Tentacles

With Israel apparently approving a wider operation in Lebanon, the die seems to be cast. The fuse will be lit, and it will burn quickly up the foodchain to one of the three original poles of power, or centers of gravity, in the mohammedan wars.

A new, key front could be opening very soon.

The coils of jihad are complicated, so it is useful to see how they interrelate. (for D&D geeks like myself, this is just like the series of "G" and "D" modules: the marauding Hill Giants were being incited by the Frost Giants which led to the Fire Giants which led to the Drow elves and finally the Demon Queen at the center of her Web of Intrigue...But I digress...)

To set the stage, a commenter (who normally irritates me) at Belmont Club summarizes the historical situation concisely, showing where two of the three poles came from:

While there are valuable precursers - the rise of the Islamic Brotherhood, the seminal teachings of Sayyid Qutb, use of mass media to stir up infidel and particularly Zionist hatred by repressive Arab rulers...even the string of using the tactic of terror as effectively as others like the zionists and communists before did....2 critical events happened in 1979.

A. The Islamic Iranian Revolution and it's ability to stand up to Western powers that placed short-term obsession over hostage lives over long-term harm.

B. Saudi Arabia caving to a small band of Islamic Extremists who too over the Grande Mosque and agreeing to devote a substantial percentage of petrodollars to spreading Wahabbism globally in return for peace with the ruling family.

Before 1979, radical Islam was localized [apparently meaning in modern times -- RDS]. After that........it proved it could take a nation and spread with the endorsement of Islam's Ruling and Clerical center. Thereupon it found it could also add major elements of the Left to it's positions and beliefs - justification of terror, anticolonial rhetoric - Islam as the native - the ifidel as the colonist, use of identity politics, victimhood, using legal systems against majority populations. And use of technology to begin winning the PR war, proselytizing, networking..

While we slept, it spread like wildfire, and as polls show, fundamentally changed the attitudes of the Ummah towards the West, as well as among Islamic natives and immigrants outside the Ummah compared to polls on attitudes towards modernity, America, culture, Christianity, what makes a good Muslim - taken in the 60s and 70s.

9/11? Just a small chapter in the war if we win. A minor footnote in the Islamic chronciles if we lose.

Victory against the modern jihad will not come until all the sources of influence are all destroyed.

We see the two "religious" poles sprung into action around 1979: the Shiite Persian islamists of revolutionary Iran (with lots of oil money) and the Sunni Arab Wahabbists (with even more oil money) in the Bandit Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

And in between them, the third troublemaker: the "secular" Sunni/Shiite mix of old-fashioned Arab nazi-like imperialism in Saddam Hussein's Iraq (also with lots of oil money, and the "best" mohammedan army in the region).

These are the three "Kingpins."

Understanding how they influence the Middle East is perhaps best seen by using the analogy of Prison Bitches.

Hussein, the imperialist, tried to make Iran his bitch and failed. Then he made Kuwait his bitch, probably with aims of making the Saudis his bitch. With that oil money and influence, he could have made the whole region his bitch. Gulf War 1 ended those ambitions.

And we knocked out that Kingpin, which is vitally important. No pressure would be on any of them if we hadn't taken out the middle.

We now are located right between the two remaining Kingpins.

The Bandit Kingdom sent its money and clerics to the madrassas in Pakistan, making Pakistan's intelligence service its bitch. The Taliban were Pakistan's bitch.

We've attacked that end of the snake, but have stalled in moving up that food chain for important reasons: Pakistan has nuclear bombs and the Bandit Kingdom has the biggest oil spigot. Those problems must be delicately handled, but handled they must eventually be. We can save them for last. India, our "new best friend", will be important.

Finally, Iran has made Syria its bitch, to aid its proxy army Hezbollah. Hezbollah has made Lebanon its bitch.

And attempted to make Israel its bitch, perhaps a little too early.

If Israel's response is unexpectedly forceful and effective, removing the huge investment Iran has made in Southern Lebanon, the war could widen quickly to involve Iran, which would be a Gift from Heaven.

Some parallel tentacles are worth noting.

Mookie Sadr in Iraq with his Shiite "Mahdi Army" is also Iran's bitch.

al-Qaeda tried to make the Sunnis in Iraq their bitches, but that hasn't been too popular.

al-Qaeda had been operating with the Taliban, at the end of the Bandit Kingdom's foodchain. Binny decided that the Saudis weren't pious enough, even though the Royal Family is indeed composed of vile Wahabbists. So they've gone "rogue" and al-Qaeda's main goal is to make Saudi Arabia its bitch, in order to then restore the Caliphate and make everyone else their bitch. Perhaps they can be considered a Kingpin as well, but are not as tangible a "node" as the others.

The Palestinians are the arab world's bitch, for making Israel miserable.

So it's one down, two (or three) to go.

And another one could be on the chopping block soon, with pressure being applied at both ends: diplomatic pressure directly on Iran for its nuclear program is moving along with an actual deadline in place, and military pressure on its proxies.

The situation is highly volatile.

Anything can happen at any time.

Be prepared.

Relative Approval

The MSM likes to harp on Bush's low approval rating -- as if he were running for another term!

