FRENCH TOURISTS MURDERED IN MAURITANIA WERE VICTIMS OF AL QAEDA

AFP:

Two people wanted over the killing of four French tourists in Mauritania are suspected of having links to Al-Qaida's North African branch based in Algeria, prosecutors in Nouakchott said on Tuesday.

Among three suspects in Monday's fatal shooting are "two young Mauritanians who are suspected of belonging to extremist Salafist groups," prosecutors said in a statement.

The statement referred to the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat, the Algerian group which earlier this year declared allegiance to Al-Qaida and renamed itself Al-Qaida's Branch in the Islamic Maghreb.

VOA:

Authorities in Mauritania say three suspects linked to the killing of four members of a French family in the east of the country, may have fled to neighboring Senegal.

A taxi driver told police he drove the men to the town of Boghe on the Senegalese border, about 50 kilometers south of Aleg, where the attack took place.

Security officials say the French tourists were picnicking on the side of the highway outside of Aleg when a group gunmen pulled up and demanded money. The family refused and the gunmen opened fire. One man survived the attack, but lost his two children, his brother and a family friend.

THESE FRENCH TOURISTS WHO WERE THE VICTIMS OF THIS ATTACK HAD NOTHING TO DO WITH NEOCONS OR THE LIKUD OR BUSHITLERCHENEYHALLIBURTON.

IT'S THE GLOBAL JIHAD, STUPID!

INDONESIA HAS ANOTHER BIRD FLU DEATH -VICTIM HAD NO KNOWN CONTACT WITH INFECTED BIRDS

XINHUA:

A 24-year-old Indonesian woman from West Jakarta has died from avian influenza, putting the total fatalities in the country to 94, the Indonesian Health Ministry said Tuesday.

The woman died on Tuesday morning at Cengkareng Hospital in the capital and both of her laboratory tests showed that she was positively infected by H5N1 virus, said Nyoman Kandun, director of the ministry.

"She died on Tuesday after midnight, two of her laboratory tests indicate that she is positive of bird flu," Kandun told Xinhua.

He said that it is not clear whether the woman had historical contact with fowls as investigation is underway.

THIS MAY BE ANOTHER H2H CASE... STAY TUNED...

NYTIMES NEGATIVELY SPINS CHRISTMAS RETAIL NUMBERS

REUTERS:

U.S. specialty apparel retailers saw sales rise 3.6 percent in holiday shopping, at the lower-end of expectations, according to data released on Tuesday by SpendingPulse. ... "It's more at the lower end of the expected range but more or less in line with the reduced expectations coming into the holiday season," Michael McNamara, vice president of Research and Analysis for MasterCard Advisors, said.

NOT BAD: IN LINE WITH EXPECTATIONS, AND MORE THAN LAST YEAR.

AP:

Just weeks ago, the holiday shopping season seemed headed for disaster. But in the waning hours before Christmas, the nation's retailers got their wish -- a last-minute surge of shopping that helped meet their modest sales goals, according to data released late Monday by research firm ShopperTrak RCT Corp.

And with post-Christmas shopping to come, some malls and stores were downright optimistic.

... ShopperTrak said late Monday that total sales on Saturday reached $9.36 billion, up a robust 7.6 percent from $8.7 billion on the same day a year ago. That surge will put stores on track to at least meet its forecast of a 3.6 percent sales gain for the season, according to ShopperTrak.

For the Friday through Sunday period, total retail sales soared 18.7 percent from the year-earlier period, though the increase was inflated because Christmas Eve fell on a Sunday a year ago, according to ShopperTrak. Dollar figures were not available for this past weekend.

Scott Krugman, a spokesman at NRF, noted that the season is turning out as expected: The final days before Christmas and the week after Christmas ''determine the holiday season.''

He expects total holiday sales will meet NRF's growth forecast of 4 percent.

NOT BAD: IN LINE WITH EXPECTATIONS, AND MORE THAN LAST YEAR.

THEN THERE THE NYTIMES: Disappointing Sales During Holiday Season - By MICHAEL BARBARO

American consumers, uneasy about the economy and unimpressed by the merchandise in stores, delivered the bleak holiday shopping season retailers had expected, if not feared, according to one early but influential projection.

Spending between Thanksgiving and Christmas rose just 3.6 percent over last year, the weakest performance in at least four years, according to MasterCard Advisors, a division of the credit card company. By comparison, sales grew 6.6 percent in 2006, and 8 percent in 2005.

• THIS HIT-PIECE ON RETAIL BY BARBARO IS AN OBJECT LESSON IN NEGATIVE SPIN.

• NOTE: ALL OF BARBARO'S ARTICLES ON RETAIL FOR THE NYTIMES FOR THE LAST MONTH HAVE BEEN NEGATIVE.

