"I just hope that there is enough of the "Old Europe" left to justify our saving it.

Again."

Signs It Won't Quite Work Out ...

The way these people Cuckoo Clocks expect:



Chalk up another one for the there is justice in the world files...

The NYeT Staffing Pipeline

"Long winded writing and dodgy facts." Yes, just what we need is more Jayson Blairs to go along with 17th.

Oh brother...

Perfectly Puerile Projection

Projection is back big time.

Gelernter strikes hard on the Dhimmi-crats and their Infantile American Principle:

Now some readers will say, hold on, be fair! Democrats only oppose vouchers because the teachers unions ordered them to. Agreed, teachers unions are a big factor in every major decision a good Democrat makes, starting with what cereal to have for breakfast. But Democrats also oppose vouchers out of honest conviction. They are honestly convinced that ordinary Americans don't have the brains to choose a school for their own kids.

The way I normally think of them is as puerile fascifists. But that's just because I tend toward thinking the best of folks rather than taking the avalanche of evidence at face value that they're on the other side.

Control complexes result in puerile projection. My IQ -- not to mention EQ -- is Oh so much lower than theirs.

NOT.

And go read the hat tip from Armed Liberal while you're in the neighborhood...

"In truth, in a free society, income is earned through pleasing and serving one’s fellow man. I mow your lawn, repair your roof or teach your kid economics. In turn you give me dollars. We can think of dollars as certificates of performance."

Hitch Is Back

With an overdue obit for the "Arab street":

Other Muslim streets are even more problematic for those who lazily assume that the jihadists are the voice of the unheard. The populations of Bosnia and Kosovo—populations that actually did have to confront anti-Muslim violence on a large scale—are generally hostile to Bin-Ladenism. Nobody has ever used the term "Iranian street," at least in print or on broadcast news, if only because everyone knows that Iranian opinion, as registered during the mock elections or voiced to visiting hacks, is strongly against the reigning theocracy.

This doesn't entitle those of us in the regime-change camp to claim the "street" either. It simply means that those who once annexed the term have been forced to drop it, and for a good reason. The struggle for public opinion in the region is a continuing one and cannot be determined in advance, least of all by pseudo-populists who grant the violent Islamists their first premise.

The same will hold true, one hopes, for the cheap propagandists who have lately been flourishing the term "Islamophobia." This word, or slogan, has been gaining ground among soft defenders of Islamism in Europe. It is used to put a stop to discussion about the political aims of Islamists in non-Islamic societies, and it has most recently generated great nervousness in Britain—sufficient nervousness to decide the Blair government to introduce legislation to make criticism of Islam into a prohibited hate crime.

Here again, the most persuasive evidence is the evidence that looks us in the face. In Iraq, Muslim militants place bombs in the mosques of those Muslims they regard as heretics. In Afghanistan and Pakistan, too, the Salafi and Wahhabi extremists commit murder against Muslims they deem unclean or unorthodox. And in the West, there are non-Muslims who excuse such atrocities as "resistance." These are often the same as those who hailed what they thought of as the "street." I don't think they should be indicted for hate crimes, but they should be made to understand that what they say is hateful and criminal, as well as sectarian. The battle for clarity of language is a part of this larger contest, and it is time for the opponents of terror and bigotry to become very much less apologetic and defensive on this score.

And so they would if not for being so risibly puerile...

Canuck corruption continues cheekily...

This Is What *NOT* NYeT

Reads like:

May 2, 2005: There are increasing signs that a rift has developed in the Baath Party leadership. It appears that two camps are emerging. The more moderate group – who might be termed “Accomodationists” – seems to have decided that continuing armed resistance to the Interim Government and its American and Coalition supports is likely to get nowhere, and merely alienate Iraq’s Sunni Arabs, who are the backbone of Baath support. In recent weeks representatives of the Accomodationists reportedly have been in contact with the Iraqi government, US officials, moderate Sunni leaders, and UN personnel. The Iraqi Transitional Government has UN support. The Accomodationists are seeking to discuss terms under which an amnesty might be offered and formal legitimacy accorded the Baath as one of the country’s political parties. Presumably some complex negotiations will result from this. How the more radical Baath Party supporters – call them the “Rejectionists” – will react to this is not clear. Even before Saddam, factions in the Baath movement were wont to settle their differences with bloodshed, so a Baath purge or even civil war is not out of the question.

The Syrian pullout from Lebanon may have some interesting effects on the Iraqi violence. The Syrians have indicated that they will be using the troops released by the pull-out to bolster the security of their frontier with Iraq. This will impede the movement of personnel and materiel from Syria into Iraq in support of the anti-government forces, while, not incidentally, improving Syria’s image with the US and other Western Powers.

