In Honor of Those Who Sacrificed for Our Freedom (11Nov09)
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?filter=h#/notes/sarah-palin/in-honor-of-those-who-sacrificed-for-our-freedom/171573088434
In most of our cities and towns, you’ll see memorials to brave Americans – some in uniforms of wars from long ago – who defended freedom. If you look down at their inscriptions, you’ll see that they were dedicated by the mothers, fathers, wives and orphans of the veterans who gave all for their country. In distant lands across the globe, you’ll find silent fields of white markers with the names of Americans who never came home, but who showed their dedication to their country by where they died. Today we honor those who served and made the ultimate sacrifice, as well as those who served and came home forever changed by the battlefield.
Remember all the veterans who fought and sacrificed for our freedom today, and then please take the time to thank our brave men and women currently serving in uniform. We owe them so much.
- Sarah Palin
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
Memorial Day: Home of The Brave by Ben Stein (11Nov09)
Memorial Day: Home of The Brave by Ben Stein (11Nov09)
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=34314
Washington, D.C., our nation’s capital, is the most beautiful city I have ever seen. It has broad, leafy boulevards.
It has magnificent public buildings that seem to float on pools of light by night. The Jefferson Memorial, the Lincoln Memorial, the Capitol, the White House, the Supreme Court -- these are just the main items in a virtually endless list of glorious sights. Then there is the Potomac River and its many bridges, a restful sight for sore eyes. And, of course, there are the war memorials -- the Vietnam Memorial with its list of names, the Korean War Memorial with its watchfully trudging soldiers in stone, the new World War II Memorial with its encircling columns, and innumerable statues of generals of the Civil War.
Then, of course, there are the fine museums, the best museums in the nation for art, for natural history, for American history, for the Holocaust, for Air and Space. A man or woman could spend a year at the Smithsonian with endless variety and profit to the mind.
But if you want to see the very most spectacular display in our national capital, you should go as I do, many times a year, to the Walter Reed Army Medical Center. This immense hospital complex has something that you cannot see even at Arlington National Cemetery: It has a living, breathing collection of the finest, bravest, most magnificent souls on the earth.
At Walter Reed, a great hospital much maligned by the press, you will see the men and women who are fighting America’s wars and coming home without legs, without arms, without intestines, with severe brain injuries, getting surgeries day after day--and still bravely, sometimes smiling, sometimes grim, coming back for more.
I have been visiting WRAMC for about five years now. I come maybe eight times a year, and I always find myself moved, uplifted, touched, humbled. I meet men who have been hit by IEDs and who are missing two limbs, one arm and one leg, and who have the remaining limbs sewn to their abdomens to get blood -- who are cracking jokes. I meet men with their guts missing, with every kind of artificial mechanism inside, yet with the glory of human heroism as the mainspring of their lives.
They lie in their beds or they whip up and down the halls in their wheelchairs. Their families are with them, the wives gamely, lovingly attached, the kids looking a bit bewildered, the parents sad but proud.
These young men -- and they usually are men but there are women at WRAMC too -- suffer more pain in a day, or maybe in a minute, than most of us do in a lifetime. What do they want to do when they get healed? Go back in the Army and help the next group of wounded men and women. Where do they come from? The small towns of America at every point of the compass, the less affluent neighborhoods of big cities, the nation’s territories and islands. There are very few heirs and heiresses.
But this is not the whole magnificence of the place. The caregivers are as heroic, as giving, as sacrificing, as the wounded. Tireless, enthusiastic, deeply committed to each and every patient, these people are the real hero civil servants or military servants of our capital. I often laugh to myself at all of the attention a president gets for his speeches and his press conferences a few miles south at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. I often think of the media attention on members of Congress.
Then I think of how the really indispensable work in Washington is the orderlies emptying the bedpans of the men and women who have given their health and their soundness of body for their country. I get to go to Walter Reed because I am a small caliber "celebrity" and I am believed to cheer up the troopers with my company and my well wishes. As far as I know there are no open-to-the-public tours and that’s a shame. It is by far the most inspiring sight in the capital or anywhere else.
This is where the men and women who have spilled their blood to keep us breathing free are nursed back to health by the finest health care professionals on earth. It is a temple to what is finest in the human spirit.
--------------------------------------------------
Commentary:
Good gracious, Ben. What a beautiful column; brought tears to my eyes. This should be mandatory reading for every student in America, from 7th grade on up. Thank you for writing it. Now, if I could only get over the guilt I feel for having never served.
Nov 10, 2009 @ 08:20 AM Bob D., South Lyon, MI
Thank You Mr Stein--I lost my hero,a veteran of three wars, in June,09, I know the sacrifices these military personnel and families make. Bless you for caring in a very confusing/confused world. The prioities of today are so difficult for an old gal like me to understand.kcl
Nov 10, 2009 @ 09:14 AM Kathryn Liggett, Plant City, Fl
I served in combat in Afghanistan, and although wounded I never received such an injury as to warrant hospital care. I wish that I could go visit WRAMC, but even not having gone I find every reason to agree with this article. Wonderful writing, and true to the core. Thanks for posting this just before Veteran's day. My hope is that more people gain a sense of respect for what has been sacrificed.
Nov 10, 2009 @ 09:22 AM Ryan Bunge, USA
May God bless the men, women and the families of all of our military members. May he keep them safe in battle, and be with them in their joy and their sorrow.
Thank You American Veterans.
Bob D., you CAN serve. Today, tomorrow and for the rest of your life. Join. Get active. Get out there and work hard to get your states America-Hating Commie Democrats out of our congress, and your state halls. While you still have a state left. By rope and tree if that's what it comes to. To hell with these people, literally.
Nov 10, 2009 @ 09:43 AM Scott, America.
These are part of the long line of those who have died to make and keep men free. We will NOT dishonor their memory and their sacrifice by failing to stand now in this time when our liberties are under attack.
God bless them and increase our strength.
On a related note -- Happy Birthday Marine Corps!
Nov 10, 2009 @ 09:58 AM Cutch, Alabama
Dear Mr. Stein, Why is it that those of you in the spolight who actually understand the sacrifice these brave men and women make, are plowed under by the wave of ignorance that represents the entertainment industry?
Perhaps if some of the members of your industry threw their support behind these types of programs instead of supporting Hugo Chavez, Iran, and others, we might generate some serious support for these fine young folks who lives were altered.
God bless you for your insight, and others like you, such as John Voight, who understand the cliff that our nation is teetering upon.
Nov 10, 2009 @ 10:02 AM Glenn Johannsen, Bentonville, AR.
Ben, I am almost in tears from this great article; thank you for bringing our dedicated men and women to the forefront - my prayer is that more people will become aware and get involved with your efforts. My Dad served 26 months in a German POW camp, I have a heart for all of those who serve. They're family!
Nov 10, 2009 @ 10:22 AM Joan Hammond, Kansas
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=34314
Washington, D.C., our nation’s capital, is the most beautiful city I have ever seen. It has broad, leafy boulevards.
It has magnificent public buildings that seem to float on pools of light by night. The Jefferson Memorial, the Lincoln Memorial, the Capitol, the White House, the Supreme Court -- these are just the main items in a virtually endless list of glorious sights. Then there is the Potomac River and its many bridges, a restful sight for sore eyes. And, of course, there are the war memorials -- the Vietnam Memorial with its list of names, the Korean War Memorial with its watchfully trudging soldiers in stone, the new World War II Memorial with its encircling columns, and innumerable statues of generals of the Civil War.
Then, of course, there are the fine museums, the best museums in the nation for art, for natural history, for American history, for the Holocaust, for Air and Space. A man or woman could spend a year at the Smithsonian with endless variety and profit to the mind.
But if you want to see the very most spectacular display in our national capital, you should go as I do, many times a year, to the Walter Reed Army Medical Center. This immense hospital complex has something that you cannot see even at Arlington National Cemetery: It has a living, breathing collection of the finest, bravest, most magnificent souls on the earth.
At Walter Reed, a great hospital much maligned by the press, you will see the men and women who are fighting America’s wars and coming home without legs, without arms, without intestines, with severe brain injuries, getting surgeries day after day--and still bravely, sometimes smiling, sometimes grim, coming back for more.
I have been visiting WRAMC for about five years now. I come maybe eight times a year, and I always find myself moved, uplifted, touched, humbled. I meet men who have been hit by IEDs and who are missing two limbs, one arm and one leg, and who have the remaining limbs sewn to their abdomens to get blood -- who are cracking jokes. I meet men with their guts missing, with every kind of artificial mechanism inside, yet with the glory of human heroism as the mainspring of their lives.
They lie in their beds or they whip up and down the halls in their wheelchairs. Their families are with them, the wives gamely, lovingly attached, the kids looking a bit bewildered, the parents sad but proud.
These young men -- and they usually are men but there are women at WRAMC too -- suffer more pain in a day, or maybe in a minute, than most of us do in a lifetime. What do they want to do when they get healed? Go back in the Army and help the next group of wounded men and women. Where do they come from? The small towns of America at every point of the compass, the less affluent neighborhoods of big cities, the nation’s territories and islands. There are very few heirs and heiresses.
But this is not the whole magnificence of the place. The caregivers are as heroic, as giving, as sacrificing, as the wounded. Tireless, enthusiastic, deeply committed to each and every patient, these people are the real hero civil servants or military servants of our capital. I often laugh to myself at all of the attention a president gets for his speeches and his press conferences a few miles south at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. I often think of the media attention on members of Congress.
Then I think of how the really indispensable work in Washington is the orderlies emptying the bedpans of the men and women who have given their health and their soundness of body for their country. I get to go to Walter Reed because I am a small caliber "celebrity" and I am believed to cheer up the troopers with my company and my well wishes. As far as I know there are no open-to-the-public tours and that’s a shame. It is by far the most inspiring sight in the capital or anywhere else.
This is where the men and women who have spilled their blood to keep us breathing free are nursed back to health by the finest health care professionals on earth. It is a temple to what is finest in the human spirit.
--------------------------------------------------
Commentary:
Good gracious, Ben. What a beautiful column; brought tears to my eyes. This should be mandatory reading for every student in America, from 7th grade on up. Thank you for writing it. Now, if I could only get over the guilt I feel for having never served.
Nov 10, 2009 @ 08:20 AM Bob D., South Lyon, MI
Thank You Mr Stein--I lost my hero,a veteran of three wars, in June,09, I know the sacrifices these military personnel and families make. Bless you for caring in a very confusing/confused world. The prioities of today are so difficult for an old gal like me to understand.kcl
Nov 10, 2009 @ 09:14 AM Kathryn Liggett, Plant City, Fl
I served in combat in Afghanistan, and although wounded I never received such an injury as to warrant hospital care. I wish that I could go visit WRAMC, but even not having gone I find every reason to agree with this article. Wonderful writing, and true to the core. Thanks for posting this just before Veteran's day. My hope is that more people gain a sense of respect for what has been sacrificed.
Nov 10, 2009 @ 09:22 AM Ryan Bunge, USA
May God bless the men, women and the families of all of our military members. May he keep them safe in battle, and be with them in their joy and their sorrow.
Thank You American Veterans.
Bob D., you CAN serve. Today, tomorrow and for the rest of your life. Join. Get active. Get out there and work hard to get your states America-Hating Commie Democrats out of our congress, and your state halls. While you still have a state left. By rope and tree if that's what it comes to. To hell with these people, literally.
Nov 10, 2009 @ 09:43 AM Scott, America.
These are part of the long line of those who have died to make and keep men free. We will NOT dishonor their memory and their sacrifice by failing to stand now in this time when our liberties are under attack.
God bless them and increase our strength.
On a related note -- Happy Birthday Marine Corps!
Nov 10, 2009 @ 09:58 AM Cutch, Alabama
Dear Mr. Stein, Why is it that those of you in the spolight who actually understand the sacrifice these brave men and women make, are plowed under by the wave of ignorance that represents the entertainment industry?
Perhaps if some of the members of your industry threw their support behind these types of programs instead of supporting Hugo Chavez, Iran, and others, we might generate some serious support for these fine young folks who lives were altered.
God bless you for your insight, and others like you, such as John Voight, who understand the cliff that our nation is teetering upon.
Nov 10, 2009 @ 10:02 AM Glenn Johannsen, Bentonville, AR.
Ben, I am almost in tears from this great article; thank you for bringing our dedicated men and women to the forefront - my prayer is that more people will become aware and get involved with your efforts. My Dad served 26 months in a German POW camp, I have a heart for all of those who serve. They're family!
Nov 10, 2009 @ 10:22 AM Joan Hammond, Kansas
Memorial Day: Tribute to Our Soldiers: Victims, Villains and Heros (11Nov09)
Memorial Day: Tribute to Our Soldiers; Victims, Villains and Heros (11Nov09)
http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/11/victims_villains_and_heroes.html
American soldiers find themselves once again caught in the inhumane crossfire of the Media.
Since the Vietnam War, the Media designates Soldiers as being in one of two unfortunate categories: victim or villain.
The current struggle to make meaning out of the Hisan Nidal terror attack at Fort Hood is indicative of the immoral rhetorical frame created by the national punditry.
Even Obama has entered the fray, departing from his rash indictment of the Cambridge police officer to urge caution in judging Nidal's actions.
For NPR and related 'journalistic' outlets, Nidal is a "victim" of the trauma associated with war.
The careful consideration of Nidal's victimage stands in sharp contrast to the treatment of American soldiers at Haditha denounced as cold blooded killers by a member of the United States Congress.
A U.S. Senator was willing to refer to American soldier interrogators at Guantanomo as comparable to Pol Pot and Hitler.
What American soldiers are not allowed to be is heroes.
The moral consequence of this propaganda war fought by "journalists" is the increased deaths of our soldiers at home and abroad. With attacks on our bases here at home and hundreds of attacks overseas, the world has been conditioned to believe that American soldiers do not enter the world to protect the innocent but to kill them.
In reality, from Kosovo to Kuwait and Indonesia to Pakistan, no military force does more to protect innocent Muslims than the American soldier.
The refusal to provide a public space for this argument has incited a global contempt for the American soldier, which if applied to any other group, would be termed a "hate crime."
American soldier medics even work to save the lives of those who seek to kill them-- like Hisan and the suicide bombers of Bagdad.
Even as these monsters are strapped to gurneys hurling epithets, American soldiers work to extract the shrapnel from their suicide bombs that killed so many other innocent Muslims but by some freak of nature spared the life of the bomber.
The careful concerted refusal of our media to allow a candid discussion of how Saddam Hussein delighted in dropping weapons of mass destruction on Muslims in northern Iraq or the brutal slaughters of Muslim women by the Taliban in Afghanistan allows the global propaganda against humanity's heroes to rebound in echo chambers of hate. Saddam referred to his WMD for Kurds as "human insecticides," and it was a powerful act of eliminationism that killed more than 300,000 Kurds.
The lack of this vital context deprives American soldiers of the heroic stature they deserve in saving Muslims from such inhumanity.
And so the mythic tale of the American soldier as aggressor continues without interruption. The American soldier is a ruthless killer and murderer like the ones portrayed in the global cinema blockbuster released by our "ally" Turkey, "The Valley of the Wolves."
American movie stars Gary Busey and Billy Zane were happy to take their 30 coins of silver to betray their freedom creating brethren as craven bloodlusting monsters. Millions watched the film and drank in its anti-semitic and anti-American poison so their lust for dead American soldiers could be better fed.
The deliberate actions of Nidal were not those of a mad man or a solitary freak. They were the byproduct of a concerted six year misrepresentation about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The murder of American soldiers came in response to these consistent inaccurate depictions of our soldiers as ruthless killers of innocent Muslims. Those misrepresentations continue today largely unabated.
But the American soldiers and their human allies are prepared to stand against this propaganda onslaught that fires away at light speed.
Like Kimberly Munley standing against Nidal Hisan, the bullets pierced her thighs and wrist, but she continued to fire against a man convinced that the death of American soldiers was his greatest moral service.
Munley stood and as a police officer and former soldier she recognized the evil threat and immediately risked her own life to save the innocent.
She did this because this is what an American soldier is truly like-- a hero.
http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/11/victims_villains_and_heroes.html
American soldiers find themselves once again caught in the inhumane crossfire of the Media.
Since the Vietnam War, the Media designates Soldiers as being in one of two unfortunate categories: victim or villain.
The current struggle to make meaning out of the Hisan Nidal terror attack at Fort Hood is indicative of the immoral rhetorical frame created by the national punditry.
Even Obama has entered the fray, departing from his rash indictment of the Cambridge police officer to urge caution in judging Nidal's actions.
For NPR and related 'journalistic' outlets, Nidal is a "victim" of the trauma associated with war.
The careful consideration of Nidal's victimage stands in sharp contrast to the treatment of American soldiers at Haditha denounced as cold blooded killers by a member of the United States Congress.
A U.S. Senator was willing to refer to American soldier interrogators at Guantanomo as comparable to Pol Pot and Hitler.
What American soldiers are not allowed to be is heroes.
The moral consequence of this propaganda war fought by "journalists" is the increased deaths of our soldiers at home and abroad. With attacks on our bases here at home and hundreds of attacks overseas, the world has been conditioned to believe that American soldiers do not enter the world to protect the innocent but to kill them.
In reality, from Kosovo to Kuwait and Indonesia to Pakistan, no military force does more to protect innocent Muslims than the American soldier.
The refusal to provide a public space for this argument has incited a global contempt for the American soldier, which if applied to any other group, would be termed a "hate crime."
American soldier medics even work to save the lives of those who seek to kill them-- like Hisan and the suicide bombers of Bagdad.
Even as these monsters are strapped to gurneys hurling epithets, American soldiers work to extract the shrapnel from their suicide bombs that killed so many other innocent Muslims but by some freak of nature spared the life of the bomber.
The careful concerted refusal of our media to allow a candid discussion of how Saddam Hussein delighted in dropping weapons of mass destruction on Muslims in northern Iraq or the brutal slaughters of Muslim women by the Taliban in Afghanistan allows the global propaganda against humanity's heroes to rebound in echo chambers of hate. Saddam referred to his WMD for Kurds as "human insecticides," and it was a powerful act of eliminationism that killed more than 300,000 Kurds.
The lack of this vital context deprives American soldiers of the heroic stature they deserve in saving Muslims from such inhumanity.
And so the mythic tale of the American soldier as aggressor continues without interruption. The American soldier is a ruthless killer and murderer like the ones portrayed in the global cinema blockbuster released by our "ally" Turkey, "The Valley of the Wolves."
American movie stars Gary Busey and Billy Zane were happy to take their 30 coins of silver to betray their freedom creating brethren as craven bloodlusting monsters. Millions watched the film and drank in its anti-semitic and anti-American poison so their lust for dead American soldiers could be better fed.
The deliberate actions of Nidal were not those of a mad man or a solitary freak. They were the byproduct of a concerted six year misrepresentation about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The murder of American soldiers came in response to these consistent inaccurate depictions of our soldiers as ruthless killers of innocent Muslims. Those misrepresentations continue today largely unabated.
But the American soldiers and their human allies are prepared to stand against this propaganda onslaught that fires away at light speed.
Like Kimberly Munley standing against Nidal Hisan, the bullets pierced her thighs and wrist, but she continued to fire against a man convinced that the death of American soldiers was his greatest moral service.
Munley stood and as a police officer and former soldier she recognized the evil threat and immediately risked her own life to save the innocent.
She did this because this is what an American soldier is truly like-- a hero.
Memorial Day: Sheriff to Marines; Your Service is Not Over (11Nov09)
Memorial Day: Sheriff to Marines; Your Service is Not Over (11Nov09)
http://www.wnd.com/?pageId=115662
A Colorado sheriff whose deliberate non-compliance with the politically correct attitude of his county over previous Christmas seasons has made headlines today honored the U.S. Marine Corps on its 234th birthday, and said his comments apply equally to members of other military services, to be recognized on Veterans Day this week.
And he implored them to be vigilant now as ever, since their service is not over.
The comments come from Larimer County Sheriff Jim Alderden.
He was in the news over recent Christmas seasons when he scoffed at politically correct county rules about using neutral themes like penguins for Christmas decorations, and staged the display of his own traditional Christmas tree and accompanying American themes and decorations at his department's facility in Fort Collins, Colo.
Alderden spoke a few days ago at the local Marine Corps Ball, and released his remarks in today's column.
He cited bumper stickers seen on vehicles driven by members of the Marine Corp:
U.S. Marines – Certified Counselors to the 72 Virgins Dating Club;
U.S. Marines – Travel agents to Allah;
The Marine Corps – When It Absolutely, Positively Has To Be Destroyed Overnight;
Marine Sniper – You can run, but you'll just die tired!
Alderden told the Marines when he was elected 11 years earlier, he decided he wanted his office to be the Marine Corps of law enforcement agencies.
Then he talked about freedom and liberty, asking the Marines to ready, now more than ever.
"I don't mean for this message to be overly political, certainly not partisan political, but the Marines have shed blood to defend the Constitution," he said. "I fear what is happening in Washington, D.C., particularly with the over-reach of the federal government, intruding into areas beyond what is authorized in the U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights."
"The freedoms and liberties which we enjoy under the U.S. Constitution are under siege," he said.
He said there has been:
Legislation proposed that "infringes" on the right to keep and bear arms;.
Legislation proposed that violates the people's rights to be secure in their homes;
Legislation that authorizes the government to seize businesses;
Places in our country that are considering allowing Shariah law.
"I look at the growth of Muslim extremism, even within our borders, most recently demonstrated just a few days ago at Fort Hood, and I fear for our country," he said.
"My message to you is simple: be vigilant. 'Once a Marine always a Marine.' Your service is not over."
He quoted from the Marine Corps oath: "I do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies foreign and domestic…'"
"Foreign – and domestic," he said. "The United States military is the best in the world. We have the best equipment. We have the finest young men and women. If our country fails, it won't be because our military is defeated. It will be due to the complacency of the politicians in Washington, D.C., and a failed educational system."
He cited some of the early honors earned by the Marines, fighting Muslim pirates in the Barbary Wars in the early 1800s, through the War of 1912, World Wars and Korea and Vietnam.
"Panama. Granada. Iran. Somalia. Lebanon. Liberia. Kuwait. Iraq. Afghanistan. Wherever Americans are in jeopardy, wherever freedoms and liberties are threatened - the Marines are there," he said.
http://www.wnd.com/?pageId=115662
A Colorado sheriff whose deliberate non-compliance with the politically correct attitude of his county over previous Christmas seasons has made headlines today honored the U.S. Marine Corps on its 234th birthday, and said his comments apply equally to members of other military services, to be recognized on Veterans Day this week.
And he implored them to be vigilant now as ever, since their service is not over.
The comments come from Larimer County Sheriff Jim Alderden.
He was in the news over recent Christmas seasons when he scoffed at politically correct county rules about using neutral themes like penguins for Christmas decorations, and staged the display of his own traditional Christmas tree and accompanying American themes and decorations at his department's facility in Fort Collins, Colo.
Alderden spoke a few days ago at the local Marine Corps Ball, and released his remarks in today's column.
He cited bumper stickers seen on vehicles driven by members of the Marine Corp:
U.S. Marines – Certified Counselors to the 72 Virgins Dating Club;
U.S. Marines – Travel agents to Allah;
The Marine Corps – When It Absolutely, Positively Has To Be Destroyed Overnight;
Marine Sniper – You can run, but you'll just die tired!
Alderden told the Marines when he was elected 11 years earlier, he decided he wanted his office to be the Marine Corps of law enforcement agencies.
Then he talked about freedom and liberty, asking the Marines to ready, now more than ever.
"I don't mean for this message to be overly political, certainly not partisan political, but the Marines have shed blood to defend the Constitution," he said. "I fear what is happening in Washington, D.C., particularly with the over-reach of the federal government, intruding into areas beyond what is authorized in the U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights."
"The freedoms and liberties which we enjoy under the U.S. Constitution are under siege," he said.
He said there has been:
Legislation proposed that "infringes" on the right to keep and bear arms;.
Legislation proposed that violates the people's rights to be secure in their homes;
Legislation that authorizes the government to seize businesses;
Places in our country that are considering allowing Shariah law.
"I look at the growth of Muslim extremism, even within our borders, most recently demonstrated just a few days ago at Fort Hood, and I fear for our country," he said.
"My message to you is simple: be vigilant. 'Once a Marine always a Marine.' Your service is not over."
He quoted from the Marine Corps oath: "I do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies foreign and domestic…'"
"Foreign – and domestic," he said. "The United States military is the best in the world. We have the best equipment. We have the finest young men and women. If our country fails, it won't be because our military is defeated. It will be due to the complacency of the politicians in Washington, D.C., and a failed educational system."
He cited some of the early honors earned by the Marines, fighting Muslim pirates in the Barbary Wars in the early 1800s, through the War of 1912, World Wars and Korea and Vietnam.
"Panama. Granada. Iran. Somalia. Lebanon. Liberia. Kuwait. Iraq. Afghanistan. Wherever Americans are in jeopardy, wherever freedoms and liberties are threatened - the Marines are there," he said.
Tuesday, November 10, 2009
ObamaNation: Actions Fail to Match Mideast Rhetoric (10Nov09)
ObamaNation: Actions Fail to Match Mideast Rhetoric (10Nov09)
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/5be4b65c-ce2b-11de-a1ea-00144feabdc0.html?nclick_check=1
Less than a year after Barack Obama took presidential office promising a new start in the Middle East, US policy towards the region is under siege.
Top US diplomats acknowledged on Tuesday that Washington had failed to make substantial progress on the Arab-Israeli conflict and that Tehran was likely to reject a compromise offer many administration officials identified as a key step towards Mr Obama’s goal of engagement with Iran.
There is now growing criticism of the administration’s inconsistent language on a possible Israeli settlement freeze as a prelude to final negotiations. “I wish I could stand before you today and point to substantial progress,” William Burns, the state department’s top career diplomat, told a conference on the Middle East on Tuesday. “I cannot.”
Remarks by Hillary Clinton, US secretary of state, praising a partial Israeli offer on settlements as “unprecedented” have particularly infuriated Palestinians. Mahmoud Abbas, Palestinian Authority president, soon followed with an announcement that he did not intend to run again, a declaration that reflected his disappointment with recent US policy and which seemingly put any prospect of negotiations on ice.
Among the Palestinians, Mr Obama and his secretary of state are widely blamed for fatally undermining Mr Abbas, a long-time opponent of violence against Israel. Many Israelis also see the Obama administration’s initial calls for a settlement freeze as markedly less friendly to their country than moves initiated by George W. Bush, his predecessor.
Meanwhile, on the issue the US identifies as the most pressing in the region – the dispute over Iran’s nuclear programme – Washington has come round to British and French arguments that Tehran has in effect rejected a compromise Obama championed. Iran’s decision this week to press espionage charges against three American hikers is set to increase mutual distrust.
Robert Einhorn, who with Mr Burns was one of the top US architects of the proposed deal to exchange enriched uranium from Iran for fuel for a medical research reactor, said that Tehran’s reported response to the proposal was “not very encouraging”.
The challenge facing the US, if it is ever to convince Tehran to scale back its nuclear programme, has been highlighted by the intense opposition within Iran’s divided political elite to what Washington and its partners depict as a modest confidence-building deal.
This is despite US readiness to consider a further compromise, in which a friendly country such as Turkey would keep hold of Iran’s enriched uranium – another proposal Tehran has refused to accept.
Mr Burns said that on issues such as Iran, Iraq, Israel and the Palestinians there was no alternative but to press on.
The administration has signalled it intends to do that, by appointing John Limbert as its senior diplomat on Iran. He is a state department veteran who advocates patience in dealing with the Islamic republic, having gained firsthand experience of what that means; Mr Limbert was held as a hostage in the US embassy in Tehran for 14 months.
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/5be4b65c-ce2b-11de-a1ea-00144feabdc0.html?nclick_check=1
Less than a year after Barack Obama took presidential office promising a new start in the Middle East, US policy towards the region is under siege.
Top US diplomats acknowledged on Tuesday that Washington had failed to make substantial progress on the Arab-Israeli conflict and that Tehran was likely to reject a compromise offer many administration officials identified as a key step towards Mr Obama’s goal of engagement with Iran.
There is now growing criticism of the administration’s inconsistent language on a possible Israeli settlement freeze as a prelude to final negotiations. “I wish I could stand before you today and point to substantial progress,” William Burns, the state department’s top career diplomat, told a conference on the Middle East on Tuesday. “I cannot.”
Remarks by Hillary Clinton, US secretary of state, praising a partial Israeli offer on settlements as “unprecedented” have particularly infuriated Palestinians. Mahmoud Abbas, Palestinian Authority president, soon followed with an announcement that he did not intend to run again, a declaration that reflected his disappointment with recent US policy and which seemingly put any prospect of negotiations on ice.
Among the Palestinians, Mr Obama and his secretary of state are widely blamed for fatally undermining Mr Abbas, a long-time opponent of violence against Israel. Many Israelis also see the Obama administration’s initial calls for a settlement freeze as markedly less friendly to their country than moves initiated by George W. Bush, his predecessor.
Meanwhile, on the issue the US identifies as the most pressing in the region – the dispute over Iran’s nuclear programme – Washington has come round to British and French arguments that Tehran has in effect rejected a compromise Obama championed. Iran’s decision this week to press espionage charges against three American hikers is set to increase mutual distrust.
Robert Einhorn, who with Mr Burns was one of the top US architects of the proposed deal to exchange enriched uranium from Iran for fuel for a medical research reactor, said that Tehran’s reported response to the proposal was “not very encouraging”.
The challenge facing the US, if it is ever to convince Tehran to scale back its nuclear programme, has been highlighted by the intense opposition within Iran’s divided political elite to what Washington and its partners depict as a modest confidence-building deal.
This is despite US readiness to consider a further compromise, in which a friendly country such as Turkey would keep hold of Iran’s enriched uranium – another proposal Tehran has refused to accept.
Mr Burns said that on issues such as Iran, Iraq, Israel and the Palestinians there was no alternative but to press on.
The administration has signalled it intends to do that, by appointing John Limbert as its senior diplomat on Iran. He is a state department veteran who advocates patience in dealing with the Islamic republic, having gained firsthand experience of what that means; Mr Limbert was held as a hostage in the US embassy in Tehran for 14 months.
Japan: SDP Leader Hopes Obama will Visit Okinawa (10Nov09)
Japan: SDP Leader Hopes Obama will Visit Okinawa (10Nov09)
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D9BT42H80&show_article=1&catnum=0
TOKYO(Kyodo) — Mizuho Fukushima, leader of the Social Democratic Party that forms part of the coalition government, expressed hope Wednesday that U.S. President Barack Obama or a member of his administration will visit Nago, the Okinawa city tapped to host a new U.S. military base under a 2006 Japan-U.S. accord.
"If it is possible, I would hope that President Obama or some other high-ranking officials of his administration will be able to visit Henoko," Fukushima, also a Cabinet minister, told a press conference at the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan in Tokyo.
Fukushima was referring to the Henoko area in Nago, to which the U.S. Marine Corps' Futemma Air Station currently in Ginowan, another Okinawa city, is to be relocated in line with the bilateral accord.
Obama will visit Japan for two days from Friday for talks with Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama.
"I am one of those who are impressed with President Obama's speeches and books and respect what he has been doing," Fukushima said. "I am also delighted to hear that he is interested in visiting Hiroshima and Nagasaki (the two Japanese atomic-bombed cities) in the future."
Fukushima said she hopes that Obama will also put more focus on the base issue in Okinawa and visit the southernmost Japanese prefecture before coming to a conclusion on the Futemma relocation issue.
The Japan-U.S. summit will be held as bilateral ties appear to be fraying amid a row over the Futemma relocation, as the government led by the Democratic Party of Japan, launched in mid-September, has pledged to review the bilateral accord to alleviate the burden of people in Okinawa.
She stressed that both governments should not ignore the persistent opposition by local residents against the construction of a new relocation site in Nago.
"We must not coerce the construction of the base because if we do so, we will be exposed to antagonism among the people in Okinawa and this would produce no beneficial results as we look back on the history in many years ahead of us," she said.
Also on the Japan-U.S. Status of Forces Agreement, Fukushima, a lawyer-turned-politician, said the agreement should be revised so a U.S. soldier suspected of a crime can be handed over to Japanese authorities in any case and tried under Japanese laws in a more smooth way than now.
She made the comments on the SOFA in reference to a recent hit-and-run incident that resulted in the death of a man in the village of Yomitan, Okinawa. A U.S. Army member has been in custody at a U.S. base in connection with the case.
Under the SOFA, which governs the operations of the U.S. military in Japan, a U.S. service member can be handed over to Japan before a formal indictment only in cases of murder, rape and other heinous crimes.
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D9BT42H80&show_article=1&catnum=0
TOKYO(Kyodo) — Mizuho Fukushima, leader of the Social Democratic Party that forms part of the coalition government, expressed hope Wednesday that U.S. President Barack Obama or a member of his administration will visit Nago, the Okinawa city tapped to host a new U.S. military base under a 2006 Japan-U.S. accord.
"If it is possible, I would hope that President Obama or some other high-ranking officials of his administration will be able to visit Henoko," Fukushima, also a Cabinet minister, told a press conference at the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan in Tokyo.
Fukushima was referring to the Henoko area in Nago, to which the U.S. Marine Corps' Futemma Air Station currently in Ginowan, another Okinawa city, is to be relocated in line with the bilateral accord.
Obama will visit Japan for two days from Friday for talks with Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama.
"I am one of those who are impressed with President Obama's speeches and books and respect what he has been doing," Fukushima said. "I am also delighted to hear that he is interested in visiting Hiroshima and Nagasaki (the two Japanese atomic-bombed cities) in the future."
Fukushima said she hopes that Obama will also put more focus on the base issue in Okinawa and visit the southernmost Japanese prefecture before coming to a conclusion on the Futemma relocation issue.
The Japan-U.S. summit will be held as bilateral ties appear to be fraying amid a row over the Futemma relocation, as the government led by the Democratic Party of Japan, launched in mid-September, has pledged to review the bilateral accord to alleviate the burden of people in Okinawa.
She stressed that both governments should not ignore the persistent opposition by local residents against the construction of a new relocation site in Nago.
"We must not coerce the construction of the base because if we do so, we will be exposed to antagonism among the people in Okinawa and this would produce no beneficial results as we look back on the history in many years ahead of us," she said.
Also on the Japan-U.S. Status of Forces Agreement, Fukushima, a lawyer-turned-politician, said the agreement should be revised so a U.S. soldier suspected of a crime can be handed over to Japanese authorities in any case and tried under Japanese laws in a more smooth way than now.
She made the comments on the SOFA in reference to a recent hit-and-run incident that resulted in the death of a man in the village of Yomitan, Okinawa. A U.S. Army member has been in custody at a U.S. base in connection with the case.
Under the SOFA, which governs the operations of the U.S. military in Japan, a U.S. service member can be handed over to Japan before a formal indictment only in cases of murder, rape and other heinous crimes.
Korea: SKorea troops on high alert after navy battle (10Nov09)
Korea: SKorea troops on high alert after navy battle (10Nov09)
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D9BT4IGG0&show_article=1&catnum=0
SEOUL, South Korea - South Korea's troops went on high alert Wednesday for possible retaliation by North Korea after one of its navy ships was nearly destroyed and an officer reportedly killed in a skirmish with the South, ahead of a visit by President Barack Obama.
The clash Tuesday along the disputed western sea border was the first such engagement in seven years, sending tensions soaring about a week before Obama travels to Seoul as part of his Asian tour.
The exchange of fire also occurred just hours before the State Department announced a senior U.S. diplomat will travel to North Korea before year's end to try to entice North Korea back into international negotiations on nuclear disarmament. The dispatch of envoy Stephen Bosworth would mark the first direct talks between Washington and Pyongyang since Obama took office in January.
South Korean officials said the North Korean ship was on fire and heavily damaged following a two-minute skirmish off the west coast—the scene of two bloody naval battles in 1999 and 2002. The South Korean ship was only lightly damaged and there were no South Korean causalities, according to the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
South Korea's mass-circulation Chosun Ilbo newspaper and other media reported that one North Korean officer was believed killed and three other sailors wounded. President Lee Myung-bak ordered his Defense Minister Kim Tae-young to strengthen military readiness.
Late Tuesday, Kim said in parliament that he believed the North may take retaliatory action. "The president also has such concerns," Kim said.
