Hayek On The "Reality Based" Community

Check this out at QandO:

It may indeed prove to be far the most difficult and not the least important task for human reason rationally to comprehend its own limitations. It is essential for the growth of reason that as individuals we should bow to forces and obey principles which we cannot hope fully to understand yet on which the advance and even the preservation of civilisation depends. Historically this has been achieved by the influence of the various religious creeds and by traditions and superstitions which made men submit to those forces by an appeal to his emotions rather than his reason. The most dangerous stage in the growth of civilisation may well be that in which man has come to regard all these beliefs as superstitions and refuses to accept or to submit to anything which he does not rationally understand. The rationalist whose reason is not sufficient to teach him those limitations of the powers of conscious reason, and who despises all the institutions and customs which have not been consciously designed, would thus become the destroyer of the civilisation built upon them. This may well prove a hurdle which man will repeatedly reach, only to be thrown back into barbarism.

Hayek is vastly underappreciated, even by conservatives. Of course, the problem is that the "reality based" community isn't actually "reality based" -- it's actually just the "Church of the Left". But I'll get to that in the next few posts. And conservatives aren't blame free either...

Nazi Dhimmi Update

Europe has cast its lot with the enemy of civilization itself. (Hat tip Powerline)

MUST. READ. NOW.

Europe is attracted to nihilism like a moth to the flame.

You know that Strategy Page will tell you what the MSM won't -- don't you?

MSM belly laugh of the day.

A Prime Directive prelude...

And American Nazism -- Just Not As Gruesome -- Yet...

"Anybody who knows me knows I'm not a racist."

Ummmmmmmmm -- I beg to differ Charlie.

Our dissident leader.

Today's Nazi Comment(ary)

Our (still nazi) betters and their progeny come into conflict...

UPDATE: The prize winning comment on this post re an accusation that we have been too pro-Israel:

ahem:

Arabs were slaughtering Jews in the 1920's and calling for fatwas against the British and Jews in the 1930's.

No Israel to blame and the US did not write the Balfour Declaration or parcel things up after WW1.

WW1 the Palestinians sided with the Germans. WW2, Arabs sided with the Nazis and then the Soviets.

The US did not give all that much support to Israel until the 1970's when it appeared it might actually be destroyed. In fact Eisenhower was anything but proIsrael and we had a huge falling out with the Brits in the 50's over Suez and our refusal to go along with Israel and Britain going after Egypt.

The US has not been antiArab and proJew. It is not that simple.

Surely you remember Arafat's mentor, Haj Mohammad Amin Al-Husseini?

Comment Of The Day

Over on Belmont Club:

I would agree that one of President Bush’s strong points is his patience. He also seems to have the ability to ask a question or present a situation, such as Wretchard has done today, without feeling obligated to tell the answer. This demands thought on the part of the listener or reader, something we desperately need in order to win this war.

This jihad and new Islamic revival has been going on for quite some time. Patience at its finest. It is my opinion that the intellectuals guiding it were likely unhappy when bin Laden and his boys prematurely took things into their own hands. I can imagine the headshaking over the impetuousness of youth. The movement was well underway and traveling with great steam throughout Europe and with good seeding in the United States.

The youngsters, the violent impatient ones, have suffered a great loss at Falluja, while the patient ones may have suffered their greatest loss on 9/11 when some of us became aware. Daniel Pipes suggests the youthful terrorists will give up on theatrical violence and use mafia tactics. They already are in Paris and Malmo. Watching blogs and newspapers closely I see a new wave of warfare coming from the patient group. They are returning with a vengeance to the well-marketed psychological PR type moderate rhetoric directed at our desire to get along and our penchant for political correctness. There are plenty of apologetic dhimmis in Europe who will happily accommodate by spewing anything but their fear. You can see it today in a Glenn Reynolds post. What we need to worry most about is whether individually we will be as strong and prepared as our Marines when the silent patient battle comes to our neighborhood, school board and political system.

Yes, it does relate to Nazis -- that would be the dhimmis in Europe. Stay tuned...

Did I forget to mention that I don't always feel obligated to tell the answer either?

UPDATED ALREADY: Wow is Wretchard good. At the same time I was posting this, he elevated part of Jane's comment into his next post. Cool.

And You Thought The Jacques Quote In My Last Post Was Good

Attention Kmart shoppers! The glory of France, she is born anew!

(Hat tip LGF)

A funny sort of empire. And its nuanced opponent.

Back To Nazism

... back near the beginning. And one of the ways it could have been stopped.

Does the recent Fallujan "security round" come to mind?

How's that for an eye-opener?

Humor Of Various Types

Iran pleads for sanctions!

On why Reps need to plead for more recounts...

Feh. Tastes like a bearded chick pea...

The last nail in the coffin. (Warning: Least funny but most satisfying.)

As nutty as Walter Cronkite. (OK, that was a bit of a joke on my part -- you need to read everything on the way to finding it as well -- it's one of James' better days ;)

On shit-clogged noodles. And don't forget the ragged, crusty prophyllactic of the Islamo-Fascist War Machine ... (Hat tip Glenn)

Did I mention that outsourcing may have an unnecessarily bad rep?

I'll Take Dick Cheney's Daughter Is A Lesbian For $1000 Alex!

Who says the French won't fight? Not very well of course...

On The Proper Application Of Squalid

Hitch again. Arafat splayed and eviscerated.

NYeT On The "Church Of The Left"!?

Remember yesterday's WOW? Well, today the NYeT editors must have had a world class brain fart for they have seemingly published something that tops even that! (And don't miss the Captain's analysis!)

It starts this way:

As a young Canadian Muslim who has called for reform in Islam, I've been traveling throughout North America and Europe over the past year. Last week, I toured France and Spain. God help me.

I didn't expect a warm reception from fellow Muslims. But now, I'm also not sure that liberal Muslims like me fit comfortably in a secular European crowd. I say this even after the murder of Theo van Gogh, the Dutch filmmaker, who police officials say was shot and stabbed by a Muslim extremist. Mr. van Gogh had exercised his right to criticize Islam - a right that I, as a modern Muslim, defend unequivocally.

What then gives me the sense that even modern Muslims can't be modern enough for Western Europe? It's precisely that, from Amsterdam to Barcelona to Paris to Berlin, people incredulously ask me one type of question that I'm never asked in the United States and Canada: Why does an independent-minded woman care about God? Why do you need religion at all?

I'll answer in a moment. To get there, allow me to observe key differences between the debate over Islam in Western Europe and North America. In Western Europe, the entry point for this debate is the hijab - the headscarf that many Muslim women wear as a signal of modesty. By contrast, the entry point in North America is terrorism.

And now you know you MUST go read it (you're already nearly half way done).

There ARE moderate Muslims. But they aren't naturally supported by the European "Church Of The Left".

No surprise there.

But how about that NYeT brain fart?

Like I Said -- On Any Other Day...

No sooner is W re-elected and Condi heads for SecState than does the NorKorCom barbarous loon asylum seem mired in a Soviet era portrait tea leaf reading exercise. No doubt the NoKo generals are just a tad more nervous than if Neville Kerry had won...

Tear down that wall Mr. Kim!

On Most Days

this would be a breathtaking WOW. Barbaric misogyny defended as a right of the Islamofascists by our fascifist crowd. Ho hum.

But this is what WOW really looks like. She has my vote. And yes, I would defend her with my life.

Thanks soldiers -- guys and gals.

UPDATE: Roger weighs in.

ANOTHER UPDATE: More on "Moderate Islam".

Of homo economicus, literacy tests and man dating...

Cambodia Update

The evidence just keeps on growing -- soon I'll have to admit that Kerry really was in Cambodia...

I suspect that alert readers may point out my utter lack of nuance -- after all, incompetence can be just one of the symptoms of wearing a tinfoil lucky CIA hat.

Did I mention that the CIA isn't exactly a water-tight organization? I suspect we would have heard from Kerry's CIA buds -- if there were any.

OK -- so I won't have to admit it then.

On Evangelical Darwinism

" ...but since they look the same, no one noticed."

Bwwwaaahahahah!

Yuppers. Dem whipper-snapper libs is sho' 'nuff dang tootin' smarter dan us'uns! (Hat tip BOTW)

The Aztecs are back?

Hypocrisy Interlude: But Kerry Was A Hero Of Course...

Pulling a Kerry. Lib hypocrisy knows no bounds.

Did I forget to mention that the reporter just might have a particular POV? That just might match my theme?