Perhaps of equal importance, however, is that the withdrawal of Syrian forces from Lebanon, leaves Iraqi-sympathizing groups in Lebanon – such as Hezbollah and other Islamist and pro-Palestinian militias – without the moderating influence that the Syrian presence provided. The Syrians more or less protected these groups from any threats by the Lebanese government to bring them to heel, provided some security against Israeli intervention, and kept the sometimes mutually-hostile groups from attacking each other. With the Syrians gone, these groups, which have been supplying men, money, and equipment to the Iraqi terrorists, are likely to reduce their level of support for the Iraqi terrorism in order to strengthen themselves in Lebanon.

In April, the level of car bomb were the highest in about six months. While it's not always easy to determine what the objectives of car bombs attacks are, it seems that only about a quarter of the attacks actually have been successful, in the sense that they hit the planned target. About a third more were partial successes, in that they did some damage to the intended target but detonated prematurely. About another third seem to have been intercepted by security forces or detonated so prematurely that they caused no damage to their intended targets. Naturally, even the premature detonations have killed or injured people. Most of the casualties have been Iraqi civilians, although most of the attacks seem to have actually been aimed at Iraqi, American, or Coalition forces. On the other hand, the assassination rate in April was about average for the past six months, running about 10-15 a week (though the rate for January was very high due to the terrorists attempt to disrupt the elections). Although a mid-level member of the interim government was killed this past week, most of the victims have been relatively low level political, police, and military officials.

The "De-Baathification" Process is a big issue. Accomodationist Baath leaders have been quietly negotiating with Iraqi Interim Government authorities about integration into the political process. The question of "de-Baathification" seems to be a stumbling block. The Baathists would like a halt to further investigations and persecutions. Many Shias and Kurds in the government, and even a few American politicians, seem to want a total purge of all Baath influence, which would mean the complete exclusion of anyone with Baath connections from any role in a new Iraqi government. While parallel's with the "de-Nazification" of Germany have been drawn, most of those drawing the parallels have missed the point. In fact, the Allied de-Nazification of Germany did not actually go very deep. The focus of de-Nazification was primarily on decapitating the Nazi movement. Of the hundreds and hundreds of thousands of Nazi Party members, only about 6,000 were actually ever charged by Allied officials during the occupation of Germany. And only about 600 were actually sent to jail (this excludes people charged with specific war crimes). Most former Nazi Party members were quickly reintegrated into civil and political life. Even among those sent to jail, almost all were out within a decade.

One major difference between Iraq and Nazi Germany is that in Iraq, Baath diehards continue to fight to regain power. There was no such Nazi terror campaign after World War II. Also, the German Nazis came from every region and religion in the country, while nearly all of the Iraqi Baath and al Qaeda terrorists are Sunni Arabs, which are less than twenty percent of the population. Recently, the Iraqi terrorists have made another major effort to break the morale, and effectiveness, of the government, and particularly the police. In the last four days, terrorist attacks have killed some 120 people, mostly civilians. In the last two months, over 400 Iraqi security troops (police, army, security guards) have been killed, out of a force of over 150,000. An equal number of Coalition troops only lost 87 dead in the same period. This has become a war of Iraqi versus Iraqi. More precisely, it's Sunni Arab terrorists killing Iraqi civilians (including Sunni Arabs.) The Shia and Kurd hard liners are calling for harsh policies against the Sunni population that harbors and supports the terrorists. The government is using this very real threat to get Sunni leaders to negotiate a peace deal. This includes the tribal and religious leaders providing information on where the terrorists are. The terrorists have threatened to kill any Sunni Arabs who do this, and have carried out attacks on Sunni leaders to prove their threat. But more and more Sunni Arabs are ratting out the terrorists, and in the last two months, dozens of raids, often carried out by Iraqi police, have shut down bomb factories and terrorist safe houses. But many of the terrorists are determined to fight to the death. In this respect, they are more like the Japanese soldiers of World War II, not the Nazi German troops. Alas, the Japanese troops, at least most of them, obeyed their emperor's command to surrender in August, 1945. There is no emperor of the Islamic terrorists, and many of the terrorists will fight to the death, the others will become disillusioned and go home. The Iraqi Sunni Arabs have declared Iraq to be the battlefield for a war between Islamic radicals and the rest of the world. The Sunni Arabs have to decide whose side they are on, before the rest of Iraq declares war on them.

Surely you've become a regular Strategy Page reader by now?

