The Tourism Ministry has been forced to change an advertising campaign in Britain in which the Qumran caves were pictured, after the UK's Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) ruled that it did not consider the site part of Israel, it was reported Saturday.Honestly, I don't think we need any tourist business with Britain if they're going to be so continuously negative.
The ASA also reprimanded the Tourism Ministry for not responding to its numerous appeals on the matter.
The Tourism Ministry's representative in Britain, Uri Gafni, told Israel Radio that the ministry had no intention whatsoever of claiming that the Qumran caves were in Israeli territory.
He said the picture had now been swapped with an image of Masada.
The Qumran caves are located south of Jericho. It is the site where the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered by a Beduin shepherd looking for a lost goat in 1947.
DEDICATED TO EXPOSING DISINFORMATION AND PROPAGANDA AND TO PROMOTING UNIVERSAL HUMAN RIGHTS - WITH SHARP ANALYSIS AND BLUNT COMMENTARY. NO ADS. NO TIP-JAR. JUST THE TRUTH.
Monday, April 14, 2008
UK BALKS AT TOURISM AD FOR QUMRAN CAVES
Why do we do business with Britain then? Here's their latest dirty deed and what it caused:
"Jerusalem" hymn banned by politically correct clergy in Britain
It's probably the hymn I love best: "And did those feet in ancient times.... ''. With the marvellous William Blake writing the words and the music by Parry, it had to be good. Comments below by the Revd Dr Peter Mullen, Rector of St Michael's, Cornhill
Funny how the "liberals" in the Church have developed this fondness for banning things. First they banned their own modern Alternative Service Book after only 20 years in use. Now, the Very Reverend Colin Slee, the Dean of Southwark, has banned the hymn Jerusalem from his cathedral because it is "not in the glory of God" and is too nationalistic. But surely there is the radiance of divinity in "And was the Holy Lamb of God on England's pleasant pastures seen"? The pseudo-scholarly clergy don't like that line because they deny the Glastonbury legend about Jesus coming to England with Joseph of Arimathea. This shows a numbskull literal-mindedness.
When I preach the Resurrection on Easter Day, I try to evoke the Lord's appearances around Galilee, and on the walk to Emmaus, as if they had happened in my beloved Yorkshire Dales. Blake didn't think Jesus came to England, either. He was a poet and his lines are the stuff of imaginative allusion. But imagination is a bit beyond the reach of the polite mechanicals among the modern clergy.
Christians in England are redeemed by Christ, as surely as the first disciples were redeemed by him in Galilee. Blake's magnificent poem is a way of bringing this home to us, building the truth of the experience into our hearts and minds by using homely, national imagery. The spirit of God breathes all through Jerusalem. Take the fervent line, "Bring me my chariot of fire." It is straight out of the Bible, the ecstatic vision of the prophet Elijah carried up to heaven in the whirlwind (II Kings 2:11). "Nor shall my sword sleep in my hand" is clearly a reference to "the sword of the Spirit which is the word of God" (Ephesians 6:17).
What the modern clergy can't stand is the powerful evocation of England. When they see the word "England" they don't hear the music of ancient Albion. They see patriotism and national pride, which to them are the next worse things to fascism and expansionary imperialism. But, as Chesterton said, if a man won't love his country, it is difficult to believe he loves anything. Blake's hymn was a prelude to Milton, and he knew that Paradise Lost, the Fall of Man, happens down the Old Kent Road as definitely as anywhere else.
Odd, the trendy clergy's preference for abstractions and internationalism when it was abstracted international communism under Stalin and Mao which slaughtered millions more even than the ueber-nationalists in the Third Reich.
There is nothing abstract or theoretical about Blake's hymn. He wasn't writing a report for the General Synod. As a poet of genius, he knew that the way to convey spiritual realities is to incarnate them in things: swords, chariots, clouded hills, mountains green. St Margaret's, "Parliament's church" in Westminster, disapproves of the line about "dark satanic mills" only by misunderstanding it. No English literature scholar imagines for a minute that Blake was referring to the cotton mills and weaving sheds in Lancashire.
One of our finest biblical commentators, Tom Wright, Bishop of Durham, says: "The 'dark satanic mills' were not the cotton mills and steel mills of the new, noisy and smoky industrial revolution. They were the great churches, such as Westminster Abbey and St Paul's Cathedral, which Blake saw as being hopelessly in thrall to the follies of the world, follies he saw all too clearly in the great thinkers of what was already calling itself the Enlightenment. He faced down the scorn of Voltaire and Rousseau against the deep mysteries of faith. 'You throw the sand against the wind,' he wrote, 'and the wind blows it back again.'?"
Now, at last, we are getting close to understanding this sour prejudice against Jerusalem among so many clergy. For Blake is attacking them - those who, though they promised at ordination to challenge the follies of the age, actually aid and encourage them. It is the Jerusalem haters who have swallowed whole all the dogmas of Rousseauism and the secular superstitions of the Enlightenment in its most recent form: political-correctness.
If Blake could hear for five minutes these people banging on about their true preoccupations, the follies of the age - anti-racism, gender egalitarianism, compliance, the foreign aid industry and the paranoid fantasy of global warming - he would sing all the more loudly against this lot: "Bring me my bow… bring me my arrows… bring me my sword…"
Source
Posted by John Ray. For a daily critique of Leftist activities, see DISSECTING LEFTISM. For a daily survey of Australian politics, see AUSTRALIAN POLITICS Also, don't forget your summary of Obama news and commentary at OBAMA WATCH
Funny how the "liberals" in the Church have developed this fondness for banning things. First they banned their own modern Alternative Service Book after only 20 years in use. Now, the Very Reverend Colin Slee, the Dean of Southwark, has banned the hymn Jerusalem from his cathedral because it is "not in the glory of God" and is too nationalistic. But surely there is the radiance of divinity in "And was the Holy Lamb of God on England's pleasant pastures seen"? The pseudo-scholarly clergy don't like that line because they deny the Glastonbury legend about Jesus coming to England with Joseph of Arimathea. This shows a numbskull literal-mindedness.
When I preach the Resurrection on Easter Day, I try to evoke the Lord's appearances around Galilee, and on the walk to Emmaus, as if they had happened in my beloved Yorkshire Dales. Blake didn't think Jesus came to England, either. He was a poet and his lines are the stuff of imaginative allusion. But imagination is a bit beyond the reach of the polite mechanicals among the modern clergy.
Christians in England are redeemed by Christ, as surely as the first disciples were redeemed by him in Galilee. Blake's magnificent poem is a way of bringing this home to us, building the truth of the experience into our hearts and minds by using homely, national imagery. The spirit of God breathes all through Jerusalem. Take the fervent line, "Bring me my chariot of fire." It is straight out of the Bible, the ecstatic vision of the prophet Elijah carried up to heaven in the whirlwind (II Kings 2:11). "Nor shall my sword sleep in my hand" is clearly a reference to "the sword of the Spirit which is the word of God" (Ephesians 6:17).
What the modern clergy can't stand is the powerful evocation of England. When they see the word "England" they don't hear the music of ancient Albion. They see patriotism and national pride, which to them are the next worse things to fascism and expansionary imperialism. But, as Chesterton said, if a man won't love his country, it is difficult to believe he loves anything. Blake's hymn was a prelude to Milton, and he knew that Paradise Lost, the Fall of Man, happens down the Old Kent Road as definitely as anywhere else.
Odd, the trendy clergy's preference for abstractions and internationalism when it was abstracted international communism under Stalin and Mao which slaughtered millions more even than the ueber-nationalists in the Third Reich.
There is nothing abstract or theoretical about Blake's hymn. He wasn't writing a report for the General Synod. As a poet of genius, he knew that the way to convey spiritual realities is to incarnate them in things: swords, chariots, clouded hills, mountains green. St Margaret's, "Parliament's church" in Westminster, disapproves of the line about "dark satanic mills" only by misunderstanding it. No English literature scholar imagines for a minute that Blake was referring to the cotton mills and weaving sheds in Lancashire.
One of our finest biblical commentators, Tom Wright, Bishop of Durham, says: "The 'dark satanic mills' were not the cotton mills and steel mills of the new, noisy and smoky industrial revolution. They were the great churches, such as Westminster Abbey and St Paul's Cathedral, which Blake saw as being hopelessly in thrall to the follies of the world, follies he saw all too clearly in the great thinkers of what was already calling itself the Enlightenment. He faced down the scorn of Voltaire and Rousseau against the deep mysteries of faith. 'You throw the sand against the wind,' he wrote, 'and the wind blows it back again.'?"