And you need to read Wretchard -- especially his ending:

Salehma Mahmoud, 43, and her four daughters fled Fallujah on Tuesday after her husband was killed fighting against the Americans. They walked 4 miles only to be confronted by Iraqi soldiers who insulted and harassed them, grabbing at Mahmoud's oldest daughter. "He grabbed Fatima's hand and tried to kiss her. I was trying to stop him with all I had," she said. "He beat me and pushed me to the ground, and his friends were laughing at us loud. He tore the right sleeve of my daughter's dress and lay her on the ground."

To Mahmoud's surprise -- because she had been told that US troops would beat and rape her -- a US patrol rescued them. An American soldier pulled the Iraqi soldier away and yelled at him. Mahmoud's daughter, who speaks some English, told her that the American called the Iraqi names and said, "If you had really come to save the people of this city, you would not have done such a thing."

You can bet the Globe's Lib editors had a struggle before they printed this -- for it contradicts the "story line" you see...

UPDATE: They're called "security rounds". Oh, and on top of that 1) no uniform + 2) fighting from mosques = 3) no Geneva conventions any way you slice it. (Hat tip LGF)

AND AGAIN: This is truly eye-opening. And Donald (note the end) and Wretchard need to be read.

CASE CLOSED: Here.

C-BS Programming Interruption

I interrupt the regularly scheduled hoots of derision at the heirs of Nazism to hoot with derision at one of their Reifenstahls:

Sunday’s report on the killing of Emmett Till was an example of slipshod and misleading journalism. The producers have few excuses in this case. They did it with their eyes open. They were warned not just once but several times that their forthcoming report might contain inaccuracies. In a rush to air the story, however, they plowed ahead, instead of following the first rule of journalism: getting their facts straight. . . .

The producers of "60 Minutes" have an ethical obligation to correct their inaccurate information and to corroborate their claims that five participants in the kidnapping or murder are still alive. Given our previous experiences with "60 Minutes," however, we have little hope that they will do so. While the killing of Emmett Till deserves more attention from the media, the producers of "60 Minutes" have failed to fulfill their stated mission to serve the public good.

Theo rests his point.

Nazis Are As Nazis Do

Here are Hitler's heirs at work. (Look over on the right at the "Previous Jaw Dropper".)

QOTD And Fascifism Redux

That would be "Question Of The Day" [check out the third comment]:

Here's a good illustration that hit very close to home for me: After watching some news of the fighting in Fallujah, my reflexively pacifist wife (who voted for Kerry) asked why our soldiers couldn't use tear gas to clear enemy fighters out of buildings--so we wouldn't have to kill people who were trying to kill us. Seriously. I was dumbfounded. I'm still dumbfounded. Where does one even start? "Kill or be killed" is just not a conceivable scenario for 60s antiwar types. Nor is the concept of sworn enemies beyond the reach of reason.

"If you were an officer in charge of 30-40 soldiers, how many of their lives would you be prepared to sacrifice on the off chance that hardened thugs who behead their captives would be prepared to surrender peacefully?"

What? Another question before I answer the last one?

Kept you waiting didn't I? Look at the masthead.

The answer to the previous question is of course GEORGE ORWELL. And you need to go read "Pacifism And The War".

Let's cut to the chase and look at the closing paragraph:

‘Mr Orwell is intellectual-hunting again’ (Mr Comfort). I have never attacked ‘the intellectuals’ or ‘the intelligentsia’ en bloc. I have used a lot of ink and done myself a lot of harm by attacking the successive literary cliques which have infested this country, not because they were intellectuals but precisely because they were not what I mean by true intellectuals. The life of a clique is about five years and I have been writing long enough to see three of them come and two go — the Catholic gang, the Stalinist gang, and the present pacifist or, as they are sometimes nicknamed, Fascifist gang. My case against all of them is that they write mentally dishonest propaganda and degrade literary criticism to mutual arse-licking. But even with these various schools I would differentiate between individuals. I would never think of coupling Christopher Dawson with Arnold Lunn, or Malraux with Palme Dutt, or Max Plowman with the Duke of Bedford. And even the work of one individual can exist at very different levels. For instance Mr Comfort himself wrote one poem I value greatly (‘The Atoll in the Mind’), and I wish he would write more of them instead of lifeless propaganda tracts dressed up as novels. But his letter he has chosen to send you is a different matter. Instead of answering what I have said he tries to prejudice an audience to whom I am little known by a misrepresentation of my general line and sneers about my ‘status’ in England. (A writer isn’t judged by his ‘status’, he is judged by his work.) That is on a par with ‘peace’ propaganda which has to avoid mention of Hitler’s invasion of Russian [sic], and it is not what I mean by intellectual honesty. It is just because I do take the function of the intelligentsia seriously that I don’t like the sneers, libels, parrot phrased and financially profitable back-scratching which flourish in our English literary world, and perhaps in yours also.

Fascifism. Savor that word. It's not clear that Orwell coined it -- but he knows its proper use.

And the Nazi-theme will be extended well beyond this weekend due to a surfeit of material in the queue and far too little time available...

Eh Tu, Italy? Could Il Duce's Legacy Finally Die?

In addition to the tentative signs of life shown by the Dutch after van Gogh's slaying, there is emerging evidence that Fallaci's homeland may yet recover her will to fight the Islamist onslaught:

One striking thing about Italy these days, compared to 30 years ago, is how many former leftists have awakened to the illusions of the Left, and begun flocking to the center-right. Nearly every one mentioned by name in this article is one such, and the numbers keep growing, almost exponentially, among writers and other intellectuals. Everything leftist is increasingly being questioned — economic orthodoxy often first of all, but now leftist cultural politics, too. Even those not prepared to go all the way to the center-right, at least on all issues, are raising tough questions.

For instance, La Repubblica (Nov.7), which I read on the plane, carries a front-page jump column by Eugenio Scalfari, its founder and publisher, under the title "Why We Cannot Call Ourselves Laicists." After confessing his own secular creed — the creed of the Enlightenment and the great principles of liberty, fraternity, and equality — he writes that this does not end the matter. He notes how the Christian idea of a duty to the most needy and vulnerable has undeniably influenced his creed, and how the Christian idea of giving to Caesar what is Caesar's, and to God what is God's, is a necessary barrier to totalitarianism both Left and Right. The history of the European secular mind cannot be described simply as laicist, he insists, for it also includes a crucial source of light absorbed from Christian faith.

What I conclude after this visit, more powerfully than ever, is that important new currents so visible in the victory of George W. Bush are also beginning to affect very distant places, and that great spiritual changes are beginning to display their first sprouts: a profoundly new vision of our own secular history, more open to religion than formerly; a new attention to the family and to the traditional morality on which its health depends; and a rethinking of fundamental economic principles concerning taxation, state power, and welfare programs. The notion is also gaining traction that the ideas of the Left belong to the 1950s, if not earlier, while those of Bush and others like him point to a new and more creative future.

Fascism/Nazism and Communism are spiritual siblings. This is self evident to the point of risibility. Time for an examination...

The Best Defense Is ...

... We're so much in their knickers abroad ...

About Us "Evangelical Moralists"

My wife found this and I thought it was worth chewing on before I get back to topic A [UPDATE: Found the original.]:

By Al Ruechel | 11-10-04

Can you believe it? They’ve barely stopped counting the provisional ballots and already pundits are blasting Evangelicals as brain dead, cold hearted, religious zealots who pose the greatest threat to democracy since Adolph Hitler.

I told myself as a TV news anchor I wasn’t going to write much about the election prior to the vote because I wanted to remain objective. You bet, I have strong feelings about the candidates. They both had huge failings, in my humble opinion. Still, my solemn obligation as a journalist is to deliver accurate, fair, balanced information to my viewers void of any political slant. I must be doing something right because I quite regularly get blasted from both sides. Mentally and emotional I prepared myself to remain claim during our election night coverage, whichever candidate pulled the most votes. I was blessed with two expert Democrat and Republican analysts to provide their own unique and informed “spin”… and a co-host to provide all the “color”. To quote the late Johnny Cash, “I walked the line”.

Today I cross that line in this column and switch hats to commentator, not on behalf of a candidate, but on behalf of Evangelicals and their belief in Jesus. There I’ve said the “J’ word. In their most recent columns over the weekend and their appearances on TV those masters of analysis have proven, once again, they “don’t get”.

Andrea Mitchell of NBC news says the victory was about, “guns, God and gays”. I don’t recall any gun initiatives on any ballots. Did you see a space marked “God” on the presidential race? George Bush IS NOT God! And unless my math is bad, which it could be, 39 states DID NOT have gay marriage bans on their ballot.