• ALL IT PROVES IS THAT BARBARO KNOWS HOW TO GET FRONT PAGE INK AT THE NYTIMES: PLEASE KELLER AND PINCH: GO NEGATIVE ON AMERICA.

THE REAL STORY IS THAT DESPITE HIGH ENERGY COSTS, A RELENTLESSLY NEGATIVE MSM SPIN

• ON THE IRAQ WAR,
• AND ON GLOBAL CLIMATE,
• AND THE ECONOMY,
• AND INTERNATIONAL REGARD FOR THE USA,
• AND ON PRIVACY ISSUES, ETC:

THE US CITIZEN IS IN A GOOD HOLIDAY GIFT-GIVING MOOD.

YUP: DESPITE THE NAY-SAYING FROM THE LEFT, THE AMERICAN SPIRIT PREVAILS AGAIN.

BOTTOM-LINE: THE NYTIMES IS TO CHRISTMAS RETAIL SALES WHAT HARRY "WE'VE LOST" REID IS TO THE SURGE.

SHEESH: NYTIMES WORRIES ABOUT WHAT WILL HAPPEN TO CUBA'S ECOLOGY AFTER FIDEL PASSES FROM THE SCENE...

NYTIMES:

Through accidents of geography and history, Cuba is a priceless ecological resource. That is why many scientists are so worried about what will become of it after Fidel Castro and his associates leave power and, as is widely anticipated, the American government relaxes or ends its trade embargo.

... “an invasion of U.S. consumerism, a U.S.-dominated future, could roll over it like a bulldozer” when the embargo ends.

In a report last year, the World Wildlife Fund said that “in dramatic contrast” to its island neighbors, Cuba’s beaches, mangroves, reefs, seagrass beds and other habitats were relatively well preserved. Their biggest threat, the report said, was “the prospect of sudden and massive growth in mass tourism when the U.S. embargo lifts.”

• IN THE BATTLE FOR HUMAN FREEDOM AND DIGNITY, THE LEFT CHOOSES TO WORRY ABOUT THE ECOLOGY.

• THIS IS NOT SHOCKING IN AS MUCH AS IT COMES FROM THE SAME FOLKS WHO THINK HAVING CHILDREN IS BAD FOR THE ECOLOGY.

THE LEFT IS LOST IN A DESERT OF CULTURAL RELATIVISM AND GAIA WORSHIP - AND IS ENTIRELY WITHOUT A MORAL COMPASS.

What really happened

As the world's attention turns to the town of Bethlehem, it's worth revisiting the question: what really happened in the Middle East? Why is it so dysfunctional? What prevents people of all religions from living in peace? The highlights of The Terrorism Awareness Project's presentation are worth reviewing.







Read the rest of the presentation here.

The Arkansas Governorship Virus claims another victim

 
Caucus Cooler offers a new nickname for Mike Huckabee, officially labeling him Arkansas's "Governor Graft."*

The Cooler has obtained documents that show Mike Huckabee received $378,000 in consulting fees during 2006, while he was still governor of Arkansas.

[Most notably], $35,000 came from Novo Nordisk, one of the world's largest embryonic stem cell researchers. It seems that when money is at stake Huckabee may be able to look past his supposedly fervent opposition to this procedure...

...You can view a full list of Huckabee "donors" here.

Bob Krumm provides additional insight into Huckabee's startling stem-cell duplicity:

On April 13, 2007 Mike Huckabee was interviewed by the Des Moines Register. Among the questions was one about stem cells. In response Huckabee said that “I don’t think that the only avenue to curing cacer and heart disease and diabetes and some of the horrible things that inflict Americans is that we have to destroy life in order to create it.”

That’s not an absolute denunciation of embryonic stem cell research*, but the “destroy life” phraseology certainly gave the impression to social conservatives that he is against it.

Interestingly, just one month later Mike Huckabee produced his financial disclosure statement indicating that he had been paid a $17,500 consulting fee by a leading pharmaceutical company engaged in embryonic stem cell research to find a treatment for diabetes.

Obviously, this is a problem for some social conservatives. To others it is an example of the hypocrisy of Huckabee. And to all, that financial statement should raise other alarms.

In addition to the payments from Novo Nordisk, Mike Huckabee took a third of a million, much of it from organizations with governmental interests, even while he was Governor of Arkansas. Included in that is a salary from Flagship Global Health... There is quite obviously a conflict of interest [regarding healthcare]. Even worse, Flagship’s business model would seem to profit from an increase in government medical spending... [even worse,] as the quality of government care deteriorates, his company’s profits presumably grow. It would be like choosing the owner of a taxi company to regulate buses; the worse the buses perform, the more he profits.

After [Mike Huckabee’s] personal success at shedding 100-plus pounds, he has found a platform to share his secrets to creating better health habits in “Quit Digging Your Grave with a Knife and Fork”. Novo Nordisk, a world leader in diabetes care, today announced the availability of 35,000 Spanish-translated copies of this best-selling book, which can be ordered free of charge.

