IR1

The Question Had to be Asked

2011-10-11T23:34:00.000-07:00

With Harry Belafonte and now Cornell West both piling on to attack Herman Cain the question has to be asked. Why do black people hate Herman Cain? There is only one answer, racism.

Powerlineblog "Dawn of the Debt"

2011-07-27T20:47:00.000-07:00

My (very) little contribution to spreading the word. Debt will destroy us if we don't destroy it.

Debt Ceiling Drama…If Not Now, When?

2011-07-13T21:53:00.000-07:00

The drama over the debt ceiling continues to build to the point where I actually have to post this entry to my long-neglected blog. Today we learn that Obama and Cantor actually don’t like each other. Wow, who would have thought. This coming just a day after Mitch McConell threw out a proposal that is supposed to be somewhere between a brilliant pincer movement to trap Obama between two untenable alternatives and a rank betrayal of the Tea Party conservatives in the House of Representatives. And this comes just one day after John Boehner suddenly appeared to grow a spine. It’s the best show in Washington for a long time and there’s just one problem with it. It’s more business as usual and the American people have had it with business as usual.

The one constant among all the politicians in Washington is their insistence that, somehow or other, the debt ceiling must be raised. They argue over how and when and how much, but they all agree the debt ceiling must be raised. Not to do so would be, irresponsible. Funny thing though, when you look at what the American people want the message is clear. By a two to one margin they do not want the debt ceiling raised. And the reason is simple. Americans are, correctly, far more afraid of the consequences of Washington’s business as usual, piling on more debt, then they are of the consequences of not raising the debt ceiling.

“But they don’t understand”, the politicians say, “Not raising the debt ceiling would be an unprecedented calamity.” And you know what, they are probably right. But you know what the American people have finally figured out after decades of watching their government spend $1.17 for every $1.00 taken in taxes.

It’s Not Ever Going To Get Any Better.

Sure not raising the debt ceiling now will cause huge problems but ask yourself this, do you really think the crew in Washington will have us better prepared to deal with it at any point in the future? The answer is obvious. No, they won’t. Everybody knows it.

Politicians don’t want to face it because it means they lose the big game of musical chairs they’ve all been playing. But for the rest of us it means the opposite. We had better face it now. Face the fact that our government is like an addict who is always going to ask for “just one more” before going into recovery. Face the fact that the problem is only going to be worse a year from now, and worse than that two years from now. Face the fact that no matter how painful it is to deal with our problem now, it will only become much more painful the longer we wait.

We’re like the passengers in a car without any brakes speeding down the mountain out of control. We don’t want to run the car into the ditch. We know it’s going to be a wreck. But we’ve also figured out that Bozo the clown is driving the car and there’s no other way to stop. And we’re picking up speed fast. That’s why the American people don’t want the debt ceiling raised. It’s not because we don’t understand what’s going on. It’s because we do.

PS: I want to apologize in advance to Bozo.

Government Help

2009-09-15T22:21:00.000-07:00

I'd Rather They Didn't...

I was over at thehill.com reading about how Olympia Snowe is bailing out on the Democrats on health care. One of the reasons given was:

"Snowe has objected to Baucus’s bill for requiring as many as 4 million uninsured Americans to buy health plans without providing them with significant federal subsidies.
Snowe said that lawmakers cannot expect people to comply with a federal mandate to buy health insurance if affordable plans are not available"

That got me thinking, the government plans to fine you $3800 if you don't get health care. So if you can't afford health care you get the fine, and you STILL don't have health care. In a way it's a perfect example of how government help "works".

Ten Ways I Would Help Obama

2009-09-02T22:16:00.000-07:00

I've been out of school awhile but hearing that Obama was going to address school-children nationwide after which the children would be required to discuss and write a paper on how they would "help" Obama got me thinking. After all he needs a lot of help.

Dear Teacher,
I would help President Obama by:

1. Getting him a door detector so he can quit trying to get into the White House through the window.

2. Lending him my geography book so he can look up how many states there are (hint, not 57).

3. Giving him a helmet or maybe just a big hat so it won't hurt when he bangs his head getting into his helicopter. A bucket might work too and then I could help him get his head out of it. (Teacher - does that count for two ideas? Do I get extra credit for having more than 10?)

4. Helping him to fix his teleprompter so he'll know what to say.

5. Getting him a copy of the United States constitution so he can look at it when people ask him questions about what's in there.

6. Giving him $15 so he could afford to order a copy of his birth certificate from the county recorder.

7. Getting him a ramp to put under the bus so people can walk down there instead of him having to throw them. That sounds hard. Especially if he ever has to throw Michael Moore down there.

8. Getting him bowling lessons would be a good idea.

9. Talking to him about why he shouldn't be so touchy about his ears.

10. Getting him some good tennis shoes so he can run away from all the old people who are mad at him for trying to take away their medicare. He's probably pretty fast already though.

A Stone Around Their Necks

2009-02-10T23:36:00.000-08:00

I have been writing in to a few politicians and noticed I was repeating myself so thought I would post it up here. Senator Schumer (D-NY) seems to think that Americans don't mind the "porky" nature of the Democrats stimulus bill. Other politicians seem to think the voter's attention span will be too short to bring judgement on them next election day.
The facts are this bill is more toxic to liberal politicians than DDT. The negative effects of this bill will last for years and be more firmly tied to the democrats who voted for it than a midriff bulge. Compared to a vote for this loser a vote for the Iraq war will seem like a get out of jail free card. By the time it's all over this stimulus bill will be known as the terminator for all the political careers it ends.

Gaza Truce

2009-01-03T10:43:00.000-08:00

Just a quick repost of a comment I left at "Have Your Say" on the BBC news page. I know it's a waste of time but it's a tough habit to break. Also I want to point out I DID NOT recommend my own comment so at least one other person agrees with me.

Added: Saturday, 3 January, 2009, 05:38 GMT 05:38 UK

Oh well, truce in Gaza is it? This joins the growing number of issues to which my reaction is, who cares? Why should I make a serious, logical effort to understand and react to complex issues when actual events, the people involved in the events, and the people reporting on the events, all seem completely mad. My new opionion is, if a thousand rockets are good then a million rockets must be a thousand times better. And if a suicide bomb is good then a nuclear bomb must be perfectly wonderful.
Memphis, USA
Recommended by 1 person

So THIS is "Change"

2008-11-13T23:34:00.000-08:00

I haven't posted anything lately.

BUT

The story about Obama considering Hillary for Secretary of State was just begging for a snarky comment and here it is.

So, we trade a black woman for a white woman and a white man for a black man and this is transformational because...?

Tell me this isn't the first thing that crossed your mind. You know it was.

Seems to me things were less racial before they were post-racial.

IR1

Sarah Palin versus The New Republic

2008-08-29T23:59:00.000-07:00

This article was begging for a Fisking

An Astonishingly Arrogant V.P Selection - --Peter Scoblic , The New Republic

It may be John McCain's birthday, but it seems like he's the one giving out gifts today. The selection of Palin doesn't simply, as others have pointed out, undermine the notion that Obama is too inexperienced to be president; it gives Obama the chance to actually take the edge on national security while making John McCain's age a central issue of the campaign.

OK I don't see any logic behind these assertions but give the guy a chance to make his argument.

Whatever the political calculations involved in picking a veep, the most important qualification for the vice presidency is the ability to assume the presidency in a crisis. Given that of the last 12 presidents, three have either died or resigned, this is hardly a hypothetical consideration--in fact, given that McCain is 72, it is a very real consideration. Harry Truman, Lyndon Johnson, and Gerald Ford all faced multiple foreign policy crises immediately upon assuming office, whether it was the onset of the Cold War, the North's invasion of South Korea, the Vietnam War, or the withering of détente and the resulting increase in nuclear tension with the Soviet Union. The next president will have to finish the denuclearization of North Korea; prevent the nuclearization of Iran; organize a departure from Iraq that maintains some level of stability; defeat a resurgent Taliban in Afghanistan; establish, nurture, and make the most of a relationship with Pakistan's new leaders; and confront a revanchist Russia while preserving and enhancing its cooperation on nonproliferation and climate change--to say nothing of working with India, China, or our allies.

Yeah OK, we know being president is an important job. Could you get on with it?

Could Sarah Palin conceivably manage this task? Her tenure as a small-town mayor and Alaska governor has given her no foreign policy experience whatsoever. True, Obama has little foreign policy experience either, as McCain and others have pointed out again and again. But during his time in national office he has demonstrated a clear commitment to the most pressing issues in American foreign policy. Take nuclear proliferation. Early in his tenure on the Foreign Relations Committee, Obama joined Richard Lugar's efforts to secure weapons of mass destruction in the former Soviet Union. Obama's first trip abroad as senator was to Russia and Ukraine to learn more about those efforts firsthand. In 2007, he cosponsored legislation with Senator Chuck Hagel calling for ratification of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty and negotiation of a fissile material cut-off treaty. And he was the first major presidential candidate to embrace the steps laid out in 2007 by Sam Nunn, Bill Perry, George Shultz, and Henry Kissinger through which the United States would fight nuclear terrorism, reinvigorate the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, and ultimately eliminate nuclear weapons.

When you cut through the BS Obama's "experience" includes signing onto the same uncontroversial and pedestrian idea three times and taking one foreign trip. So we should give him credit for being against nuclear proliferation? Name one politician who's for it. His only apparent "commitment" is to his own career. Yeah I'm pretty sure Sarah Palin could handle this task.

Perhaps more important than the experience they embodied, these efforts demonstrate that Obama has a worldview. Obama recognizes the greatness and uniqueness of the United States, but he does not translate that exceptionalism into dominance or isolationism as conservatives often have. Instead, he sees it as the basis for U.S. leadership. He has laid out that worldview in myriad speeches and articles, and he has surrounded himself with pragmatists who have a record of translating that understanding of America's role into concrete gains for our national security. By contrast, there is no indication that Palin has even shades of a foreign policy worldview; a Nexis search doesn't turn up a single article that she has written on international affairs.

A google search of Obama and "foreign policy article" turns up one article written after he was already a presidential candidate. This constitutes a "worldview"? The elitist attitude seeping out of this charge is outrageous. If you don’t have the right friends to get your article published in the right place you must not even have a "worldview" Bite me.

McCain undoubtedly thinks he has his national security bases covered; picking Palin shows that, unlike Obama, he doesn't need an eminence grise like Biden to add heft to his ticket. But surely McCain recognizes that Palin may have to fill his shoes someday. By choosing her anyway, he has demonstrated hubris well beyond anything Obama has displayed on his most arrogant day: a belief that he can master unforeseen circumstances, physical and otherwise, that are well beyond his control. This is insulting and dangerous and suggests that McCain may want to think twice before accusing Obama of putting his personal ambition ahead of the national interest.

Probably McCain just believes Sarah Palin can handle it if necessary. Why would you think a woman can't handle it? What's the odds he drops dead in less than a year or two anyway? And filling his shoes in exactly 4 years and 142 days is part of the genius of this selection.

No doubt Michelle is right that the Obama-Biden team will have to be careful attacking Palin's frighteningly thin resume and tenuous grasp of foreign policy. But surely a campaign that has been charged with being too naïve to manage rogue state dictators can have a bit of fun with the idea that a one-time Miss Congeniality could effectively face down Vladimir Putin, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, or Kim Jong Il. Surely, Obama's "eight is enough" quip ought to apply not only to President Bush's economic and foreign policy travesties, but to the elevation of mediocrity that has characterized his appointment of Michael Brown to FEMA and his nomination of Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court. And surely we can agree that if the McCain campaign was desperate to transparently court voters put off by Hillary Clinton's loss, there is no dearth of women with far greater intellectual, executive, and political abilities--abilities that would allow them to assume the presidency in a heartbeat.

OK finally to the point. She's dangerous because she has no less real experience than Obama and that could make him look bad. On top of that she would be the Vice-President, not President, and at least has several years of successful executive experience. And being elected mayor and then governor doesn't sound "mediocre" any more than "state senator" and "senator". Was McCain transparently courting voters, well duh. And frankly the implied offer to suggest other better qualified women sounds like a cry of pain that McCain may have picked a winner.

Why Obama is a dumb jerk

2008-05-27T22:58:00.000-07:00

As opposed to just a jerk
.
Because he keeps saying the Iraq war has not made us any safer. I got the data for this chart from Powerline so if you don't like it blame them. But if you don't like it you're probably a jerk too so who cares. By the way I put the hint in the chart for Obama since he probably doesn't know when the Iraq war started.

2007-06-06T19:37:00.000-07:00

The following is pulled from david frum's diary over at National Review. It makes the point that the current immigration bill will be a financial disaster so well I had to include it. Also I think this may well be the first time ever that I have posted twice in one day. I can feel the energy building... Seriously if you think you are ever going to collect a social security or medicare benefit payment you should read his article and oppose this disastrous bill.

david frum's diary

Wednesday, June 06, 2007

Statistics Never Lie, But ....

... well you know how the rest of the aphorism goes. This afternoon's email brings a so-called Immigration Fact Check from the White House communications office. Here is the headline:

Immigration Fact Check: CBO Report – The Rest Of The Story
CBO Report Says Bipartisan Immigration Reform Bill Will Have "Relatively Small" Effect On Budget Balance, Impact On Illegal Immigration "Could Be Large"
The Washington Times offers a devastating rebuttal here:

CBO's misleading immigration $ numbers
The new Congressional Budget Office report on the Senate immigration bill is a textbook illustration of how advocates of massive new spending programs (and the tax increases that will be inevitable to pay for them) hide the true cost: Taking advantage of the fact that the the CBO only looks at the budgetary impact for over a 10-year period, Sen. Edward Kennedy and Republican supporters drew up a bill where — you guessed it — the real spending binge begins in year 11.