Boston Globe columnist Ellen Goodman (Nov. 6, 2004) says Evangelical’s set of values don’t include things like Iraq, equality, or the economy. She concludes one of the main reasons Evangelicals turned out in mass was the amendment banning gay marriage passed in 11 states. Not a bad argument except the 11 states in which the amendments appeared drew nearly the same percentage of voters as the states without the ban. She does have one premise down pat. “The blue candidates will never convert people who believe that homosexuality is a sin, or that the fertilized egg is a human being, or that evolution is a scam taught by secular humanists.”

And you know why that is Ellen? Too many blue candidates treated the reds as if they were ideological idiots. There are plenty of scientists and doctors and learned men and women who have come to their faith conclusions after years of inquiry. The blues goofed when they chose Hollywood as the epicenter of American morality. The reds do see fine lines of distinction in the so-called cultural war hot buttons of abortion and stem cell research. What they are asking is more time to digest the implications of those acts in the light of the “Bible”, that vexed document you believe was scribbled down by drug crazed, starving Jewish rebels. By the way, Ms. Goodman, did you happen to read the article in last months “Scientific American” that reported on the use of fat as stem cell generators. Yep! Fat cells, the kind that wrap around many Americans like a second belt, may be able to produce the same kind of cells scientists thought only came from human embryos.

UPDATE: [ ... ]

Finally, there are the likes of Paul Begalla and James Carvel and Terry McCullough. Talk about denial. They give Carl Rove and Jerry Falwell all the credit for this Evangelical onslaught. Wrong, wrong, wrong. And if those pundits don’t listen they are doomed to witness the same onslaught in 2008.

As an Evangelical let me spell it out based on hundreds of conversations I have had with other E’s.

E’s voted for Bush because he is an honest, sincere, sinner who speaks their language. Many aren’t happy with some of his economic policies but they believe he is acting in the nation’s best interest.

E’s voted for Bush because he took a strong position in support of the sanctity of marriage and not against gays and lesbians in general. Nuance is the key. Contrary to the elitist view, many Evangelicals do wrestle with the issue of equal protection for gays. The do believe being gay or lesbian is a choice and a sin but are often torn on how to respond to it. Most try to respond in love by providing counseling and support for those with aids. Of course, we do have our own black sheep of the family!

E’s are against abortion but appreciate President Bush’s statement when he said that this country needs a change of heart before it will be possible to change Roe V Wade. That’s something God will have to do, not a sitting President or the courts.

E’s voted for Bush because after much prayer they saw him as the only alternative. Mr. Blue often quoted the Bible saying, ”faith without works is dead” but then didn’t back it up with any works or display of his faith that Evangelicals could see.

E’s pay no homage to the new God of Tolerance. There are Ten Commandments, not suggestions. I know that comes as a shock and a great disappointment to the “Enlightened ones”. E’s do believe in love and acceptance and that all men are born with certain inalienable rights but not at the expense of surrendering their God-established values.

E’s were ticked, big time at Michael Moore! Mr. Large did more to energize the right than a thousand prime-time commercials. You could hear the E’s dropping away from the blue bandwagon the microsecond he suggested that Hollywood represented the true American values.

E’s were afraid if Mr. Blue won he would appoint activist judges that would make it more difficult to express love and commitment to God in public or in the pledge.

E’s believe the war in Iraq is as much a spiritual battle as it is a political fight.

E’s would and have voted for Blue candidates who treated them fairly and support some, not necessarily all, of their views, as long as they aren’t anti-God!

E’s listened to the voice of God in their own lives. For the benefit of the atheists in the audience it works like this. You pray for His guidance. You read the word to make sure you aren’t acting in the flesh and it all agrees. You listen and seek counsel from other believers. You act in accordance with all of the above, attempting to leave as much physical emotion out of the picture. Does that sound like an ill-informed, Dark Age practice to you!

Bottom line, Evangelicals are people of faith and surprisingly, not all Christian. They are a group of people who believe that morality is not some loosely defined, changing with the wind, ambiguous concept that can be ignored. They believe if you get the morality right the economy, education, helping children, health care, social security and the war will all follow suit. Combined with the traditional conservative elements, the independents and discontented Democrats they made their voice heard. This time around, the silent majority was anything but silent!

Tin Pacifists Somehow Won't Do

The shot across the bow on a surprising Nazi-themed weekend:

Despotic governments can stand ‘moral force’ till the cows come home; what they fear is physical force. But though not much interested in the ‘theory’ of pacifism, I am interested in the psychological processes by which pacifists who have started out with an alleged horror of violence end up with a marked tendency to be fascinated by the success and power of Nazism. Even pacifists who wouldn’t own to any such fascination are beginning to claim that a Nazi victory is desirable in itself.

Who wrote this? Does it sound more than a bit familiar with just a bit of sprucing for modernity?

And don't forget the current Jaw Dropper...

Middle East Madness, Part 38256

Stalling, lies, stalling, lies...

The NYeT said the A-word -- I didn't. In fact, I never believe a comma they print. For instance, they point out in the same article that the Koran says "Don't throw yourself into death." UmmmHmmm...

Scowcroft pines for the fjords of Oslo...

And how could this possibly be topped:

First Gray Davis, Now This
"Arafat to Be Recalled for Leading Palestinians to Accept Principle of Coexistence With Israel: Annan"--headline, ElectronicIntifada.net, Nov. 11

UPDATE: What's to worry about? Greenland is safe...

Dhimmitude? Or just plain dim?

Sounds In The Forest

If an insurgent craven brutal barbarous killer wets his pants in the desert and no one is around to snap a picture, does it make a puddle?

I may live in Colorado but I'm doing *my* part to salvage it from the red cellar. Surrounded by blues is an awful place to be...

Projection 202: On The Stupidity Of Thomas Aquinas And C.S. Lewis

Analphilosopher -- did I mention that he's a philosopher and an athiest? -- vivisects the liberal shiboleth that the religious are stupid. Thomas Aquinas leaps to his mind.

So let's think a bit more. Who might be the actual stupid folk?

And I won't comment on manners. Any six-year-old could make a spot-on judgement on that one.

Ummm, C.S. Lewis?

"You don't have a soul. You are a Soul. You have a body."

"We laugh at honor, and are shocked to find traitors in our midst."

"If you think you are not conceited, it means you are very conceited indeed."

"The egg that came from nothing is not more logical than the chicken that always was."

War Never Solved Anything

... except slavery, Nazism and Communism.

And now David Warren points out this quote from Richard Perle: "It has a better track-record than social work."

My heart-felt thanks to our brave troops on this Veteran's Day.

Finally, A True American Litmus Test

READ. THIS. NOW.

If your throat doesn't have a catch in it right now then I'll write you a check for $100 if you promise to move out of the country. Offer good to the first 10 takers.

The catch: If you aren't gone by a year from today your name will be reverbrating around the blogosphere as the corrupt, craven asshole you truly are.

The good news: For takers I will work mightily to find you additional funding from others. For how could it not be in my best interest?

You see, I am a man of my word. And I'm not sure what you are.

But it isn't good.

Only the French. Mais oui.

Welcome to the religion of mosques full of bombs peace the mentally ill submission.

Hitch On Militant Secularism

And guess who isn't on board?:

George Bush may subjectively be a Christian, but he—and the U.S. armed forces—have objectively done more for secularism than the whole of the American agnostic community combined and doubled. The demolition of the Taliban, the huge damage inflicted on the al-Qaida network, and the confrontation with theocratic saboteurs in Iraq represent huge advances for the non-fundamentalist forces in many countries. The "antiwar" faction even recognizes this achievement, if only indirectly, by complaining about the way in which it has infuriated the Islamic religious extremists around the world. But does it accept the apparent corollary—that we should have been pursuing a policy to which the fanatics had no objection?

Secularism is not just a smug attitude. It is a possible way of democratic and pluralistic life that only became thinkable after several wars and revolutions had ruthlessly smashed the hold of the clergy on the state. We are now in the middle of another such war and revolution, and the liberals have gone AWOL.

Once Again

reality is indistinguishable from Scrappleface: Arafat May Soon Sign Death Certificate. Brother.

UPDATE: You stunned him!

Projection 201: Relativized To The Point Of Suicide

Ledeen weighs in on the Dutch tragedy of submission:

The Dutch — like every other European society I know — were unwilling to recognize that they had potentially lethal enemies within, and that it was necessary to impose the rules of civil behavior on everyone within their domain. The rules of political correctness made it impossible even to criticize the jihadists, never mind compel them to observe the rules of civil society. Just look at what happened the next day: An artist in Rotterdam improvised a wall fresco that consisted of an angel and the words "Thou Shalt Not Kill." The local imam protested, and local authorities removed the fresco.

