You Can't Have Both

clipped from www.captainsquartersblog.com I often remind my liberal friends in the mainstream media and non-profit advocacy communities who believe Washington has become too secretive that you can have open government or you can have big government, but you can't have both simultaneously. That was the absurdity of "compassionate conservativism" -- not that conservatism can't be compassionate, but because in the version offered over the last six years, it's amounted to a miniature version of the Great Society. Thompson gives a clear indication of how federalism can apply to today's government to reduce its reach and to allow more control over self-government by communities and states. The founders included the 10th Amendment because they knew the farther power traveled from the voters, the less accountable the powerful would become. The nightmare bureaucracy of Washington DC today would be their worst nightmare come to life, with its control over all aspects of American life far outside the boundaries of the Constitution.

Most Excellent

clipped from www.dailymail.co.uk Three Arab princesses were thrown off a packed British Airways flight after refusing to sit next to male passengers they didn't know. The dispute - in which the three princesses from the ultra-conservative Qatar royal family demanded segregated seating - left the London-bound plane delayed on a baking Italian runway for nearly three hours. Furious passengers whistled and clapped as the row intensified before the captain eventually ordered the women to be escorted off the plane. Cabin crew tried to rearrange the seats but passengers travelling together refused to give up their allotted places. The captain tried to mediate but after more than two and a half hours of wrangling he ordered the bulk of their royal party off the plane.

And kudos to the passengers for holding firm. A minor victory against both Islamist supremacy and the horsehsh*t pretense called royalty. If it was a western royal family the same should have happened -- although in that case the excuse would have been "elbow room" or something similarly concocted...

Overlawyered (Part 92365)

clipped from instapundit.com For example, it is a specific federal crime to use the symbol of 4-H Clubs with the intent to defraud. And don’t even think about using the Swiss Confederation’s coat of arms for commercial purposes. That’s a federal offense, too.

Mental Midgets Security Watch

clipped from powerlineblog.com To understand why, keep in mind that we live in a world of fiber optics and packet-switching. A wiretap today doesn't mean the FBI must install a bug on Abdul Terrorist's phone in Peshawar. Information now follows the path of least resistance, wherever that may lead. And because the U.S. has among the world's most efficient networks, hundreds of millions of foreign calls are routed through the U.S. That's right: If an al Qaeda operative in Quetta calls a fellow jihadi in Peshawar, that call may well travel through a U.S. network. This ought to be a big U.S. advantage in our "asymmetrical" conflict with terrorists. But it also means that, for the purposes of FISA, a foreign call that is routed through U.S. networks becomes a domestic call. So thanks to the obligation to abide by an outdated FISA statute, U.S. intelligence is now struggling even to tap the communications of foreign-based terrorists. If this makes you furious, it gets worse.

No Mr. Bond, I Expect You To Die

clipped from www.blogtalkradio.com A review of news and developments with AEI fellow Michael Ledeen

The Saudi Sixth Column

clipped from article.nationalreview.com Unless we counteract the influence of Saudi money on the education of the young, we’re going to find it very difficult to win the war on terror. I only wish I was referring to Saudi-funded madrassas in Pakistan. Unfortunately, I’m talking about K-12 education in the United States. Believe it or not, the Saudis have figured out how to make an end-run around America’s K-12 curriculum safeguards, thereby gaining control over much of what children in the United States learn about the Middle East. While we’ve had only limited success paring back education for Islamist fundamentalism abroad, the Saudis have taken a surprising degree of control over America’s Middle-East studies curriculum at home. How did they do it? Very carefully...and very cleverly. It turns out that the system of federal subsidies to university programs of Middle East Studies (under Title VI of the Higher Education Act) has been serving as a kind of Trojan horse for Saudi influence over American K-12 education.

The Tilted Picture

clipped from fallbackbelmont.blogspot.com This is all good news, but there is something wrong with this picture. The diplomats, the aid-workers, professional information warriors, the "nation-builders" are all missing from the scene. Yon describes how the military had been forced to discover hidden political and administrative skillsets within themselves. It was not something they had signed up to do when they joined the Armed Forces. This involuntary retooling probably occurred because they had no choice but to learn it and kept at it like a man learning to hammer tacks for the first time, however sore his thumb got. And the retooling was necessary because the State Department, the aid agencies and other civilian agencies, for reasons related to their organizational culture and inability to provide their own organic security, were unable to do the job.

