indeed a profession -- or just a happy combination of craft, curiosity, cleverness and confidence tricks -- is being tested for the first time out there in the ether.



As a semi-retired veteran of what we long ago called "the newspaper game," I find the whole advent of the blogs exhilarating. They have made the game more exciting and challenging than ever.



I'll try to put you through as little "my life in journalism" crap as possible -- enough to establish my, perhaps, shabby bona fides for "sharing" on this subject.



By the time I was in fifth grade I set my heart on being a reporter. I never heard the word "journalism" until I was in high school. Through a series of fortunate events I was able to work all my summers and college class breaks as a reporter for a daily newspaper -- The Greensburg Tribune-Review, in Western Pennsylvania.



By the time I graduated college with a bachelor's degree in English literature and as much history, language and other liberal arts as I could stuff into my curriculum, I had made my bones, so to speak, on the paper's night staff.



That meant I had done my share of stories about sewer bonds, city council races, courthouse politics, county fair prize pigs, Lions Club speeches, graduations, "tax hikes," "budget squabbles," auto accidents, fires, and floods. I had mastered that self-contained journalism school -- the obituary.



My wife and I were married on graduation day and our honeymoon consisted of driving to Connecticut where I began my first full-time job, as a reporter for the New Haven Register. From there, I went to The Philadelphia Inquirer; from there to Washington, D.C., and The National Observer, Dow-Jones' brave attempt at a national weekly newspaper.



I ended up in the Washington bureau of The Reader's Digest, writing on national and international affairs. Looking back on it all, I sure had a lot of fun. Too much fun for a small town boy, come to think of it. I loved it. I met famous people. I got shot at. I ate expense account lunches. I had to get a passport. I got to be a close-up witness to history. And I got paid for it.



What did I learn during more than 40 years in journalism?



It's easy to be a journalist.



It's hard to be a good journalist.



It's easy because you really don't have to pass professional muster like a lawyer or a doctor or an accountant. If you're curious, have reasonable intelligence and some aptitude for writing, there's nothing about the "mechanics" of the thing that you can't learn on the job in a matter of months.



It's hard to be a good journalist because, well, it's hard. You have to work hard to be honest to your readers, to the facts, to the difficulty of panning for truth in a torrent of information.



It's hard to go the extra mile for that final piece in the puzzle when you only have an hour to deadline. It's hard to turn the corner on some bright fact you "know" to be true and look down the other side of it and find that maybe it isn't true after all.



It's hard to develop a sense of where you are historically, philosophically and practically, so that you can report on an event with proper perspective. It's hard to present the complexities of an issue in a way that will make sense to the ordinary reader, but still pass the scrutiny of the experts.



It's hard, when overwhelmed by sudden events, to have the disciplined wisdom to wait out the storms of rumor until you can see reality.



It's precisely because good journalism is hard that I love bloggers.



They are always ready to pounce. Whether you're CBS News or the Daily Bugle, they will not let you get by on the cheap. They teach you by their native wisdom. They teach you by their ignorance.



They can be immensely unfair and incredibly stupid. They open up new vistas for you and force you to consider sometimes cockeyed perspectives that end up giving you more perspective.



They bring the world to a screen right in front of your eyes -- in all its uncouth, elegant, raw, funny, revolting, thoughtful, partisan, passionate, tedious, upsetting, amazing, predictable, biased, sordid, elemental, ethereal, exhaustive, cynical, hopeful, delightful, excruciating variety.



And they are providing a venue for some thoughtful, fresh, clever writers who otherwise might have taken a while to find their way into print.



Pompous journalists are disdainful of blogs because they feel threatened by them. They are like members of the Raccoon Lodge and the bloggers just barreled into the ritual room and tore open the curtains and they all look slightly ridiculous in their epaulets and tin pot hats and braided swallowtail coats.



Tonight, as I write this, I have been able to move with a mouse click from the ravings of Islamic militants to the thoughtful analysis of an Arab academic; from the anti-Iraq War propaganda on an ultra-liberal site to curt, irreverent, on-scene reports from soldiers who have been fighting in Anbar province.



Blogs introduce me to a much wider spectrum of writings on whatever subject I am pursuing than I would ever be able to run down on my own. They provide a particularly serendipitous quality to surfing. I would never have seen Sadik J. Al-Azm's fascinating dissection of Islamic terror and the Arab psyche if I had not stopped by theadventuresofchester and used his link.



When I want to get a tour d'horizon on foreign affairs I know that one of the best places to start is the superb Belmont Club. Thanks to the "redoubtable Wretchard" there, I not only read a sobering article on the Left's preoccupation with revenge against America ("The Berlin Wall's Revenge" by Nelson Ascher) but benefited from Wretchard's own thought-provoking observation on the "conceit" of the Left.



I have been able to follow the maunderings of the pseudo-Indian, "Little Big Man" Ward Churchill, on some hair-raisingly benighted "Native American" sites. On other blogs I have found links to scholarly papers thoroughly deracinating his whole bogus misuse of history.



The unmasking of "the li'l Injun that could" set me to thinking. Can you imagine what a job freewheeling bloggers would have done on Adolf Hitler as he was on his "way up?" A few newspapermen, scholars and politicians tried back then. But they didn't have the cojones or the perspective or the "dirt," or the marvelous "back channel" of the Internet to find it and get it out there.