Or as if that when it hits a certain magic number, he gets frog-marched out of the Oval Office and executed, ritually murdered like some king of old.

What is not so often mentioned is that the approval rating of Congress is even lower than the President's...by 14 points!

And the approval rating of islam is even lower than that!

One-Way Function

Every day, things get better and better.

Because it's a one-way function.

Every day, more and more people suddenly realize that in the Middle East, one side is right and the other is wrong.

And that the problem is indeed islam.

It surely isn't working the other way around, except for perhaps a handful of the already useless and insane.

It feels like a tipping point was reached recently, over the last few months.

Look at this Pew Research polling information from September, 2004.

It showed views of islam remained remarkably and stubbornly stable for several years after 9/11, with the same poll taken in 2002, 2003, and 2004.

It had been roughly balanced, with views on islam being an average of 39% Unfavorable and 35% Favorable.

The only sub-group that expressed a majority favorable view of islam was "liberal democrats", at 56%! That is all the more remarkable given the relatively poorer "favorability" ratings of Catholicism vs islam, for example -- surely liberal democrats aren't carrying water for the Papists! That means the liberal democrats must have been wildly more favorable in their opinion of islam than of just about any other religion -- even after 9/11!

If that doesn't prove their fundamental lack of seriousness on the issue, I don't know what does. They are clearly striking a pose of excessive, ostentatious "tolerance" to appear enlightened and gain a cheap sense of smug self-satisfaction.

It was an example of the stifling conformity of hyper political correctness, holding on dissonantly to a patently false fantasy in spite of all the mountains of evidence to the contrary.

But things have changed.

The worm has turned.

As of last Spring, the Favorability rating of islam plummeted to 19% -- we can take that number as representing the hard core of left-wingers who for the sake of their position on Iraq and Bush will do anything to gum up the GWOT.

And the Unfavorable rating has jumped to 45%.

I can understand it's a little harder for those giving up their ridiculous idea that islam is to be viewed favorably to suddenly admitting an unequivocal unfavorable view.

In other words, those who are "officially undecided" has increased to 36%.

We can be relatively sure that in their hearts, many of those undecideds probably have a negative view they just won't admit.

That's the one-way function.

The Undecideds aren't going to switch to Favorable!

One step at a time...

And even better, on a less sweeping but perhaps more telling question, the numbers who believe islam encourages violence went from 25% in 2002 to 46% in 2004 to a whopping 60% last Spring!

Numbers vary somewhat from pollster to pollster, but this ABC poll confirms the findings with 58% saying islam has more violent extremists than other religions.

That's about half of those "undecideds" letting their true feelings be known!

They're even finding one in four Americans admitting to prejudicial feelings against arabs and muslims in general. Admitting to such a thing in today's milieu of hate-speech laws and multiculturalism is astonishing -- the true number is probably higher.

The poll reporting attributes these numbers to people lacking an "understanding" of islam. Ha! Certainly something has changed suddenly in perceptions, and people surely haven't somehow come to know less about islam since 9/11!

In fact, even though the reported figures oddly don't seem to support an increase in self-reported knowledge of islam (although perhaps people who actually "understand" islam all too well would answer that they don't "understand" it, in a rational sense), surely the number of people who now use words such as dhimmi, hudna, taqqiya, Qutb, and "abrogation" has increased by several orders of magnitude.

Every little pebble, every little nugget of information carried by the blogosphere, seemed to perhaps do little for 4 and a half long years, against the relentless disinformation and enemy propaganda of the MSM.

But that mountain was built, and criticality was finally reached.

Whether the progress will be jerky or steady from this point is a lesser issue than the fact that the break has already happened.

One can see the mohammed cartoon controversy as perhaps one of the key flashpoints, but it required setting the groundwork beforehand. The Dubai Ports deal reaction was another clue.

And the fruit of this change is being seen in support of Israel against Hezbollah, in which the Western politicians jaw-jaw and wink-wink speaking of imminent ceasefires, encouraging Hez to stand and fight a battle it shouldn't, and yet no deadline appears in sight.

And for every American whose mind gets made up on this matter is just another 1/300 millionth of a finger on The Button.

More and more every day.

A One-Way Function!

Under God

Article III, Section 2, of the U.S. Constitution:

...the supreme Court shall have appellate Jurisdiction, both as to Law and Fact, with such Exceptions, and under such Regulations as the Congress shall make.

Last week the House passed a bill to make just such an exception:

WASHINGTON -- The House, citing the nation's religious origins, voted Wednesday to protect the Pledge of Allegiance from federal judges who might try to stop schoolchildren and others from reciting it because of the phrase "under God."

The legislation, a priority of social conservatives, passed 260-167. It now goes to the Senate, where its future is uncertain.

"We should not and cannot rewrite history to ignore our spiritual heritage," said Rep. Zach Wamp (R-Tenn.). "It surrounds us. It cries out for our country to honor God."

Opponents said the legislation, which would bar federal courts from ruling on the constitutional validity of the pledge, would undercut judicial independence and would deny access to federal courts to religious minorities seeking to defend their rights.

"We are making an all-out assault on the Constitution of the United States which, thank God, will fail," said Sen. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.).

The legislation grew out of a 2002 ruling by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that the pledge is unconstitutional when recited in public schools.