Now, at last, we are getting close to understanding this sour prejudice against Jerusalem among so many clergy. For Blake is attacking them - those who, though they promised at ordination to challenge the follies of the age, actually aid and encourage them. It is the Jerusalem haters who have swallowed whole all the dogmas of Rousseauism and the secular superstitions of the Enlightenment in its most recent form: political-correctness.
If Blake could hear for five minutes these people banging on about their true preoccupations, the follies of the age - anti-racism, gender egalitarianism, compliance, the foreign aid industry and the paranoid fantasy of global warming - he would sing all the more loudly against this lot: "Bring me my bow… bring me my arrows… bring me my sword…"
Source
Posted by John Ray. For a daily critique of Leftist activities, see DISSECTING LEFTISM. For a daily survey of Australian politics, see AUSTRALIAN POLITICS Also, don't forget your summary of Obama news and commentary at OBAMA WATCH
Some reflections on relationships between Jews and non-Jews
One of the privileges of being a blogger is that one gets in touch with many people whom one would not otherwise know at all. One person whose correspondence I particularly appreciate is the man I mentioned on a previous occasion as a descendant of The Landlord of "The Sun".
He is Jewish so of course noted with some interest my recent quest to attend a seder. He was particularly keen to comment on a speculation that I included in my first report on the matter:
I will let him take up the story from there. What I reproduce is an email he sent me which I reproduce with his permission. I am particularly glad to reproduce it because I think he strives hard for balance in the same way that I hope I do:
I just saw these comments and wanted to just say a couple of things: Jewish love is a mixed bag, and a result of 2000 years (or more) of anti-Semitism. There's a real chicken-and-egg thing...did intolerance lead to hate against Jews or did hate against Jews lead to our being intolerant? A little of both. In fact, according to our own tenets, we are supposed to love everyone, don't damn anyone to hell, accept converts...which was once quite easy, until persecution and even laws demanding death for those who converted Christians kind of put the kibbosh on that. I am not saying any of this is good, but it's what happened.
Because of my own background, I have been buffetted by the problems. My dad, being a Holocaust survivor, was intolerant to the idea that I would marry out, but even if they were to have an Orthodox and sincere conversion...no good. However, he even admitted it was wrong per the tenets of the faith, and he was not rational about it, because of what he had undergone. On the other hand, he was head of a microbiology lab and a university professor...and those who worked under him loved him, and he had a number of them who worked for him for 30 or more years, and none were Jewish...i.e. he treated them almost as if family...we still hear from them occasionally, though he's been gone 25 years now.
In the congregation I used to go, there are a number of converts, and I was very close with a convert and his family when in college. And it's an Orthodox congregation. I now go to a small Chabad synagogue, and there are converts-in-training there....now, you can say it's only because they are potentially Jews and that's why they are treated well...it would be untrue. I have never heard that particular Chabad rabbi (and like all groups, Chabad has no-goodniks and saints and everything in between) talk down Christians or Christianity. True, there is talk of "love of Israel", i.e. the Jewish people, but there is no negative talk.
Ironically, also, yesterday, I was at my old congregation for a bar mitzvah...and the rabbi there made a speech talking about precisely about how we need to be more outgoing, interact with the rest of the world. He was talking about the Seder and Passover, which is both a uniquely particularistic Jewish holiday, but has universal themes of freedom and liberty. But even in our household, at our Seder, and most of my family is Orthodox, we talk of the liberation from bondage in the historical sense, but leading to the Redemption of all Mankind in the Messianic Era. It is NOT limited to Jews (in fact, we talk about the Seven Noahide Laws, which if followed, enable non-Jews to go to the World-to-Come, or be labeled "righteous" or whatever...and in fact, what we did was make it much harder for ourselves, in a kind of nobless oblige fashion, to follow all the crazy laws we have, as Jews, to get there....we didn't expect anyone else to have to do that. In fact, one of the rationales now for not actively seeking converts (versus allowing conversion if pursued) is that "it's hard to be a Jew", an old saying, derived from both the external problems of anti-Semitism but MORE so from the internal obligations.
There are also plenty of laws about how to treat the stranger...and that's what the rabbi was speaking of...but yes, over the centuries, we withdrew and became quite chauvinist at times...it's an incredibly complex topic. I'm not trying to excuse the Chabad folks there...my family would have the same problems here, meaning my mother and my sister, though I wouldn't mind at all and would LOVE to have you as a guest...I think you would add immensely to the discussions we have every year.
You probably have been warned, though, that the Reform...and I don't know how they are in Australia, but here, they are of course extremely liberal in every bad sense of the word, and I'm sorry you won't be able to attend a more traditional Seder. That doesn't mean that the one you'll be going to will be bad, or will have some of the ultra-liberal memes going on that we see here...but I wouldn't be shocked. Not all of it is bad...a lot of it is the usual liberal fairy-tale utopian ideals, but without a shred of common sense...but oftentimes far removed from the Jewish (as some of us see it) aspects, and so watered down as to be too universally-themed...a lot of kumbaya and can't we all just get along nonsense.
I don't know, for instance, if they will have this paragraph at the end, which we include:
You can imagine that my dad would say these with a bit of passion. On the other hand, there is a lot about the stranger, and "let all those who are hungry come and eat"...and doesn't say "Jewish hungry". Mixed bag.
I would say it would be good to find a traditional haggadah, the 'book' that's used to retell the story of the Exodus, but not quite in any fashion one would recognize from the Bible. But even then, it would be good to see if someone can give you one that is annotated and has explanations/footnotes, because even for those of us who have done this for 50 years, there are still passages that make no sense...it's VERY different than one would expect, and is not a simple retelling of the story. In turn, it will be VERY different than the Reform version...as example, here's something I found on the Internet:
Or, even better, a broader article about the various Haggadot available...even at our Orthodox table, we use a lot of different versions, with different commentaries, though all are based on traditional sources for the commentaries...no "feminist" or "Humanist" ones here.
Probably more information than you wanted or needed, but I thought I'd try to clarify. I feel somewhat qualified to do this, having grown up with not only my dad, but with my mother's parents, who are now also gone; My grandfather's father was murdered in front of my grandfather, during the 1905 Revolution, but it was as much because he was Jewish, according to my grandfather...and my grandmother was from Poland, and experienced anti-Semitism there...pogroms...but lived to tell the tale.
Nevertheless, though my grandmother would spit on the sidewalk if she saw a priest or nun...the Polish Catholic Church was virulently anti-Semitic back when (Pope John Paul being a saint in my eyes, truly, as he was so different in that regards, as I actually believe Ratzinger to be too)....my grandparents were beloved by those they dealt with, Jewish or non-Jewish, because even with their own prejudices, they were able to overcome those in their day-to-day dealings and treated everyone as their equals, or judged them solely on their behavior, rather than on their background. But I grew up in the 60's, with "peace, love and rock'n roll", and so found all this stuff antiquated and silly...and then realized it wasn't! But I've genuinely tried to look at it from every perspective.
The "Chosen People" thing...even that is rife with complications. We werent' chosen to be the overlords nor the "best"...it was us being chosen to do obligations, to show a way. INCREDIBLY difficult to not be pain-in-the-ass "I know better than you" vs. "I'm just going to show by example"...and we're not always successful at it. But I can tell you that it is what we are SUPPOSED to do, to live and show by example, not be being utopianists who know it all...though liberal Jews, as all liberals do, go and do that. So the irony (and I'll finish finally) is that the most liberal Jews are the ones that know the least about Judaism, but are in the forefront of every nut movement from Communism to every dubious "rights" group...
I try to live by the creed of just trying to be a good human being, as were my grandparents and my dad, and treat everyone well, regardless of background, because that is the REAL creed Judaism is supposed to follow. I work in a hospital and I think there are a total of about 3 Jewish workers...I'm the only one in the Emergency room...but I love my coworkers and (I hope) they love me, even though we have such different backgrounds.