Glenn Reynolds wondered what Huckabee was paid for the 35,000 books. It’s a good question.

Piling on? The pundits aren't done yet.

BizzyBlog's Tom Blumer adds:

And to think I was tempted to give the guy a pass over the “wedding” registries used to collect gifts from “friends” last year when his time as governor had ended. You see, Poor Huck and his wife Janet were moving into a 7,000-foot house, and had to furnish it “somehow.” Gag me.

...I’m insulted that Huckabee — take your pick — thought he could get all of this past the nation indefinitely, or that we wouldn’t care if it became known.

What is it with these Arkansas governors? Is there some sort of virus circulating in the HVAC of the governor's mansion, similar to those gastrointestinal bugs people catch on cruise ships?


* Because there was simply nothing else to do in Little Rock, the Arkansas House passed legislation in March '07 ruling that "Arkansas's" is the correct possessive form of the state's name.

VOTER ID: WHY IS IT A PARTISAN ISSUE?

WASH POST: Partisan Fissures Over Voter ID

Justices to Hear Challenge to Law

The Supreme Court will open the new year with its most politically divisive case since Bush v. Gore decided the 2000 presidential election, and its decision could force a major reinterpretation of the rules of the 2008 contest.

The case presents what seems to be a straightforward and even unremarkable question: Does a state requirement that voters show a specific kind of photo identification before casting a ballot violate the Constitution?

The answer so far has depended greatly on whether you are a Democratic or Republican politician -- or even, some believe, judge.

... The case has pitted Democrats against Republicans, conservative legal foundations against liberal ones, civil rights organizations against the Bush administration.

"Voter ID laws have become the most politicized" of governments' efforts to try to limit fraud and voting irregularities, said Richard L. Hasen, an election-law expert at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles, who filed a brief supporting the law's challengers. "It's in the nation's best interest for the court to resolve it."

Hasen is one of those who point out that the partisan division on voter ID laws often extends to the judiciary. Not only did the 7th Circuit's 2 to 1 vote to uphold Indiana's law break down along the lines of which party nominated the judges; so, with one exception, did the full court's decision not to reconsider the ruling. Michigan's Supreme Court justices -- who are elected in partisan races -- upheld that state's voter ID law, with the five Republicans voting to support it and the two Democrats opposing it.

... "Virtually everything you do, you have to show a photo ID," Rokita said in an interview, and the "sacred civic transaction" of voting should be no different.

• THIS LAST STATEMENT MAKES PERFECT SENSE.

• YET THE DEMS OPPOSE VOTER ID.

• WHY? SIMPLE: THE DEMS AND THEIR BACKERS ROUTINELY USE VOTER FRAUD; THERE HAVE BEEN UNGTEEN PROSECUTIONS IN THE LAST TEN YEARS, AND ALMOST ALL ARE DEMS.

• THAT'S WHY THIS IS A PARTISAN ISSUE: THE DEM MACHINE DEPENDS ON FRAUD IN MANY MANY JURISDICTIONS: MADISON; PHILLY; ST LOUIS; SEATTLE; ETC.

I THINK THIS - ALONG WITH ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION AND EXPANDING ENERGY EXPLORATION - ARE KEY SLEEPER ISSUES FOR THE GOP IN 2008.

CHECK HERE (A DOZEN POSTS WITH LINKS AT GATEWAY) AND HERE FOR MORE ON RAMPANT INSTITUTIONALIZED DEMOCRAT PARTY VOTER FRAUD.

ROUND UP AT MEMEORANDUM.

WHO IS MORE CHRISTIAN FRIENDLY, CHINA OR GOOGLE?

ANSWER HERE - WITH PHOTOGRAPHIC EVIDENCE!

SYRIA THREATENS SPAIN

Yahoo/AFP:

Syria's secret service has reportedly threatened Spanish soldiers in Lebanon in a bid to block the extradition of suspected arms dealer Monzer Al-Kassar to the United States.

The Spanish intelligence service, according to a memo cited by the newspaper El Mundo, fears that troops on UN deployment in south-east Lebanon could be targeted if the Spanish cabinet ratify a judicial verdict and send Kassar to the US.

General Assef Schawkat, chief of Syrian military intelligence, wrote to his opposite number in Spain: "If you think we are going to ignore the affront inflicted by north-American henchmen on our brother (Kassar), you don't really know us and [you] are no friends of the Syrian people."

Dated end-July, the note also refers to Schawkat delivering a thinly-veiled threat during a discussion with Spain's Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos.

Around 1,100 Spanish soldiers serve in the UN interim force in Lebanon installed after the summer 2006 war between Israel and Hezbollah. Six Spanish soldiers were killed during a bombing there in June.

Syrian native Kassar, known colloquially as the "Prince of Marbella" where he has been based for the last decade, is wanted in the US on suspicion of arranging arms deals for leftist FARC rebels in Colombia.