That's what happens when a culture is relativized to the point of suicide. As Daniel Patrick Moynihan once remarked of an American politician, "he can longer distinguish between our friends and our enemies, and so he has ended by adopting our enemies' view of the world." This has now befallen Europe, which cannot distinguish between free societies — their natural friends — like the United States and Israel, and has ended by embracing enemies such as the radical Islamist regimes and elevating Yasser Arafat to near beatific stature.

The process by which the Europeans arrived at this grave impasse has been going on ever since the late 19th century, when the intelligentsia revolted against "bourgeois society" and its values, and sought for deeper meaning in acts of nihilistic violence, in fascism and communism, and in vast wars that engulfed the rest of the world. The Europeans might have confronted their spiritual crisis after the Second World War (some brave souls, like Albert Camus, tried), but the Cold War tamped it down. With a huge enemy on their borders, the Europeans finessed the issue, opted for a soulless materialism (that has given them a nanny state and a birth rate that promises to extinguish them in relatively short order), and pretended that the core of Western civilization was irrelevant to their lives.

When the Cold War ended, the crisis was still there, but they projected it onto us. The United States "needed an enemy," they scoffed, because otherwise we could not define our mission. But they were the ones who had lost their enemy, and thus had to face their own terrible contradictions and moral failures. Now they deride us because of our presumed archaic faith. They even equate American religion with the fundamentalism that now menaces them inside their model cities and threatens their enormously self-satisfied secular utopia.

Wow. He had been winding up on that one for a while I think. RTWT.

Europe. Will they break 100 million this time around? Surely they're disappointed that the Cold War didn't sate their immoral blood lust...

Islam Means Peace?

Mais non W. It means S-U-B-M-I-S-S-I-O-N.

Did you forget that Rushdie is still in hiding?

(Click anywhere on the full page image. Not suitable for children.)

Welcome Carnival Readers!

My recent post "What Manchurian Candidate?" is now up on the latest Carnival of the Vanities! Check it out at "Let's Try Freedom". (There's something about the name of that blog I like -- now what could it be???)

If you like my Manchurian analysis you might enjoy this, this, this or this.

UPDATE: Here's what pushed me over the edge to get more serious about the blog: "A Sinful Soapbox: The Local Root Cause". And here are the links (101, 102, 103, 104) to my recent series on PROJECTION. Bone up, the 200 series classes are about to begin...

And I always devote the right side of the blog to making your jaw drop ======>>>

Cheers,
Bob

"We are not their permanent enemies; that foe is within their breast." Wretchard again.

What the U.S. And Squalid Africa Have In Common

That would be a lack of local terrorism:

Abadie, whose work was published in the Kennedy School's Faculty Research Working Paper Series, included both acts of international and domestic terrorism in his analysis.

Though after the 9/11 attacks most of the work in this area has focused on international terrorism, Abadie said terrorism originating within the country where the attacks occur actually makes up the bulk of terrorist acts each year. According to statistics from the MIPT Terrorism Knowledge Base for 2003, which Abadie cites in his analysis, there were 1,536 reports of domestic terrorism worldwide, compared with just 240 incidents of international terrorism.

Before analyzing the data, Abadie believed it was a reasonable assumption that terrorism has its roots in poverty, especially since studies have linked civil war to economic factors. However, once the data was corrected for the influence of other factors studied, Abadie said he found no significant relationship between a nation's wealth and the level of terrorism it experiences.

"In the past, we heard people refer to the strong link between terrorism and poverty, but in fact when you look at the data, it's not there. This is true not only for events of international terrorism, as previous studies have shown, but perhaps more surprisingly also for the overall level of terrorism, both of domestic and of foreign origin," Abadie said.

Instead, Abadie detected a peculiar relationship between the levels of political freedom a nation affords and the severity of terrorism. Though terrorism declined among nations with high levels of political freedom, it was the intermediate nations that seemed most vulnerable.

Like those with much political freedom, nations at the other extreme - with tightly controlled autocratic governments - also experienced low levels of terrorism.

Though his study didn't explore the reasons behind the trends he researched, Abadie said it could be that autocratic nations' tight control and repressive practices keep terrorist activities in check, while nations making the transition to more open, democratic governments - such as currently taking place in Iraq and Russia - may be politically unstable, which makes them more vulnerable.

"When you go from an autocratic regime and make the transition to democracy, you may expect a temporary increase in terrorism," Abadie said.

The U.S. has already made the transition to democracy and everyone realizes they are too fat and happy to consider terror as anything more than a nutso idea. Most African countries are the poster children for squalid poverty -- so why aren't they the world champions of terror?

You just read the answer. RTWT.

Bits Of (Im)Morality

The terrorism gap. Of course, the terrorists are immoral...

Whoops -- isn't prostitution supposed to be immoral? And that's some red-neck gay old Sheriff ain't she Mabel?

Is trust a moral issue? Nahhhhh...

It Ends

Like this:

But for those of you who think your grief and disappointment justify your pious nastiness and blame-shifting for your own failures: Do keep in mind that it is precisely such self-indulgence and arrogance that costs you elections.

But Goldberg's so good in this one that's almost an anticlimax! Whee-haw. And you'll keel over laughing at the Krugman joke...

What Manchurian Candidate?

SPECIAL UPDATE FOR CARNIVAL VIEWERS: See here for other posts to read if you like this one:

Why all the Manchurian Candidate references from yours truly? That isn't quite right you say. Kerry isn't an assassin -- he's a presidential candidate, no?

Well here's my markup of the Amazon review so you'll understand that reality is once more stranger than fiction:

Amazon.com

Richard Condon's 1959 Cold Vietnam War thriller remains just as chilling today. It's the story of Sgt. Raymond Shaw Lt. John F. Kerry, an ex-prisoner of war ex-CIA ferry boat flskipper (and winner of the Congressional Medal of Honor three undeserved Purple Hearts) who, brainwashed with the rest of his unit by a Chinese Viet Cong terrorist psychological expert during his captivity in North Korea visits to Paris, has come home programmed to kill secretly overthrow the U.S. government. His primary target is a U.S. presidential nominee president. Made into a controversial 1962 movie with Laurence Harvey, Frank Sinatra, and Angela Lansbury 2004 presidential campaign flacked by the MSM.

Now that we have that cleared up, feast yourself on this (Hat tip Charles):

But as early as Aug. 5, when the Swifties were just getting traction, Edwards wanted to push back, hard. McCain had just told the Associated Press that the Swift Boat ads were "dishonest and dishonorable... the same kind of deal that was pulled on me." Edwards wanted to begin a speech, "I join with Senator McCain in calling on the president to condemn this dishonest and dishonorable ad." But Kerry headquarters said no. Stephanie Cutter, the boss of the Kerry communications shop, explained that the campaign didn't need to give the Swift Boat vets any more attention than they were already getting.

Edwards played along, but his aides were indignant. They warned the veep candidate that the story was already out of control and about to get worse. Historian Douglas Brinkley, author of a wartime biography of Kerry, cautioned that Kerry's diary included mention of a meeting with some North Vietnamese terrorists in Paris. Edwards was flabbergasted. "Let me get this straight," the senator said. "He met with terrorists? Oh, that's good."

I'm shocked, just shocked that he didn't release his diaries or sign the Form 180 to release his military records.

Shocked, I tell ya.

Did I forget to mention that there's actual evidence that the Viet Cong had relations with -- if not control of -- the People's Committee for Peace and Justice (PCPJ) headed by Al Hubbard.

Did I mention that Al Hubbard was also the executive director of the Vietnam Veteran's Against the War (VVAW) and recruited Kerry into the organization? And that they constantly appeared together to talk to the MSM and obviously worked closely together.

The original Manchurian Candidate didn't even come close to the magnitude of the assassin's bullet we just missed...

Around And Around

Clinton our (nuclear) saviour.

Why no "Sister Souljah" moment targeting the excreble Mikey? Ummm. Perhaps because the idea would never occur to the Manchurian Candidate?

On Van Gogh and Somalia:

I too have heard the argument that the resumption of Gulf War hostilities in Iraq have led to increased terrorism around the world. However, there is a large body of evidence suggesting the US retreat from militant Islamic forces in Somalia provided a tremendous morale boost to Al-Qaida and other terrorist organization.

In a 1998 interview, Osama Bin Laden states that his victory in Somalia boosted his confidence and led him to label the US soldier a "paper tiger".

Oh what does Osama know? He's just a mouthpiece for Mikey anyway...

And the Manchurian Candidate should have been a bit less hypocritical about outsourcing now that QandO should mention it ;)

And around hell on earth. (Warning, not for weak stomachs. Of course Palestinian children are raised on this so what's your problem anyway? You're a Nazi Bush supporter aren't you?)