Interesting that Pelosi would call the exercising of a fundamental Constitutional authority of Congress an "assault" on the Constitution.

And what of that "spiritual heritage" mentioned by Sen. Wamp?

It is a simple statement of historical fact, as said in the Pledge of Allegiance, that this Nation was founded Under God.

Why anyone would think that such factual recognition amounts to Congress establishing an official relgion is incomprehensible.

Exhibit A is the Mayflower Compact of 1620:

"In the name of God, Amen. We, whose names are underwritten, the Loyal Subjects of our dread Sovereign Lord, King James, by the Grace of God, of England, France and Ireland, King, Defender of the Faith, e&. Having undertaken for the Glory of God, and Advancement of the Christian Faith, and the Honour of our King and Country, a voyage to plant the first colony in the northern parts of Virginia; do by these presents, solemnly and mutually in the Presence of God and one of another, covenant and combine ourselves together into a civil Body Politick, for our better Ordering and Preservation, and Furtherance of the Ends aforesaid; And by Virtue hereof to enact, constitute, and frame, such just and equal Laws, Ordinances, Acts, Constitutions and Offices, from time to time, as shall be thought most meet and convenient for the General good of the Colony; unto which we promise all due submission and obedience. In Witness whereof we have hereunto subscribed our names at Cape Cod the eleventh of November, in the Reign of our Sovereign Lord, King James of England, France and Ireland, the eighteenth, and of Scotland the fifty-fourth. Anno Domini, 1620."

Though headed for Virginia, God apparently saw fit to settle them in the Plymouth Colony of Massachusetts (which would become the "cradle of Liberty" 150 years later) by blowing them off course.

Over that first hard winter, ravaged by disease and harship, half of the colonists were dead.

What did they do?

Did they whine and complain about why some government didn't take care of them better, as if they were helpless infants?

No, they praised God and redoubled their efforts, celebrating a harvest feast (to later be enshrined as a model for our national Thanksgiving celebration).

And they prospered.

New Orleans, take note.

It is fashionable to revise and discredit the contributions of these people to our Founding by dismissing them as intolerant. The Pilgrims of Plymouth, however, should not be confused by the Puritans who arrived a decade later and built up Salem and Boston.

And about those witch trials of 1692?

What is not often recognized is that for the 20 that were executed, there had been 150 who had been accused, which is only 14%!

That's quite a low conviction rate for what is portrayed as an irrational kangaroo court.

Furthermore, what is even less known, is that a mere five years later,

1697 - The Massachusetts general court expresses official repentance regarding the actions of its judges during the witch hysteria of 1692. Jurors sign a statement of regret and compensation is offered to families of those wrongly accused.

That's not quite the picture the anti-American and anti-religious forces like to paint, is it?

And as for religious intolerance, Mass. was a leader in abolishing slavery early, to the extent that there were zero slaves found there in the census of 1790. They were driven to this by the seriousness of their Christian religious belief of the Universal Brotherhood of Mankind as taught by Jesus, as were the Quakers of Pennsylvania.

Because everyone was a Child of God.

How different from the basic islamic (it means "submission") relationship in which everyone is a Slave of Allah, making slavery a natural and even divinely-inspired institution, which exists with allah's blessings and specific koranic intructions to this very day.

Shaykh Ibn Taymiyyah defines the concept of worship in Islam and explains that to be a true "slave of Allah" is a status of both virtue and nobility. The title "slave of Allaah" is one of great honor which Allah bestowed upon the best of creation, Muhammad (SAW).

How about that. A whole culture, without irony, declaring that Freedom is Slavery.

Indeed, the name "Abdallah", so common in the arab world, literally means "Slave of Allah."

The child is given a name indicating servitude to Allah (SWT) by calling him 'Abd (slave of...) followed by one of Allah’s (SWT) names, those which are confirmed for Him and the most beloved of such names to Allah (SWT) - the One free of all imperfections - are 'Abdullah (the slave of Allah) and 'Abdur-Rahman (the slave of the Most Merciful) as shown by the Hadith:

"The most beloved of your names to Allah - the Mighty and Magnificent - are 'Abdullah and 'Abdur-Rahman" (Reported by Muslim & Abu Dawud)
...
The Messenger (SAW) established the example for us in this by putting into practice, so he called on of his sons ‘Abdullah and he called the son of Abu Talhah: ‘Abdullah. He furthermore called the son of another ‘Abdur-Rahman and there are many more examples.

They bring their filthy practice here to this country, with two illustrative cases from just last month alone.

Slavery in Denver, Colorado:

A jury in the western U.S. state of Colorado has convicted a Saudi national of keeping his family’s Indonesian housekeeper captive for more than four years.

The jury found Homaidan al-Turki guilty Friday on 12 charges of false imprisonment, extortion and sexual abuse involving the woman, who al-Turki brought to the United States in 2000 to cook and take care of his wife and children at their home in a Denver suburb.

Al-Turki’s attorney argued that cultural differences are behind the charges, and said the verdict would be appealed.

And technically, that lawyer is correct! Their islamic culture encourages slavery.

Doesn't mean they aren't guilty as hell.

Al-Turki is a linguistics doctoral candidate at the University of Colorado at Boulder. Let's give them more visas, shall we?