• ASSAD IS A PUTINESQUE THUG WHO SHOULD BE NEUTRALIZED.
• HE THREATENS MORE THAN SPAIN AND THE UN; HE THREATENS LEBANON AND ISRAEL.
• IT SEEMS TO ME THAT BUSH AND RICE HAVE REALLY BEEN SUCKING UP TO ASSAD INSTEAD OF CONFRONTING HIM.
• IT SEEMS TO ME LIKE BUSH AND RICE HAVE BEEN SURREPTITIOUSLY FOLLOWING THEIR BUDDY BAKER'S ISG PLAN, MORE OR LESS...
  

OUR FOREIGN POLICY NEEDS LESS BAKER AND MORE BOLTON!

More fun! Gore camp suggests skeptical scientists bought off

A spokeswoman for former Vice President Al Gore has suggested that scientists cited in a new Senate minority report that calls global warming worries "entirely without merit" have been bought off. The U.S. Senate report documents hundreds of prominent scientists - experts in dozens of fields of study worldwide - who say global warming and cooling is a cycle of nature and cannot legitimately be connected to man's activities.

But Gore spokeswoman Kalee Kreider told the Washington Times that after a quick review, about 25 or 30 of the scientists cited in the report may have received funding from Exxon Mobil Corp. However, Mobil spokesman Gantt H. Walton dismissed the claim, telling the newspaper the company is concerned about climate change reports, and doesn't pay scientists to "bash global-warming theories." "Recycling of that kind of discredited conspiracy theory is nothing more than a distraction from the real challenge facing society and the energy industry," he told the Times. "And that challenge is how are we going to provide the energy needed to support economic and social development while reducing greenhouse-gas emissions."

A spokesman for Gore declined WND requests for additional comment on the issue....

More here

(For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, DISSECTING LEFTISM, IMMIGRATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, EYE ON BRITAIN and TELSTRA/BIGPOND. My Home Pages are here or here or here. Email me (John Ray) here.)

Does black IQ matter?

There is a post on the libertarian Rockwell site which quite rightly points out that it is absurd to judge a person by his race or by any other group membership he may have where there is variety within that group. So why do I, as a libertarian conservative, continue to expound the science of the matter? There are two reasons: Because we do not live in a libertarian world and because it is my own scientific discipline that is involved and I feel a committment to publicize the truth of the matter.

The second reason I will not expand on as it is simply a personal committment that I feel. The first reason is the important one: Vast errors in public policy are made because of the general refusal to accept the truth of the matter. Race is a most vexed topic in all countries where there is a substantial African minority and the problem is made much worse by the utter failure of many attempts to deal with it. The clearest example is in education.

Because the lesser ability of blacks is not accepted in education circles, every failure of blacks to do well at educational tasks is always attributed to "the system" or "racism". A perfectly normal and natural occurrence is treated as an emergency which must be remedied by hook or by crook. And because the real nature of the problem is not admitted, all the "solutions" that are tried are based on wrong theories so not only fail but normally make the problem worse -- generating much anger and feelings of victimization among blacks at the same time.

One "solution", for instance, is "dumbing down". The requirements for (say) a diploma are watered down so that EVERYBODY (or most anyway) passes. In the course of that, however, the educational requirements for whites have to be lowered too (it would be "racism" otherwise) so that white kids in the same educational institutions are taught and evaluated at a "black" level and consequently receive a much degraded education -- which is a tragedy, however you look at it. For instance, around half of High School graduates trying to entering Florida's public colleges and universities are found to lack the basics of reading, writing and arithmetic -- skills which in more "racist" times were acquired in grade school.

I could go on to multiply examples of how refusals to cope with black realities degrade life for everybody but I think I have said enough to make my point clear. I cover the matter in more detail here. For the record, what I would advocate as regards black educational failure is simply for the authorities to be race blind. Let children be judged not by the colour of their skin but by their individual characteristics. Kids who are not doing well should get extra tuition whether they are black, white or brindle and after that let the chips fall where they may. That would be the least destructive policy.

(For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, DISSECTING LEFTISM, IMMIGRATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, EYE ON BRITAIN and TELSTRA/BIGPOND. My Home Pages are here or here or here. Email me (John Ray) here.)

DAVID LETTERMAN: RUDY GIULIANI IS THE PERSONIFICATION OF COURAGE

PLEASE WATCH THE FIRST FEW MINUTES OF DAVE LETTERMAN'S OPENING MONOLOGUE ON HIS FIRST SHOW AFTER 9/11...

• I LIKE MITT AND RUDY AND FRED.

• AND I LIKE RUDY FOR HOW HE GOVERNED NYC FOR EIGHT YEARS - SAVING THE CITY - AND NOT JUST FOR HIM HE RESPONDED TO 9/11.