South Korea's 680,000-strong military was on heightened alert but detected no unusual North Korean troop movements, an officer at the Joint Chiefs of Staff said.
Asked if U.S. troops in South Korea had raised their alert level, David Oten, a spokesman for the U.S. military in Seoul, said it does not comment on operational or security issues. The U.S. stations about 28,500 troops in South Korea to deter possible North Korean aggression.
The officer, speaking on condition of anonymity citing department policy, said the heightened posture meant having troops stay vigilant but that there were no additional deployments in border areas. South Korean ships did routine patrols along the sea border Wednesday, he said.
Presidential security adviser Kim Sung-hwan was quoted as saying by Yonhap news agency that signs of a North Korean retaliation have not been detected. Kim, however, said North Korea may take time before retaliating.
Yonhap also quoted an unidentified government official as saying that North Korea had also put its troops on high alert.
The Koreas blamed each other Tuesday for causing the skirmish in the rich crab-fishing area, where both sides regularly accuse the other of border violations.
A North Korean patrol boat crossed the disputed sea border before noon on Tuesday, drawing warning shots from a South Korean navy vessel, South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff said in a statement. It said the North Korean boat then opened fire and the South's ship returned fire before the North's vessel sailed back toward its waters.
The ships were about two miles (3.2 kilometers) apart during the clash, South Korean Rear Adm. Lee Ki-sik told reporters.
North Korea's military said its ship was attacked by South Korean vessels as it was returning from checking on "an unidentified object that intruded" into its waters.
South Korean Prime Minister Chung Un-chan said Tuesday the North Koreas may have been clamping down on Chinese fishing vessels in the area, and probably did not intend to violate the border.
Some South Korean analysts, however, said North Korea was sending a clear message ahead of Obama's two-day visit starting next Wednesday.
"It was an intentional provocation by North Korea to draw attention ahead of Obama's trip," said Shin Yul, a political scientist at Seoul's Myongji University.
Traveling with Obama on Air Force One, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said the administration was aware of the clash and urged North Korea not to escalate tensions.
The two Koreas are still technically at war and the U.S., which fought as part of U.N. forces on South Korea's side, has never had diplomatic relations with North Korea.
Washington has consistently said that Pyongyang must abandon its nuclear arsenal for any peace treaty to be concluded. North Korea has conducted two underground nuclear tests since 2006 and is believed to have enough weaponized plutonium for half a dozen atomic weapons.
The U.S. will send Bosworth to North Korea in part of its efforts to get the North to return stalled six-nation nuclear talks involving the two Koreas, the U.S., China, Russia and China.
Some analysts said the clash could have been accidental.
"This is not the first naval incident, and it is a border area where both sides have different claims," Charles Morrison, president of the Honolulu-based East-West Center, said in Singapore. "So it's possible it's an error."
South Korea's military said North Korean ships have violated the sea border 22 times this year. North Korea last month accused South Korean warships of broaching its territory and warned of a clash.
No South Koreans were killed in 1999, but six South Korean sailors died in 2002, according to the South Korean navy. It said exact North Korean causalities remain unclear.
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D9BT4IGG0&show_article=1&catnum=0
SEOUL, South Korea - South Korea's troops went on high alert Wednesday for possible retaliation by North Korea after one of its navy ships was nearly destroyed and an officer reportedly killed in a skirmish with the South, ahead of a visit by President Barack Obama.
The clash Tuesday along the disputed western sea border was the first such engagement in seven years, sending tensions soaring about a week before Obama travels to Seoul as part of his Asian tour.
The exchange of fire also occurred just hours before the State Department announced a senior U.S. diplomat will travel to North Korea before year's end to try to entice North Korea back into international negotiations on nuclear disarmament. The dispatch of envoy Stephen Bosworth would mark the first direct talks between Washington and Pyongyang since Obama took office in January.
South Korean officials said the North Korean ship was on fire and heavily damaged following a two-minute skirmish off the west coast—the scene of two bloody naval battles in 1999 and 2002. The South Korean ship was only lightly damaged and there were no South Korean causalities, according to the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
South Korea's mass-circulation Chosun Ilbo newspaper and other media reported that one North Korean officer was believed killed and three other sailors wounded. President Lee Myung-bak ordered his Defense Minister Kim Tae-young to strengthen military readiness.
Late Tuesday, Kim said in parliament that he believed the North may take retaliatory action. "The president also has such concerns," Kim said.
South Korea's 680,000-strong military was on heightened alert but detected no unusual North Korean troop movements, an officer at the Joint Chiefs of Staff said.
Asked if U.S. troops in South Korea had raised their alert level, David Oten, a spokesman for the U.S. military in Seoul, said it does not comment on operational or security issues. The U.S. stations about 28,500 troops in South Korea to deter possible North Korean aggression.
The officer, speaking on condition of anonymity citing department policy, said the heightened posture meant having troops stay vigilant but that there were no additional deployments in border areas. South Korean ships did routine patrols along the sea border Wednesday, he said.
Presidential security adviser Kim Sung-hwan was quoted as saying by Yonhap news agency that signs of a North Korean retaliation have not been detected. Kim, however, said North Korea may take time before retaliating.
Yonhap also quoted an unidentified government official as saying that North Korea had also put its troops on high alert.
The Koreas blamed each other Tuesday for causing the skirmish in the rich crab-fishing area, where both sides regularly accuse the other of border violations.
A North Korean patrol boat crossed the disputed sea border before noon on Tuesday, drawing warning shots from a South Korean navy vessel, South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff said in a statement. It said the North Korean boat then opened fire and the South's ship returned fire before the North's vessel sailed back toward its waters.
The ships were about two miles (3.2 kilometers) apart during the clash, South Korean Rear Adm. Lee Ki-sik told reporters.
North Korea's military said its ship was attacked by South Korean vessels as it was returning from checking on "an unidentified object that intruded" into its waters.
South Korean Prime Minister Chung Un-chan said Tuesday the North Koreas may have been clamping down on Chinese fishing vessels in the area, and probably did not intend to violate the border.
Some South Korean analysts, however, said North Korea was sending a clear message ahead of Obama's two-day visit starting next Wednesday.
"It was an intentional provocation by North Korea to draw attention ahead of Obama's trip," said Shin Yul, a political scientist at Seoul's Myongji University.
Traveling with Obama on Air Force One, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said the administration was aware of the clash and urged North Korea not to escalate tensions.
The two Koreas are still technically at war and the U.S., which fought as part of U.N. forces on South Korea's side, has never had diplomatic relations with North Korea.
Washington has consistently said that Pyongyang must abandon its nuclear arsenal for any peace treaty to be concluded. North Korea has conducted two underground nuclear tests since 2006 and is believed to have enough weaponized plutonium for half a dozen atomic weapons.
The U.S. will send Bosworth to North Korea in part of its efforts to get the North to return stalled six-nation nuclear talks involving the two Koreas, the U.S., China, Russia and China.
Some analysts said the clash could have been accidental.
"This is not the first naval incident, and it is a border area where both sides have different claims," Charles Morrison, president of the Honolulu-based East-West Center, said in Singapore. "So it's possible it's an error."
South Korea's military said North Korean ships have violated the sea border 22 times this year. North Korea last month accused South Korean warships of broaching its territory and warned of a clash.
No South Koreans were killed in 1999, but six South Korean sailors died in 2002, according to the South Korean navy. It said exact North Korean causalities remain unclear.
Sarah Palin: Huckabee Whines About Palin Publicity (10Nov09)
Sarah Palin: Huckabee Whines About Palin Publicity (10Nov09)
http://www.thesarahpalinblog.com/2009/11/mike-huckabee-whines-about-sarah-palin.html
The 2012 Republican hopeful is trying to sell a book and can't get the publicity that Sarah Palin is getting.
Also, Huckabee is winning many polls for the Republican Nomination and yet bemoans the fact that he isn't taken seriously. He tell Politico - "I'm a very serious person. I may not be dour, but I'm serious."
Poor, poor Mike Huckabee. No one feels mores sorry for Mike Huckabee - than Mike Huckabee.
And he can't seem to get his mind off of Sarah Palin. This is the way Politico puts it -
"As Huckabee works his way through a 22-state tour for his new book, “A Simple Christmas,” he knows that he and the book will be almost entirely overshadowed by former Gov. Sarah Palin’s two-week barnstorming tour for her forthcoming memoir.
Palin is the party’s rock star.
Huckabee laments, 'Some of the people who had excoriated me and really been very dismissive of me for views that I had taken, and labeled me anything from a populist to an ignoramus — the same people have been very defensive [of] and laudatory to Sarah Palin."
Poor, poor, poor Mike Huckabee. He also told Politico that he has been trying to get Sarah Palin on his weekly FoxNews Tv show, but she won't return his calls.
There is probably good reason for that. CNN reminds us that the former two-term Arkansas governor has expressed criticism of Palin before, suggesting her abrupt resignation of the Alaska governorship may suggest she's not ready to handle the pressures of a hardscrabble presidential primary campaign.
"If she's looking to be a national political figure, it's not going to get easier," he said in July. "In a primary this is going to be an issue she'll have to face. Will she be able to withstand the pressure?"
That has to be the funniest thing Mike Huckabee has ever said. Does he even realize how ridiculous that sounds. First - Sarah Palin already is a "national public figure." Second - she has already been through a campaign - remember Mike? - she was McCain's running mate Third - "Will she be able to withstand the pressure?" Puh-leazze. This woman has withstood attacks unparalleled in modern politics and she is stronger than ever. Her intestinal fortitude has never been in question - she has never whined like - well - like Mike Huckabee.
This is a good time to point out that Sarah Palin has not attacked or talked negatively about any Republican leaders or potential 2012 candidates - not one.
And yet here is poor, poor, poor, poor Mike Huckabee whining that his book isn't as popular as Sarah Palin's - that he is not defended by the rank and file like Sarah Palin - that he can't get Sarah Palin on his TV show. This all after warning Sarah about how tough it will be on the campaign trail (again, laugh out loud funny).
Someone cue up the Warren Zevon song "Poor, Poor, Pitiful Me" and lets have a pity party of Mike Huckabee - or better yet - let's wait until after the Iowa caucus when his 2012 bid ends. Because this time, Mike, you will have competition in Iowa - and if you don't win there - it's over.
"Poor, poor, pitiful me - poor, poor pitiful me - Sarah Palin is more popular than me - Lord have mercy on me - woe, woe is me."
Poor, poor, poor, poor, poor Mike Huckabee.
http://www.thesarahpalinblog.com/2009/11/mike-huckabee-whines-about-sarah-palin.html
The 2012 Republican hopeful is trying to sell a book and can't get the publicity that Sarah Palin is getting.
Also, Huckabee is winning many polls for the Republican Nomination and yet bemoans the fact that he isn't taken seriously. He tell Politico - "I'm a very serious person. I may not be dour, but I'm serious."
Poor, poor Mike Huckabee. No one feels mores sorry for Mike Huckabee - than Mike Huckabee.
And he can't seem to get his mind off of Sarah Palin. This is the way Politico puts it -
"As Huckabee works his way through a 22-state tour for his new book, “A Simple Christmas,” he knows that he and the book will be almost entirely overshadowed by former Gov. Sarah Palin’s two-week barnstorming tour for her forthcoming memoir.
Palin is the party’s rock star.
Huckabee laments, 'Some of the people who had excoriated me and really been very dismissive of me for views that I had taken, and labeled me anything from a populist to an ignoramus — the same people have been very defensive [of] and laudatory to Sarah Palin."
Poor, poor, poor Mike Huckabee. He also told Politico that he has been trying to get Sarah Palin on his weekly FoxNews Tv show, but she won't return his calls.
There is probably good reason for that. CNN reminds us that the former two-term Arkansas governor has expressed criticism of Palin before, suggesting her abrupt resignation of the Alaska governorship may suggest she's not ready to handle the pressures of a hardscrabble presidential primary campaign.
"If she's looking to be a national political figure, it's not going to get easier," he said in July. "In a primary this is going to be an issue she'll have to face. Will she be able to withstand the pressure?"
That has to be the funniest thing Mike Huckabee has ever said. Does he even realize how ridiculous that sounds. First - Sarah Palin already is a "national public figure." Second - she has already been through a campaign - remember Mike? - she was McCain's running mate Third - "Will she be able to withstand the pressure?" Puh-leazze. This woman has withstood attacks unparalleled in modern politics and she is stronger than ever. Her intestinal fortitude has never been in question - she has never whined like - well - like Mike Huckabee.
This is a good time to point out that Sarah Palin has not attacked or talked negatively about any Republican leaders or potential 2012 candidates - not one.
And yet here is poor, poor, poor, poor Mike Huckabee whining that his book isn't as popular as Sarah Palin's - that he is not defended by the rank and file like Sarah Palin - that he can't get Sarah Palin on his TV show. This all after warning Sarah about how tough it will be on the campaign trail (again, laugh out loud funny).
Someone cue up the Warren Zevon song "Poor, Poor, Pitiful Me" and lets have a pity party of Mike Huckabee - or better yet - let's wait until after the Iowa caucus when his 2012 bid ends. Because this time, Mike, you will have competition in Iowa - and if you don't win there - it's over.
"Poor, poor, pitiful me - poor, poor pitiful me - Sarah Palin is more popular than me - Lord have mercy on me - woe, woe is me."
Poor, poor, poor, poor, poor Mike Huckabee.
Israel: Major Cities now Within Hezbollah's Range (10Nov09)
Israel: Major Cities now Within Hezbollah's Range (10Nov09)
http://apnews.myway.com/article/20091110/D9BSOACG1.html
JERUSALEM (AP) - The Lebanese militant group Hezbollah has significantly expanded its ability to strike deep into Israel with rockets that can now reach the Jewish state's largest cities, and now possesses tens of thousands of projectiles, Israel's army chief said Tuesday.
The remarks by Maj. Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi were the first official assessment of the guerrilla group's capabilities since Israel seized a ship last week carrying weapons allegedly destined for Hezbollah.
Ashkenazi indicated that the arms bust had little effect in stopping what Israel says has been a massive arms buildup by the Iranian-backed militia since the sides fought a bitter monthlong war in 2006.
An official said that Ashkenazi told lawmakers Tuesday that some of the rockets can fly up to 200 miles (325 kilometers). That would put Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, as well as Israel's nuclear reactor in the southern desert, within rocket range.
Alternatively, the official said, Hezbollah could pound Israeli towns and cities closer to the border from positions north of the Litani River, outside the area of south Lebanon policed by U.N. peacekeepers.
Ashkenazi was briefing the Israeli parliament's influential Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the meeting was closed.
A lawmaker present at the briefing said Ashkenazi told legislators Israel would hold the Lebanese government responsible for any attacks by Hezbollah. "Everything that happens in Lebanese territory is the responsibility of the Lebanese government," she quoted him as saying.
There was no immediate reaction from Hezbollah. But its leader, Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, has bragged recently that the group can now strike any Israeli city.
After months of wrangling, Lebanon's prime minister formed a Cabinet Monday that includes Hezbollah ministers. Some observers suggest the arrangement could give Hezbollah virtual veto power over government decisions.
Israel said the huge weapons haul backs up its long-standing contention that Iran is supplying large quantities of arms to Hezbollah and Hamas, the Palestinian militant group that governs the Gaza Strip to Israel's south. Hezbollah denied any connection to the weapons.
During the 2006 war, Hezbollah fired nearly 4,000 Katyusha rockets across Israel's northern border, some of which fell as far as 55 miles (90 kilometers) inside Israel.
Israel went after Hezbollah in a massive air, sea and ground campaign in which nearly 1,200 people died in Lebanon and 159 lost their lives in Israel. The war ended with a U.N. resolution that bans Hezbollah and other militias and their weapons from the area south of the Litani.
Israel has repeatedly accused Hezbollah of violating that cease-fire and says Iran and Syria are colluding in smuggling arms to the group. Israeli officials have said they believe Hezbollah has managed to triple its prewar arms stockpile to more than 40,000 rockets.
Last week, Israel seized a ship that it says was carrying hundreds of tons of Iranian-made weapons to Hezbollah.
The seizure at sea came a day after Israeli officials said Hamas tested an Iranian rocket that can hit Tel Aviv - bringing to the fore Israeli fears that both Hezbollah and Hamas are rearming for more confrontations.
Last winter, Israel carried out a devastating military offensive against Hamas. Some 1,400 Palestinians, including hundreds of civilians, were killed. Thirteen Israelis also died in the fighting.
The Israeli assault on Gaza came in response to years of Hamas rocket fire into Israel, which has reached as far as Beersheba, a major Israeli city 37 kilometers (or 23 miles) from the Gaza border.
At Tuesday's meeting, Ashkenazi said a rocket-defense system that Israel is developing is on course to enter service next year. The laser-based "Iron Dome" system is meant to counter Hezbollah's Katyushas and the more primitive Qassam rockets fired from Gaza.
Despite last week's reported Hamas missile test, the militant group does not appear to be looking for another round of fighting with Israel "at this time," Ashkenazi said.
http://apnews.myway.com/article/20091110/D9BSOACG1.html
JERUSALEM (AP) - The Lebanese militant group Hezbollah has significantly expanded its ability to strike deep into Israel with rockets that can now reach the Jewish state's largest cities, and now possesses tens of thousands of projectiles, Israel's army chief said Tuesday.
The remarks by Maj. Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi were the first official assessment of the guerrilla group's capabilities since Israel seized a ship last week carrying weapons allegedly destined for Hezbollah.
Ashkenazi indicated that the arms bust had little effect in stopping what Israel says has been a massive arms buildup by the Iranian-backed militia since the sides fought a bitter monthlong war in 2006.
An official said that Ashkenazi told lawmakers Tuesday that some of the rockets can fly up to 200 miles (325 kilometers). That would put Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, as well as Israel's nuclear reactor in the southern desert, within rocket range.
Alternatively, the official said, Hezbollah could pound Israeli towns and cities closer to the border from positions north of the Litani River, outside the area of south Lebanon policed by U.N. peacekeepers.
Ashkenazi was briefing the Israeli parliament's influential Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the meeting was closed.
A lawmaker present at the briefing said Ashkenazi told legislators Israel would hold the Lebanese government responsible for any attacks by Hezbollah. "Everything that happens in Lebanese territory is the responsibility of the Lebanese government," she quoted him as saying.
There was no immediate reaction from Hezbollah. But its leader, Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, has bragged recently that the group can now strike any Israeli city.
After months of wrangling, Lebanon's prime minister formed a Cabinet Monday that includes Hezbollah ministers. Some observers suggest the arrangement could give Hezbollah virtual veto power over government decisions.
Israel said the huge weapons haul backs up its long-standing contention that Iran is supplying large quantities of arms to Hezbollah and Hamas, the Palestinian militant group that governs the Gaza Strip to Israel's south. Hezbollah denied any connection to the weapons.
During the 2006 war, Hezbollah fired nearly 4,000 Katyusha rockets across Israel's northern border, some of which fell as far as 55 miles (90 kilometers) inside Israel.
Israel went after Hezbollah in a massive air, sea and ground campaign in which nearly 1,200 people died in Lebanon and 159 lost their lives in Israel. The war ended with a U.N. resolution that bans Hezbollah and other militias and their weapons from the area south of the Litani.
Israel has repeatedly accused Hezbollah of violating that cease-fire and says Iran and Syria are colluding in smuggling arms to the group. Israeli officials have said they believe Hezbollah has managed to triple its prewar arms stockpile to more than 40,000 rockets.
Last week, Israel seized a ship that it says was carrying hundreds of tons of Iranian-made weapons to Hezbollah.
The seizure at sea came a day after Israeli officials said Hamas tested an Iranian rocket that can hit Tel Aviv - bringing to the fore Israeli fears that both Hezbollah and Hamas are rearming for more confrontations.
Last winter, Israel carried out a devastating military offensive against Hamas. Some 1,400 Palestinians, including hundreds of civilians, were killed. Thirteen Israelis also died in the fighting.
The Israeli assault on Gaza came in response to years of Hamas rocket fire into Israel, which has reached as far as Beersheba, a major Israeli city 37 kilometers (or 23 miles) from the Gaza border.
At Tuesday's meeting, Ashkenazi said a rocket-defense system that Israel is developing is on course to enter service next year. The laser-based "Iron Dome" system is meant to counter Hezbollah's Katyushas and the more primitive Qassam rockets fired from Gaza.
Despite last week's reported Hamas missile test, the militant group does not appear to be looking for another round of fighting with Israel "at this time," Ashkenazi said.
ObamaCare: We Are Losing Our Republic (10Nov09)
ObamaCare: We Are Losing Our Republic (10Nov09)
http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/11/losing_our_republic.html
At a November 4th presentation by GOP congressional leadership on their alternative health care plan, Eric Cantor & Co. seemed energized and upbeat, both about their own plan and about the other side's chances -- more than one said flatly that the Dems "don't have the votes" to pass their bill. That confidence seemed justified as late as Friday afternoon, with the Wall Street Journal reporting that "Democrats estimated they were 10 to 15 votes short of getting to a majority of 218."
On Saturday night, November 7, the Democratic bill passed 220-215. One Republican, Anh "Joseph" Cao of Louisiana, voted "yes."
The political sands had obviously shifted a lot in the days and hours leading up to the vote. Who knows what Pelosi and Obama promised those wavering Democrats should their "yes" vote cost them reelection in 2010? Lucrative post-congressional jobs like ambassadorships? Threats, arm-twisting, bribes...all part of the legislative sausage-making process, I know. Unfortunately, what emerged from the House on Saturday night was no sausage, but instead a malignant, Republic-killing tumor.
It left me wondering about the tea party movement and how much effect it has really had in this whole affair. There was much chest-thumping in conservative circles after the August town hall uprisings, much talk that the demonstrations had put the fear of God into congressional Democrats. Maybe. And yet since then, liberal health care bills and plans have continued to coalesce on Capitol Hill. Now one has passed the House. The momentum, it seems, is with the President and his party.
This is so for two reasons, I think. One: as I was going to work in downtown Washington, D.C. on Thursday morning -- the day of the "House call" protests -- I emerged from my train into Union Station and beheld the protesters, who were then gathering and preparing for their march on Capitol Hill just a few blocks a away.
I spoke to a number of them. They were uniformly middle-class, middle-American folks, whole families, whole neighborhoods of them. They looked and acted so nice. These are the kind of people who would bake you a tray of brownies if you weren't feeling very well...in other words, not intimidating in the slightest.
I tried to imagine myself as a Democratic congressman with this group outside my office. I would listen to their complaints, of course, but in the end, nothing more. Why? I would conclude (correctly) that I had more to fear from my own Left than from these nice folks.
So that is one reason health care "reform" continues its unholy march toward the President's desk. The other? Congressman Paul Ryan (R-WI) put it best in a phone interview last Thursday. The Dems, he says, have "the courage of their convictions" in regard to health care. They are true believers. They are going to push this forward, regardless of the electoral consequences. My own suspicion is the same: that Pelosi and the Democratic leadership are perfectly willing to march their party off a cliff if it means achieving the long-held liberal dream of government health care.
Having spoken to a number of GOP players on the Hill this last week, I can assure my readers of two things. One: Congressional Republicans, their staff, and their allies are focused and determined. They are fully aware of the dangers of ObamaCare and are working 24/7 to secure its defeat. And two: there just aren't enough of them.
Our Republic is passing from history. It's now up to the Senate to preserve it -- or else administer the last rights.
http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/11/losing_our_republic.html
At a November 4th presentation by GOP congressional leadership on their alternative health care plan, Eric Cantor & Co. seemed energized and upbeat, both about their own plan and about the other side's chances -- more than one said flatly that the Dems "don't have the votes" to pass their bill. That confidence seemed justified as late as Friday afternoon, with the Wall Street Journal reporting that "Democrats estimated they were 10 to 15 votes short of getting to a majority of 218."
On Saturday night, November 7, the Democratic bill passed 220-215. One Republican, Anh "Joseph" Cao of Louisiana, voted "yes."
The political sands had obviously shifted a lot in the days and hours leading up to the vote. Who knows what Pelosi and Obama promised those wavering Democrats should their "yes" vote cost them reelection in 2010? Lucrative post-congressional jobs like ambassadorships? Threats, arm-twisting, bribes...all part of the legislative sausage-making process, I know. Unfortunately, what emerged from the House on Saturday night was no sausage, but instead a malignant, Republic-killing tumor.
It left me wondering about the tea party movement and how much effect it has really had in this whole affair. There was much chest-thumping in conservative circles after the August town hall uprisings, much talk that the demonstrations had put the fear of God into congressional Democrats. Maybe. And yet since then, liberal health care bills and plans have continued to coalesce on Capitol Hill. Now one has passed the House. The momentum, it seems, is with the President and his party.
This is so for two reasons, I think. One: as I was going to work in downtown Washington, D.C. on Thursday morning -- the day of the "House call" protests -- I emerged from my train into Union Station and beheld the protesters, who were then gathering and preparing for their march on Capitol Hill just a few blocks a away.
I spoke to a number of them. They were uniformly middle-class, middle-American folks, whole families, whole neighborhoods of them. They looked and acted so nice. These are the kind of people who would bake you a tray of brownies if you weren't feeling very well...in other words, not intimidating in the slightest.
I tried to imagine myself as a Democratic congressman with this group outside my office. I would listen to their complaints, of course, but in the end, nothing more. Why? I would conclude (correctly) that I had more to fear from my own Left than from these nice folks.
So that is one reason health care "reform" continues its unholy march toward the President's desk. The other? Congressman Paul Ryan (R-WI) put it best in a phone interview last Thursday. The Dems, he says, have "the courage of their convictions" in regard to health care. They are true believers. They are going to push this forward, regardless of the electoral consequences. My own suspicion is the same: that Pelosi and the Democratic leadership are perfectly willing to march their party off a cliff if it means achieving the long-held liberal dream of government health care.
Having spoken to a number of GOP players on the Hill this last week, I can assure my readers of two things. One: Congressional Republicans, their staff, and their allies are focused and determined. They are fully aware of the dangers of ObamaCare and are working 24/7 to secure its defeat. And two: there just aren't enough of them.
Our Republic is passing from history. It's now up to the Senate to preserve it -- or else administer the last rights.
ObamaNation: The President of Resentment (10Nov09)
ObamaNation: The President of Resentment (10Nov09)
http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/11/the_president_of_resentment.html
Some people have a government; and some governments have a people, said Ronald Reagan.
We are being turned into a nation where the government owns the people.
It is the demagogic heirs to the dreadful history of slavery who are now trying to turn the tables; Obama is a slave master in the making. He looks the part; he acts the part; and behind the scenes his Commissars are making it happen.
Obama has never quite displayed his bitter, long-harbored resentment toward America quite as obviously as he did after the Fort Hood massacre. The President couldn't figure out how to respond with the dignity fitting his office.
I happened to be going through the Washington, DC airport a couple of months ago when I heard a lot of people clapping and whooping, a little demonstration. When I looked, I noticed a single, elderly French horn player, sitting on a folding chair and playing patriotic tunes to enliven a parade -- if you can call it that -- of elderly, wheel-chair-bound vets from World War Two coming off their plane: The Greatest Generation, as even Tom Brokaw called them. They looked shrunken, most of those lifelong handicapped vets, wearing baseball and VFW caps, but some of them left their wheel chairs and walked through the reception as the old horn player did his tunes. My eyes started to tear up and I walked over to join the applause as these real saviors of the West went on by. They were greeted by a little reception committee and then went on to what was almost surely their last celebration with their buddies from the War. And that octogenarian horn player kept on playing his patriotic tunes.
Some of the bystanders joined in the applause, but there were some who made a display of their indifference and contempt as well. It was an interesting lesson in our split society. One young man jauntily walked away from the little final home-coming demonstration, prancing in the opposite direction, a little counter-demonstration all by himself. Those old vets in wheelchairs had no meaning for him; just the opposite. They were just mean old white guys, or something equally bizarre. The most democratic Army in history, the one that brought together Italians, Jews, Germans, Poles, and yes, blacks and Japanese Americans and everyone else, all of them scared of dying but pretty much convinced that their country was in peril from some pretty evil characters in Nazi Germany, Imperial Japan and the Soviet Union. So they fought, and died, sometimes in great numbers. Bob Dole got his lifelong wounds in the murderous Italian campaign, just like John McCain got his shoulder bones broken in the Hanoi Hilton. Some of those World War Two guys were wounded for life, and some of them were now being rolled in their wheelchairs in front of our eyes. They meant nothing to the contemptuous young man who pranced away from them.
That'a a small metaphor for this Administration. The young counter-demonstrator had no idea about the sacrifices of the Greatest Generation, the lethal dangers the country confronted after People Harbor, and the heroism of our Soldiers, Sailors and Marines. He'd no doubt been told from childhood onward how evil White America really is. Yes, those WW Two soldiers represented an imperfect democracy; it just happened to be the best one on earth. And they knew that because of their own family histories, because American history was still taught in all the schools, and because they were good and decent people who were shocked by the vile and evil regimes that were conquering Europe and Asia, ruthlessly killing millions of innocent civilians as they went. It was a huge resurgence of barbarism, and their very souls cried out against the injustice of it all. They were Americans. It wasn't necessary to explain things to them. They got it.
And so the high school girls saw their sweethearts going off to war, and were left back home. Some of their men came back, often shell-shocked, but they didn't talk about the war. They went back to their lives and tried to pursue happiness. A lot of them never came back.
And then some guy named Joe Stalin exploded the first Soviet nuclear bombs, an A bomb and an H bomb. After all of their pain and homesickness and sacrifices, another totalitarian enemy had infiltrated the US Government up to and including the White House staff. Those infiltrations were real, as we now know. They were not just the wild imaginings of Tailgunner Joe McCarthy. So Americans became angry and frightened by this new totalitarian danger, especially because the State and Federal bureaucracies, the teachers, the media, and the universities were penetrated by the Stalinist Left and their Front organizations. For the first time in human history, a single Soviet bomber could fly from Europe to New York City and drop a bomb to obliterate all of Manhattan. They were outraged and frightened by this new threat, and they supported a vigorous anti-Communist movement led by people like Harry Truman, Richard Nixon, Joe McCarthy, President Eisenhower, and a host of others. For some decades the American people defended itself vigorously and effectively against the Stalin-directed Fifth Column that threatened their lives and freedom.
Today we are seeing a Second Cold War, but the enemy is within, just as it was after World War Two.
We are seeing outright front organizations again. "J Street" is a classical front organization, which should be called "J Front." It's a fraud, claiming to represent people who never voted for them. George Soros, who sets up many of these phony fronts, is a man who accommodated the Nazis, among other distinctions. He has never displayed a smidgen of guilt for his role in the the disposition of Jewish possessions after their owners were arrested and sent to death camps -- men, women, and children. Normal Holocaust survivors feel tremendous guilt; Soros sounds jaunty and devil-may-care about the murderous cannibalism of those years. He made out well, and started his long road to fortune. Today he is financing Obama's "Coup from Above," with the same insouciance with which he betrayed his Jewish relatives in Hungary.
There's a story to be told there. But don't expect the media to tell it.
The American people are hearing a call to arms -- not literal arms, for our system can self correct. But we have to out-organize and out-pressure the Left. They have called us "the enemy" ever since Alinsky's little book radicalized the revolutionaries of the Boomer Left after the violent revolutionary groups were readily suppressed. When somebody really considers you their enemy you have no choice. Either you return the compliment, or you get overwhelmed by the new Chicago Mob in DC.
The Left has shown how to fight from a position of the minority and win. American conservatives by a recent poll have a two-to-one majority. They are constantly undermined by the political Left: Ridiculed in the media, demeaned in the schools and universities, out-maneuvered in politics at the state and national level by Leftists who are far nastier and far more ruthless than ordinary, decent Americans. This is a struggle for the country. We need to toughen up.
The first lesson is to start telling the truth without fear.
Shout it out. Demonstrate.
Tell your truth to your relatives that you've been trying to be nice to all these years. Make it pleasant and polite, but firm. Don't yell. Just talk and talk and talk. Yes, you can stand out from the crowd. Half of your listeners will privately agree with you if you state your case well, and over time they will find the courage to speak up, too.
The second lesson is to build up a cadre of leaders -- in the media, in politics, in the educational system, everywhere.
We have at least one charismatic leader now in Sarah Palin. That's why she is under constant, vicious attack from the Left. That's why they burned down her church in Wasilla. They fear her. I love her for the enemies she has made. There are many other good people, but a charismatic political talent comes just once in every generation. She needs and deserves support. So do others.
When conservatives betray American conservatism, let them know you will vote against them, and support their conservative opponents in all the ways that work. Don't get nasty and hysterical. Just be calm and firm.
The third lesson is to organize, organize, and organize.
That's how the Left did it. Tea Parties are good, the Heritage Foundation is good.
There are many good organizations: We need to support them with our dollars and with our voices. We need to mobilize conservatives into active pressure groups around their greatest concerns: Web freedom is a crucial one right now. So is free radio and TV. When the Left attacks Fox News or Rush, we have to raise a gigantic fuss on their behalf. The media cannot be allowed to ignore our demonstrations. We have allowed far too many good people be attacked and attacked and shrugged our shoulders.
The election of 2010 will be a major survival test. If Americans fail that test, we will become Britain in its catastrophic decline under fifty years of socialism. A new Ruling Class will arise, just as it has in socialist Europe, and they will not care one bit about the people. They will import hostile voters from Third World countries. They will forge alliances with Islamists, as they are already doing. America will be helpless, and all the hostile forces around the world will know it. They will all be trying to push us under. If we are governed by a domestic Fifth Column, then North Korea, Russia, China, Iran, Hugo Chavez, the Sunni Moslem Brotherhood, all will beat us down. Real democracy is just not their thing.
At the UN we see kleptocracies in charge. Behold our future if we do not act. Chicago and Detroit stand as warnings.
Conservatives are individualists, so we have to do something unusual: organize, organize, organize. Local and national. Even international. Some of our friends are in the British media, where they are looking for us to stand up and defend civilization, just as they stood up against Hitler when we were still dithering. Some of our friends are in Australia, in Canada, and yes, in France. Around the world there are millions of people who get it. We can be American patriots with allies all around the world. They need leaders and vocal support just as much as we do.
And we must militantly defend the freedom of the web. The Stalinoids will attack it viciously, just as they will attack talk radio and Fox News. We are fighting the same enemy Ronald Reagan fought. We have to do it just as intelligently and vigorously as he did.
The word "activist" used to be a media word for the Left. It's high time to make it work for American conservatives.
Become an activist or lose your country.
http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/11/the_president_of_resentment.html
Some people have a government; and some governments have a people, said Ronald Reagan.
We are being turned into a nation where the government owns the people.
It is the demagogic heirs to the dreadful history of slavery who are now trying to turn the tables; Obama is a slave master in the making. He looks the part; he acts the part; and behind the scenes his Commissars are making it happen.
Obama has never quite displayed his bitter, long-harbored resentment toward America quite as obviously as he did after the Fort Hood massacre. The President couldn't figure out how to respond with the dignity fitting his office.
I happened to be going through the Washington, DC airport a couple of months ago when I heard a lot of people clapping and whooping, a little demonstration. When I looked, I noticed a single, elderly French horn player, sitting on a folding chair and playing patriotic tunes to enliven a parade -- if you can call it that -- of elderly, wheel-chair-bound vets from World War Two coming off their plane: The Greatest Generation, as even Tom Brokaw called them. They looked shrunken, most of those lifelong handicapped vets, wearing baseball and VFW caps, but some of them left their wheel chairs and walked through the reception as the old horn player did his tunes. My eyes started to tear up and I walked over to join the applause as these real saviors of the West went on by. They were greeted by a little reception committee and then went on to what was almost surely their last celebration with their buddies from the War. And that octogenarian horn player kept on playing his patriotic tunes.
Some of the bystanders joined in the applause, but there were some who made a display of their indifference and contempt as well. It was an interesting lesson in our split society. One young man jauntily walked away from the little final home-coming demonstration, prancing in the opposite direction, a little counter-demonstration all by himself. Those old vets in wheelchairs had no meaning for him; just the opposite. They were just mean old white guys, or something equally bizarre. The most democratic Army in history, the one that brought together Italians, Jews, Germans, Poles, and yes, blacks and Japanese Americans and everyone else, all of them scared of dying but pretty much convinced that their country was in peril from some pretty evil characters in Nazi Germany, Imperial Japan and the Soviet Union. So they fought, and died, sometimes in great numbers. Bob Dole got his lifelong wounds in the murderous Italian campaign, just like John McCain got his shoulder bones broken in the Hanoi Hilton. Some of those World War Two guys were wounded for life, and some of them were now being rolled in their wheelchairs in front of our eyes. They meant nothing to the contemptuous young man who pranced away from them.