Sure, you have to know what you're doing in this onrushing stream of Blogs. There's a lot of useless "noise" to filter out. But I have always felt that is the supreme test of the reporter anyway. Especially in an environment like Washington -- a world market of information -- you're kind of like a bear standing in the middle of a stream of salmon. The fishing's not hard. The challenge is being selective.



As blogs proliferate, the market is ruthless. If you can't be provocative, informative, or at least fun, you die. If you're dealing in phony crap, the electronic public catches on pretty fast. The visits disappear. I'm constantly pruning my "favorites" list. And adding to it, too.



In an hour, I can race through link after link of scholarly articles, position papers, news broadcast transcripts, weapons specifications, historical documents, statistics, informed and uninformed opinions, scraps of thoughts, bits of video, photographs, maps, animated schematics, you name it.



Blogs are not a substitute for the dogged, primary source reporting that still marks great journalism. But they bring a new efficiency to the "hunt," and enhance the journalist's reach and grasp of the world to a degree never before possible.



They are forcing the journalistic priesthood out of the temple. It's disconcerting. It's fun. And it's good, real good.

Once again, Charles Krauthammer is right on target with his analysis of the current revolution to democracy in the Middle East. - Sailor

Revolution's on a roll in the Mideast
Charles Krauthammer
New York Daily News


Revolutions either move forward or die. We are at the dawn of a glorious, delicate, revolutionary moment in the Middle East. It was triggered by the invasion of Iraq, the overthrow of Saddam Hussein and televised images of 8 million Iraqis voting. Which led to the obvious question throughout the Middle East: Why Iraqis and not us?
The revolution began outside the Middle East with the Afghan elections. That was followed by the Iraqi elections. In between came free Palestinian elections that produced a moderate, reform-oriented leadership. Demonstrations for democracy led President Hosni Mubarak to promise the first contested presidential elections in Egyptian history. And now, the Cedar Revolution in Lebanon, where the assassination of opposition leader Rafik al-Hariri fueled an explosion of people power in the streets that brought down Syria's puppet government in Beirut.

Revolution is in the air. What to do? We are already hearing voices for restraint about liberating Lebanon. Flynt Leverett, your usual Middle East expert, takes to The New York Times to oppose immediate withdrawal of Syria's occupation of Lebanon. Instead, he thinks we should be trying to "engage and empower" Damascus.

We are on the threshold of what Arabs in the region are calling the fall of their Berlin Wall, and our "realists" want us to make deals with dictators. It would be a tragedy to try to rein in Lebanon's revolution. It would betray our principles.

The Cedar Revolution promises not only to liberate Lebanon. A forced Syrian withdrawal could bring down the Assad dictatorship. Changing Damascus will transform the Middle East.

We are not talking about invading Syria; there is no need. If Assad loses Lebanon, his regime could be fatally weakened, economically and psychologically.

Assad has succeeded Saddam as the principal bad actor in the region. From the al-Hariri bombing in Lebanon to the Feb. 25 Tel Aviv bombing to its support of insurgents in Iraq, Syria is trying to destabilize its neighbors.

Five years ago, Assad repressed Syrian demands for more freedom. Now 140 Syrian intellectuals have petitioned their government to withdraw from Lebanon. They signed their names. Were the contagion to spread to Damascus, the entire region would be on a path to democratization.

This is no time to heed the voices of indecision, compromise and fear. It is our principles that brought us to this moment by way of Afghanistan and Iraq. They need to guide us now, through Beirut to Damascus.

Originally published on March 4, 2005

Charles Krauthammer, who was born in New York and raised in Montreal, won the 1987 Pulitzer Prize for distinguished commentary. His Washington Post column is syndiated to 100 newspapers. He attended McGill University, Oxford and Harvard, where he was given his medical degree in 1975. He practiced medicine for three years as a resident and then chief resident in psychiatry at Massachusetts General Hospital. In 1978, he quit medical practice, came to Washington to direct planning in psychiatric research for the Carter administration, and began contributing articles to The New Republic. During the presidential campaign of 1980, he served as a speechwriter to Vice President Walter Mondale. He joined The New Republic as a writer and editor in 1980. He lives in suburban Washington with his wife, Robyn, an artist, and their son.

E-mail:krauthammerra@hotmail.com

There is an old saying; Be careful what you ask for, you may just get it. - Sailor

Friday, March 4, 2005 - Page updated at 12:00 a.m.
When soft campaign cash meets hazy memories
Collin Levey / Times editorial columnist
Seattle Times

Where's a time machine when you really need it? This week, EMILY's List, one of the country's top Democratic political-action committees, went to court to challenge the latest batch of campaign-finance reforms. The group complains that new rules on "soft money" of so-called 527 groups would represent an "arbitrary and capricious" limit on its First Amendment rights.

No kidding. But where were these principled ladies when the original campaign restrictions were being written? Their help would have been terrific back then, but one gets the feeling that EMILY's List is opposed only to restrictions that disadvantage EMILY's List.

On Monday, a D.C. Circuit Court judge denied the group's demand for a preliminary injunction against a new rule that restricts the way it can spend its soft money. Three years ago, Democrats couldn't be bothered to defend the rights of individual donors. But now that professional hit organizations might find themselves reined in, EMILY and friends appreciate the connection between political spending and free speech.

The current controversy is an aftershock from the 2004 election, wherein the new Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (also known as McCain-Feingold) was found to be springing leaks like the SS Minnow. Remember all those 527 groups whose "independent" spending drove both parties mad? On the left, there was MoveOn.org, funded by billionaire George Soros. On the right, there were the Swift Boat veterans, who raised nasty questions about John Kerry's Vietnam service.