• EVERY NEW YORKER OWES RUDY A HUGE DEBT FOR IMPROVING THE QUALITY OF LIFE HERE. THEY SAID IT COULDN'T BE DONE, AND HE DID IT.
  

• HECK: HE MADE PEOPLE BILLIONS AND BILLIONS OF DOLLARS BY MAKING BY SAVING NYC FROM FILTH AND CRIME AND MAKING OUR REAL ESTATE THE MOST PRIZED IN THE WORLD.

ANYHOW: WATCH HOW HONESTLY AND DIRECTLY DAVE PRAISES RUDY.

• THIS WAS RIGHT AFTER THE ORDEAL.

• DAVE'S WORDS ARE REAL.

AND REMEMBER: AS CHURCHIL SAID: “Without courage all virtues lose their meaning.”

STRENGTH COMES BEFORE PEACE

"The Prince of Peace Vs the Prophet of War":

The utter contempt Muslims show for Judaism and Christianity seems to elude a lot of people who, while turning the other cheek, find Muslims seeking to impose their sharia law on them and elbowing them out of the way as, for example, in England where many British have abandoned their churches only to see them replaced as mosques. The Church of England has devolved into a grotesquery in which its leaders make light of the most fundamental beliefs of Christianity.

If anyone doesn’t believe that there is a war of religions occurring, they are not paying attention.

... On Christmas day, as churches fill and carols are sung about the “Prince of Peace”, it would be well to remember that ancient Roman dictum, “Si vis pacem, para bellum”;

If you want peace, plan for war.

RTWT.

A Psalm of David.

1 Give unto the LORD, O ye mighty, give unto the LORD glory and strength.

2 Give unto the LORD the glory due unto his name; worship the LORD in the beauty of holiness.

3 The voice of the LORD is upon the waters: the God of glory thundereth: the LORD is upon many waters.

4 The voice of the LORD is powerful; the voice of the LORD is full of majesty.

5 The voice of the LORD breaketh the cedars; yea, the LORD breaketh the cedars of Lebanon.

6 He maketh them also to skip like a calf; Lebanon and Sirion like a young unicorn.

7 The voice of the LORD divideth the flames of fire.

8 The voice of the LORD shaketh the wilderness; the LORD shaketh the wilderness of Kadesh.

9 The voice of the LORD maketh the hinds to calve, and discovereth the forests: and in his temple doth every one speak of his glory.

10 The LORD sitteth upon the flood; yea, the LORD sitteth King for ever.

11 The LORD will give strength unto his people; the LORD will bless his people with peace.

MAY PEACE BE WITH YOU, BUT REMEMBER: STRENGTH COMES BEFORE PEACE:

The LORD will give strength unto his people;
the LORD will bless his people with peace.

DEPARTMENT OF UNINTENTIONALLY FUNNY HEADLINES: "Chinese universities urged to better develop Party organs on campus"

PEOPLE'S DAILY:

Chinese universities urged to better develop Party organs on campus

Chinese universities should develop their Party organs in a "reformative and innovative manner," said a senior Party official on Monday.

DIDN'T THEY EVER HEAR OF VIAGRA!?

Zimbabwean Government Allocates 15 Trillion To Fund 2008 Campaigns

VOA:

The Zimbabwean government has allocated Z$15 trillion dollars to the ruling ZANU-PF party and the two factions of the Movement for Democratic Change to fund operations in the 2008 election year, a more than 20-fold increase from $650 million in 2007.

Political sources said that based on its share of the vote in the 2005 general election, ZANU-PF will receive some $9 trillion while the two MDC formations led, respectively, by Morgan Tsvangirai and Arthur Mutambara, will divide up the remainder.

IF WE TELL THE DEMS, THEN MAYBE WE CAN GET ALL OF THEM TO MOVE THERE! JUST DON'T TELL THEM THIS:

The total of Z$15 trillion equals some US$5-7 million at the parallel market exchange rate, which has fluctuated recently amid a severe shortage of local cash money.

BTW: IT'S NO ACCIDENT THAT MUGABE'S ZIMBABWE HAS PUBLICLY FINANCED ELECTIONS: HE'S A SOCIALIST AND LEFTIES LIKE HIM AND THE DEMS PREFER TO DO EVERYTHING WITH SOMEBODY ELSE'S MONEY.

MERRY CHRISTMAS FROM THE ASTUTE BLOGGERS - AND BACH!

THREE PIECES FROM BACH'S ORATORIO.

ENJOY.

NO SIGN OF GLOBAL WARMING IN THE USA

NYTIMES: New England Is Celebrating Season Filled With Snow

BOSTON — After an absence, a white Christmas will be a reality and not a dream this year in northern New England, elating skiers and people whose livelihood depends on snow.