How Exotic!

clipped from powerlineblog.com

Those Who Cannot Remember History...

clipped from www.opinionjournal.com Barack Obama's latest pronouncement on Iraq should have shocked the conscience. In an interview with the Associated Press last week, the freshman Illinois senator and Democratic presidential candidate opined that even preventing genocide is not a sufficient reason to keep American troops in Iraq. Mr. Obama is engaging in sophistry. By his logic, if America lacks the capacity to intervene everywhere there is ethnic killing, it has no obligation to intervene anywhere--and perhaps an obligation to intervene nowhere. His reasoning elevates consistency into the cardinal virtue, making the perfect the enemy of the good. the 27-year-old Mr. Kerry said, "There's absolutely no guarantee that there would be a bloodbath According to a 2001 investigation by the Orange County Register, Hanoi's communist regime imprisoned a million Vietnamese without charge in "re-education" camps, where an estimated 165,000 perished. a million Cambodians, and perhaps as many as two million, died

Where Are They Now?

clipped from hotair.com And finally this one, which is predictable in the aggregate and shocking in the specific instance of which country it is that places highest for satisfaction. Exit question: Is that because all the people who are dissatisfied have already crossed the border and are living here now?

Terror Fatigue Update

clipped from article.nationalreview.com Lowry: Why are the Sunnis turning against al Qaeda? Gen. Keane: Al Qaeda has overplayed their hand. What the al Qaeda do when they go into a town, or village or a neighborhood inside a major city is they get a stranglehold on the people themselves. They force the men to wear beards and the women to be properly costumed and essentially completely covered up. Men cannot smoke or drink, and obviously women can’t do the same. They actually even change their diet, and they force compliance. They change the curricula in the schools to their version of shari’ah law and radical Islamic fundamentalism. And they get such a strong hold on the day-in, day-out lives of the people that they use power and intimidation to do it. They normally immediately kill a leader or two who is respected in the neighborhood to strike fear and intimation in the hearts of the people. What has happened after four years of this is that they are willing to take more risk to get rid of it than they were initially.

Merry Christmas ...

... and a Happy New Year!

We Want To Use Children To Behead Infidels And Spies

clipped from littlegreenfootballs.com LGF operative Kasper shares another video clip from UK Channel 4, an interview with Taliban terrorist leader Mansour Dadullah. It’s the face of the enemy. These creatures do not hide anything about their intentions, their depravity, or their love of killing—and Dadullah, who was released in a hostage deal made by Italy, makes a point of noting that kidnapping is a tactic that very obviously works for them, and promises more.

Any more questions?

Complete With Comparison Table

clipped from www.techcrunch.com With the Wi-Fi-equipped BlackBerry 8820 coming soon to an AT&T store near you, business folks around the country will be faced with the decision of switching to the trendy new iPhone or upgrading to a more iPhonesque version of their trusty CrackBerry. To determine whether the grass really is greener on the iPhone side of the fence, we have chronicled the experience of a venture capitalist (who wishes to remain anonymous) who has been using an iPhone and a BlackBerry 8800 side-by-side for the past few weeks. His conclusion: despite the overall attractiveness of the iPhone, it lacks too many vital features to replace the BlackBerry as the corporate weapon of choice.

Nuclear Priorities

clipped from pajamasmedia.com Located on the Persian Gulf, the Bushehr complex is the most visible symbol of Iran’s nuclear program, but it is not the most important element. Those can be found at Esfahan (where yellow cake uranium is produced) and Natanz, where uranium is being enriched in centrifuges. Eventually, those facilities will yield sufficient quantities of feedstock and enriched uranium to produce nuclear weapons. That’s why activity (and construction) at those sites continue unabated. Even in tough economic times, Tehran has ensured that both Esfahan and Natanz receive full-funding, even if it means slowing the pace at Bushehr.

After All, Rathergate Was Such A Smashing Success...

clipped from powerlineblog.com CBS's report creates a conundrum. It is inconceivable that CBS's reporters would broadcast this segment without reading President Bush's speech of January 10. It is equally inconceivable that they could read that speech without realizing that there is, in fact, no contradiction between it and the President's speech in South Carolina yesterday. The obvious inference is that CBS has deliberately chosen to mislead and misinform its viewers on the most vital issue of our time. I would much rather not believe that. But what other explanation can there be?