Chagrined, the law's authors have since been cobbling together some further restrictions on how soft money can be spent. One plan would cap individual donations to 527s at $30,000. And lo and behold, Democratic political-action committee America Coming Together has begun humming a free-speech tune, too. Why do we suspect this has more to do with self-interest than principle?

Forgive us if we roll our eyes a little: Back when the laws were being written, Democrats favored new restrictions because they believed it would curb the political giving of big-business pachyderms. Then, when it was campaign season, they channeled Al Gore: The spirit of the law took a back seat to "no controlling legal authority" as they simply redirected millions of "soft dollar" donations from the Democratic Party to nominally independent 527 groups.

After all, most of the biggest soft-money donors were on the Democratic side. Republicans had their "shadowy" groups, but they played a far smaller role in pure dollar terms.

Overall, 2004 saw political contributions climb 70 percent for the presidential race and over 30 percent for congressional candidates. In terms of independent expenditures, Democrats outspent Republicans by a ratio of 3-to-1. And in keeping with tradition, "those backed by labor unions, abortion rights and environmental groups were among the most active," notes the Center for Public Integrity.

So you see what's going on. Groups like EMILY's List and other Democratic organizations have got the system where they want it. Big businesses don't want to be associated with controversial groups, so their executives donate money directly to politicians — and their donations are limited by law. Not so the Democratic Party's richest constituents, who can give unlimited money to groups that are relatively uninhibited in their willingness to offend, and polarize large parts of the electorate.

Bill Clinton, for one, did not buy the distinction that somehow Democratic fund-raising groups were more virtuous than Republican ones. "That's a hot issue up here," Clinton told a questioner back in 1993 when an EMILY's List exemption was being considered. "I really appreciate the work that EMILY's List has done. ... But my own personal view is that the law should be the same for everyone."

To Clinton's credit, he recognized that the principles of campaign finance should not be dictated by partisan advantage. Many Republicans who once argued, in principled fashion, against any restrictions are now in favor of killing the 527s — because 527s were used more broadly, if less effectively, by the Democrats in the most recent election.

But these lessons should really be about the unwisdom of limiting political donations, when all we really need is good disclosure. Eventually, the reformers will realize that the new campaign-finance laws have done nothing to increase public confidence in elected officials or the sanctity of elections. Nor have they done anything to improve the accountability of politicians, who plead ignorance when a 527 group smears an opponent on their behalf.

EMILY's List bases its existence on defending a woman's right to choose what to do with her body. Too bad she can't do the same with her pocketbook.

Collin Levey writes Fridays for editorial pages of The Times. E-mail her at clevey@seattletimes.com

Will the US be next? - Sailor

TOTALITARIAN REGIMES ARREST BLOGGERS
War Blog
By FrontPage Magazine
FrontPageMagazine.com March 4, 2005

The Committee to Protect Bloggers points out that in the last week, totalitarian regimes have been arresting and threatening numerous bloggers:

Malaysian blogger Jeff Ooi questioned by police.
Bahraini blogger Ali Abdulemam arrested with two of his fellow moderators on the BahrainOnline bulletin board.
Iranian blogger Nasjeh Omidparvar arrested.
Omidparvar, who is pregnant, is the wife of recently convicted blogger Mohamad Reza Nasab Abholahi.

This is the down side of the recent media focus on blogging; the repressive theocrats and dictators of the world also read our media. They perceive a threat to their control of information, and they’re reacting the way these atavistic monsters always do—by attempting to crush the threat at its source.
But this time, they’re going to fail. Thursday, March 3, 2005

http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog
*

War Blog
By FrontPage Magazine

FrontPageMagazine.com March 4, 2005
THE COMING CRACKDOWN ON BLOGGING

By Michelle Malkin
CNET reporter Declan McCullagh has an important piece warning of the "coming crackdown on blogging."

Joshua Claybourn of In the Agora analyzes the campaign finance law absurdities and First Amendment infringements on bloggers here.
Winfield Myers is on the same wavelength. He writes:

The possibilities that [FEC commissioner Bradley] Smith lays out are chilling and, if enacted, could spell the end of blogging as we know it. Indeed, it could turn much of what is published on the Net into a samizdat-style activity.

Sound alarmist? Read on. It all stems, of course, from McCain-Feingold, the absurd and (pace the Supreme Court) unconstitutional curtailment of political speech in violation of the First Amendment. Both Senators, and the Democratic members of the Commission, favor regulating political speech on the Internet, lest bloggers and electronic publications enjoy an advantage over print publications. This is a huge power grab by elements of the federal bureaucracy who are threatened by New Media, and a first step by those forces to shut down political speech they don't like.
This is something bloggers of all political stripes should unite against.

Instapundit has more links.

I think McCullagh and FEC commissioner Brad Smith have done a real service sounding the alarm as the panel moves forward on extending McCain-Feingold to the Internet. Here's the last paragraph from the CNET interview, but make sure to read it in its entirety:

Smith: This is an incredible thicket. If someone else doesn't take action, for instance in Congress, we're running a real possibility of serious Internet regulation. It's going to be bizarre.