“We couldn’t be happier,” said Eric Friedman, a spokesman for the Mad River Glen ski cooperative in Waitsfield, Vt., which reported receiving about six feet of snow. “This is like the best Christmas present we ever could have gotten. The old-timers who have seen it all have far and away said this is the best December they remember.”

The snow has been a particular relief to snowmobilers and the businesses that depend on them. For the past two Decembers, trails have been a muddy, rocky mess. Last year, the season did not really start until mid-February.

“This is the earliest season we’ve had in about five years, and it’s cold and staying with us,” said Heather Davis, who operates the Cozy Moose Cabins and rents snowmobiles in Greenville, Me. “We have more snow now than we have in the last two years combined.”

Parker Riehle, president of the Vermont Ski Areas Association, said all of that state’s resorts are expected to be open by New Year’s Day. He described the situation as unprecedented.

“This couldn’t be a better start to the season,” Mr. Riehle said.

Ski resorts are hoping that the strong start will give resorts enough momentum and a firm foundation of snow to last them through the winter.

To understand the difference, consider recent snow totals posted in Burlington, Vt. It has received 34 inches of snow so far in December, compared with 10 inches during that month in 2006, 18.4 inches in 2005 and 22.8 inches in 2004. The average for the month is 15.7 inches.

In Maine and northern New Hampshire, snowfall is about 20 inches above normal, said Butch Roberts, a forecaster at the National Weather Service in Gray, Me. “It just makes everybody happy who wants to participate in winter sports,” Mr. Roberts said.

Sunday River ski resort in Bethel, Me., is having its best December in terms of snow and traffic since 1995, said a spokesman, Alex Kaufman.

BBC: Snow storms in US claim 14 lives

A man walking through the snow in Kansas, 22 December 2007 Snow storms in the central US have left at least 14 people dead and tens of thousands without electricity, the Associated Press news agency reports.

Hundreds of accidents were reported as far south as Texas, where there was a 50-vehicle motorway pile-up.

The storm has also felled trees and power lines and caused the cancellation of hundreds of flights.

More heavy snow has been forecast as the storms move into the Great Lakes region bordering Canada.

"I know it's the holidays but we hope people use some common sense when travelling" Sgt Chad Breuer - Grant County Sheriff's Dept, Wisconsin

The US National Weather Service has issued several heavy snow and winter storm warnings.

Among others, north-central Idaho, western Montana, and western and north-east Wyoming were expected to suffer fresh falls of snow and freezing rain on Monday.

'Miserable Christmas'

Officials reinforced their warnings to people to stay at home.

"I know it's the holidays but we hope people use some common sense when travelling," said Sergeant Chad Breuer in Wisconsin.

"There are a lot of people saying: 'Ill just leave that much earlier,' but still the roads are not favourable for travelling."

Multiple vehicle pile-ups closed major highways in the central states over the weekend.

In Minnesota alone, there were more than 300 road accidents and three deaths.

See map of weather warnings

At least nine people died in accidents in Wyoming, Indiana, and Wisconsin and deaths were also reported in Texas and Kansas.

The fatality in Texas came in a pile-up on Interstate 40.

At least 16 people were taken to hospital, two with life-threatening injuries.

Many in the pile-up were holidaymakers, including families with small children not dressed for the weather, police said.

Winter storm warnings for parts of Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan were being lifted on Monday.

But the authorities said this did not mean safer roads - with interstate routes still icy and rural roads even more dangerous.

The BBC's Matthew Price in the US says Americans expect bad weather at this time of year and the country has the resources to cope.

But for some the fierce winter is making it a miserable Christmas, our correspondent adds.

• IF THE GLOBE WAS WARMING BECAUSE OF INCREASES IN MAN-MADE CO2 THEN THIS WOULD NOT BE HAPPENING.
• AGW = BS.

LAWYERIZED WAR

While I'm personally not an expert on law, I can say that there is what to learn about why lawyerizing war is very ill-advised (Hat tip: Patterico's Pontifications and Instapundit):

This week the IDF distributed ribbons to its soldiers and officers for their service in the war with Hizbullah in 2006. The ribbons were a source of embarrassment. Soldiers and officers, who like the general public view the war as Israel’s greatest military defeat, are loath to pin them on their uniforms.

While the soldiers and general public view the war as a failure, one sector of Israeli society sees the war as a great triumph. For Israel’s legal establishment, the war was a great victory. It was a war in which its members asserted their dominance over Israel’s political and military leadership.

The legal establishment’s ardor for the Second Lebanon War was exposed on Tuesday with the publication of the testimonies of Attorney-General Menahem Mazuz and Military Advocate-General Avichai Mandelblit before the Winograd Committee which the Olmert government established to research the war’s failures. In their testimonies both men shared their perception of the war as a great victory of lawyers in their campaign to “lawyerize” - or assert their control - over Israeli society.

In his opening statement, Mazuz extolled the war as “the most ‘lawyerly’ in the history of the State of Israel, and perhaps ever.” He explained, “The process didn’t begin in Lebanon 2006. It… is a gradual process of ‘lawyerizing’ life in Israel.”

