Boring

clipped from www.moonbattery.com Saul Alinsky — the repellant radical who wrote the book on using underhanded tactics to undermine democracy — has now been acknowledged as a hero by prominent MSNBC Obamunist Chris "Tingles" Matthews. WND quotes Tingles: Well, to reach back to one of our heroes from the past, from the '60s, Saul Alinsky once said that even though both sides have flaws in their arguments and you can always find something nuanced about your own side you don't like and it's never perfect, you have to act in the end like there's simple black and white clarity between your side and the other side or you don't get anything done. I always try to remind myself of Saul Alinsky when I get confused. We all know how often that is. Next WND quotes former leftist David Horowitz, who describes Alinsky's salient contribution to moonbat tactics: The strategy of working within the system until you can accumulate enough power to destroy it was what sixties radicals called "boring from within."

Everyone Knows It

clipped from hotair.com As if dozens of jihadis wearing suicide underwear wasn’t enough of a problem for the US and the world, the Israelis remind us today of an even bigger threat about to reach maturation.  The Iranians will have the technical capability to build a nuclear weapon within weeks, and will have one completed by 2011, according to Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak: Iran will possess the technology to build a nuclear bomb by early 2010 and be able to produce one the following year, Israeli media quoted Israel’s defense minister as saying Monday. Israel’s diplomatic recall and Netanyahu’s warning is meant to send another signal, both to Iran and the international community.  Israel will take care of the problem their way if the world doesn’t start taking this seriously.  That first bomb has Tel Aviv written on the nose cone, and everyone knows it. It would seem that Barack Obama and the West has only a few weeks left to head off unilateral Israeli action.

Time For The Beach

clipped from gatewaypundit.firstthings.com German Chancellor Angela Merkel spoke out against the repression of protestors in Iran and the violent attacks on democracy activists. DW World reported: In a strong statement to the press on Monday, German Chancellor Angela Merkel called the actions of Iran’s state security services “unacceptable.” She called on them to “avoid any further escalation of the violence and to pursue political dialogue to peacefully settle internally disputed matters,” and also to respect their commitment to the International Pact on Civil and Political Rights, which guarantees the right to peaceful protest. Meanwhile… Barack Obama was off to the beach in Hawaii.

Joe Wilson Was Right Of Course

clipped from gatewaypundit.firstthings.com On September 9, 2009, Barack Obama stood in front of the American public and promised them that abortion funding would not be included in the democrat’s health care bill. It was a lie. But, we all know now that Barack Obama cannot be trusted and that absolutely everything he says comes with an expiration date. Life News reported: President Barack Obama promised Americans in a speech to Congress that his version of a government-run health care bill would not contain abortion funding. Now his top spokesman confirms that Obama favors the Senate bill that funds abortions over the House bill that bans abortion funding. In a September nationally-televised speech to Congress, Obama sought to clear up projections from pro-life advocates that his health care plan would fund abortions. “One more misunderstanding I want to clear up — under our plan, no federal dollars will be used to fund abortions,” Obama claimed.

On Fire

clipped from gatewaypundit.firstthings.com A protester screams his rage at the Iranian regime on December 27, 2009 in front of police motorcycles burning in Tehran (AFP- Iran Press News) Protesters torch a police car during yesterday’s rioting. Ahmadinejad warned the West today that Iran is united. This is an amazing video– Protesters stop a police car and free the captured protesters:

Did I Forget To Mention It's Been Deleted?

clipped from magicjava.blogspot.com In the middle of the night on Monday morning, enough believers posted they wanted the article deleted to tie the count evenly between delete and keep. Then the polling was shut down early and the page was deleted. It's now a redirect to the Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident article. Editor Rd232 has tried to block the ClimateGate author from posting to wikipedia. This isn't the first time this has happened. Wikipedia previously blocked all known skeptics from posting on the ClimateGate article. The deletion is under review, as it occured less than 12 hours after the delete notice was posted and there was no consensus for deletion. We need wiki editors to get over there and get this reversed. And Rd232 needs to lose his editor privileges due to abuse.

cn4iran

clipped from andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com A reader writes: Greetings from Shanghai. I don't think you're on twitter, so I thought I'd give you a head's up on something pretty amazing. The hashtag #CN4Iran - designated by Chinese twitter users offering support to the Iranian uprising - is a trending topic on the twitter top 10  of trending topics. Ahead of Avatar, Singapore Idol, and Sezairi. Needless to say, twitter is blocked in China (though easy enough to get access to it). An absolutely incredible development.