I'll Take Green For 400 With A Side Of Crow

clipped from www.futurepundit.com Ausubel argues that nuclear energy uses the smallest land footprint by far. Ausubel has analyzed the amount of energy that each so-called renewable source can produce in terms of Watts of power output per square meter of land disturbed. He also compares the destruction of nature by renewables with the demand for space of nuclear power. "Nuclear energy is green," he claims, "Considered in Watts per square meter, nuclear has astronomical advantages over its competitors." Ausubel sees the need for large amounts of land as the flaw with renewables. On this basis, he argues that technologies succeed when economies of scale form part of their evolution. No economies of scale benefit renewables. More renewable kilowatts require more land in a constant or even worsening ratio, because land good for wind, hydropower, biomass, or solar power may get used first.

Good Luck With That

clipped from instapundit.com As Mickey Kaus observes: "They're in the business of killing stories these days, not publishing them, apparently." Good luck with that.

Almost Plugged In Now...

clipped from www.engadget.com Apparently taking a cue from drivers that have already modded their Priuses for plug-in capabilities, Toyota's now gone and created a plug-in version of the Prius itself, and it's set to soon test the vehicle on public roads. Dubbed the Toyota Plug-in HV, the vehicle can be charged simply by plugging it into a standard electrical socket, although you won't get much farther than 8 miles on a single charge (the gasoline engine will kick in after the batts have been exhausted). While Toyota says that a commercialized version will "depend largely on advances in battery technology," the company is planning to test the vehicle in its current state in Japan shortly, with tests in the US and Europe apparently also in the works.

The Most Educated Person In The World Knows Nothing

clipped from littlegreenfootballs.com

Not Socialist For Nothing

clipped from volokh.com Putting the Socialism Back Into National Socialism: The idea that Nazism was an extreme form of "capitalism" and Hitler primarily a tool serving the interests of "big business" is a longstanding myth that even now retains a measure of popularity in some quarters. This, despite the fact that the full name of the Nazi Party was the National Socialist German Workers' Party, and that Nazi political strategy was explicitly based on combining the appeal of socialism with that of nationalism (thus the choice of name). Once in power, the Nazis even went so far as to institute a Four Year Plan for running the German economy, modeled in large part on the Soviet Union's Five Year Plans.

Lewis Again ... C.S. This Time...

clipped from drsanity.blogspot.com C.S. Lewis wrote: "Of all tyrannies a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated, but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience." Many people never completely resolve all the tension between the two poles of narcissistic development; thereby never reaching a fully integrated and cohesive self. While most would not meet specific criteria for a diagnosis of Narcissistic Personality Disorder, such people have extremely dysfunctional narcissistic traits that continually interfere with their own and other's lives.

Al Qaeda In Iraq Theatre Redux

clipped from powerlineblog.com A few weeks ago, we captured a senior al Qaida in Iraq leader named Mashadani. Now, this terrorist is an Iraqi. In fact, he was the highest ranking Iraqi in the organization. Here's what he said, here's what he told us: The foreign leaders of Al Qaida in Iraq went to extraordinary lengths to promote the fiction that al Qaida in Iraq is an Iraqi-led operation. He says al Qaida even created a figurehead whom they named Omar al-Baghdadi. The purpose was to make Iraqi fighters believe they were following the orders of an Iraqi instead of a foreigner. Yet once in custody, Mashadani revealed that al-Baghdadi is only an actor. He confirmed our intelligence that foreigners are at the top echelons of al Qaida in Iraq -- they are the leaders -- and that foreign leaders make most of the operational decisions, not Iraqis. Foreign terrorists also account for most of the suicide bombings in Iraq.

Boring Doesn't Exist

clipped from instapundit.com Everyone was friendly. No one shot at us or even looked at us funny. Infrastructure problems, not security, were the biggest concerns at the moment. I felt like I was in Iraqi Kurdistan – where the war is already over – not in Baghdad. . . . “This is not what I expected in Baghdad,” I said. “Most of what we’re doing doesn’t get reported in the media,” he said. “We’re not fighting a war here anymore, not in this area. We’ve moved way beyond that stage. We built a soccer field for the kids, bought all kinds of equipment, bought them school books and even chalk. Soon we’re installing 1,500 solar street lamps so they have light at night and can take some of the load off the power grid. The media only covers the gruesome stuff. We go to the sheiks and say hey man, what kind of projects do you want in this area? They give us a list and we submit the paperwork. When the projects get approved, we give them the money and help them buy stuff.”