Projection 104: Murder Is Normal

Just in from the Netherlands TV via LGF:

Third man: This man (the imam) has given his personal response. He’s not expressing everyone’s point of view. I say, if he (Mohamed B., the murderer) wouldn’t have done it, I could have done it, or somebody else would have done it. Because, that man (Van Gogh) went too far. He had all the possibilities.

Interviewer: You mean, it’s self-evident that it has happenend?

Third man: It’s very self-evident. He had his freedom of speech, but he has never tried to start a discussion or debate. He called Muslims goat f-ckers. He received all attention to express that Muslims...

Interviewer: So the murder was in fact a just act?

Third man: That’s my opinion. Not everybody’s opinion, but that’s my opinion. It is just.

Interviewer: But you do agree this doesn’t fit the way we think in the Netherlands?

Third man: It’s not about the way we think. I’m married myself to a Dutch woman. I have five children who have been raised here in the Netherlands. If you try to insult their mother, then this reaction is very normal.

Interviewer: But don’t you think that murder can’t ever be considered normal?

Third man: Murder is normal. Why wouldn’t murder be normal? What happens in Iraq? What do the Americans do to the Iraqis? Did the Iraqis ask for that? That’s murder as well, and everone has accepted that. Everyone thinks that’s ‘deadly normal’.

Yes, quite normal old chap. Where would you get any other idea? Like perhaps freeing people from being terrorized by brutal barbarians such as yourself. But there's no projection to be found here, is there?

Next up, the 200 level courses begin...

Just flip around -- no matter the channel, it's all Rove all the time...

The Loathin' Of The Church Of The Left

Eviscerated Steyn-style:

That's fine. But what happens if the European elite should decide a whole lot of other stuff is beyond the pale, too, some of it that B J Kelly is quite partial to? In affirming the traditional definition of marriage in 11 state referenda, from darkest Mississippi to progressive enlightened Kerry-supporting Oregon, the American people were not expressing their "gay-loathin' ", so much as declining to go the Kelly route and have their betters tell them what they can think. They're not going to have marriage redefined by four Massachusetts judges and a couple of activist mayors. That doesn't make them Bush theo-zombies marching in lockstep to the gay lynching, just freeborn citizens asserting their right to dissent from today's established church - the stifling coercive theology of political correctness enforced by a secular episcopate.

As Americans were voting on marriage and marijuana and other matters, the Rotterdam police were destroying a mural by Chris Ripke that he'd created to express his disgust at the murder of Theo van Gogh by Islamist crazies. Ripke's painting showed an angel and the words "Thou Shalt Not Kill". Unfortunately, his workshop is next to a mosque, and the imam complained that the mural was "racist", so the cops arrived, destroyed it, arrested the television journalists filming it and wiped their tape. Maybe that would ring a bell with Oliver James's mum.

'Scuse me now so's I can go spit out my chewin' teebacur...

(Hat Tip LGF)

Did I mention that I'm on that top line? And that it may even be in the black on of these days...

The slippery slope to somatic cell nuclear transfer...

The Church Of The Left, Part 7857

Cherney gets it. But "Mission Impossible" would be an understatement.

Read them. They're short. And very important. I'll wait...

Did I mention that if you're a Dem and don't read them you deserve to suffer the consequences?

Here's the net: Somewhere north of 30% of the Dems are now fundamentalist church goers. But it's not a church in any conventional sense. It's a "reality based" church. It's the church of the left.

And if the rest of the Dems try to get serious about addressing the issues of the "Red" heartland, they will find themselves immediately in a Democratic civil war accused of heresy. And if they still persevere then the Demo Party will fracture -- ensuring Republican dominance for as far as the eye can see...

Did I forget to mention that if they don't choose fracture then they'll just continue to slowly fade into the sunset of irrelevancy?

I'm satisfied with either result. Thanks for asking.

Projection 103: It's Not Cool To Be Smart

Brooks has projection nailed:

But the same insularity that caused many liberals to lose touch with the rest of the country now causes them to simplify, misunderstand and condescend to the people who voted for Bush. If you want to understand why Democrats keep losing elections, just listen to some coastal and university town liberals talk about how conformist and intolerant people in Red America are. It makes you wonder: why is it that people who are completely closed-minded talk endlessly about how open-minded they are?

What we are seeing is a diverse but stable Republican coalition gradually eclipsing a diverse and stable Democratic coalition. Social issues are important, but they don't come close to telling the whole story. Some of the liberal reaction reminds me of a phrase I came across recently: The rage of the drowning man.

I am endlessly fascinated by this torrent of liberal projection. No sooner do they get done saying the problem was all about Republicans as being simple-minded illegitimate brutal killers of Iraqi babies since there were no WMD [Saddam? Who's that? -ed. I thought there was something about someone "reporting for duty"?.] but we learn that it was actually all about gay marriage! Forget what we said about WMD!

It's spelled P-R-O-J-E-C-T-I-O-N.

I was quite comfortable with the Iraq war resolution listing *over 20* reasons for toppling Saddam. In fact, I thought the list was too short. It's the libs who insisted on one!

And who still insist on one. Just not the same one this week. Maybe it'll be back in style next week.

It's not cool to be smart.

(Hat tip Glenn)

What part of this don't you understand?

Goodnight Herbert.

Great Jumping "Reality-Based" Butterballs!

Glenn points out that ERIC SCHEIE of Classical Values has some choice comments about the "reality-based" community. But you rarely see a consecutive string of quality comments like this on a blog. Jaw gaping kudos to Eric's readers! Check this out:

My sister considers herself to be in the "Reality Based Community." I consider her delusional. I present as evidence the following exchange. My sister has refered to Bush as Hitler. In a series of e-mails I patiently explained that Bush couldn't be Hitler since Hitler was dead. He also couldn't be a "new Hitler" since the two men have policies almost diametrically opposed. Most significantly, Bush is attempting to replace genocidal dictatorships with secular democracies. Hitler did everything he could do to destroy democracies and replace them with genocidal dictators. I thought my sister might understand the difference. I also pointed out that Hitler was a starving artist who joined the National Socialist Party, supported gun control, abortion, government control of corporations, was an athiest with an affinity for paganism, hated Jews and allied himself with radical Muslims. I then noted that the Democratic Party, not the Republicans, had a platform which came closest to Hitler's. In other words, using objective reality, not delustional rantings, Hitler is closer politically to the Democrats than to Bush. My sister sent me this in response:

"Bush is backed by goups I wouldn't affiliate myself with because they are not conservatives...they are radicals with a philosophy similar to fanatics worldwide. That is, intolerence for all things different then themselves. Wow, sounds like similiar behavior...don't we hear about all the radical muslims that are fighting a holy war killing everyone that is different. Holy shmoly...I think we are doing the same thing. You're either with us or against us. No room for differences and we'll just kill all those that don't agree or put you in jail or deny you your civil rights or make it very difficult to live a good life. Sounds like a return to the dark ages just disguised as "good for us" and a little more high tech than the radical islamists that are throwing bombs and rocks in the desert. Like here in the US...yelling GOD at the top of our lungs.

I thought here in the US we took the constitution seriously and did not willfully choose to violate it's tenents. There is movement alive that has been working on it since before our constitution was written. [I can't quite figure this one out. I think she means that a secret cabal has been working to undermine the constituion, even before it was written, but I'm not sure. - David] Because this current administration and those "behind the scenes" neo conservatives and theocrats are working towards eroding what I believe is a profound document I cannot in good faith and conscience vote for or support them. I find The Bush/Cheney ticket hard to swallow and huge portions of the GOP population as fanatical. I am saddened to find so many references to Kerry and the democratic party as Nazis, even from you. It is apparent that historically the GOP much closer resembles the Movement leading up to and including the Nazis."

I'll let you decide who is a member of the Reality Based Community.

posted by: David on 11.05.04 at 08:31 PM [permalink]

----------------------------------------------------

I had no idea!

This is the hep way to say what was in 1990s jargon "politically correct" or in the Soviet Union was termed "the sole progressive world view".

posted by: Harry Forbes on 11.05.04 at 08:36 PM [permalink]

-----------------------------------------------------------

"Faith" in the context of having a vision of what the would could and should be is critical to achieving anything.

Consider Europe in the late 1930s. Chamberlain, member of the "reality-based community" opted to appease Germany, while Churchill (with a vision of Hitler's Germany defeated and his nearby neighbors freed) recognized the need to confront and defeat tyranny to make England safe.