Submergence

clipped from andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com A reader writes: Ali was a seyyed ... of the line of the Imam. Western analysts do not actually understand the importance of the twin mantles of heredity and scholarship to the Shi'ia. This will start the martyrdom remembrance cycle ... with Ali Mousavi as the Shaheed, the martyr. I predict this is the single event that will crush the tyrant regime of Khamenei and 'Nejad. Killing a seyyed during Ashura? Gasoline on the fires of revolution. If Qom was not in the Green Wave before this will submerge them. This is a martyrdom of far greater import than any killings so far....this is an exact parallel to the martyrdom of Imam Ali at the hands of Ummayyads.

Death To The Dictator Update

clipped from www.timesonline.co.uk It is time to start wondering out loud whether Iran’s uprising could become one of those Berlin Wall moments. There’s the currency campaign, for starters. Thousands of rial notes have been stamped with a simple green “V” for victory. Others bear handwritten slogans that echo the public chants denouncing the regime. Some have even been reprinted with pictures: one is a cartoon of President Ahmadinejad with “people’s enemy” written underneath. Another carries a picture from the mobile phone images of Neda Agha Soltan as she lay dying on the street from a sniper’s bullet. Underneath is written “death to the dictator” — a common public chant against Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Then there is the boycott of goods advertised on state-controlled television. People in line at markets whisper to other shoppers not to buy certain products that help to subsidise the Government’s broadcasting monopoly — and its version of events.

Go Green!

Climaquiddick Memory Hole Update

clipped from magicjava.blogspot.com It looks like the believers lost the battle to control the ClimateGate page that I talked about in this post, because now wikipedia is trying to delete the ClimateGate page altogether. Deleting a page in wikipedia means the entire page and all it's history is forever gone. The public can never view it and will never even know it existed. The plan seems to be to move the article to Climatic Research Unit e-mail_hacking incident. Screen shot of wikipedia's attempt to delete the ClimateGate article.

The Other Man

clipped from www.mlive.com Haskell said he and his wife were sitting on the ground near their boarding gate in Amsterdam, which is when they saw Mutallab approach the gate with an unidentified man. While Mutallab was poorly dressed, his friend was dressed in an expensive suit, Haskell said. He says the suited man asked ticket agents whether Mutallab could board without a passport. “The guy said, 'He's from Sudan and we do this all the time.'” Mutallab is Nigerian. Haskell believes the man may have been trying to garner sympathy for Mutallab's lack of documents by portraying him as a Sudanese refugee. The ticket agent referred Mutallab and his companion to her manager down the hall, and Haskell didn't see Mutallab again until after he allegedly tried to detonate an explosive on the plane. About an hour after landing, Haskell said he saw another man being taken into custody. But a spokeswoman from the FBI in Detroit said Mutallab was the only person taken into custody.

Now?

clipped from www.redstate.com I feel better now for finally getting that out there.  The 22% of us Eeeeevil civilian Jooooooooooos were instructed by Teh Eeeeevilest of big-player Jooooooooooos around to not say anything before the conference started or preferrably, long after the fairly well-hidden press release went out - the press release Ms. Feldman over at American Thinker ran up her post regarding and that she should have NEVER mentioned.  Tthat’s what Scope found…….. A bunch of us told the folks in Tel Aviv to NOT put out the press release until today.  We got lucky that nobody has said a word anywhere else until right now.  Sometimes it’s nice to be the invisible nation. Just so you understand what’s going on, this ‘bring-’em-all-in’ conference wasn’t planned to take place until Iran got a bit further on with the big toys that go bang program.  But since their own people are starting their uprising with the Ashura holiday, why not get going now, eh ?

That Much Rage

clipped from www.opednews.com You know, I've really been trying not to write an article every other week about all the things I don't like about Barack Obama. But the little prick is making it very hard. Like any good progressive, I've gone from admiration to hope to disappointment to anger when it comes to this president. Now I'm fast getting to rage. How much rage? I find myself thinking that the thing I want most from the 2010 elections is for his party to get absolutely clobbered, even if that means a repeat of 1994. And that what I most want from 2012 is for him to be utterly humiliated, even if that means President Palin at the helm. That much rage. Did this clown really say on national television that "I did not run for office to be helping out a bunch of you know, fat cat bankers on Wall Street"?!?! Really, Barack? So, like, my question is: Then why the hell did you help out a bunch of fat cat bankers on Wall Street?!?!