CBO found that during the first decade, the immigration bill would increase discretionary spending by $43 billion, while new workers would provide $48 billion worth of additional revenue to the government. (Over the next few days, these numbers will be repeated endlessly on radio and television and in Senate debate by advocates of the "compromise" bill.) But these numbers could hardly be more misleading, because with the exception of the earned-income tax credit and one smaller welfare program, illegal aliens granted amnesty under the bill do not become eligible to benefit from federally funded means-tested welfare programs until 2018 and beyond, while CBO's figures cover the years 2008-2017. After 10 years, amnesty beneficiaries become eligible for nearly 60 taxpayer-subsidized programs ranging from food stamps to Medicaid, Medicare and Social Security.
Roughly 9 million adult illegal immigrants will be given amnesty under the bill; 7 to 8 million of them will live to retirement age. When this occurs, 30 to 35 years from now, they will receive from the taxpayer an average of $17,000 a year in benefits above and beyond the taxes they pay. When amnesty recipients retire, the situation becomes much worse for the taxpayer: these people will pay approximately $5,000 a year in taxes and receive approximately $37,000 in benefits. The total net cost of the amnesty over the next three to four decades will be approximately $2.5 trillion, estimates Heritage Foundation scholar Robert Rector, who has done pioneering work in analyzing the effect of low-skilled immigrants on taxpayers.

None of this be a surprise, given the low level of employment skills these people bring to the United States. "This is a group that is 50 to 60 percent high-school dropouts," Mr. Rector tells us. "They will never pay substantial taxes in the U.S. system. But you're making every one of them, from the very beginning, eligible for Social Security and Medicare. And the worst thing about this is that the fiscal cost is going to come smashing into the Social Security and Medicare systems at the very time they are already going bankrupt."

In sum, when it comes to the true cost of the Senate bill, CBO's numbers have little to do with fiscal reality.

06/06 07:01 PM

OK now here's my summation. If you are a law abiding hard working citizen the political elites running the government want to sell you, your family, your children and your grandchildren down the river.

Why Illegal Immigration is Bad

2007-06-06T11:17:00.000-07:00

OK lists are boring but I felt this list would help make the case against the current immigration bill. Please go through the list and ask yourself if the current immigration bill would solve that particular problem if passed. By my count in the very best case the current bill would help with less than half of these problems even if we believe that its enforcement provisions would be pursued vigorously. Of course simply enforcing current laws would help with all of them. So the reason we need this bill is…?

1. Depressed wages and benefits and lack of opportunity for entry-level job seekers and unskilled or semi-skilled workers generally

2. Over-crowded classrooms and accommodations needed for non-English speaking children reduce the quality of education for citizens

3. Over-crowded hospitals and emergency rooms reduce the quality of emergency medical care for citizens

4. Closure of hospitals and emergency rooms over-burdened by providing urgent medical care to illegal aliens reduce availability of medical care for citizens

5. Loss of respect for the law

6. Participation by corporations and various levels of government in promoting illegal activity

7. Diversion of tax revenue to provide services (hospitals, schools, police, firefighters, roads, public transportation, etc.) to illegal aliens at a net loss to government at all levels requires higher taxes on citizens

8. Threat to solvency of social security fund from requirement to pay benefits if illegal aliens are granted legal status

9. Loss of opportunity to select more highly educated and trained applicants for legal immigration

10. Large flows of illegal persons over the border creates an opportunity for professional criminals or terrorists to enter the US

11. Large numbers of undocumented persons creates a favorable environment for professional criminals or terrorists to stay in the US undetected

12. Illegal aliens generally do not obtain auto insurance or valid driving licenses and often flee accident scenes

13. Illegal immigration leads to pressure for amnesty which will lead to further pressure on border security in the future

14. Illegal immigrants generally do not assimilate and threaten political and social cohesion in the US

15. Illegal immigrants are at high risk for injury and death from natural causes and professional criminals while trying to illegally enter the US

16. Money earned by illegal immigrants is usually sent abroad and is lost to the US economy

17. Illegal immigrants are especially vulnerable to exploitation by professional criminals

18. Large flows of illegal persons over the border are causing environmental damage to the border area

19. Large numbers of undocumented persons creates a favorable environment for professional criminals or terrorists to use false identities enabling them to flee back to their home countries without any consequence for crimes committed in the US

20. Creation of an underclass performing labor regarded as undignified and poorly paid leads to a loss of respect for work and threatens the US work ethic

21. Uneven distribution of benefits (federal) and costs (state and local) creates conflict between different levels of government leading to poor enforcement of existing laws

22. Hasty efforts to regularize the status of undocumented illegal immigrants will create opportunities for professional criminals and terrorists to obtain fraudulent identities backed by actual government documents

No Brag, Just Fact

2006-10-09T06:06:00.000-07:00

IR1 Scoops the New York Times

OK compare the dates on the NYT story and my next post below. The NYT took a lot more words but they are saying the same thing. Only they are saying it five days later. Gloat.
I am reproducing the entire NYT story here because it will go behind their archive wall pretty soon. I think this is a legitimate use because I am using it, with accreditation, to comment on one difference between MSM and the blogosphere: we're faster.

New York Times Story Follows

Evangelicals Blame Foley, Not Republican Party
Gary C. Knapp for The New York Times
Published: October 9, 2006

VIRGINIA BEACH, Oct. 7 — As word of Representative Mark Foley’s sexually explicit e-mail messages to former pages spread last week, Republican strategists worried — and Democrats hoped — that the sordid nature of the scandal would discourage conservative Christians from going to the polls
But in dozens of interviews here in southeastern Virginia, a conservative Christian stronghold that is a battleground in races for the House and Senate, many said the episode only reinforced their reasons to vote for their two Republican incumbents in neck-and-neck re-election fights, Representative Thelma Drake and Senator George Allen.
“This is Foley’s lifestyle,” said Ron Gwaltney, a home builder, as he waited with his family outside a Christian rock concert last Thursday in Norfolk. “He tried to keep it quiet from his family and his voters. He is responsible for what he did. He is paying a price for what he did. I am not sure how much farther it needs to go.”
The Democratic Party is “the party that is tolerant of, maybe more so than Republicans, that lifestyle,” Mr. Gwaltney said, referring to homosexuality.
Most of the evangelical Christians interviewed said that so far they saw Mr. Foley’s behavior as a matter of personal morality, not institutional dysfunction.
All said the question of broader responsibility had quickly devolved into a storm of partisan charges and countercharges. And all insisted the episode would have little impact on their intentions to vote.
It is too soon to tell if the scandal will affect the turnout of evangelical Christians, who make up about a quarter of the electorate and more than a third of Republican voters. Some of President Bush’s political advisers have said that pre-election reports in 2000 that Mr. Bush was once arrested for drunken driving depressed turnout among conservative Christians, nearly costing him the White House.
Pollsters and conservative leaders have said for months that grass-roots evangelicals were demoralized by what they felt was the Republicans’ failure to live up to their talk about social issues — to say nothing of the economy, the Iraq war and other issues that weigh more broadly across the electorate. A recent poll by the Pew Research Center showed a steep drop in conservative Christian support for Republicans, albeit without a corresponding gain for the Democrats.
Some in the crowd waiting outside the concert, by the evangelical group MercyMe, said the revelations about Mr. Foley, Republican of Florida, had redoubled their previous concerns about the Republican Party.
“The Republicans need to tighten up their ship,” said Wade Crane, a sign maker from Virginia Beach who said he usually voted Republican but had soured on the party in the last several months. “They need to stop covering themselves, using their power to protect themselves.”
Charles W. Dunn, dean of the school of government at Regent University, founded here by the religious broadcaster Pat Robertson, said that so many conservative Christians were already in a funk about the party that “the Foley issue just opens up the potential floodgate for losses.” The tawdry accusations, Mr. Dunn said, “give life” to the charges of Republican corruption that had been merely “latent” in the minds of many voters.
But as far as culpability in the Foley case, Mr. Dunn said, House Republicans may benefit from the evangelical conception of sin. Where liberals tend to think of collective responsibility, conservative Christians focus on personal morality. “The conservative Christian audience or base has this acute moral lens through which they look at this, and it is very personal,” Mr. Dunn said. “This is Foley’s personal sin.”
To a person, those interviewed said that Speaker J. Dennis Hastert of Illinois should resign if he knew of the most serious claims against Mr. Foley and failed to stop him. They said the degree of Mr. Hastert’s responsibility remained to be seen. Many said the issue had not changed their view of Congress because, in their opinion, it could not sink any lower.
But all also noted that the swift Democratic efforts to broaden the scandal to Mr. Hastert and other Republicans had added more than a whiff of partisanship to the stink of the scandal.
As the details were emerging last Tuesday, for example, Phil Kellam, the Democrat challenging Ms. Drake, called on her to demand Mr. Hastert’s immediate resignation. In a statement, Mr. Kellam said the House Republican leaders’ “lack of attention” was “perhaps more shocking” than what Mr. Foley had done.
Drew Lankford, a spokesman for Mr. Kellam, said the attacks on Ms. Drake had “painted her into a corner” because she was unwilling to denounce Mr. Hastert. Ms. Drake has said she will wait for a thorough investigation into what Mr. Hastert knew. (The matter has come up less in the Senate race between Mr. Allen and Jim Webb, the Democrat.)
Brian Courtney, a Republican-leaning sales manager attending the concert, said the Foley affair had led to “the kind of mudslinging one would expect to see at an election time like this.” He added that he was paying closer attention to the “values and character” of the candidates, and that he would probably vote Republican again.
Republicans have put up a vigorous defense, mainly through conservative allies and on talk radio. An e-mail message to talk-radio hosts from the Republican Party last week asked, “How would Democrats react if one of their own had a sexual relationship with an intern, was found out, then lied to a grand jury in an attempt to cover it up?”
Rush Limbaugh devoted much of his airtime to the Democrats’ defense of President Bill Clinton in the Monica Lewinsky scandal. Sean Hannity focused on former Representative Gerry Studds, a Massachusetts Democrat who in 1983 admitted having sex with a teenage male page, won re-election and served several more terms with the support of his colleagues.
Still, many conservative churchgoers said that what stood out for them was not the politics but the individual sin. “It is not going to affect my vote because I don’t live in Florida,” said Scott O’Connell, a mechanical engineer who described himself as a fundamentalist. “But there is a bigger moral issue which I would say is the prism I view this through: I do not believe in homosexuality.”
David Thomas, a father taking his family to the concert, said that he, too, was leaning toward voting Republican and that the scandal only reinforced his conservative Christian convictions. “That is the problem we have in society,” Mr. Thomas said. “Nobody polices anybody. Everybody has a ‘right’ to do whatever.”
In an interview on Friday, Pastor Anne Gimenez of the 15,000-member Rock Church here said the scandal “doesn’t change the issues we are voting on,” like abortion, public expression of religion and same-sex marriage.
The church has been actively registering parishioners and reminding them to vote. “Every Sunday already,” Ms. Gimenez said.

Not Perfect, Forgiven

2006-10-04T09:54:00.000-07:00

Democrats are Tone Deaf on Foley Scandal

This is just a quick post about the topic of the day, the Mark Foley scandal. Specifically this is about the democratic party reaction to the scandal and why I don’t see it as playing out the way they seem to expect.

I won’t recount the details of the scandal itself but while driving my daughter to school this morning I heard a democratic party spokesman on the radio claiming this scandal would “cut directly to the Christian right base of the Republican party and make them question their support for George Bush”. I also read this Townhall article about how the democrats have already launched an ad campaign centered on Foley. It’s pretty obvious the democrats are hoping this scandal will cause Christians conservatives to stay home in disgust and hand the election to democrat candidates. I think this betrays a profound misunderstanding of how Christians think.

I am a Christian and consider myself an evangelical Christian, although not always a very good one and that’s really key to what I want to say. The democrats seem to think that Christians will recoil in disgust at Foley’s transgressions. However knowing that “all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God” is so ingrained in Christians that I don’t believe most will either recoil in shocked horror or see a particularly political dimension in this. It's just ordinary human weakness.

Obviously Mark Foley’s weaknesses have caught up with him and his behavior must, I believe, be called sinful. As an added note I personally am totally unsympathetic to homosexual inclinations or behavior. In Foley’s case it’s right that he should lose his job. I hope he is sincere in confessing and repenting his sins. However Christians must heed the call to “hate the sin and love the sinner”. For Christians that insulates not only the republican party but even Foley himself from the sort of animus the democrats seem to expect. Being motivated by hatred is completely un-Christian. The democrats just don’t seem to get it

Tribute to 9/11 Victim Joseph J Berry

2006-09-11T05:32:00.000-07:00

Part of the 2996 Tribute Project

A proper tribute to Joseph J Berry must start with his family for he valued his family above all else as this article and this make clear. But along with being a wonderful husband and father he was also an extraordinarily successful executive and it is this aspect of Joseph J Berry I wish to expand on.

Just to get some perspective on the outline and dimension of his success in business consider this simple listing of the various job titles he held throughout his career:
Men’s Clothing Salesman
Math Teacher
Vice President of Equity Sales
Senior Vice-President
Executive Vice-president
President and Chief Operating Officer
Co-Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of the Board

His early position as a math teacher hints at his analytical ability and indeed Joseph Berry spent his career in the arcane world of financial institutions and their incredibly complex transactions. In this world he not only mastered the technical details, a daunting feat itself, but added two other important dimensions, the human and strategic perspectives.