Update: Lots of buzz about this:
- Steven Bainbridge: "Thank You Senators McCain and Feingold ... you [plural expletive deleted]"
- Pajama Hadin: "The Coming Crackdown on Blogging"
- Rightwing Nuthouse: "BLOGOSPHERE… WE HAVE A PROBLEM"
- Say Anything: "Political Blogging To Be Outlawed?"
- Baronger's Scribblings: "Political Prisoners coming to the United States?"
- Mike Krempasky: "FEC regulating Blogging?"
- Susanna Cornett, "Will blogging be restricted by the government?"
- Hennessy's View: "McCain-Feingold Outlaws Blogging?"
- The Anchoress, "You knew this was coming, and right on time..."
- The invaluable Captain Ed, who has long assailed the back-door First Amendment violations of the McCain-Feingold Act, writes:

Bigger blogs will come under closer scrutiny, which means that any expression of support on CQ with a referential hyperlink may well get valued at more than the $2,000 maximum hard-cash contribution.

In order for me to operate under those conditions, I will need to hire a lawyer and an accountant to guide me through the election laws and calculate my in-kind donations on almost an hourly basis. How many bloggers will put up with that kind of hassle just to speak their minds about candidates and issues?

-More round-up from Red State, including reaction from the left side of the blogosphere. MyDD, for example, writes:

I swear to the gods, how idiotic can people be? If the 3 Democratic-appointed judges on the FEC panel manage to extend the 2002 campaign finance law to regulate political speech over the internet, we Democrats can say hello to the wilderness for sure.

RS's Mike Krempasky is right about this:

Make no mistake - Democrats and Republicans together got us into this mess, including President Bush - who in the most glaring example of political cowardice of his administration signed McCain-Feingold.

But now that it's becoming clear what sort of disaster we're heading for as this law evolves and expands - the Democrats own this one. The Republican members of the FEC have seen the edge of the cliff and are trying to back away, only to be frustrated by the three Democratic appointees on the Commission. So I hope that our friends on the left side of the blogosphere will join us in urging those Democrats to stop this before it's too late.

Consider it the first opportunity for the left-of-center bloggers to have their very own Sister Souljah moment.

Here's hoping. In the meantime, here's contact info for the FEC:

Federal Election Commission, 999 E Street, NW, Washington, DC 20463 (800) 424-9530
The commissioners' pages are here.

Brad Smith's home page quotation is particularly fitting as this battle of the Blogs Vs. Big Government looms:

“I want to note that the growth of regulation generally, or more precisely, the growth of the administrative state, is itself smothering democracy in America, not only in its particulars, but in its general, ubiquitous presence.”

--Bradley A. Smith, speech delivered at the Catholic University Law Review’s Election Law Symposium on September 23, 2000.

Just so no one forgets, here's how each member of the Senate voted on McCain-Feingold back in '01. And here's how members of the House voted on the House companion bill known as Shays-Meehan.

Update II: Letters, we've got letters. There's Captain Ed's letter to Senators. And Mark Coffey's open letter to Sen. McCain.

Via the Anchoress, here's contact info for the entire Congress. Thursday, March 3, 2005

http://www.michellemalkin.com/
*

The assualt on political speech starts in earnest now. The FEC will be coming after the blogosphere and with a vengence. This is all the more reason that McCain-Feingold needs to be repealed and/or modified. The FEC, which refused to make a ruling on the 527's last year, is also not of a mind to appeal U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly's ruling that the internet needs to be regulated under McCain-Feingold.

This is a nothing less then an attempt to stiffle free speech. Free political speech was a founding tenant of this country. While one can argue the merits of whether or not donating significant amouts of money to a political campaign is a free speech issue, there can be no arguement that what occurs in the blogosphere is speech. There are those that are concerned that the Patriot Act would take away freedoms, they need to also be very concerned about this attempt to muzzle the bloggers. - Sailor

The coming crackdown on blogging
By Declan McCullagh
SOURCE
Story last modified Thu Mar 03 04:00:00 PST 2005


Bradley Smith says that the freewheeling days of political blogging and online punditry are over.

In just a few months, he warns, bloggers and news organizations could risk the wrath of the federal government if they improperly link to a campaign's Web site. Even forwarding a political candidate's press release to a mailing list, depending on the details, could be punished by fines.

Smith should know. He's one of the six commissioners at the Federal Election Commission, which is beginning the perilous process of extending a controversial 2002 campaign finance law to the Internet.

In 2002, the FEC exempted the Internet by a 4-2 vote, but U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly last fall overturned that decision. "The commission's exclusion of Internet communications from the coordinated communications regulation severely undermines" the campaign finance law's purposes, Kollar-Kotelly wrote.

Smith and the other two Republican commissioners wanted to appeal the Internet-related sections. But because they couldn't get the three Democrats to go along with them, what Smith describes as a "bizarre" regulatory process now is under way.

CNET News.com spoke with Smith about the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002, better known as the McCain-Feingold law, and its forthcoming extrusion onto the Internet.

Q: What rules will apply to the Internet that did not before? A: The commission has generally been hands-off on the Internet. We've said, "If you advertise on the Internet, that's an expenditure of money--much like if you were advertising on television or the newspaper."


Do we give bloggers the press exemption?

The real question is: Would a link to a candidate's page be a problem? If someone sets up a home page and links to their favorite politician, is that a contribution? This is a big deal, if someone has already contributed the legal maximum, or if they're at the disclosure threshold and additional expenditures have to be disclosed under federal law.

Certainly a lot of bloggers are very much out front. Do we give bloggers the press exemption? If we don't give bloggers the press exemption, we have the question of, do we extend this to online-only journals like CNET?