Posted by John Ray. For a daily critique of Leftist activities, see DISSECTING LEFTISM. For a daily survey of Australian politics, see AUSTRALIAN POLITICS Also, don't forget your summary of Obama news and commentary at OBAMA WATCH
He is Jewish so of course noted with some interest my recent quest to attend a seder. He was particularly keen to comment on a speculation that I included in my first report on the matter:
"As the Lubavitchers are very fundamentalist, I think we might perhaps conclude that we see the basic difference between Jewish love and Christian love there. Jewish love is for Jews and Christian love is for all mankind"
I will let him take up the story from there. What I reproduce is an email he sent me which I reproduce with his permission. I am particularly glad to reproduce it because I think he strives hard for balance in the same way that I hope I do:
I just saw these comments and wanted to just say a couple of things: Jewish love is a mixed bag, and a result of 2000 years (or more) of anti-Semitism. There's a real chicken-and-egg thing...did intolerance lead to hate against Jews or did hate against Jews lead to our being intolerant? A little of both. In fact, according to our own tenets, we are supposed to love everyone, don't damn anyone to hell, accept converts...which was once quite easy, until persecution and even laws demanding death for those who converted Christians kind of put the kibbosh on that. I am not saying any of this is good, but it's what happened.
Because of my own background, I have been buffetted by the problems. My dad, being a Holocaust survivor, was intolerant to the idea that I would marry out, but even if they were to have an Orthodox and sincere conversion...no good. However, he even admitted it was wrong per the tenets of the faith, and he was not rational about it, because of what he had undergone. On the other hand, he was head of a microbiology lab and a university professor...and those who worked under him loved him, and he had a number of them who worked for him for 30 or more years, and none were Jewish...i.e. he treated them almost as if family...we still hear from them occasionally, though he's been gone 25 years now.
In the congregation I used to go, there are a number of converts, and I was very close with a convert and his family when in college. And it's an Orthodox congregation. I now go to a small Chabad synagogue, and there are converts-in-training there....now, you can say it's only because they are potentially Jews and that's why they are treated well...it would be untrue. I have never heard that particular Chabad rabbi (and like all groups, Chabad has no-goodniks and saints and everything in between) talk down Christians or Christianity. True, there is talk of "love of Israel", i.e. the Jewish people, but there is no negative talk.
Ironically, also, yesterday, I was at my old congregation for a bar mitzvah...and the rabbi there made a speech talking about precisely about how we need to be more outgoing, interact with the rest of the world. He was talking about the Seder and Passover, which is both a uniquely particularistic Jewish holiday, but has universal themes of freedom and liberty. But even in our household, at our Seder, and most of my family is Orthodox, we talk of the liberation from bondage in the historical sense, but leading to the Redemption of all Mankind in the Messianic Era. It is NOT limited to Jews (in fact, we talk about the Seven Noahide Laws, which if followed, enable non-Jews to go to the World-to-Come, or be labeled "righteous" or whatever...and in fact, what we did was make it much harder for ourselves, in a kind of nobless oblige fashion, to follow all the crazy laws we have, as Jews, to get there....we didn't expect anyone else to have to do that. In fact, one of the rationales now for not actively seeking converts (versus allowing conversion if pursued) is that "it's hard to be a Jew", an old saying, derived from both the external problems of anti-Semitism but MORE so from the internal obligations.
There are also plenty of laws about how to treat the stranger...and that's what the rabbi was speaking of...but yes, over the centuries, we withdrew and became quite chauvinist at times...it's an incredibly complex topic. I'm not trying to excuse the Chabad folks there...my family would have the same problems here, meaning my mother and my sister, though I wouldn't mind at all and would LOVE to have you as a guest...I think you would add immensely to the discussions we have every year.
You probably have been warned, though, that the Reform...and I don't know how they are in Australia, but here, they are of course extremely liberal in every bad sense of the word, and I'm sorry you won't be able to attend a more traditional Seder. That doesn't mean that the one you'll be going to will be bad, or will have some of the ultra-liberal memes going on that we see here...but I wouldn't be shocked. Not all of it is bad...a lot of it is the usual liberal fairy-tale utopian ideals, but without a shred of common sense...but oftentimes far removed from the Jewish (as some of us see it) aspects, and so watered down as to be too universally-themed...a lot of kumbaya and can't we all just get along nonsense.
I don't know, for instance, if they will have this paragraph at the end, which we include:
"Pour out Thy wrath upon the nations that know Thee not, and upon kingdoms that did not call upon Thy name. For they have consumed Jacob, and laid waste his habitation. Pour out Thy rage upon them, and let Thy fury overtake them. Pursue them in anger and destroy them, from under the heavens of the LORD."
You can imagine that my dad would say these with a bit of passion. On the other hand, there is a lot about the stranger, and "let all those who are hungry come and eat"...and doesn't say "Jewish hungry". Mixed bag.
I would say it would be good to find a traditional haggadah, the 'book' that's used to retell the story of the Exodus, but not quite in any fashion one would recognize from the Bible. But even then, it would be good to see if someone can give you one that is annotated and has explanations/footnotes, because even for those of us who have done this for 50 years, there are still passages that make no sense...it's VERY different than one would expect, and is not a simple retelling of the story. In turn, it will be VERY different than the Reform version...as example, here's something I found on the Internet:
Or, even better, a broader article about the various Haggadot available...even at our Orthodox table, we use a lot of different versions, with different commentaries, though all are based on traditional sources for the commentaries...no "feminist" or "Humanist" ones here.
Probably more information than you wanted or needed, but I thought I'd try to clarify. I feel somewhat qualified to do this, having grown up with not only my dad, but with my mother's parents, who are now also gone; My grandfather's father was murdered in front of my grandfather, during the 1905 Revolution, but it was as much because he was Jewish, according to my grandfather...and my grandmother was from Poland, and experienced anti-Semitism there...pogroms...but lived to tell the tale.
Nevertheless, though my grandmother would spit on the sidewalk if she saw a priest or nun...the Polish Catholic Church was virulently anti-Semitic back when (Pope John Paul being a saint in my eyes, truly, as he was so different in that regards, as I actually believe Ratzinger to be too)....my grandparents were beloved by those they dealt with, Jewish or non-Jewish, because even with their own prejudices, they were able to overcome those in their day-to-day dealings and treated everyone as their equals, or judged them solely on their behavior, rather than on their background. But I grew up in the 60's, with "peace, love and rock'n roll", and so found all this stuff antiquated and silly...and then realized it wasn't! But I've genuinely tried to look at it from every perspective.
The "Chosen People" thing...even that is rife with complications. We werent' chosen to be the overlords nor the "best"...it was us being chosen to do obligations, to show a way. INCREDIBLY difficult to not be pain-in-the-ass "I know better than you" vs. "I'm just going to show by example"...and we're not always successful at it. But I can tell you that it is what we are SUPPOSED to do, to live and show by example, not be being utopianists who know it all...though liberal Jews, as all liberals do, go and do that. So the irony (and I'll finish finally) is that the most liberal Jews are the ones that know the least about Judaism, but are in the forefront of every nut movement from Communism to every dubious "rights" group...
I try to live by the creed of just trying to be a good human being, as were my grandparents and my dad, and treat everyone well, regardless of background, because that is the REAL creed Judaism is supposed to follow. I work in a hospital and I think there are a total of about 3 Jewish workers...I'm the only one in the Emergency room...but I love my coworkers and (I hope) they love me, even though we have such different backgrounds.
Posted by John Ray. For a daily critique of Leftist activities, see DISSECTING LEFTISM. For a daily survey of Australian politics, see AUSTRALIAN POLITICS Also, don't forget your summary of Obama news and commentary at OBAMA WATCH
Sunday, April 13, 2008
NEWT PEGS OBAMA'S ELITIST MARXISM
Yes I know I don't have any startling revelations regarding Barack [middle name redacted] Obama's self-revelatory gaffe -- I just wanted to display another marxist Obama logo.
But Ed Morrissey pointed out a brilliant, pith assessment by the great Newt Gingrich:
As Ed Morrissey says:If you go to the most expensive private school in Hawaii and then move on to Columbia University and Harvard Law School, you may not understand normal Americans. Their beliefs are so alien to your leftwing viewpoint that you have to seek some psychological explanation for what seem to be weird ideas.
They can't really believe in the right to bear arms.
They can't really believe in traditional marriage.
They can't really believe in their faith in God.
They can't really want to enforce the law on immigration.
Therefore, they must be "bitter" and "frustrated."
This is the closest Senator Obama has come to openly sharing his wife's view that "America is a mean country". Not since Governor Dukakis have we seen anyone so out of touch with normal Americans. It makes perfect sense that it was in a fundraiser in San Francisco that he would have shared the views he has so carefully kept hidden for the entire campaign.
This distills the Obama viewpoint about middle America to its essence. He assumes that gun ownership, religious faith, and a desire to enforce border security grows out of a mental defect or simple petulance. He cannot understand any of it as deeply held values or beliefs because they are all so foreign to him. His cure is a huge, whopping dose of government intervention to replace all of it. That’s the hubris, the condescension, and the elitism rolled up into a precise point.That's all there is to it, people, and all there is to Barack [middle name redacted] Obama.