Did I Forget To Say B prus?

clipped from www.boston.com “I’ll do better,’’ my student told me, leaning forward in his chair. “I know I’ve gotten behind this semester, but I’m going to turn things around. Would it be OK if I finished all my uncompleted work by Monday?’’ I sat silent for a moment. “Yes. But it’s important that you catch up completely this weekend, so that you’re not just perpetually behind.’’ A few weeks later, I would conduct a nearly identical conversation with two other students. And, again, there would be no tangible result: No make-up papers. No change in effort. No improvement in time management. By the time students are in college, habits can be tough to change. If you’re used to playing video games like “Modern Warfare’’ or “Halo’’ all night, how do you fit in four hours of homework? Or rest up for class? My “C,’’ “D,’’ and “F’’ students this semester are almost exclusively American, while my students from India, China, and Latin America have - despite language barriers - generally written solid papers

Punishment

clipped from pajamasmedia.com RAND SIMBERG: Some Thoughts On The Latest Man-Caused Disaster Attempt. “Once again, airline passengers 1, Transportation Security Administration (TSA) 0. And the response of the TSA? To further punish the passengers, of course.”

The Unspeakable One On Jack-ass Propaganda

clipped from www.zerohedge.com A similar situation prevails with what we today call propaganda. The function of propaganda does not lie in the scientific training of the individual, but in calling the masses' attention to certain facts, processes, necessities, etc., whose significance is thus for the first time placed within their field of vision. The whole art consists in doing this so skillfully that everyone will be convinced that the fact is real, the process necessary, the necessity correct, etc. But since propaganda is not and cannot be the necessity in itself, since its function, like the poster, consists in attracting the attention of the crowd, and not in educating those who are already educated or who are striving after education and knowledge, its effect for the most part must be aimed at the emotions and only to a very limited degree at the so-called intellect. All propaganda must be popular and its intellectual level mustbe adjusted to the most limited intelligence among those it is addressed to.

COTD: Stolen Goods

clipped from www.zerohedge.com by Gordon_Gekko on Sun, 12/27/2009 - 16:38 #175540 Here is exactly what I think about government and everything it does or tries to do (via Jesse's Cafe Americain): "The government consists of a gang of men exactly like you and me. They have no special talent for the business of government; they have only a talent for getting and holding office. Their principal device to that end is to search out groups who pant and pine for something they can't get and to promise to give it to them. In other words, government is a broker in pillage, and every election is sort of an advance auction sale of stolen goods." - H. L. Mencken reply

Discarded

clipped from www.thedailybeast.com Today a significant number of the original revolutionaries of 1979 are imprisoned or being harassed by shadowy groups from the borderlands of state authority. The constituency of the Islamic Republic is becoming increasingly alienated as the hard line faction ruling Tehran demands loyalty to an increasingly surreal understanding of, and vision for, Iranian society. Not much is left of the dynamism and visions that fuelled the revolution of 1979—but having learned from that experience the demands of the reformist movement today are much more sophisticated and their abstention from violence so much more promising for the future. Instead of a system where religious thinking controlled and wielded state power he ended up with an arrangement where the state utilized religion for its own purposes, emptying religion and its language of substance, discarding it on the growing heap of unfulfilled promises of the revolution.

Commissar Clinton

clipped from www.powerlineblog.com Earlier this month, I noted that "democracy" is not among "the three Ds" -- "defense, development and diplomacy" -- that Hillary Clinton says, in one of her stock speeches, animate the administration's concept of global leadership. In other words, "democracy" does not even "medal" within its own letter. As the Post's editors explain: Ms. Clinton's lumping of economic and social "rights" with political and personal freedom was a standard doctrine of the Soviet Bloc, which used to argue at every East-West conference that human rights in Czechoslovakia were superior to those in the United States, because one provided government health care that the other lacked. In fact, as U.S. diplomats used to tirelessly respond, rights of liberty -- for free expression and religion, for example -- are unique in that they are both natural and universal Hillary Clinton isn't much a Secretary of State, but she would have made an excellent Commissar.