That'a a small metaphor for this Administration. The young counter-demonstrator had no idea about the sacrifices of the Greatest Generation, the lethal dangers the country confronted after People Harbor, and the heroism of our Soldiers, Sailors and Marines. He'd no doubt been told from childhood onward how evil White America really is. Yes, those WW Two soldiers represented an imperfect democracy; it just happened to be the best one on earth. And they knew that because of their own family histories, because American history was still taught in all the schools, and because they were good and decent people who were shocked by the vile and evil regimes that were conquering Europe and Asia, ruthlessly killing millions of innocent civilians as they went. It was a huge resurgence of barbarism, and their very souls cried out against the injustice of it all. They were Americans. It wasn't necessary to explain things to them. They got it.
And so the high school girls saw their sweethearts going off to war, and were left back home. Some of their men came back, often shell-shocked, but they didn't talk about the war. They went back to their lives and tried to pursue happiness. A lot of them never came back.
And then some guy named Joe Stalin exploded the first Soviet nuclear bombs, an A bomb and an H bomb. After all of their pain and homesickness and sacrifices, another totalitarian enemy had infiltrated the US Government up to and including the White House staff. Those infiltrations were real, as we now know. They were not just the wild imaginings of Tailgunner Joe McCarthy. So Americans became angry and frightened by this new totalitarian danger, especially because the State and Federal bureaucracies, the teachers, the media, and the universities were penetrated by the Stalinist Left and their Front organizations. For the first time in human history, a single Soviet bomber could fly from Europe to New York City and drop a bomb to obliterate all of Manhattan. They were outraged and frightened by this new threat, and they supported a vigorous anti-Communist movement led by people like Harry Truman, Richard Nixon, Joe McCarthy, President Eisenhower, and a host of others. For some decades the American people defended itself vigorously and effectively against the Stalin-directed Fifth Column that threatened their lives and freedom.
Today we are seeing a Second Cold War, but the enemy is within, just as it was after World War Two.
We are seeing outright front organizations again. "J Street" is a classical front organization, which should be called "J Front." It's a fraud, claiming to represent people who never voted for them. George Soros, who sets up many of these phony fronts, is a man who accommodated the Nazis, among other distinctions. He has never displayed a smidgen of guilt for his role in the the disposition of Jewish possessions after their owners were arrested and sent to death camps -- men, women, and children. Normal Holocaust survivors feel tremendous guilt; Soros sounds jaunty and devil-may-care about the murderous cannibalism of those years. He made out well, and started his long road to fortune. Today he is financing Obama's "Coup from Above," with the same insouciance with which he betrayed his Jewish relatives in Hungary.
There's a story to be told there. But don't expect the media to tell it.
The American people are hearing a call to arms -- not literal arms, for our system can self correct. But we have to out-organize and out-pressure the Left. They have called us "the enemy" ever since Alinsky's little book radicalized the revolutionaries of the Boomer Left after the violent revolutionary groups were readily suppressed. When somebody really considers you their enemy you have no choice. Either you return the compliment, or you get overwhelmed by the new Chicago Mob in DC.
The Left has shown how to fight from a position of the minority and win. American conservatives by a recent poll have a two-to-one majority. They are constantly undermined by the political Left: Ridiculed in the media, demeaned in the schools and universities, out-maneuvered in politics at the state and national level by Leftists who are far nastier and far more ruthless than ordinary, decent Americans. This is a struggle for the country. We need to toughen up.
The first lesson is to start telling the truth without fear.
Shout it out. Demonstrate.
Tell your truth to your relatives that you've been trying to be nice to all these years. Make it pleasant and polite, but firm. Don't yell. Just talk and talk and talk. Yes, you can stand out from the crowd. Half of your listeners will privately agree with you if you state your case well, and over time they will find the courage to speak up, too.
The second lesson is to build up a cadre of leaders -- in the media, in politics, in the educational system, everywhere.
We have at least one charismatic leader now in Sarah Palin. That's why she is under constant, vicious attack from the Left. That's why they burned down her church in Wasilla. They fear her. I love her for the enemies she has made. There are many other good people, but a charismatic political talent comes just once in every generation. She needs and deserves support. So do others.
When conservatives betray American conservatism, let them know you will vote against them, and support their conservative opponents in all the ways that work. Don't get nasty and hysterical. Just be calm and firm.
The third lesson is to organize, organize, and organize.
That's how the Left did it. Tea Parties are good, the Heritage Foundation is good.
There are many good organizations: We need to support them with our dollars and with our voices. We need to mobilize conservatives into active pressure groups around their greatest concerns: Web freedom is a crucial one right now. So is free radio and TV. When the Left attacks Fox News or Rush, we have to raise a gigantic fuss on their behalf. The media cannot be allowed to ignore our demonstrations. We have allowed far too many good people be attacked and attacked and shrugged our shoulders.
The election of 2010 will be a major survival test. If Americans fail that test, we will become Britain in its catastrophic decline under fifty years of socialism. A new Ruling Class will arise, just as it has in socialist Europe, and they will not care one bit about the people. They will import hostile voters from Third World countries. They will forge alliances with Islamists, as they are already doing. America will be helpless, and all the hostile forces around the world will know it. They will all be trying to push us under. If we are governed by a domestic Fifth Column, then North Korea, Russia, China, Iran, Hugo Chavez, the Sunni Moslem Brotherhood, all will beat us down. Real democracy is just not their thing.
At the UN we see kleptocracies in charge. Behold our future if we do not act. Chicago and Detroit stand as warnings.
Conservatives are individualists, so we have to do something unusual: organize, organize, organize. Local and national. Even international. Some of our friends are in the British media, where they are looking for us to stand up and defend civilization, just as they stood up against Hitler when we were still dithering. Some of our friends are in Australia, in Canada, and yes, in France. Around the world there are millions of people who get it. We can be American patriots with allies all around the world. They need leaders and vocal support just as much as we do.
And we must militantly defend the freedom of the web. The Stalinoids will attack it viciously, just as they will attack talk radio and Fox News. We are fighting the same enemy Ronald Reagan fought. We have to do it just as intelligently and vigorously as he did.
The word "activist" used to be a media word for the Left. It's high time to make it work for American conservatives.
Become an activist or lose your country.
Korea: Koreas Exchange Fire in Naval Clash (10Nov09)
Korea: Koreas Exchange Fire in Naval Clash (10Nov09)
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,573527,00.html
South Korean Navy patrol boats engage in an exercise in the West Sea, South Korea.
SEOUL, South Korea — The two Koreas briefly exchanged naval fire Tuesday along their disputed western sea border, with a North Korean ship suffering heavy damage before retreating, South Korean military officials said.
There were no South Korean casualties, the country's Joint Chiefs of Staff said in a statement, and it was not immediately clear if there were any casualties on the North Korean side. Each side blamed the other for violating the sea border.
The clash — the first of its in kind in seven years — occurred as U.S. officials said President Barack Obama has decided to send a special envoy to Pyongyang for rare direct talks on the communist country's nuclear weapons program. No date has been set but it would be the first one-on-one talks since Obama took office in January. Obama is due in Seoul next week.
"It's a regrettable incident," South Korean Commodore Lee Ki-sik told reporters in Seoul. "We are sternly protesting to North Korea and urging it to prevent the recurrence of similar incidents."
North Korea's military issued a statement blaming South Korea for the "grave armed provocation," saying its ships crossed into North Korean territory.
The North claimed that a group of South Korean warships opened fire but fled after the North's patrol boat dealt "a prompt retaliatory blow." The statement, carried on the official Korean Central News Agency, said the South should apologize.
South Korean President Lee Myung-bak, who convened an emergency security meeting, ordered his defense minister to strengthen military readiness.
South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff said in a statement that a North Korean patrol boat crossed the disputed western sea border around 11:27 a.m. (0227 GMT), drawing warning shots from a South Korean navy vessel. The North Korean boat then opened fire and the South's ship returned fire before the North's vessel sailed back toward its waters, the statement said.
The clash occurred near the South-held island of Daecheong, about 120 nautical miles off the port city of Incheon, west of Seoul, the statement said.
The North Korean ship was seriously damaged in the skirmish, a Joint Chiefs of Staff officer said on condition of anonymity, citing department policy. Prime Minister Chung Un-chan told lawmakers the ship was enveloped in flames when it fled north, according to Yonhap news agency.
Lee, the commodore, said the shooting lasted for about two minutes, during which the South Korean ship fired 50 rounds from naval guns at the North Korean vessel, about 2 miles away. He said the South Korean ship was lightly damaged.
Lee said several Chinese fishing boats were operating in the area at the time of clash, but they were undamaged. He said it wasn't clear if the North Korean ship was trying to clamp down on the Chinese boat for possible poaching.
He said the South Korean military was investigating if the North's alleged violation was deliberate, but Prime Minister Chung was quoted as telling lawmakers that the clash was not intentional.
The Koreas regularly accuse each other of straying into their respective territories. South Korea's military said that North Korean ships violated the sea border on 22 occasions this year.
The two sides have fought deadly skirmishes along the western sea border in 1999 and 2002.
No South Korean sailors were killed in 1999, but six South Korean sailors died in 2002, according to the South Korean navy. It said exact North Korean causalities remain unclear.
Baek Seung-joo, a North Korea expert at Seoul's state-run Korea Institute for Defense Analyses, said the clash would not have a big impact on inter-Korean relations.
He said the Koreas held a landmark summit in 2000 and the North sent a cheering squad to the South for the Asian Games in 2002. Both events took place after the separate clashes in 1999 and 2002.
"It was an intentional provocation by North Korea," Baek said, noting that Pyongyang appears to want to create tensions and use them for domestic political consumption.
The two Koreas have yet to agree on their sea border more than 50 years after the end of their 1950-53 Korean War, which ended in an armistice and not a permanent peace treaty. Instead, they rely on a line that the then-commander of U.N. forces, which fought for the South, drew unilaterally at the end of the conflict.
North Korea last month accused South Korean warships of broaching its territory in waters off the west coast and warned of a clash in the zone, which is a rich crab fishing area.
The latest conflict comes after North Korea has reached out to Seoul and Washington following months of tension over its nuclear and missile programs.
North Korea launched a long-range rocket in April and carried out its second underground nuclear test in May. But it subsequently released South Korean and U.S. detainees, agreed to resume joint projects with South Korea and offered direct talks with Washington.
Two administration officials said Monday in Washington that Obama has decided, after months of deliberation, has decided to send a special envoy to Pyongyang for direct talks on nuclear issues.
Obama will send envoy Stephen Bosworth, although no date for his trip has been set, the officials said. The officials discussed the matter on condition of anonymity because the decision has not been publicly announced.
Hundreds of thousands of combat-ready troops on both sides face across the 155-mile-long land border that is also strewn with land mines and tank traps and laced with barbed wire. About 28,500 U.S. troops are stationed in South Korea to deter a potential North Korean aggression.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,573527,00.html
South Korean Navy patrol boats engage in an exercise in the West Sea, South Korea.
SEOUL, South Korea — The two Koreas briefly exchanged naval fire Tuesday along their disputed western sea border, with a North Korean ship suffering heavy damage before retreating, South Korean military officials said.
There were no South Korean casualties, the country's Joint Chiefs of Staff said in a statement, and it was not immediately clear if there were any casualties on the North Korean side. Each side blamed the other for violating the sea border.
The clash — the first of its in kind in seven years — occurred as U.S. officials said President Barack Obama has decided to send a special envoy to Pyongyang for rare direct talks on the communist country's nuclear weapons program. No date has been set but it would be the first one-on-one talks since Obama took office in January. Obama is due in Seoul next week.
"It's a regrettable incident," South Korean Commodore Lee Ki-sik told reporters in Seoul. "We are sternly protesting to North Korea and urging it to prevent the recurrence of similar incidents."
North Korea's military issued a statement blaming South Korea for the "grave armed provocation," saying its ships crossed into North Korean territory.
The North claimed that a group of South Korean warships opened fire but fled after the North's patrol boat dealt "a prompt retaliatory blow." The statement, carried on the official Korean Central News Agency, said the South should apologize.
South Korean President Lee Myung-bak, who convened an emergency security meeting, ordered his defense minister to strengthen military readiness.
South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff said in a statement that a North Korean patrol boat crossed the disputed western sea border around 11:27 a.m. (0227 GMT), drawing warning shots from a South Korean navy vessel. The North Korean boat then opened fire and the South's ship returned fire before the North's vessel sailed back toward its waters, the statement said.
The clash occurred near the South-held island of Daecheong, about 120 nautical miles off the port city of Incheon, west of Seoul, the statement said.
The North Korean ship was seriously damaged in the skirmish, a Joint Chiefs of Staff officer said on condition of anonymity, citing department policy. Prime Minister Chung Un-chan told lawmakers the ship was enveloped in flames when it fled north, according to Yonhap news agency.
Lee, the commodore, said the shooting lasted for about two minutes, during which the South Korean ship fired 50 rounds from naval guns at the North Korean vessel, about 2 miles away. He said the South Korean ship was lightly damaged.
Lee said several Chinese fishing boats were operating in the area at the time of clash, but they were undamaged. He said it wasn't clear if the North Korean ship was trying to clamp down on the Chinese boat for possible poaching.
He said the South Korean military was investigating if the North's alleged violation was deliberate, but Prime Minister Chung was quoted as telling lawmakers that the clash was not intentional.
The Koreas regularly accuse each other of straying into their respective territories. South Korea's military said that North Korean ships violated the sea border on 22 occasions this year.
The two sides have fought deadly skirmishes along the western sea border in 1999 and 2002.
No South Korean sailors were killed in 1999, but six South Korean sailors died in 2002, according to the South Korean navy. It said exact North Korean causalities remain unclear.
Baek Seung-joo, a North Korea expert at Seoul's state-run Korea Institute for Defense Analyses, said the clash would not have a big impact on inter-Korean relations.
He said the Koreas held a landmark summit in 2000 and the North sent a cheering squad to the South for the Asian Games in 2002. Both events took place after the separate clashes in 1999 and 2002.
"It was an intentional provocation by North Korea," Baek said, noting that Pyongyang appears to want to create tensions and use them for domestic political consumption.
The two Koreas have yet to agree on their sea border more than 50 years after the end of their 1950-53 Korean War, which ended in an armistice and not a permanent peace treaty. Instead, they rely on a line that the then-commander of U.N. forces, which fought for the South, drew unilaterally at the end of the conflict.
North Korea last month accused South Korean warships of broaching its territory in waters off the west coast and warned of a clash in the zone, which is a rich crab fishing area.
The latest conflict comes after North Korea has reached out to Seoul and Washington following months of tension over its nuclear and missile programs.
North Korea launched a long-range rocket in April and carried out its second underground nuclear test in May. But it subsequently released South Korean and U.S. detainees, agreed to resume joint projects with South Korea and offered direct talks with Washington.
Two administration officials said Monday in Washington that Obama has decided, after months of deliberation, has decided to send a special envoy to Pyongyang for direct talks on nuclear issues.
Obama will send envoy Stephen Bosworth, although no date for his trip has been set, the officials said. The officials discussed the matter on condition of anonymity because the decision has not been publicly announced.
Hundreds of thousands of combat-ready troops on both sides face across the 155-mile-long land border that is also strewn with land mines and tank traps and laced with barbed wire. About 28,500 U.S. troops are stationed in South Korea to deter a potential North Korean aggression.
Monday, November 9, 2009
Sarah Palin: Going Rogue Book Tour Dates Through Thanksgiving (09Nov08)
Sarah Palin: Going Rogue Book Tour Dates Through Thanksgiving (09Nov09)
Here are some details of the upcoming book tour. I’m starting in Michigan and you’ll understand why when you read the book. Last year, I made a promise to the good people of Michigan that I would be back, and now I’m keeping that promise. (Michigan is near and dear to my family’s heart! Our eldest son, Track, lived with a great host family there during his hockey days.)
From Michigan, the “Going Rogue” tour will cover as much of the country as possible. I’ve decided to stop in cities that are not usually included in a typical book tour. For instance, I’m looking forward to meeting our honorable men in women in uniform and their families at a Fort Bragg book signing, and to reconnecting with friends my family made last year on the campaign trail in different book signing venues.
We have a tight schedule, but I’m working with the publisher to allow possibilities of stopping at a few unannounced places, too.
I’ll Twitter information when the tour starts, so I’ll post our progress from the road. You can follow on Twitter at SarahPalinUSA.
Below are dates, times, and locations for the first part of the tour – this schedule brings us up to Thanksgiving, where I’ll get to connect with family in Washington state for the holiday. Stay tuned for our post-Thanksgiving schedule coming soon.
Please contact each venue for more information. Can’t wait to see you soon!
- Sarah Palin
PS: Included below is a flyer for the tour. Feel free to pass it around!
November 18th
GRAND RAPIDS, MI
Barnes & Noble
3195 28th Street SE
Space B116
Grand Rapids, MI 49512
6:00 – 9:00 PM
November 19th
FORT WAYNE, IN
Meijer’s
10301 Maysville Road
Fort Wayne, IN 46835
12:00 – 3:00 PM
NOBLESVILLE, IN
Borders Books and Music
13145 Levinson Lane
Noblesville, IN 46060
6:00 – 9:00 PM
November 20th
CINCINNATI, OH
Joseph-Beth Booksellers
2692 Madison Road
Cincinnati OH 45208
12:00 – 3:00 PM
COLUMBUS, OH
Borders Books and Music
6670 Sawmill Road
Columbus, OH 43235
6:00 – 9:00 PM
November 21st
WASHINGTON, PA
Sam’s Club
80 Trinity Point Drive
Washington, PA 15301
11:00 AM – 2:00 PM
ROCHESTER, NY
Borders Books and Music
1000 Hylan Drive
Rochester, NY 14623
6:00 – 9:00 PM
November 22nd
ROANOKE, VA
Barnes & Noble
4802 Valley View Boulevard NW
Roanoke, VA 24012
11:00 AM – 2:00 PM
November 23rd
FORT BRAGG, NC
AAFES Bragg N Main Shop
Bldg 8-5050, 2nd & Butner Road
Ft. Bragg, NC 28307
11:00 AM – 2:00 PM
BIRMINGHAM, AL
Books-A-Million
757 Brookwood Village
Birmingham, AL 32509
4:30 – 7:30 PM
November 24th
JACKSONVILLE, FL AREA
Books-A-Million
Orange Park Mall
1910 Wells Road
Orange Park, FL 32073
9:00 – 11:00 AM
THE VILLAGES, FL
Barnes & Noble
1055 Old Camp Road
The Villages, FL 32162
2:30 – 5:00 PM
ORLANDO, FL
Barnes & Noble
Colonial Plaza Market Center
2418 East Colonial Drive
Orlando, FL 32803
7:30 – 10:00 PM
Here are some details of the upcoming book tour. I’m starting in Michigan and you’ll understand why when you read the book. Last year, I made a promise to the good people of Michigan that I would be back, and now I’m keeping that promise. (Michigan is near and dear to my family’s heart! Our eldest son, Track, lived with a great host family there during his hockey days.)
From Michigan, the “Going Rogue” tour will cover as much of the country as possible. I’ve decided to stop in cities that are not usually included in a typical book tour. For instance, I’m looking forward to meeting our honorable men in women in uniform and their families at a Fort Bragg book signing, and to reconnecting with friends my family made last year on the campaign trail in different book signing venues.
We have a tight schedule, but I’m working with the publisher to allow possibilities of stopping at a few unannounced places, too.
I’ll Twitter information when the tour starts, so I’ll post our progress from the road. You can follow on Twitter at SarahPalinUSA.
Below are dates, times, and locations for the first part of the tour – this schedule brings us up to Thanksgiving, where I’ll get to connect with family in Washington state for the holiday. Stay tuned for our post-Thanksgiving schedule coming soon.
Please contact each venue for more information. Can’t wait to see you soon!
- Sarah Palin
PS: Included below is a flyer for the tour. Feel free to pass it around!
November 18th
GRAND RAPIDS, MI
Barnes & Noble
3195 28th Street SE
Space B116
Grand Rapids, MI 49512
6:00 – 9:00 PM
November 19th
FORT WAYNE, IN
Meijer’s
10301 Maysville Road
Fort Wayne, IN 46835
12:00 – 3:00 PM
NOBLESVILLE, IN
Borders Books and Music
13145 Levinson Lane
Noblesville, IN 46060
6:00 – 9:00 PM
November 20th
CINCINNATI, OH
Joseph-Beth Booksellers
2692 Madison Road
Cincinnati OH 45208
12:00 – 3:00 PM
COLUMBUS, OH
Borders Books and Music
6670 Sawmill Road
Columbus, OH 43235
6:00 – 9:00 PM
November 21st
WASHINGTON, PA
Sam’s Club
80 Trinity Point Drive
Washington, PA 15301
11:00 AM – 2:00 PM
ROCHESTER, NY
Borders Books and Music
1000 Hylan Drive
Rochester, NY 14623
6:00 – 9:00 PM
November 22nd
ROANOKE, VA
Barnes & Noble
4802 Valley View Boulevard NW
Roanoke, VA 24012
11:00 AM – 2:00 PM
November 23rd
FORT BRAGG, NC
AAFES Bragg N Main Shop
Bldg 8-5050, 2nd & Butner Road
Ft. Bragg, NC 28307
11:00 AM – 2:00 PM
BIRMINGHAM, AL
Books-A-Million
757 Brookwood Village
Birmingham, AL 32509
4:30 – 7:30 PM
November 24th
JACKSONVILLE, FL AREA
Books-A-Million
Orange Park Mall
1910 Wells Road
Orange Park, FL 32073
9:00 – 11:00 AM
THE VILLAGES, FL
Barnes & Noble
1055 Old Camp Road
The Villages, FL 32162
2:30 – 5:00 PM
ORLANDO, FL
Barnes & Noble
Colonial Plaza Market Center
2418 East Colonial Drive
Orlando, FL 32803
7:30 – 10:00 PM
Sarah Palin: Commemorating a Victory for Freedom (09Nov08)
Commemorating a Victory for Freedom (09Nov08)
Twenty years ago, the ultimate symbol of the division between freedom and tyranny was torn down. The Berlin Wall was constructed for one purpose: to prevent the escape of East Germans to the freedom of the West. The Wall’s cold, gray façade was a stark reminder of the economic and political way of life across the Soviet Union’s sphere of influence in Eastern Europe.
Ronald Reagan never stopped regarding the Berlin Wall as an affront to human freedom. When so many other American leaders and opinion makers had come to accept its presence as inevitable and permanent, Reagan still hammered away at the Wall’s very premise in human tyranny, until finally the Wall itself was hammered down. Its downfall wasn’t the work of Reagan alone. Our president’s actions were joined with the brave acts of many individuals who stood firm and united in facing the Soviet Union. The Berlin Wall came down because millions of people behind the Iron Curtain refused to accept the fate of enslavement and their supporters in the West refused to accept that the “captive nations” would remain captive forever.
Though that long, tragic episode in human history had come to a close finally with the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, it wasn’t the “end of history” or the end of conflict as some had hoped. New conflicts confront us today throughout the world which call for courage and resolve and dedication to freedom. The new democracies and market economies that have emerged in Central and Eastern Europe still require our friendship and alliances as they continue to seek security, prosperity, and self-determination. But as we reflect on present and future challenges, let’s take time to celebrate the anniversary of this awesome victory for freedom. The downfall of that cold, gray concrete Wall should be a lesson to us in hope. Nothing is inevitable. Tyranny is no match for the hope and resolve of those who work and fight for freedom.
- Sarah Palin
Twenty years ago, the ultimate symbol of the division between freedom and tyranny was torn down. The Berlin Wall was constructed for one purpose: to prevent the escape of East Germans to the freedom of the West. The Wall’s cold, gray façade was a stark reminder of the economic and political way of life across the Soviet Union’s sphere of influence in Eastern Europe.
Ronald Reagan never stopped regarding the Berlin Wall as an affront to human freedom. When so many other American leaders and opinion makers had come to accept its presence as inevitable and permanent, Reagan still hammered away at the Wall’s very premise in human tyranny, until finally the Wall itself was hammered down. Its downfall wasn’t the work of Reagan alone. Our president’s actions were joined with the brave acts of many individuals who stood firm and united in facing the Soviet Union. The Berlin Wall came down because millions of people behind the Iron Curtain refused to accept the fate of enslavement and their supporters in the West refused to accept that the “captive nations” would remain captive forever.
Though that long, tragic episode in human history had come to a close finally with the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, it wasn’t the “end of history” or the end of conflict as some had hoped. New conflicts confront us today throughout the world which call for courage and resolve and dedication to freedom. The new democracies and market economies that have emerged in Central and Eastern Europe still require our friendship and alliances as they continue to seek security, prosperity, and self-determination. But as we reflect on present and future challenges, let’s take time to celebrate the anniversary of this awesome victory for freedom. The downfall of that cold, gray concrete Wall should be a lesson to us in hope. Nothing is inevitable. Tyranny is no match for the hope and resolve of those who work and fight for freedom.
- Sarah Palin
Energy: Great Light Bulb Robbery by First Energy Ohio (09Nov08)
Energy: Great Light Bulb Robbery by First Energy Ohio (09Nov08)
http://greenhellblog.com/
(note: greenhellblog is part of junkscience.com undergoing reconstruction at the present time)
The Great Light Bulb Robbery has been called off in Ohio due to consumer outrage.
In early October, Akron, OH-based First Energy planned to force consumers to buy two compact fluorescent lightbulbs for $21.60 — bulbs for which the utility paid only $3.50 each.
The utility then planned to charge consumers $0.60 more per month to make up for lost electricity sales due to the bulbs’ energy efficiency.
But as Akron’s WYTV reported,
After taking a huge public relations hit when it tried to force all its customers to buy energy-efficient light bulbs, First Energy is making a new proposal.
The electric company is now asking the Public Utilities Commission to approve a voluntary program so that those who don’t want or need the mini-florescent lights don’t have to pay for them.
The scam would have netted First Energy $7.6 million — more than the $7 million (in 1963 dollars) netted during the August 1963 Great Train Robbery.
Green is the 21st century term for “stand and deliver.”
http://greenhellblog.com/
(note: greenhellblog is part of junkscience.com undergoing reconstruction at the present time)
The Great Light Bulb Robbery has been called off in Ohio due to consumer outrage.
In early October, Akron, OH-based First Energy planned to force consumers to buy two compact fluorescent lightbulbs for $21.60 — bulbs for which the utility paid only $3.50 each.
The utility then planned to charge consumers $0.60 more per month to make up for lost electricity sales due to the bulbs’ energy efficiency.
But as Akron’s WYTV reported,
After taking a huge public relations hit when it tried to force all its customers to buy energy-efficient light bulbs, First Energy is making a new proposal.
The electric company is now asking the Public Utilities Commission to approve a voluntary program so that those who don’t want or need the mini-florescent lights don’t have to pay for them.
The scam would have netted First Energy $7.6 million — more than the $7 million (in 1963 dollars) netted during the August 1963 Great Train Robbery.
Green is the 21st century term for “stand and deliver.”
Energy: What Would It Take to Replace Coal in the USA? (08Nov09)
Energy: What Would It Take to Replace Coal in the USA? (08Nov09)
http://greenhellblog.com/
(note: greenhellblog is part of junkscience.com undergoing reconstruction at the present time)
From today’s Financial Times, here’s what it would take to replace coal as a fuel for generating electricity:
It would take a massive effort to replace coal production. Peabody Energy, which owns North Antelope and is the world’s largest private sector coal company, says replacing coal would be a gargantuan task.
It would require:
2,400 times more solar generation,
40 times more wind power,
250 new nuclear plants,
almost double the US production of natural gas,
500 hydro plants the size of the Hoover Dam or halving electricity consumption.
Even then, the US would have to find a way to meet new demand, given growth forecasts.
The greens’ choice, of course, is the “halving electricity consumption” option. But never in the history of mankind has reduced energy use been associated with social and economic advancement.
http://greenhellblog.com/
(note: greenhellblog is part of junkscience.com undergoing reconstruction at the present time)
From today’s Financial Times, here’s what it would take to replace coal as a fuel for generating electricity:
It would take a massive effort to replace coal production. Peabody Energy, which owns North Antelope and is the world’s largest private sector coal company, says replacing coal would be a gargantuan task.
It would require:
2,400 times more solar generation,
40 times more wind power,
250 new nuclear plants,
almost double the US production of natural gas,
500 hydro plants the size of the Hoover Dam or halving electricity consumption.
Even then, the US would have to find a way to meet new demand, given growth forecasts.
The greens’ choice, of course, is the “halving electricity consumption” option. But never in the history of mankind has reduced energy use been associated with social and economic advancement.
Global Warming: NYT Excuses Gore Climate Profiteering (09Nov08)
Global Warming: NYT Excuses Gore Climate Profiteering (09Nov08)
http://greenhellblog.com/
(note: greenhellblog is part of junkscience.com undergoing reconstruction at the present time)
The New York Times and reporter John Broder get partial credit for spotlighting Al Gore’s climate profiteering on the front-page of today’s paper.
Unfortunately the article offers really lame justifications for Gore’s self-serving alarmism.
Gore only responded to the Times in an e-mail:
Mr. Gore says that he is simply putting his money where his mouth is.
“Do you think there is something wrong with being active in business in this country?” Mr. Gore said. “I am proud of it. I am proud of it.”
In an e-mail message this week, he said his investment activities were consistent with his public advocacy over decades.
Or is it that he’s putting his mouth where his money is?
Don’t forget that Al Gore testified before the House last spring that he has no profit motive. As reported by Broder:
But at the hearing in April, he was challenged by Ms. Blackburn, who echoed some of the criticism of Mr. Gore that has swirled in conservative blogs and radio talk shows. She noted that Mr. Gore is a partner at Kleiner Perkins, which has hundreds of millions of dollars invested in firms that could benefit from any legislation that limits carbon dioxide emissions.
“I believe that the transition to a green economy is good for our economy and good for all of us, and I have invested in it,” Mr. Gore said, adding that he had put “every penny” he has made from his investments into the Alliance for Climate Protection.
“And, Congresswoman,” he added, “if you believe that the reason I have been working on this issue for 30 years is because of greed, you don’t know me.”
It was apparently “a bridge too far” for Broder to notice that Gore’s House testimony is entirely inconsistent with Gore’s e-mail to the Times.
Readers of this blog will recall that it was this Steve Milloy column in Human Events that prompted Rep. Marsha Blackburn to ask Gore about his profiteering. But rather than saying he was “putting his money where his mouth was,” Gore chose to dissemble, if not outright lie, to Congress.
And let’s not forget about Gore’s feigned ignorance before Congress of his relationship with Goldman Sachs.
http://greenhellblog.com/
(note: greenhellblog is part of junkscience.com undergoing reconstruction at the present time)
The New York Times and reporter John Broder get partial credit for spotlighting Al Gore’s climate profiteering on the front-page of today’s paper.
Unfortunately the article offers really lame justifications for Gore’s self-serving alarmism.
Gore only responded to the Times in an e-mail:
Mr. Gore says that he is simply putting his money where his mouth is.
“Do you think there is something wrong with being active in business in this country?” Mr. Gore said. “I am proud of it. I am proud of it.”
In an e-mail message this week, he said his investment activities were consistent with his public advocacy over decades.
Or is it that he’s putting his mouth where his money is?
Don’t forget that Al Gore testified before the House last spring that he has no profit motive. As reported by Broder:
But at the hearing in April, he was challenged by Ms. Blackburn, who echoed some of the criticism of Mr. Gore that has swirled in conservative blogs and radio talk shows. She noted that Mr. Gore is a partner at Kleiner Perkins, which has hundreds of millions of dollars invested in firms that could benefit from any legislation that limits carbon dioxide emissions.
“I believe that the transition to a green economy is good for our economy and good for all of us, and I have invested in it,” Mr. Gore said, adding that he had put “every penny” he has made from his investments into the Alliance for Climate Protection.
“And, Congresswoman,” he added, “if you believe that the reason I have been working on this issue for 30 years is because of greed, you don’t know me.”
It was apparently “a bridge too far” for Broder to notice that Gore’s House testimony is entirely inconsistent with Gore’s e-mail to the Times.
Readers of this blog will recall that it was this Steve Milloy column in Human Events that prompted Rep. Marsha Blackburn to ask Gore about his profiteering. But rather than saying he was “putting his money where his mouth was,” Gore chose to dissemble, if not outright lie, to Congress.
And let’s not forget about Gore’s feigned ignorance before Congress of his relationship with Goldman Sachs.
Energy: Global Cooling Hurts Duke Energy (09Nov08)
Energy: Global Cooling Hurts Duke Energy (09Nov08)
http://greenhellblog.com/
(note: greenhellblog is part of junkscience.com undergoing reconstruction at the present time)
It seems as if Duke Energy CEO Jim Rogers should be lobbying for increased greenhouse gas emissions.
Rogers is convinced — because his grandchildren told him so — that carbon dioxide emissions are warming the planet. So Rogers helped form the U.S. Climate Action Partnership, a coalition of a few big businesses and environmental groups that lobbies for carbon caps.
Ironically, the very global cooling that Rogers seems to be for is actually hurting his company’s earnings.
According to Duke’s the third quarter earnings report, earnings-before-interest-and-tax (EBIT) for Duke’s electric and gas division decreased:
$46 million because of unfavorable weather (i.e, a cooler summer);
$22 million because of reduced industrial demand (i.e., weak economy); and
$27 million because of the expiration of a temporary rate raise (i.e., government granted windfall).
All very interesting since Rogers wants to:
Cool the planet through carbon caps;
Weaken the economy through carbon caps; and
Make up for losses by charging more for electricity.
But for the three factors mentioned above, USFE&G’s Q3 EBIT would have increased by 11%.
Finally, Duke has spent about $10 million since 2008 lobbying for carbon caps. That’s a lot of lost earnings itself spent working against the interests of Duke shareholders and customers.
Hey Jim, there’s a reason children aren’t allowed to run the world.
http://greenhellblog.com/
(note: greenhellblog is part of junkscience.com undergoing reconstruction at the present time)
It seems as if Duke Energy CEO Jim Rogers should be lobbying for increased greenhouse gas emissions.
Rogers is convinced — because his grandchildren told him so — that carbon dioxide emissions are warming the planet. So Rogers helped form the U.S. Climate Action Partnership, a coalition of a few big businesses and environmental groups that lobbies for carbon caps.
Ironically, the very global cooling that Rogers seems to be for is actually hurting his company’s earnings.
According to Duke’s the third quarter earnings report, earnings-before-interest-and-tax (EBIT) for Duke’s electric and gas division decreased:
$46 million because of unfavorable weather (i.e, a cooler summer);
$22 million because of reduced industrial demand (i.e., weak economy); and
$27 million because of the expiration of a temporary rate raise (i.e., government granted windfall).
All very interesting since Rogers wants to:
Cool the planet through carbon caps;
Weaken the economy through carbon caps; and
Make up for losses by charging more for electricity.
But for the three factors mentioned above, USFE&G’s Q3 EBIT would have increased by 11%.
Finally, Duke has spent about $10 million since 2008 lobbying for carbon caps. That’s a lot of lost earnings itself spent working against the interests of Duke shareholders and customers.
Hey Jim, there’s a reason children aren’t allowed to run the world.
Sunday, November 8, 2009
War on Terror: The Left and Terrorism (08Nov09)
War on Terror: The Left and Terrorism (08Nov09)
http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/11/the_left_and_terror.html
The Jihadis will return.
We know this, in the same way that we know about death and taxes.
Thanks in large part to the weakening of our defensive efforts under the new administration, there will be further attacks against this country's population, perhaps even worse than those of 9/11. (This week's attack by Nidal Malik Hasan serves to underline the threat.)
When this attack occurs, we will see an end to all the nonsense. Our present drift regarding terror policy is occurring only because Americans have been encouraged to put unpleasant realities at a distance, to live in a dream world where all the bad stuff happens to other people. 9/11 has ceased to signify. Terrorism has become a matter of bad manners. As my grandfather might have put it, this country is in for a rude awakening.
When it comes (and sad to say, it will need to be even worse than the Hassan attack) people will want answers and action. They will get both.