The 2 1/2-week trial ended in drama in the courtroom, with as many as nine sheriff's deputies trying to keep peace while Al-Turki's supporters howled at the verdict that was delivered after a day of deliberation.

One man was forcibly removed.

Jabbering savages, the lot of them.

And in Irvine, California:

An Egyptian former couple have pleaded guilty to enslaving a 10-year-old girl in their southern California home.

The girl, who was brought to the US from Egypt, was forced to work 16-hour days and was not allowed to leave the house during her 20-month ordeal. [She was given by her family in Egypt as payment of a debt.]

Abdel Nasser Eid Youssef Ibrahim, 45, and his ex-wife, Amal Ahmed Ewis-abd Motelib, 43, agreed to plead guilty to four federal charges.

They face jail terms of three years when they are sentenced in October [and $100,000 in compensation].

She was forced to clean their home, take care of their five children, prepare food and do the laundry, for no pay. She lived in squalor in the garage and was told that if she left the house in Irvine, southern California, she might be arrested.

So much for celebrating all cultures equally.

No Options

Well, that's it.

We'd best just pack it up.

A headline above the fold in the latest New York Times blares,

US Needing Options, Finds Its Hands Tied

No options.

Our hands are tied!

It's a shame, really, that we took a million casualties in the Iraq debacle. A whole generation of our fighting men, wiped out, when we really needed them now.

Oh, wait. Nevermind.

It's too bad, then, we aren't more strategically deployed at this critical time. It would take months to move all the supplies and munitions for 150,000 heavily armed troops to the heart of the Middle East. Time we simply do not have.

Uh...

If only we didn't have Iraq to worry about. It's such a distraction. We just can't walk and chew gum at the same time, unfortunately. If we had left poor old Saddam Hussein alone, we'd be able to focus exclusively on Iran or North Korea, because he would've agreed to make absolutely no trouble while we were looking elsewhere.

Ok, wait...

Aha! Of course, everyone agrees the World is ruled by China and Russia, and we can do nothing unless they bless our actions beforehand. The support of Japan and Europe is meaningless. We take our directives from the communists. And they say we can't do anything. So, that's that.

I think what the NYT means to say is that there are no options they approve of, so they hope to tie our hands.

Don't Miss

For insightful analysis as world events become more "interesting" (our office manager at work yesterday threw up her hands and said 'it seems like we're all about to be in a Schwarzenegger movie!'), don't miss Belmont Club.

And "zombie" has been doing incredible "undercover" photojournalism work for some time, revealing the insanity and outright support for terrorism in left-wing demonstrations in places like San Francisco and Berkeley.

The latest one is interesting in that for once, in San Francisco of all places, there was a reasonable pro-Israel counterdemonstration against the filthy Hamas and Hezbollah supporters who were clamoring for the destruction of Israel -- always backed/organized/supplied with posters by Soros money and Internation ANSWER, a front for the communist World Workers Party. It's foreign subversion. The last few photos in the series, however, are heartening.

And even better is this snippet that zombie reported from the event:

On a side street, a pair of Palestinian supporters were getting ready to enter the protest, using a window as a mirror to make sure their kaffiyeh-masks looked just right. I got a blurry snapshot of the moment.

Unfortunately for them, a pair of cops noticed their preparations. When the protesters said they weren't planning to do any violence, one of the cops asked, "Then why are you dressing up like a terrorist like that?" while the other made them empty their bags to make sure they didn't have any weapons.

Sweet.

Evacuation

CNN was good for one amusing item tonight.

In small print, in a roundup of news items, they mentioned in passing that the Pentagon was exploring plans for a possible "evacuation of up to 25,000 American citizens from Lebanon."

I could only smile.

I remember the last time there was an "evacuation mission" of American citizens.

And there were fewer than a thousand of them "at risk" at that time.

I can dream, can't I?

More Stupidity From CNN

I am forced to watch the Communist News Network every evening at the gym.

At least it provides endless amounts of material to criticize!

A few items.

First, a little while ago, when the biggest news was North Korea's attempted missile strike on Hawaii...

That didn't get much news coverage, did it?

data from U.S. and Japanese Aegis radar-equipped destroyers and surveillance aircraft on the missile's angle of take-off and altitude indicated that it was heading for waters near Hawaii, the Sankei Shimbun reported, citing multiple sources in the United States and Japan.

A quick digression:
(btw, why are the NORKs still breathing? Just because the South Koreans were unwise enough to develop their major city within range of the Evil Hermit Kingdom's artillery doesn't mean we now ALL have to live with becoming in range, does it? I really don't care what happens to the ungrateful ROKers when it comes to missile attacks on the US. Should we wait around while they launch another one, wondering where it's aimed, and what kind of warhead it might carry?

Imagine if the Limpdong Missile hadn't failed after 30 seconds. You're the President. NORAD tells you their tracking an ICBM from a rogue nuclear power -- technically still at war with us -- headed for Hawaii. It lands in 15 minutes. What do you do?

Sit around and see whether it's "loaded" or not?

I never understood how the Leftists could be so adamantly opposed to Reagan's missile defense projects for so long -- "oh, the scenario of a rogue nation with just a few ICBMs threatening us is ludicrous! It will Never Happen!" I could only conclude they were deliberatly collaborating with the Red Menace.)