Ditto for Reagan vs. Carter. One saw the "reality" of malaise, the other had a vision of greatness. One thought the US had to live with Soviet domination in the world, the other defeated Communist tyranny across the globe. I'll take a positive vision of economic and political liberty over "realistic" status-quo tyranny in the Middle East. We've seen the fruits of the Scowcroft / Kissinger approach the past 25 years.

posted by: Matthew Cromer on 11.05.04 at 08:42 PM [permalink]

-------------------------------------------------------------

So you're telling me the people who, not more than two months ago, were saying that a man in Texas - a man who didn't know how to type, mind - acquired and used a *four thousand dollar* typesetting machine to compose terse, secret memos to himself; that this man made a dozen or so highly technical adjustments to that machine, all of which *just happened* to line up perfectly with the default settings on Microsoft Word, a program which didn't even exist until several years after his death; and that these memos, which contained the bombshell revelation that Bush missed his mo-fo-ing PHYSICAL thirty years ago, yes, these highly charged *dynamite* memos would grip the electorate with such fiery passion that it would rush to the polls like an hoard of keening devils and swing the entire election out of pure vengeance; you're telling me that the very people who believed EVERY WORD of this utterly ridiculous narrative and who tried to convince others of its truth, ignoring raised eyebrows and helpless laughter; these very same people are now calling themselves the farking "REALITY-BASED community"?!?!?!?!?!?!?

Great jumping butterballs!

It IS to laugh.

I was feeling a bit let down by Eric's denouement. Then I realized that the commenters provided just the completion Eric needed -- and then some!

Ann Provides Conclusive Proof

of how smart and evil Karl Rove really is:

Seventy percent to 80 percent of Americans oppose gay marriage and partial-birth abortion. Far from appealing exclusively to a narrow Republican base, opposition to gay marriage is strongest among the Democratic base: blacks, Hispanics, blue-collar workers and the elderly. There were marriage amendments on the ballot in Michigan and Ohio. Bush won Ohio narrowly and lost Michigan by only 2 points. How different might that have been if Bush hadn't run from the issue.

But Rove concluded Bush should stay mum on gay marriage and partial-birth abortion – contravening the politicians' rule of thumb: Talk about your positions that are wildly popular with voters. "Boy Genius" Rove decided Bush shouldn't even run radio ads on gay marriage, and at the last minute, Bush started claiming he was in favor of civil unions, just like John Kerry.

Amazingly, it was the Democrats – the ones who support gay marriage – who used the gay issue for political advantage, most famously when Kerry gay-baited Mary Cheney during the third debate.

Ya sure, you betcha...

Lies -- Just For Old Times Sake...

President Clinton does not exist and never lied!

Forged Documents, Forged Exit Polls, Etc, Etc

Republicans remember history even under pressure. Can you say "no more Panhandle 2000s?"

I thought you could...

Where people can fly in freedom, but not into buildings...

Kerry Concedes!

Kerry concedes and Rodger Morrow has it right:

"First President Bush was misunderestimated. Now he has been unredefeated."

(IL)LEGAL HUMOR

What do you call 1000 lawyers on the bottom of the ocean?

A GOOD START.

But then there's Scrappleface!

The Tinfoil Apocalypse Prelude: And Who Do You Think You Are? Einstein?

Remember "The Greatest Intelligence Failure In History"?

The core is as follows:

First let's look at a description of one of the universally acclaimed great Presidents. We'll call him X:

X was also an outstanding example of a leader who, although not in any full sense an intellectual (he was a book collector rather than a book reader, and his Harvard grades were of a mediocrity that suggest that today he might have had difficulty in gaining entry to that august institution), ...

Sounds a lot like W's story at Yale, no? So he was easily duped by someone of clearly superior intelligence -- call him Y -- into spending massively to counter a threat that turned out to be nearly non-existant. X was duped so badly that he spent somewhere north of $25 billion on the fiasco.Folks, this is easy for anyone who has even basic Google skills and understands the rudiments of inflation adjustment.

Can you tell me who X and Y were?

Can you tell me what he (and his successor) did that was the direct result of what was actually the greatest intelligence failure of all time?

And for another hint as well as extra bonus points: Was there a genzai bakudan? Or not? Was that an intelligence failure too? Do you think we'll ever know for sure?

As you've certainly figured out by now, X was Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Y was Albert Einstein.But Einstein "mislead" FDR:

With the 1938 discovery of nuclear fission, Germany had a two-year head start on developing nuclear energy; the Americans' fear was that the Nazis would shape it into a weapon of mass destruction. Germany also had in its grasp two materials critical to its development -- heavy water and uranium. They were available in abundance only in Norway and Czechoslovakia, both under Nazi control.

In August 1939, Leo Szilard and fellow Hungarian physicists Eugene Wigner and Edward Teller urged Albert Einstein to sign a letter they had drafted for President Roosevelt. Einstein's letter noted that the work of Fermi and Szilard "leads me to expect that the element uranium may be turned into a new and important source of energy in the near future." President Roosevelt responded by appointing an Advisory Committee on Uranium. The Office of Scientific Research and Development was established on June 28, 1941, under the direction of Vannevar Bush, to develop atomic energy.

But in the end, the Alsos project determined that they might have spent more looking for German nukes than Hitler had spent on developing them:

In the end, ALSOS concluded that the Allies had surpassed the German atomic bomb effort monumentally by 1942. Compared to the Manhattan Project, one of the largest scientific endeavors of all time, the German project was considerably underfunded and understaffed, and it is questionable whether Germany would have had the resources or isolation which were required for the Allies to produce such a weapon. Goudsmit, in a monograph published two years after the end of the war, further concluded that a principal reason for the failure of the German project was that science could not flourish under totalitarianism -- an argument seemingly rebutted by the Soviet Union's development of a nuclear weapon by 1949. The Soviets, however, benefited from Stalin's extensive spy network, which included many top scientists in Los Alamos working to prevent the United States from holding a nuclear monopoly over the world.

And this provides our initial insight into intelligence failure.

And the genzai bakudan? It's possible that the Japanese may have been closer to nuclear weapons than the Germans were! In fact there's a report of unclear reliability that they actually exploded a bomb -- just a little too late...

So was Roosevelt a dimwit like W who screwed up royally and should have focused the war effort on Japan? Or one of the great Presidents?

Everything you know may well be wrong.

The Stakes Are High

VERY, VERY HIGH.

W For President -- Of The Miners

Yes of course! I voted for W last Friday! Surely you don't think I'd take my chances with tomorrow's blockade of Democratic lawyers do you?

If you haven't voted Bush yet, please get out there and do so as if your life depended on it -- because it does.

And please forget the ludicrous arguments about how Bush is a recruiting tool for terrorists. By that argument Hiroshima was a really bad idea because it made the Japanese really, really, really mad.

Yes it did. But they were too shocked with too many dead to do anything about it. Ruthless barbarians will only surrender when they are confronted with the only language they understand. And that language by definition -- and sadly -- is utter devastation.

The other argument that I have been warming up to put to rest is the loony left myth that if only we will surrender Israel to them then the Islamists will leave us alone.

This is utter and complete garbage. As I recently posted, there is a single word reply to this: Bamiyan. Not to mention Beslan and a host of others...

The Jews are the canaries in the coal mine.

And the miners ignore the canaries at their own peril...


(Yes, the suspense is nearly unbearable on the $25 billion failure -- and I dropped another hint too...)

Will Lincoln be repudiated tomorrow?

Kerry's Legal Memory Hole Leaks Some More...

As Beldar notes that we may have found the real reason that Kerry could only get into Boston College Law School. And it may not be stupidity after all. Though that may still be determined to be the root cause that got him into this pickle of course...

Glenn on the REAL threat to Al Qaeda.And Afghanistan a disaster? Brother...

Memory Hole Redux 2: In Case You're Tempted By Hudna

Just in case you're tempted by Osama's nuanced hudna offer with your state, here's how it works in Spain:

MADRID (Reuters) - Police arrested seven suspected Islamic militants in raids across Spain on Monday to foil a planned bomb attack on the High Court, judicial sources said.

The arrests came seven months after train bombs killed 191 people in Madrid.

The seven suspects, including four Algerians and one Moroccan, were arrested in the southern region of Andalusia, the Mediterranean city of Valencia and Madrid.

Further arrests could be made in the coming hours as part of the operation against a radical and violent Muslim network, the Interior Ministry said in a statement.

Crusading Judge Baltasar Garzon ordered the arrests as part of his inquiry into Islamic militant cells in Spain.

The suspects had been in contact with other individuals in Europe, the United States and Australia, the statement said.

So feel free to call for negotiations. Sounds like a good plan to me. Surely his latest tape is evidence that Osama has given up on Andalusia...

MSMemory Hole Watch

HOLE SPOTTED. Not to worry. I'm sure they go around re-editing their site all the time in favor of W...