Hillary Clinton's extreme gun-control makeover
• Before: The New York Times, May 9, 1999:
• After: The New York Times, April 12, 2008:
For the 471st time, I ask you: is there anything the Clintons wouldn't say or do to regain power? If so, I'd like to know what it is.
Stepping up the Clinton Administration's campaign against gun violence, Hillary Rodham Clinton used an emotional White House ceremony today to call on Americans to press Congress to ''buck the gun lobby'' and pass several gun control measures....The Senate is to begin debate next week on a number of gun control measures, some of which mirror proposals offered recently by President Clinton. ''The senators need to hear from all of us,'' Mrs. Clinton said... "[from those] who will stand behind political leaders who are brave enough to buck the gun lobby, wherever that may take us, so that they will vote for the measures that we know will save lives.''
• After: The New York Times, April 12, 2008:
“I disagree with Senator Obama’s assertion that people in our country cling to guns and have certain attitudes about immigration or trade simply out of frustration,” she said.She described herself as a pro-gun churchgoer, recalling that her father taught her how to shoot a gun when she was a young girl and said that her faith “is the faith of my parents and my grandparents.”
For the 471st time, I ask you: is there anything the Clintons wouldn't say or do to regain power? If so, I'd like to know what it is.
BOYCOTT NBC TO PROTEST BEIJING OLYMPICS
Yahoo/Reuters:
NBC Universal has sold 75 percent of the commercial inventory for its upcoming Olympics broadcast and has seen no discomfort from advertisers over pro-Tibet protests against China, Chief Executive Jeff Zucker said on Monday.
Zucker told Reuters in an interview that Olympic advertising prices have been "incredibly strong" despite political tensions and anti-China protests ahead of the August games in Beijing.
PATHETIC.
Everyone should boycott NBC and the sponsors of the Beijing Olympic broadcasts.
The Olympics should never be given to any nation which prevents people from enjoying their innate, universal human rights.
ANOTHER LOOK AT THE UN-CONSTITUTIONALITY OF ROE v WADE
Hot on the heels of his Watergate success, Bob Woodward co-wrote a book on the SCOTUS in 1979, (with Scott Armstrong).
It's titled THE BRETHREN, and it's regarded as one of the best books EVER on the SCOTUS. It details the Burger Court and many of their decisions and all the great and historic personalities and crises of that court.
Ultra-liberal Jeff Toobin wrote another book last year on the SCOTUS specifically because it had been nearly 30 years since Woodward & Armstrong's great book had been published and he and his publishers felt it was time to do another on today's SCOTUS.Woodward & Armstrong detail many of the "behind the scene" dramas that went into historic decisions - INCLUDING ROE v WADE.
I have posted JPEGS scans of two fascinating excerpts on this decision - EXCERPTS WHICH PROVE THAT THE DECISION WAS FUNDAMENTALLY UNCONSTITUTIONAL, NON-CONSTITUTIONAL, or "EXTRA-CONSTITUTIONAL. (Just click on them to see them larger.)
What they prove is that the decision was NOT BASED ON THE CONSTITUTION, BUT ON BRENNAN'S INDEPENDENT ANALYSIS OF MEDICINE.
QUOTE #1 (page 271):
" Harry Blackmun returned to Rochester, Minnesota for the summer of 1972 and immersed himself in research at the huge Mayo Clinic medical library. Rochester and the clinic were home to Blackmun, a safe harbor after a stormy term.(ALSO DISGUSTING: His research was intended to bolster his pre-formed opinion, not to form it!)
...In his summer office... Blackmun began to organize the research that would bolster his abortion opinion. ... Blackmun pondered the relevance of the Hippocratic oath, which prohibits doctors from performing abortions. He also wanted to understand the positions of the medical organizations and to learn more about the advances in sustaining the life of a fetus outside of the womb."
QUOTE #2 (page 203):
Blackmun was convinced that of all the justices he alone had the medical background and sufficient patience to sift through the voluminous record for the scientific data on which to base a decision.The SCOTUS is NOT meant to be a trier of fact or a finder of fact, but a decider of constitutionality. Justices should decide on the US Constitution and not their "medical knowledge".
When Justices of the SCOTUS go beyond this role, then they have over-stepped their constitutional powers, and any and all decisions which are so based are not lawful.
In this case, not only is Roe v Wade unconstitutional and unlawful, it is immoral.
It was a sad day for humanity. Millions of American babies have been murdered as a result. Most of whom might have been born and adopted. Living full lives. (And doing the work today's living Americans won't do!) And more importantly, an un-sarcastically - just being alive.
How sad. How sad, and unconstitutional.
UK: [CORRECTED] 2,000 TERRORISTS, 200 NETWORKS, 30 ACTIVE PLOTS
*******UPDATED AND BUMPED - [AND CORRECTED: REUTERS ERRED]:
Home Secretary Jacqui Smith spelled it out in a newspaper interview:
Home Secretary Jacqui Smith spelled it out in a newspaper interview:
Maybe it's time to stop putting terrorists on the dole?"We now face a threat level that is severe. It's not getting any less, it's actually growing," she said in an interview to be published in Sunday's News of the World.
"We task the police and the security agencies with protecting us ... There are [CORRECTED] 2,000 individuals they are monitoring. There are 200 networks. There are 30 active plots," she said.
How Al Qaeda must be gloating. What would any sane country do if it discovered that living among it was Osama Bin Laden's right-hand man, who was wanted by his own country on terrorism charges? It's a fair bet that it would deport him to that country as fast as it could.
What does Britain do in those circumstances? Declare that extradition would be a breach of his human rights and prepare to release him from jail under indefinite house arrest, courtesy of the British taxpayer, to the tune of some £1,000 per month in welfare benefits.
This is the surreal situation following the Appeal Court judgment this week on Abu Qatada, who is currently in jail fighting deportation to his native Jordan, where he was convicted in his absence on terrorist charges in both 1999 and 2000.
It isn't Der Untergang des Abendlandes, it's Der Selbstmord des Abendlandes.
RELIAPUNDIT ADDS: FROM JAWA:
UK: Extremism Spread By Saudi Backed University Donations Extremist ideas are being spread by Islamic study centres linked to British universities and backed by multi-million-pound donations from Saudi Arabia and Muslim organisations, a new report claims.Eight universities, including Oxford and Cambridge, have accepted more than £233.5 million from Saudi and Muslim sources since 1995, with much of the money going to Islamic study centres, according to the report.
The total sum, revealed by Anthony Glees, the director of Brunel University's Centre for Intelligence and Security Studies, amounts to the largest source of external funding to UK
Arab donors have argued that their gifts to academic institutions help to promote understanding between the West and the Islamic world. However, Prof Glees claims in his unpublished report that the propagation of one-sided views of Islam and the Middle East at universities amounts to anti-Western propaganda.
- THIS AMOUNTS TO AN ATTACK, AN ACT OF WAR, ON THE WEST.
- THESE DONATIONS AND THE JIHADISM THEY SPREAD ARE A REAL AND PRESENT THREAT.
- WHEN WILL THE WEST COUNTER-ATTACK EFFECTIVELY?
- THE WEST MUST NOT ONLY MONITOR THESE 22,000 AGENTS IN THE UK (AND ELSEWHERE), WE MUST ALSO CUT OFF THIS IN-FLOW OF MONEY AND PEOPLE - IF WE REALLY WANT TO WEST TO SURVIVE.
- MEANWHILE, THE USA IS DOING THE OPPOSITE: ARAB NEWS:
US to Double Visas for Saudi Students
Abdul Aziz Abdul Wahed, Arab News
Al-JOUF, 10 April 2008 — US Ambassador Ford Fraker said in Sakaka that his country aims to double the number of student visas issued to Saudis.
“Currently there are 15,000 Saudi students in the US,” he said during an event on Sunday with local business leaders to an audience at the Al-Jouf Chamber of Commerce and Industry. “We aim to increase their numbers to 30,000 over the next five years.”
THIS IS INSANE AND MUST BE STOPPED! [End Reliapundit.]
Is there any limit to British battiness?
Pirates can claim UK asylum so may not be detained by the navy
The Royal Navy, once the scourge of brigands on the high seas, has been told by the Foreign Office not to detain pirates because doing so may breach their human rights. Warships patrolling pirate-infested waters, such as those off Somalia, have been warned that there is also a risk that captured pirates could claim asylum in Britain. The Foreign Office has advised that pirates sent back to Somalia could have their human rights breached because, under Islamic law, they face beheading for murder or having a hand chopped off for theft.....