Few things move faster than a frightened politician, particularly a politician frightened by his own constituents.
Fearful pols will see to it that current efforts to undermine American security will come to an abrupt halt. The law enforcement paradigm will be overturned. The attempts to "Mirandize" Islamist terrorists -- to turn them into esoteric versions of American street criminals, protected by the same legal constraints -- will cease. Contingent efforts to criminalize American security officials doing their best to protect the country will be curtailed. All the deeply complex questions fabricated over the past few years will be abruptly simplified.
But there is one thing that will not be addressed: the role of the American left.
The American left is unparalleled at wriggling out of deadly cul-de-sacs of its own creation.
Consider how many times since the Vietnam War this country's left has involved itself in activities that in saner epochs would have resulted in lengthy jail sentences.
Support for the Sandinistas and the Salvadoran FMLN, the Nuclear Freeze movement (a KGB operation from start to finish), cooperation with Palestinian and related terrorist groups. In each case, the left continued its involvement until the bitter end; and in each case skipped off with no consequences. This offhand attitude toward sedition has its roots in the excesses of the witch-hunt era. The aura of martyrdom donned by the left since the early 50s has bought them a free pass for over half a century.
The myth concerning the left and the terror conflict asserts that American leftists pulled together with the rest of the country until such Republican Saurons as Cheney, Rove, Ashcroft, and their puppet W simply went too far: persecuting innocent citizens, impugning the Constitutional rights of the poor Jihadis, and shocking the world with their viciousness and brutality. As the sole exemplars of moral purity in the millennial world, the left had no choice but to begin "speaking truth to power".
My own experience suggests otherwise. In September 2001 I had a part-time position as copy-editor for a small but well-known national magazine. Within days of 9/11 -- and I mean days; not weeks or months -- while the smoke was still rising, I began receiving copy containing pieces suggesting that the terrorists -- Moussaoui in particular -- were poor, misunderstood victims in need of therapy. That there was far more to the event than appeared -- one short piece contained the first suggestion I saw of what was to become known as the "Truther" movement. But possibly the worst was a call for the assassination of John Ashcroft by one of the magazine's regular writers. Calling the editor's attention to this, I was told that it was not necessarily Ashcroft, since the writer did not mention his full name. (It was "John A.", or something of that sort.)
I simply exploded. I've seen a lot from lefties - we all have. There's no limit to their nastiness, their vindictiveness, their callousness. It's this lack of everyday morality that truly distinguishes them from the mass of Americans. So I shouldn't have been shocked. But I was, and I was not willing to accept it. My main gig at the time was five blocks from the WTC, and hundreds of people I had known in passing were no longer of this earth. My patience for the kind of thing I was seeing was strictly limited.
I wrote a short memo outlining my objections. What I got in reply was a blast of vituperation accusing me of slander, McCarthyism, and promoting censorship. That last was quite true; that's exactly what I was doing. But wartime changes things -- certain activities that are perfectly acceptable in times of peace have to go by the board. Or did (editor's name here) really think that he'd breeze through airport security as usual on his next business trip?
In the midst of the exchange I received further copy. It contained more of the same. I sent it back with an ultimatum. I got more abuse in reply, and so I walked.
That's how it looked from my small corner. No lag time, no hesitation -- left-of-center writers knew what was required of them and produced it. There were similar signs on the wider public stage -- Michael Moore berating the Jihadis for their choice of targets, Some obtuse blurt from Susan Sontag. That nameless pol in San Francisco blaming America first. But much of the left decided the better part of valor lay in keeping their mouths shut -- courage is not a widely-displayed trait in that crowd either.
Of course, it didn't remain that way. First came the niggling over the Patriot Act, followed by Fahrenheit 911, the incisive foreign policy analyses of Ward Churchill, and Cindy Sheehan's assorted campouts. But it was Iraq that proved to be the crack through which the left wriggled back to its accustomed status. Abu Ghraib was the fulcrum by which leftists were able to turn public trust and support of the anti-terror campaign to nagging doubt. Justified shock and disgust at the Abu Ghraib photos was amplified by the media in their expert fashion. Within months, such doubts had expanded to include not only the war effort in Iraq, but the overall conduct of the war against terror. Rarely has the misbehavior of a few malcontent backwoodsmen had such heavy consequences.
Not a single aspect of the U.S. policy was left unaffected. The foreign wiretapping program ("listening in on U.S. citizens"), the bank surveillance effort, the terrorist rendition program, and of course Gitmo, all received the Abu Ghraib treatment. Those images of tormented Iraqi prisoners had a deep and extended impact: if Abu Ghraib could happen, why couldn't all the rest happen too? That quivering sense of doubt was all the left needed to put themselves back in the sedition business big time.
We know where it led to. We have reached the point where successful programs are being abandoned, where national defense has taken a back seat, and where decent men out to protect their homes and fellow citizens are being targeted for legal sanction. The left has gained a shoddy and partial triumph. Though they could not destroy the despised Bush administration or throw away Iraq, they have the consolation prize of shutting down all those evil programs and betraying the people of Afghanistan. No fall of Saigon or Watergate this time around, but they'll make do.
There is only one way this will end: people are going to die. Americans will be killed in large numbers and under the most horrifying circumstances in attacks that could very likely have been prevented. And when this occurs -- as it must -- what will the left do? The same as they did after 9/11. Grab a kid-size American flag from somebody else's hand and stand waving it frantically until the moment of potential retribution is safely past.
What motivates this kind of behavior? The answer lies in the leftist worldview, which is simplicity itself. (It has to be simple, designed as it is to be comprehended by workers, peasants, and college students.) The world is divided into oppressors and victims, with history a dialectical struggle between the two. The oppressor is anyone who holds power, the victims everyone else. By definition, the U.S., as the worlds reigning power, is an oppressor state. In fact, the greatest of all oppressor states, worse than Assyria, worse than Rome, worse than Hitler's Germany, because it has craftily convinced much of the world that it is no such thing.
As for the Jihadis, they are victims in arms -- revolutionaries acting against the imperial state, like the Viet Cong and the Sandinistas before them. Islam, reactionary politics, contempt for women -- none of that matters, as long as they are active against the common enemy. And the role of the Western leftist is to support and assist these heroes, exactly as occurred with all the revolutionary movements in the past. By "speaking out", by "defying authority", and above all by undercutting any efforts to combat the new revolutionary vanguard. But what of the real victims, you ask, all the innocents left scattered like broken, burnt dolls in New York, and Bali, and London, and Madrid? "Little Eichmanns", in the immortal words of the renowned plagiarist, Ward Churchill. Or perhaps you prefer ancient the leftist slogan: "You can't make an omelet without breaking a few eggs.
Clearly, American leftists cannot act otherwise. They can never be truly patriotic in the real sense, in the sense of sacrifice and overcoming doubts, of valuing their country as a larger expression of family and neighborhood. To ask that of them is to ask them to give up their higher allegiance, to demand that they stop being leftists, stop being progressives, stop being the world's holy fools. And that is to ask too much.
This is a historically unique situation, a product of the modern temperament. Never before would effective treason by a large minority have been tolerated, particularly involving such crucial sectors as media, academia, and education. This is not a stable condition, and it cannot be maintained for long. There is no reason why it should be.
So how do we respond? We'll pause here to allow the loud cry of "Hang ‘em all!" to roll over us and commend everyone involved for their enthusiasm, if not their prescription. But what we need, though perhaps not as final, is something effective and workable within with contemporary social norms.
The first step is not to buy their story. There is nothing wrong with the fact that we believed the left the first time around -- it involved an unprecedented event. They assured us that 9/11 was different, a good war, the war one against reaction, that they could support in good conscience. We were obliged to listen -- they were fellow citizens, after all, those who had died screaming amid flames their friends and acquaintances as well. But now we know it as a lie, one that they will inevitably repeat. So we must turn away. And that can be a problem. Understanding the limitations of human nature, conservatives have a tendency to hand out second chances whether deserved or not. This is commendable under most circumstances, but not these, not when lives are at stake. We yank drunk drivers out of cars; we must also yank leftists out of the public sphere.
The second step is to identify them. Call them out by name, relentlessly and repeatedly. Note how scarcely a day goes by without some (often dozens) of disparaging references to Gov. Palin. The left knows how this is done, how to assure that the public overlooks nothing and forgets nothing. Turnabout is fair play. Again, conservatives tend to be squeamish, to hesitate before pointing fingers. There is no excuse for that here. As the old saying goes: don't bring a knife to a gun fight.
The third step is to target them, isolate them and render them harmless. The question is how we go about it. The left itself may well have put the weapon in our hands. The attacks against Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck, and Rush Limbaugh, among many others, have been so noxious and vicious as to change the way such tactics are currently received. The public has become hardened to such attacks. Much is accepted now that would not have been accepted even a few years ago. We need to take advantage of this. Ask questions, poke around, find out where the bones are buried and use the shovel. The left threw out the rulebook: now they need to pay the consequences. (This is not unprecedented. In fact, it's a historical commonplace. Few are aware that Joe McCarthy was supported by the Communist Party in his Senate run -- the CPUSA loathed his opponent, Robert LaFollette, Jr., as the son of one of their deadliest enemies during the Progressive era. The Tailgunner is supposed to have studied their tactics of bullying and humiliation with interest.)
Van Jones should act as our model. A few years ago, it wouldn't have mattered that Jones was associated with a nut cult like the Truthers. Now everything matters, and everything goes under the microscope. Jones was a critical figure to the administration, one for whom they were willing to put their reputations on the line to save. It made no difference. Once exposed, and hammered, and spotlighted, he was shown the door and wished luck with his further endeavors. For this outcome, he has no one to thank but his own comrades on the left.
Need we ask if all of them have something hidden, something they'd truly rather not see in the light of day? They all do. Consider Barney Frank. Consider Bill Ayers. Consider Ward Churchill. Under the old dispensation, he might well have been given a pass for his more vicious remarks under "freedom of expression" as understood in this fallen age. But that wasn't all -- far from it. Ward turned out to be a plagiarist, hustler, cheat, and poser of master status. When it all poured out, even as left-wing a campus as Boulder had to cut him loose.
Nobody on the planet earth quite equals the left for simple worldly corruption. The Renaissance princes might have been able to teach them a thing or two, but nobody else. Dig, and you will find. While digging, we might wish that things were different, that we could operate in as civil a manner as many of us would prefer. But we are not at the moment living in a civil epoch. No one reading these words ever has. We know of such a world once -- where decency is honored and nobility is a way of life, only because we have read about it. We are living in a different period now, a period in which our opponents feel completely at home. We cannot allow ourselves to be backed down by thugs such as these. To paraphrase Boccaccio: any tactic against such would-be tyrants is legitimate.
There is a difference between dissent and desertion, criticism and undermining. That difference has been lost amid a fog of relativism in the past few decades. But behind that fog, the hard stone of reality remains. It's no longer a game. People are going to die because of the actions taken by this country's leftists. Recognizing those differences has become a matter of life and death.
The terror conflict is a two-front war. It always has been, as reluctant as we have been to admit it. The time to open the second front is coming.
http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/11/the_left_and_terror.html
The Jihadis will return.
We know this, in the same way that we know about death and taxes.
Thanks in large part to the weakening of our defensive efforts under the new administration, there will be further attacks against this country's population, perhaps even worse than those of 9/11. (This week's attack by Nidal Malik Hasan serves to underline the threat.)
When this attack occurs, we will see an end to all the nonsense. Our present drift regarding terror policy is occurring only because Americans have been encouraged to put unpleasant realities at a distance, to live in a dream world where all the bad stuff happens to other people. 9/11 has ceased to signify. Terrorism has become a matter of bad manners. As my grandfather might have put it, this country is in for a rude awakening.
When it comes (and sad to say, it will need to be even worse than the Hassan attack) people will want answers and action. They will get both.
Few things move faster than a frightened politician, particularly a politician frightened by his own constituents.
Fearful pols will see to it that current efforts to undermine American security will come to an abrupt halt. The law enforcement paradigm will be overturned. The attempts to "Mirandize" Islamist terrorists -- to turn them into esoteric versions of American street criminals, protected by the same legal constraints -- will cease. Contingent efforts to criminalize American security officials doing their best to protect the country will be curtailed. All the deeply complex questions fabricated over the past few years will be abruptly simplified.
But there is one thing that will not be addressed: the role of the American left.
The American left is unparalleled at wriggling out of deadly cul-de-sacs of its own creation.
Consider how many times since the Vietnam War this country's left has involved itself in activities that in saner epochs would have resulted in lengthy jail sentences.
Support for the Sandinistas and the Salvadoran FMLN, the Nuclear Freeze movement (a KGB operation from start to finish), cooperation with Palestinian and related terrorist groups. In each case, the left continued its involvement until the bitter end; and in each case skipped off with no consequences. This offhand attitude toward sedition has its roots in the excesses of the witch-hunt era. The aura of martyrdom donned by the left since the early 50s has bought them a free pass for over half a century.
The myth concerning the left and the terror conflict asserts that American leftists pulled together with the rest of the country until such Republican Saurons as Cheney, Rove, Ashcroft, and their puppet W simply went too far: persecuting innocent citizens, impugning the Constitutional rights of the poor Jihadis, and shocking the world with their viciousness and brutality. As the sole exemplars of moral purity in the millennial world, the left had no choice but to begin "speaking truth to power".
My own experience suggests otherwise. In September 2001 I had a part-time position as copy-editor for a small but well-known national magazine. Within days of 9/11 -- and I mean days; not weeks or months -- while the smoke was still rising, I began receiving copy containing pieces suggesting that the terrorists -- Moussaoui in particular -- were poor, misunderstood victims in need of therapy. That there was far more to the event than appeared -- one short piece contained the first suggestion I saw of what was to become known as the "Truther" movement. But possibly the worst was a call for the assassination of John Ashcroft by one of the magazine's regular writers. Calling the editor's attention to this, I was told that it was not necessarily Ashcroft, since the writer did not mention his full name. (It was "John A.", or something of that sort.)
I simply exploded. I've seen a lot from lefties - we all have. There's no limit to their nastiness, their vindictiveness, their callousness. It's this lack of everyday morality that truly distinguishes them from the mass of Americans. So I shouldn't have been shocked. But I was, and I was not willing to accept it. My main gig at the time was five blocks from the WTC, and hundreds of people I had known in passing were no longer of this earth. My patience for the kind of thing I was seeing was strictly limited.
I wrote a short memo outlining my objections. What I got in reply was a blast of vituperation accusing me of slander, McCarthyism, and promoting censorship. That last was quite true; that's exactly what I was doing. But wartime changes things -- certain activities that are perfectly acceptable in times of peace have to go by the board. Or did (editor's name here) really think that he'd breeze through airport security as usual on his next business trip?
In the midst of the exchange I received further copy. It contained more of the same. I sent it back with an ultimatum. I got more abuse in reply, and so I walked.
That's how it looked from my small corner. No lag time, no hesitation -- left-of-center writers knew what was required of them and produced it. There were similar signs on the wider public stage -- Michael Moore berating the Jihadis for their choice of targets, Some obtuse blurt from Susan Sontag. That nameless pol in San Francisco blaming America first. But much of the left decided the better part of valor lay in keeping their mouths shut -- courage is not a widely-displayed trait in that crowd either.
Of course, it didn't remain that way. First came the niggling over the Patriot Act, followed by Fahrenheit 911, the incisive foreign policy analyses of Ward Churchill, and Cindy Sheehan's assorted campouts. But it was Iraq that proved to be the crack through which the left wriggled back to its accustomed status. Abu Ghraib was the fulcrum by which leftists were able to turn public trust and support of the anti-terror campaign to nagging doubt. Justified shock and disgust at the Abu Ghraib photos was amplified by the media in their expert fashion. Within months, such doubts had expanded to include not only the war effort in Iraq, but the overall conduct of the war against terror. Rarely has the misbehavior of a few malcontent backwoodsmen had such heavy consequences.
Not a single aspect of the U.S. policy was left unaffected. The foreign wiretapping program ("listening in on U.S. citizens"), the bank surveillance effort, the terrorist rendition program, and of course Gitmo, all received the Abu Ghraib treatment. Those images of tormented Iraqi prisoners had a deep and extended impact: if Abu Ghraib could happen, why couldn't all the rest happen too? That quivering sense of doubt was all the left needed to put themselves back in the sedition business big time.
We know where it led to. We have reached the point where successful programs are being abandoned, where national defense has taken a back seat, and where decent men out to protect their homes and fellow citizens are being targeted for legal sanction. The left has gained a shoddy and partial triumph. Though they could not destroy the despised Bush administration or throw away Iraq, they have the consolation prize of shutting down all those evil programs and betraying the people of Afghanistan. No fall of Saigon or Watergate this time around, but they'll make do.
There is only one way this will end: people are going to die. Americans will be killed in large numbers and under the most horrifying circumstances in attacks that could very likely have been prevented. And when this occurs -- as it must -- what will the left do? The same as they did after 9/11. Grab a kid-size American flag from somebody else's hand and stand waving it frantically until the moment of potential retribution is safely past.
What motivates this kind of behavior? The answer lies in the leftist worldview, which is simplicity itself. (It has to be simple, designed as it is to be comprehended by workers, peasants, and college students.) The world is divided into oppressors and victims, with history a dialectical struggle between the two. The oppressor is anyone who holds power, the victims everyone else. By definition, the U.S., as the worlds reigning power, is an oppressor state. In fact, the greatest of all oppressor states, worse than Assyria, worse than Rome, worse than Hitler's Germany, because it has craftily convinced much of the world that it is no such thing.
As for the Jihadis, they are victims in arms -- revolutionaries acting against the imperial state, like the Viet Cong and the Sandinistas before them. Islam, reactionary politics, contempt for women -- none of that matters, as long as they are active against the common enemy. And the role of the Western leftist is to support and assist these heroes, exactly as occurred with all the revolutionary movements in the past. By "speaking out", by "defying authority", and above all by undercutting any efforts to combat the new revolutionary vanguard. But what of the real victims, you ask, all the innocents left scattered like broken, burnt dolls in New York, and Bali, and London, and Madrid? "Little Eichmanns", in the immortal words of the renowned plagiarist, Ward Churchill. Or perhaps you prefer ancient the leftist slogan: "You can't make an omelet without breaking a few eggs.
Clearly, American leftists cannot act otherwise. They can never be truly patriotic in the real sense, in the sense of sacrifice and overcoming doubts, of valuing their country as a larger expression of family and neighborhood. To ask that of them is to ask them to give up their higher allegiance, to demand that they stop being leftists, stop being progressives, stop being the world's holy fools. And that is to ask too much.
This is a historically unique situation, a product of the modern temperament. Never before would effective treason by a large minority have been tolerated, particularly involving such crucial sectors as media, academia, and education. This is not a stable condition, and it cannot be maintained for long. There is no reason why it should be.
So how do we respond? We'll pause here to allow the loud cry of "Hang ‘em all!" to roll over us and commend everyone involved for their enthusiasm, if not their prescription. But what we need, though perhaps not as final, is something effective and workable within with contemporary social norms.
The first step is not to buy their story. There is nothing wrong with the fact that we believed the left the first time around -- it involved an unprecedented event. They assured us that 9/11 was different, a good war, the war one against reaction, that they could support in good conscience. We were obliged to listen -- they were fellow citizens, after all, those who had died screaming amid flames their friends and acquaintances as well. But now we know it as a lie, one that they will inevitably repeat. So we must turn away. And that can be a problem. Understanding the limitations of human nature, conservatives have a tendency to hand out second chances whether deserved or not. This is commendable under most circumstances, but not these, not when lives are at stake. We yank drunk drivers out of cars; we must also yank leftists out of the public sphere.
The second step is to identify them. Call them out by name, relentlessly and repeatedly. Note how scarcely a day goes by without some (often dozens) of disparaging references to Gov. Palin. The left knows how this is done, how to assure that the public overlooks nothing and forgets nothing. Turnabout is fair play. Again, conservatives tend to be squeamish, to hesitate before pointing fingers. There is no excuse for that here. As the old saying goes: don't bring a knife to a gun fight.
The third step is to target them, isolate them and render them harmless. The question is how we go about it. The left itself may well have put the weapon in our hands. The attacks against Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck, and Rush Limbaugh, among many others, have been so noxious and vicious as to change the way such tactics are currently received. The public has become hardened to such attacks. Much is accepted now that would not have been accepted even a few years ago. We need to take advantage of this. Ask questions, poke around, find out where the bones are buried and use the shovel. The left threw out the rulebook: now they need to pay the consequences. (This is not unprecedented. In fact, it's a historical commonplace. Few are aware that Joe McCarthy was supported by the Communist Party in his Senate run -- the CPUSA loathed his opponent, Robert LaFollette, Jr., as the son of one of their deadliest enemies during the Progressive era. The Tailgunner is supposed to have studied their tactics of bullying and humiliation with interest.)
Van Jones should act as our model. A few years ago, it wouldn't have mattered that Jones was associated with a nut cult like the Truthers. Now everything matters, and everything goes under the microscope. Jones was a critical figure to the administration, one for whom they were willing to put their reputations on the line to save. It made no difference. Once exposed, and hammered, and spotlighted, he was shown the door and wished luck with his further endeavors. For this outcome, he has no one to thank but his own comrades on the left.
Need we ask if all of them have something hidden, something they'd truly rather not see in the light of day? They all do. Consider Barney Frank. Consider Bill Ayers. Consider Ward Churchill. Under the old dispensation, he might well have been given a pass for his more vicious remarks under "freedom of expression" as understood in this fallen age. But that wasn't all -- far from it. Ward turned out to be a plagiarist, hustler, cheat, and poser of master status. When it all poured out, even as left-wing a campus as Boulder had to cut him loose.
Nobody on the planet earth quite equals the left for simple worldly corruption. The Renaissance princes might have been able to teach them a thing or two, but nobody else. Dig, and you will find. While digging, we might wish that things were different, that we could operate in as civil a manner as many of us would prefer. But we are not at the moment living in a civil epoch. No one reading these words ever has. We know of such a world once -- where decency is honored and nobility is a way of life, only because we have read about it. We are living in a different period now, a period in which our opponents feel completely at home. We cannot allow ourselves to be backed down by thugs such as these. To paraphrase Boccaccio: any tactic against such would-be tyrants is legitimate.
There is a difference between dissent and desertion, criticism and undermining. That difference has been lost amid a fog of relativism in the past few decades. But behind that fog, the hard stone of reality remains. It's no longer a game. People are going to die because of the actions taken by this country's leftists. Recognizing those differences has become a matter of life and death.
The terror conflict is a two-front war. It always has been, as reluctant as we have been to admit it. The time to open the second front is coming.
ObamaNation: Tea Party Express II Tour; Great Day in Texas (09Nov08)
ObamaNation: Tea Party Express II Tour; Great Day in Texas (09Nov08)
By Lloyd Marcus
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2009/11/tea_party_express_ii_tour_a_gr.html
He hates it when we call him "cheese head". Forty something year old white male, Hustusa has been following the Tea Party Express tour across America. He wears a triangle hat shaped like the cheese head hats wore by Green Bay Packers football team fans. Hustusa's hat reads "I didn't vote for this Obamanation" on all three sides. He also carries a tall sign and sells buttons at every rally. A general contractor by trade, Hustusa said his phone stopped ringing the day after Obama was elected. He lost his home earlier this year.
In Amarillo TX, I met a grandmother who is raising a little boy, not her own, on a widow's income. She proudly told me, "I never asked nobody for a bailout!" This feisty grandmother is not infected with the entitlement mindset being spread by liberal Democrats.
The crowds love it when I (a black man) say I am not a hyphenated American. In Beaumont, TX, a white cowboy approached me at the rally pushing a stroller with two black babies. He said, "My babies are hyphenated Americans until we get their citizenship a week from today". He explained that he and his wife (also white) wanted children who really needed them. They adopted two black babies from Ethiopia. Today they are Ethiopian-Americans. Next week, they will be Americans! But how could such a "color blind" act of love happen? The Left says only racists attend the tea parties.
Also in Texas, a woman with her husband asked me to let America know about the plight of our truckers. She said her husband, along with hundreds of thousands of other truckers across America, are out of work. She lamented that trucking companies who have been in business for a hundred years have closed their doors. Truck stops which used to be full are empty.
In case anyone thinks the Tea Party Movement is winding down, think again. At a whistle stop rally in Brenham, TX, our Tea Party Express bus was greeted by 600 cheering patriots; extremely grateful we stopped in their town.
We are 14 days, several states, two and three rallies per day into the national Tea Party Express II tour. We hear and feel the same emotions at every rally. The American people are frustrated, angry and terrified of the Obama administration's agenda. We (Tea Party Express) give them hope that "We The People" can and will save the America we know and love.
Lloyd Marcus, (black) Unhyphenated American
By Lloyd Marcus
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2009/11/tea_party_express_ii_tour_a_gr.html
He hates it when we call him "cheese head". Forty something year old white male, Hustusa has been following the Tea Party Express tour across America. He wears a triangle hat shaped like the cheese head hats wore by Green Bay Packers football team fans. Hustusa's hat reads "I didn't vote for this Obamanation" on all three sides. He also carries a tall sign and sells buttons at every rally. A general contractor by trade, Hustusa said his phone stopped ringing the day after Obama was elected. He lost his home earlier this year.
In Amarillo TX, I met a grandmother who is raising a little boy, not her own, on a widow's income. She proudly told me, "I never asked nobody for a bailout!" This feisty grandmother is not infected with the entitlement mindset being spread by liberal Democrats.
The crowds love it when I (a black man) say I am not a hyphenated American. In Beaumont, TX, a white cowboy approached me at the rally pushing a stroller with two black babies. He said, "My babies are hyphenated Americans until we get their citizenship a week from today". He explained that he and his wife (also white) wanted children who really needed them. They adopted two black babies from Ethiopia. Today they are Ethiopian-Americans. Next week, they will be Americans! But how could such a "color blind" act of love happen? The Left says only racists attend the tea parties.
Also in Texas, a woman with her husband asked me to let America know about the plight of our truckers. She said her husband, along with hundreds of thousands of other truckers across America, are out of work. She lamented that trucking companies who have been in business for a hundred years have closed their doors. Truck stops which used to be full are empty.
In case anyone thinks the Tea Party Movement is winding down, think again. At a whistle stop rally in Brenham, TX, our Tea Party Express bus was greeted by 600 cheering patriots; extremely grateful we stopped in their town.
We are 14 days, several states, two and three rallies per day into the national Tea Party Express II tour. We hear and feel the same emotions at every rally. The American people are frustrated, angry and terrified of the Obama administration's agenda. We (Tea Party Express) give them hope that "We The People" can and will save the America we know and love.
Lloyd Marcus, (black) Unhyphenated American
War on Terror: Why do we have to read Brit Newspapers to get Ft. Hood Jihadist News? (08Nov09)
War on Terror: Why do we have to read Brit Newspapers to get Ft. Hood Jihadist News? (08Nov09)
By Michelle Malkin - November 8, 2009 01:38 AM
The London Telegraph has the bombshell report on Ft. Hood jihadist Nidal Hassan’s ties to the September 11 terrorists.
Read and re-read it for the full investigative piece.
Allahpundit has a full round-up and commentary on the Telegraph’s revelations.
Question: Why is it that we have to read British papers to get the unvarnished truths about the Ft. Hood Muslim mass murderer?
***
Asra Nomani reports on “Hasan’s hidden militancy.” Well, it wasn’t that hidden:
The alleged Fort Hood gunman had revealed a hard-line Islamist streak to acquaintances in the Muslim Community Center that he made his mosque. The Daily Beast’s Asra Q. Nomani reports.
Not long ago, inside the quiet library of the Muslim Community Center here in Silver Spring, Maryland, a suburb of Washington, D.C., Golam Akhter, a local Bangladeshi-American civil engineer, 67, got into a fierce debate with a young Muslim doctor over how to interpret the concept of “jihad” within Islam. Akhter argued, “Jihad means an inner struggle, fighting against corruption and injustice.”
The young doctor responded. “That’s not a correct interpretation. Jihad means holy war. When your religion isn’t safe, you have to fight for it. If someone attacks you, you must fight them. That is jihad. You can kill someone who is harming you.”
Doug Giles says “We need an ask and tell policy for jihadists in the military.”
Yes, yes we do.
By Michelle Malkin - November 8, 2009 01:38 AM
The London Telegraph has the bombshell report on Ft. Hood jihadist Nidal Hassan’s ties to the September 11 terrorists.
Read and re-read it for the full investigative piece.
Allahpundit has a full round-up and commentary on the Telegraph’s revelations.
Question: Why is it that we have to read British papers to get the unvarnished truths about the Ft. Hood Muslim mass murderer?
***
Asra Nomani reports on “Hasan’s hidden militancy.” Well, it wasn’t that hidden:
The alleged Fort Hood gunman had revealed a hard-line Islamist streak to acquaintances in the Muslim Community Center that he made his mosque. The Daily Beast’s Asra Q. Nomani reports.
Not long ago, inside the quiet library of the Muslim Community Center here in Silver Spring, Maryland, a suburb of Washington, D.C., Golam Akhter, a local Bangladeshi-American civil engineer, 67, got into a fierce debate with a young Muslim doctor over how to interpret the concept of “jihad” within Islam. Akhter argued, “Jihad means an inner struggle, fighting against corruption and injustice.”
The young doctor responded. “That’s not a correct interpretation. Jihad means holy war. When your religion isn’t safe, you have to fight for it. If someone attacks you, you must fight them. That is jihad. You can kill someone who is harming you.”
Doug Giles says “We need an ask and tell policy for jihadists in the military.”
Yes, yes we do.
War on Terror: Yes Michael Moore, there is a Terrorist Threat (09Nov08)
War on Terror: Yes Michael Moore, there is a Terrorist Threat (09Nov08)
Moore's comments in a recent interview with Sean Hannity sound even more foolish in the aftermath of Fort Hood.
LONDON: November 8, 2009 - by Carol Gould
I had only just been putting the finishing touches on a column that I had entitled “Wakey, Wakey! Remember the Liquid Bomb Plotters?” when I saw my esteemed colleague Phyllis Chesler’s excellent piece about Hizb ut-Tahrir.
In turn, I had also been inspired to write my piece about the supreme idiocy of Michael Moore on a recent Hannity, when the filmmaker made the staggeringly naive observation that there are a mere “few hundred guys on monkey bars” roaming the world.
Hannity shot back that we are talking about millions of terrorists.
A couple of hundred? I think there are a thousand just living around the corner from me in London’s Edgware Road!
Moore laughed at Hannity and said it was absurd to treat terrorists like “they are some kind of nation.” My God, Michael, they are many nations.
Let us go back to the British liquid bomb plotters of August 2006. (Remember why, until very recently, we had to remove bottles from our luggage?)
I was in Washington at the time and could feel the fear so many thousands of miles away. I was meant to fly back to London and decided to switch to a budget cruise package to cross the Atlantic. When I arrived at the dock on the day of departure from New York, there were a thousand other folks as frightened as I who had scraped together their last few pennies in order to avoid having to fly. After all, we were told the British Muslims who had concocted the “liquid bomb plot” had been planning to bring down scores of airplanes crossing the sea.
Now let’s skip to 2009.
In September the plotters Abdulla Ahmed Ali, Assad Sarwar, and Tanvir Hussain were convicted in the British courts of conspiracy to murder on transatlantic planes.
At Woolwich Crown Court in south London, Mr. Justice Henriques said the aircraft plot was the “most grave and wicked conspiracy ever proven within this jurisdiction. The intention was to perpetrate a terrorist atrocity that would stand alongside September 11 in world history.” He sentenced them to life.
As usual, the men involved were well integrated into mainstream British society and one had even been a foster parent. Abdulla Ahmed Ali had been given the right to foster a child by Haringey Council, but when his Walthamstow home was searched extremist literature was found in a baby’s cot. At the bomb plot trial Justice Henriques told Ali, “I have concluded you are a driven and determined extremist with boundless energy and an ambition to lead a terrorist outrage of boundless proportion.”
What I find fascinating about the endless stream of Muslim terror plotters who populate these islands — that little bunch of guys on monkey bars Michael Moore says are the sum total with whom we need concern ourselves! —is that most are British-born.
Phyllis Chesler laments the fact that the brave report by Douglas Murray’s Centre for Social Cohesion about the danger of the extremist group Hizb ut-Tahrir in Britain has received little attention. Indeed, the amount of airtime devoted to the crimes of Israel far exceeds that about the dangers inside our own shores of ruthless, hateful fifth-columnists who wish to kill and maim their own fellow British citizens.
It was reported in September in the Daily Telegraph that the ringleader of the liquid plot, Rashid Rauf, roams free in Britain because a jury determined there was “insufficient evidence” to charge him.
As you read this he is planning something new. Nice. Just days after the October 6 Moore-Hannity interview, two men who worked at the Swiss nuclear CERN lab (European Organization for Nuclear Research) were arrested in France and charged with links to al-Qaeda.
Okay, now let’s skip to Thursday night as I write this in London. I had planned to go to bed a few hours ago but am glued to the television; all regular broadcasting has ceased on BBC News and Sky channels to cover the shootings at Fort Hood, evidently committed by a Muslim who worked at the base.
However, no sooner had the Texas coverage started than the BBC switched over to Jerusalem to show us evil Jewish settlers tormenting helpless Arabs in a small street! Horrors! Those pesky Jews are picking on Palestinians yet again!
Jeremy Bowen, renowned for his barely contained bile when reporting on his pet hates, settlers and Zionists, reported with great despair about the hopeless situation endured by Arabs in “occupied East Jerusalem.”
Well, let me tell you something, Mr. Bowen: Here inside Britain we have a problem. It is exactly the same as the problem Israel has. We have just under two million souls who ascribe to Islam. Most are decent citizens. But a small and powerful number are anti-British, anti-Jewish, and anti-American. They are fifth-columnists, like many Muslims living inside Israel, who are lucky they have the right to flourish in that democracy.
Jews cannot live in the huge majority of Muslim countries. The Muslims who live in Britain (they outnumber Anglo-Jews by eight to one) are also fortunate to have jobs, masses of opportunities, grants, and unlimited acreage for mosque after mosque.
Jews have lived in Britain for 350 years and their young men do not spend their every waking moment plotting to blow up their fellow Britons.
Likewise at Fort Hood the suspect in question had every opportunity afforded him.
Most Israelis want peace. Jews inside Britain are not causing the British intelligence services to work overtime monitoring their multifaceted plots 365 days a year, 24/7, unlike so many British Muslims.
Phyllis Chesler and Douglas Murray are courageous prophets in their own respective lands and though I regret to have to agree with Nick Griffin of the loathsome British National Party, his contention that all immigration into the UK must cease is looking more and more attractive. Likewise, how the Fort Hood shooter slipped through the net is yet to be determined.
America, wake up. And ignore the idiocy of Michael Moore. His “few hundred guys on monkey bars” are living around the corner.
Moore's comments in a recent interview with Sean Hannity sound even more foolish in the aftermath of Fort Hood.
LONDON: November 8, 2009 - by Carol Gould
I had only just been putting the finishing touches on a column that I had entitled “Wakey, Wakey! Remember the Liquid Bomb Plotters?” when I saw my esteemed colleague Phyllis Chesler’s excellent piece about Hizb ut-Tahrir.
In turn, I had also been inspired to write my piece about the supreme idiocy of Michael Moore on a recent Hannity, when the filmmaker made the staggeringly naive observation that there are a mere “few hundred guys on monkey bars” roaming the world.
Hannity shot back that we are talking about millions of terrorists.
A couple of hundred? I think there are a thousand just living around the corner from me in London’s Edgware Road!
Moore laughed at Hannity and said it was absurd to treat terrorists like “they are some kind of nation.” My God, Michael, they are many nations.
Let us go back to the British liquid bomb plotters of August 2006. (Remember why, until very recently, we had to remove bottles from our luggage?)
I was in Washington at the time and could feel the fear so many thousands of miles away. I was meant to fly back to London and decided to switch to a budget cruise package to cross the Atlantic. When I arrived at the dock on the day of departure from New York, there were a thousand other folks as frightened as I who had scraped together their last few pennies in order to avoid having to fly. After all, we were told the British Muslims who had concocted the “liquid bomb plot” had been planning to bring down scores of airplanes crossing the sea.
Now let’s skip to 2009.
In September the plotters Abdulla Ahmed Ali, Assad Sarwar, and Tanvir Hussain were convicted in the British courts of conspiracy to murder on transatlantic planes.