Anyway.

CNN brought on some former CIA head. Woolsey I think it was.

And he was asked what we should do.

Like everyone else on tv talking about Iran and NK, he pointed out we had few options and certainly no military ones (ok, let me get this straight: the world's sole hyperpower somehow can't do ANYTHING about Iran? Wouldn't that make Iran the world's sole hyperpower? As if.)

Instead, he proposed getting tough with some kinds of sanctions.

Some kind of blockade of supplies.

Well -- EXCEPT for humanitarian supplies, of course!

Sigh.

At one time, people knew how to make sieges effective.

You starve the enemy until they die or beg for mercy unconditionally.

Instead, today, the besiegers are supposed to supply food and energy, at their own expense.

Oh, he added this precious line: and somehow we'd have to make sure that the food got to the people, but not the North Korean army!!!

This guy ran the CIA!

And he actually said that!

How is it even possible to imagine such a scenario in any realm even merely close to reality?

Of course, in Gaza, (aka "Gone-za"), we have the double absurdity of Israel not only attempting to besiege them while supplying them with food, electricity, etc and other vitals that Gaza has always needed Israel for, and yet the Gazans have also never stopped trying to destroy the people who provide them these supplies.

Then tonight, I had to endure Jeff Greenfield being deliberately stupid just to make a cheap attack on Bush.

Another digression:
(This kind of anklebiting, like Valerie Plame now suing Cheney etc., is so counterproductive. Don't these morons realize that there are several very real possible futures that involve nuclear armageddon or other major catastrophe in the near future, and the job of preventing that is tough enough for the Bush administration, who are only human after all, and that these constant personal attacks and legal distractions only serve to reduce the effectiveness of these key players on the world stage who should -- for the safety of all of us, including Democrats who apparently think they live on a different planet -- be in top form to deal with these crises? For all our sakes?)

He basically said, ha ha, there goes another Bush policy in tatters, that promoting Democracy in the Middle East will lead to greater stability -- look at war breaking out! Hamas was elected! Nanny-boo-boo on you, Bush!

So what this pinhead is actually promoting is the idea that, what, it's now morally acceptable (or wisely pragmatic) to consign people to tyranny? He'd criticize for supporting dictators with the next sentence, the unserious hypocrite.

Furthermore, he deliberately takes a hyper-literal interpretation of the word "democracy" to mean the simple act of voting. Anyone with any sense knows that Bush is talking about the concept of Liberty rather than simple mob rule.

Voting, or "democracy", by itself is just a process. It confers no special legitimacy. We are under no obligation to take Hamas or Hezbollah any more seriously if they are elected or not.

Any idiot knows that pure democracy, aka "mob rule", is one of the worst systems of governance possible, certainly much worse than enlightened monarchy.

But the real point unfolding that this CNN "pundit" misses is that what "democracy" brings, while perhaps not automatic respectability, is civic responsibility.

Aha. Yes. And that may take some time for the Arabs to learn. But learn it they will, the hard way or the easy way.

The Gazans voted in Hamas, and now they have to take the consequences of that choice.

If they chose war, they shall get war.

And they shall get no sympathy.

There is no way to now call the poor Gazans apowerless people who had nothing to do with the terrorist attacks on Israel and are just caught in the crossfire.

No, no more!

They showed their true colors, and now it is not only morally acceptable, but morally imperative, to collectively punish them for their folly.

Learn responsibility, or die.

Castro Dead?

Some rumors.

We'll know for sure in about a week and half.

Good Gun News

This really irked me, and now it's being fixed.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Senate on Thursday voted to prohibit the confiscation of legally owned guns during an emergency like last year's Hurricane Katrina, marking another victory for the gun lobby.

By a vote of 84-16, the Senate embraced an amendment by Sen. David Vitter, a Louisiana Republican. He attached his measure to a domestic security spending bill for the fiscal year starting October 1 that the Senate is expected to pass soon.

The U.S. House of Representatives has passed its version of the spending bill and negotiators will have to decide whether to keep the gun provision. The House is usually sympathetic to gun owners.

Citing the constitutional right to bear arms, Vitter said that during an emergency people should be allowed to hold onto "legally possessed firearms to defend your life, your property" at a time when telephone lines and cell phones probably are not operating and victims "can't reach out to law enforcement authorities."
...
Sen. Richard Durbin (news, bio, voting record), an Illinois Democrat, added, "You send the National Guardsmen in ... and then snipers start shooting at them and the police make it known this is going to be a gun-free zone. We don't want any National Guardsmen killed because of this national emergency, this disaster. Is that an unreasonable thing?"

Yes, it's totally unreasonable! I don't want to be killed by some looter because some cop freaked out and took my legal guns to protect soldiers.

That's a little backwards, isn't it? Making law-abiding citizens less safe to protect the government forces that were sent in to supposedly protect the citizens in the first place?

Vitter countered that the "declaration or state of emergency in and of itself does not give anyone the right to confiscate guns" and local law enforcement officials should not "trump" the Constitution.

Duh.

I don't recall a codicil in the Constitution stating local law enforcement can selectively overrule the Bill of Rights on a whim.