A Foreign Office spokesman said: "There are issues about human rights and what might happen in these circumstances. The main thing is to ensure any incident is resolved peacefully." The guidance is the latest blow to the robust image of the navy. Last year 15 of its sailors were taken prisoner by the Iranians and publicly humiliated. In the 19th century, British warships largely eradicated piracy when they policed the oceans. The death penalty for piracy on the high seas remained on the statute books until 1998. Modern piracy ranges from maritime mugging to stealing from merchant ships with the crew held at gunpoint.
More here
Posted by John Ray. For a daily critique of Leftist activities, see DISSECTING LEFTISM. For a daily survey of Australian politics, see AUSTRALIAN POLITICS Also, don't forget your summary of Obama news and commentary at OBAMA WATCH
The Royal Navy, once the scourge of brigands on the high seas, has been told by the Foreign Office not to detain pirates because doing so may breach their human rights. Warships patrolling pirate-infested waters, such as those off Somalia, have been warned that there is also a risk that captured pirates could claim asylum in Britain. The Foreign Office has advised that pirates sent back to Somalia could have their human rights breached because, under Islamic law, they face beheading for murder or having a hand chopped off for theft.....
A Foreign Office spokesman said: "There are issues about human rights and what might happen in these circumstances. The main thing is to ensure any incident is resolved peacefully." The guidance is the latest blow to the robust image of the navy. Last year 15 of its sailors were taken prisoner by the Iranians and publicly humiliated. In the 19th century, British warships largely eradicated piracy when they policed the oceans. The death penalty for piracy on the high seas remained on the statute books until 1998. Modern piracy ranges from maritime mugging to stealing from merchant ships with the crew held at gunpoint.
More here
Posted by John Ray. For a daily critique of Leftist activities, see DISSECTING LEFTISM. For a daily survey of Australian politics, see AUSTRALIAN POLITICS Also, don't forget your summary of Obama news and commentary at OBAMA WATCH
Jimmy Carter and Unconscious Hate
Post below recycled from Shrinkwrapped. See the original for links
Manifest behavior is always the summation of competing wishes and inhibitions, most of which are unconscious. When someone makes a great show of his personal piety yet his manifest behavior is often damaging to others, it is worth wondering if he is expressing forbidden unconscious wishes in ways that are disguised and acceptable to himself. Jimmy Carter, our nation's worst ex-President, offers an excellent case in point.
Carter describes himself as a friend of Israel, only interested in Peace in the Middle East and the world. Yet he is now planning to meet with Khaled Meshal, one of the leaders of Hamas, an agent of genocide, in Damascus, the capital of a terror supporting and enabling state which oppresses its own people in ways that the left's fantasies of the Bush administration's tortures cannot even approach. While many believe, and he grants copious evidence to support the belief, that Jimmy Carter is in part motivated by anti-Semitism, let us take him at his word that he is not an anti-Semite and is in fact motivated solely by a desire for peace and love. What are the implications of such a position?
First of all, it is an impossibility. The Pope correctly beatifies those few individuals who live lives of such virtue and selflessness that we can truly believe they are containers of minimal stores of hate. For the rest of us merely human, our reptilian brains (midbrian and hindbrain) are filled with aggression, hate, lust, rage, and all manner of emotions unacceptable to civilized men and women. As I have pointed out before, the input descending from the most recent parts of the brain, the neocortex, is predominantly inhibitory on the lower strata of roiling emotions. Much of the chore of remaining civilized has to do with modulating the expression of those emotions and the behaviors that they would motivate.....
When one, instead of recognizing and metabolizing his hatreds and aggressive drives, denies their existence, they continue to live on in the unconscious, empowered by the denial. The expression of such denied aggression can be seen in the Preacher who is "holier than thou" and takes great pleasure in condemning the sinner to eternal torment. Some will happily supply details of the unimaginable torments (easily imagined by the Preacher) of those unfortunate consigned to the Preacher's vision of Hell.
Jimmy Carter is the Godfather of the modern leftist hater. He presents a pious mien, untroubled by rage or hate. He truly sees himself as a man of peace. Yet Hamas is openly and unapologetically genocidal. Jimmy Carter hates through others -- [thus] maintaining deniability of his own monstrous impulses. His evil is worse than the banality Hannah Arendt described because he should know better. The compartmentalization required to embrace the murderers of innocents while proclaiming their moderation is breath taking yet never seems to give pause to our ex-President. Jimmy Carter is a hate filled and bitter man and every effort he makes seems to support monsters. It is a mystery only to him.
Posted by John Ray. For a daily critique of Leftist activities, see DISSECTING LEFTISM. For a daily survey of Australian politics, see AUSTRALIAN POLITICS Also, don't forget your summary of Obama news and commentary at OBAMA WATCH
Manifest behavior is always the summation of competing wishes and inhibitions, most of which are unconscious. When someone makes a great show of his personal piety yet his manifest behavior is often damaging to others, it is worth wondering if he is expressing forbidden unconscious wishes in ways that are disguised and acceptable to himself. Jimmy Carter, our nation's worst ex-President, offers an excellent case in point.
Carter describes himself as a friend of Israel, only interested in Peace in the Middle East and the world. Yet he is now planning to meet with Khaled Meshal, one of the leaders of Hamas, an agent of genocide, in Damascus, the capital of a terror supporting and enabling state which oppresses its own people in ways that the left's fantasies of the Bush administration's tortures cannot even approach. While many believe, and he grants copious evidence to support the belief, that Jimmy Carter is in part motivated by anti-Semitism, let us take him at his word that he is not an anti-Semite and is in fact motivated solely by a desire for peace and love. What are the implications of such a position?
First of all, it is an impossibility. The Pope correctly beatifies those few individuals who live lives of such virtue and selflessness that we can truly believe they are containers of minimal stores of hate. For the rest of us merely human, our reptilian brains (midbrian and hindbrain) are filled with aggression, hate, lust, rage, and all manner of emotions unacceptable to civilized men and women. As I have pointed out before, the input descending from the most recent parts of the brain, the neocortex, is predominantly inhibitory on the lower strata of roiling emotions. Much of the chore of remaining civilized has to do with modulating the expression of those emotions and the behaviors that they would motivate.....
When one, instead of recognizing and metabolizing his hatreds and aggressive drives, denies their existence, they continue to live on in the unconscious, empowered by the denial. The expression of such denied aggression can be seen in the Preacher who is "holier than thou" and takes great pleasure in condemning the sinner to eternal torment. Some will happily supply details of the unimaginable torments (easily imagined by the Preacher) of those unfortunate consigned to the Preacher's vision of Hell.
Jimmy Carter is the Godfather of the modern leftist hater. He presents a pious mien, untroubled by rage or hate. He truly sees himself as a man of peace. Yet Hamas is openly and unapologetically genocidal. Jimmy Carter hates through others -- [thus] maintaining deniability of his own monstrous impulses. His evil is worse than the banality Hannah Arendt described because he should know better. The compartmentalization required to embrace the murderers of innocents while proclaiming their moderation is breath taking yet never seems to give pause to our ex-President. Jimmy Carter is a hate filled and bitter man and every effort he makes seems to support monsters. It is a mystery only to him.
Posted by John Ray. For a daily critique of Leftist activities, see DISSECTING LEFTISM. For a daily survey of Australian politics, see AUSTRALIAN POLITICS Also, don't forget your summary of Obama news and commentary at OBAMA WATCH
TIME FOR THE LOGAN ACT FOR DHIMMI CARTER
Dhimmi Carter admitted to ABC news that he has been in discussions with Hamas terrorists for years:
Just like Barack [middle name redacted] Obama, isn't he?
"I've been meeting with Hamas leaders for years," Carter said.The Logan Act (1799, Amended 1994) "forbids unauthorized citizens from negotiating with foreign governments."
- § 953. Private correspondence with foreign governments.
- Any citizen of the United States, wherever he may be, who, without authority of the United States, directly or indirectly commences or carries on any correspondence or intercourse with any foreign government or any officer or agent thereof, with intent to influence the measures or conduct of any foreign government or of any officer or agent thereof, in relation to any disputes or controversies with the United States, or to defeat the measures of the United States, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than three years, or both.
- This section shall not abridge the right of a citizen to apply himself, or his agent, to any foreign government, or the agents thereof, for redress of any injury which he may have sustained from such government or any of its agents or subjects.