At Woolwich Crown Court in south London, Mr. Justice Henriques said the aircraft plot was the “most grave and wicked conspiracy ever proven within this jurisdiction. The intention was to perpetrate a terrorist atrocity that would stand alongside September 11 in world history.” He sentenced them to life.
As usual, the men involved were well integrated into mainstream British society and one had even been a foster parent. Abdulla Ahmed Ali had been given the right to foster a child by Haringey Council, but when his Walthamstow home was searched extremist literature was found in a baby’s cot. At the bomb plot trial Justice Henriques told Ali, “I have concluded you are a driven and determined extremist with boundless energy and an ambition to lead a terrorist outrage of boundless proportion.”
What I find fascinating about the endless stream of Muslim terror plotters who populate these islands — that little bunch of guys on monkey bars Michael Moore says are the sum total with whom we need concern ourselves! —is that most are British-born.
Phyllis Chesler laments the fact that the brave report by Douglas Murray’s Centre for Social Cohesion about the danger of the extremist group Hizb ut-Tahrir in Britain has received little attention. Indeed, the amount of airtime devoted to the crimes of Israel far exceeds that about the dangers inside our own shores of ruthless, hateful fifth-columnists who wish to kill and maim their own fellow British citizens.
It was reported in September in the Daily Telegraph that the ringleader of the liquid plot, Rashid Rauf, roams free in Britain because a jury determined there was “insufficient evidence” to charge him.
As you read this he is planning something new. Nice. Just days after the October 6 Moore-Hannity interview, two men who worked at the Swiss nuclear CERN lab (European Organization for Nuclear Research) were arrested in France and charged with links to al-Qaeda.
Okay, now let’s skip to Thursday night as I write this in London. I had planned to go to bed a few hours ago but am glued to the television; all regular broadcasting has ceased on BBC News and Sky channels to cover the shootings at Fort Hood, evidently committed by a Muslim who worked at the base.
However, no sooner had the Texas coverage started than the BBC switched over to Jerusalem to show us evil Jewish settlers tormenting helpless Arabs in a small street! Horrors! Those pesky Jews are picking on Palestinians yet again!
Jeremy Bowen, renowned for his barely contained bile when reporting on his pet hates, settlers and Zionists, reported with great despair about the hopeless situation endured by Arabs in “occupied East Jerusalem.”
Well, let me tell you something, Mr. Bowen: Here inside Britain we have a problem. It is exactly the same as the problem Israel has. We have just under two million souls who ascribe to Islam. Most are decent citizens. But a small and powerful number are anti-British, anti-Jewish, and anti-American. They are fifth-columnists, like many Muslims living inside Israel, who are lucky they have the right to flourish in that democracy.
Jews cannot live in the huge majority of Muslim countries. The Muslims who live in Britain (they outnumber Anglo-Jews by eight to one) are also fortunate to have jobs, masses of opportunities, grants, and unlimited acreage for mosque after mosque.
Jews have lived in Britain for 350 years and their young men do not spend their every waking moment plotting to blow up their fellow Britons.
Likewise at Fort Hood the suspect in question had every opportunity afforded him.
Most Israelis want peace. Jews inside Britain are not causing the British intelligence services to work overtime monitoring their multifaceted plots 365 days a year, 24/7, unlike so many British Muslims.
Phyllis Chesler and Douglas Murray are courageous prophets in their own respective lands and though I regret to have to agree with Nick Griffin of the loathsome British National Party, his contention that all immigration into the UK must cease is looking more and more attractive. Likewise, how the Fort Hood shooter slipped through the net is yet to be determined.
America, wake up. And ignore the idiocy of Michael Moore. His “few hundred guys on monkey bars” are living around the corner.
Military: US Northcom Continental Insignia Integrates North America (08Nov09)
Military: US Northcom Continental Insignia Integrates North America (08Nov09)
NEW YORK – Troops in the United States' USNORTHCOM ranks appear to have adopted a shoulder patch showing a North American continental design, with an emphasis on United Nations colors, giving evidence of the strength of a plan to integrate North America.
The patch reveals the continent of North America in the orange and blue colors typical to the U.N.
It carries the 5th Army "Quadrangle" and has been seen at Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio, Texas, the headquarters of the 5th Army.
The insignia patch also is displayed on the 5th Army website, the home of U.S. Army North, USARNORTH, the Joint Force Land Component Command and the Army Service Component Command of USNORTHCOM.
The U.S. and Canada signed a military agreement Feb. 14 allowing the armed forces from one nation to support the armed forces of the other nation during a domestic civil emergency, even one that does not involve a cross-border crisis.
The USNORTHCOM logo similarly displays a continental design, but without the U.N. (see USNORTHCOM Internet homepage)
The integration of the U.S. with Canada and Mexico, long deemed by many as little more than a fanciful "conspiracy theory," actually was an idea promoted by the Council on Foreign Relations and presented to President Bush as a means of increasing commerce and business interest throughout North America, according to a top Canadian businessman.
Thomas d'Aquino, CEO and president of the Canadian Council of Executives, the Canadian counterpart to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, confirmed in an interview recently published in Canada that the Council on Foreign Relations was the prime mover in establishing the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America, or SPP.
A close reading of an interview with d'Aquino published by the Metropolitan Corporate Counsel Oct. 4, stated that the creation of the SPP was not a "conspiracy theory" but a well thought-out North American integration plan launched by the Canadian Council of Chief Executives and the Council of Foreign Relations in the United States.
The interview further confirmed President Obama wants to continue North American integration under the rebranded North American Leaders Summit, providing the North American Competitiveness Council can be recast to include more environmentalists and union leaders.
In the interview, d'Aquino traced the origin of SPP to his concerns after the terrorist attacks on 9/11 that "there was a pressing need to keep the border open for commerce while simultaneously addressing the security needs of the United States and North America as a whole."
With this goal in mind, d'Aquino reported the CCCE by 2003 "launched an agenda that we called the North American Security and Prosperity Initiative, or NASPI."
The term "Security and Prosperity" was first used by the Canadian Council of Chief Executives in a Jan. 23, 2003, report, "Security and Prosperity: Toward a New Canada-United States Partnership in North America."
Then, in 2003, d'Aquino took the idea to Richard Hass, president of the Council on Foreign Relations.
"I helped convince Richard Haass at the Council on Foreign Relations that we should put together a trilateral task force to look at the future of North America," d'Aquino said. "We recruited John Manley on Canada's side, along with William Weld, former governor of Massachusetts, and Pedro Aspe, the former Mexican economy minister, who had been so influential in promoting NAFTA."
The result was a CFR Task Force on the Future of North America created Oct. 15, 2004, and chaired by Manley, Weld and Aspe, precisely as d'Aquino had recommended to Haass.
The CFR Task Force on the Future of North America issued an executive summary entitled "Creating a North American Community" on March 14, 2005, just days prior to the March 23, 2005, trilateral summit at Waco, Texas, in which President George W. Bush, then-Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin and then-Mexican President Vicente Fox declared the SPP.
The final report from the group, called "Building a North American Community," was issued in March 2005, immediately following the Waco summit.
D'Aquino appears to agree the CFR task force was instrumental to the trilateral summit in Waco in which the SPP was declared, saying in the published interview, "The result of all these efforts [by the CFR Task Force on the Future of North America] was that in 2005, Prime Minister Martin, President Bush and President Fox decided to sign what they called the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America – the SPP."
The two reports issued by the CFR Task Force on the Future of North America were the "blueprint" for the SPP declared at the Waco summit meeting.
The final CFR report's own statement of purpose is: "The Task Force's central recommendation is establishment by 2010 of a North American economic and security community, the boundaries of which would be defined by a common external tariff and an outer security perimeter."
Next, d'Aquino confirmed that the North American Competitiveness Council was hand-picked by the chambers of commerce in the three countries.
"At their next summit meeting, in 2006, the three leaders invited leading members of the CEO communities in the three countries to provide private-sector input on issues related to competitiveness," he continued. "From that idea, the North American Competitiveness Council (NACC) was born, to be composed of 10 frontline CEOs from each of Canada, the United States and Mexico."
How the CFR plan became SPP
"We produced 10 of our most senior CEO's, while the Americans established an executive committee of 15 representing a broad range of large companies with rotating memberships. The Mexicans produced some heavy-duty people – many names you know well."
The NACC dominated the third annual SPP summit meeting held in Montebello, Quebec, Canada, in August 2007.
"The first meeting of the NACC with the three leaders took place in Montebello, Quebec, in 2007," d'Aquino confirmed. "Our Mexican and American counterparts graciously asked us to write the first NACC report. It was very well received, albeit heavily criticized by unions on the left and others as elitist: 'Why did these people have access to the national leaders while everyone else was left out?'"
He then reported the NACC continued to advise the SPP leaders behind closed doors at the fourth annual SPP summit meeting in New Orleans in April 2008.
"The second meeting of the NACC with the three leaders took place at their summit in New Orleans in 2008 – we were in the room with the leaders for a full hour and a half," he said.
D'Aquino then confirmed Obama would only want to continue with the SPP initiative if more environmentalists and union leaders were included in the private advisory group that had consisted entirely of business leaders under the aegis of the NACC.
"When President Obama came to power, he faced a lot of pressure to shelve the SPP and not follow through with the NACC because his advisers were looking for an institution that would also involve environmentalists, union leaders, et al."
Still, d'Aquino continued to argue that the NACC should not be abandoned.
"But at the North American Leaders Summit in Guadalajara this summer, President Calderon and Prime Minister Harper both told President Obama that the NACC was very useful," d'Aquino said. "In fact, the Canadian NACC group met with our prime minister and his key ministers for an hour and a half on the eve of his departure for the Guadalajara summit. He said that, regardless of whether the NACC continues formally on a trilateral basis, he welcomes our advice on trilateral issues."
The unannounced goal of the SPP was to create a North American plan by advancing the trade integration realized in NAFTA into continental political integration through the creation of some 20 trilateral working groups and the North American Competitiveness Council, or NACC, composed of 30 North American business executives – 10 each hand-picked by the chambers of commerce in the three countries.
NEW YORK – Troops in the United States' USNORTHCOM ranks appear to have adopted a shoulder patch showing a North American continental design, with an emphasis on United Nations colors, giving evidence of the strength of a plan to integrate North America.
The patch reveals the continent of North America in the orange and blue colors typical to the U.N.
It carries the 5th Army "Quadrangle" and has been seen at Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio, Texas, the headquarters of the 5th Army.
The insignia patch also is displayed on the 5th Army website, the home of U.S. Army North, USARNORTH, the Joint Force Land Component Command and the Army Service Component Command of USNORTHCOM.
The U.S. and Canada signed a military agreement Feb. 14 allowing the armed forces from one nation to support the armed forces of the other nation during a domestic civil emergency, even one that does not involve a cross-border crisis.
The USNORTHCOM logo similarly displays a continental design, but without the U.N. (see USNORTHCOM Internet homepage)
The integration of the U.S. with Canada and Mexico, long deemed by many as little more than a fanciful "conspiracy theory," actually was an idea promoted by the Council on Foreign Relations and presented to President Bush as a means of increasing commerce and business interest throughout North America, according to a top Canadian businessman.
Thomas d'Aquino, CEO and president of the Canadian Council of Executives, the Canadian counterpart to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, confirmed in an interview recently published in Canada that the Council on Foreign Relations was the prime mover in establishing the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America, or SPP.
A close reading of an interview with d'Aquino published by the Metropolitan Corporate Counsel Oct. 4, stated that the creation of the SPP was not a "conspiracy theory" but a well thought-out North American integration plan launched by the Canadian Council of Chief Executives and the Council of Foreign Relations in the United States.
The interview further confirmed President Obama wants to continue North American integration under the rebranded North American Leaders Summit, providing the North American Competitiveness Council can be recast to include more environmentalists and union leaders.
In the interview, d'Aquino traced the origin of SPP to his concerns after the terrorist attacks on 9/11 that "there was a pressing need to keep the border open for commerce while simultaneously addressing the security needs of the United States and North America as a whole."
With this goal in mind, d'Aquino reported the CCCE by 2003 "launched an agenda that we called the North American Security and Prosperity Initiative, or NASPI."
The term "Security and Prosperity" was first used by the Canadian Council of Chief Executives in a Jan. 23, 2003, report, "Security and Prosperity: Toward a New Canada-United States Partnership in North America."
Then, in 2003, d'Aquino took the idea to Richard Hass, president of the Council on Foreign Relations.
"I helped convince Richard Haass at the Council on Foreign Relations that we should put together a trilateral task force to look at the future of North America," d'Aquino said. "We recruited John Manley on Canada's side, along with William Weld, former governor of Massachusetts, and Pedro Aspe, the former Mexican economy minister, who had been so influential in promoting NAFTA."
The result was a CFR Task Force on the Future of North America created Oct. 15, 2004, and chaired by Manley, Weld and Aspe, precisely as d'Aquino had recommended to Haass.
The CFR Task Force on the Future of North America issued an executive summary entitled "Creating a North American Community" on March 14, 2005, just days prior to the March 23, 2005, trilateral summit at Waco, Texas, in which President George W. Bush, then-Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin and then-Mexican President Vicente Fox declared the SPP.
The final report from the group, called "Building a North American Community," was issued in March 2005, immediately following the Waco summit.
D'Aquino appears to agree the CFR task force was instrumental to the trilateral summit in Waco in which the SPP was declared, saying in the published interview, "The result of all these efforts [by the CFR Task Force on the Future of North America] was that in 2005, Prime Minister Martin, President Bush and President Fox decided to sign what they called the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America – the SPP."
The two reports issued by the CFR Task Force on the Future of North America were the "blueprint" for the SPP declared at the Waco summit meeting.
The final CFR report's own statement of purpose is: "The Task Force's central recommendation is establishment by 2010 of a North American economic and security community, the boundaries of which would be defined by a common external tariff and an outer security perimeter."
Next, d'Aquino confirmed that the North American Competitiveness Council was hand-picked by the chambers of commerce in the three countries.
"At their next summit meeting, in 2006, the three leaders invited leading members of the CEO communities in the three countries to provide private-sector input on issues related to competitiveness," he continued. "From that idea, the North American Competitiveness Council (NACC) was born, to be composed of 10 frontline CEOs from each of Canada, the United States and Mexico."
How the CFR plan became SPP
"We produced 10 of our most senior CEO's, while the Americans established an executive committee of 15 representing a broad range of large companies with rotating memberships. The Mexicans produced some heavy-duty people – many names you know well."
The NACC dominated the third annual SPP summit meeting held in Montebello, Quebec, Canada, in August 2007.
"The first meeting of the NACC with the three leaders took place in Montebello, Quebec, in 2007," d'Aquino confirmed. "Our Mexican and American counterparts graciously asked us to write the first NACC report. It was very well received, albeit heavily criticized by unions on the left and others as elitist: 'Why did these people have access to the national leaders while everyone else was left out?'"
He then reported the NACC continued to advise the SPP leaders behind closed doors at the fourth annual SPP summit meeting in New Orleans in April 2008.
"The second meeting of the NACC with the three leaders took place at their summit in New Orleans in 2008 – we were in the room with the leaders for a full hour and a half," he said.
D'Aquino then confirmed Obama would only want to continue with the SPP initiative if more environmentalists and union leaders were included in the private advisory group that had consisted entirely of business leaders under the aegis of the NACC.
"When President Obama came to power, he faced a lot of pressure to shelve the SPP and not follow through with the NACC because his advisers were looking for an institution that would also involve environmentalists, union leaders, et al."
Still, d'Aquino continued to argue that the NACC should not be abandoned.
"But at the North American Leaders Summit in Guadalajara this summer, President Calderon and Prime Minister Harper both told President Obama that the NACC was very useful," d'Aquino said. "In fact, the Canadian NACC group met with our prime minister and his key ministers for an hour and a half on the eve of his departure for the Guadalajara summit. He said that, regardless of whether the NACC continues formally on a trilateral basis, he welcomes our advice on trilateral issues."
The unannounced goal of the SPP was to create a North American plan by advancing the trade integration realized in NAFTA into continental political integration through the creation of some 20 trilateral working groups and the North American Competitiveness Council, or NACC, composed of 30 North American business executives – 10 each hand-picked by the chambers of commerce in the three countries.
Friday, November 6, 2009
Sports: Isotruss Carbon Fiber Road Bike Weighs 1.8 Lbs. (06Nov09)
Sports: Isotruss Carbon Fiber Road Bike Weighs 1.8 Lbs. (06Nov09)
http://www.sciencedaily.com/videos/2008/1201-hitech_cycling.htm
Engineers used elements of architecture and geometry to create a strong but lightweight triangle-based isotruss bicycle frame. To make a road bike or mountain bike, the isotruss is first wound with carbon fiber using a sheet that holds the tension constant. The engineers then hand-wind Kevlar strands over the isotruss. The process creates a bike with a large strength-to-weight ratio.
Almost every kid has at one time or another asked for one for Christmas. Now, engineers have developed what may be the most technologically advanced bike to hit the road yet. It took ten years to develop a new incredibly light and strong model that will take cyclists into the future.
Karl Vizmeg has ridden his Delta 7 Arantix bike 1,700 miles. He has raced dozens of bikes, but says a new see-through model is the strongest and lightest.
"This is phenomenal," said Vizmeg. "I've had so much fun this year, particularly with the 'wow' factor, but [also] because it's such a great racing bike."
Vizmeg's $8,500 bike was handmade in Utah using geometry and architecture. To make bikes like his, workers first make an isotruss, a form made from isosceles triangles. Then, they wind carbon fiber around the form -- creating a great strength-to-weight ratio.
"We go back afterwards and hand-wind all the little Kevlar strands, inch-by-inch, over each isotruss," said Tyler Evans, program manager at Delta 7 Sports in Payson, Utah.
They then bake the bike to bond the materials. The mountain bike frame weighs 2.6 pounds. The new Ascend road bike weighs 1.8 pounds.
"This bike rides like bikes that are much heavier and stronger and built like a tank, but it's still in the featherweight category," Evans said.
You might think the open-lattice design wouldn't be aerodynamic, but Delta 7 says wind-tunnel tests prove the bikes are as aerodynamic as traditional ones. The Ascend bike has another advantage.
"You definitely feel like a rock star, like you're famous, like you belong in the Tour de France or some high-end race," cyclist Dan Weller told Ivanhoe.
Right now, that feeling requires patience. It takes about 100 hours to build each IsoTruss bike. Delta 7 produced only 200 IsoTruss models in 2008, but is working on ways to mass-produce them in the near future. To get one right now, you have to add yourself to the waiting list and put down a $1,000 deposit.
A SEE-THROUGH BIKE FRAME? The Arantix mountain bicycle and Ascend road bicycle have frames made from carbon fiber, shaped into a form called IsoTruss. The lattice structure is woven by hand into the form of pyramid-like shapes made of isosceles triangles (the kind with two sides of equal length). The design is specially designed to make the bicycle resistant to bending and twisting, with a greater ratio of strength to weight than metal frames. This technology is currently promoted as an alternative to heavier, weaker materials in everything from automobiles to building materials and utility poles.
HOW TO WEAVE A BICYCLE: To construct the bike, the artisans take a single strand of carbon fiber and wind it back and forth (by hand) over a cylindrical mandrill until it is the right size, then wrap Kevlar around the fibers to bundle it. Then they bake it in an oven, which bonds all the carbon together.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/videos/2008/1201-hitech_cycling.htm
Engineers used elements of architecture and geometry to create a strong but lightweight triangle-based isotruss bicycle frame. To make a road bike or mountain bike, the isotruss is first wound with carbon fiber using a sheet that holds the tension constant. The engineers then hand-wind Kevlar strands over the isotruss. The process creates a bike with a large strength-to-weight ratio.
Almost every kid has at one time or another asked for one for Christmas. Now, engineers have developed what may be the most technologically advanced bike to hit the road yet. It took ten years to develop a new incredibly light and strong model that will take cyclists into the future.
Karl Vizmeg has ridden his Delta 7 Arantix bike 1,700 miles. He has raced dozens of bikes, but says a new see-through model is the strongest and lightest.
"This is phenomenal," said Vizmeg. "I've had so much fun this year, particularly with the 'wow' factor, but [also] because it's such a great racing bike."
Vizmeg's $8,500 bike was handmade in Utah using geometry and architecture. To make bikes like his, workers first make an isotruss, a form made from isosceles triangles. Then, they wind carbon fiber around the form -- creating a great strength-to-weight ratio.
"We go back afterwards and hand-wind all the little Kevlar strands, inch-by-inch, over each isotruss," said Tyler Evans, program manager at Delta 7 Sports in Payson, Utah.
They then bake the bike to bond the materials. The mountain bike frame weighs 2.6 pounds. The new Ascend road bike weighs 1.8 pounds.
"This bike rides like bikes that are much heavier and stronger and built like a tank, but it's still in the featherweight category," Evans said.
You might think the open-lattice design wouldn't be aerodynamic, but Delta 7 says wind-tunnel tests prove the bikes are as aerodynamic as traditional ones. The Ascend bike has another advantage.
"You definitely feel like a rock star, like you're famous, like you belong in the Tour de France or some high-end race," cyclist Dan Weller told Ivanhoe.
Right now, that feeling requires patience. It takes about 100 hours to build each IsoTruss bike. Delta 7 produced only 200 IsoTruss models in 2008, but is working on ways to mass-produce them in the near future. To get one right now, you have to add yourself to the waiting list and put down a $1,000 deposit.
A SEE-THROUGH BIKE FRAME? The Arantix mountain bicycle and Ascend road bicycle have frames made from carbon fiber, shaped into a form called IsoTruss. The lattice structure is woven by hand into the form of pyramid-like shapes made of isosceles triangles (the kind with two sides of equal length). The design is specially designed to make the bicycle resistant to bending and twisting, with a greater ratio of strength to weight than metal frames. This technology is currently promoted as an alternative to heavier, weaker materials in everything from automobiles to building materials and utility poles.
HOW TO WEAVE A BICYCLE: To construct the bike, the artisans take a single strand of carbon fiber and wind it back and forth (by hand) over a cylindrical mandrill until it is the right size, then wrap Kevlar around the fibers to bundle it. Then they bake it in an oven, which bonds all the carbon together.
ObamaCare: Bishops say Health Care Bill Creates Money Laundering for Abortion (06Nov09)
ObamaCare: Bishops say Health Care Bill Creates Money Laundering for Abortion (06Nov09)
http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/56700
The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops dismissed the House Democrats’ plan to try to isolate funding for abortion in the health care bill as a “money-laundering system” that would do nothing to stop federal funding of abortion, an issue that could potentially derail health care reform.
The plan, known as the Ellsworth amendment after its author Rep. Brad Ellsworth (D-Ind.), attempts to serve as a compromise between pro-life Democrats led by Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich) and the party’s liberal, pro-abortion leadership. All of the health care bills currently before Congress allow for taxpayer funding of abortion.
The Ellsworth amendment claims to prevent federal funds from paying for abortion – Stupak’s main objection – by mandating that federal money be segregated from individuals’ premium payments and that abortions can only be paid for by using the premiums, not the federal subsidies.
The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), which speaks for the approximately 300 active bishops in the United States, sent a memo to congressional staff on Thursday about the issue. The memo, a copy of which was obtained by CNSNews.com, says that the Ellsworth amendment is not a “meaningful compromise,” because merely segregating the funds would not prevent federal money from being used to fund abortion.
“On examination, it is not a meaningful compromise. It addresses none of the substantial criticisms offered by the Catholic bishops’ conference and other pro-life advocates for health care reform,” Richard Doerflinger, secretariat of Pro-Life Activities at the USCCB, wrote in the memo.
Those criticisms are that the bill (HR 3962) would use taxpayer dollars to fund abortion, both directly through the public option and indirectly through the generous health insurance subsidy program the bill creates.
In an Oct. 8 letter to Congress, the bishops wrote, “No one should be required to pay for or participate in abortion. It is essential to clearly include longstanding and widely supported federal restrictions on abortion funding/mandates and protections for rights of conscience. No current [health care] bill meets this test. … If acceptable language in these areas cannot be found, we will have to oppose the health care vigorously.”
Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.) (AP Photo)In the case of the bill’s public option, the Ellsworth amendment mandates that the government segregate federal subsidy payments from individual premiums. The bishops called this a “money-laundering system” because once premiums are paid into a public option, they become federal funds.
“While all funds in the public plan begin as private funds, in the pockets of taxpayers and purchasers, they all become federal funds once they are paid to the government (whether paid as taxes or as premiums) – and all abortions in the plan are paid for by the federal government,” the USCCB memo reads.
“So this money-laundering system, aside from making the operation of the public plan more unwieldy, does nothing to address pro-life concerns,” the bishops said.
For private health insurance plans, which can also be purchased with federal subsidies, the Ellsworth amendment would have the federal government segregate federal funds from individual premiums based on an estimate of the average cost of abortion procedures.
This arrangement apparently would enable the government to claim it is not paying for abortion by saying it never paid the abortion surcharge, which would be delineated on every American’s health insurance statement.
The bishops, however, state: “[T]he government’s approach of ‘segregating’ the supposed cost of abortion into a distinct ‘abortion surcharge’ charged to all purchasers only makes the mandatory payment of abortion in these plans even more specific and direct than if the purchaser had to pay it as part of an overall premium.”
Doug Johnson of the National Right to Life Committee (NRLC) told CNSNews.com that House Democrats were “desperately trying to disguise” the fact that their health care overhaul would allow the federal government to pay for abortions.
“When the public option pays for elective abortions, that is federal funding of abortion,” he said. “And that’s what they’re desperately trying to disguise.”
Johnson called the Ellsworth amendment a “fig leaf made out of cellophane,” adding that it was nothing more than a “last minute effort” to cloak the reality of the bill.
“The only thing that federal agencies can spend is federal funds,” he said. “The whole effort for months has been to disguise what they are doing, because it’s not a popular position. It doesn’t matter what you call it, it’s all the government.
“We anticipated all along that there would be a last-minute effort to cloak what they’re doing, and that’s what this is about,” said Johnson. “It’s simply camouflage. It’s a ludicrous hoax - for what purpose?
“To try to provide some political cover so that a few congressmen can claim they voted for something that prevented federal funding of abortion, even though the reality is they’re voting for a bill that will establish a nationwide federal agency program that will pay for abortion on demand, with government funds,” he added.
Stupak told CNSNews.com on Thursday that he and 40 other pro-life Democrats would continue to oppose the health care bill unless House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) allows a floor vote on his amendment that would explicitly prohibit federal funds from going to insurance plans that cover abortion.
http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/56700
The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops dismissed the House Democrats’ plan to try to isolate funding for abortion in the health care bill as a “money-laundering system” that would do nothing to stop federal funding of abortion, an issue that could potentially derail health care reform.
The plan, known as the Ellsworth amendment after its author Rep. Brad Ellsworth (D-Ind.), attempts to serve as a compromise between pro-life Democrats led by Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich) and the party’s liberal, pro-abortion leadership. All of the health care bills currently before Congress allow for taxpayer funding of abortion.
The Ellsworth amendment claims to prevent federal funds from paying for abortion – Stupak’s main objection – by mandating that federal money be segregated from individuals’ premium payments and that abortions can only be paid for by using the premiums, not the federal subsidies.
The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), which speaks for the approximately 300 active bishops in the United States, sent a memo to congressional staff on Thursday about the issue. The memo, a copy of which was obtained by CNSNews.com, says that the Ellsworth amendment is not a “meaningful compromise,” because merely segregating the funds would not prevent federal money from being used to fund abortion.
“On examination, it is not a meaningful compromise. It addresses none of the substantial criticisms offered by the Catholic bishops’ conference and other pro-life advocates for health care reform,” Richard Doerflinger, secretariat of Pro-Life Activities at the USCCB, wrote in the memo.
Those criticisms are that the bill (HR 3962) would use taxpayer dollars to fund abortion, both directly through the public option and indirectly through the generous health insurance subsidy program the bill creates.
In an Oct. 8 letter to Congress, the bishops wrote, “No one should be required to pay for or participate in abortion. It is essential to clearly include longstanding and widely supported federal restrictions on abortion funding/mandates and protections for rights of conscience. No current [health care] bill meets this test. … If acceptable language in these areas cannot be found, we will have to oppose the health care vigorously.”
Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.) (AP Photo)In the case of the bill’s public option, the Ellsworth amendment mandates that the government segregate federal subsidy payments from individual premiums. The bishops called this a “money-laundering system” because once premiums are paid into a public option, they become federal funds.
“While all funds in the public plan begin as private funds, in the pockets of taxpayers and purchasers, they all become federal funds once they are paid to the government (whether paid as taxes or as premiums) – and all abortions in the plan are paid for by the federal government,” the USCCB memo reads.
“So this money-laundering system, aside from making the operation of the public plan more unwieldy, does nothing to address pro-life concerns,” the bishops said.
For private health insurance plans, which can also be purchased with federal subsidies, the Ellsworth amendment would have the federal government segregate federal funds from individual premiums based on an estimate of the average cost of abortion procedures.
This arrangement apparently would enable the government to claim it is not paying for abortion by saying it never paid the abortion surcharge, which would be delineated on every American’s health insurance statement.
The bishops, however, state: “[T]he government’s approach of ‘segregating’ the supposed cost of abortion into a distinct ‘abortion surcharge’ charged to all purchasers only makes the mandatory payment of abortion in these plans even more specific and direct than if the purchaser had to pay it as part of an overall premium.”
Doug Johnson of the National Right to Life Committee (NRLC) told CNSNews.com that House Democrats were “desperately trying to disguise” the fact that their health care overhaul would allow the federal government to pay for abortions.
“When the public option pays for elective abortions, that is federal funding of abortion,” he said. “And that’s what they’re desperately trying to disguise.”
Johnson called the Ellsworth amendment a “fig leaf made out of cellophane,” adding that it was nothing more than a “last minute effort” to cloak the reality of the bill.
“The only thing that federal agencies can spend is federal funds,” he said. “The whole effort for months has been to disguise what they are doing, because it’s not a popular position. It doesn’t matter what you call it, it’s all the government.
“We anticipated all along that there would be a last-minute effort to cloak what they’re doing, and that’s what this is about,” said Johnson. “It’s simply camouflage. It’s a ludicrous hoax - for what purpose?
“To try to provide some political cover so that a few congressmen can claim they voted for something that prevented federal funding of abortion, even though the reality is they’re voting for a bill that will establish a nationwide federal agency program that will pay for abortion on demand, with government funds,” he added.
Stupak told CNSNews.com on Thursday that he and 40 other pro-life Democrats would continue to oppose the health care bill unless House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) allows a floor vote on his amendment that would explicitly prohibit federal funds from going to insurance plans that cover abortion.
Economy: U.S. Foreign arms sales hit record in 2009 (06Nov09
Economy: U.S. Foreign arms sales hit record in 2009 (06Nov09
http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSTRE5A559G20091106
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. government-to-government arms sales rose 4.7 percent to a record $38.1 billion last year and are projected to total almost as much in 2010, a Pentagon agency said on Friday.
The bumper 2009 sales reflected 465 percent growth from an arms sales "low point" in fiscal 1998, according to Vice Admiral Jeffrey Wieringa, head of the Pentagon's Defense Security Cooperation Agency.
Many, if not most, of the pacts signed in fiscal 2009 that ended September 30, are part of a boom in U.S. conventional weapons sales that started under former President George W. Bush.
The 2009 sales were up from $36.4 billion in sales agreements in 2008 and $23.3 billion in 2007, said the agency, which administers the Pentagon's Foreign Military Sales program, a key part of U.S. alliance-building and maintenance.
U.S. sales are expected to top $37.9 billion in fiscal 2010, which began October 1, Vanessa Murray, an agency spokeswoman, said in a written reply to Reuters.
Top U.S. arms makers such as Lockheed Martin Corp, Boeing Co, Northrop Grumman Corp, General Dynamics Corp and Raytheon Co are looking to boost overseas sales to help hedge against Pentagon belt-tightening at home on big-ticket arms programs.
The top purchasing countries in 2009 were:
United Arab Emirates ($7.9 billion);
Afghanistan ($5.4 billion);
Saudi Arabia ($3.3 billion);
Taiwan ($3.2 billion);
Egypt ($2.1 billion);
Iraq ($1.6 billion);
NATO ($924.5 million);
Australia ($818.7 million);
South Korea ($716.6 million.
http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSTRE5A559G20091106
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. government-to-government arms sales rose 4.7 percent to a record $38.1 billion last year and are projected to total almost as much in 2010, a Pentagon agency said on Friday.
The bumper 2009 sales reflected 465 percent growth from an arms sales "low point" in fiscal 1998, according to Vice Admiral Jeffrey Wieringa, head of the Pentagon's Defense Security Cooperation Agency.
Many, if not most, of the pacts signed in fiscal 2009 that ended September 30, are part of a boom in U.S. conventional weapons sales that started under former President George W. Bush.
The 2009 sales were up from $36.4 billion in sales agreements in 2008 and $23.3 billion in 2007, said the agency, which administers the Pentagon's Foreign Military Sales program, a key part of U.S. alliance-building and maintenance.
U.S. sales are expected to top $37.9 billion in fiscal 2010, which began October 1, Vanessa Murray, an agency spokeswoman, said in a written reply to Reuters.
Top U.S. arms makers such as Lockheed Martin Corp, Boeing Co, Northrop Grumman Corp, General Dynamics Corp and Raytheon Co are looking to boost overseas sales to help hedge against Pentagon belt-tightening at home on big-ticket arms programs.
The top purchasing countries in 2009 were:
United Arab Emirates ($7.9 billion);
Afghanistan ($5.4 billion);
Saudi Arabia ($3.3 billion);
Taiwan ($3.2 billion);
Egypt ($2.1 billion);
Iraq ($1.6 billion);
NATO ($924.5 million);
Australia ($818.7 million);
South Korea ($716.6 million.
ObamaNation: Obama and Islam Update (06Nov09)
ObamaNation: Obama and Islam Update (06Nov09)
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2009/11/obama_and_islam_seeing_is_beli.html
President Obama is playing out a drama on the world stage, addressing Islam as a virtual supplicant, and conceding serious issues, while getting nothing in return. Why?
Richard Baehr writes:
The President demanded a complete freeze on Israeli settlement building, including in sections of Jerusalem, supposedly in return for some conciliatory gestures by the Palestinians and Arab states toward Israel. The demands on Israel hardened Palestinian attitudes, and the PA made a total settlement freeze a precondition for resuming peace talks. No gestures towards Israel were forthcoming from any Arab party. Instead, the Palestinians and Arab states launched a full frontal assault on Israel at the UN with the Goldstone Report as ammunition.
The President promised he would meet without preconditions with any foreign leader. For 9 months, he pressured Congress not to pass any tougher sanctions bill against Iran, while he floated his diplomatic offensive. When the mullahs stole the recent election, Obama was tongue tied, and avoided criticizing the brutal suppression of dissent, calling only for an end to violence, as if violence just breaks out like the flu. When the group of six nations meeting with Iran offered a plan for taking low enriched uranium from Iran to Russia for further enrichment (ignoring Iran's violation of prior Security Council resolutions that prohibited such enrichment at all), Iran stalled,, and blocked the deal. We have been slapped around and humiliated, which is what happens when you are taken for a weakling.
//Note: Check the CNN video out at the bottom of this article //
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2009/11/obama_and_islam_seeing_is_beli.html
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2009/11/obama_and_islam_seeing_is_beli.html
President Obama is playing out a drama on the world stage, addressing Islam as a virtual supplicant, and conceding serious issues, while getting nothing in return. Why?
Richard Baehr writes:
The President demanded a complete freeze on Israeli settlement building, including in sections of Jerusalem, supposedly in return for some conciliatory gestures by the Palestinians and Arab states toward Israel. The demands on Israel hardened Palestinian attitudes, and the PA made a total settlement freeze a precondition for resuming peace talks. No gestures towards Israel were forthcoming from any Arab party. Instead, the Palestinians and Arab states launched a full frontal assault on Israel at the UN with the Goldstone Report as ammunition.
The President promised he would meet without preconditions with any foreign leader. For 9 months, he pressured Congress not to pass any tougher sanctions bill against Iran, while he floated his diplomatic offensive. When the mullahs stole the recent election, Obama was tongue tied, and avoided criticizing the brutal suppression of dissent, calling only for an end to violence, as if violence just breaks out like the flu. When the group of six nations meeting with Iran offered a plan for taking low enriched uranium from Iran to Russia for further enrichment (ignoring Iran's violation of prior Security Council resolutions that prohibited such enrichment at all), Iran stalled,, and blocked the deal. We have been slapped around and humiliated, which is what happens when you are taken for a weakling.