By the way, Concealed Carry laws have been continuously won over the last two decades, showing the hard work of the NRA against HCI (has anyone heard from them lately?), so that now 2/3 of all states will allow all eligible citizens to carry concealed guns, and only 2 states still disallow it outright.

See the map!

And yet the Wild West has not broken out!

This is essentially a complete inversion of the situation over the last thirty years, and is perhaps one long-term sign that statist progressivism has already begun to ebb from its high water mark.

Kosovo

Looks like we sure got that one wrong.

Save Kosovo.

Who knows, perhaps one day the West might just think of the Serbs as having been a bit ahead of the curve.

Prescription for Victory

Here is how to win against the terror masters.

It's very simple:



Just substitute islamist for jap and it's guaranteed to work in the end.

Cpl. Shalit could be this century's Archduke.

This has that same feel of an inevitable domino-like triggering of alliances and mobilizations.

That War put an end to the last islamic Caliphate.

Perhaps this one will bury those aspirations to resurrect it once and for all.

At Last?

It seems a regional war could be breaking out in the Middle East.

See a roundup here.

Interestingly -- in fact, splendidly -- Hamas, Hezbollah, Syria, and Iran (the man behind the curtain) are all lining themselves up to get in much deeper than they expected.

Events are now beyond control and anything can happen.

Chemical missiles on Israel?

Nuclear retaliation?

We should be so lucky that the mad Iranians solve our political problems by making the same mistake as Hitler and declare war on us.

Well, ok, so they already have 25 years ago, but they might make us finally notice.

Now, an observation.

Imagine this scenario unfolding with Saddam Hussein still in power.

With the sanctions regime long gone and his own nuclear program ALSO in full swing?

Now, imagine it with not only Iraq out of the picture, but with us having an army of hardened veterans smack in the middle and bordering on everybody.

Maybe that helped precipitate this.

Or perhaps it was the Gaza pullout.

Either way, stasis was no solution.

And public opinion here in the US has never been more pro-Israel.

Some also see our age-old commie enemies Russia and China behind the insane actions of North Korea and Iran. They could certainly be more helpful if they wanted to, but ar emaking sure the UN will act as a shield to their nefarious plans. What a useless organization, by the way.

But with the Cold War "officially" off, I think there won't be any bailing out of their terror-state clients this time.

Not For Me

Here's a catchy tune.

The songwriter sure did some thorough research!

Rave Party!

Bringin' down the House!

No Shame

Here's an interesting story:

AUSTIN, Texas - With state election deadlines closing in, the legal fight over whether to keep indicted former U.S. Rep. Tom DeLay on the November ballot moves next to a higher court.

The Texas Republican Party plans to appeal federal Judge Sam Sparks' ruling Thursday that DeLay must remain on the ballot even though he resigned from office and isn't actively campaigning for re-election.
...
DeLay won his March primary and then announced a month later that he would be leaving office and moving to Virginia. DeLay left Congress on June 9.

Republican Party state chair Tina Benkiser said under state law she could declare DeLay "ineligible" for the ballot because she received proof of his move out of state, thus allowing a party committee to name a new nominee. Had DeLay simply "withdrawn," the party wouldn't be allowed to replace him in the race under state law.

Democrats sued to keep the Republicans from removing DeLay's name.
...
The judge [a Democrat] agreed, saying he was not convinced that DeLay would not return to Texas.

So it's months before the election, and months ago the candidate resigned. State law allows changes of party candidates all the way to the end of August.

And yet the Democrats want to sue to keep a fictitious candidate as the Republican "nominee".

Isn't that taking away choice from The People?

I mean, isn't that the VERY SAME argument used in New Jersey in 2002?

Remember that case?

KWAME HOLMAN: Robert Torricelli had received bad news over the weekend. A Newark Star Ledger Eagleton Rutgers poll of probable New Jersey voters showed Torricelli trailing his Republican challenger businessman Doug Forrester 37 to 34 percent. Back in June that same poll had Torricelli up by 14 points. Apparently convinced that the news was not going to get any better, Torricelli today gave up his bid for re-election five weeks before election day.
...
Torricelli's troubles were well publicized: Charges he failed to disclose thousands of dollars in gifts he received from businessman David Chang in exchange for political favors. Chang now is serving an 18-month sentence for illegal contributions to Torricelli's 1996 Senate campaign. No criminal charges were ever brought against Torricelli, but in late July he was severely admonished for his activities by his colleagues on the Senate Ethics Committee.

Instead of months, it was a handful of weeks before the actual election.

And the Democrat senatorial candidate was polling very poorly. In 2002, control of the Senate was up for grabs.

So the party wanted to pull out their losing candidate, and replace him with a ringer. In went tired old Lautenberg.

However, state law specifically forbade making ballot changes at such a late date.

And yet the New Jersey Supreme Court quickly returned a decision that making a last-minute change to rescue a poorly-polling candidate for a privileged political machine was just fine and dandy, in spite of the law:

After his original opponent, Robert Torricelli, abandoned his re-election bid under a cloud of scandal, Forrester sued to stop Democratic Party efforts to have Frank Lautenberg replace Torricelli. The New Jersey Supreme Court rejected Forrester's claim, in a decision written by Peter Verniero, a Republican, stating that "We see what advantage this has for Mr. Forrester; we fail to see what advantage this has for the people of New Jersey." Forrester was defeated by Lautenberg 54%-44%.