How can the government place a value on a blog that praises some politician? How do we measure that? Design fees, that sort of thing? The FEC did an advisory opinion in the late 1990s (in the Leo Smith case) that I don't think we'd hold to today, saying that if you owned a computer, you'd have to calculate what percentage of the computer cost and electricity went to political advocacy.

It seems absurd, but that's what the commission did. And that's the direction Judge Kollar-Kotelly would have us move in. Line drawing is going to be an inherently very difficult task. And then we'll be pushed to go further. Why can this person do it, but not that person?

How about a hyperlink? Is it worth a penny, or a dollar, to a campaign? I don't know. But I'll tell you this. One thing the commission has argued over, debated, wrestled with, is how to value assistance to a campaign.

Corporations aren't allowed to donate to campaigns. Suppose a corporation devotes 20 minutes of a secretary's time and $30 in postage to sending out letters for an executive. As a result, the campaign raises $35,000. Do we value the violation on the amount of corporate resources actually spent, maybe $40, or the $35,000 actually raised? The commission has usually taken the view that we value it by the amount raised. It's still going to be difficult to value the link, but the value of the link will go up very quickly.

Then what's the real impact of the judge's decision? The judge's decision is in no way limited to ads. She says that any coordinated activity over the Internet would need to be regulated, as a minimum. The problem with coordinated activity over the Internet is that it will strike, as a minimum, Internet reporting services.

They're exempt from regulation only because of the press exemption. But people have been arguing that the Internet doesn't fit under the press exemption. It becomes a really complex issue that would strike deep into the heart of the Internet and the bloggers who are writing out there today. (Editor's note: federal law limits the press exemption to a "broadcasting station, newspaper, magazine or other periodical publication." )

How do you see this playing out? There's sensitivity in the commission on this. But remember the commission's decision to exempt the Internet only passed by a 4-2 vote.

This time, we couldn't muster enough votes to appeal the judge's decision. We appealed parts of her decision, but there were only three votes to appeal the Internet part (and we needed four). There seem to be at least three commissioners who like this.

Then this is a partisan issue? Yes, it is at this time. But I always point out that partisan splits tend to reflect ideology rather than party. I don't think the Democratic commissioners are sitting around saying that the Internet is working to the advantage of the Republicans.

One of the reasons it's a good time to (fix this) now is you don't know who's benefiting. Both the Democrats and Republicans used the Internet very effectively in the last campaign.

What would you like to see happen?I'd like someone to say that unpaid activity over the Internet is not an expenditure or contribution, or at least activity done by regular Internet journals, to cover sites like CNET, Slate and Salon. Otherwise, it's very likely that the Internet is going to be regulated, and the FEC and Congress will be inundated with e-mails saying, "How dare you do this!"

What happens next? It's going to be a battle, and if nobody in Congress is willing to stand up and say, "Keep your hands off of this, and we'll change the statute to make it clear," then I think grassroots Internet activity is in danger. The impact would affect e-mail lists, especially if there's any sense that they're done in coordination with the campaign. If I forward something from the campaign to my personal list of several hundred people, which is a great grassroots activity, that's what we're talking about having to look at.

Senators McCain and Feingold have argued that we have to regulate the Internet, that we have to regulate e-mail. They sued us in court over this and they won.

If Congress doesn't change the law, what kind of activities will the FEC have to target? We're talking about any decision by an individual to put a link (to a political candidate) on their home page, set up a blog, send out mass e-mails, any kind of activity that can be done on the Internet.

Again, blogging could also get us into issues about online journals and non-online journals. Why should CNET get an exemption but not an informal blog? Why should Salon or Slate get an exemption? Should Nytimes.com and Opinionjournal.com get an exemption but not online sites, just because the newspapers have a print edition as well?

Why wouldn't the news exemption cover bloggers and online media? Because the statute refers to periodicals or broadcast, and it's not clear the Internet is either of those. Second, because there's no standard for being a blogger, anyone can claim to be one, and we're back to the deregulated Internet that the judge objected to. Also I think some of my colleagues on the commission would be uncomfortable with that kind of blanket exemption.
So if you're using text that the campaign sends you, and you're reproducing it on your blog or forwarding it to a mailing list, you could be in trouble?Yes. In fact, the regulations are very specific that reproducing a campaign's material is a reproduction for purpose of triggering the law. That'll count as an expenditure that counts against campaign finance law.

This is an incredible thicket. If someone else doesn't take action, for instance in Congress, we're running a real possibility of serious Internet regulation. It's going to be bizarre.

Copyright ©1995-2005 CNET Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.

It is about time some one in Europe asked and answered this question. - Sailor

March 04, 2005

What have the Americans ever done for us? Liberated 50 million people...
Gerard Baker
SOURCE

ONE OF MY favourite cinematic moments is the scene in Monty Python’s Life of Brian when Reg, aka John Cleese, the leader of the People’s Front of Judea, is trying to whip up anti-Roman sentiment among his team of slightly hesitant commandos.

“What have the Romans ever done for us?” he asks.

“Well, there’s the aqueduct,” somebody says, thoughtfully. “The sanitation,” says another. “Public order,” offers a third. Reg reluctantly acknowledges that there may have been a couple of benefits. But then steadily, and with increasing enthusiasm, his men reel off a litany of the good things the Romans have wrought with their occupation of the Holy Land.

By the time they’re finished they’re not so sure about the whole insurgency idea after all and an exasperated Reg tries to rally them: “All right, but apart from the sanitation, the medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, a fresh water system, and public health, what have the Romans ever done for us?”