And surely you've cancelled your subscription by now to any retarded [That would be pretty much all of them -ed. Can't argue with that.] MSM rags you still retain...

Warren takes on arrant nonsense.

And errant nonsense too. (See the last post.)

Did I Mention That W Is Actually A Septenthian?

Mary Madigan rocks with this post:

Unfortunately, also last week our President exploded another myth. He just killed the belief that America has been fighting a war against terrorism by publicly begging the financier and the source of most Islamist terrorism for a favor.

Appeasing the Saudi government and helping the Royals in any way they can has been a long-standing policy of our Government. It’s doubtful that the Democrats could criticize Bush for his actions when Clinton accepted millions in Saudi donation towards the building of his library, or when Jimmy Carter accepts many millions in Saudi donations for ‘peace’ in Africa.

But like many Democrats, the Bush administration still seems to be living in a 9/10 universe. According to this article, Pump Dreams, published in the New Yorker and in the Energy Bulletin, Dick Cheney stated that the war in Iraq was necessary to protect America’s friends in the region:

.. in August, 2002, seven months before the war started, Cheney warned that Saddam would be able to seize control of the world’s economic lifeline if he acquired weapons of mass destruction: “Armed with an arsenal of these weapons of terror, and seated atop ten per cent of the world’s oil reserves, Saddam Hussein could then be expected to seek domination of the entire Middle East, take control of a great portion of the world’s energy supplies, directly threaten America’s friends throughout the region, and subject the United States or any other nation to nuclear blackmail.”

America's friends as in Saudi Arabia. Saudi oil wealth pays Osama bin Laden’s salary, and the salaries of most Islamist terror organizations around the world. They are responsible for 9/11. As our president held Abdullah’s hand, Abdullah’s employee and friend, chief justice of Saudi Arabia's Supreme Judicial Council Sheik Saleh Al Luhaidan encouraged young Saudis to go to Iraq to kill American soldiers.

"This statement shows the real face of the Saudi government," says Saudi dissident Ali Al-Ahmed of the Saudi Institute, based in Washington.

Al-Ahmed says that while Saudi officials — including Sheik Luhaidan — publicly oppose jihad in Iraq, privately some send a different message.

"He is telling Saudis it's OK to go to Iraq and kill Americans and Iraqis and they won’t be punished for doing that," says Al-Ahmed.

Young Saudis don’t need Al Luhaidan to tell them to kill Americans. They were happy to do that on 9/11, and they’ve been killing, maiming American soldiers and destroying the Iraqi oil fields since the ‘end’ of the Iraq war. As we can see from oil prices, terrorism has been very profitable for the KSA.

These are our friends?

Of course, in WWII FDR had to make common cause with Stalin to defeat Hitler. I sincerely hope that's what W is doing. What's going on with Musharraf in Pakistan comes to mind along that vein.

Or W may still be a Septenthian.

And some of us actually understand that another key player in this battle is either nuttier than a Cuckoo clock or a step from Lucifer himself.

Or BOTH.

Ummmm -- Yes, Mr. Khamenei

That would be correct:

Tehran, 27 April (AKI) - The Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei has said that “human rights, are a weapon in the hands of our enemies to fight Islam.”

Speaking at the Conference for the Unity of Islam which opened in Tehran yesterday, Khamenei said: “The awakening of Muslims, had weakened the plot by America, by international Zionism and by other hidden forces on the planet implicated in a universal strategy which has the objective of fighting Islamic nations, which are a force of one and a half billion believers and with the large natural reserves.”

To a mixed audience of Iranians, Arabs and other foreigners at the conference, Ayatollah Khamenei said that it was “only through the unity of all Muslims, can they confront these diabolical attempts.”

Khamenei also explained how Iran is viewed globally in the role that it plays within the context of Islam. As the supreme leader of the Islamic republic, he said, that the “country has contributed to the awakening of Muslims and our enemies are trying to compensate for their poverty of thought, and so they have raised the banner of terrorism and are armed with human rights in order to defeat Islam and Muslims.”

Yes. That would be all that "poverty of thought" contained in the Magna Carta, the Reformation, the Enlightenment and the U.S. Declaration of Independence and Constitution and modern science. You know, all that stuff that the Islamists are too busy chopping off heads to read up on.

Anyone who can't understand the Iranian Islamists as the brutal paranoid thugs that they are from comments like this -- not to mention their actions -- is quite simply insensate.

Or worse...

BINGO.

First go read "The Last Jaw Dropper" over right. Then read these few paragraphs. Then ponder them together...