In other words, the People deserved a Choice!

Even though the People were already apparently choosing, weren't they?

They just weren't choosing correctly.

And in spite of the fact that there were several 3rd-party candidates also running against the Republican. These candidates testified in front of the court that it was insulting to not consider them valid choices, and that only one particular party actual counted as "a choice."

Why won't they use the same reasoning to "benefit" the people of Texas?

Do they have no shame?

Spirit of '42

Caught an old wartime movie from 1944 today called The Purple Heart:

This is the story of the crew of a downed bomber, captured after a run over Tokyo, early in the war. Relates the hardships the men endure while in captivity, and their final humiliation: being tried and convicted as war criminals.

I assumed it was only generically based on the historical Doolittle raids, but it turns out the actual characters themselves in this film were real:

Based on the eight men captured by the Japanese after the Doolittle raid: Lt. Robert Hite, Lt. William G. Farrow, Lt. George Barr, Sgt. Harold A. Spatz, Cpl. Jacob De Shazer, Dean Hallmark, Robert Meder, and Chase Nielsen. The trial, as depicted in the film, was held at Police Headquarters in Shanghai, China on 14 October 1942.

The eight men were condemned to death. Hallmark, Farrow, and Spatz were executed by a firing squad of the Imperial Japanese Army at sunset the next day. The remainder were given an Imperial commutation to life in prison. In 1943, Meder died of mistreatment and various diseases. The remaining four survived until they were freed upon Japan's surrender in August, 1945.

Of course in 1944 the filmmakers would not have known that four would survive, and the film ends with them marching out defiantly to be handed over to the military authorities for execution to the strains of The U.S. Air Force (Into the Wild Blue Yonder).

This, in the movie, being after they had rejected an offer to be treated as "normal" prisoners (hardly an improvement) if they would only give up information on where the raid came from.

What is interesting is the final statement, given by Dana Andrews as Captain Harvey Ross, which one commenter at imdb implies comes at least in part from an actual record of the trial via a Portugese reporter:

No your excellency. It's true we Americans don't know very much about you Japanese. And we never did. And now I realize you know even less about us. You can kill us. All of us, or part of us. But if you think that's going to put the fear of God into the United States of America, and stop them from sending other flyers to bomb you, you're wrong.

Dead wrong.

They'll come by night, they'll come by day. Thousands of them. They'll blacken your skies and burn your cities to the ground and make you get down on your knees and beg for mercy.

This is your war. You wanted it. You asked for it. You started it. And now you're going to get it. And it won't be finished until your dirty little empire is wiped off the face of the earth.

And that's exactly what they did, God bless 'em.

That's how to win wars.

Today that kind of moral clarity and cultural self-confidence is all too lacking.

Here is a "propaganda" poster that relates directly to the incident above:



Would you look at that, righteous anger at the enemy was not considered something to be ashamed of:



Here is a lesson plan for studying "propaganda" at a Florida elementary school. It exposes the nasty tools of propaganda, to thwart its wicked purpose. Here is one example, the students were to look at this actual "propaganda" poster:



The Teacher's Guide for this poster states:

In this poster we see demonization, emotional appeals, name-calling, and evocative visual symbols.

Well, duh!

Demonization? Name-calling?

It's presented as a bad thing, or somehow inappropriate, or manipulative, to "demonize" actual Nazi atrocities?

Here's another:

Poster #3: In this poster we see caricatures of Adolf Hitler and Admiral Yamamoto sneaking around the globe to attack the United States from both sides. Both brandish weapons, with blood dripping from Yamamoto’s knife. America is shown clean and unspoiled, yet defenseless against the aggression of the Axis leaders, even though neither side really had the capability of launching a full-scale invasion of the United States. The objective of this poster is to increase factory production of war materials. In this poster we see evidence of the following tools: demonization, emotional appeals, half-truths or lies, evocative visual symbols, and caricatures.

Oh, you see, there was really no threat at all! The whole effort of WW2 was based on half-truths and lies! And demonization!

Why, they even dehumanized and mocked the enemy! It's horribly racist!

The whole social programming of the past few decades has been to instill the notion that anger at anyone but our own guilty selves is wrong, and that all "propaganda" that "dehumanizes" the "enemy" is based on that worst of all possible sins, racism, and must be stopped.

If your goal is to win, however, it's absolutely necessary to dehumanize the enmy or how else are you going to get ordinary people motivated to kill them?

The whole point of destroying our ability to get angry at the enemy by counter-propaganda that "humanizes" them is to get us to not be able to win wars.

All anti-war "literature" is geared to making wars unwinnable by our side.

Rather than make war less likely, the doves end up making us as a society unable to fight back effectively against real threats, like medieval islamic barbarism.

They act like they don't have a stake in the outcome, as if they exist on some other ethereal, theoretical plane and won't suffer any consequences from a lack of victory.

Indeed, they gain some perverse satisfaction from seeing the U.S. humiliated. It assuages guilt.