I can’t help but think of that scene as I watch the contortions of the anti-American hordes in Britain, Europe and even in the US itself in response to the remarkable events that are unfolding in the real Middle East today.

Little more than three years after US forces, backed by their faithful British allies, set foot in Afghanistan, the entire historical dynamic of this blighted region has already shifted.

Ignoring, fortunately, the assault from clever world opinion on America’s motives, its credibility and its ambitions, the Bush Administration set out not only to eliminate immediate threats but also to remake the Middle East. In the last month, the pace of progress has accelerated, and from Beirut to Kabul.

Confronted with this awkward turn of events, Reg’s angry successors are asking their cohorts: “What have the Americans ever done for us?” “Well, they did get rid of the Taleban in Afghanistan. ’Orrible bunch, they were.”

“All right, the Taleban, I grant you.”

“Then there was Iraq. Knocked off one of the nastiest dictators who ever lived and gave the whole nation a chance to pick its own rulers.”

“Yeah, all right. Fair enough. I didn’t like Saddam.”

“Libya gave up its nuclear weapons.”

“And then there’s Syria. Thousands of people on the streets of Lebanon. Syrians look like they’re pulling out.”

“I just heard Egypt’s going to hold free presidential elections for the first time. And Saudi Arabia just held elections too.”

“The Palestinians and the Israelis are talking again and they say there’s a real chance of peace this time.”

“All right, all right. But apart from liberating 50 million people in Iraq and Afghanistan, undermining dictatorships throughout the Arab world, spreading freedom and self-determination in the broader Middle East and moving the Palestinians and the Israelis towards a real chance of ending their centuries-long war, what have the Americans ever done for us?”

It’s too early, in fairness, to claim complete victory in the American-led struggle to bring peace through democratic transformation of the region. Despite the temptation to crow, we must remember that this is not Berlin 1989. There will surely be challenging times ahead in Iraq, Iran, in the West Bank and elsewhere. The enemies of democratic revolution — all the terrorists and Baathists, the sheikhs, the mullahs and the monarchs — are not going to give up without a fight.

But something very important is happening now, something that will be very hard to stop. And, although not all of it can be directly attributed to the US strategy in the region, can anyone seriously argue that it would have happened without it? Neither is it true, as some have tried to argue, that all of this is merely some unintended consequence of an immoral and misconceived war in Iraq.

It was always the express goal of the Bush Administration to change the regime in Baghdad, precisely because of the opportunities for democracy it would open up in the rest of the Arab world. George Bush understands the simple but historically demonstrable thesis that freedom is not only the most basic of human rights, but also the best way to ensure that nations do not go to war with each other.

In a speech one month before the start of the Iraq war in 2003, Mr Bush laid out the strategy: “The world has a clear interest in the spread of democratic values, because stable and free nations do not breed the ideologies of murder. They encourage the peaceful pursuit of a better life.”

I doubt that anybody, even the most prescient in the Bush Administration or at 10 Downing Street, thought the progress we are now seeing would come as quickly as it has.

But what was clear to the bold foreign policy strategists in Washington was that the status quo that existed before September 11 could no longer be tolerated. Much of the Muslim world represented decay and stagnation, and bred anger and resentment. That was the root cause of the terrorism that had attacked America with increasing ferocity between 1969 and 2001.

America’s critics craved stability in the Middle East. Don’t rock the boat, they said. But to the US this stability was that of the mass grave; the calm was the eerie quiet that precedes the detonation of the suicide bomb. The boat was holed and listing viciously.

As a foreign policy thinker close to the Administration put it to me, in the weeks before the Iraq war two years ago: “Shake it and see. That’s what we are going to do.” The US couldn’t be certain of the outcome, but it could be sure that whatever happened would be better than the status quo.

And so America, the revolutionary power, plunged in and shook the region to its foundations. And it is already liking what it sees.

gerard.baker@thetimes.co.uk

An very interesting and timely article. - Sailor

How Should Non-Muslims Approach Islamic History?

By Stephen Schwartz
Published
03/02/2005
Tech Central Station

The present conflict between Islamist extremists and the world order is in many respects a confrontation between interpretations of religious history, and therefore between differing methods of interpreting religious history. Radical Islam, particularly in its Wahhabi form, as the state cult in Saudi Arabia which inspires the terrorists of al-Qaeda and its allies, treats the record of Islamic revelation as an unchanging source of authority, which may neither be interpreted nor questioned. In reality, classical Islam, prior to the emergence of Wahhabism only 250 years ago, viewed all aspects of Islamic revelation, from the holy scripture of Qur'an to the details of the life of the Prophet Muhammad, as subject to debate.

Some Christian commentators have mirrored the colossal intellectual error of the Islamists, in ignoring controversy within Islam. Non- and anti-Muslim polemicists argue, like Muslim radicals, that Islamic textual and canonical authority is rigid and unchallengeable. These mainly Christian critics then select out of the Islamic past the elements they consider most shocking to Western sensibilities and hold them up as fundamental to the belief of all Muslims anywhere.



How should non-Muslims approach the Islamic past, particularly as it embodies precedents for the behavior of today's believers in the faith of Muhammad?