1 Stat. 613, January 30, 1799, codified at 18 U.S.C. § 953 (2004).
Doesn't the Logan Act cover Dhimmi Carter's travels to encourage anti-American terrorists?Several State Department officials, including the secretary, Condoleezza Rice, criticized Carter's plans to talk in Syria this week with exiled Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal in the first public contact in two years between a prominent American figure and the group. Carter said he had not heard the objections directly, although a State Department spokesman said earlier that a senior official from the department had called the former president.
"I feel quite at ease in doing this," Carter said. "I think there's no doubt in anyone's mind that, if Israel is ever going to find peace with justice concerning the relationship with their next-door neighbors, the Palestinians, that Hamas will have to be included in the process."
Although he said the meeting would not be a negotiation, he outlined distinct goals.
"I think that it's very important that at least someone meet with the Hamas leaders to express their views, to ascertain what flexibility they have, to try to induce them to stop all attacks against innocent civilians in Israel and to cooperate with the Fatah as a group that unites the Palestinians, maybe to get them to agree to a cease-fire - things of this kind," he said.
The State Department says it advised Carter twice against meeting representatives of Hamas, which Washington considers a terrorist organization.
He was warned twice.
Time for an indcitment.
And was this a Freudian slip or what? --
"I think that it's very important that at least someone meet with the Hamas leaders to express their views . . .
Not "to ascertain their views," but "to express their views!"
He admits he sees himself as a mouthpiece for murderers!
Meanwhile, the man who decided to boycott the Moscow Olympics, causing the CCCP to boycott the Los Angeles Olympics, doesn't think Beijing deserves similar treatment:
As president, Carter led the boycott of the Moscow Olympics in protest against the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. "That was a totally different experience in 1980, when the Soviet Union had brutally invaded and killed thousands and thousands of people," he said, rejecting the idea of boycotting the Beijing games to protest China's crackdown in Tibet. He did not address whether just the opening ceremonies should be boycotted.The worst President in American history is also the worst ex-President. He is sympathetic to every anti-American, communist-inspired tyranny in the world, and he blames Americans for failing to fall into line with his folk-marxist folly.
Just like Barack [middle name redacted] Obama, isn't he?
EXPLOSIVE UPDATE Did Pelosi go to Syria to help engineer a Defeat in Iraq? ---- Latin American Press: Pelosi is Chavez' "Lackey"
You know... the Latin American media do have a point here... (via the always superb Gateway Pundit):
From the IBD article:
I am hoping that the resources in the blogosphere and in our intelligence community can get to the bottom of this, and quickly. (Before the election would be nice...).
The South American media knows who the Chavez lackeys are...So who is surprised?? This. is. who. they. are. And if you read the article in Investors Business Daily, Pelosi is destabilizing the entire region--and for what?? Why for the Worldwide Socialist Movement of course (one can just imagine the stirring notes of The Internationale coming from her billionaire husband's living room...)
"Democrats Freeze the Colombian FTA With the "Chavez Rule""
... is the headline at Noticias 24 following Pelosi's historic move to block free trade with Colombia.
Pelosi-- The Hugo Chavez Lackey...
The South American news agencies were following the Democrat's historic move to change House rules and block a free trade agreement for the first time in American history.
Noticias 24 reported:Nancy Pelosi, used as an excuse to work in the priority legislation and packages to resolve the financial crisis and economic slowdown in the United States. However, opposition to the trade pact may have more to do with the objections of the Democrats to President Uribe as personal...
From the IBD article:
The cowardly start more wars than the courageous. Nancy Pelosi's craven altering of House rules to kill off Colombia's trade pact brings that danger to the Andes. If war breaks out, her name will be on it.April 10 may end up as a date which will live in infamy. The Speaker of the House not only refused to step forward and be counted on approving the vital Colombia free-trade agreement, she ran away from letting anyone else vote on it.
After President Bush submitted the pact to a vote under fast-track rules, she changed them to ensure it wouldn't go anywhere anytime soon. By a 224-195 House vote, the voting timeline rule on trade pacts was changed from 90 days to whenever. Pelosi now can hold up Colombia's treaty however long her caprice dictates.
"The message Democrats sent today," a bitter Bush warned after Thursday's vote, "is that no matter how steadfastly you stand with us, we will turn our backs on you when it is politically convenient."
Pelosi's move leaves Colombia, an ally, in limbo and uncertainty. She may think her clever maneuver was done in a vacuum, but it wasn't. In Venezuela's capital of Caracas, where Hugo Chavez holds forth, and in the jungles of Colombia, where drug terrorists hide out, Pelosi's move was watched closely.
Indeed, within hours of the vote, Latin American media already were calling Pelosi's maneuver the "Chavez Rule."
The Venezuelan dictator is no doubt fascinated at how Pelosi could do this to America's best ally in Latin America, punishing a vibrant democracy by isolating it from all the other nations that have sought and won free trade.
Unlike, say, military aid, this deal costs the U.S. nothing, is too small to have much impact on the U.S. economy and is mainly about ending tariffs on U.S. goods sold in Colombia, matching the no-tariff trade that Colombian firms already get here.
Free trade was what Chavez's enemy, Colombian President Alvaro Uribe, considered his best weapon. And Pelosi knocked it right out of his hand, just to placate her party's union supporters.
Only a month ago, Chavez sent 10 tank divisions to the Colombian border after Colombia's army blew away a FARC terrorist kingpin. He warned he would bring war inside Colombia.
Encircled by tanks not only in the East by Venezuela but also in the South by Chavez's cat's paw, Ecuador, Colombia asked the U.S. for just one thing: to pass the free-trade agreement. No tanks. No jets. Just free trade.
Now without it, Chavez might be emboldened to strike. After all, he'll hear from congressional sources that Pelosi probably won't bring up a vote on the trade pact for at least several months. He'll use that time to pick fights with its now-forsaken neighbor. The fact that Colombia can't get even a trade pact tells him all he needs to know about American commitment.
UPDATE: TREASON???
Remember this picture?
Well, if the Chavez reports weren't reprehensible enough, Pam Geller has gotten her hands on a really hot story--if it is proven true. The allegation is that the sole purpose of the Pelosi-Santos "excursion" to Syria last year was to undermine US Iraq success using as a Proxy a Marxist Kurdish organization, the PKK. Strategy: to help ensure an American LOSS in Iraq by planning with the Kurdish terror organization to attack US supply lines.
Very big charges, and not much known about the source, but Atlas has been pretty reliable over the years; my suggestion is to watch it carefully--read all of Pam's post: if she is onto something this story could blow the Presidential election story to the back pages of the Home and Garden Section. Keep in mind that Pelosi as Speaker is briefed on highly sensitive intelligence, much of which would be enormously useful to our enemies.
I will just add this: if it can be shown that Pelosi's purpose in going to Syria was to undermine the effort (and endanger the lives) of American soldiers deployed abroad, then she should not only be impeached from the House and charged with Treason; in a just world she should be whisked off to Gitmo to find out what she told our enemies...
Here is a portion of Pam's explosive post:
Andy (who sent me all this data) was listening to talk radio when the host Jim Quinn of The Quinn & Rose Show mentioned for the second day in a row the aforementioned topic of the Pelosi trip. The reason he was talking about this a year removed was because the topic came up about how the democrats killed the free trade deal with Columbia, effectively siding with the narco terrorist group FARC, and Thug Hugo Chavez. Which made him revisit the Pelosi/Syria trip once again. That was yesterdays show.There is much more to the Atlas post, and I do not know who this "son of deep throat" source is, but if there is something to these allegations, and actionable intelligence trail could be established, if the information became widely known (which would be difficult in today's poisoned media environment) it could cause a tectonic shift in American politics that would make Watergate look like, well...a third-rate burglary.
Today he informed his listeners that someone in Washington was listening in to yesterdays show and heard him talking about the Pelosi trip, and that that DC listener had sent an email to someone he [Quinn] calls "son of deep throat" telling him that he was exactly right about someone from Pelosi's delegation meeting with members of the PKK. He said the letter went on to explain that it wasn't Pelosi who met with them. It was the late Tom Lantos, and Louise Slaughter (D) NY who met with the PKK members. This is a rough transcript.Certain members of Pelosi's 7 representative delegation to Syria last spring met with officers of the PKK an affiliated terrorist organization...this is not an assumption...this is something that several Republican congressmen know with 100% certainty, but they can't come forward with it because they need to protect sources and methods...