His continuing involvement and success in equity sales speaks to his ability to build strong personal relationships with his customers. His position at the highly respected firm of Keefe, Bruyette and Woods gave him excellent products to sell that created real value for his clients. Nevertheless, the nature of sales work always requires personally facing difficult situations without the resources to control the outcome. Those without the empathy to truly understand the customer, the fortitude to sustain their own energy and optimism, and the strength of character to maintain their integrity, cannot enjoy lasting success in this challenging field. Joseph J Berry however, possessed all of these traits in abundance.

His ability to lead through consensus also speaks to his mastery of the human and strategic elements in business. Managing highly skilled professionals, such as the traders and analysts employed at Keefe, Bruyette and Woods has been quite properly compared to herding cats. Only someone with the ability to let all employees know their opinions had been heard and respected combined with the ability to find the key common elements to set a vision and strategies providing daily guidance to employees and keeping the firm moving in the right direction can be successful. Again, Joseph J Berry possessed these abilities in abundance.

Finally the continuing success of the firm he ultimately headed speaks to Joseph Berry’s abilities as an executive. From its founding in 1962 through to today Keefe, Bruyette and Woods has enjoyed both steady financial growth and the respect of customers and even competitors. As one of the early employees, hired in 1972, and as a leading member of the management team who helped to set and implement strategic direction, Joseph J Berry was a key contributor to the firm’s outstanding success.

With these outstanding achievements it is no wonder that for the last two years of his life Joseph Berry was honored as one of the top fifty Irishmen on Wall Street by Irish America Magazine. Although he always placed his family first he achieved an uncommon level of success in his career. Doing both so well made him a truly extraordinary person.

Relax and Give France a Chance

2006-08-26T09:52:00.000-07:00

Who Knows?

One of the things America and Americans are said to be is pragmatic. As individuals and as a nation willing to put aside fancy theories and preconceived conclusions in favor of what actually works. So now we have a chance to put this national predilection to work for us in a gigantic experiment conceived and largely funded by Iran, Israel and the European Union. I am speaking, of course, of Lebanon.
As everyone knows the outcome of fighting in Lebanon has been inconclusive and the resulting situation fluid. France, with US backing, has assumed the lead role in attempting to manage the outcome. So far so good but almost immediately France was accused of failing to carry out the responsibilities it had shouldered, mostly by volunteering what was regarded as too few troops. I suggest that this criticism amounts to expecting the French to act like a bunch of Americans with French accents.
One of the really basic principles of conducting an experiment is to try something and see what happens. Arguments I can think of against this approach fall into two main categories. One, its been tried so many times before there’s no chance of learning anything new. Two, the outcome is too important to take a chance on. It doesn’t seem either exactly applies here. True France’s track record of success in foreign endeavors over the last fifty years or so is pretty dismal. On the other hand so many new factors are in play now that it can be argued that the pattern may not hold.
First, there is at least some reasonable threat of a far more muscular response from Israel or even a direct confrontation between Iran and the US somewhere down the line if France fails. Second the configuration of Islamic forces seems to change like a kaleidoscope, frequently and abruptly falling into totally new patterns. Is this instability a weakness to be exploited or some sort of self-organizing strength? If it is a weakness how can it be used? We don’t seem to have really figured this out so why not let someone else take a shot? Third, there is a lot of activity on the surface in the Middle East and it is logical to assume this means a high level of less visible changes we should not expect to immediately see or understand. Possibly just one key new perception can have an enormous effect on outcomes.
The other argument, that a poor outcome is too big a risk doesn’t seem to apply either. Hizbollah is significant to Lebanon and Israel and as a proxy for Iran but that is about the extent of it. Lebanon is obviously not the only opportunity for the US to confront Iran and Islamic fascism in general so leaving it to the French doesn’t foreclose all other options. Israel can pretty much be relied on not to allow itself to be destroyed by even a well armed group of terrorists with very limited offensive military capability. At worst if France fails we move back a couple of squares in the ongoing struggle with the larger forces of Islamic fascism.
In Iraq the US has tried an approach that is pretty much typically American. I don’t mean to imply that is was not multilateral to some extent or that American efforts in Iraq entirely lack subtlety. In fact though, 500 lb JDAM bombs may be precise but lack the nuances you can get from even one Frenchman, let alone the several thousand they are proposing to send to Lebanon. So why not wait and see what sort of results we get from this experiment?

Layers of Editors

2006-08-21T05:06:00.000-07:00

Just Being Snarky
I found this article on the BBC website this morning August 21, 2006. I guess that last sentence is an example of the high quality of writing you get when you have the "layers of editors" the MSM is so proud of, instead of just a guy in pajamas like me.

Saudi Arabian security forces have surrounded a building holding suspected militants in the west coast city of Jeddah, Saudi's commercial capital.
There have been exchanges of fire in the al-Jamea area of the city.
The suspected militants took refuge in the building after being chased by police, interior ministry spokesman General Mansur al-Turki said.
Saudi Arabia has been battling a wave of violence by militants linked to the al-Qaeda organisation.
There have been a series of attacks and bombings in Saudi Arabia over the last three years. In the most bloody of these, 35 people were killed in a attack on three residential compounds in Riyadh in May 2003.
In February this year, a suicide attack on was foiled on major oil production facility in the eastern town of Abqaiq was foiled.

Mr. Naverrette Thinks You're a Racist

2006-08-12T23:54:00.000-07:00

The following editorial on CNN bothered me so much I had to put it up and reply to it. I am reproducing it in its entirety for the purpose of commenting on each section. My comments are in italics. The original article is in regular font.

Navarrette: What really bothers immigration foes
By Ruben Navarrette Jr.
Special to CNN

Ruben Navarrette: The Hutchison-Pence proposal reveals what motivates immigration restrictionists.

SAN DIEGO, California (CNN) -- Immigration restrictionists can be so dishonest.
They've said all along that all they care about is that border security be the first priority of any immigration reform plan and that illegal immigrants not be given amnesty. They insisted that they aren't motivated by racism and that they have no problem with immigrants, if they are here legally.
Now we learn otherwise in light of the opposition to a middle-ground immigration reform plan proposed by two anti-amnesty, pro-border security Republicans: Rep. Mike Pence of Indiana and Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas.

First, by asserting that border security and amnesty is "all" illegal immigration opponents admit to caring about Mr. Naverrette tries to make it appear concern for the cultural heritage of this country is a shameful hidden agenda. In fact that concern and doubts about the willingness of purely economic immigrants to assimilate is an important part of the debate. Second he attempts to narrow the scope of legitimate opposition to a question of legal status as if the qualifications for legal status are unimportant. However how and when immigrants can become citizens is the heart of the debate.

Anti-amnesty Republicans in Congress come in three flavors. There are the opportunists who view the issue as red meat that will inspire GOP voters in November. There are the nativists who are frightened over how Latinos affect the culture and who have taken it on as their crusade to reverse that trend. And there are the pragmatists who are willing to work for a bipartisan agreement that fixes a broken immigration system.

OK this trick of classifying your opponents into categories that fit your argument is so stale I won’t comment on it except to point out the further attack on concern over assimilation of immigrants. Perhaps he should ask the French if unassimilated immigrants can be a problem.

Pence and Hutchison are pragmatists. They came up with this: As the first priority, secure the U.S.-Mexico border. For the first two years after the bill becomes law, the emphasis would be on beefing up the border patrol. Once that happens, it would be up to the president to certify to Congress that the border is secure.

Since the president has, unfortunately, demonstrated he is unabashedly in favor of legalization under terms so liberal that it borders on outright amnesty why should his certification be at all reassuring. (Note, check into fox and henhouse.)

Then we'd move on to goal No. 2: establishment of a guest-worker program that would require millions of illegal immigrants in the United States to return to their home country for a couple of weeks to register at privately run "Ellis Island"-type placement centers, where they would receive temporary work visas that could be renewed every two years for a maximum of 12 years.

Why is establishment of a guest worker program a goal? The goal is to get control of illegal immigration. If a guest worker program could do that then it could be considered. Otherwise it's just a way to wave a magic wand and pronounce millions of illegal immigrants "legal". (Note pay no attention to the man behind the curtain. Just click your ruby slippers and say "There's no place like home...as long as it's in the US")

At that point, workers convert to a new type of visa. And then, in five years -- or 17 years after enrolling in the program -- we'd move on to goal No. 3 in which workers could apply for U.S. citizenship.

Mr. Naverrette uses the length of time, 17 years, to make it seem as if the proposed program has stringent requirements. The problem is other than one little joy ride back to their home country the illegal immigrants will still be in this country the entire time. What's so stringent about that? And again, why is it a goal to grant illegal immigrants citizenship through a charade of legalistic machinations.

You would think that GOP hard-liners could live with this. You'd be wrong. The Pence-Hutchison plan is under fire. Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Alabama, criticized it for favoring low-skilled workers and not offering preference to immigrants who speak English.
And, during an interview last week with The San Diego Union-Tribune editorial board, House Judiciary Committee Chairman James Sensenbrenner, R-Wisconsin, flirted with nativism when he said that his concern is that the plan would provide "unlimited immigration from Mexico and Central America."
Now we're getting to the heart of the matter.

You know I actually agree with that last sentence. This is the heart of the matter. If you think it is legitimate for a country to determine who it will accept as an immigrant and potential citizen based on the country's own best interest then, according to Mr. Naverrette you are a racist. If you think that it is legitimate for a country to allocate a reasonable quota of immigration slots to various other countries then, according to Mr Naverrette, you are a racist. In short it seems if you don’t agree that US immigration policies should be set in Latin America for that regions sole benefit then, according to Mr Naverrette, you are a racist.

The Hutchison-Pence plan forces the anti-amnesty crowd to level finally with the rest of us about what really bothers them. If it is that people are here illegally, or that the border isn't secure, then the plan has that covered.

Note the technical definition of "illegally". Same people, doing the same thing but now it's different because they all jumped through Hutchison-Pence's magic hoop. And if you don’t believe that then you must be a racist.

But if it's the fear that Anglo-Saxon culture and the English language are being eroded by Spanish-speaking foreigners, and that the country is going down the tubes because of it -- then this plan doesn't offer much relief.

This country combines many other cultures than just Anglo-Saxon but the key word is "combines". The problem with illegal immigrants with purely economic motivation is that they don't combine. They live in little isolated enclaves that weaken the overall social fabric (I hate that term but it really fits here).

After all, under it, the immigrants get to be legal, but they also get to stay. For some people, that's the real problem. As far as those people are concerned, the Hutchison-Pence plan doesn't offer much comfort.

At this point Mr. Naverrette doesn’t even bother to address why adding tens of millions of unassimilated illegal immigrants should not be considered a problem. Again if you are opposed to the idea then you must be a racist.

What it does offer is something this debate could use more of: clarity.

What's clear is Mr Naverrette's whole goal is to smear and intimidate anyone who opposes this latest fraud with the term racist. Would Mr Naverrette look his opponents in the eye and call them racists for disagreeing with him? If so he does not understand the whole illegal immigration debate. There's plenty of evidence for that here. But if not, then this editorial is a despicable, hypocritical, piece of work.

Why Israel Fights

2006-08-09T22:41:00.000-07:00

Hat Tip to Powerline

Condi, Warrior Princess

2006-07-25T07:49:00.000-07:00

You can't make this stuff up!

From our pals at the Tehran Times we get the following gem. My response: Yes Condi Rice is a warrior princess fit to rule over the hearts and minds of men (particularly).
I think what really annoyed the Iranians was the way Condi played their own negotiating tactics back to them through Lebanon. Sort of like, "Well we'd really like to discuss a cease fire but that's all, just discuss. We don't actually plan to do anything." Go Condi!

From the July 25, 2006 Tehran Times:

Condi, warrior princess, comes to town

By our staff writer
The warrior princess Condoleezza Rice began her trip to the Middle East so nonchalantly that it made everyone wonder what is really going on behind the scenes. It seems that she had been waiting until Israel completed the destruction of much of Lebanon’s civilian infrastructure, an assault which it initiated after receiving the green light from the U.S. administration. Ironically, after the murder of about 400 hundred people, mostly civilians, and billions of dollars in damage, she said a ceasefire is “urgent.” She also said she would not try to restore the status quo which existed before the ongoing conflict. "What we're seeing here, in a sense, is… the birth pangs of a new Middle East and, whatever we do, we have to be certain that we're pushing forward to the new Middle East, not going back to the old one."

The Tehran Times is not supposed to be a satire but I'm pretty sure these guys are going to be good for a lot of laughs.

Top 10 Reasons Why Kim Jong Il is a Loser

2006-07-05T10:55:00.000-07:00

Even Bozo Had Better Hair

After the North Koreans ludicrous failure at rocketry I thought I would encourage everyone to let Kim know just what we thought of him and his limp little rocket. The best email address I could find was the feedback line of the official North Korean News Agency: eng-info@kcna.co.jp . If anyone finds a better one please let me know.