A useful example, which applies to the history of Sufism, the form of Islamic spirituality on which I have previously written, as well as to general Islamic history, is that of the 12th century Islamic philosopher Abu Hamid al-Ghazali (1058-1111). Al-Ghazali was a Persian who lived in Baghdad between journeys as a wandering ascetic. He is known as the Proof of Islam, and in Western literature as Algazel. Al-Ghazali authored a massive work, The Revival of the Religious Sciences, that was widely read, not only by Christians, but also by Jews, as well as Muslims.



In one of his works, Al-Ghazali wrote harshly on Muslim relations with non-Muslims:

"[O]ne must go on jihad (i.e., warlike razzias or raids) at least once a year...one may use a catapult against them [non-Muslims] when they are in a fortress, even if among them are women and children. One may set fire to them and/or drown them...If a person of the Ahl al-Kitab [People of The Book - primarily Jews and Christians] is enslaved, his marriage is [automatically] revoked…One may cut down their trees...One must destroy their useless books. Jihadists may take as booty whatever they decide...they may steal as much food as they need... [T]he dhimmi [non-Muslim living under Islamic rule] is obliged not to mention Allah or His Apostle…Jews, Christians, and [Zoroastrians] must pay the jizya [tax on non-Muslims]…on offering up the jizya, the dhimmi must hang his head while the official takes hold of his beard and hits [the dhimmi] on the protruberant bone beneath his ear [i.e., the mandible]… They are not permitted to ostentatiously display their wine or church bells…their houses may not be higher than the Muslim's, no matter how low that is. The dhimmi may not ride an elegant horse or mule; he may ride a donkey only if the saddle[-work] is of wood. He may not walk on the good part of the road. They [the dhimmis] have to wear [an identifying] patch [on their clothing], even women, and even in the [public] baths…[dhimmis] must hold their tongue…."

Taken out of context, such a comment, if presented as a representation of all Islamic thought, may inspire fear among non-Muslims. But Al-Ghazali lived 900 years ago, and while social evolution and technological advances have slowed down in the Islamic world, only Islamist extremists believe that no change has occurred or is acceptable in Islamic life. Thus, many Muslims would criticize or otherwise dissent from Al-Ghazali's citation included here.



Still, there is another way to examine the legacy of Al-Ghazali. That is demonstrated by the commentary on him provided by a Jewish scholar, Menahem Mansoor. The latter translated the Arabic original of the Jewish mystical classic, Al-Hidaya ila Fara'id Al-Qulub, or The Book of the Direction of the Duties of the Heart, by the 11th century Spanish Jewish jurist Bahya ben Joseph ibn Paquda, who lived in Zaragoza, in the Iberian territory of Aragon. This volume, translated into Hebrew by French Jews under the abbreviated title Duties of the Heart, is among the greatest Jewish spiritual classics of all time, a true bestseller that has been printed in many languages. Indeed, I was recently informed, by one whose opinion cannot be doubted, that Yiddish-language pocket editions of Duties of the Heart are commonly seen among pious Jews in New York.



Menahem Mansoor, in his introduction to the 1973 English translation from Arabic, describes Bahya's work as follows:

"there is no denying the great influence of Sufism on Bahya… his style, and his language, all bear the marks of Sufist influence… The very name of his book shows Sufist influence, for many Sufi authors used the [Arabic] word 'qulub' (hearts) in the titles of their treatises, and from this one may assume that Bahya adopted as well the distinction they made between the duties of the limbs [i.e. prayer and other rituals] and the duties of the heart."

Mansoor points out that "there arose in Islam an ascetic literature which regarded the outward expression of piety as less significant than internal devoutness." He indicates the importance of Al-Ghazali's "attack" on Muslim clerics who had insisted on the superiority of formalistic observance and normative debate, and argues that Bahya, a Jewish dayyan or jurist, similarly saw the belief of the heart opposed to the rigid interpretations maintained by the rabbinical elite among the Jews.



Thus we may see in Al-Ghazali a valuable and necessary predecessor of those Muslims who today battle for the "Islam of the heart" against the Saudi-backed Wahhabis and others who insist on an externally observant but narrow interpretation of Islam. Al-Ghazali was a man of his time, and his comments on jihad and the dhimma may be left to his time; much more important for us today are his spiritual lessons.



Critics who would discredit Sufism for its honors to Al-Ghazali might be tempted to dismiss the Jewish scholar Menahem Mansoor as a contemptible "dhimmi" who has surrendered to Islamic authority, even though Mansoor lived in the West, teaching at the University of Wisconsin. But if such is the manner in which all who call for a rational understanding of Islam are to be treated, then a great many distinguished Jews will be so condemned. For example, we may read in The New York Times of November 25, 1912, i.e. 93 years ago, of a sermon delivered in Temple Emanu-El, by Rev. Dr. Joseph Silverman, a prominent Jewish religious figure, on the wars then raging in the Balkans. Blood flowed on all sides as the Christian nations of Greeks, Bulgarians, Serbs, and others proclaimed their liberation from the Ottoman empire.



Dr. Silverman had a distinctly surprising view of the anti-Turkish wars, especially for readers today. He denounced "the unworthy reasons of the powers of Europe for not preventing or stopping" the Balkan fighting, which he enumerated as "First, the general hostility against Turkish advance as a menace to western civilization; second, the secret hope of Russia and Austria to gain an outlet to the sea by getting rid of the Turkish barriers; third, selfish, material interests of Germany and France, and fourth, the silent yet potent religious conflict between Christianity and Mohammedanism."