Mazuz responded negatively to the question of whether legal considerations superseded operational and strategic goals during the war. He claimed that the government and the IDF restricted their plans from the beginning to conform with perceived legal restrictions.

As he put it, that preemptive limitation of goals was “the result of a sort of education and internalization that have taken place over the years. I remember periods where there was a great deal of friction with the senior military level regarding what is allowed and what is prohibited. But today I think that there is more or less an understanding of the rules of the game and I can’t identify any confrontation... or ... demands to ‘Let the IDF win.’”

Mandelblit and Mazuz testified that legal advisers were present at all levels of command in all the relevant service arms and in the security cabinet. At each level the lawyers were asked to judge the legality of all the proposed targets and planned operations before they were carried out. And as the two explained, in their decisions, these lawyers were informed not by the goal of winning the war, but by their interpretation of international law.

From both men’s perspectives, international law takes precedence over the national interests in wartime war. Mazuz argued, “Today international law controls our lives, no less … than domestic law. In all spheres - not just in the sphere of the laws of war… the sovereignty of states is diminishing and international law is becoming the tip of the pyramid of norms. It is becoming a substitute for the constitutions of states.”

A perfect lesson why legal issues cannot be allowed to dictate the outcome of battle. And Mazuz should be ashamed of himself if he's upholding the whole notion.

TRASHING CHRISTMAS NOT ENOUGH; NYTIMES NOW TRASHES "ODE TO JOY" - IN TIME FOR CHRISTMAS

NYTIMES: Ode to Joy,’ Followed by Chaos and Despair

By SLAVOJ ZIZEK

London

LAST week, European Union leaders put an end to a decade of diplomatic wrangling and signed the Treaty of Lisbon, which outlined a complete overhaul of the organization, including the creation of a permanent post of European Union president to represent Europe on the world stage. During the ceremony at Lisbon’s grandiose Jerónimos Monastery, a choir performed Beethoven’s “Ode to Joy” in the background. While the fourth movement of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, first performed in 1824, may seem an innocuous choice for the official anthem of the European Union (it was declared such in 1972), it actually tells much more than one would expect about Europe’s predicament today.

The “Ode to Joy” is more than just a universally popular piece of classical music that has become something of a cliché during the holiday season (especially, oddly, in Japan, where it has achieved cult status). It has also been, for more than a century, what literary theorists call an “empty signifier” — a symbol that can stand for anything.

In early 20th-century France, the Nobel laureate Romain Rolland declared it to be the great humanist ode to the brotherhood of all people, and it came to be called “the Marseillaise of humanity.” In 1938, it was performed as the high point of the Reichsmusiktage, the Nazi music festival, and was later used to celebrate Hitler’s birthday. In China during the Cultural Revolution, in an atmosphere of total rejection of European classics, it was redeemed by some as a piece of progressive class struggle.

In the 1950s and ’60s, when the West German and East German Olympic squads were forced to compete as a single team, gold medals were handed out to the strains of the “Ode to Joy” in lieu of a national anthem. It served as the anthem, too, for the Rhodesian white supremacist regime of Ian Smith. One can imagine a fictional performance at which all sworn enemies — Hitler and Stalin, Saddam Hussein and George W. Bush — for a moment forget their adversities and participate in the same magic moment of ecstatic musical brotherhood.

• THIS IS NONSENSE.
• THE ODE TO JOY IS NOT AN EMPTY SIGNIFIER.
  
• AND THE ODE IS NOT MERELY AN ODE TO BROTHERHOOD OF MEN, BUT TO THE UNDERLYING FACT THAT WE ARE ALL BROTHERS BECAUSE WE ARE ALL CHILDREN OF GOD; IT IS A DEEPLY RELIGIOUS ODE.
• AND NEITHER STALIN, HITLER, OR SADDAM WERE BELIEVERS.

EXCERPTS FROM THE ODE TO JOY:

Be embraced, you millions!
This kiss for the entire world!
Brothers, above the starry canopy
Must a loving Father reside.

... Do you fall before him, you millions?
Do you sense the Creator, world?
Seek him above the starry canopy,
Above the stars he must live.

... Endure courageously, you millions!
Endure for the better world!
Over the starry canopy
A good God will reward you!

... Close the holy circle tighter,
Swear by this golden vine:
Remain true to the vows,
Swear by the judge above the stars!

ZIZEK IS NOT A BELIEVER, AND SO "CONVENIENTLY" LEAVES THE FACT THAT THE ODE IS A RELIGIOUS WORK OF ART OUT OF HIS ATTACK PIECE POSING AS INSIGHT.

• ZIZEK'S CRITICSM OF BEETHOVEN'S MASTERPIECE - PERHAPS THE GREATEST MUSIC EVER WRITTEN - APPEARS TO BE AN ATTACK ON EUROPE FOR LEAVING TURKEY OUT OF THE EU.