The Rap

clipped from powerlineblog.com As Marsalis puts it in the title of a 2006 song, when you look at the underclass, it seems that all the progress blacks have made is to go “from the plantation to the penitentiary” and to be, as the song puts it, “in the heart of freedom...in chains.” Those chains are not only the chains that bind prisoners but also what the poet William Blake called “mind forg’d manacles”—beliefs, attitudes, and habits of feeling that imprison you even when you are outwardly free. For the underclass, those manacles are the beliefs that they’re victims, that they’re entitled to be angry and resentful, that the law is an oppression, Rap didn’t cause [the disintegration of the black family], but it doesn’t merely reflect it, either, just as it doesn’t merely reflect ghetto lawlessness. It is part of a culture that reinforces, normalizes, and perpetuates a self-destructive, pathological way of life. From soul to funk to rap the descent is steep.

The Sickness Turns Them

clipped from www.timesonline.co.uk Fed up with being part of a group that cuts off a person’s face with piano wire to teach others a lesson, dozens of low-level members of al-Qaeda in Iraq are daring to become informants for the US military in a hostile Baghdad neighbourhood. “They are turning. We are talking to people who we believe have worked for al-Qaeda in Iraq and want to reconcile and have peace,” said Colonel Ricky Gibbs, commander of the 4th Brigade, 1st Infantry Division, which oversees the area. “It is only after al-Qaeda has become truly barbaric and done things like, to teach lessons to people, cut their face off with piano wire in front of their family and then murdered everybody except one child who told the tale afterwards . . . that people realise how much of a mess they are in,” Lieutenant James Danly, 31, who works on military intelligence in Doura, said.

You might argue that it's just a tall tale about the piano wire. But it doesn't matter as long as it's in range of truth. And the inviolable truth includes decapitated heads paraded around on poles. Unfortunately, the Nazis have now been exposed as amateurs...

The Gassings Are By No Means The Worst

clipped from www.dailymail.co.uk "Let me tell you," General Count Edwin von Rothkirch und Trach told General Bernhard Ramcke on March 13, 1945, "the gassings are by no means the worst." "What happened?" asked Ramke. "To start with, people dug their own graves, then the firing squad arrived with tommy-guns and shot them down. Many of them weren't dead, and a layer of earth was shovelled in between. They had packers there who packed the bodies in, because they fell in too soon. The SS did that. Josting continued: "The barn was full of women and children. Petrol was poured over them and they were burned alive. You can't imagine what their screams were like." After the publication of this extraordinary, horrific but compelling collection of secretly-recorded conversations, the alibi of the German High Command - that they did not know what the SS were up to, and anyhow they were, as Heim put it, "only carrying out orders" - is shown to be demonstrably false.

I have to stop blogging for a while now. I've become nauseous thinking about the Arab world's denial of the holocaust. Especially after my last post...

Israel Montage

clipped from pajamasmedia.com Look there: this is what they think, this is what they preach, this is what they have become. Look here, this is how we think, this is how we live, this is what we have become. Can you see it? Just remove the seven veils of accusation against the Jews. Just suppose, for a minute, that free human beings must take responsibility for the consequences of their thoughts and acts. Just assume, for the sake of argument, that Israel is what it seems, Palestinian society is what it seems. And look how sweet and beautiful is Israel. Look how it prospers, look at its strong healthy children, listen to the birds, look at the flowers cascading in voluptuous abundance. What is the solution to the Middle East crisis? That’s the solution—that indomitable vitality, pleasure, and resilience embodied in the individuals, one by one, who make up Israeli society.

RTWT. Amazing...

China Can (Tell The Difference)

clipped from fallbackbelmont.blogspot.com I worry that these same types of reporters also write that we need not be concerned about, say, China because they now spend one tenth of what the U.S. spends on its military. What if it takes our world (government that doesn't work) twenty times as much to match the effort of a world that does? Perhaps China has similar or worse problems in its institutions, but I've not seen it (after 10 years and 20 plus weeks working in that country). I've seen the opposite. One of many examples: In financial, trade, economic development, regulation and educational settings I've seen at least 50 offices (of hundreds) with books by Milton Friedman and Hayek (and even the occasional Ayn Rand). I've spent 20 years of occasional visits to the offices of U.S. government agencies and Congress and seen the same precisely twice.