It was not Pelosi who originally had the meeting with the PKK, nor was it Henry Waxman or the original Muslim Congressman, Keith Ellison...It was Tom Lantos and Louise Slaughter (Democrat from New York) who had the actual meeting with Haji Amadi, the leader of the PJAK, which is an arm of the PKK who were tasked with handling the battle within Iraq, and other PKK and KCK officers. He said that one PKK officer Marrett Kereillin(sp) has even bragged on this and other meetings in interviews in English and Arabic and Farsi language publications. This is all the source could and likely will say...
He feels if we continue to talk about it the story could break in the national media...the possibility of some Kurd or even a PKK member or a sister terrorist organization might be willing to discuss what they know or one of the intelligent sources, French, US, Israeli, Iraqi, who already are aware of the meeting will finally see the need to leak it...or even a democratic staffer will come forward with the facts...
If this is true we have a bunch of people in the Congress of the United States who have committed treason...they have actually consorted with the enemy to create a situation that cuts off the supply line to an American military operation...Tom Lantos is dead Louise Slaughter is still alive...
If this is true...this is enormous...it's so big the average American can't even get their head around the idea that the Speaker of the House would lead an entourage to try and undermine a military operation and put our people in danger.
If the Syria charges alone were shown to be true, it would probably be enough to guarantee that no Democrat majority will see the light of day for the next 50 years; but if Pelosi and the neo-Marxists running today's Democrat Party also collaborated with the Marxist thug Chavez in denying free trade to our staunchest ally in Latin America, then it is time for our President and Executive Branch to begin playing some serious hardball. It all sounds like a plot from "24" but the scary thing is that it is indeed plausible and seems to underscore everything that Pelosi and the Democrats are about.
I am hoping that the resources in the blogosphere and in our intelligence community can get to the bottom of this, and quickly. (Before the election would be nice...).
Saturday, April 12, 2008
OPEC: OIL PRICES SHOULD DECLINE BY SUMMER
REUTERS:
High oil prices in recent months are due more to financial market developments than fundamental growth in demand, Mohammad Alipour-Jeddi, OPEC's head of petroleum market analysis, told the International Monetary Fund's steering committee. The higher prices have coincided with a falling dollar and rising speculation in paper oil contracts, he said.
"While financial market dynamics have been a contributing factor to record high prices, oil market fundamentals point to a market which is currently well supplied and the balance is expected to soften further due to lower seasonal demand in the coming months," Alipour-Jeddi said in a statement to the committee.
- I PREDICT $80/BARREL BY SUMMER
- WE COULD REDUCE THEM FURTHER BY LICENSING SOME NUKE PLANTS AND SOME COAL PLANTS
- AND ALLOWING DRILLING IN ANWR AND OFF THE COASTS OF CA AND FL.
OBAMA: HARD-CORE FOLK MARXIST
Barack [middle name redacted] Obama's self-revelatory comments continue to be discussed.
As Reliapundit noted, Obama's disdain for ordinary people is part and parcel of his underlying folk marxism.
To explain why he can't garner support of working people in Pennsylvania, Obama shared his marxist theories of proletarian false consciousness to an audience of latte-drinking San Francisco sophisticates:
You go into some of these small towns in Pennsylvania, and like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them. And they fell through the Clinton administration, and the Bush administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate and they have not. And it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.Marc Ambinder of The Atlantic Monthly thinks that:
Obama was sketching out a variation of the Thomas Frank argument about working class voters who seem to choose candidates whose policies cut against their economic interest.
But it isn't Thomas Frank's argument, it is straight up Marx & Engels.
And Obama's comments also reveal, once again, his deep and underlying cynicism and hypocrisy.
He criticizes working-class Pennsylvanians for "anti-trade sentiment" while he blithely opposes free trade with Colombia. (He only wants increased trade with his communist hero, Fidel!)
He criticizes working-class Pennsylvanians for "antipathy to people who aren't like them," when he of course attended for two decades a church that preached James Cone's distorted theology of hatred: "If God is not for us and against white people, then he is a murderer, and we had better kill him. The task of black theology is to kill Gods who do not belong to the black community ... Black theology will accept only the love of God which participates in the destruction of the white enemy. What we need is the divine love as expressed in Black Power, which is the power of black people to destroy their oppressors here and now by any means at their disposal. Unless God is participating in this holy activity, we must reject his love.”
And of course Barack [middle name redacted] Obama thinks that ALL white people are afraid of anyone different, anyway:
“But [my grandmother] is a typical white person who, you know, if she sees somebody on the street that she doesn’t know, there is a reaction. That has been bred into our experiences that don’t go away and that sometimes come out in the wrong way.”And he criticizes working-class Pennsylvanians for "religion," when he has never shied away from claiming to be a man of faith, himself.
The leading candidate for the Democratic Party's Presidential nomination is a first-term Senator with a completely nugatory record. Obama is also a liar, a hypocrite, a snob, a self-centered folk-marxist who socializes with anti-American terrorists and terrorist-supporters, and a racist.
Updated to add the logo. Hat tip: Chrissie via Knowledge Is Power.
PHOTO ESSAY PROVES OBAMA IS PROJECTING WHEN HE BLAMES PEOPLE'S BITTERNESS FOR THEIR MISGUIDED POLITICAL VIEWS
HERE. NOW. (FEATURES REV. WRIGHT, SHARPTON, HUNTER THOMPSON, BOBBY SEALE, DAILY KOSSACKS AND MR. & MRS THURSTON HOWELL III. VIA GLENN.)
YES: OBAMA IS PROJECTING:
VOTE ACCORDINGLY.
YES: OBAMA IS PROJECTING:
In psychology, psychological projection (or projection bias) is a defense mechanism in which one attributes one’s own unacceptable or unwanted thoughts or/and emotions to others.
- BOTTOM-LINE: OBAMA IS BITTER; HIS POLICIES ARE AN OUTGROWTH OF HIS OWN BITTERNESS; HIS CAMPAIGN IS A CYNICAL ATTEMPT TO EXPLOIT THE DESIRE FOR CHANGE AND SUPPLANT THIS BENIGN DESIRE WITH HIS OWN LEFTIST WORLDVIEW. DON'T FALL FOR IT.
VOTE ACCORDINGLY.
MORE UNREST INSIDE IRAN: BOMB BLAST IN MOSQUE IN SHIRAZ
BBC:
MORE HERE.
Deadly blast strikes Iran mosqueI HOPE ANTI-JIHADISTS WERE BEHIND IT...
At least nine people have been killed and more than 100 wounded in an explosion at a mosque in Iran, local media reports say.
The blast reportedly occurred during an address by a prominent local cleric in the southern city of Shiraz.
The city's Law Enforcement Force commander, Col Zamani, told the semi-official Fars news agency that the explosion had been caused by a bomb.
There has been no immediate claim of responsibility for the blast.
MORE HERE.
Chavez pitches Africa on Nationalizing the Oil Industry
Venezuela's deputy foreign minister has counseled African governments to emulate Venezuela and nationalize the oil industry.
Rather than look to Chavez' failed economy -- which has nationalized the oil, steel, and cement industries, to name but a few -- Africans should closely examine Zimbabwe's Robert Mugabe. Mugabe nationalized a far simpler enterprise than oil: land use for farming. The result was an utter disaster.
AlertNet adds:
Yes, it's another success story for socialism!
And remember: when Democrats advocate ever greater government control -- of the oil industry or increased taxes -- they are putting America on the road to economic disaster.
How many case studies do we need before Democrats get the point?
...Reinaldo Bolivar speaking in Senegal has advised African nations to nationalize their oil resources in order to fight poverty and follow the example of Venezuela.
Africa currently produces 15% of the world’s oil and according to Bolivar “Africa's oil is plundered by multinationals: they sell it very expensively even here" he suggested that by pooling resources Africa could supply its own market.
Bolivar went on to say "There are some things for (African countries) to learn: the principal of nationalization of our basic industries, our natural resources in Venezuela, is something we consider necessary for our riches to benefit the people..."
Rather than look to Chavez' failed economy -- which has nationalized the oil, steel, and cement industries, to name but a few -- Africans should closely examine Zimbabwe's Robert Mugabe. Mugabe nationalized a far simpler enterprise than oil: land use for farming. The result was an utter disaster.
Mugabe's land reform program was supposed to redistribute among poor blacks large commercial farms owned by about 4,500 whites that covered 80 percent of Zimbabwe's best land. Instead, he used the farms to extend his patronage system, giving them to ruling party leaders, security chiefs, relatives and friends.Zimbabwe had been a major food exporter until then, but its agricultural sector collapsed and the economy started unraveling. Today, a third of Zimbabweans depend on international food handouts, and another third have fled abroad looking for work or political asylum...