ALREADY UPDATED: MUST. PLACE. THIS. DOWN. HOLE. ALSO. ALONG. WITH. BAMIYAN. W. IS. ROOT. OF. ALL. WORLD'S. PROBLEMS. NO. FLOOD. OF. DISPROOF. ALLOWED. TO. RE-EDUCATION. CAMPS. WITH. DISSENTERS.

I can only repeat the painfully great Soviet dissident joke yet again: "The future is known, it's the past that keeps changing."

ANOTHER UPDATE BEFORE THEY THROW ME DOWN THE HOLE: Did I mention that the left suffers no cognitive dissonance whatsoever from their simultaneous assertions that W is in bed with both Israel and the Saudis? Of course, I would suggest that the left suffers from something else but what do I know with my wee tiny brain?

MILITARY IN THE HOLE UPDATE: And you wonder why the majority of the military are hopping mad! If John Neville Kerry wins, the MSM is going to be tarred and feathered by the public when this finally comes out. They have no idea what they've done.

Just remember when you vote: General Giap and Madame Bihn love him -- but 2/3+ of the military and 90% of Vietnamese Americans will be voting against him. But they're just a bunch of baby killers and lackeys so what do they know???

Case Summation -- Straight To The Point

DAVID WARREN: "To replace Mr. Bush with Mr. Kerry in the present circumstances, would be like replacing Mr. Churchill with Mr. Chamberlain while Britain was at war. It is hard to believe that it could happen. I pray very earnestly that it won't."

NEWSFLASH: Tad Devine and Joe Lockhart are NOT -- REPEAT NOT -- part of the Kerry campaign!

So when you see them shilling for Kerry just turn off the TV. K?

Veritas Koppelgate Redux

It turns out that any criticism of Koppelgate may possibly be an exercise in bad faith. So I gladly spew forth some more from the Captain:

Nor does ABC's embarassment stop there, although failing to even interview American veterans and witnesses in discussing a military engagement and favoring villagers whose only qualification is a self-identification that they were there for this one battle, 35 years ago. Bandit notes that staunch Kerry supporter and defender Doug Reese, who was on Bill Rood's boat during the engagement, also disputes everything ABC reported:

Army advisor, Doug Reese, who was on Bill Rood's boat and just happens to be a staunch Kerry supporter and defender has publicly spoken in detail of what he had witnessed of the dead VC guerrilla minutes after he had been shot by Kerry. It should be noted that Mr. Reese works in Vietnamese Tourism out of the Vietnamese Embassy in Washington D.C.
Mr. Reese was kind enough to document the following with Swift Vets for Truth:

"Anyway, we'll never know much about him [VC killed by Kerry], as he wasn't local like the other guys, who lived right there. The survivors -- local guys -- weren't in a good position to see what was going on with the B-40 guy. For that matter, they don't even know his name."

Mr. Reese's statement says it all about the facts surrounding the dead VC, and he should know since was standing over the dead VC along with Sen. Kerry within 5-8 minutes of the shooting. Unfortunately, ABC was not interested in the facts, just any interview they could use to distort the truth to their viewers.

ABC News makes one thing abundantly clear: despite taking the lead on covering Rathergate, they've apparently learned absolutely nothing from it. Their badly-misfired attack piece should embarass everyone who works in their news division.

And check out Beldar as well...

When I played hockey, I never considered it smart to play with a broken stick...

And You Thought There Was Already A Red And Blue Divide

Looks like Osama may have lost something in the initial translation (Hat Tip INDC):

The tape of Osama bin Laden that was aired on al-Jazeera on Friday, October 29 included a specific threat to "each U.S. state," designed to influence the outcome of the upcoming election against George W. Bush. The U.S. media in general mistranslated the words "ay wilaya" (which means "each U.S. state") to mean a "country" or "nation" other than the U.S., while in fact the threat was directed specifically at each individual U.S. state. This suggests some knowledge by bin Laden of the U.S. electoral-college system. In a section of his speech in which he harshly criticized George W. Bush, bin Laden stated: "Any U.S. state that does not toy with our security automatically guarantees its own security."

This has an interesting relationship to my last post to say the least! If Osama can finally muster a serious attack and it's in RED STATES then he will truly get his wish for the clash of civilizations. And what if Kerry is Prez and is perceived by red governors as having an ineffectual response?

I continue to be truly astounded with the left's racist condescension toward the Arabs and Muslims as being only a "nuisance" that can be licked by "law enforcement". But then why should I be astounded by the truth?

Binny Censored By al-Jazeera???

Roger has the scoop once more:

Officials said that in the 18-minute long tape - of which only six minutes were aired on the al-Jazeera Arab television network in the Middle East on Friday - bin Laden bemoans the recent democratic elections in Afghanistan and the lack of violence involved with it.

On the tape, bin Laden also says his terror organization has been hurt by the U.S. military's unrelenting manhunt for him and his cohorts on the Afghan-Pakistani border.

So it includes both the Dems talking points AND underpinnings for the general tone of requesting a hudna. But somehow the underpinnings get edited out of the original story.

And if you really want an eye opener check out this comment on the post:

It's less than 48 hours to election day. If the terrorists are going to lauch an attack, if they can, they'd better do it soon.

And when they do, the East Coast Democracts will cower at home while the rest of the country votes George Bush into office. I doubt the terrorists understand that even yet.

So if there's no attack on the election then Bush has made us safer and the folks may notice that when they dimple their chads. And if there is an attack on the election then that would facilitate a Bush victory too.

Keep watching F-911 and playing checkers guys...

Blameless and confused. MUST. READ. NOW. (Hat Tip Michelle)

The insanity of the Arabs illustrated in the post is what moderate Dems don't understand. But worse, it is the very definition of their lunatic brethren...

The Canary In The Coal Mine: Stolen Erieness For Our Stolen Election

I was about to do a post on how Osama seems to have turned into a devotee of the fat oaf MM (and maybe M&M is next come to think of it) himself. And then I read this comment on Roger Simon's blog and realized I had just been saved the trouble. Stolen here for your jaw dropping pleasure:

Copyright John with apologies to DTP:

I doubt there is collusion but damn this eerie:

Democratic talking point 1: Bush lies.

"Bush is still practicing distortion and misleading on you, and obscuring the main reasons and therefore the reasons are still existing to repeat what happened before."

Democratic talking point 2: Bush family/Saudi connection.

"Both parties are arrogant and stubborn and the greediness and taking money without right and that similarity appeared during the visits of Bush to the region while people from our side were impressed by the US and hoped that these visits would influence our countries. Here he is being influenced by these regimes, Royal and military."

Democratic talking point 3: Patriot law takes away our freedoms.

"So he transferred the oppression of freedom and tyranny to his son and they call it the Patriot Law to fight terrorism."

Democratic talking point 4: Bush stole the 2000 election.

"He was bright in putting his sons as governors in states and he didn't forget to transfer his experience from the rulers of our region to Florida to falsify elections to benefit from it in critical times."

Democratic talking point 5: 9/11 and My pet goat story

"Before Bush and his administration would pay attention and we never thought that the high commander of the US armies would leave 50 thousand of his citizens in both towers to face the horrors by themselves when they most needed him because it seemed to distract his attention from listening to the girl telling him about her goat butting was more important than paying attention to airplanes butting the towers which gave us three times the time to execute the operation thank god."

Pretty impressive, eh? No more talking points about Andalusia -- narrowed now to just how Israel is the font of all evil in the world. Did I mention that's a Dem talking point also???

So let's do put on our thinking caps. First, we have this clown -- not sure he's AQ but he seems to be produced by one of their normal production houses -- clearly telling us that it's all W's fault and they're about to make 9/11 seem like small potatoes.

Then we have what appears to be Osama with an October surprise appearance with Andalusian amnesia if not as a living breathing Democratic operative. Of course, there's the seeming veneer statement about not caring who wins but in fact, he's doing such a good job with Dem talking points that the most trusted man in America is convinced that Karl Rove is behind his transformation. (Did I mention that Walter has now officially joined John Neville Kerry in the coveted "nuttier than a pecan plantation" status?)

Even Wretchard thinks that Osama is making a surprisingly straightforward appeal to the electorate:

The American answer to Osama's proposal will be given on Election Day. One response is to agree that the United States of America will henceforth act like Sweden, which is on track to become majority Islamic sometime after the middle of this century. The electorate best knows which candidate will serve this end; which candidate most promises to be European-like in attitude and they can choose that path with both eyes open. The electorate can strike that bargain and Osama may keep his word. The other course is to reject Osama's terms utterly; to recognize the pleading in his outwardly belligerent manner and reply that his fugitive existence; the loss of his sanctuaries; the annihilation of his men are but the merest foretaste of what is yet to come: to say that to enemies such as he, the initials 'US' will always mean Unconditional Surrender.