//Note: Check the CNN video out at the bottom of this article //
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2009/11/obama_and_islam_seeing_is_beli.html
ObamaNation: No Holds Barbara (Boxer goes Nuclear against opposition) (06Nov09)
ObamaNation: No Holds Barbara (Boxer goes Nuclear against opposition) (06Nov09)
http://www.gop.com/index.php/research/comments/no_holds_barbara
Senate EPW Chairwoman Barbara Boxer (D-CA) may not want nuclear energy in her “cap-and-trade” bill, but she certainly was ready to go nuclear on her colleagues. Boxer took advantage of a loophole in the committee’s rules to circumvent Republican members to pass her national energy tax out of her committee. According to one Democratic aide, Boxer’s move “poisoned the waters.”
Boxer’s decision to go nuclear shouldn’t be surprising. Back in September, Sen. Kerry tried to rebrand the “cap-and-trade” bill as a “pollution reduction" bill, and as the bill was being introduced Democrats tested out “new catch phrase[s]” to sell the legislation. And more recently, Kerry noted, “the bill that I submitted with Sen. Boxer [that] went to her committee doesn’t mention cap and trade, and there’s a reason.” But Kerry and Boxer can’t hide the true cost of their national energy tax to American families. As Paul Cicio of the Industrial Energy Consumers Of America said:
[The bill] is not cost effective and would: reduce competitiveness, increase natural gas, electricity and transportation fuel costs, increase job losses, lower capital investment in the manufacturing sector, impede increased production, impede exports and increase imports.
Maybe that’s why Politico reports that “rank-and-file members from both parties dismissed the Boxer bill, coal-state senators were unhappy and many said Boxer’s move to approve the bill without any Republicans even in the committee room had poisoned the process.” With unemployment over ten percent, the last thing America needs is a national energy tax. As Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-ND) said, "[cap-and-trade] is the wrong solution.”
http://www.gop.com/index.php/research/comments/no_holds_barbara
Senate EPW Chairwoman Barbara Boxer (D-CA) may not want nuclear energy in her “cap-and-trade” bill, but she certainly was ready to go nuclear on her colleagues. Boxer took advantage of a loophole in the committee’s rules to circumvent Republican members to pass her national energy tax out of her committee. According to one Democratic aide, Boxer’s move “poisoned the waters.”
Boxer’s decision to go nuclear shouldn’t be surprising. Back in September, Sen. Kerry tried to rebrand the “cap-and-trade” bill as a “pollution reduction" bill, and as the bill was being introduced Democrats tested out “new catch phrase[s]” to sell the legislation. And more recently, Kerry noted, “the bill that I submitted with Sen. Boxer [that] went to her committee doesn’t mention cap and trade, and there’s a reason.” But Kerry and Boxer can’t hide the true cost of their national energy tax to American families. As Paul Cicio of the Industrial Energy Consumers Of America said:
[The bill] is not cost effective and would: reduce competitiveness, increase natural gas, electricity and transportation fuel costs, increase job losses, lower capital investment in the manufacturing sector, impede increased production, impede exports and increase imports.
Maybe that’s why Politico reports that “rank-and-file members from both parties dismissed the Boxer bill, coal-state senators were unhappy and many said Boxer’s move to approve the bill without any Republicans even in the committee room had poisoned the process.” With unemployment over ten percent, the last thing America needs is a national energy tax. As Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-ND) said, "[cap-and-trade] is the wrong solution.”
ObamaMotors: A Clunker of a Deal (Cash for Clunkers Update) (06Nov09)
ObamaMotors: A Clunker of a Deal (Cash for Clunkers Update) (06Nov09)
http://www.gop.com/index.php/research/comments/a_clunker_of_a_deal
The Associated Press reports on Thursday that data from the recent “Cash for Clunkers” program is evidence that the program was not being used as intended. It was sold as a program to not only spur auto sales, but also put more energy efficient vehicles on the road. Apparently, this was not the case, The Associated Press reports:
The single most common swap — which occurred more than 8,200 times — involved Ford F150 pickup owners who took advantage of a government rebate to trade their old trucks for new Ford F150s.
While we have no problem with Ford, or their popular F-150 pickup truck, the 2010 trucks get between 14 and 15 miles per gallon in the city. And the report notes that owners of F-150s were “17 times more likely to buy a new F150” than a Toyota Prius, a popular fuel efficient car that would get you 51 mpg. This is not encouraging news for those who hoped the highly touted Clunkers agenda would spur an era of environmentally friendly automobiles on the roads. Jeremy Anwyl, the Chief Executive of Edmunds.com, put it best when he said, “If we’re looking for the environmental story here, we’re going to be disappointed.” Amen.
Edmunds.com has also recently found that of the 690,000 vehicles sold under “Cash For Clunkers,” only 125,000 of those sales were a result of the program. The rest of the car sales would have happened anyways. According to Edmunds.com, this results in a cost to taxpayers of $24,000 per car – a hefty price, especially considering many of these cars appear to get basically the same gas mileage as the car that was traded in.
If the government can’t run a relatively small program like “Cash for Clunkers” correctly, how can we trust the government to effectively run a $1.3 trillion government-run health care experiment? Was the “Cash for Clunkers” experiment a preview of the type of results the American people should expect from the Obama administration’s other experiments?
http://www.gop.com/index.php/research/comments/a_clunker_of_a_deal
The Associated Press reports on Thursday that data from the recent “Cash for Clunkers” program is evidence that the program was not being used as intended. It was sold as a program to not only spur auto sales, but also put more energy efficient vehicles on the road. Apparently, this was not the case, The Associated Press reports:
The single most common swap — which occurred more than 8,200 times — involved Ford F150 pickup owners who took advantage of a government rebate to trade their old trucks for new Ford F150s.
While we have no problem with Ford, or their popular F-150 pickup truck, the 2010 trucks get between 14 and 15 miles per gallon in the city. And the report notes that owners of F-150s were “17 times more likely to buy a new F150” than a Toyota Prius, a popular fuel efficient car that would get you 51 mpg. This is not encouraging news for those who hoped the highly touted Clunkers agenda would spur an era of environmentally friendly automobiles on the roads. Jeremy Anwyl, the Chief Executive of Edmunds.com, put it best when he said, “If we’re looking for the environmental story here, we’re going to be disappointed.” Amen.
Edmunds.com has also recently found that of the 690,000 vehicles sold under “Cash For Clunkers,” only 125,000 of those sales were a result of the program. The rest of the car sales would have happened anyways. According to Edmunds.com, this results in a cost to taxpayers of $24,000 per car – a hefty price, especially considering many of these cars appear to get basically the same gas mileage as the car that was traded in.
If the government can’t run a relatively small program like “Cash for Clunkers” correctly, how can we trust the government to effectively run a $1.3 trillion government-run health care experiment? Was the “Cash for Clunkers” experiment a preview of the type of results the American people should expect from the Obama administration’s other experiments?
ObamaNomics: Stimulus Watch, Obama Willful Ignorance? (06Nov09)
ObamaNomics: Stimulus Watch, Obama Willful Ignorance? (06Nov09)
http://www.gop.com/index.php/research/comments/stimulus_watch_white_houses_willful_ignorance
On Friday, the White house claimed the stimulus created or saved 640,000 jobs, but we are seeing more and more evidence that their claim should be viewed with great suspicion:
The New York Times highlights some of the preposterous data contained in the job report, including the fact that one lawn mower purchased using stimulus funds saved or created 50 jobs.
The NYT also drew attention to the fact that the majority of stimulus jobs being reported are in the public sector instead of the private sector, even though Obama promised 90 percent of jobs created by the stimulus would be created in the private sector.
The Wall Street Journal found that a Head Start preschool program claimed that the stimulus created jobs, when in fact the employees just received raises.
The Associated Press found that a business in Georgia reported that the stimulus created or saved 935 jobs, but the AP points out that only 508 people actually work there.
The Chicago Tribune has reported some school districts reported that the stimulus saved more jobs than actually exist on the payrolls.
The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel found that many jobs were counted twice, and in one instance 100 jobs were reported to have been created by stimulus funds, even though the project won’t start until this spring.
The White House has tried to push the idea that the stimulus is creating jobs, but the truth has a funny way of coming out, and it is apparent that stimulus is not working as well as the administration has hoped.
http://www.gop.com/index.php/research/comments/stimulus_watch_white_houses_willful_ignorance
On Friday, the White house claimed the stimulus created or saved 640,000 jobs, but we are seeing more and more evidence that their claim should be viewed with great suspicion:
The New York Times highlights some of the preposterous data contained in the job report, including the fact that one lawn mower purchased using stimulus funds saved or created 50 jobs.
The NYT also drew attention to the fact that the majority of stimulus jobs being reported are in the public sector instead of the private sector, even though Obama promised 90 percent of jobs created by the stimulus would be created in the private sector.
The Wall Street Journal found that a Head Start preschool program claimed that the stimulus created jobs, when in fact the employees just received raises.
The Associated Press found that a business in Georgia reported that the stimulus created or saved 935 jobs, but the AP points out that only 508 people actually work there.
The Chicago Tribune has reported some school districts reported that the stimulus saved more jobs than actually exist on the payrolls.
The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel found that many jobs were counted twice, and in one instance 100 jobs were reported to have been created by stimulus funds, even though the project won’t start until this spring.
The White House has tried to push the idea that the stimulus is creating jobs, but the truth has a funny way of coming out, and it is apparent that stimulus is not working as well as the administration has hoped.
ObamaNation: Senate Cut Marine Base relocation from Okinawa by 70% (06Nov09)
ObamaNation: Senate Cut Marine Base relocation from Okinawa by 70% (06Nov09)
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D9BQ79H01&show_article=1&catnum=0
The U.S. Senate has cut spending earmarked in a fiscal 2010 budget bill for the relocation of 8,000 Marines from Okinawa to Guam by 70 percent, congressional sources said Friday.
The sharp cut from about $300 million earmarked for the transfer of the Marines comes at a time when the new Japanese government led by Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama has been unable to reach a conclusion on the issue of relocating the U.S. Marine Corps' Futemma Air Station.
The transfer of the Marines to Guam is closely linked with the relocation of the Futemma base.
In May 2006, Japan and the United States agreed to move the heliport functions of the Futemma Air Station located in downtown Ginowan, Okinawa Prefecture, to a less densely populated area in Nago, northern Okinawa, by 2014. The two countries also agreed at the time on the transfer of 8,000 Marines from Okinawa to Guam.
The United States has been pressing Japan to implement the relocation of the Futemma base as agreed in 2006, but Hatoyama is seeking to move the airfield out of Okinawa or even out of Japan.
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D9BQ79H01&show_article=1&catnum=0
The U.S. Senate has cut spending earmarked in a fiscal 2010 budget bill for the relocation of 8,000 Marines from Okinawa to Guam by 70 percent, congressional sources said Friday.
The sharp cut from about $300 million earmarked for the transfer of the Marines comes at a time when the new Japanese government led by Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama has been unable to reach a conclusion on the issue of relocating the U.S. Marine Corps' Futemma Air Station.
The transfer of the Marines to Guam is closely linked with the relocation of the Futemma base.
In May 2006, Japan and the United States agreed to move the heliport functions of the Futemma Air Station located in downtown Ginowan, Okinawa Prefecture, to a less densely populated area in Nago, northern Okinawa, by 2014. The two countries also agreed at the time on the transfer of 8,000 Marines from Okinawa to Guam.
The United States has been pressing Japan to implement the relocation of the Futemma base as agreed in 2006, but Hatoyama is seeking to move the airfield out of Okinawa or even out of Japan.
Energy: New Smart Meters Raise (more) Privacy Issues (06Nov09)
Energy: New Smart Meters Raise (more) Privacy Issues (06Nov09)
http://www.physorg.com/news176703307.html
The new "smart meters" utilities are installing in homes around the world to reduce energy use raise fresh privacy issues because of the wealth of information about consumer habits they reveal, experts said Friday.
The devices send data on household energy consumption directly to utilities on a regular basis, allowing the firms to manage demand more efficiently and advise households when it is cheaper to turn on appliances.
But privacy experts gathered in Madrid for a three-day conference which wraps up Friday warned that the meters can also reveal intimate details about customers' habits such as when they eat, what time they go to sleep or how much television they watch.
With cars expected to be fuelled increasingly by electricity in the coming years, the new meters could soon be used to gather information on consumer behaviour beyond the home, they added.
"The collection and storage and retention of the data makes it vulnerable to security breaches as well as to government access," Christopher Wolf, the co-chairman and founder of the Washington-based Future of Privacy Forum, told AFP.
"It is really an issue of how much information about us can be collected by a third party, how much do they really need, how long do they need to keep it, what should the rules be on retention and when should destruction of it occur."
More than eight million "smart meters" have already been installed in the United States and the number is projected by the government to rise to 52 million by 2012.
Last month US President Barack Obama announced 3.4 billion dollars (2.3 billion euros) in grants to modernise the country's electricity grid, part of which will pay for about 18 million "smart meters."
The European Parliament passed an energy package in April which proposed that 80 percent of electricity consumers have "smart meters" by 2020.
In Italy 85 percent of homes already have smart meters installed, the highest penetration rate in Europe, according to the Future of Privacy Forum. France is second with a 25 percent penetration rate.
"This is certainly the next stage, the new frontier, in the potential for privacy invasion," Elias Quinn, a senior policy analyst at the Center for Energy and Environmental Security at the University of Colorado, told AFP.
"The potential is great for privacy invasion depending on who can have access to this information. We are kind of walking into 'smart meter' development blindly. There is no general informed consent."
Utilities could be tempted to sell the data on their customers' behaviour to marketers who use it to pitch advertising geared to their habits, said Quinn.
A restless sleeper who gets up frequently throughout the night -- identified by electricity consumption records that show he frequently turns on the lights -- could be targeted with adverts for sleep aids for example.
Insurance firms, meanwhile, could use the data to justify charging higher fees to a driver whose electricity consumption records indicate he often drives while sleep deprived or regularly gets home at around the time the bars close.
The utilities would be following the lead of Internet service providers which already gear online advertising based on the content of the Web page being viewed by their customers.
http://www.physorg.com/news176703307.html
The new "smart meters" utilities are installing in homes around the world to reduce energy use raise fresh privacy issues because of the wealth of information about consumer habits they reveal, experts said Friday.
The devices send data on household energy consumption directly to utilities on a regular basis, allowing the firms to manage demand more efficiently and advise households when it is cheaper to turn on appliances.
But privacy experts gathered in Madrid for a three-day conference which wraps up Friday warned that the meters can also reveal intimate details about customers' habits such as when they eat, what time they go to sleep or how much television they watch.
With cars expected to be fuelled increasingly by electricity in the coming years, the new meters could soon be used to gather information on consumer behaviour beyond the home, they added.
"The collection and storage and retention of the data makes it vulnerable to security breaches as well as to government access," Christopher Wolf, the co-chairman and founder of the Washington-based Future of Privacy Forum, told AFP.
"It is really an issue of how much information about us can be collected by a third party, how much do they really need, how long do they need to keep it, what should the rules be on retention and when should destruction of it occur."
More than eight million "smart meters" have already been installed in the United States and the number is projected by the government to rise to 52 million by 2012.
Last month US President Barack Obama announced 3.4 billion dollars (2.3 billion euros) in grants to modernise the country's electricity grid, part of which will pay for about 18 million "smart meters."
The European Parliament passed an energy package in April which proposed that 80 percent of electricity consumers have "smart meters" by 2020.
In Italy 85 percent of homes already have smart meters installed, the highest penetration rate in Europe, according to the Future of Privacy Forum. France is second with a 25 percent penetration rate.
"This is certainly the next stage, the new frontier, in the potential for privacy invasion," Elias Quinn, a senior policy analyst at the Center for Energy and Environmental Security at the University of Colorado, told AFP.
"The potential is great for privacy invasion depending on who can have access to this information. We are kind of walking into 'smart meter' development blindly. There is no general informed consent."
Utilities could be tempted to sell the data on their customers' behaviour to marketers who use it to pitch advertising geared to their habits, said Quinn.
A restless sleeper who gets up frequently throughout the night -- identified by electricity consumption records that show he frequently turns on the lights -- could be targeted with adverts for sleep aids for example.
Insurance firms, meanwhile, could use the data to justify charging higher fees to a driver whose electricity consumption records indicate he often drives while sleep deprived or regularly gets home at around the time the bars close.
The utilities would be following the lead of Internet service providers which already gear online advertising based on the content of the Web page being viewed by their customers.
Wednesday, November 4, 2009
ObamaCare: 111 New Bureacracies in New Health Care Bill (04Nov09)
ObamaCare: 111 New Bureacracies in New Health Care Bill (04Nov09)
http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/56532
(CNSNews.com) - The House Republican Conference has compiled a list of all the new boards, bureaucracies, commissions, and programs created in the House health care bill.
The Republican conference describes H.R. 3962 as “Speaker Pelosi’s government takeover of health care.”
The list of 111 new bureaucracies is reprinted here:
1. Retiree Reserve Trust Fund (Section 111(d), p. 61)
2. Grant program for wellness programs to small employers (Section 112, p. 62)
3. Grant program for State health access programs (Section 114, p. 72)
4. Program of administrative simplification (Section 115, p. 76)
5. Health Benefits Advisory Committee (Section 223, p. 111)
6. Health Choices Administration (Section 241, p. 131)
7. Qualified Health Benefits Plan Ombudsman (Section 244, p. 138)
8. Health Insurance Exchange (Section 201, p. 155)
9. Program for technical assistance to employees of small businesses buying Exchange coverage (Section 305(h), p. 191)
10. Mechanism for insurance risk pooling to be established by Health Choices Commissioner (Section 306(b), p. 194)
11. Health Insurance Exchange Trust Fund (Section 307, p. 195)
12. State-based Health Insurance Exchanges (Section 308, p. 197)
13. Grant program for health insurance cooperatives (Section 310, p. 206)
14. “Public Health Insurance Option” (Section 321, p. 211)
15. Ombudsman for “Public Health Insurance Option” (Section 321(d), p. 213)
16. Account for receipts and disbursements for “Public Health Insurance Option” (Section 322(b), p. 215)
17. Telehealth Advisory Committee (Section 1191 (b), p. 589)
18. Demonstration program providing reimbursement for “culturally and linguistically appropriate services” (Section 1222, p. 617)
19. Demonstration program for shared decision making using patient decision aids (Section 1236, p. 648)
20. Accountable Care Organization pilot program under Medicare (Section 1301, p. 653)
21. Independent patient-centered medical home pilot program under Medicare (Section 1302, p. 672)
22. Community-based medical home pilot program under Medicare (Section 1302(d), p. 681)
23. Independence at home demonstration program (Section 1312, p. 718)
24. Center for Comparative Effectiveness Research (Section 1401(a), p. 734)
25. Comparative Effectiveness Research Commission (Section 1401(a), p. 738)
26. Patient ombudsman for comparative effectiveness research (Section 1401(a), p. 753)
27. Quality assurance and performance improvement program for skilled nursing facilities (Section 1412(b)(1), p. 784)
28. Quality assurance and performance improvement program for nursing facilities (Section 1412 (b)(2), p. 786)
29. Special focus facility program for skilled nursing facilities (Section 1413(a)(3), p. 796)
30. Special focus facility program for nursing facilities (Section 1413(b)(3), p. 804)
31. National independent monitor pilot program for skilled nursing facilities and nursing facilities (Section 1422, p. 859)
32. Demonstration program for approved teaching health centers with respect to Medicare GME (Section 1502(d), p. 933)
33. Pilot program to develop anti-fraud compliance systems for Medicare providers (Section 1635, p. 978)
34. Special Inspector General for the Health Insurance Exchange (Section 1647, p. 1000)
35. Medical home pilot program under Medicaid (Section 1722, p. 1058)
36. Accountable Care Organization pilot program under Medicaid (Section 1730A, p. 1073)
37. Nursing facility supplemental payment program (Section 1745, p. 1106)
38. Demonstration program for Medicaid coverage to stabilize emergency medical conditions in institutions for mental diseases (Section 1787, p. 1149)
39. Comparative Effectiveness Research Trust Fund (Section 1802, p. 1162)
40. “Identifiable office or program” within CMS to “provide for improved coordination between Medicare and Medicaid in the case of dual eligibles” (Section 1905, p. 1191)
41. Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation (Section 1907, p. 1198)
42. Public Health Investment Fund (Section 2002, p. 1214)
43. Scholarships for service in health professional needs areas (Section 2211, p. 1224)
44. Program for training medical residents in community-based settings (Section 2214, p. 1236)
45. Grant program for training in dentistry programs (Section 2215, p. 1240)
46. Public Health Workforce Corps (Section 2231, p. 1253)
47. Public health workforce scholarship program (Section 2231, p. 1254)
48. Public health workforce loan forgiveness program (Section 2231, p. 1258)
49. Grant program for innovations in interdisciplinary care (Section 2252, p. 1272)
50. Advisory Committee on Health Workforce Evaluation and Assessment (Section 2261, p. 1275)
51. Prevention and Wellness Trust (Section 2301, p. 1286)
52. Clinical Prevention Stakeholders Board (Section 2301, p. 1295)
53. Community Prevention Stakeholders Board (Section 2301, p. 1301)
54. Grant program for community prevention and wellness research (Section 2301, p. 1305)
55. Grant program for research and demonstration projects related to wellness incentives (Section 2301, p. 1305)
56. Grant program for community prevention and wellness services (Section 2301, p. 1308)
57. Grant program for public health infrastructure (Section 2301, p. 1313)
58. Center for Quality Improvement (Section 2401, p. 1322)
59. Assistant Secretary for Health Information (Section 2402, p. 1330)
60. Grant program to support the operation of school-based health clinics (Section 2511, p. 1352)
61. Grant program for nurse-managed health centers (Section 2512, p. 1361)
62. Grants for labor-management programs for nursing training (Section 2521, p. 1372)
63. Grant program for interdisciplinary mental and behavioral health training (Section 2522, p. 1382)
64. “No Child Left Unimmunized Against Influenza” demonstration grant program (Section 2524, p. 1391)
65. Healthy Teen Initiative grant program regarding teen pregnancy (Section 2526, p. 1398)
66. Grant program for interdisciplinary training, education, and services for individuals with autism (Section 2527(a), p. 1402)
67. University centers for excellence in developmental disabilities education (Section 2527(b), p. 1410)
68. Grant program to implement medication therapy management services (Section 2528, p. 1412)
69. Grant program to promote positive health behaviors in underserved communities (Section 2530, p. 1422)
70. Grant program for State alternative medical liability laws (Section 2531, p. 1431)
71. Grant program to develop infant mortality programs (Section 2532, p. 1433)
72. Grant program to prepare secondary school students for careers in health professions (Section 2533, p. 1437)
73. Grant program for community-based collaborative care (Section 2534, p. 1440)
74. Grant program for community-based overweight and obesity prevention (Section 2535, p. 1457)
75. Grant program for reducing the student-to-school nurse ratio in primary and secondary schools (Section 2536, p. 1462)
76. Demonstration project of grants to medical-legal partnerships (Section 2537, p. 1464)
77. Center for Emergency Care under the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response (Section 2552, p. 1478)
78. Council for Emergency Care (Section 2552, p 1479)
79. Grant program to support demonstration programs that design and implement regionalized emergency care systems (Section 2553, p. 1480)
80. Grant program to assist veterans who wish to become emergency medical technicians upon discharge (Section 2554, p. 1487)
81. Interagency Pain Research Coordinating Committee (Section 2562, p. 1494)
82. National Medical Device Registry (Section 2571, p. 1501)
83. CLASS Independence Fund (Section 2581, p. 1597)
84. CLASS Independence Fund Board of Trustees (Section 2581, p. 1598)
85. CLASS Independence Advisory Council (Section 2581, p. 1602)
86. Health and Human Services Coordinating Committee on Women’s Health (Section 2588, p. 1610)
87. National Women’s Health Information Center (Section 2588, p. 1611)
88. Centers for Disease Control Office of Women’s Health (Section 2588, p. 1614)
89. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality Office of Women’s Health and Gender-Based Research (Section 2588, p. 1617)
90. Health Resources and Services Administration Office of Women’s Health (Section 2588, p. 1618)
91. Food and Drug Administration Office of Women’s Health (Section 2588, p. 1621)
92. Personal Care Attendant Workforce Advisory Panel (Section 2589(a)(2), p. 1624)
93. Grant program for national health workforce online training (Section 2591, p. 1629)
94. Grant program to disseminate best practices on implementing health workforce investment programs (Section 2591, p. 1632)
95. Demonstration program for chronic shortages of health professionals (Section 3101, p. 1717)
96. Demonstration program for substance abuse counselor educational curricula (Section 3101, p. 1719)
97. Program of Indian community education on mental illness (Section 3101, p. 1722)
98. Intergovernmental Task Force on Indian environmental and nuclear hazards (Section 3101, p. 1754)
99. Office of Indian Men’s Health (Section 3101, p. 1765)
100. Indian Health facilities appropriation advisory board (Section 3101, p. 1774)
101. Indian Health facilities needs assessment workgroup (Section 3101, p. 1775)
102. Indian Health Service tribal facilities joint venture demonstration projects (Section 3101, p. 1809)
103. Urban youth treatment center demonstration project (Section 3101, p. 1873)
104. Grants to Urban Indian Organizations for diabetes prevention (Section 3101, p. 1874)
105. Grants to Urban Indian Organizations for health IT adoption (Section 3101, p. 1877)
106. Mental health technician training program (Section 3101, p. 1898)
107. Indian youth telemental health demonstration project (Section 3101, p. 1909)
108. Program for treatment of child sexual abuse victims and perpetrators (Section 3101, p. 1925)
109. Program for treatment of domestic violence and sexual abuse (Section 3101, p. 1927)
110. Native American Health and Wellness Foundation (Section 3103, p. 1966)
111. Committee for the Establishment of the Native American Health and Wellness Foundation (Section 3103, p. 1968)
http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/56532
(CNSNews.com) - The House Republican Conference has compiled a list of all the new boards, bureaucracies, commissions, and programs created in the House health care bill.
The Republican conference describes H.R. 3962 as “Speaker Pelosi’s government takeover of health care.”
The list of 111 new bureaucracies is reprinted here:
1. Retiree Reserve Trust Fund (Section 111(d), p. 61)
2. Grant program for wellness programs to small employers (Section 112, p. 62)
3. Grant program for State health access programs (Section 114, p. 72)
4. Program of administrative simplification (Section 115, p. 76)
5. Health Benefits Advisory Committee (Section 223, p. 111)
6. Health Choices Administration (Section 241, p. 131)
7. Qualified Health Benefits Plan Ombudsman (Section 244, p. 138)
8. Health Insurance Exchange (Section 201, p. 155)
9. Program for technical assistance to employees of small businesses buying Exchange coverage (Section 305(h), p. 191)
10. Mechanism for insurance risk pooling to be established by Health Choices Commissioner (Section 306(b), p. 194)
11. Health Insurance Exchange Trust Fund (Section 307, p. 195)
12. State-based Health Insurance Exchanges (Section 308, p. 197)
13. Grant program for health insurance cooperatives (Section 310, p. 206)
14. “Public Health Insurance Option” (Section 321, p. 211)
15. Ombudsman for “Public Health Insurance Option” (Section 321(d), p. 213)
16. Account for receipts and disbursements for “Public Health Insurance Option” (Section 322(b), p. 215)
17. Telehealth Advisory Committee (Section 1191 (b), p. 589)
18. Demonstration program providing reimbursement for “culturally and linguistically appropriate services” (Section 1222, p. 617)
19. Demonstration program for shared decision making using patient decision aids (Section 1236, p. 648)
20. Accountable Care Organization pilot program under Medicare (Section 1301, p. 653)
21. Independent patient-centered medical home pilot program under Medicare (Section 1302, p. 672)
22. Community-based medical home pilot program under Medicare (Section 1302(d), p. 681)
23. Independence at home demonstration program (Section 1312, p. 718)
24. Center for Comparative Effectiveness Research (Section 1401(a), p. 734)
25. Comparative Effectiveness Research Commission (Section 1401(a), p. 738)
26. Patient ombudsman for comparative effectiveness research (Section 1401(a), p. 753)
27. Quality assurance and performance improvement program for skilled nursing facilities (Section 1412(b)(1), p. 784)
28. Quality assurance and performance improvement program for nursing facilities (Section 1412 (b)(2), p. 786)
29. Special focus facility program for skilled nursing facilities (Section 1413(a)(3), p. 796)
30. Special focus facility program for nursing facilities (Section 1413(b)(3), p. 804)
31. National independent monitor pilot program for skilled nursing facilities and nursing facilities (Section 1422, p. 859)
32. Demonstration program for approved teaching health centers with respect to Medicare GME (Section 1502(d), p. 933)
33. Pilot program to develop anti-fraud compliance systems for Medicare providers (Section 1635, p. 978)
34. Special Inspector General for the Health Insurance Exchange (Section 1647, p. 1000)
35. Medical home pilot program under Medicaid (Section 1722, p. 1058)
36. Accountable Care Organization pilot program under Medicaid (Section 1730A, p. 1073)
37. Nursing facility supplemental payment program (Section 1745, p. 1106)
38. Demonstration program for Medicaid coverage to stabilize emergency medical conditions in institutions for mental diseases (Section 1787, p. 1149)
39. Comparative Effectiveness Research Trust Fund (Section 1802, p. 1162)
40. “Identifiable office or program” within CMS to “provide for improved coordination between Medicare and Medicaid in the case of dual eligibles” (Section 1905, p. 1191)
41. Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation (Section 1907, p. 1198)
42. Public Health Investment Fund (Section 2002, p. 1214)
43. Scholarships for service in health professional needs areas (Section 2211, p. 1224)
44. Program for training medical residents in community-based settings (Section 2214, p. 1236)
45. Grant program for training in dentistry programs (Section 2215, p. 1240)
46. Public Health Workforce Corps (Section 2231, p. 1253)
47. Public health workforce scholarship program (Section 2231, p. 1254)
48. Public health workforce loan forgiveness program (Section 2231, p. 1258)
49. Grant program for innovations in interdisciplinary care (Section 2252, p. 1272)
50. Advisory Committee on Health Workforce Evaluation and Assessment (Section 2261, p. 1275)
51. Prevention and Wellness Trust (Section 2301, p. 1286)
52. Clinical Prevention Stakeholders Board (Section 2301, p. 1295)
53. Community Prevention Stakeholders Board (Section 2301, p. 1301)
54. Grant program for community prevention and wellness research (Section 2301, p. 1305)
55. Grant program for research and demonstration projects related to wellness incentives (Section 2301, p. 1305)
56. Grant program for community prevention and wellness services (Section 2301, p. 1308)
57. Grant program for public health infrastructure (Section 2301, p. 1313)
58. Center for Quality Improvement (Section 2401, p. 1322)
59. Assistant Secretary for Health Information (Section 2402, p. 1330)
60. Grant program to support the operation of school-based health clinics (Section 2511, p. 1352)
61. Grant program for nurse-managed health centers (Section 2512, p. 1361)
62. Grants for labor-management programs for nursing training (Section 2521, p. 1372)
63. Grant program for interdisciplinary mental and behavioral health training (Section 2522, p. 1382)
64. “No Child Left Unimmunized Against Influenza” demonstration grant program (Section 2524, p. 1391)
65. Healthy Teen Initiative grant program regarding teen pregnancy (Section 2526, p. 1398)
66. Grant program for interdisciplinary training, education, and services for individuals with autism (Section 2527(a), p. 1402)
67. University centers for excellence in developmental disabilities education (Section 2527(b), p. 1410)
68. Grant program to implement medication therapy management services (Section 2528, p. 1412)
69. Grant program to promote positive health behaviors in underserved communities (Section 2530, p. 1422)
70. Grant program for State alternative medical liability laws (Section 2531, p. 1431)
71. Grant program to develop infant mortality programs (Section 2532, p. 1433)
72. Grant program to prepare secondary school students for careers in health professions (Section 2533, p. 1437)
73. Grant program for community-based collaborative care (Section 2534, p. 1440)
74. Grant program for community-based overweight and obesity prevention (Section 2535, p. 1457)
75. Grant program for reducing the student-to-school nurse ratio in primary and secondary schools (Section 2536, p. 1462)
76. Demonstration project of grants to medical-legal partnerships (Section 2537, p. 1464)
77. Center for Emergency Care under the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response (Section 2552, p. 1478)
78. Council for Emergency Care (Section 2552, p 1479)
79. Grant program to support demonstration programs that design and implement regionalized emergency care systems (Section 2553, p. 1480)
80. Grant program to assist veterans who wish to become emergency medical technicians upon discharge (Section 2554, p. 1487)
81. Interagency Pain Research Coordinating Committee (Section 2562, p. 1494)
82. National Medical Device Registry (Section 2571, p. 1501)
83. CLASS Independence Fund (Section 2581, p. 1597)
84. CLASS Independence Fund Board of Trustees (Section 2581, p. 1598)
85. CLASS Independence Advisory Council (Section 2581, p. 1602)
86. Health and Human Services Coordinating Committee on Women’s Health (Section 2588, p. 1610)
87. National Women’s Health Information Center (Section 2588, p. 1611)
88. Centers for Disease Control Office of Women’s Health (Section 2588, p. 1614)
89. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality Office of Women’s Health and Gender-Based Research (Section 2588, p. 1617)
90. Health Resources and Services Administration Office of Women’s Health (Section 2588, p. 1618)
91. Food and Drug Administration Office of Women’s Health (Section 2588, p. 1621)
92. Personal Care Attendant Workforce Advisory Panel (Section 2589(a)(2), p. 1624)
93. Grant program for national health workforce online training (Section 2591, p. 1629)
94. Grant program to disseminate best practices on implementing health workforce investment programs (Section 2591, p. 1632)
95. Demonstration program for chronic shortages of health professionals (Section 3101, p. 1717)
96. Demonstration program for substance abuse counselor educational curricula (Section 3101, p. 1719)
97. Program of Indian community education on mental illness (Section 3101, p. 1722)
98. Intergovernmental Task Force on Indian environmental and nuclear hazards (Section 3101, p. 1754)
99. Office of Indian Men’s Health (Section 3101, p. 1765)
100. Indian Health facilities appropriation advisory board (Section 3101, p. 1774)
101. Indian Health facilities needs assessment workgroup (Section 3101, p. 1775)
102. Indian Health Service tribal facilities joint venture demonstration projects (Section 3101, p. 1809)
103. Urban youth treatment center demonstration project (Section 3101, p. 1873)
104. Grants to Urban Indian Organizations for diabetes prevention (Section 3101, p. 1874)
105. Grants to Urban Indian Organizations for health IT adoption (Section 3101, p. 1877)
106. Mental health technician training program (Section 3101, p. 1898)
107. Indian youth telemental health demonstration project (Section 3101, p. 1909)
108. Program for treatment of child sexual abuse victims and perpetrators (Section 3101, p. 1925)
109. Program for treatment of domestic violence and sexual abuse (Section 3101, p. 1927)
110. Native American Health and Wellness Foundation (Section 3103, p. 1966)
111. Committee for the Establishment of the Native American Health and Wellness Foundation (Section 3103, p. 1968)
Science: Elevator To Space Concept to be Tested (04Nov09)
Science: Elevator To Space Concept to be Tested (04Nov09)
http://www.physorg.com/news176545232.html
Elevator to space? They're really trying!
In a major test of the concept, robotic machines powered by laser beams will try to climb a cable suspended from a helicopter hovering more than a half-mile (one kilometer) high.
Three teams have qualified to participate in the event on the dry lakebed near NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards. Attempts were expected from early Wednesday through Thursday.
Funded by a space agency program to explore bold technology, the contest is a step toward bringing the idea of a space elevator out of the realm of science fiction and into reality.
Theorized in the 1960s and then popularized by Arthur C. Clarke's 1979 novel "The Fountains of Paradise," space elevators are envisioned as a way to gain access to space without the risk and expense of rockets.
Instead, electrically powered vehicles would run up and down a cable anchored to a ground structure and extending thousands of miles up to a mass in geosynchronous orbit - the kind of orbit communications satellites are placed in to stay over a fixed spot on the Earth.