Top 10 Reasons Why Kim Jong Il is a Loser

1. You only got your job because of your daddy
2. Your poofy hair is gay
3. You have the moral standards of an alien cockroach
4. Your clothes look like a dictator uniform from a bad 1950s movie
5. "Beloved Leader" is a name for either a dominatrix hooker or a fishing line
6. Even the Chinese are getting sick of you
7. Your country is so poor people save up to buy dirt...to eat!
8. You, on the other hand, have the physical conditioning of the Pilsbury doughboy
9. Your glasses are so thick they're bulletproof
10. Your rocket lasted 39 seconds longer than you do

Taliban Burns School

2006-06-10T05:30:00.000-07:00

Threaten to cut class next

This paragraph from an article on CNN caught my eye:

Taliban militants set fire to a school on June 3, in Uruzgan, the coalition command said..."

Now I don’t want to imply that burning a school is insignificant. However, in the last five years the Taliban have been reduced from ruling an entire country through terror, destroying historic cultural artifacts with high explosives, imposing repressive and archaic Sharia law on millions of people, and bragging about how they would put an end to Western civilization to: starting fires at school.

One of the enablers of the Islamist terrorist movement was a mistaken belief on the jihadis part that they were an especially potent force. This arose from a familiar litany, Afghanistan, Lebanon, Somalia, etc. This is an important part of their appeal so anything that helps point out how relatively weak they really are helps reduce their ability to attract recruits. Of course for this purpose nothing succeeds like repeatedly beating them down. And ridicule.

What's next for the Taliban, spit-wads?

Zarqawi You Dog!

2006-06-09T14:22:00.000-07:00

Just what kind of meeting was this?

Now from the BBC we have this statement from Major General William Caldwell providing more details about the death of terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi :

Zarqawi was one of six people killed in the raid, including two other men and three women, he added - contrasting with earlier statements that a child had died.

OK, Zarqawi plus two other men…hmmm, that's three men. And let's see, oh yeah, three women!

Is this kind of carrying on the sort of "spiritual advice" Abdel Rashid Rahman was providing to Zarqawi.

But seriously Islam is a sort of sex-crazed religion. I guess that reflects its founders personality since, after all, he did marry an 8 year old (or was it 6 I forget) so maybe we shouldn't be too surprised.

In honor of Zarqawi's demise I am reposting my last article about him dating from November 2004. I am glad to say it looks like he finally fought to the death, even if it was in a cowardly and immoral way.

Terror Leader Zarqawi Denies Fight to Death Flip Flop!
Cites PLO Leader Yassar Arafat as Role Model
Terrorist leader Al Zarqawi strongly defended his record on fighting to the death today despite critics’ claims that he has recently modified his position to accommodate changing political circumstances.
"I have said the exact same thing from the very beginning", Al Zarqawi claimed. "My position on fighting to the death has not changed once and I have been absolutely consistent. I completely support the idea of fighting to the death as long as it does not involve any risk of injury to me. My personal role model is the late PLO chairman Yassar Arafat who, although he spent an entire lifetime championing fighting to the death, died himself at a very advanced age in a French hospital surrounded by sympathetic toadies. That’s my idea of fighting to the death".
When questioned by reporters over what appeared to be clear changes in his position over the last several months Al Zarqawi claimed he was the victim of misunderstanding. "I never said I would fight to the death", he stated. "What I said is that I would fight until I was a little bit out of breath. The two words sound alike so when my remarks were translated it was understandable that there would be some confusion. I stand by my record, having run from Falluja so fast I was not only a little bit out of breath but was, in fact, completely winded. And I promise my supporters I will keep running at least that fast for the foreseeable future now that the US marines are chasing me."
When asked what effect his rapid departure from the battle of Falluja would have on those who remained behind to fight and die Al Zarqawi was unapologetic. "I have sent a message conveying my enthusiastic support for the terrorists in Falluja in their fight to the death. It is not important that the message was sent from a relatively secure location far from the actual battle, or that I composed the message while relaxing and enjoying a nice hot meal, or even that I received large sacks of cash from sympathetic governments in the region for carrying out my duties which included sending the message. The important thing is that I sent a message. This shows that I have continued to support fighting to the death. People who don’t appreciate the risks I take should know I received a serious paper cut from the message itself." Al Zarqawi then showed reporters the paper cut on his left little finger, covered by a purple heart band-aid.
When it was pointed out that many would interpret fighting to the death to mean actually continuing to fight personally until killed Al Zarqawi responded that the questioner clearly did not understand the meaning of the term as it is used by Islamic terrorists.

Two Can Play

2006-05-17T14:10:00.000-07:00

Rethinking “Guest Workers”

Like many conservatives I have been lukewarm, or less, on a so-called “guest worker” program. I had considered this little more than another way for President Bush to propose amnesty or “amnesty lite” under another name.

But today I had another thought. Since the administration does seem to be having some success with blurring the distinction between a “guest worker” program and a “path to legalization program”, which is pretty clearly an amnesty program, why don’t conservatives take advantage of this? In other words propose an immigration package that in fact includes a “guest worker” program but define it so that it actually means guest workers. This would tend to deflect the criticism that an “enforcement only” program would receive while actually helping to bring the border under control.

Taking this one step further I have a modest proposal that I think would be appealing to all sides. Let’s go ahead and automatically make ALL illegal aliens “guest workers”. In other words as of a certain date any undocumented person would automatically become a guest worker without any further effort on their part. The provisions of the guest worker program could then include a requirement to register within a period of time, say six months or a year, in order to remain in the USA. Any undocumented person who is in the USA illegally and who does not register within the required time would be liable to deportation. Those who do register would receive documentation entitling them to remain in the USA for an additional period of time, say an additional year. After that time they would be required to leave the country for some short period before re-entering as guest workers.

Naturally as participants in a guest worker program any children born to registered or unregistered guest workers would not become American citizens. Additionally participation in the guest worker program would have no impact on an eventual path to legalization. In other words the application to immigrate legally would still have to be made from the applicants home country through the normal process.

I think this proposal has a little something for everybody. It would immediately upgrade the status of all illegal aliens from “undocumented” to “deferred documentation”. It would allow guest workers to stay for fairly long periods before having to return to their home countries. It would completely avoid the problem of non-participation by simply including all undocumented persons. It would enable guest workers to be covered under minimum wage laws both avoiding their exploitation and raising unskilled wages generally. It would eliminate the problem of “anchor babies”. And by requiring periodic returns to their home country it would insure guest workers retain ties to their country of origin and citizenship.

That’s the idea in a nutshell. One of the refrains you hear over and over in this debate is the need to “get control of the border”. So let’s make every single undocumented person in the USA a guest worker and define exactly what that does and doesn’t entitle them to. That’s control.

A Man Under Authority

2006-05-15T17:18:00.000-07:00

Going and Coming….

When I first heard that President Bush was planning to make a speech on immigration tonight, and heard the speculation that it would mark a shift in his position away from amnesty and towards enforcement I felt that he had finally heard the message from the American people. However the more I though about the proposal to place National Guard troops on the border the less impressed I was with it. Why is that? Let me give you chapter and verse, Matthew: Chapter 8, Verse 9 to be specific:

For I am a man under authority, having soldiers under me: and I say to this man, Go, and he goeth; and to another, Come, and he cometh….Matthew 8:9 KJV

So if President Bush tells the National Guard to “go” to the border how long will it be before he tells them to “come” on home?

That’s the advantage of a wall. It might not be perfect. It might get a few holes poked in it. It might not stop everybody. But once you put it somewhere that’s where it’s going to stay.

Frankly I am now suspicious that this is another Republican “bait and switch” and that the guard troops will be nothing but another promise for conservatives while the big money gets the programs, and the cheap illegal workers.

Yes We Can...what?

2006-04-10T22:22:00.000-07:00

Memphis, April 10, 2006
There were two things in the air at the rally for illegal immigrants at the National Civil Rights Center in Memphis today, hope and fear. Fear is never far when you are living illegally in a foreign country but hope is elusive. When the speakers on the local stage in Memphis spoke, in Spanish, of America as a country of immigrants where decent people could live, work and raise their families in peace and dignity the hot run-down streets around the museum were filled with it. But when the speakers on a bigger national stage speak of making it a felony to be in the country illegally hope vanishes to be replaced by fear. Both emotions can bring people to action, or a political rally, and the size of the crowd proved their potency. I estimated the crowd at three to four thousand when the rally started at 3:00 PM
]

but by 3:40 PM I estimated the crowd at about five thousand and when I left at 4:15 PM the crowd had grown to about seven thousand and people were still arriving as quickly as when I came. Despite a number of families and children the crowd was overwhelmingly male and young. I estimated that better than ninety percent of the crowd was men and the average age appeared to be under thirty.

I had planned to spend some time trying to determine the percentage of “undocumented” immigrants. I thought this would be a touchy subject and I was right, sort of. The first two people I talked with, Alberto and his friend who preferred to remain anonymous did not volunteer their own status. However they readily responded to my questions, in broken and heavily accented English, estimating that over ninety percent of the crowd was “undocumented”. This raises at least one tough question: what does it mean to a political movement when your supporters, by definition, do not have a political voice? Will politicians listen to people who can never vote for them? Why should they? And if they do does that serve or betray their actual constituents? Whoops, that's four questions. This is tough.

Of course any politician that tried to listen to the crowd at this rally had better speak Spanish. Not only were nearly all the speeches in Spanish, easily overwhelming my minimal ability, the crowd’s lack of English skills made getting reactions to the speeches in real time impossible. Only one of the actual speakers used English. At one point I thought I heard someone echoing a Spanish speaker’s remarks in English, which I thought a good idea. I had it backwards though. The organizers had not found it necessary to provide a translation of Spanish remarks but were thoughtfully translating English remarks. At least you have to give them credit for knowing their audience.

And if politicians do listen what would they hear? “Yo soy creo en Dios”, I heard one speaker say, following this affirmation of faith with some remarks about God not permitting injustice and then a sentence or two later the name Martin Luther King. I could understand where he was going with that and the crowd’s enthusiastic reaction indicated the popularity of either God or Martin Luther King or, more probably, both. Another crowd pleaser was a black speaker who extolled the alliance started “in 1967 between blacks, browns, reds and yellows”, and ended with “Gracias mi hermanos”, to sustained cheers. The endless repetitions of the chant, “Si se puede” show they intend to do something, but what? Is the crowd cheering the political sub-text or are they just glad of anything that looks like an offer of assistance?
]
The political sub-text is definitely there. I spoke with Dan Driscoll of the Service Workers Union and found myself on the receiving end of a polished presentation about the immorality of making it a felony to be or assist an illegal immigrant. The power of this argument is that most people remain opposed to jailing the good Samaritan. And according to Dan the real problems caused by illegal immigration would be solved by just changing the law and thus preventing the “exploitation” of these “workers”. However I also spoke with Jason, one of a group of black men carrying a sign reading, “How dare you desecrate our holy place, what’s wrong with Mexico.” Jason said the rally, ”is like someone cutting in front of you in the lunch line and I’m getting further and further back. And by the time I get up to the front all the real meat will be gone.” His associate, Sam, said that where Martin Luther King Jr. had promised to overcome. “These people threaten to overwhelm. This is their shock and awe.”

Despite that, one thing that was thankfully missing was hate. Security was tight but it wasn’t really needed. Even without it the crowd was polite, orderly and respectful. One could suspect that the word had gone out to restrain any anti-American speech and to bring US flags instead of Mexican. The event organizers were handing out miniature US flags as fast as they could and they actually had two singers sing "The Star Spangled Banner". Twice.

Still there was no sense of suppressed anger. As I wandered through the crowd in the streets and small park in front of the National Civil Rights Museum looking for reactions I found no hostility but just the normal reticence born of fear, and the eagerness to be heard born of hope. Hope that by explaining why America should allow them to stay their dreams would become real.

I could see hope and fear struggle on the face of Guillermina Hernandez when I asked her if she would like to give me any reaction to the rally. Here eyes remained impassive at first, until she was convinced I would really listen to and report her words. Then her face lit up with eagerness as she struggled to say, “We come here because we need America people to respect us. We been living here seven years and we love America. This United States I like for my daughter and sons and for my family.” And Estrada, one of a group of young men who finally decided to speak to me said, “All the Mexicans, we are together. We only want to work. We don’t want nothing else.” That sounds a lot like at least part of the American dream but is it enough? What is America’s capacity to absorb so many? What of those who have already stood in line waiting for their turn? And why should Mexico fail to profit from the labor of so many of its own citizens?

Mañana. Today hope was clearly ascendant, as the crowd believed together, “Yes we can.”

Fence First Frist

2006-04-08T09:52:00.000-07:00

The House is Burning
Let me tell you something about myself. For years I have been a single-issue voter. The one issue I judged every politician on was gun control. I thought Arnold Schwarzenegger was terrific until he supported the .50 caliber ban. After that I didn't care what he said or did I would rather vote for a sausage. Well just this last week I finally made what was, for me, a momentous decision: I'm switching issues. From now on my issue is illegal immigration.

I have to briefly apologize to and thank the NRA. The terrific job they have done is partly what allows me to switch since that battle is just about completely won. And maybe someday they'll be my number one political concern again. And I always enjoyed getting the frequent NRA-ILA-PVF solicitations even when the threats of registration and confiscation started to seem a little far-fetched. (Please don’t get mad and take away my life membership guys.)

But it seems to me that illegal immigration is now the bigger threat and it can only be dealt with by the same sort of single-minded focus that the NRA brings to the gun control issue.

I am not opposed to legal immigrants or any ethnic group. I work in the electronics manufacturing industry where immigrants, legal and illegal, are common. Nearly all have been hard-working, upstanding people that I was glad to know. And having seen it first hand, as well as having heard it directly from their mouths, I am completely sympathetic to the often horrific reality in their home countries. Just seeing the surprising weight loss people would often show after a lengthy visit home to Mexico dramatizes the advantages of our economic and political system, to say nothing of the number who have lost friends and relatives to murderous corruption, criminal violence, and deadly political rivalries in their home country. I understand these people have a world of trouble on their backs. That does not convey the right to break our laws.