Osama has stated his terms. He awaits America's answer.

Hooo haw. My ancestors were way, way smarter than anyone could have realized to flee Scandinavia, you betcha!

Sensing seems to be back at least temporarily and thinks they're down and we should take the opportunity to hit them hard while they are. (Now I remember why I missed Donald :) In a similar vein, Roger thinks it's just a hudna offer -- more likely but no reason not to take the Donald's advice!

If Karl Rove didn't write the script then I would guess Beldar is closer to the mark in thinking that Osama has a bead on Kerry:

I agree. But I respectfully disagree, in part, with Wretchard that "[t]he American answer to Osama's proposal will be given on Election Day." Yes, if Pres. Bush is re-elected, bin Laden will have his answer. But I don't think that bin Laden's tape is primarily an attempt to influence the course of the American election next Tuesday. Rather, I think it's a very clear attempt to begin negotiations with a Kerry administration for a "cease-fire" in the Global War on Terror.

Of course, I don't believe for an instant that bin Laden's sincere. Only a blithering fool would trust him. But only a blithering fool would —

• have listened to the North Vietnamese/Viet Cong's "seven-point peace plan" during the Vietnam War, and have taken it at face value and endorsed it as the course that America should follow.
  
• have believed Daniel Ortega's promises to reform his communist government in Nicaragua if only America would stop funding the contras.
  
• have believed that a nuclear freeze and sharp cutbacks in America's military and intellligence programs would placate the Soviet Union and win the Cold War.
  
• have believed that diplomacy would have gotten Saddam out of Kuwait in the last decade, or out of power in his own country in this one.
  
• believe that North Korea will respond more favorably to unilateral negotiations with the United States than to combined pressure in six-way talks that also involve South Korea, Japan, China, and Russia.
  

One such blithering fool may be elected President of the United States on Tuesday. And Osama bin Laden — like Madame Binh, Daniel Ortega, a succession of Soviet dictators, Saddam, and Kim Jong Il before him — has already begun his sly attempts to manipulate that candidate. So it is that this blithering fool's personal history of enthusiastically swallowing just this kind of bait, hook, line, and sinker — and then trying to base America's course upon it — scares me far more than anything Osama bin Laden could ever say.

Bottom line is that both are true: Osama is going after moderation of talking points (it's a sad, sad commentary when Michael Moore's hateful drivel is considered moderate -- but it's surely true compared to the world wide Caliphate) to sway the voters as well as hoodwink Johnny boy -- who never met a tyrant he didn't support.

Osama thinks we're stupid enough not to notice the missing Andalusian Caliphate with the focus on Israel. John Neville Kerry is either taken in or thinks the coming Caliphate is a good thing -- how to tell which is a mystery. Possibly both are true.

The election has now become a referendum on whether Osama can hide the destruction of the Bamiyan statues.

As the Soviet dissidents used to say: "The future is known; it's the past that's always changing."

PLEASE VOTE. AND DON'T FORGET BAMIYAN. ISRAEL IS THE CANARY IN THE COAL MINE. ALWAY'S HAS BEEN -- ALWAYS WILL BE.

And here's why your vote is important from a comment on Captain's Quarters:

My liberal coworker just informed me that OBL wants Bush to get elected because he knows that if Kerry gets elected that Kerry will come after him and kill him.

How do I respond to something like this? I just quietly shake my head at the ignorance.

Freedom fighters? Really???

Banana Republic Watch

My guess right now is that just as Iraq will be looking to us for an example of how to run an election, we'll be degenerating into a banana republic. Powerline has some great perspective from Joseph Perkins on how we got here:

Richard Nixon would have captured the 1960 presidential election but for five states he lost by 5,000 votes or fewer – Missouri, Illinois, Nevada, New Mexico and Hawaii.
Gerald Ford would have retained the presidency in 1976 but for two states he lost by no more than 5,600 votes – Ohio and Hawaii.

Though the 1960 and 1976 elections were close, though they turned on a few thousand votes in a handful of states, the outcomes were faithfully accepted by the American people, by Republicans and Democrats alike.

That's because neither Nixon or Ford demanded that the votes be recounted in the states in which they lost by narrow margins. And neither Nixon or Ford insisted they were denied election because of voting irregularities in some state or another.

Then there was the 2000 election.

[Al] Gore refused to accept that he lost Florida, that he lost the presidency, by so small a margin. He refused to put the national interest before his own selfish interest.

Interesting to note that the hated Richard Nixon chose not to contest even though part of the problem was the Daley machine with corruption as deep as the Marianas trench. And Ohio hardly has a Snow White reputation in Ford's case.

I pray this election is not close. But I have serious doubts my prayers will be fulfilled on this one. (With humble apologies to the Lord, of course.)

Thanks, Al.

Stalking the blithering fool.

A hopeful sign. And jail. For a long time.

Peer reviewed. Uh huh.

Buy Your Black Hoodies

This might also explain why you could talk to lefties for eternity without a positive peep from them about the liberation of women in Afghanistan and Iraq. (Hat tip INDC)

The Largest Bribery Scheme In The History Of The World

The largest bribery scheme in the history of the world. Surely you can tell me what that would be?

No, I haven't developed a fixation on the Guiness Book of World Records. (Well, my 7-year-old has though ;)

You'd never know it exists reading the traditional MSM though...

(I will post the link tomorrow to alleviate your suffering...)

UPDATE: Read all about it.

QaQaa

(How could I possibly resist such an elegantly titled post? ;)

McQ leverages Peters to eviscerate NYeTCBS's Al-Qaqaa. GO. READ. IT.

Never mind the IAEA's admission in their own reports that stuff could be removed via the ventilation shafts, El Baradei's obvious grudge against W for wanting him out for incompetence.

Did I mention part of the incompetence was letting Saddam keep this stuff beyond 1995 when the weapons inspectors first told him to destroy it?

And now you have a clue as to which Presidential candidate the word was born to describe...

UPDATE: More from Cliff May and Hugh (scroll down a ways). A warehouse 25 miles away??? Oh, brother. As Cliff points out you have Kerry's key foreign policy advisor (Holbrooke) admitting that nobody really knows what happened but Kerry is out there with this as his main attack this week. Pitiful...

Only The Name Remains

Stolen from the Kerry Spot:

THE BRILLIANCE OF THIS STRATEGY ELUDES ME [10/28 03:42 PM]

AP:

"When the Bay of Pigs went sour, John Kennedy had the courage to look America in the eye and say, `I take responsibility, it's my fault," Kerry said, referring to a bungled invasion of Cuba in 1961. "John Kennedy knew how to take responsibility for the mistakes he made and Mr. President, it's long since time for you to start taking responsibility for the mistakes you made."

"You know, mistakes like reminding the Cuban-American community of why they hate the Democratic Party, just five days before an election in which I have staked almost everything on winning in Florida. Mistakes like comparing the popular successful overthrow of Saddam Hussein to a failed coup attempt in Cuba more than forty years ago. Mistakes like that."

Remember "The Greatest Intelligence Failure In History"? (Don't worry the answer is coming soon to a post near you...)

It's all right, I'll wait while you read it. It's short.

Well, the President that's the correct answer is amazingly NOT Kennedy (another big hint for you needless to say). But letting the Russians get as close as they did to seriously operational nukes in Cuba is definitely on the short list of contestants. And I do mean the SHORT list. And the Bay of Pigs as well as the near holocaust of the Cuban Missile Crisis were part of the legacy of one of the best Dem presidents of all time. (Surely I have your guessing compass oriented in the right direction by now?)

On the other hand, Caroline Kennedy's blather notwithstanding, the real J.F.K. was actually a liberal in the best classical tradition of the word -- modulo the Daley machine and a long list of other egregious issues of course.

He was the last outpost of sanity before the Democratic Party was co-opted by the loony left. Kennedy was for spreading Democracy, for staring down communists, for tax cuts, for going to the stars, for bearing any burden ... in short, he was heavily aligned with Ronald Reagan and W!

John Kerry is NOT for spreading Democracy -- in Vietnam, Iraq, Central America or anywhere else I am sad to inform you.

If we lived in a rational world and the lawyers weren't one of the cores of the Democratic Party -- the modern Democrats could be soundly convicted in a trial for fraudulent misrepresentation of goods.

Only the name remains without the brains.

That a boy John! Way to win Florida!

And Al Qaeda Would Vote For

Who Again?

WHOOPS!

Who is Harold Baer, Jr.? And what did C-BS report about him? RTWT! (Hat tip INDC)