Electricity would be supplied through a concept known as "power beaming," ground-based lasers pointing up to photo voltaic cells on the bottom of the climbing vehicle - something like an upside-down solar power system.
The space elevator competition has not produced a winner in its previous three years, but has become increasingly difficult.
The vehicles must climb a cable six-tenths of a mile into the sky and move at an average speed of 16.4 feet (five meters) per second.
The competition is sponsored by the nonprofit Spaceward Foundation with support from NASA's Centennial Challenges program.
http://www.physorg.com/news176545232.html
Elevator to space? They're really trying!
In a major test of the concept, robotic machines powered by laser beams will try to climb a cable suspended from a helicopter hovering more than a half-mile (one kilometer) high.
Three teams have qualified to participate in the event on the dry lakebed near NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards. Attempts were expected from early Wednesday through Thursday.
Funded by a space agency program to explore bold technology, the contest is a step toward bringing the idea of a space elevator out of the realm of science fiction and into reality.
Theorized in the 1960s and then popularized by Arthur C. Clarke's 1979 novel "The Fountains of Paradise," space elevators are envisioned as a way to gain access to space without the risk and expense of rockets.
Instead, electrically powered vehicles would run up and down a cable anchored to a ground structure and extending thousands of miles up to a mass in geosynchronous orbit - the kind of orbit communications satellites are placed in to stay over a fixed spot on the Earth.
Electricity would be supplied through a concept known as "power beaming," ground-based lasers pointing up to photo voltaic cells on the bottom of the climbing vehicle - something like an upside-down solar power system.
The space elevator competition has not produced a winner in its previous three years, but has become increasingly difficult.
The vehicles must climb a cable six-tenths of a mile into the sky and move at an average speed of 16.4 feet (five meters) per second.
The competition is sponsored by the nonprofit Spaceward Foundation with support from NASA's Centennial Challenges program.
Economy: US Clean Energy Corporate Patent Protection Should Not be Compromised (04Nov09)
Economy: US Clean Energy Corporate Patent Protection Should Not be Compromised (04Nov09)
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601130&sid=aug9aycq0lJw
Clean-Energy Cause Shouldn’t Void Patents, Senators Tell Obama
Nov. 4 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. must “stand fast” on patent protection and resist calls from developing nations to share energy-efficient technologies to combat climate change, 42 senators told President Barack Obama.
The administration shouldn’t waver in its “support of American intellectual property, American workers, and American innovators” during climate-change talks next month in Copenhagen, the lawmakers said in the letter to Obama yesterday that was circulated by Senator Evan Bayh, an Indiana Democrat.
Developing nations have cited a World Trade Organization ruling as grounds to break patent protections on drugs in health emergencies. Some seek a similar approach to wind- and solar- energy innovations in the name of curbing global warming. U.S. companies such as General Electric Co., which makes wind turbines, would be forced to give free or low-cost access to patents under such proposals.
“They want companies in the U.S. to give away their technology,” said Lawrence Kogan, head of the Institute for Trade, Standards and Sustainable Development, a Princeton, N.J.- based group that advocates for intellectual property rights. It’s part of an effort to “treat intellectual property as a utilitarian tool to promote development.”
Delegates from about 190 nations will meet in Copenhagen next month in the effort to complete a global-warming treaty. How to help fast-growing developing countries pay for clean- energy technology is one of the unresolved issues.
U.S. officials such as Todd Stern, special envoy for climate change, and Ron Kirk, U.S. trade representative, have said the administration won’t weaken intellectual-property protections.
India, Brazil, China
India, Brazil and China, the world’s largest greenhouse-gas emitter, want easier access to licenses to make and export systems that produce electricity with fewer emissions, said James Love, an economist with Knowledge Ecology International, a Washington-based group that follows intellectual-property negotiations.
“If what you’re trying to do is mobilize the world to do something about climate change, you could actually be in favor of a lot of compulsory licensing,” Love said in an interview. “If you want to deal with climate change, you want buy-in from developing countries.”
World Trade Organization agreements should be interpreted to “allow compulsory licensing of patents for the production of climate-friendly equipment and goods that embed climate-friendly technology,” the United Nations’ Geneva-based Conference on Trade and Development said in a report released on Sept. 7.
The sharing of some clean-energy patents has support from Senator Jay Rockefeller, a Democrat from West Virginia, a coal- producing state. He said he backs development of “national technologies” to reduce carbon dioxide from burning coal that “nobody can put a patent on.”
‘Just Give It’
“If we get a good technology and Wall Street and industry and everybody else buys into it, then I want to give it free of charge to the Chinese and the Indians and to others, anybody who needs it,” Rockefeller told reporters Oct. 30. “Just give it. This is a worldwide problem.”
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601130&sid=aug9aycq0lJw
Clean-Energy Cause Shouldn’t Void Patents, Senators Tell Obama
Nov. 4 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. must “stand fast” on patent protection and resist calls from developing nations to share energy-efficient technologies to combat climate change, 42 senators told President Barack Obama.
The administration shouldn’t waver in its “support of American intellectual property, American workers, and American innovators” during climate-change talks next month in Copenhagen, the lawmakers said in the letter to Obama yesterday that was circulated by Senator Evan Bayh, an Indiana Democrat.
Developing nations have cited a World Trade Organization ruling as grounds to break patent protections on drugs in health emergencies. Some seek a similar approach to wind- and solar- energy innovations in the name of curbing global warming. U.S. companies such as General Electric Co., which makes wind turbines, would be forced to give free or low-cost access to patents under such proposals.
“They want companies in the U.S. to give away their technology,” said Lawrence Kogan, head of the Institute for Trade, Standards and Sustainable Development, a Princeton, N.J.- based group that advocates for intellectual property rights. It’s part of an effort to “treat intellectual property as a utilitarian tool to promote development.”
Delegates from about 190 nations will meet in Copenhagen next month in the effort to complete a global-warming treaty. How to help fast-growing developing countries pay for clean- energy technology is one of the unresolved issues.
U.S. officials such as Todd Stern, special envoy for climate change, and Ron Kirk, U.S. trade representative, have said the administration won’t weaken intellectual-property protections.
India, Brazil, China
India, Brazil and China, the world’s largest greenhouse-gas emitter, want easier access to licenses to make and export systems that produce electricity with fewer emissions, said James Love, an economist with Knowledge Ecology International, a Washington-based group that follows intellectual-property negotiations.
“If what you’re trying to do is mobilize the world to do something about climate change, you could actually be in favor of a lot of compulsory licensing,” Love said in an interview. “If you want to deal with climate change, you want buy-in from developing countries.”
World Trade Organization agreements should be interpreted to “allow compulsory licensing of patents for the production of climate-friendly equipment and goods that embed climate-friendly technology,” the United Nations’ Geneva-based Conference on Trade and Development said in a report released on Sept. 7.
The sharing of some clean-energy patents has support from Senator Jay Rockefeller, a Democrat from West Virginia, a coal- producing state. He said he backs development of “national technologies” to reduce carbon dioxide from burning coal that “nobody can put a patent on.”
‘Just Give It’
“If we get a good technology and Wall Street and industry and everybody else buys into it, then I want to give it free of charge to the Chinese and the Indians and to others, anybody who needs it,” Rockefeller told reporters Oct. 30. “Just give it. This is a worldwide problem.”
Economy: ObamaBanks; UK Break-up Template for Obama's Zombies? (04Nov09)
Economy: ObamaBanks; UK Break-up Template for Obama's Zombies? (04Nov09)
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601039&sid=aVW1nX0i4L40
Nov. 4 (Bloomberg) -- It’s too late, too timid, and comes with too many questions attached. Even so, the U.K. government deserves some credit for finally moving to break up a bloated, failed banking industry.
It has done two things that were urgently needed.
The banks that were bailed out at such huge cost to the taxpayer will be forced to become more competitive. And they will finally have to curb the bonuses they pay to senior staff.
The question now is whether the British break-up plan will provide a template for zombie banks in the U.S., and all the other countries where banking systems were rescued by taxpayers.
So far, U.S. President Barack Obama’s administration has dithered. But maybe the U.K.’s action will prompt the U.S. government to stop molly-coddling Wall Street and start protecting consumers and taxpayers instead.
/more......
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601039&sid=aVW1nX0i4L40
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601039&sid=aVW1nX0i4L40
Nov. 4 (Bloomberg) -- It’s too late, too timid, and comes with too many questions attached. Even so, the U.K. government deserves some credit for finally moving to break up a bloated, failed banking industry.
It has done two things that were urgently needed.
The banks that were bailed out at such huge cost to the taxpayer will be forced to become more competitive. And they will finally have to curb the bonuses they pay to senior staff.
The question now is whether the British break-up plan will provide a template for zombie banks in the U.S., and all the other countries where banking systems were rescued by taxpayers.
So far, U.S. President Barack Obama’s administration has dithered. But maybe the U.K.’s action will prompt the U.S. government to stop molly-coddling Wall Street and start protecting consumers and taxpayers instead.
/more......
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601039&sid=aVW1nX0i4L40
Economy: Berkshire's Buffett Buys BNSF in Total (04Nov09)
Economy: Berkshire's Buffett Buys BNSF in Total (04Nov09)
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601170&sid=aBqDOv2bZ1q8
Nov. 3 (Bloomberg) -- Warren Buffett put together the biggest deal in his 44-year career at Berkshire Hathaway Inc. in 10 days.
Buffett, Berkshire’s chairman, was in Fort Worth, Texas, on Oct. 22 for a company board meeting. The next day, he invited Matthew Rose, chief executive officer of Burlington Northern Santa Fe Corp., to meet him at the Ashton Hotel, a 1915 city landmark.
“It was a relatively short conversation,” Rose told Bloomberg Television today. “He told me what he wanted to do and the next day we fired up the process.”
The deal Buffett unveiled to Rose was $100 a share for the 77.4 percent of Burlington not already owned by Omaha, Nebraska- based Berkshire, and Rose said he would take it to his board, according to a person familiar with the matter, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the talks were private.
Over the weekend, Rose hired his longtime financial adviser, Goldman Sachs Group Inc., to analyze the bid. Goldman’s team included bankers Marc Nachmann and Dusty Philip. Rose also added George Ackert and Roger Altman of Evercore Partners Inc., a New York-based boutique.
Part of the reason Burlington’s board wanted Evercore as a second adviser was that Berkshire owns a $5 billion stake in Goldman Sachs, said the person with knowledge of the situation.
Burlington Board Approves
Buffett, Rose and their advisers spent the next week working out the deal. Burlington’s board approved the sale yesterday in Detroit, because lead director Edward Whitacre, who is chairman of General Motors Co., needed to be there for a GM board meeting, the person said. Berkshire’s board approved the deal last night, and Buffett announced it today.
Buffett didn’t return a message left with his assistant Carrie Kizer.
Berkshire will pay $26 billion, or $100 in cash and stock. Including Buffett’s previous investment and the assumption of debt, the deal’s value is about $44 billion, Berkshire said in a statement.
Berkshire didn’t disclose using any financial advisers on the transaction. Buffett turned to his longtime outside lawyers, at the Los Angeles firm of Munger, Tolles & Olson LLP, including Robert Denham, Mary Ann Todd, and Brett Rodda. Burlington used a team from New York-based Cravath Swaine & Moore LLP, including Scott Barshay, George Zobitz and Damien Zoubek.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601170&sid=aBqDOv2bZ1q8
Nov. 3 (Bloomberg) -- Warren Buffett put together the biggest deal in his 44-year career at Berkshire Hathaway Inc. in 10 days.
Buffett, Berkshire’s chairman, was in Fort Worth, Texas, on Oct. 22 for a company board meeting. The next day, he invited Matthew Rose, chief executive officer of Burlington Northern Santa Fe Corp., to meet him at the Ashton Hotel, a 1915 city landmark.
“It was a relatively short conversation,” Rose told Bloomberg Television today. “He told me what he wanted to do and the next day we fired up the process.”
The deal Buffett unveiled to Rose was $100 a share for the 77.4 percent of Burlington not already owned by Omaha, Nebraska- based Berkshire, and Rose said he would take it to his board, according to a person familiar with the matter, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the talks were private.
Over the weekend, Rose hired his longtime financial adviser, Goldman Sachs Group Inc., to analyze the bid. Goldman’s team included bankers Marc Nachmann and Dusty Philip. Rose also added George Ackert and Roger Altman of Evercore Partners Inc., a New York-based boutique.
Part of the reason Burlington’s board wanted Evercore as a second adviser was that Berkshire owns a $5 billion stake in Goldman Sachs, said the person with knowledge of the situation.
Burlington Board Approves
Buffett, Rose and their advisers spent the next week working out the deal. Burlington’s board approved the sale yesterday in Detroit, because lead director Edward Whitacre, who is chairman of General Motors Co., needed to be there for a GM board meeting, the person said. Berkshire’s board approved the deal last night, and Buffett announced it today.
Buffett didn’t return a message left with his assistant Carrie Kizer.
Berkshire will pay $26 billion, or $100 in cash and stock. Including Buffett’s previous investment and the assumption of debt, the deal’s value is about $44 billion, Berkshire said in a statement.
Berkshire didn’t disclose using any financial advisers on the transaction. Buffett turned to his longtime outside lawyers, at the Los Angeles firm of Munger, Tolles & Olson LLP, including Robert Denham, Mary Ann Todd, and Brett Rodda. Burlington used a team from New York-based Cravath Swaine & Moore LLP, including Scott Barshay, George Zobitz and Damien Zoubek.
GOP: NY23 Object Lesson (Michelle Malkin) (04Nov09)
GOP: NY23 Object Lesson (Michelle Malkin) (04Nov09)
http://michellemalkin.com/2009/11/04/the-gop-elites-1-million-object-lesson-and-the-message-of-ny-23/
The GOP elite’s $1 million object lesson — and the message of NY-23
By Michelle Malkin, November 4, 2009
Conservatives owe NY-23 candidate Doug Hoffman immeasurable gratitude. He overcame impossible odds (single digits just a month ago) to come within two points of defeating Democrat Bill Owens. Hoffman had zero name recognition. National Republican Party officials dumped nearly $1 million into the race on behalf of radical leftist GOP candidate Dede Scozzafava, who then turned around, endorsed Owens and siphoned off 5 percent of the vote with her name still on the ballot after she dropped out.
Conservatives’ money went to support a GOP candidate who shares the same socialist alliances with fellow SEIU/ACORN/New Party/Working Families Party activist Patrick Gaspard, the Obama White House political director who intervened in the race to secure Scozzafava’s endorsement of Owens.
Hoffman’s candidacy illuminated the stark difference between GOP political opportunists willing to pimp out their endorsements to any old ACORN-embracing, Working Families Party-consorting, Big Labor crony who puts an “R” by her name — and movement conservatives who refuse to “mooooderate” for the politically expedient sake of mooooderation as dictated by out-of-touch Beltway party leaders. The NRCC/RNC’s $1 million debacle will cost much more than that.
As I’ve repeated many times over the last several weeks:
One thing is guaranteed at the conclusion of the NY-23 special congressional election: The Beltway Republicans who endorsed radical leftist Dede Scozzafava are going to have indelible egg stains on their faces. And GOP establishment fund-raising organizations will be the poorer for it.
To illustrate the point: This blog now has a regular feature spotlighting readers’ RNC rejected solicitation forms of the day.
Which brings me to my syndicated column today.
Hoffman may have lost narrowly, but NY-23 is a much broader victory for conservatives who believe the Republican Party should stand for core limited government principles. Scozzafava, who was endorsed by far Left blogger Markos Moulitsas Zuniga and backed by Planned Parenthood, the National Education Association, and card-check-promoting trade unions, was denied the congressional seat because movement conservatives refused to support Arlen Specter in a skirt. This is a victory of principle.
Better a donkey in office that acts like a donkey than a donkey in elephant’s clothing making a complete ass of the GOP.
Moreover, NY-23 is a victory for conservatives who refuse to be marginalized in the public square by either the unhinged left or the establishment right. A humble accountant from upstate New York exposed the hypocrisy of GOP leaders trying to solicit funds from conservatives by lambasting Pelosi and the Dems’ support for high taxes, Big Labor, and bigger government — while using conservatives’ money to subsidize a high-taxing, Big Labor-pandering, bigger government radical. The repercussions will be felt well beyond NY-23’s borders. Conservatives’ disgust with the status quo has been heard and felt. They have been silent too long. They will be silent no more.
The GOP leadership knows it cannot afford to rest on its laurels, continue business as usual, and bask in yesterday’s electoral victories without confronting its abysmal abdication of principled conservative leadership in NY-23.
As Hoffman said in his concession speech, “This is only one fight in the battle.”
http://michellemalkin.com/2009/11/04/the-gop-elites-1-million-object-lesson-and-the-message-of-ny-23/
The GOP elite’s $1 million object lesson — and the message of NY-23
By Michelle Malkin, November 4, 2009
Conservatives owe NY-23 candidate Doug Hoffman immeasurable gratitude. He overcame impossible odds (single digits just a month ago) to come within two points of defeating Democrat Bill Owens. Hoffman had zero name recognition. National Republican Party officials dumped nearly $1 million into the race on behalf of radical leftist GOP candidate Dede Scozzafava, who then turned around, endorsed Owens and siphoned off 5 percent of the vote with her name still on the ballot after she dropped out.
Conservatives’ money went to support a GOP candidate who shares the same socialist alliances with fellow SEIU/ACORN/New Party/Working Families Party activist Patrick Gaspard, the Obama White House political director who intervened in the race to secure Scozzafava’s endorsement of Owens.
Hoffman’s candidacy illuminated the stark difference between GOP political opportunists willing to pimp out their endorsements to any old ACORN-embracing, Working Families Party-consorting, Big Labor crony who puts an “R” by her name — and movement conservatives who refuse to “mooooderate” for the politically expedient sake of mooooderation as dictated by out-of-touch Beltway party leaders. The NRCC/RNC’s $1 million debacle will cost much more than that.
As I’ve repeated many times over the last several weeks:
One thing is guaranteed at the conclusion of the NY-23 special congressional election: The Beltway Republicans who endorsed radical leftist Dede Scozzafava are going to have indelible egg stains on their faces. And GOP establishment fund-raising organizations will be the poorer for it.
To illustrate the point: This blog now has a regular feature spotlighting readers’ RNC rejected solicitation forms of the day.
Which brings me to my syndicated column today.
Hoffman may have lost narrowly, but NY-23 is a much broader victory for conservatives who believe the Republican Party should stand for core limited government principles. Scozzafava, who was endorsed by far Left blogger Markos Moulitsas Zuniga and backed by Planned Parenthood, the National Education Association, and card-check-promoting trade unions, was denied the congressional seat because movement conservatives refused to support Arlen Specter in a skirt. This is a victory of principle.
Better a donkey in office that acts like a donkey than a donkey in elephant’s clothing making a complete ass of the GOP.
Moreover, NY-23 is a victory for conservatives who refuse to be marginalized in the public square by either the unhinged left or the establishment right. A humble accountant from upstate New York exposed the hypocrisy of GOP leaders trying to solicit funds from conservatives by lambasting Pelosi and the Dems’ support for high taxes, Big Labor, and bigger government — while using conservatives’ money to subsidize a high-taxing, Big Labor-pandering, bigger government radical. The repercussions will be felt well beyond NY-23’s borders. Conservatives’ disgust with the status quo has been heard and felt. They have been silent too long. They will be silent no more.
The GOP leadership knows it cannot afford to rest on its laurels, continue business as usual, and bask in yesterday’s electoral victories without confronting its abysmal abdication of principled conservative leadership in NY-23.
As Hoffman said in his concession speech, “This is only one fight in the battle.”
Books: New Translations of Tocqueville's Letters Home, circa 1831 (04Nov09)
Books: New Translations of Tocqueville's Letters Home, circa 1831 (04Nov09)
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/04/books/04alexis.html
Alexis de Tocqueville, the author of the landmark “Democracy in America,” was in many ways a typical Frenchman. Practically the minute he got off the boat, in Newport, R.I., on May 9, 1831, he started making generalizations: the only thing Americans really care about is making money. American women are good homemakers but boring wives. Southern men care more about honor than Northerners do. Americans drink no wine but stuff themselves with stupefying amounts of food.
But Tocqueville was also unusual, especially for a Frenchman of his class and background, in immediately warming to America, a country that most European travelers considered uncouth, and Americans in turn warmed to him. His letters home fairly bubble with enthusiasm.
“Here we are truly in another world,” he wrote to his brother Édouard, and in a letter to his father he said, “This population is one of the happiest in the world.”
Most of Tocqueville’s letters from America, which were written between the spring of 1831 and February 1832, when he sailed for home, have never been published in English, but Frederick Brown, a biographer of Flaubert and Zola, has collected and translated them for a volume that Yale University Press is to release next year. A sample of the letters, roughly 20 percent of the whole, appears in the current issue of The Hudson Review, and they reveal a Tocqueville different from the one we know, or think we know, from “Democracy in America.”
For one thing, he’s much younger-seeming. Tocqueville was 30 when he published “Democracy in America” but only 25 when he made his nine-month trip, and his letters have a boyish ebullience. He writes about dancing on the deck of Le Havre, the ship that carried him here, and crawling out on the bowsprit to watch the foam break. He writes one letter to his father while perched in a sycamore tree overlooking the Hudson River. In another to his brother, he asks for two dozen yellow kid gloves, because he’s been going to so many balls that he runs through a pair every two or three days.
Ostensibly, Tocqueville and his friend and traveling companion, Gustave de Beaumont, were here to study the American prison system for the French government, and on their return they dutifully filed a lengthy report — a book so forbidding that, though he owns a copy, Mr. Brown has so far avoided reading it.
But almost from the start of his trip Tocqueville, at least, seems to have imagined another kind of book, a study of Americans themselves, and he turned every encounter with them into a reporting mission. “No one is better set up for the study of the American people than we are,” he wrote to Édouard. “Our mission and our letters open all doors; we rub shoulders with all classes.”
The letters are in a way field notes for “Democracy in America.” Their observations are more spontaneous, less nuanced and considered than those in the book, without the note of regret that sometimes pops up there — for example, the idea that American individualism is isolating as well as liberating.
In these letters Tocqueville likes pretty much everything he sees except for slavery and the forced resettlement of the Indians. The most moving passage in the sample is a long description of some Choctaws boarding a riverboat in Memphis.
“The whole spectacle had an air of ruin and destruction,” he writes. “It spoke of final farewells and of no turning back.”
The existence of these letters was not exactly a secret, Mr. Brown said last week. Most of the ones to Tocqueville’s family are in the volume called “Correspondence Familiale” in the Gallimard edition of his complete works. Many of those to his friends are in the Beinecke Library at Yale. In 1938 George Wilson Pierson, a Yale scholar, translated and quoted from several of the letters in a book he wrote about Tocqueville in America.
“But he used them mostly as source documents,” Mr. Brown said. “He didn’t consider the letters an epistolary accomplishment.”
Oddly, when Mr. Brown began to collect the letters, he discovered that the originals had vanished. They exist now only in handwritten copies, some from the 19th century and some made later at Professor Pierson’s request. “It’s just a mystery,” Mr. Brown said. “Someone is probably sitting on them somewhere, and they’re worth a fortune.”
Mr. Brown considers the style of the letters, or most of them anyway, as interesting as the content. “There’s a long letter about the judicial system in Pennsylvania,” he said, “and it’s — well, not fascinating.”
But most, he went on, have a tautness and an elegance that derive from Tocqueville’s education in 18th-century prose. They were written in part as entertainments, to be read aloud by his family back home.
“The letters are written with a kind of concision you don’t find in ‘Democracy in America,’ ” he said. “The vocabulary is relatively small, and not romantic. Chateaubriand was one of Tocqueville’s relatives, and there was plenty of romanticism in Tocqueville’s soul, but not here.”
Yet if the letters aren’t romantic, they’re often exuberant, and this quality, Mr. Brown guessed, came both from Tocqueville’s youthfulness and from his feeling of liberation.
“This trip was his great escape,” he said. “I think he felt imprisoned by his family and the past. He came from the ancien régime, from a royalist family, and the Revolution of 1830 more or less consigned his father to retirement. Alexis was a young lawyer and very much of two minds about the constitutional monarchy. He wanted to keep his job, and that required pledging loyalty to Louis-Philippe. On the other hand he felt like a traitor to his family. In America he imagined a world without that kind of conflict, without a past.”
Once he got here, Tocqueville was dazzled by the country’s sheer expansiveness, Mr. Brown said, and found in all that physical space a sense of inner space and freedom.
“But what’s remarkable,” he went on, “is how open he was to everything. He wasn’t snobbish at all. All right, so Americans spit — it just didn’t bother him very much.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/04/books/04alexis.html
Alexis de Tocqueville, the author of the landmark “Democracy in America,” was in many ways a typical Frenchman. Practically the minute he got off the boat, in Newport, R.I., on May 9, 1831, he started making generalizations: the only thing Americans really care about is making money. American women are good homemakers but boring wives. Southern men care more about honor than Northerners do. Americans drink no wine but stuff themselves with stupefying amounts of food.
But Tocqueville was also unusual, especially for a Frenchman of his class and background, in immediately warming to America, a country that most European travelers considered uncouth, and Americans in turn warmed to him. His letters home fairly bubble with enthusiasm.
“Here we are truly in another world,” he wrote to his brother Édouard, and in a letter to his father he said, “This population is one of the happiest in the world.”
Most of Tocqueville’s letters from America, which were written between the spring of 1831 and February 1832, when he sailed for home, have never been published in English, but Frederick Brown, a biographer of Flaubert and Zola, has collected and translated them for a volume that Yale University Press is to release next year. A sample of the letters, roughly 20 percent of the whole, appears in the current issue of The Hudson Review, and they reveal a Tocqueville different from the one we know, or think we know, from “Democracy in America.”
For one thing, he’s much younger-seeming. Tocqueville was 30 when he published “Democracy in America” but only 25 when he made his nine-month trip, and his letters have a boyish ebullience. He writes about dancing on the deck of Le Havre, the ship that carried him here, and crawling out on the bowsprit to watch the foam break. He writes one letter to his father while perched in a sycamore tree overlooking the Hudson River. In another to his brother, he asks for two dozen yellow kid gloves, because he’s been going to so many balls that he runs through a pair every two or three days.
Ostensibly, Tocqueville and his friend and traveling companion, Gustave de Beaumont, were here to study the American prison system for the French government, and on their return they dutifully filed a lengthy report — a book so forbidding that, though he owns a copy, Mr. Brown has so far avoided reading it.
But almost from the start of his trip Tocqueville, at least, seems to have imagined another kind of book, a study of Americans themselves, and he turned every encounter with them into a reporting mission. “No one is better set up for the study of the American people than we are,” he wrote to Édouard. “Our mission and our letters open all doors; we rub shoulders with all classes.”
The letters are in a way field notes for “Democracy in America.” Their observations are more spontaneous, less nuanced and considered than those in the book, without the note of regret that sometimes pops up there — for example, the idea that American individualism is isolating as well as liberating.
In these letters Tocqueville likes pretty much everything he sees except for slavery and the forced resettlement of the Indians. The most moving passage in the sample is a long description of some Choctaws boarding a riverboat in Memphis.
“The whole spectacle had an air of ruin and destruction,” he writes. “It spoke of final farewells and of no turning back.”
The existence of these letters was not exactly a secret, Mr. Brown said last week. Most of the ones to Tocqueville’s family are in the volume called “Correspondence Familiale” in the Gallimard edition of his complete works. Many of those to his friends are in the Beinecke Library at Yale. In 1938 George Wilson Pierson, a Yale scholar, translated and quoted from several of the letters in a book he wrote about Tocqueville in America.
“But he used them mostly as source documents,” Mr. Brown said. “He didn’t consider the letters an epistolary accomplishment.”
Oddly, when Mr. Brown began to collect the letters, he discovered that the originals had vanished. They exist now only in handwritten copies, some from the 19th century and some made later at Professor Pierson’s request. “It’s just a mystery,” Mr. Brown said. “Someone is probably sitting on them somewhere, and they’re worth a fortune.”
Mr. Brown considers the style of the letters, or most of them anyway, as interesting as the content. “There’s a long letter about the judicial system in Pennsylvania,” he said, “and it’s — well, not fascinating.”
But most, he went on, have a tautness and an elegance that derive from Tocqueville’s education in 18th-century prose. They were written in part as entertainments, to be read aloud by his family back home.
“The letters are written with a kind of concision you don’t find in ‘Democracy in America,’ ” he said. “The vocabulary is relatively small, and not romantic. Chateaubriand was one of Tocqueville’s relatives, and there was plenty of romanticism in Tocqueville’s soul, but not here.”
Yet if the letters aren’t romantic, they’re often exuberant, and this quality, Mr. Brown guessed, came both from Tocqueville’s youthfulness and from his feeling of liberation.
“This trip was his great escape,” he said. “I think he felt imprisoned by his family and the past. He came from the ancien régime, from a royalist family, and the Revolution of 1830 more or less consigned his father to retirement. Alexis was a young lawyer and very much of two minds about the constitutional monarchy. He wanted to keep his job, and that required pledging loyalty to Louis-Philippe. On the other hand he felt like a traitor to his family. In America he imagined a world without that kind of conflict, without a past.”
Once he got here, Tocqueville was dazzled by the country’s sheer expansiveness, Mr. Brown said, and found in all that physical space a sense of inner space and freedom.
“But what’s remarkable,” he went on, “is how open he was to everything. He wasn’t snobbish at all. All right, so Americans spit — it just didn’t bother him very much.”
China: Chinese Govt. giant to buy US oil assets (04Nov09)
Chinese Govt. Giant to Buy US Oil Assets (04Nov09)
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=CNG.ab4e01612acd5f1379f80dde54d05bb9.321&show_article=1&catnum=0
Norwegian energy group Statoil said on Wednesday it was selling some of its oil assets in the United States to China's state-owned CNOOC, marking the first step by a Chinese energy major into the US market.
The sale, announced along with the company's quarterly results, involves a limited stake in four exploitation licences acquired by Statoil in 2007 and 2008 for deep-water blocks.
"On 29 October Statoil signed a farm down agreement with the Chinese company CNOOC (China National Offshore Oil Corporation) involving a number of Statoil's leases in the Gulf of Mexico," Statoil said in a third-quarter earnings statement.
Statoil declined to disclose the value of the transaction but spokesman Kai Nielsen told AFP that the size of the deal was "very small."
In 2005, CNOOC was forced to cancel an 18.5-billion-dollar (12.4-billion-euro) deal with US company Unocal following domestic political opposition in the United States over the sale of strategic assets to China.
But with the credit crunch slowing down offshore oil exploration, opposition to Chinese investors is now less likely, the Wall Street Journal said last month.
CNOCC will be acquiring 20 percent of the Tucker prospect and a 10-percent stake on the licences of the Krakatoa, Cobra and Logan blocks, according to the deal reached October 29.
Statoil will remain the operator of the four blocks.
"In the Gulf of Mexico, it is customary to optimise the portfolio and spread risk involved in exploration drilling efforts," Statoil's spokesman said.
In its earnings statement on Wednesday, the firm reported a 13.9-percent rise in profits, largely due to financial items including currency effects, but voiced caution about the prospects for an economic recovery.
"Although we see signs of improvement in the global economy, there is no firm evidence that industry investment, employment and private consumption have recovered in a sustainable way," chief executive Helge Lund said.
"This calls for cautiousness. Statoil is continuing to reduce costs, and we still have the flexibility to adjust our activity in response to a volatile business environment," he added.
Statoil's net profit in the third quarter was 7.4 billion kroner (1.3 billion dollars, 872.2 million euros) compared to 6.5 billion kroner in the same quarter last year.
Statoil is 67-percent state-owned.
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=CNG.ab4e01612acd5f1379f80dde54d05bb9.321&show_article=1&catnum=0
Norwegian energy group Statoil said on Wednesday it was selling some of its oil assets in the United States to China's state-owned CNOOC, marking the first step by a Chinese energy major into the US market.
The sale, announced along with the company's quarterly results, involves a limited stake in four exploitation licences acquired by Statoil in 2007 and 2008 for deep-water blocks.
"On 29 October Statoil signed a farm down agreement with the Chinese company CNOOC (China National Offshore Oil Corporation) involving a number of Statoil's leases in the Gulf of Mexico," Statoil said in a third-quarter earnings statement.
Statoil declined to disclose the value of the transaction but spokesman Kai Nielsen told AFP that the size of the deal was "very small."
In 2005, CNOOC was forced to cancel an 18.5-billion-dollar (12.4-billion-euro) deal with US company Unocal following domestic political opposition in the United States over the sale of strategic assets to China.
But with the credit crunch slowing down offshore oil exploration, opposition to Chinese investors is now less likely, the Wall Street Journal said last month.
CNOCC will be acquiring 20 percent of the Tucker prospect and a 10-percent stake on the licences of the Krakatoa, Cobra and Logan blocks, according to the deal reached October 29.
Statoil will remain the operator of the four blocks.
"In the Gulf of Mexico, it is customary to optimise the portfolio and spread risk involved in exploration drilling efforts," Statoil's spokesman said.
In its earnings statement on Wednesday, the firm reported a 13.9-percent rise in profits, largely due to financial items including currency effects, but voiced caution about the prospects for an economic recovery.
"Although we see signs of improvement in the global economy, there is no firm evidence that industry investment, employment and private consumption have recovered in a sustainable way," chief executive Helge Lund said.
"This calls for cautiousness. Statoil is continuing to reduce costs, and we still have the flexibility to adjust our activity in response to a volatile business environment," he added.
Statoil's net profit in the third quarter was 7.4 billion kroner (1.3 billion dollars, 872.2 million euros) compared to 6.5 billion kroner in the same quarter last year.
Statoil is 67-percent state-owned.
GOP: Steele Asserts GOP on the move again (04Nov09)
GOP: Steele Asserts GOP on the move again (04Nov09)
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D9BON4LG1&show_article=1&catnum=0
WASHINGTON - Republican Party Chairman Michael Steele is asserting that GOP victories in governors' races in New Jersey and Virginia demonstrate "a transcendent party" on the move again.
Steele told CBS's "The Early Show" Wednesday he thinks Chris Christie's victory in New Jersey and Robert McConnell's win in Virginia show that the GOP has "really found its voice again" after sustaining damaging losses last year.
But David Plouffe (pluff), the man who managed Barack Obama's winning presidential campaign last year, said he thought the elections presented a "mixed picture" and should not be overblown by either party. Plouffe told CBS he believes the GOP still has a problem because "Palin and Limbaugh and Beck are out there purging moderates from the party."
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D9BON4LG1&show_article=1&catnum=0
WASHINGTON - Republican Party Chairman Michael Steele is asserting that GOP victories in governors' races in New Jersey and Virginia demonstrate "a transcendent party" on the move again.
Steele told CBS's "The Early Show" Wednesday he thinks Chris Christie's victory in New Jersey and Robert McConnell's win in Virginia show that the GOP has "really found its voice again" after sustaining damaging losses last year.
But David Plouffe (pluff), the man who managed Barack Obama's winning presidential campaign last year, said he thought the elections presented a "mixed picture" and should not be overblown by either party. Plouffe told CBS he believes the GOP still has a problem because "Palin and Limbaugh and Beck are out there purging moderates from the party."
Israel: U.S. Wants Israel to Halt Settlements 'Forever'(04Nov09)
Israel: U.S. Wants Israel to Halt Settlements 'Forever'(04Nov09)
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/11/04/clinton-wants-israel-settlement-halt-forever/
CAIRO -- Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton defended the U.S stance toward Israeli settlement building to worried Arab allies on Wednesday, saying Washington does not accept the legitimacy of the West Bank enclaves and wants to see their construction halted "forever."
Still, she said an Israeli offer to restrain -- but not halt -- construction represents "positive movement forward" toward resuming Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations.
Clinton met for an hour with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak during a hastily arranged stopover in the Egyptian capital to soothe Arab concerns that Washington is backing off demands for an Israeli settlement halt. The fears were sparked on Saturday when Clinton, with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at her side in Jerusalem, praised his government's offer as unprecedented.
She has since tried to clarify the remarks, saying that the Israeli offer does not got far enough. Still, she has indicated that the Palestinians should resume negotiations with Israel without a full settlement halt as they demand.
On Wednesday, Clinton insisted "our policy on settlement has not changed."