Illegal immigration threatens our country on so many levels you need a program to keep track of it. It threatens us with criminal violence, since career criminals and gangs mix easily in a transient population with no legitimate identification who are forced to maintain shadowy connections to criminal enterprises to enter and remain here illegally. For the same reason it threatens us with rich opportunities for terrorists. It threatens our economy. Not the capital "E" Economy that politicians talk about but the real economy that average Americans face when they or their friends or relatives can't get an entry level job at a wage that will pay the bills. It threatens the rule of law when different levels of our own government not only embrace the concept that some laws are not to be enforced, but actively work to subvert the law. It threatens our political democracy when we allow illegal foreign nationals to vote in our elections.

Worst it threatens what is most important to our country, the entire concept of America, and being an American. This is a country of immigrants. American identity is not based on a particular ethnic group. This country relies on a shared concept of itself, its citizens and its destiny, to remain the United States. America can not survive without the very concepts that entrenched populations of unassimilated illegal immigrants will destroy. Unlike nearly any other country America welcomes immigrants with only two conditions. Come legally and come with the intent to become an American.

As I write this the compromise bill sponsored by senator Frist appears dead for this session but like a zombie vampire the "path to legalization" approach will certainly return to life. It's bad enough pairing this fallacy to the popular and needed strengthening of our border security, a classic "bait and switch", but what's worse is that the "path to legalization" is just the thin edge of the wedge of amnesty. Just as the NRA understands that gun registration, no matter how reasonable it is made to appear, is always the path to confiscation we need to understand that "legalization" will always result in amnesty for lawbreakers, and an ultimate worsening of our crisis.

When it comes to illegal immigration our national house is burning. We don't need to figure out how to put up smoke detectors. We need to put out the fire by stopping illegal immigration. We need to stop it at the border. We need to stop it at employers. We need to stop it with enforcement at the local government level. We need to enlist every possible approach to stop this raging fire that threatens to consume the fabric of our country.

New Mohammed Cartoon

2006-02-07T21:30:00.000-08:00

The cartoon that should have been made from the pig caller
With apologies to the pig caller (and the pig) ...

Well I'm not an artist so I was at a loss as to how I would show my solidarity with my Danish brothers and sisters (actually no kidding my great-grandmother on my Dad's side came over from Denmark on a boat). Then I saw an article exposing one of the "extra" cartoons as a flimsy fraud derived from, of all things, a picture of a competitor in a pig calling contest.
Carefully comparing the original image to the cartoon created from it I was able to detect absolutely no sign of imagination or a sense of humor. My opportunity was at hand. Here is the cartoon the Danish imams should have created.

Talk Back to bin Laden

2006-01-20T05:15:00.000-08:00

Fun with Today's Headlines

I realize this won’t do one single thing to advance the level of discussion on the GWOT but how often do you get a chance to talk back to the head terrorist? AND as a special added bonus I'm making this a "living document". If any of my 3 or 4 faithful readers posts their own reply to one of bin-Ladens statements I'll paste their comment into the document. Go ahead and talk back to Mr. Nutso himself. I know it's hard to avoid but no profanity please.

My message to you is about the war in Iraq and Afghanistan and the way to end it.
Thanks but we already have a plan. It includes you and a 6 foot deep hole.

I had not intended to speak to you about this issue, because, for us, this issue is already decided on: diamonds cut diamonds.
We agree it's decided. It will only be over when you're all dead or in Gitmo for life.

Praise be to God, our conditions are always improving and becoming better, while your conditions are to the contrary of this.
You might want to check with your staff on this, if you can find any of them alive.

However, what prompted me to speak are the repeated fallacies of your President Bush in his comment on the outcome of the US opinion polls, which indicated that the overwhelming majority of you want the withdrawal of the forces from Iraq, but he objected to this desire and said that the withdrawal of troops would send a wrong message to the enemy.
Wait a minute, your conditions are improving and Bush is the one with the fallacies. Have you stopped taking your medicine?

Bush said: It is better to fight them on their ground than they fighting us on our ground.
In my response to these fallacies, I say: The war in Iraq is raging, and the operations in Afghanistan are on the rise in our favour, praise be to God.
You sound like the fleas planning to take over the dog.

The Pentagon figures indicate the rise in the number of your dead and wounded, let alone the huge material losses, and let alone the collapse of the morale of the soldiers there and the increase in the suicide cases among them.
So, just imagine the state of psychological breakdown that afflicts the soldier while collecting the remnants of his comrades' dead bodies after they hit mines, which torn them. Following such situation, the soldier becomes between two fires. If he refuses to go out of his military barracks for patrols, he will face the penalties of the Vietnam butcher, and if he goes out, he will face the danger of mines.
More like they can't wait to get out and grease the next terrorist.

So, he is between two bitter situations, something which puts him under psychological pressure - fear, humiliation, and coercion. Moreover, his people are careless about him. So, he has no choice but to commit suicide.
What you hear about him and his suicide is a strong message to you, which he wrote with his blood and soul while pain and bitterness eat him up so that you would save what you can save from this hell. However, the solution is in your hand if you care about them.
Air strikes!

The news of our brother mujahideen, however, is different from what is published by the Pentagon.
This news indicates that what is carried by the news media does not exceed what is actually taking place on the ground. What increases doubts on the information of the White House's administration is its targeting of the news media, which carry some facts about the real situation.
That paragraph doesn’t inspire a lot of confidence in whatever's coming next. It must have lost a lot in translation.

Documents have recently showed that the butcher of freedom in the world [US President Bush] had planned to bomb the head office of al-Jazeera Space Channel in the state of Qatar after he bombed its offices in Kabul and Baghdad, although despite its defects, it is [Al-Jazeera] one of your creations.
"Space Channel"? Does that make al-Jazeera's listeners space cadets? (Cheap shot I know Osama but you really left yourself open there)

Jihad is continuing, praise be to God, despite all the repressive measures the US army and its agents take to the point where there is no significant difference between these crimes and those of Saddam.
These crimes include the raping of women and taking them hostage instead of their husbands. There is no power but in God.
The torturing of men has reached the point of using chemical acids and electric drills in their joints. If they become desperate with them, they put the drill on their heads until death.
Oh, the big lie technique. But if you're going to use that show a little imagination. Don’t just rehash your own techniques. Accuse Bush of something only the Americans could do, like strapping Qaeda prisoners to the space shuttle before launch. That would be more believable.

If you like, read the humanitarian reports on the atrocities and crimes in the prisons of Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo.
I say that despite all the barbaric methods, they have failed to ease resistance, and the number of mujahideen, praise be to God, is increasing.
I guess you mean the number of mujahideen martyrs. There's certainly lots more of them. In this world though they're definitely thinning out.

In fact, reports indicate that the defeat and devastating failure of the ill-omened plan of the four - Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Wolfowitz - and the announcement of this defeat and working it out, is only a matter of time, which is to some extent linked to the awareness of the American people of the magnitude of this tragedy.
The wise ones know that Bush has no plan to achieve his alleged victory in Iraq.
OK, real slow here for the dimwits. The plan is to kill all you al-Qaeda guys.

If you compare the small number of the dead when Bush made that false and stupid show-like announcement from an aircraft carrier on the end of the major operations, to many times as much as this number of the killed and injured, who fell in the minor operations, you will know the truth in what I am saying, and that Bush and his administration do not have neither the desire nor the will to withdraw from Iraq for their own dubious reasons.
To go back to where I started, I say that the results of the poll satisfy sane people and that Bush's objection to them is false.
OK I get it. You're hoping Bush will be voted out and the next guy will cut and run. Two problems for you. Won’t happen and wouldn't help you if it did. Qaeda is already wobbling and will be nothing but charred splinters by 2008.

Reality testifies that the war against America and its allies has not remained confined to Iraq, as he claims.
In fact, Iraq has become a point of attraction and recruitment of qualified resources.
The good old terrorist magnet at work. Just like a big bug zapper.

On the other hand, the mujahideen, praise be to God, have managed to breach all the security measures adopted by the unjust nations of the coalition time and again.
The evidence of this is the bombings you have seen in the capitals of the most important European countries of this aggressive coalition.
Oh yeah, the stringent security measures on subways and commuter trains. Give yourselves a big pat on the back. Maybe next you can work up to attacking a school. Oh yeah, you already did that. Did you ever think of attacking actual military targets? That would be a lot more impressive.

As for the delay in carrying out similar operations in America, this was not due to failure to breach your security measures.
Operations are under preparation, and you will see them on your own ground once they are finished, God willing.
Boy that must be some elaborate plan. How long you been working on that?

Based on the above, we see that Bush's argument is false. However, the argument that he avoided, which is the substance of the results of opinion polls on withdrawing the troops, is that it is better not to fight the Muslims on their land and for them not to fight us on our land.
Duh. It would have been better for you not to start something you can’t finish. Too late now.

We do not object to a long-term truce with you on the basis of fair conditions that we respect.
Here's our conditions: you all lay down and die. We'd respect that.

We are a nation, for which God has disallowed treachery and lying.
So you're hoping we're too lazy to learn anything about Islam.

In this truce, both parties will enjoy security and stability and we will build Iraq and Afghanistan, which were destroyed by the war.
Iraq and Afghanistan are being built now, just without you. Anyway why should we make a deal when you're on the ropes?

There is no defect in this solution other than preventing the flow of hundreds of billions to the influential people and war merchants in America, who supported Bush's election campaign with billions of dollars.
Hence, we can understand the insistence of Bush and his gang to continue the war.
If you have a genuine will to achieve security and peace, we have already answered you.
When? How did I miss the answer? Why does this always happen to me? It's just like when everyone is talking about some TV show you've never seen. It's going to be so embarassing when people come up and ask me "Well what did you think of bin Laden's answer? Darn!

If Bush declines but to continue lying and practicing injustice [against us], it is useful for you to read the book of "The Rogue State", the introduction of which reads: If I were a president, I would halt the operations against the United States.
Well if I were head of al-Qaeda I'd halt operations against the US too. Where are we going with this?

First, I will extend my apologies to the widows, orphans, and the persons who were tortured. Afterwards, I will announce that the US interference in the world's countries has ended for ever.
Oh I see. We're going to fantasy-land. Do you spend a lot of time there?

Finally, I would like to tell you that the war is for you or for us to win. If we win it, it means your defeat and disgrace forever as the wind blows in this direction with God's help.
If you win it, you should read the history. We are a nation that does not tolerate injustice and seek revenge forever.
Days and nights will not go by until we take revenge as we did on 11 September, God willing, and until your minds are exhausted and your lives become miserable and things turn [for the worse], which you detest.
So you admit you're responsible for 9/11. We'll rest our minds when you're dead.

As for us, we do not have anything to lose. The swimmer in the sea does not fear rain. You have occupied our land, defiled our honour, violated our dignity, shed our blood, ransacked our money, demolished our houses, rendered us homeless, and tampered with our security. We will treat you in the same way.
In your dreams.

You tried to deny us the decent life, but you cannot deny us a decent death. Refraining from performing jihad, which is sanctioned by our religion, is an appalling sin. The best way of death for us is under the shadows of swords.
Would the shadow of a missile be OK?

Do not be deluded by your power and modern weapons. Although they win some battles, they lose the war. Patience and steadfastness are better than them. What is important is the outcome.
Duh. The battle is not always to the strong or the race to the swift but that's the way to bet.

We have been tolerant for 10 years in fighting the Soviet Union with our few weapons and we managed to drain their economy.
They became history, with God's help.
Yeah and the CIA's help. I would think you'd have realized by now your analysis of this bit of history is a little flawed.

You should learn lessons from that. We will remain patient in fighting you, God willing, until the one whose time has come dies first. We will not escape the fight as long as we hold our weapons in our hands.
Exactly right which is why we need to kill all of you fanatics.