If we substitute oil interests for those involving access to the sea in this commentary, the same words could be pronounced today in analyzing the arguments that condemn the whole of Islam for the crimes committed by a radical minority. Certainly, these words apply shockingly to the indifference shown by Europe when a renewed slaughter of Muslims in ex-Yugoslavia took place a decade ago, and could also partly explain the current campaign against Turkish entry into the European Union. But let me stipulate that I do not, and would not, equate the new U.S. campaign for democratization of the Islamic world with the assault on the Ottomans seen in 1912; and I know that President George W. Bush will not accede to the demands of Christian fanatics, and declare war on Islam as a faith.



I will conclude by citing, ad extenso, another example from Judeo-Islamic history that discredits the fear-mongering of those obsessed with jihad, shariah, and the dhimma as the alleged principles by which all Muslims purportedly seek to conquer the West today. That is the existence of a phenomenon known as "Jewish Sufism."



One of the most prominent commentators on "Jewish Sufism" is a scholar named Paul B. Fenton, who teaches at the Université de Strasbourg, in France. Fenton is also known as a ferocious critic of the dhimma. But his article "Abraham Maimonides (1186-1237: Founding a Mystical Dynasty," in Jewish Mystical Leaders and Leadership in the 13th Century (Ed. Moshe Idel and Mortimer Ostow, Jerusalem, 1998), is filled with provocative observations. Fenton describes a group of Jews, directly descending from the great theologian Moses Maimonides, among whom "there arose a pietistic elite whose search for mystical fulfillment led them to introduce into the framework of traditional Judaism a creative change that drew its inspiration from the nearest spiritual model -- Islamic Sufism." These Jewish figures wrote in Arabic, but according to Fenton, "had historical circumstances been less unfavorable and had their writings been translated into Hebrew… the pietist movement could have profoundly and permanently transformed the face of Judaism."



The leading figure in the phenomenon of "Jewish Sufism" was none other than the son of Maimonides, Abraham Maimonides (1138-1204), who succeeded to his father's position as rayyis al-yahud, or chief scholar of the Egyptian Jews. Abraham Maimonides went so far as to praise the Muslim Sufis as the spiritual heirs of the ancient Hebrew prophets, expressing his disappointment that his fellow-Jews did not emulate them. He was, according to Fenton, eager to found a Jewish tariqa, or Sufi order. He adopted many Islamic practices, including forms of prayer, and took on the woolen garment or suf for which, according to many, the Sufis were named. The spiritual disciplines he embraced were carried forward and defended by his family, including his grandson David Maimonides (1222-1300). As in the case of Bahya ibn Paquda, Fenton, the critic of the dhimma, notes that Abraham Maimonides "was trying to enact within Judaism that which [Al-Ghazali] had accomplished more successfully within Islam, namely a synthesis of rational and mystical currents compatible with an orthodox perspective." According to Fenton, Sufi influence extended to the last member of the "Maimonidean dynasty," David ben Joshua Maimonides (1334-1415). Fenton even asserts that had the influence of the Maimonidean dynasty prevailed, "the face of subsequent Judaism would have strangely resembled that of Sufism."



Should non-Muslims fear and denounce Sufism as a cover for jihad, shariah, and the dhimma, and, therefore, execrate scholars like Menahem Mansoor and the anti-dhimma authority, Fenton, as miserable "dhimmis" who have given up in the face of Islamic aggression? Fenton himself, writing on Jewish Sufism, aspires to evoke "the dhimmi's utter religious isolation within Islamic society at the time, which we do not think the adoption of Sufism could have alleviated." And yet, dialogue and interchange between Muslims, Jews, and Christians were common while the dhimma was in effect. Is it impossible to imagine that, like other legal standards in societies throughout history, the dhimma was porous, and did not obstruct fruitful intellectual, social, political, and moral solidarity between believers in the different versions of the same faith, the belief in One God? To leap ahead centuries, was the sermon pronounced in New York in 1912, which described things as they were and are, an expression of cowardice in the face of an Islamic menace? Few would, or should, make such claims. Victory in the war against Islamist radicalism will be won by those who understand distinctions, not those who confuse them.

Sage advice from Ralph Peters. While progress in the spread of democracy in the Middle East is moving along better then many anticipated, there are still pitfalls to be avoided. Of course, the leftists are still whining and gnashing their teeth over this. Ralph Peters delves into the progress and pitfalls. - Sailor

DON'T GET COCKY

By RALPH PETERS
New York Post


March 4, 2005 -- FOR three years, this column has shot down the pessimists who warned we were bound to fail in the Middle East. Now those of us who see our confidence vindicated must beware a premature euphoria.
There's plenty of work ahead.

Our successes have been remarkable. In the past six weeks, we've seen more positive movement in the region than we saw in the preceding six decades. The political landscape of the old Islamic heartlands has changed breathtakingly since our first special-operations team went to work in the wake of 9/11.

Afghanistan's finding its footing as a democracy. Iraq welcomed its first free elections with an enthusiasm and valor that should shame apathetic Western voters. Inspired, the people of Lebanon took to the streets to demand freedom from Syrian occupation. Palestinians voted, too — and their new government is resisting the terrorists who want to frustrate peace efforts.

From Iran through Saudi Arabia to Egypt, the first breezes of change are beginning to blow.

But they're not gale-force winds just yet. We would be almost as foolish as the eternal naysayers were we to imagine that our mission is nearing completion.

Excessive euphoria would only play into the hands of those who wanted freedom's campaign to fail all along. If our rhetoric becomes too exuberant, even positive events on the ground co