"We do not accept the legitimacy of settlement activity. Ending all settlement activity current and future would be preferable," she told reporters after talks with Mubarak.
Of the Israeli offer, she said, "It is not what we would prefer because we would like to see everything ended forever."
"But it is something that I think shows at least a positive movement forward toward final status issues being addressed," she said.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas is sticking to his refusal to resume negotiations until Israel stops building settlements. He rejected the Israeli plan to complete 3,000 housing units in Jewish settlements in the West Bank, and to continue to construct public buildings and other construction in east Jerusalem -- a territory Palestinians hope will be their future capital.
After Arab criticism of her comments in Jerusalem on the Israeli plan, Clinton delayed her return to Washington after attending an international conference in Marrakech, Morocco, and flew instead to Cairo.
Appearing at Clinton's press conference on Wednesday, Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit said the Mubarak-Clinton talks were "very fruitful and will have clear benefits and results in the future."
"The talks were frank and clear that showed a U.S.-Egyptian common understanding on several issues," he said.
In a new twist Tuesday, Clinton made what appeared to be an inadvertent slip of the tongue in a television interview with the al-Jazeera network, referring to the goal of "an Israeli capital in east Jerusalem."
It has not been U.S. policy to favor including east Jerusalem in an Israeli capital; the Palestinians claim it as their capital, and the issue is one of the most important and delicate points that would have to be settled in any final peace deal between the two parties.
In the al-Jazeera interview, Clinton reiterated that Obama has clearly stated his desire for a halt to settlements. But she added that the Israeli offer of "restraint," to include an end to establishment of new settlements and other measures that limit settlement growth, might be close enough to the ultimate U.S. and Palestinian goal to merit embracing in the near future.
"It is nowhere near enough, but I think when you keep your eye on what we want to achieve, it is a better place to be than the alternative, which is unrestrained (growth)," she said.
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/11/04/clinton-wants-israel-settlement-halt-forever/
CAIRO -- Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton defended the U.S stance toward Israeli settlement building to worried Arab allies on Wednesday, saying Washington does not accept the legitimacy of the West Bank enclaves and wants to see their construction halted "forever."
Still, she said an Israeli offer to restrain -- but not halt -- construction represents "positive movement forward" toward resuming Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations.
Clinton met for an hour with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak during a hastily arranged stopover in the Egyptian capital to soothe Arab concerns that Washington is backing off demands for an Israeli settlement halt. The fears were sparked on Saturday when Clinton, with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at her side in Jerusalem, praised his government's offer as unprecedented.
She has since tried to clarify the remarks, saying that the Israeli offer does not got far enough. Still, she has indicated that the Palestinians should resume negotiations with Israel without a full settlement halt as they demand.
On Wednesday, Clinton insisted "our policy on settlement has not changed."
"We do not accept the legitimacy of settlement activity. Ending all settlement activity current and future would be preferable," she told reporters after talks with Mubarak.
Of the Israeli offer, she said, "It is not what we would prefer because we would like to see everything ended forever."
"But it is something that I think shows at least a positive movement forward toward final status issues being addressed," she said.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas is sticking to his refusal to resume negotiations until Israel stops building settlements. He rejected the Israeli plan to complete 3,000 housing units in Jewish settlements in the West Bank, and to continue to construct public buildings and other construction in east Jerusalem -- a territory Palestinians hope will be their future capital.
After Arab criticism of her comments in Jerusalem on the Israeli plan, Clinton delayed her return to Washington after attending an international conference in Marrakech, Morocco, and flew instead to Cairo.
Appearing at Clinton's press conference on Wednesday, Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit said the Mubarak-Clinton talks were "very fruitful and will have clear benefits and results in the future."
"The talks were frank and clear that showed a U.S.-Egyptian common understanding on several issues," he said.
In a new twist Tuesday, Clinton made what appeared to be an inadvertent slip of the tongue in a television interview with the al-Jazeera network, referring to the goal of "an Israeli capital in east Jerusalem."
It has not been U.S. policy to favor including east Jerusalem in an Israeli capital; the Palestinians claim it as their capital, and the issue is one of the most important and delicate points that would have to be settled in any final peace deal between the two parties.
In the al-Jazeera interview, Clinton reiterated that Obama has clearly stated his desire for a halt to settlements. But she added that the Israeli offer of "restraint," to include an end to establishment of new settlements and other measures that limit settlement growth, might be close enough to the ultimate U.S. and Palestinian goal to merit embracing in the near future.
"It is nowhere near enough, but I think when you keep your eye on what we want to achieve, it is a better place to be than the alternative, which is unrestrained (growth)," she said.
Israel: Navy Intercepts Weapons Smuggling Ship (04Nov09)
Israel: Navy Intercepts Weapons Smuggling Ship (04Nov09)
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,571548,00.html
JERUSALEM — Israeli naval commandos on Wednesday seized a ship that defense officials said was carrying missiles and anti-tank weapons from Iran to Hezbollah guerrillas in Lebanon.
The pre-dawn seizure near Cyprus was a rare interception of a suspected arms shipment by Israel, which has long accused Iran of arming its enemies. Israel offered no evidence to support its claim that the weapons were meant for Hezbollah.
Weapons including anti-tank missiles and Katyusha rockets were stashed on a commercial vessel operating under the guise of an aid boat, captained by a Pole and flying an Antiguan flag, Israeli defense officials said. They spoke on condition of anonymity because the military had not officially released the information.
Based on intelligence reports, a naval unit patrolling the area intercepted and boarded the vessel without incident, defense officials said.
Deputy Defense Minister Matan Vilnai said the crew was not involved in any arms-smuggling effort.
The boat was towed to the southern Israeli port of Ashdod, where the weapons were being unloaded.
A senior Lebanese army official refused to comment on the report, saying it happened outside Lebanon's national waters. He spoke on condition of anonymity in line with military regulations.
Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak called the interception "another success against the relentless attempts to smuggle weapons to bolster terrorist elements threatening Israel's security."
The boat was the second major arms ship Israel has seized in its campaign to quash the smuggling of weapons to Palestinian and Lebanese militants.
In January 2002, Israeli forces stormed the Karine A freighter on the Red Sea, and confiscated what the military said were 50 tons of missiles, mortars, rifles and ammunition headed for Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip.
Authorities from other countries, including the United States last month, have stopped ships suspected of carrying arms in the past.
The Lebanon-Israel border has been largely quiet since Israel and Hezbollah fought a fierce war in the summer of 2006. But Israel has long warned that Hezbollah fighters have been rearming and now possess some 40,000 rockets.
Gaza militants also have dramatically reduced their rocket attacks on southern Israel since a bruising winter war. But militants continue to smuggle in rockets and components through underground tunnels with Egypt, the Israeli military says.
On Tuesday, the head of military intelligence said Gaza's militant Hamas rulers recently test-fired a missile capable of striking Israel's largest urban center, metropolitan Tel Aviv.
Hamas and Hezbollah are both proxies of Iran, whose nuclear program, long-range missiles and patronage of militants on Israel's southern and northern flanks make it the Jewish state's most formidable foe.
Israel shares the West's fears that Tehran is developing nuclear weapons, despite its assertions to the contrary. Neutralizing the Iranian nuclear threat remains Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's top priority and Israel has not ruled out a military strike against Tehran's nuclear facilities.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,571548,00.html
JERUSALEM — Israeli naval commandos on Wednesday seized a ship that defense officials said was carrying missiles and anti-tank weapons from Iran to Hezbollah guerrillas in Lebanon.
The pre-dawn seizure near Cyprus was a rare interception of a suspected arms shipment by Israel, which has long accused Iran of arming its enemies. Israel offered no evidence to support its claim that the weapons were meant for Hezbollah.
Weapons including anti-tank missiles and Katyusha rockets were stashed on a commercial vessel operating under the guise of an aid boat, captained by a Pole and flying an Antiguan flag, Israeli defense officials said. They spoke on condition of anonymity because the military had not officially released the information.
Based on intelligence reports, a naval unit patrolling the area intercepted and boarded the vessel without incident, defense officials said.
Deputy Defense Minister Matan Vilnai said the crew was not involved in any arms-smuggling effort.
The boat was towed to the southern Israeli port of Ashdod, where the weapons were being unloaded.
A senior Lebanese army official refused to comment on the report, saying it happened outside Lebanon's national waters. He spoke on condition of anonymity in line with military regulations.
Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak called the interception "another success against the relentless attempts to smuggle weapons to bolster terrorist elements threatening Israel's security."
The boat was the second major arms ship Israel has seized in its campaign to quash the smuggling of weapons to Palestinian and Lebanese militants.
In January 2002, Israeli forces stormed the Karine A freighter on the Red Sea, and confiscated what the military said were 50 tons of missiles, mortars, rifles and ammunition headed for Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip.
Authorities from other countries, including the United States last month, have stopped ships suspected of carrying arms in the past.
The Lebanon-Israel border has been largely quiet since Israel and Hezbollah fought a fierce war in the summer of 2006. But Israel has long warned that Hezbollah fighters have been rearming and now possess some 40,000 rockets.
Gaza militants also have dramatically reduced their rocket attacks on southern Israel since a bruising winter war. But militants continue to smuggle in rockets and components through underground tunnels with Egypt, the Israeli military says.
On Tuesday, the head of military intelligence said Gaza's militant Hamas rulers recently test-fired a missile capable of striking Israel's largest urban center, metropolitan Tel Aviv.
Hamas and Hezbollah are both proxies of Iran, whose nuclear program, long-range missiles and patronage of militants on Israel's southern and northern flanks make it the Jewish state's most formidable foe.
Israel shares the West's fears that Tehran is developing nuclear weapons, despite its assertions to the contrary. Neutralizing the Iranian nuclear threat remains Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's top priority and Israel has not ruled out a military strike against Tehran's nuclear facilities.
Tuesday, November 3, 2009
ObamaNation: ABC's new V Series Commentary on Obama Mania (03Nov09)
ObamaNation: ABC's new V Series Commentary on Obama Mania (03Nov09)
http://gawker.com/5396265/v-as-an-alien-allegory-attack-against-barack-obama
ABC's new Sci-fi series V kicks off tonight. It concerns a charismatic leader who comes out of nowhere promising a bright future and a better life for all Americans. Is that leader Barack Obama or is it a space lizard?
On the show, it is definitely a space lizard (maybe Balloon Boy's dad's conspiracy theories about lizard people were right all along!), but like a Chicago Tribune review by Glenn Garvin points out, it could also be about our nerd president.
Welcome to ABC's "V," the most fascinating and bound to be the most controversial new show of the fall television season. Nominally a rousing sci-fi space opera about alien invaders bent on the conquest (and digestion) of all humanity, it's also a barbed commentary on Obamamania that will infuriate the president's supporters and delight his detractors.
Anna is the beautiful and charming leader of the aliens—known as V's because they are visitors—and she tells the world that her people can fix everything that is wrong with society. She has the liberal media brainwashed, and they all go along with stories about how great and wonderful she is. Of course, there is a fringe group who rebel against her and want to expose them as the evil-doing, reptile skinned, foreigners that they really are. Of course, these are the heroes of the show. Wow, that really does sound like the teabaggers! There's even a religious rebel named Father Jack, which is basically an anagram of George W. Bush.
It certainly wouldn't be new for a sci-fi series to be an allegory about modern society (Battlestar Galactica, anyone?) but it would be sort of odd for a sci-fi show on a major network to give credence to tactics and delusions of the far right. The birthers will be lapping up a show about a foreign-born president who comes to snatch society out of their clutches, and Glenn Back and his cronies will love to see a media that is overtaken by liberals and keeps the truth away from the "real Americans." But what will everyone else think?
The sci-fi culture usually veers to the left in its political allegory (again, see Battlestar or this summer's upbeat Star Trek that was an endorsement for the hopeful future that the Obama administration promised to usher in). The original 1983 miniseries that the show is based on was an anti-fascist message that preyed on "the aliens are coming, the aliens are coming" invasion fears of the Cold War. This is what it has been warped into. We find it hard to believe that thinly-veiIed conservative propaganda will find a strong foothold with the core sci-fi audience, and as for those leaning to the right, they tend to like their entertainment much more straightforward. Why try to figure out what all those lizard people mean when they can just watch Jack Bauer bash people's heads in on 24? That's their idea of fun.
Our prognosis, keep picking on the president and the only letters that V will get are D.O.A.
http://gawker.com/5396265/v-as-an-alien-allegory-attack-against-barack-obama
ABC's new Sci-fi series V kicks off tonight. It concerns a charismatic leader who comes out of nowhere promising a bright future and a better life for all Americans. Is that leader Barack Obama or is it a space lizard?
On the show, it is definitely a space lizard (maybe Balloon Boy's dad's conspiracy theories about lizard people were right all along!), but like a Chicago Tribune review by Glenn Garvin points out, it could also be about our nerd president.
Welcome to ABC's "V," the most fascinating and bound to be the most controversial new show of the fall television season. Nominally a rousing sci-fi space opera about alien invaders bent on the conquest (and digestion) of all humanity, it's also a barbed commentary on Obamamania that will infuriate the president's supporters and delight his detractors.
Anna is the beautiful and charming leader of the aliens—known as V's because they are visitors—and she tells the world that her people can fix everything that is wrong with society. She has the liberal media brainwashed, and they all go along with stories about how great and wonderful she is. Of course, there is a fringe group who rebel against her and want to expose them as the evil-doing, reptile skinned, foreigners that they really are. Of course, these are the heroes of the show. Wow, that really does sound like the teabaggers! There's even a religious rebel named Father Jack, which is basically an anagram of George W. Bush.
It certainly wouldn't be new for a sci-fi series to be an allegory about modern society (Battlestar Galactica, anyone?) but it would be sort of odd for a sci-fi show on a major network to give credence to tactics and delusions of the far right. The birthers will be lapping up a show about a foreign-born president who comes to snatch society out of their clutches, and Glenn Back and his cronies will love to see a media that is overtaken by liberals and keeps the truth away from the "real Americans." But what will everyone else think?
The sci-fi culture usually veers to the left in its political allegory (again, see Battlestar or this summer's upbeat Star Trek that was an endorsement for the hopeful future that the Obama administration promised to usher in). The original 1983 miniseries that the show is based on was an anti-fascist message that preyed on "the aliens are coming, the aliens are coming" invasion fears of the Cold War. This is what it has been warped into. We find it hard to believe that thinly-veiIed conservative propaganda will find a strong foothold with the core sci-fi audience, and as for those leaning to the right, they tend to like their entertainment much more straightforward. Why try to figure out what all those lizard people mean when they can just watch Jack Bauer bash people's heads in on 24? That's their idea of fun.
Our prognosis, keep picking on the president and the only letters that V will get are D.O.A.
ObamaNation: InterNet Neutrality means Internet Control by Government (03Nov09)
ObamaNation: Internet Neutrality means Internet Control by Government (03Nov09)
http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/11/net_neutrality_nets_out_to_gov.html
"The great enemy of clear language is insincerity. When there is a gap between one's real and one's declared aims, one turns as it were instinctively to long words and exhausted idioms, like a cuttlefish spurting out ink."
George Orwell, "Politics and the English Language," 1946
There's nothing neutral about the Obama administration's push for net neutrality.
Do you suppose that, periodically, an ad appears in the Washington Post that reads this way?
Wanted. Congressional Legislation Naming Consultant (GS-9). Must be able to craft titles for legislation coming before the House and Senate. Must have a thorough understanding of the English language, and the ability to design titles counter-reflective of their intent. All applicants will be screened to assure no more than moderate recreational use of creative enhancement drugs. Preferential treatment will be given to those between 28-35 years of age who like comfort food.
Comfort food? Those include chocolate cake, macaroni and cheese, mashed potatoes, chicken noodle soup, fried chicken, ice cream...all the foods that make us feel comfortable.
Consider the titles of recent legislation.
First, there was the Troubled Assets Relief Program.
Relief is a comfort word. Who doesn't want relief when their assets are troubled? And it's trouble assets, not toxic assets. Toxic sounds dreadful.
Then came the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.
Recovery and Reinvestment are like ham-and-eggs. Comfort words, both.
Now we face America's Affordable Health Choices.
It's the full combination plate of comfort words. All it needs is "and Effective" after "Affordable" to reach Nirvana. It would roll off the tongue nicely, too. America's Affordable and Effective Health Choices.
There's another one on the near horizon. It's H.R.3458.
The Internet Freedom Preservation Act of 2009
Proposed (yet again) by Reps. Edward Markey (D-Mass.) and Anna Eshoo (D-Calif.).
It's title says it's about "Freedom" and "Preservation" of the internet. Mashed potatoes-and-gravy stuff. What could possibly be awry with this bill's intent?
The organization Free Press supports it. Its motto is "reform media. transform democracy." (Oh, oh. There's that "transform" word again.) Ben Scott, policy director of Free Press, states:
"The future of the Internet as we know it depends on maintaining freedom and openness online. This crucial legislation will help to ensure that the public -- not big phone and cable companies -- controls the fate of the Internet.
The rules that govern the Internet must protect economic innovation, democratic participation and free speech online. If we don't make Net Neutrality the law once and for all, we could see the innovation and promise of the Internet derailed forever." (July 31, 2009)
That statement offers a veritable smorgasbord of comfort words: freedom; openness; public...controls; economic innovation; democratic participation; free speech; promise. And the stark alternative if the bill isn't passed is an "Internet derailed forever." That's forever as in eternity. That's like being offered a gallon of freezer-burned Chocolate Pretzel Crunch ice cream for dessert after a meal of comfort food words.
Ben's boss, Josh Silver, who runs Free Press, identified the evil opposition to net neutrality.
As the fight over Net Neutrality or "Internet Freedom" heats up, Web sites and spin by industry front groups and high-priced consultants are popping up daily, as cable and phone companies spend millions to mislead and misinform the American public.
There's the enemies list: industry front groups; high-priced consultants (What? No moderately priced ones?); and the big bad cable and phone companies that "mislead and misinform" folks. (Cue the boos.)
So, what does the Internet Freedom Preservation Act of 2009 propose? Here's the official summary:
7/31/2009 -- Introduced. Internet Freedom Preservation Act of 2009
Amends the Communications Act of 1934 to set the policy of the United States regarding various aspects of the Internet, including access, consumer choice, competition, ability to use or offer content, applications, and services, discriminatory favoritism, and capacity. Makes it the duty of each Internet access service provider to:
(1) not block, interfere with, discriminate against, impair, or degrade the ability of any person to use an Internet access service;
(2) not impose certain charges on any Internet content, service, or application provider;
(3) not prevent or obstruct a user from attaching or using any lawful device in conjunction with such service, provided the device does not harm the provider's {sic} network;
(4) offer Internet access service to any requesting person;
(5) not provide or sell to any content, application, or service provider any offering that prioritizes traffic over that of other such providers; and
(6) not install or use network features, functions, or capabilities that impede or hinder compliance with these duties. Requires the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to promulgate related rules. Prohibits construing this Act to prohibit an Internet access provider from engaging in reasonable network management.
Requires the FCC to:
(1) promulgate rules to ensure that an Internet access service provider does not require a consumer, as a condition on the purchase of any Internet access service, to purchase any other service or offering; and
(2) take certain actions, including regarding private transmission capacity services.
A lot of open doors in that language: "take certain actions"; "various aspects of the internet"; "certain charges." Plus, give internet service to anyone and everyone who wants it, as in "any requesting person."
Here's what one of the bill's co-sponsors identifies as its basic intent:
"The Internet has thrived and revolutionized business and the economy precisely because it started as an open technology," said co-sponsor Rep. Anna Eshoo (D-CA) in a statement. "This bill will ensure that the non-discriminatory framework that allows the Internet to thrive and competition on the Web to flourish is preserved at a time when our economy needs it the most."
So, to follow Ms. Eshoo's argument, the Internet has "thrived and revolutionized business and the economy."
Now she, Mr. Markey, and the Obama administration want to regulate it so it will thrive and flourish.
So I take my truck into the dealership and say, "Fix my truck, Doug." Doug says, "What's wrong with it?" I say, "Nothing, it runs great. It just needs fixing.")
Masked beneath the comfort language of the net neutrality bill are provisions that will effectively turn over management of the internet within the United States to the federal government via the Federal Communications Commission (FCC).
It's a power for which the FCC hungers.
Perhaps it envies China.
So there's nothing neutral about the Obama administration's push for net neutrality.
"Neutrality" is a D.C. comfort word for control.
http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/11/net_neutrality_nets_out_to_gov.html
"The great enemy of clear language is insincerity. When there is a gap between one's real and one's declared aims, one turns as it were instinctively to long words and exhausted idioms, like a cuttlefish spurting out ink."
George Orwell, "Politics and the English Language," 1946
There's nothing neutral about the Obama administration's push for net neutrality.
Do you suppose that, periodically, an ad appears in the Washington Post that reads this way?
Wanted. Congressional Legislation Naming Consultant (GS-9). Must be able to craft titles for legislation coming before the House and Senate. Must have a thorough understanding of the English language, and the ability to design titles counter-reflective of their intent. All applicants will be screened to assure no more than moderate recreational use of creative enhancement drugs. Preferential treatment will be given to those between 28-35 years of age who like comfort food.
Comfort food? Those include chocolate cake, macaroni and cheese, mashed potatoes, chicken noodle soup, fried chicken, ice cream...all the foods that make us feel comfortable.
Consider the titles of recent legislation.
First, there was the Troubled Assets Relief Program.
Relief is a comfort word. Who doesn't want relief when their assets are troubled? And it's trouble assets, not toxic assets. Toxic sounds dreadful.
Then came the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.
Recovery and Reinvestment are like ham-and-eggs. Comfort words, both.
Now we face America's Affordable Health Choices.
It's the full combination plate of comfort words. All it needs is "and Effective" after "Affordable" to reach Nirvana. It would roll off the tongue nicely, too. America's Affordable and Effective Health Choices.
There's another one on the near horizon. It's H.R.3458.
The Internet Freedom Preservation Act of 2009
Proposed (yet again) by Reps. Edward Markey (D-Mass.) and Anna Eshoo (D-Calif.).
It's title says it's about "Freedom" and "Preservation" of the internet. Mashed potatoes-and-gravy stuff. What could possibly be awry with this bill's intent?
The organization Free Press supports it. Its motto is "reform media. transform democracy." (Oh, oh. There's that "transform" word again.) Ben Scott, policy director of Free Press, states:
"The future of the Internet as we know it depends on maintaining freedom and openness online. This crucial legislation will help to ensure that the public -- not big phone and cable companies -- controls the fate of the Internet.
The rules that govern the Internet must protect economic innovation, democratic participation and free speech online. If we don't make Net Neutrality the law once and for all, we could see the innovation and promise of the Internet derailed forever." (July 31, 2009)
That statement offers a veritable smorgasbord of comfort words: freedom; openness; public...controls; economic innovation; democratic participation; free speech; promise. And the stark alternative if the bill isn't passed is an "Internet derailed forever." That's forever as in eternity. That's like being offered a gallon of freezer-burned Chocolate Pretzel Crunch ice cream for dessert after a meal of comfort food words.
Ben's boss, Josh Silver, who runs Free Press, identified the evil opposition to net neutrality.
As the fight over Net Neutrality or "Internet Freedom" heats up, Web sites and spin by industry front groups and high-priced consultants are popping up daily, as cable and phone companies spend millions to mislead and misinform the American public.
There's the enemies list: industry front groups; high-priced consultants (What? No moderately priced ones?); and the big bad cable and phone companies that "mislead and misinform" folks. (Cue the boos.)
So, what does the Internet Freedom Preservation Act of 2009 propose? Here's the official summary:
7/31/2009 -- Introduced. Internet Freedom Preservation Act of 2009
Amends the Communications Act of 1934 to set the policy of the United States regarding various aspects of the Internet, including access, consumer choice, competition, ability to use or offer content, applications, and services, discriminatory favoritism, and capacity. Makes it the duty of each Internet access service provider to:
(1) not block, interfere with, discriminate against, impair, or degrade the ability of any person to use an Internet access service;
(2) not impose certain charges on any Internet content, service, or application provider;
(3) not prevent or obstruct a user from attaching or using any lawful device in conjunction with such service, provided the device does not harm the provider's {sic} network;
(4) offer Internet access service to any requesting person;
(5) not provide or sell to any content, application, or service provider any offering that prioritizes traffic over that of other such providers; and
(6) not install or use network features, functions, or capabilities that impede or hinder compliance with these duties. Requires the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to promulgate related rules. Prohibits construing this Act to prohibit an Internet access provider from engaging in reasonable network management.
Requires the FCC to:
(1) promulgate rules to ensure that an Internet access service provider does not require a consumer, as a condition on the purchase of any Internet access service, to purchase any other service or offering; and
(2) take certain actions, including regarding private transmission capacity services.
A lot of open doors in that language: "take certain actions"; "various aspects of the internet"; "certain charges." Plus, give internet service to anyone and everyone who wants it, as in "any requesting person."
Here's what one of the bill's co-sponsors identifies as its basic intent:
"The Internet has thrived and revolutionized business and the economy precisely because it started as an open technology," said co-sponsor Rep. Anna Eshoo (D-CA) in a statement. "This bill will ensure that the non-discriminatory framework that allows the Internet to thrive and competition on the Web to flourish is preserved at a time when our economy needs it the most."
So, to follow Ms. Eshoo's argument, the Internet has "thrived and revolutionized business and the economy."
Now she, Mr. Markey, and the Obama administration want to regulate it so it will thrive and flourish.
So I take my truck into the dealership and say, "Fix my truck, Doug." Doug says, "What's wrong with it?" I say, "Nothing, it runs great. It just needs fixing.")
Masked beneath the comfort language of the net neutrality bill are provisions that will effectively turn over management of the internet within the United States to the federal government via the Federal Communications Commission (FCC).
It's a power for which the FCC hungers.
Perhaps it envies China.
So there's nothing neutral about the Obama administration's push for net neutrality.
"Neutrality" is a D.C. comfort word for control.
ObamaCare: Citizen Protest Power comes to WDC Thursday (03Nov09)
ObamaCare: Citizen Protest Power comes to WDC Thursday (03Nov09)
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2009/11/citizen_power_comes_to_dc_thur.html
Rep. Michele Bachman is leading an effort to bring citizen-lobbyists to Capitol Hill, starting noon Thursday, in anticipation of a possible vote Friday on ObamaCare.
Within hours of Rep. Bachman's call for citizens to travel to DC to lobby against ObamaCare, which could come to a vote Friday, The Tea Party Express, the doctors of Take Back America and the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons, the patriots of Tea Party Patriots Live and Resistnet all stepped up.
Mark Levin, author of the important book Liberty & Tyranny (and major talk show host) will be there. Readers who are able to get to DC Thursday should be there too.
An aroused citizenry is much harder for legislators to ignore when the citizens turn out for face-to-face interaction. This was the great lesson of Town Hall August.
Having citizens come to DC for lobbying was a brilliant move on Bachman’s part, and demonstrates the difference between old-line pols, and the new breed of conservative that the era demands.
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2009/11/citizen_power_comes_to_dc_thur.html
Rep. Michele Bachman is leading an effort to bring citizen-lobbyists to Capitol Hill, starting noon Thursday, in anticipation of a possible vote Friday on ObamaCare.
Within hours of Rep. Bachman's call for citizens to travel to DC to lobby against ObamaCare, which could come to a vote Friday, The Tea Party Express, the doctors of Take Back America and the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons, the patriots of Tea Party Patriots Live and Resistnet all stepped up.
Mark Levin, author of the important book Liberty & Tyranny (and major talk show host) will be there. Readers who are able to get to DC Thursday should be there too.
An aroused citizenry is much harder for legislators to ignore when the citizens turn out for face-to-face interaction. This was the great lesson of Town Hall August.
Having citizens come to DC for lobbying was a brilliant move on Bachman’s part, and demonstrates the difference between old-line pols, and the new breed of conservative that the era demands.
ObamaCare Pumps up Obama Narcissism: 03Nov09
ObamaCare Pumps up Obama Narcissism: 03Nov09
http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/11/an_ocare_victory_will_make_him.html
O-Care is an awful idea for all kinds of reasons. It's a monstrosity. But one reason that has not been discussed is the problem of giving Obama -- a narcissist who has surrounded himself with thugs -- a crucial psychic victory.
Narcissists have a problem with reality. They are absolutists of a kind, and their absolute ideal is themselves. So a defeat makes them feel utterly enraged -- because their gnawing self-doubts are strengthened -- but a victory is interpreted to support their messianic self-image. When Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize in a way that made him the laughingstock even of the international Left, he snapped it up without a second thought. He just thinks he deserves it. Just think about that for a second; what kind of a man gets a Nobel Peace Prize on the strength of no accomplishments, and accepts it as his just due without a second thought? Obama.
That is why defeating O-Care is so important for the survival of the Republic. Obama badly needs to experience his own limits. He will keep expanding his assaults on Constitutional government until he runs into a brick wall. So far, there haven't been many brick walls. A defeat on O-Care will enrage this White House, but it will also teach it some limits. Out-of-control spoiled-brat kids need limits. A conservative victory in 2010 is absolutely crucial.
When he got into Harvard Law, it's a good bet that Obama went on an ego rampage for years. But that wasn't good enough; he had to get the biggest bauble again, the editorship of the Harvard Law Review. Because those inner doubts are never satisfied. Obama of the Hungry Ego must keep conquering new worlds. Today the Nobel PC Prize; tomorrow the world.
The very worst thing that could happen therefore is a big victory for Obama on O-Care. It would feed his greedy ego, and make it psychologically necessary for him to go for the Next Big Thing.
Like Napoleon, one win is never enough for Obama
Napoleon couldn't stop himself. He had to go aggrandizing his ego, until finally he ran into the Russian winter and Waterloo. Victories only encourage hungry narcissists. Their egos demand imperialism. Look at any imperial conquest of the past -- Mohammed, Napoleon, Lenin --- and you find an ego-hungry narcissist at the center of it.
Obama got control over GM and the big banks by Blizkrieg tactics: Hit ‘em fast before they know what's happening. If he gets O-Care, Obama will want to drive through carbon taxes as soon as possible. That will give him the biggest clout over the US economy and the American people that anyone has ever had. FDR in World War Two was a piker by comparison.
To this White House, any criticism is seen as a devastating attack on Obama's self-esteem. A major narcissist demands worship or else.That's why the White House has to attack Fox News, or Rush or Beck. That is why Obama is so hypersensitive to criticism.
Notice that the Afghanistan Dawdling Seminar at the White House makes Obama the star again.
That's his psychological need. Making proper decisions on Afghanistan is secondary. It's the grandiose show that counts. Same thing for the Nobel PC Prize acceptance speech. Watch for another Citizens of the World! speech, like his mass rally at the Berlin zoo.
Because such people can be dangerous, psychiatrists who treat them are caught in a bind. They know they should not validate the client's swollen ego. But contradicting the client will result in major rage fits, and may break the client's confidence in the doctor, which is crucial for progress. Narcissists are notoriously difficult to work with. Their character pathology is locked in concrete. So the therapist is facing a "Damned if you do, damned if you don't" choice. A good therapist waits for a crisis to arise in the client's life -- when reality stops flattering his huge ego -- and then gently probe why it happened. Defeating O-Care will be a therapeutic crisis for this president. It won't stop his imperial quest, but it will make him more cautious.
I know a business owner who is the perfect narcissist. He cannot tolerate contradiction. His employees are afraid of his rages, and some of them bitterly hate him. They feel trapped. They know that nothing will change the boss. When something goes wrong it's always somebody else's fault, and the boss strikes out at the nearest target.
Everybody must know some raging narcissist in their own lives. It's a couple of percent of the population. They are attracted to politics because they think of themselves as geniuses who can do no wrong. Well, just think of that man or woman in the White House, and acting like Obama.
The American Republic is designed to play off one ego against another one.
The Founders knew people like Obama.
They had read their Tacitus and their Book of Kings.
Edward Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire was published between 1776 and 1778.
It's all about the same thing. The Founders knew all about European aristocratic arrogance.
Big narcissists like Obama have always tried to establish Utopian cults in America.
So the Founders knew about those personalities. They exist all over the world.
Well, human nature hasn't changed since 1776, and that's why the Founders designed the Constitutional system the way they did.
http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/11/an_ocare_victory_will_make_him.html
O-Care is an awful idea for all kinds of reasons. It's a monstrosity. But one reason that has not been discussed is the problem of giving Obama -- a narcissist who has surrounded himself with thugs -- a crucial psychic victory.
Narcissists have a problem with reality. They are absolutists of a kind, and their absolute ideal is themselves. So a defeat makes them feel utterly enraged -- because their gnawing self-doubts are strengthened -- but a victory is interpreted to support their messianic self-image. When Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize in a way that made him the laughingstock even of the international Left, he snapped it up without a second thought. He just thinks he deserves it. Just think about that for a second; what kind of a man gets a Nobel Peace Prize on the strength of no accomplishments, and accepts it as his just due without a second thought? Obama.
That is why defeating O-Care is so important for the survival of the Republic. Obama badly needs to experience his own limits. He will keep expanding his assaults on Constitutional government until he runs into a brick wall. So far, there haven't been many brick walls. A defeat on O-Care will enrage this White House, but it will also teach it some limits. Out-of-control spoiled-brat kids need limits. A conservative victory in 2010 is absolutely crucial.
When he got into Harvard Law, it's a good bet that Obama went on an ego rampage for years. But that wasn't good enough; he had to get the biggest bauble again, the editorship of the Harvard Law Review. Because those inner doubts are never satisfied. Obama of the Hungry Ego must keep conquering new worlds. Today the Nobel PC Prize; tomorrow the world.
The very worst thing that could happen therefore is a big victory for Obama on O-Care. It would feed his greedy ego, and make it psychologically necessary for him to go for the Next Big Thing.
Like Napoleon, one win is never enough for Obama
Napoleon couldn't stop himself. He had to go aggrandizing his ego, until finally he ran into the Russian winter and Waterloo. Victories only encourage hungry narcissists. Their egos demand imperialism. Look at any imperial conquest of the past -- Mohammed, Napoleon, Lenin --- and you find an ego-hungry narcissist at the center of it.
Obama got control over GM and the big banks by Blizkrieg tactics: Hit ‘em fast before they know what's happening. If he gets O-Care, Obama will want to drive through carbon taxes as soon as possible. That will give him the biggest clout over the US economy and the American people that anyone has ever had. FDR in World War Two was a piker by comparison.
To this White House, any criticism is seen as a devastating attack on Obama's self-esteem. A major narcissist demands worship or else.That's why the White House has to attack Fox News, or Rush or Beck. That is why Obama is so hypersensitive to criticism.
Notice that the Afghanistan Dawdling Seminar at the White House makes Obama the star again.
That's his psychological need. Making proper decisions on Afghanistan is secondary. It's the grandiose show that counts. Same thing for the Nobel PC Prize acceptance speech. Watch for another Citizens of the World! speech, like his mass rally at the Berlin zoo.
Because such people can be dangerous, psychiatrists who treat them are caught in a bind. They know they should not validate the client's swollen ego. But contradicting the client will result in major rage fits, and may break the client's confidence in the doctor, which is crucial for progress. Narcissists are notoriously difficult to work with. Their character pathology is locked in concrete. So the therapist is facing a "Damned if you do, damned if you don't" choice. A good therapist waits for a crisis to arise in the client's life -- when reality stops flattering his huge ego -- and then gently probe why it happened. Defeating O-Care will be a therapeutic crisis for this president. It won't stop his imperial quest, but it will make him more cautious.
I know a business owner who is the perfect narcissist. He cannot tolerate contradiction. His employees are afraid of his rages, and some of them bitterly hate him. They feel trapped. They know that nothing will change the boss. When something goes wrong it's always somebody else's fault, and the boss strikes out at the nearest target.
Everybody must know some raging narcissist in their own lives. It's a couple of percent of the population. They are attracted to politics because they think of themselves as geniuses who can do no wrong. Well, just think of that man or woman in the White House, and acting like Obama.
The American Republic is designed to play off one ego against another one.
The Founders knew people like Obama.
They had read their Tacitus and their Book of Kings.
Edward Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire was published between 1776 and 1778.
It's all about the same thing. The Founders knew all about European aristocratic arrogance.
Big narcissists like Obama have always tried to establish Utopian cults in America.
So the Founders knew about those personalities. They exist all over the world.
Well, human nature hasn't changed since 1776, and that's why the Founders designed the Constitutional system the way they did.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