Telling The Difference

clipped from fallbackbelmont.blogspot.com The blooper is no big deal in itself. But I suspect it comes from the same circles where all tracked vehicles are known as "tanks", all automatic rifles are described as "machineguns", all aerial ordnance is described as "cluster bombs" and the general idea of warfare is one in which stupid, yelling men advance shooting from the hip at everything that moves. Amazingly enough none of these shortcomings in knowledge are regarded as disqualifying anyone from discoursing on grand strategic concepts -- which is what the Time article is about. It isn't necessary to be able to tell an MI-24 from a UH-60. Yet given that intellectual superiority is never to be taken for granted, it helps, ceteris paribus to know the distinction. It's a safe bet that al-Qaeda can tell the difference.

The Iron Meme And It's Clueless Victim W

clipped from powerlineblog.com The AP will, of course, do whatever it can to make sure that "any attempt to paint a positive picture of the war" fails, whether that positive picture is accurate or not. The AP wants readers to think that the U.S. is approaching Iran because the security situation in Iraq is deteriorating. In fact, it is not the situation on the ground that is worsening, it is the political climate in the U.S. And for that fact, the AP itself bears a great deal of responsibility.

Lawfare Today

clipped from www.captainsquartersblog.com Were it not for the courage and sacrifice of the passengers of United Flight 93 who forced their plane into a Pennsylvania field, many in Congress might not be here today, with a gaping hole where the U.S. Capitol still stands. We wonder if this fact is appreciated by those trying to block final passage of the so-called "John Doe" provision protecting from legal action those who report suspicious behavior on airplanes. Today's passengers have an advantage. They know what can happen. They know what to look for. They will not be taken by surprise, and they are willing to take action. But some in Congress would sacrifice their lives on the altar of political correctness. ...

In America, Clowns Are Chosen By Election

clipped from article.nationalreview.com Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke presented his semi-annual monetary report to Congress this week. Bernanke was disciplined and on message. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said of Congress. In other words, congressional “leaders” berate the Fed chairman over high energy prices, lampoon him for a focus on core inflation, and then scold him for having raised rates too much! It’s a heady combination of hypocrisy, stupidity, and ignorance that’s otherwise known as Washington D.C. Sadly, the U.S. shift toward economic populism and tax hikes, and away from free trade, is coming at a time when most of the rest of the world is moving down the Laffer curve by cutting tax rates and removing obstacles to commerce. Perhaps it’s time for Congress to end the clown show and become acquainted with the basics of monetary policy and pro-growth economics. American competitiveness and prosperity depends on it.

Worse Than Your Nightmares

clipped from www.rogerlsimon.com Admittedly, there is still dispute about how serious it was. But while Mohammed El Baradei negotiates the "peaceful" use of nuclear energy by the Iranians, he ought - and the world ought - to consider this analysis from the UPI's Claude Salhani: What do Japan and Iran have in common? Japan has nuclear power plants and Iran is on its way to acquiring nuclear technology. Japan is prone to powerful earthquakes, and so is Iran. This is where the similarities end. If a similar earthquake was to hit one of Iran's nuclear facilities, the consequences could be expected to be far worse, affecting oil production in the Gulf region and sending the price of a barrel of oil skyrocketing. And that's the least of it. We can all remember the frightened ineptitude with which primitive Iran has faced earthquakes in recent years, the psychotic ideologues who run the country debating whether to accept aid from the Infidels in the US and Israel. Wait until it hits a reactor.

The Satanic Left Continued

clipped from fallbackbelmont.blogspot.com One of the most fascinating questions -- one worthy of a book -- must be why Osama Bin Laden chose to order his suicide airplanes into Manhattan rather than say, Beijing or Moscow. Both these nations have been campaigning against Muslims for centuries. And the answer, I suspect, lies in the "excited commands and shouts of glee form the Chinese on the soundtrack". Or the veritable rain of shells that fell on Grozny in the recent past or the vicious campaign that still rages through Chechnya today. Maybe Bin Laden attacked America because he knew how it would fight. In a mode where even prisoners in Guantanamo Bay could insist upon their Korans being handled with white gloves, while a large section of America's own media would condemn this treatment as too harsh. There are times when I am tempted to think that the Western Left is radical Islam's Ring of Power. If a snapping point is reached, even the Left may not forever restrain the West.

Remember that if Hitler hadn't double crossed Stalin invaded the USSR, it's doubtful that the American Left of the time would have supported the American war effort. Plus ca change...