I recall shortly after 9/11, I was mentally composing some "fantasy speeches" that I was hoping the President would give, that would be to the effect of announcing a scorched earth policy rather than what I feared might be one of "proportionality."

What was telling was that someone I knew well from college also composed a "fantasy speech", and posted it to his blog, in which HIS major concern was for the President to essentially say, "for God's sake, you racist Americans, don't be suspicious of or mean to arabs and muslims! That is the MOST IMPORTANT THING!!!"

What a fool.

Or should I say, what a sheep:

Are all people stressed out by a defeat or does it hurt some more than others? It may depend on whether they are power-hungry wolves or sheep, say U-M psychology researchers.

In a study published in a recent issue of the science journal Hormones and Behavior, Michelle Wirth and co-authors Katy Welsh and Oliver Schultheiss looked at what happens to stress hormone levels when people are defeated in a laboratory contest.
...
"The power-hungry 'wolves' among our participants were hit hardest by a defeat, whereas the 'sheep' couldn't care less about being beaten."

As it turns out, then, not only does being defeated hurt some more than others. Defeating others also might be a source of stress, the researchers conclude.

"The sheep were really uncomfortable with winning," Schultheiss says. "This runs counter to the idea that everybody likes coming out at the top of the heap. That's a really surprising finding for us."

Of course this study may be mistaking some sheepdogs for wolves.

But I digress.

At this point, the argument is usually along the lines of, "but we mustn't become like them!"

Ok, that's ridiculuous for a multitude of reasons, namely that we've fought difficult and brutal wars several times in the past and apparently have NOT "become like them", because it's not in our basic nature.

Which is part of the reason propaganda is so necessary.

And because of our resilient institutions and the true power of our real core beliefs in freedom and individual rights.

But let's assume we DO risk becoming like them.

Ok, so SOMEONE is going to end up "being like them" in the end, right?

So why not US rather than THEM?

I mean, wouldn't it be better to "be like them" and be alive, rather than being dead with them being like them?

Well I suppose a few, in the apparent safety of not having to really face such a decision, might claim that indeed, they'd rather die than compromise their principles.

Even though from a purely utilitarian viewpoint, the outcome isn't any worse.

So then I ask the real question:

Do you not have the moral courage to risk "being like them", in order that your children do not have to face the same choice or be enslaved?

Burn their cities to the ground with pride!

Morning In America

Independence Day

Happy Birthday, America!

Mythku!

On a Lovecraft kick lately.

They're Mythkus, not haikus!

For the uninitiated, Book-a-Minute describes the Collected Works of HPL thusly:

Narrator
I will tell you about something horrific I witnessed.

(Narrator discusses MUNDANE experiences which supposedly lead up to something HORRIFIC.)

Narrator
We're almost at the horrific bit.

(Narrator talks about more stuff that might be SPOOKY if he'd only GET ON WITH IT.)

Narrator
We're very close now.

(Narrator draws it out MORE.)

Narrator
This time I swear we're just about at the horrific thing almost.

(Narrator FINALLY gets to the HORRIFIC thing which is HUGE and POWERFUL and EVIL and LAME.)

THE END

Though I disagree with "Lame."

The Mythkus do a good job of summing it all up concisely too.

Some of the more amusing (especially if you get the specific story references) are:

His parents went insane
He died without a child
Last of the Lovecrafts

wall of polished glass
the monster I see is me
I, the Outsider

I thought the Elder things were bad
then I found out
what it was they feared.

In round rooms I sit
paranoid
for I know what dwells in the angles

Mighty Cthulhu
And His servants the Deep Ones
Just so much Sushi

tentacles unfold
now my fate is surely sealed
my watery grave

Many cultists dead
Smoking Machine gun in hand
Up yours Cthulhu

I wonder about
Asenath Waite's complexion
it is so pasty

Thy sibling
gorges on cattle
Why can't thee be more like thy brother?

Nightgaunts tickling me
Laughingly defenseless
They carry me away

Dearest Grandam
the sea calls so strongly
my you've grown pudgy and gilled

what waits in the mist
in that house upon the hill
my God, the voices...

Slumbers Cthulhu
only for the period
he considers wise

Dagon, sea-god,
Your worshippers spout gills
in sleepy, troubled Innsmouth.

on the ocean floor
there lies the sleeping city
rise up great R'Lyeh!

I went to Providence,
There I lost my sanity;
Howard took it.

Cthulhu awaits
Dreaming in sunken R'Lyeh
Strange Aeons must past

Arkham Graduates!
Stride with pomp and circumstance
Down the lane of madness

Perverse earth goddess
running wildly through the woods
Ia, Shub-Niggurath!

Flap of webby wings,
a hound bays in the distance.
Death has come for me.

only you and I
know the terrible truth
soon, only you

A brain in a can
Hands and face found in a chair
a costume of flesh

The stars are aligned
The ancient is now present
The end has begun

hungry village cats
gnaw evil family bones
-just feline revenge

Have you ever felt
From the dark, eyes are watching?
They are really there.

Algol, Fomalhaut
Deneb, Riga and Altair
When will you be right?

We know not their names
And yet we fear the darkness
At night, we cry out

Cthulhu sleeps
ruling our minds
with crap like this