I swear not to die but a free man even if I taste the bitterness of death. I fear to be humiliated or betrayed.
Peace be upon those who follow guidance.
With your record it's too late to worry about being humiliated. If you weren't humiliated when you got chased out of Afghanistan or when you got ground down to defeat in Iraq I'd say you're pretty much immune to embarassment

Heads I Win Tails You Lose

2006-01-14T06:47:00.000-08:00

How the Mullahs Hedge Their Nuclear Bets

Iran these days is a lot like the weather. Everybody talks about it but nobody does anything. A big part of the reason is nobody can figure out exactly what to do. Every potential course of action comes complete with a full set of serious obstacles and negative consequences. The mullahs may come off as almost comic figures with their robes and turbans and loony pronouncements but they are making the most of a pretty good hand. With that in mind the recent verbal fireworks from Iran's very own President "Mad Mahmoud" Ahmadinejad are worth special consideration. When an opponent who has been pretty clever in the past suddenly appears to turn dumb you have to ask what's up before jumping into a trap.
It's been pretty clear for at least a couple of years, to everybody except the Europeans, that the Iranians were playing the negotiating game as a stalling tactic. They've done this in a fully professional and skillful manner with appropriate flourishes and gestures of reasonableness. Against this background we are now treated to the spectacle of an Iranian President who boasts of the "aura" extending from his head while he threatens to wipe Israel off the map. What's up with that?
So now we game this out from the mullahs perspective. The basic facts that they are entrenched in power, awash with money and oil, but deeply unpopular with their own people are well known. Where are they on the Islamic bomb? Here we don’t know much and our recent experience in Iraq with "intelligence" estimates concerning WMDs should makes us suitably humble. Either they are close or far from completion of their own efforts and they may be anywhere from early negotiation to completed purchase of a black market nuke.
First let's look at the value to the mullahs of Iran's nuclear capability versus the potential actions of an opponent. The potential range of actions extends from doing nothing to sanctions to airstrikes. The value of a homegrown program increases as it gets closer to completion. The value of a purchased device is constant. A nuclear development program can be disrupted by airstrikes, reducing its value. A completed nuclear device is unlikely to be vulnerable to an airstrike. Sanctions can retard the progress of a development program but have no effect on a completed device.
Now consider the effect on the mullahs of the outcome of each potential action. Do nothing and their position increases in value by acquiring a device or completing their own program. Apply sanctions and the outcome is mixed. If they already have a device or are able to acquire or complete a device with sanctions in place their position increases in value. If sanctions effectively prevent their acquisition of a device their position decreases in value. Additionally sanctions are likely to have a negative effect on stability within Iran decreasing the value of the mullah's position.
Finally, airstrikes would decrease the value of the mullah's position only if they are close to completion of an Iranian nuclear development program. If their program is far from completion its value is low and airstrikes can’t affect a purchased device. Also airstrikes would likely strengthen the mullah's position within Iran as the population responded to an attack by rallying around the flag. Most unsettling, airstrikes would give the mullahs cover to use a device they already have.
The mullahs unleashing of mad Mahmoud suggest they either don’t care what their opponents do or possibly even prefer airstrikes over sanctions. This is inconsistent with a nuclear development program that is close to completion. It is consistent with a development program that is far from completion, a program to purchase a device or with possession of a purchased device. Any way you have to conclude these guys are tough players. We need more spooks.

Life, Liberty. and the Pursuit of Happiness

2005-12-20T23:03:00.000-08:00

It's not first by accident

We can all be glad the New York Times has jumped into the breach to protect our right to liberty. By going public with leaked top secret classified information about how the US government was monitoring a few dozen phone calls into or out of the United States, in order to prevent another 9/11, they have effectively shut down the program. As soon as I heard about it I thought, wow, this could be serious. I better take a minute and think about what the government may have found out about me.

I started by reviewing my phone calls for the day.

1. Called wife on her cell phone. No answer. Left message.
2. Daughter called. Talked about what she wants for Christmas. Talked in a loud, semi-coherent fashion. with her cousin while on the phone with me. Could not understand their conversation. Asked if I could talk to her mother. She was busy. Daughter got another call and asked me to hang on a minute. Waited five minutes. Hung up.
3. Called wife on her cell phone. No answer. Hung up.
4. Brother called. Asked about what I wanted for Christmas. I said I had no idea. Asked what he wanted. Same response. He said he had to go reformat the hard drive on his computer. Hung up.
5. Called wife at home. New all-in-one printer answered and blasted fax tone at me. Hung up.
6. Daughter called me on work phone. Left message that she was waiting for my call. I did not pick up message until following day.
7. Called wife at home. Reached daughter. Asked if I could talk to her mother. She was busy but would be right there. Daughter got another call and asked me to hang on a minute. Waited two minutes. Hung up.
8. Wife called. Asked for advice on Christmas shopping leading to request for additional funds. Was this planned? She carried on a conversation with my daughter and two store clerks while on the phone with me. She got another call and asked me to hang on a minute. Waited five minutes. Gave up and decided to talk to wife at home.

At this point I realized the real threat was to whoever might be listening. If government employees are monitoring my calls then death by boredom must be the number one job hazard. So to sum up the balance sheet of risks:
Karl Rove discovers my wife is actually only busy shopping and can reach me in minutes if she wants to VERSUS get blown up by terrorists.
Dick Cheney finds out I haven't figured out how to keep the new printer from answering the phone VERSUS get blown up by terrorists.
President Bush finds out I don't always pick up my voice mail the same day and I came in second in excitement to a hard drive VERSUS get blown up by terrorists.

At this point I started to feel just a little upset at the New York Times, not to mention whoever leaked the information in the first place. And if I get blown up I'm really going to be mad. It's hard to pursue happiness when you're dead.

Silk Fringes

2005-12-17T11:37:00.000-08:00

Here is a link, IR1 Theme , to a short audio clip that is part of a longer song that I wrote and recorded. I selected this as the musical theme for this blog.
I once worked for someone I'll call "Bud" running a small contract assembly shop. We had decided to hire a maintenance man and after a couple of weeks "Bud" asked me how he was doing. "Well just OK", I said, "He's a pretty slow worker but his work is all right". "Listen", Bud said, "having a maintenance man at all for a company this size is like going to bed with little silk fringes on your underwear. If he's not doing a great job than we can't afford him". So unfortunately I had to let the fellow go.
The point is having a musical theme for a little blog like this is undoubtedly just like "going to bed with little silk fringes on your underwear" but as a self-confessed "music nut" I guess I think those fringes feel pretty good. Hope you enjoy it as well.
For the techies the original recording was all midi with all instruments created using a MK-4902 midi keyboard and Cakewalk version 8. Conversion to MP3 was by Cakewalk Pyro software.
If there is any interest in the comments section I will post a link to the entire song.

Islam and Castro

2005-12-07T05:56:00.000-08:00

If you came back looking for something funny go over to Memri to learn the truth about the relationship between Islam and Fidel Castro's genitals.

Note: The link was busted so if you tried it before and it didn't work give it another try.

Verbal Momentum

2005-12-06T04:38:00.000-08:00

Karl Rove Strikes Again
While watching Hannity and Colmes on Fox News last night cover John Kerry's pronouncement that our troops in Iraq are no better than terrorists it suddenly struck me: Karl Rove has made suckers out of the democrats again.
Remember how the Bush team kept strangely silent for months while democrats unleashed increasingly powerful attacks against Bush's Iraq policy and its results? Remember the agonizing questions about why Bush did not speak out in defense of his policy and its indisputable achievements in Iraq? The answer is in the phrase, verbal momentum.
What the heck is that? Well all right, I just made it up. But what it means here is the tendency to defend and even extend a position one has taken when it is first challenged, before the higher brain functions like logic have a chance to kick in. Of course the longer those higher brain functions take to kick in the further the position will be extended and with a lot of politicians that gives plenty of time to get way out in left field. Howard Dean and John Murtha spring to mind for example. I have a cousin who described this effect, after an argument with his wife, as his "out of body experience". "I was over here", he said, "and my mouth was over there still talking!"
The reason this is important is that there's a pretty fine line between vigorous opposition to your country's policy during war and behavior that most Americans regard as treason. Stay on one side of the line and your criticism drains support from your political opponents. Cross the line and you are suddenly in political no man's land. Now it's clear why the Bush team had to wait such an seemingly excessive length of time to respond. They had to wait while the democrats all slowly racheted up their rhetoric, until they were just barely on the "safe" side of the line. Then, when the Bush team finally responded, the susceptible democrats took the bait and jumped right over the line, driven by their own verbal momentum.
It's interesting to note that one politician, who pretty much everyone agrees is the Mr. Spock of the democratic party, didn’t fall for it. Of course with Hillary Clinton it's pretty hard to tell if she's one politician or two so the extra brainpower probably helped her see the trap sooner.
Anyway that's the idea. Karl Rove, master of timing and momentum, strikes again and we all get to watch the democrats crowd together on that last little twig way out at the end of the limb.

Paris is Burning...but don't tell anyone

2005-11-06T06:07:00.000-08:00

Paris Is Burning
November 6,2005

One common tendency of government functionaries everywhere is to attempt to avoid giving their superiors bad news. With that in mind the following brief paragraph from a longer article on the Paris riots in Le Monde of November 6, 2005 is interesting.

(Google translation)
The night was marked by violent … confrontations in Evreux, where the shopping centre of the district of the Madeleine was seriously damaged and where young … demonstrators, of which some were armed with bats, ran up against the police officers. These confrontations would have made casualties on both sides, according to witnesses', but the prefecture was not able to provide an assessment.

It will be interesting to see if the prefecture is able to provide an "assessment" at some time in the future or if the "casualties" will remain unreported and, hopefully, forgotten. Makes you wonder what else is being unreported.

Fun with Al Qaeda!

2005-10-09T08:16:00.000-07:00

OK folks, you want 'em, we got 'em! Al Qaeda jokes. Each and every one fresh from the pen today, October 9, 2005. Frankly though, Al Qaeda has become such a joke I expect others have come up with these as well. It's just too easy!

Where is Al Qaeda headquarters in Iraq?
Baghad
Fallujah
Mosel
Ramadi
Sammara
Tal Afar
Haditha
gas station restroom in Syria

How long do you have to be an Al Qaeda member to become number two in Iraq?
Three days: one day to join, one day to be promoted to second in command, and one day in the job.

What does Al Qaeda call someone who thinks twenty percent of the Iraqi population is a larger number than eighty percent of the Iraqi population?
Global Strategist

What does Al Qaeda call having most of its leadership killed or captured?
Cross-training

Why didn't Ali join Al Qaeda and become an Al Qaeda suicide bomber?
He put the round peg in the round hole.

Why does Bin Laden dream of being the Supreme Leader of a Global Islamic Caliphate?
Napoleon was already taken.

What do you call two elderly Arabs hiding in a cave in the middle of nowhere?
Al Qaeda

Get a Job (if you can)