Satan To The Left Of Me, W To My Right

clipped from fallbackbelmont.blogspot.com The Great Satan (Al-Shaytan Al-Akbar) now has company. No not just the Jews. Nor even the godless Russians. Nor the Indians. Make way for the Chinese. The News reports that the "attack on Chinese nationals in Balochistan is said to be the first reaction to Chinese government’s steps to curb Muslim insurgency in its own territory." This follows on recent attacks by Islamic radicals on Chinese in Islamabad. What's it all about? The Online Times describes the ongoing war between China and Islam on its Western boundaries. The Chinese executioners came for Ismail Semed before 9am. They led him out of his cell as the sun climbed over the Tien Shan mountains in the land he called East Turkestan. ... The end seems to have been quick. The dying embers of their struggle flamed into protests, shootings and bombings in the 1990s, all concealed from the world until September 11, 2001, when China discovered the usefulness of the “war on terror”.

Heh. Wretchard hits another homer with this one. RTWT. More excerpts to follow...

Deja Vu (Part 2,887,635)

clipped from littlegreenfootballs.com It’s a weird kind of “peacekeeping” the United Nations is doing in Lebanon—consisting mostly of looking the other way while Hizballah prepares for war right under the UN’s nose: IDF: Hizbullah moving rockets inside S. Lebanese villages. Hizbullah guerrillas have moved most of their rockets in south Lebanon among civilians in villages in an apparent attempt to avoid detection by Israel and UN troops, IDF officials said Sunday. The new moves are part of Hizbullah’s reorganization after the Second Lebanon War, the officials said. During the summer’s war, Hizbullah fired almost 4,000 rockets at Israel. While Lebanon criticized the IDF for targeting civilian areas during the war, Israel said Hizbullah was to blame for operating among civilians and putting them at risk. But the army’s new intelligence indicates that those positions had now largely been abandoned in favor of populated villages, which provide better cover for the group’s activities.

Suicidalists Rescue The Suiciders

clipped from littlegreenfootballs.com Someone pinch me. This has to be a bad dream. Israeli Arab schoolbooks cite Palestinian version of war. JERUSALEM (AFP) - History textbooks for Israeli Arab students this year will for the first time present the Palestinian version of Israel’s creation as a “catastrophe,” the education ministry said on Sunday. “For these types of events, both the Israeli and Palestinian versions have to be presented,” Education Minister Yuli Tamir said in a statement. Alongside presenting the Israeli interpretation of the 1948 Arab-Israeli war, the books will also present the version “that is generally accepted among the Arabs, according to which Israel’s War of Independence is perceived as a catastrophe (Naqba) by the Palestinians,” Tamir said.

Galloway's Chumps

clipped from blogs.dailymail.com Here is why the Brits failed: They were too damned cheap. The MoD only ponied up £1.5 million — $3 million. We spend more than that on toilet paper for our soldiers. Forget millions. That’s chump change. Saddam shelled out £1.4 million for George Galloway alone. The Brits say they bought off 4,000 people with this £1.5 million. That’s $750 a man. And of course, they didn’t stay bought. A decent bribe program should start at £1 billion. Saddam spent £20 billion. But then again, he was buying the UN. The Taliban shouldn’t cost more than a £1 billion. And it would be worth it. Consider this paragraph from the Times story: Britain has 7,100 troops in Afghanistan — more than in Iraq — and officials no longer talk of withdrawal dates. The British ambassador to Kabul said recently that the country may take 30 years to stabilise. Senior military figures have been warning that Afghanistan could end up worse than Iraq. Pay them off. With real money, not chump change.

Shut Your Trap!

clipped from michellemalkin.com It’s an uncanny bit of timing that the NYC MTA has just launched a new campaign to urge citizen vigilance and activism…just as Beltway Dems have sent a message to those tipsters to shut their traps.

Nuclear Survival

clipped from www.davidwarrenonline.com One might almost recommend American occupation to the people of Pakistan, as a way to reduce the casualties from daily suicide and other terrorist bombings to the levels now enjoyed in Afghanistan and Iraq. Also, as an alternative to Indian occupation. Though I doubt the Americans are currently up to the task. Yesterday, the country’s former chief justice, Iftikhar Chaudry, removed from office by President Musharraf on fairly specious grounds of corruption, and actually because he was genuinely independent, was reinstated by a 10-3 vote of the remaining high court. Musharraf has had to accept this humiliating moment of sweet victory for Pakistan’s surprisingly ebullient lawyers, and the semi-Westernized urban middle-classes they represent. He must accept it because Pakistan is currently facing a larger challenge from loose confederations of Islamists whose urban bombings and tribal insurrections are taxing the authorities’ will to survive.