AlertNet adds:
Zimbabwe is in the grip of its worst humanitarian crisis since independence. Twenty years ago the country was hailed as an African success story and dubbed the "breadbasket" of southern Africa. Now its economy is in tatters and the World Food Programme (WFP) estimates a third of the population faces food shortages...
...Zimbabwe now has one of the lowest life expectancies in the world and one of the highest HIV/AIDS rates. Just under 25 percent of people aged 15-49 are HIV-positive, according to the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS).
And with the economy in shreds, unemployment is running at an estimated 70 percent. Inflation is also rampant, standing at 164.3 percent in the year to June 2005...
Yes, it's another success story for socialism!
And remember: when Democrats advocate ever greater government control -- of the oil industry or increased taxes -- they are putting America on the road to economic disaster.
How many case studies do we need before Democrats get the point?
HEZBOLLAH SYMPATHISERS WERE ARRESTED BEFORE THEY COULD CARRY OUT POISON PLOT
In this disgusting news report, we learn that 2 Fatah collaborators who also side with Hezbollah were thankfully arrested before they could work on a plot to poison customers at a resturant they worked at:
Two Arabs from Nablus, Ahab Abu Riyal and Anas Salum, were arrested by Israeli Shin Bet officers last month before they could carry out their mission to poison Israelis on behalf of Hizballah. They are members of the Fatah-al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades, part of Mahmoud Abbas' "moderate" Fatah organization.Businesses like resturants are going to have to consider the dangers of hiring people who adhere to Islam, since they could serve as agents who'd endanger the lives of their customers.
The cell was led by two wanted terrorists, Hani Kabi and Husni Tsalag.
They were hired as kitchen workers by the Grill Express restaurant near the Diamond Exchange in Ramat Gan, apparently after presenting Israeli-issued IDs allowing them to work in the country. Their orders were to dump a slow-acting colorless, tasteless and odorless poison in the food of customers. It would take effect after four hours, enough time to murder a large number of Israeli diners. The Shin Bet did not identify the substance.
One of the two men was detained on March 19, just days before the mission date. The second was picked up at the home of an Israeli Arab friend in Jaffa.
Israeli security forces consider poisoning diners at restaurants or cafes to be a "strategic attack". In the past, terror organizations have tried repeatedly to recruit Palestinian cooks and waiters to poison food at Israeli restaurants. Police note that the plan is a relatively easy means of carrying out a mass attack, as there is no need to smuggle sophisticated weapons into Israel and restaurant employees have free access to the attack site.
USA AND IRAN ARE ALREADY AT WAR
NYTIMES: Iran is engaging in a proxy war with the United States in Iraq, adopting tactics similar to those it has used to back fighters in Lebanon, the United States ambassador to Iraq said Friday.
The remarks by the ambassador, Ryan C. Crocker, reflected the sharper criticism of Iran by President Bush and his top deputies over the past week, as administration officials have sought to trace many of their troubles in Iraq to Iran.
Mr. Crocker said in an interview that there had been no substantive change in Iranian behavior in Iraq, despite more than a year of talks between the Bush administration and Iran over how to calm Shiite-Sunni tensions in Iraq. He said that the paramilitary branch of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps was continuing to direct attacks by Shiite militias against American and Iraqi targets, although he offered no direct evidence.
Asked if the United States and Iran were engaged in a proxy war in Iraq, Mr. Crocker said, “I don’t think a proxy war is being waged from an American point of view.” But, he added, “When you look at what the Iranians are doing and how they’re doing it, it could well be that.”
MORE ON IRAN'S INVOLVEMENT IN IRAQ - AND THE BUSH ADMISTRATION'S SLOW "REAWAKENING" - HERE.- BOTTOM-LINE: WE SHOULD BE FIGHTING THE IRANIANS BACK MUCH MORE EFFECTIVELY.
- FDR AND TRUMAN KNEW HOW TO WAGE WAR, AND WOULDN'T HAVE LET IRAN INFLICT SO MUCH DAMAGE ON IRAQ OR ON OUR FORCES.
- EXCEPT FOR TARDY THE SURGE, ALL BUSH HAS PROVEN THE LAST FEW YEARS IS THAT DUBYA STANDS FOR WIMP.
- IF BUSH LEAVES OFFICE HAVING ALLOWED IRAN TO GO UNPUNISHED AND THEIR NUKE PROGRAM TO GO UNTOUCHED -- AND IF A DEM DOVE APPEASER FOLLOWS HIM IN OFFICE-- THEN BUSH WILL GO DOWN IN HISTORY AS THE WORST PRESIDENT OF ALL TIME.
- A LOUSY, APPEASING, BIG GOVERNMENT LIBERAL.
- HE ONLY HAS A FEW MONTHS MORE TO MAKE A DIFFERENCE.
Islamophobia is a disease?
The article below from the Middle East Times says it is. And Islamophobia may well be a mental illness. But first you have to find some Islamophobics. A phobia is an irrational fear. Fears about Islam are perfectly rational. Those crashing planes on 9/11 were not imaginary and they were all controlled by Muslims who justified their actions in the name of Islam. Muslims in Muslim countries are constantly shouting hate at the West and attacking Westerners and Christians wherever they can. To fear Muslims is perfectly reasonable.
Posted by John Ray. For a daily critique of Leftist activities, see DISSECTING LEFTISM. For a daily survey of Australian politics, see AUSTRALIAN POLITICS Also, don't forget your summary of Obama news and commentary at OBAMA WATCH
"The question that seems to bother many Americans is not so much if Senator Obama is a Muslim or not, rather, the issue is centered more on a question stemming from a disease which has been plaguing the United States ever since September 11, 2001. The disease is called Islamophobia. The symptoms consist of the false belief that everything relating to Islam is tied to terrorism.
Source
Posted by John Ray. For a daily critique of Leftist activities, see DISSECTING LEFTISM. For a daily survey of Australian politics, see AUSTRALIAN POLITICS Also, don't forget your summary of Obama news and commentary at OBAMA WATCH
The Left is terminally miserable
After blogging for the last five years I've come to realize that perhaps the greatest problem we have in this country is people like we see at FDR, the Daily Kos, DU and other terminally miserable websites. Quite frankly I believe they attract a lot of visitors in the way that crap attacks flies, by the smell of fear and decay. Liberals have been miserable for decades, complaining about this and that. You can hardly talk to one without them going off on a tangent about something negative. Most time one of them takes a picture they are always mad or yelling and screaming about something.
God they must corner the market on Pepto-Bismol, chugging down bottle after bottle as they find even more things to criticize and complain about. I think it's another reason that many of them are so damned ugly. Not only on the inside - where it really counts - but on the outside as well. Again, if the tree is bad the fruit is going to be rotten, and rotten fruit doesn't do anything but - you guessed it - stink and attract more flies.
To be blunt, you might wonder why they take their "screw them" mentality and simply put their heads into a collective oven, or even retire to a compound in, oh I don't know, some far away country and sip some Koolaid, and thus do the world a favor by cooling the planet down. With all that hate and anger they've got to be at least partially responsible for a few degrees of temperature rise.
The one thing miserable people hate is happy people. I wondered what a Kos Convention was like and actually asked someone who attended. He told me it was one of the most downer events he ever attended, mostly because of the anger and negativity there.
Source
Posted by John Ray. For a daily critique of Leftist activities, see DISSECTING LEFTISM. For a daily survey of Australian politics, see AUSTRALIAN POLITICS Also, don't forget your summary of Obama news and commentary at OBAMA WATCH
God they must corner the market on Pepto-Bismol, chugging down bottle after bottle as they find even more things to criticize and complain about. I think it's another reason that many of them are so damned ugly. Not only on the inside - where it really counts - but on the outside as well. Again, if the tree is bad the fruit is going to be rotten, and rotten fruit doesn't do anything but - you guessed it - stink and attract more flies.
To be blunt, you might wonder why they take their "screw them" mentality and simply put their heads into a collective oven, or even retire to a compound in, oh I don't know, some far away country and sip some Koolaid, and thus do the world a favor by cooling the planet down. With all that hate and anger they've got to be at least partially responsible for a few degrees of temperature rise.
The one thing miserable people hate is happy people. I wondered what a Kos Convention was like and actually asked someone who attended. He told me it was one of the most downer events he ever attended, mostly because of the anger and negativity there.
Source
Posted by John Ray. For a daily critique of Leftist activities, see DISSECTING LEFTISM. For a daily survey of Australian politics, see AUSTRALIAN POLITICS Also, don't forget your summary of Obama news and commentary at OBAMA WATCH
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