• BUT DOES TURKEY REALLY BELONG IN THE EU - AFTER ALL, IT IS NOT EVEN IN EUROPE.

• WHEN ASKED WHY HE FELT TURKEY DID NOT BELONG ON THE EU, SARKOZY EXPLAINED: "I CAN READ A MAP!"

• TURKEY ONLY BELONGS IN EUROPE TO THOSE - LIKE ZIZEK - WHO WANT TO SEE EUROPE DESTROYED.

JUST WHO IS ZIZEK? A LEFTIST CREEP - ONE OF THE WORST AND LOWEST "PHILOSPHERS" OF POSTMODERN CRAP SO IDIOTIC ONLY INTELLECTUALS LIKE HIM BELIEVE IT. FACTS:

Žižek is well known for his use of the works of 20th century French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan in a new reading of popular culture. He writes on countless topics including the Iraq War, fundamentalism, capitalism, tolerance, political correctness, globalization, subjectivity, human rights, Lenin, myth, cyberspace, postmodernism, multiculturalism, post-marxism, David Lynch, and Alfred Hitchcock. In an interview with the Spanish newspaper El País he jokingly described himself as an "orthodox Lacanian Stalinist".[1]

Recently, Žižek wrote text to accompany Bruce Weber photos in a catalogue for Abercrombie & Fitch. Questioned as to the seemliness of a major intellectual writing ad copy, Žižek told the Boston Globe: "If I were asked to choose between doing things like this to earn money and becoming fully employed as an American academic, kissing ass to get a tenured post, I would with pleasure choose writing for such journals!"[4]

He is widely regarded as a fiery and colorful lecturer who does not shy away from controversial remarks. His three part documentary The Pervert's Guide to Cinema was broadcast on British television by the More4 channel in July 2006 and is now available, worldwide, on DVD [3]. Zizek has been publishing on a regular basis in journals such as Lacanian Ink and In These Times in the United States, and in New Left Review and The London Review of Books in the United Kingdom.

• A POSTMODERNIST OF THE WORST KIND.

• A FOE OF GOD.

• A FOE OF BEETHOVEN.

PERFECT FOR THE NYTIMES. ESPECIALLY ON CHRISTMAS EVE.

HERE'S A VIDEO LEONARD BERNSTEIN TALKING ABOUT THE ODE TO JOY AND PERFORMING IT IN VIENNA. WTWT!

(LONG-TIME FRIENDS OF THE ASTUTE BLOGGERS MAY REMEMBER THIS IS THE THIRD TIME I HAVE POSTED IT. YOU CAN'T GET TOO MUCH OF A GRRRRREAT THINGS!)

ZIZEK IS PASSE - A VESTIGE OF THE POSTMODERN LEFT WHO BELONGS ON THE TRASH HEAP WITH LACAN AND MARX AND STALIN AND DERRIDA AND - AND THE NYTIMES.

BEETHOVEN IS ETERNAL.

HERE ARE PARTS 2 AND 3...

MERRY CHRISTMAS! ON CHRISTMAS DAY IN AUSTRALIA

Australia is up to 18 hours ahead of the USA in time zones so for American readers this greeting will probably seem a day early -- and show up as dated 24th instead of 25th



The image above is by talented Australian conservative cartoonist Zeg



A friendly Koala above

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(For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, DISSECTING LEFTISM, IMMIGRATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, EYE ON BRITAIN and TELSTRA/BIGPOND. My Home Pages are here or here or here. Email me (John Ray) here.)

Homosexuality Trumps Blackness

Jamaican culture not acceptable in Britain:

"Brighton council's decision this week to prohibit concerts that incite racist or homophobic violence should be applauded. While no BNP-supporting boot-boy band would get a council licence anywhere, there has been more tolerance for Jamaican reggae stars such as Buju Banton and Sizzla, famous for those toe-tapping lyrics "Shot battybwoy, my big gun boom" about murdering gay men.

It is time to challenge the hierarchy of discrimination that puts the rights of racial minorities and religious groups high above those of women and gay rights. Too often culture or faith are cited as excuses for attitudes that would never be forgiven in, for example, white working-class men. According to Amnesty and Human Rights Watch, Jamaica has one of the most repressive attitudes to homosexuality in the world

Source

I just wonder how the correctness police work out these priorities. So nice that we have such wise people making decisions for us dummies about what we hear. Sorta a pity if you like Jamaican music, though.

(For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, DISSECTING LEFTISM, IMMIGRATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, EYE ON BRITAIN and TELSTRA/BIGPOND. My Home Pages are here or here or here. Email me (John Ray) here.)

I'M DREAMIN OF A WHITE CHRISTMAS...

BUT AL GORE AND CHARLES JOHNSON AREN'T...