2005-03-25T09:29:00.000-08:00

Why illegal immigration robs people of opportunity
My first job was as a paperboy for the Long Beach Press Telegram when I was 12 years old. It was a different world then as I used to ride my bike all over Huntington Beach California to deliver papers without ever a thought of danger from anything except traffic. My route was 7 miles long and went all through the one new housing tract where I lived; down in what had been the bean fields, up along the bluff and all through the older downtown area, ending up near the beach. From there I had to turn around and ride home. I found out right away that the key to making more money was learning how to "porch" the customer’s paper from your bike. Then when you went around once a month to collect your money you had a better chance to get a twenty-five cent tip, the usual amount. The hardest part of the job for me was Sunday mornings. Although the Press Telegram came out in the afternoon every other day, it came out in the morning on Sunday so first, you had to get up early and I mean like 3:30 AM. Then you had to fold the papers, which were about 3 times their regular size with inserts to put in. Then you had to pack you bags until they practically burst and your bike was loaded down with what seemed like a hundred pounds of papers. Then ride your entire route trying to throw papers that were big enough to be crush a cat. It was tough, but when I was all done around 6:00 AM I used to meet a friend of mine, who also had a paper route, at a coffee shop down by the beach and we’d splurge on hot chocolate and listen to Roy Orbison play "Pretty Woman" on the juke box while the sun came up. I made about thirty dollars a month.
My next job was as a dishwasher when I was 16. I had a driver’s license and now all I needed was a car. I worked at two places, Richards Coffee Shop on Pacific Coast Highway and Gracie’s Doughnuts on Main street about two blocks away. It was a family operation owned by, not surprisingly, Richard and Gracie. Every afternoon after school and 8 hours on Saturday and Sunday I would wash dishes and equipment and do other sidework like bleaching lettuce. Richard was a tough, coarse; thoroughly grease stained old fry cook. Shortly after I started working he was cooking when a large cockroach ran out on the counter. He grabbed it and said, "Look, if you see one of these just pinch it’s tail". He then proceeded to crush the entire cockroach between this thumb and forefinger, wiped his hand on his apron and kept on cooking. I was horrified and resolved right then and there to never eat in a restaurant again, a resolution I have failed to keep. I think I was considered an adequate worker, although likely to do unexpected things. When I was first told to clean the doughnut-making machine at Gracie’s I carefully cleaned every piece, which required the disassembly of a large part of the equipment. Richard told me later it took him three hours to get the machine running and tuned up to make acceptable doughnuts the next morning. "It’s not your fault", he said. "I know I told you to clean every piece but I meant just wipe it off". I made $1.35 an hour and saved enough to buy a 1963 Ford Fairlane for $265.
My next job was in construction working for my uncle who was developing real estate over in Sunset Beach California. He was building little two and three unit apartment buildings at the time and lived in one of them himself. I worked for him eight hours a day on the weekends and during the summer. My uncle would use me as sort of a free-floating assistant to the sub-contractors so I did all sorts of things. I learned how to stand on a wheelbarrow and shovel cement up to a platform six feet over my head which is something I’m kind of pleased at knowing to this day. The trick is in knowing just how to aim and twist the shovel so the cement lands right where you want without splattering. That and not falling off the wheelbarrow. A lot of the time I painted and I learned not to carry a bucket of oil-base paint slung over your shoulder because if the lid pops off the paint will go all over your hair and you will have to dip your head in kerosene to get it off. Actually working for my uncle was really hard because I knew if I didn’t do a good job my parents would hear about it but for the two dollars an hour I was making it was really worth it. I was making so much money I used to splurge and spend about a dollar at the Jack in the Box on Pacific Coast Highway on the way home which at the time would buy you a couple of hamburgers, fries and a milkshake which you could eat looking out at the beach, or while driving home in your Ford Fairlane.
My next job was working at the school district during my senior year in high school. I had already completed enough classes to graduate with only a half time class schedule my senior year so I got a job in the audio-visual lab four hours a day. It was sort of a strange job in that I had no fixed responsibilities except to run the video recorder the school had purchased whenever teachers requested something be taped. I would lug the bulky Ampex reel to reel video recorder to the designated classroom, carefully set it up along with the large video camera, turn on and check out the setup, and then stand by to tape whatever I was told. Once while taping the rehearsal of a play I accidentally captured on tape some students drinking beer in class. I noticed it when I played the tape back and told a few people about it. It spread all over the school like lightning. The teacher involved came to me in a panic and begged me to erase the tape. I told him I was not supposed to do that but that I wouldn’t tell anyone else and would re-use the tape soon anyway because we didn’t have that many. The administration remained oblivious and nothing ever came of it. I don’t remember how much I got paid so it must not have been much.
My next job was back to dishwasher. I had to drop out of college for one quarter in my sophomore year but luckily the college, at that time, had a "stop-out" program whereby you could take a quarter off and still remain enrolled. I hope they still have that program because it sure helped me out. I got a job over at Ancient Mariner in Balboa California. Unlike Richards Coffee Shop and Gracie’s Doughnuts I think the Ancient Mariner may still be in business. It seemed like the sort of dishwasher work I was used to but with a lot more sidework than I had at Richards. I had to make the salads, make marinade, put the meat into tubs with marinade and put it in the cooler, pull down and run all the filters over the cook stations through the dishwasher, put them back up, pull up all the rubber mats at the cook stations, take them outside, clean them then put them back and a lot of other stuff. One side job was to "cool" ten or twenty bottles of each of the alcohols used to make drinks by pouring it over a jug of ice and then pouring it back into the bottle before putting it into the cooler. Of course there would be a little more so you had to use some saved bottles of the correct type for the excess. I was so naïve it was literally years later before I realized they were just having me water the drinks down. The Ancient Mariner was a pretty high-end place at the time and the other employees would sometimes eat food like lobster off the plates that came back if it looked untouched but I never liked to do that. I only kept that job for two weeks because I managed to land a job as a replacement janitor at the school district.
As a replacement janitor I was supposed to be "on call" to work from 4:00 PM to midnight in case one of the other janitors was out. In reality I was assigned a regular area of the school to clean and worked every day. It seemed to me there was a lot of padding in the work force. I had to clean two hallways, which I think was around twenty classrooms, and the boy’s gym. I quickly learned that it really only took about two hours to clean the whole thing if you kept moving fast. The other janitors showed me a trick, which was to use an early version of a leaf blower to blow everything on the floor to the back of the classroom where you could sweep it all up. The gym was more work but once I learned to mop fast, swinging the mop all the way out to the end of the handle on each side so you mop about a ten foot wide swath, it went quickly too. This was back in the days when you changed into a gym suit for gym class and showered off afterward. The resulting debris of dirty socks and jock straps I had to clean up every night were sort of repulsive so one night when there was a particularly large number of jock straps I piled them on the head coaches desk instead of throwing them away. It seemed like a good way to let him know about the problem and although I heard a few rumblings about it I didn’t get in any trouble. It didn’t seem to help much though. I left that job when it was time to go back to college for the next quarter.
My next job was a big step up, part time fireman. The college had the only multistory buildings in the small town it was located in so it had it’s own fire department. They would hire students as part time firemen. I had to compete against 76 other guys for one of what turned out to be 5 available jobs. It was all pretty exciting but I quickly found out I wasn’t cut out to be a fireman. First, you had to be right on time to work and I mean to the second. The shift leader had to call in on the radio to the main station right at the start of the shift and report the shift ready for duty. He couldn’t do that if everyone wasn’t there so if you were literally even seconds late it was a big deal. I must have been very concerned over the sequence of disciplinary measures because I still remember it. First offense written reprimand, second offense suspension, third offense termination. I was never late but the mental stress took its toll on me. Another thing that didn’t suit me was having to clean the entire fire engine and what seemed like a million feet of fire hose every shift. We actually spent most of our time just sitting around but I also learned I didn’t like getting up in the middle of the night, throwing on a turnout suit and driving down to the main campus to spend two hours standing around watching a couple of the guys fool around with a smoky old burned out air conditioner. The cops used to come by the fire department at night. I was stationed at a little airport on campus and we were always open and far enough out from the central campus to escape the repressive hand of authority, our captains. I learned that some of the wildest guys you ever want to meet are attracted to police work. I heard a story about a couple of them driving up and down the runway in their police car at 100 mph with the lights and siren running, shooting at rabbits out of the windows. The speed was probably an exaggeration. I left the job after five months and only three actual fires citing the need to focus on my classes. I made $3.95 an hour at that job which seemed like a fortune.
My next job was a step down again. I was "stopped out" of school again because my sister had talked me into driving here up to Oregon to get back to her school. She had arranged to live on a little farm just outside Portland in an old farmhouse with no running water. This was during the time when "living off the land" was the hot new idea so once I was there it just seemed like a good idea to stick around for a while. Between having to dig and use an outdoor latrine, draw water by hand from a well and lug it a hundred yards up to the house, and get by with no money the glamour wore off pretty quick. We had a real nice neighbor, a Vietnam vet, who was also "living off the land" and would give us as many zucchini’s from his garden as we could eat so this was my vegetarian period. After a while the craving for protein built up to the point where it was time for another job, berry picking. Berry picking is funny work. You’re outside which is nice, and the work is honestly not that physically hard, but it gives a whole new meaning to the word monotony. There isn’t any real mental stimulation but on the other hand you still have to focus on each and every berry to be sure it’s ready to pick. After a couple of days I could close my eyes and literally see berry’s floating around which was pretty strange. I didn’t make a whole lot of money but it was enough to buy some rice, potatoes and hamburger, not to mention gasoline. Pretty soon it was time to go back to school and I sure don’t miss berry picking.
After that it was back to the restaurant business again. I was hanging out at my parents for a couple of months after I graduated from college while arranging to rent a place with a couple of friends. I got a job as a bartender at a pizza place. The job consisted of pouring beer, making pizza, making pizza sauce, making pizza dough, stocking the pizza topping containers, cleaning up, running the cash register, and stopping fights. We had metal mop bucket handles behind the bar in case we needed them but I never did. It was a pretty big place and there were usually enough employees to just swarm anybody who started any trouble. I learned that if you didn’t have a system it was easy to completely forget the customer’s list of pizza toppings in the time it took to move from the order window to the prep table. One night, after I had been on the job a couple of weeks, I decided to sneak a beer at work. I picked dark beer because it looked like root beer that we were allowed to drink. My manager noticed and asked me to show him what I was drinking. Thinking I was about to get fired I handed him the glass. "Just as I thought", he said, "here, drink this instead" handing me his own drink. It turned out to be a rum and coke so I was off the hook. I left that job when we finally got a place rented and I never worked in the restaurant business again.
My next job was selling plants. Although I had a college degree I wanted to try starting a band with some friends of mine so I didn’t want a regular job for about a year. It seemed like there was kind of a craze going on for house plants and I worked for a couple of guys who had a plant shop but would also give people a load of plants to try and sell door to door. You could keep whatever profit you made on selling the plants. It was no good trying to sell them at people’s homes; you had to go to businesses. It turned out that the whole thing was kind of a scam because the only way to really close a sale on the spot was to convince people they were getting a special deal. To do that you had to convince them you were stuck with these plants as "leftovers" and just wanted to unload them. Surprisingly I learned that the key to success was being able to say, "Just twenty-five dollars!" like you were amazed at how cheap that was. Although the job was kind of interesting and I liked the unstructured aspect of it, the income was unreliable and the whole thing was kind of a low class deal. I left after a couple of months.
My next job was as an electrician. We ran electrical cables and conduits in various apartment buildings, commercial buildings and industrial buildings. The owner was a real nice guy and everyone on the crew was easy to get along with. The first job I worked was some apartments. They were having trouble staying on schedule. I had an engineering degree in electronics, exposure to construction working for my uncle, and I got paired with a guy who had experience wiring apartments. We started busting out two apartments a day and got them caught up. That made us golden around the place. It was a good thing because on the next industrial job I installed two out of three fuses for a one hundred horsepower motor, third one was defective, forgot to tell anyone and when they tested it the motor burned right out. I learned you should never install some of the fuses, its all or nothing. That job was a time and materials job so right after I started on it I was running conduit as fast as I could and one of the other guys told me to slow down. That was OK by me so we took a pretty measured pace on the industrial work which was just as well because we worked on the wires live a lot of the time. Once you get some instruction and the technique it’s not a problem and I always appreciated the little training classes they ran for us to explain new things we would run into on a particular job. I left that job when I finally decided it was time to give up on being a musician and go get a job in electronics using my college degree. I had resisted that because I had a strong feeling that once I did that’s what I would end up doing for the rest of my career and sure enough that’s just how it worked out.
So what’s the point besides a trip down memory lane? Just this, I had eleven jobs before I ever got onto a "white-collar" career track. Those jobs helped me learn how to make and save money. They helped me learn how to be independent. The helped me learn what having a job and working a job is all about. They gave me a chance to screw up and learn how not to screw up at a time in my life when the consequences were still relatively modest. I learned what I was good at and what I wasn’t good at. What I liked and what I didn’t like in a job. Although I will be forever grateful to my parents for financing my college education those jobs helped me get over financial rough spots with a sense of personal freedom and independence. I am currently a company president and I am certain that much of my success is due to learning how to work from broad exposure to different jobs.
So my point is; what are kids today supposed to do? If every low-end job is taken by an illegal immigrant how do they enter the work force? As a college graduate I am a strong believer in classroom learning but I also know you learn many more things much faster on the job. Worst of all a shortage of low-end jobs robs young people of their best safety net, a job that pays at least reasonably well. The result is the difficulty young people now have in establishing themselves away from their parents. The current system victimizes everyone who needs an entry-level job.
The solution is not more government training programs, although those certainly have their place. It is not to improve schools, although that is certainly needed. It is not to raise the minimum wage, which in the current environment will only cause employers to hire even fewer legal workers. It is not to re-institute more welfare programs, which thankfully doesn’t even seem to be on any serious agenda. The solution to creating better paying entry-level jobs is the law of supply and demand. To create an increased demand for legal US citizens, particularly young and unskilled people, we need to restrict the supply of illegal immigrant workers. Increased demand will lead to higher wages. It’s really that simple.

Follow up to "Is It Enough?"

2005-01-15T08:49:00.000-08:00

In case anyone was wondering (yeah right) my experiment with "Is it Enough?" did NOT work (scroll down to see original post). The problem was that although Al-Ahram did publish my letter (thanks very much AL-Ahram I do appreciate that) they stripped out the last part of the letter about replying and my link for reply (I'm somewhat less appreciative of that). In a brief email exchange with Bill Roggio of The Fourth Rail he informed me that it was rare for MSM to include links to blogs. Evidently they do not want any more competition and I guess the Egyptian publishers of Al-Ahram have the same inclination. If anyone has any ideas about how to overcome this I would appreciate a comment. Of course that assumes someone would actually read this...

MY TOP 10 UNDENIABLE TRUTHS FOR 2005

2005-01-15T08:36:00.000-08:00

Another post by guest blogger Bill. This is getting embarrassing. I'm either going to have to write more myself or turn this blog over to him. Hmmmm... maybe I can just take credit for his posts...?

10. There is nothing real about reality TV. If you want reality turn off the TV, get off the couch, and get a life.

9. Plastic packaging is out of control. I bought a plastic comb the other day and there was more plastic in the package than the comb, probably enough to make two more combs.

8. With scientists around the world working on an alternative to fossil fuel, there is still none in sight. It's too bad we can't run our cars & power plants on plastic. We seem to have an endless supply of that.

7. Dan Ratters obvious liberal bias was bound to backfire on him eventually.

6. Europeans so called recent disdain for Americans is nothing new. It started way back when we left Europe came over here and started calling ourselves Americans.

5. I'm still waiting for the flood of terrorists that was according to (anti gun rights liberals) going to come to America and buy their assault rifles after the Clinton gun ban sunset in Sept. 2004.

4. It's no wonder that the Hollywood left feels compelled to espouse their political ideas. After all their entire careers are based on pretending to be someone they are not.

3. The ACLU is now more worried about our children looking at a Christmas tree than pornography.

2. Democrats think they lost the 2004 presidential election because they were not able to explain or sell their ideas properly. They still don't get it. It was the ideas themselves that lost them the election not the way they were presented. We got it and we didn't want it.

1. Christian extremists think that you need to be saved. Muslim extremists think that you need to be dead.

So What's the Deal With the 72 Virgins?

2005-01-15T08:30:00.000-08:00

Another post from guest blogger Bill. No comment needed.

Apparently if you are a good little Muslim terrorist and you die in a jihad Mohammed will greet you with 72 virgins in the ever after. Not a bad deal I guess except for the dying part. I was just wondering though how do Muslim women feel about this? Maybe if you are a good little Muslim woman terrorist you get 72 Chip & Dale dancers. That however leaves me wondering is Allah the god of porn or what. Or maybe what you actually get is one 72 year old virgin.

Taser X26 "Stunning Success"

2004-12-12T18:58:00.000-08:00

Bernard Kerik in the right place at the right time

I continue to be impressed by the power of the blogosphere. I started my little blog a month or so ago and was fortunate enough to get a link and some very kind advice from Bill Roggio at the fourth rail and enjoyed the thrill of seeing my traffic spike up for a week or so. Then I wrote a few more things but could see that I was not able to put the time into blogging to really make a significant contribution. So I decided to simply post whatever I felt like when I had the time and consider myself sort of a "reserve" blogger in case something came along that I was actually better qualified than most to comment on.
Well what do you know, here comes a Newsweek story by Mark Hosenball about Bernard Kerik and, among other things, Mr. Kerik's connection to Taser International implying that maybe there’s a little fire here somewhere along with the smoke about the nanny. I saw the link on Instapundit and that jogged my memory because I was pretty sure I had seen a story about the technology behind the new Taser product earlier this year. Of course I googled it and sure enough there it was on Embedded.com and this sort of thing happens to be a big part of my day job.
So to give you a quick breakdown on what this means, Embedded.com is a trade magazine that targets electronic engineers who use microprocessors in all kinds of exotic and everyday products, including Tasers (in fact I first saw the story in the print version of the magazine). As the link shows they have selected the Taser X26 as an example of a "stunning success" for embedded design. Now Embedded.com receives ad revenue from, among other sources, the companies that make the microprocessors, note the Fujitsu ad on their page. This means that the selection of Taser, and by extension and more importantly the Texas Instruments products that drive the X26, is not totally non-commercial. However the community of embedded systems designers Embedded.com is trying to reach are extremely knowledgeable and unforgiving critics. Therefore the Taser X26 would not be selected as a feature story unless it was, in fact, technically slick and sweet as the article makes clear (if you're an embedded systems designer).
It all boils down to this. Whatever success the Taser X26 is having in the market is due to the fact that it is the best product of its type out there. Bernard Kerik may have made some sort of contribution in his role as a director (for $6 million one would hope so) but it looks like the product sells itself.

Is It Enough?

2004-12-10T20:42:00.000-08:00

An open letter to the Arab world

This is an experiment. This letter is being posted here and simultanesouly sent to Al-ahram weekly. The idea is to get feedback from the Arab world regarding US action in reponse to 9/11. Well let's see if it works!

To any visitors from Al-ahram: Please post your reaction as a comment to this post. Thank you for taking the time to respond. I greatly value each of your opinions.

Original article follows...

IS IT ENOUGH?
Any thinking person, which certainly includes your readers, understands the pain felt in the US on 9/11. Not only were thousand killed, they were killed in the most horrific circumstances. The pictures of the doomed jumping to their deaths rather than facing the fire were engraved into the conciousness of the US. These images control our thinking still.

The actions of the US subsequent to 9/11 are well known. Two nations conquered, thousands killed on both sides, all the horror and brutality of war unleashed. And the end still not clearly in sight.

My question for your readers is simple: Is it enough? If you were an American would you feel your honor had been avenged? Would you feel you have done enough to convince your enemies to never attack you again? What more should be done?

I invite all your readers to please reply by posting to www.ir1.blogspot.com.

Thanks and Best Regards,
Steve Foote

French Wine Takes Back Seat

2004-12-02T21:27:00.000-08:00

Another Reason the French are Mad at Us

Many thanks to guest blogger Bill for pointing out another fact that should remind us of why the French will never truly challenge the US...

FRENCH WINE TAKES BACK SEAT
France was always known to produce some of the finest wines in the world. But now many small winery's in California, in business for over one hundred years, have surpassed the French in the making of fine wines. The climate and soil of California is far better for producing a variety of wine grapes. Not to mention their meticulous attention to detail in the fermentation process. This fact is well known by French wine makers and it leaves a very bitter taste in their mouths. Still though we do have many things that come from France to be thankful for. Just think where we would be without the common garden snail.

Inspired by Bill’s article I did a quick google search and quickly came up with some solid supporting facts. CNN reported the following on August 23, 2004 in an article with a title that says it all.

Can Anything Save French Wine
'Clearly, these are desperate times for an industry that exported $6.9 billion worth of product last year, and which employs some 300,000 people. As recently as the 1990s, one in three imported bottles bought by Americans was French. Today, it's down to 15 percent. Despite particularly good vintages, U.S. sales of French wine declined more than 10 percent last year in both volume and dollar value, according to Information Resources International.'

And in an article dated November 11, 2004 Decanter.com reported:
‘This is in contrast to overall French wine imports to the US, which were down 13% over the last 12 months. ‘

So market share down by over half and double digit declines in volume and revenue in the last 12 months. Looks like the French had better concentrate on getting people to like snails!

Dan Rather Promoted to Reporter

2004-11-23T22:08:00.000-08:00

"Looks forward" to new opportunity as world’s oldest cub reporter

CBS announced today that Dan Rather was being promoted to a new position as reporter after serving 24 years as the anchor for the networks CBS nightly news broadcast. Rather appeared upbeat about the change claiming he welcomed the opportunity to relinquish the prestige and pay associated with the news anchor position in return for the grueling schedule and inadequate compensation offered to true newsmen. "I have always been and remain a `hard news' investigative reporter at heart," he said. "I now look forward to pouring my heart into that kind of reporting full time."

When asked if the move to cub reporter accurately reflected his value to CBS Rather replied, "This feels right. My best work is still ahead of me." This appeared to be something nearly everyone can agree on. Over his 24 years as news anchor Rather persistently dragged CBS News ratings’ lower. Rather dominated ratings after taking over from the highly rated Walter Cronkite during the 1980s, but he was eclipsed first by Peter Jennings and then by Tom Brokaw. His evening news broadcast generally runs a distant third in the ratings each week. "This decision to step down now gives Dan a chance to repair the damage," said Alex Jones, director of the Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy at Harvard University.

Rather and CBS officials claimed this move was planned last summer but would not be more specific about the time. When asked who would be replacing Rather in the anchor slot CBS Chairman Leslie Moonves looked surprised and declined comment. "He's going out on his own terms after serving us long and well," Moonves said. "And we’re looking forward to working with Dan in his new role." Moonves then asked to excuse himself, "I need a new stapler and some tape", he said. "And I want to get over to Dan’s office before everything is gone."

President Bush Diagnosed with Rare Eye Disease

2004-11-21T21:50:00.000-08:00

Mysterious Temporary Blindness Only Strikes One Eye at a Time

President Bush today was tentatively diagnosed with ocular Islamic lesions, commonly known as Wahhabi blindness, a mysterious ailment that can cause a number of varied symptoms related to vision and hearing. The President sought medical attention after a chance remark by a White House staffer who wondered why the President had not responded to the recent call by 26 Saudi Arabian clerics asking for terrorists to kill American troops in Iraq.
The President was evidently dumbfounded by the remark. He reported asking, "What in the Sam Hill are you talking about? Saudi’s are calling for terrorists to kill Americans? I couldn’t believe my ears." Doctors who examined the President however confirmed that the disease in his case was limited to his vision and that, for now, his hearing was fine.
The President revealed that he had been concerned for some time that events in Saudi Arabia were escaping his notice. "They're a bunch of sneaky troublemakers so I even thought about trying to move my desk so I could keep an eye on them", he said. "But Laura didn’t think I should start re-arranging the furniture without checking with an interior designer. Anyway I noticed that no matter which way I turned I always had trouble seeing out of the eye that was facing Saudi Arabia."
Doctors confirmed that the President had been diagnosed with Mecca syndrome, a variant of Wahhabi blindness. Unfortunately the relative locations of Washington DC and Mecca aggravated the problem, they said. Short of arranging to watch the actions of the Saudi government from Tehran, doctors held out little hope of treatment that would improve the President’s ability to focus on events in Saudi Arabia.
Doctors further explained that patients’ conscious or unconscious attempts to compensate for the disease can aggravate the problems it causes. This appeared to be the case with President Bush. "When I first heard about these cowardly so-called "clerics" openly calling for terrorists to kill our troops I automatically assumed the government of Saudi Arabia had thrown them all in jail, at least, and I just hadn’t seen that either"’ the President explained. "Honestly I’m still not really sure they haven’t taken some action. Didn’t they hear me say you’re either for us or against us? Do they think I didn’t mean what I said? How can that be? The Saudi government must have at least chopped off their hands, or something."
For now the President’s doctors recommended he delegate the task of keeping an eye on the Saudi’s while waiting to see if his condition will resolve itself. "I thought about asking Colin Powel to do it", the President said. "But he never seemed to see anything they were doing either. I was going to ask Condoleeza Rice but she’s been having a little problem with her hearing lately herself."

Terror Leader Zarqawi Denies Fight to Death Flip-flop

2004-11-14T18:54:00.000-08:00

Cites PLO Leader Yassar Arafat as Role Model
Terrorist leader Al Zarqawi strongly defended his record on fighting to the death today despite critics’ claims that he has recently modified his position to accommodate changing political circumstances.
"I have said the exact same thing from the very beginning", Al Zarqawi claimed. "My position on fighting to the death has not changed once and I have been absolutely consistent. I completely support the idea of fighting to the death as long as it does not involve any risk of injury to me. My personal role model is the late PLO chairman Yassar Arafat who, although he spent an entire lifetime championing fighting to the death, died himself at a very advanced age in a French hospital surrounded by sympathetic toadies. That’s my idea of fighting to the death".
When questioned by reporters over what appeared to be clear changes in his position over the last several months Al Zarqawi claimed he was the victim of misunderstanding. "I never said I would fight to the death", he stated. "What I said is that I would fight until I was a little bit out of breath. The two words sound alike so when my remarks were translated it was understandable that there would be some confusion. I stand by my record, having run from Falluja so fast I was not only a little bit out of breath but was, in fact, completely winded. And I promise my supporters I will keep running at least that fast for the foreseeable future now that the US marines are chasing me."
When asked what effect his rapid departure from the battle of Falluja would have on those who remained behind to fight and die Al Zarqawi was unapologetic. "I have sent a message conveying my enthusiastic support for the terrorists in Falluja in their fight to the death. It is not important that the message was sent from a relatively secure location far from the actual battle, or that I composed the message while relaxing and enjoying a nice hot meal, or even that I received large sacks of cash from sympathetic governments in the region for carrying out my duties which included sending the message. The important thing is that I sent a message. This shows that I have continued to support fighting to the death. People who don’t appreciate the risks I take should know I received a serious paper cut from the message itself." Al Zarqawi then showed reporters the paper cut on his left little finger, covered by a purple heart band-aid.
When it was pointed out that many would interpret fighting to the death to mean actually continuing to fight personally until killed Al Zarqawi responded that the questioner clearly did not understand the meaning of the term as it is used by Islamic terrorists.

The Problem With Democrats

2004-11-07T20:52:00.000-08:00

While reading and reflecting on the liberal reaction to Bush’s re-election (well OK, gloating still just a little bit) I came across, for what seemed like the millionth time, another case of some liberal whining (in a deliciously pitiful way) 'Bush lied about WMDs'. This was intended of course as another indictment of all the morons who voted for Bush. However with the perspective of the last few days (decisive win for Bush, defeat and ruin for his supposed intellectual superiors) it started me thinking. Could this be a clue to where the democrats have gone wrong? Maybe their problem is the average voter senses that their intense dislike of President Bush has left them, well, a little unhinged.
Taking the WMD case as an example, it’s common knowledge that folks pretty far from Bush’s end of the political spectrum, like Bill Clinton and Jacques Chirac just to name two, also thought that Saddam Hussein possessed WMDs. Now a snappy little saying like 'Bush lied, people died' (or whatever it was) could be useful for a day or two. It’s sort of like what is called 'puffing' in advertising. You are allowed to exaggerate slightly for effect and it’s supposed to be understood as just a quick shorthand way to make your point. On the other hand, if you repeat something like that so many times and so seriously and so sincerely that people start to understand you really believe it completely yourself, then they are likely to watch you carefully while slowly backing away.
This, it seems to me, is the basic problem of the democrats. They hate Bush so intensely, they so much want to believe the worst of him, that they have completely bought into their own puffing. As long as they only talk to each other this works really well for them. They can validate each other’s opinions and congratulate each other on their superior grasp of the political situation and finely tuned moral sense. The problem occurs when they bring that sense of certainty and conviction about 'facts' that just aren’t quite true to a broader audience.
There is a long list of such 'facts'; Bush lied about WMDs, Bush corruptly awarded contracts to Halliburton, Bush will reinstate the draft, Bush will slash Social Security, Bush has ruined the economy, and Bush will give tax breaks to companies to send your job overseas, are just few. Each of these statements is, in its own way, legitimate puffing or shorthand designed to make a point. Bush did justify the war against Iraq based on WMD that were nowhere to be found. The government did award a large non-competitive contract to Halliburton, whatever the reasons. Bush may follow a course that will demand a larger military than Kerry would. You get the point.
The Bush campaign has a pretty long list of such 'facts' themselves; Kerry is the most liberal senator, Kerry will institute government run health care, Kerry voted to slash intelligence spending, Kerry voted to slash defense, Kerry will raise your taxes, and Kerry thinks terrorism is only a nuisance, and so on. This is all legitimate puffing too because it clearly has a core of truth and is designed to make a point.
The democrats though, appear to have gone completely over the edge. You couldn’t really tell for sure while the campaign was still going on because endlessly repeating campaign slogans is an accepted part of the game. Now that the campaign is over though, and the logical motivation for puffing is gone or even, considering the outcome, reversed, the fact that the democrats continue to repeat 'facts' like this is a little spooky. And even though you couldn’t really tell for sure did the average voter sense during the campaign that the democrats were slowly floating away from reality?
The lesson in this is, let’s not get sucked in by our own slogans. For example, sure it’s a lot of fun to mock the French and ridicule Kerry’s global test but we still have to figure out some way at some level to work with Europe and the UN to get the nations business done. Again, you get the point. We don’t want to end up like the democrats; a party visibly twitching and muttering to itself, with its eyes fixed on 'facts' no one else can see.