Back To 9/10

clipped from corner.nationalreview.com Though I share their outrage, I think outraged readers are missing the point. The people now in charge of our government believe Clinton-era counterterrorism was a successful model. They start from the premise that terrorism is a crime problem to be managed, not a war to be won. Here, no thanks to the government, the plane was not destoyed, and we won't get to the bottom of the larger conspiracy (enabling the likes of Napolitano to say there's no indication of a larger plot — much less one launched by an international jihadist enterprise) because the guy got to lawyer up rather than be treated like a combatant and subjected to lengthy interrogation. In their minds, litigation success equals national security success.  It is a dangerously absurd viewpoint, but it was clear during the campaign that it was Obama's viewpoint. The American people — only seven years after 9/11 — elected him anyway. As we learn more painfully everyday, elections matter.

Never Happened

clipped from www.americanthinker.com Legendary lawyer and politician Percy Sutton has died at the age of 89, and the major media are omitting mention of one of his most notable acts. The former Borough President of Manhattan, Sutton had a long and distinguished career as a lawyer (he was Malcolm X's attorney) and media mogul He also purchased and renovated (thereby saving from the wrecking ball) New York's legendary Apollo Theatre in Harlem. To top it off, Sutton was member of the Tuskegee Airmen, one of the most celebrated groups in military aviation circles. A man of great accomplishment, whatever else one might think about his politics, and a man worthy of great respect. However, one of Sutton's most notable moments is absent from the media hagiographies I have seen: he stated on television that he knew that an Islamic supremacist, Dr. Khalid al-Mansour, and advisor to a wealthy Saudi, had paid for Barack Obama's education at Harvard Law School. clipped from www.americanthinker.com clipped from www.americanthinker.com

Biparsin .. Tirely U.true...

clipped from ace.mu.nu Let's keep this civil. Let's keep this on the issues. And the issues are 1, whether Max Baucus is a falling-down drunk, and 2, whether he can balance a ball on his nose while riding a tricycle? Ba-Zing! Cicero-- This is just before he nominated Captain Morgan for the Congressional Medal of Honor.

Eaten Up

clipped from pajamasmedia.com WELCOME TO JAPAN: At Tiny Rates, Saving Money Costs Investors. “What the average citizen doesn’t explicitly understand is that a significant part of the government’s plan to repair the financial system and the economy is to pay savers nothing and allow damaged financial institutions to earn a nice, guaranteed spread.” Plus, good news for seniors! “If your assets aren’t appreciating and aren’t producing any income, you’re getting eaten up in this interest rate environment.”

Strategery Update

clipped from campaignspot.nationalreview.com In fact, he's been golfing. He received a counterterrorism briefing early this morning, Hawaii time, and moments later, left for the gym.  The president's vacation activities might have become the subject of a fierce partisan fight — but really, the only carping is coming from the usual suspects on the right. There is a reason why Obama hasn't given a public statement. It's strategy. So we're now all in agreement, correct? Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11 was a cavalcade of cheap shots, and Bush's speaking from a golf course in no way indicated a casualness or lack of appropriate focus on the threat of terrorism, correct? Because it might have been nice to hear non-conservatives saying this, oh, five years ago or so.

Victories

clipped from ace.mu.nu I suppose one can make that argument — if one assumes that the system includes allowing a man included on a watch list onto an airplane, allowing his visa to remain in force even after his own father informs the US that he’s become a radical jihadi, assuming that any explosive said terrorist will smuggle onto the plane will fizzle out, and that only quick thinking by the other passengers on the plane kept the jihadi from trying it again while he barbecued his crotch. Is that the actual system we put in place after 9/11? Because if it is, a lot of heads need to roll, starting with the woman who believes that this near-miss represents a validation of the system. Most of us would prefer to keep the known radical Islamist terrorists off the plane in the first place. The stimulus? The system worked. Appeasement? The system worked. Diplomacy with Iran? The system worked. Obama's got so many "successes" of this sort I don't know how many more victories this country can withstand.

B+

clipped from ace.mu.nu I thought the wires were running three days late when I saw something about all passengers on a Delta/Northwest flight being taken off a plane that just landed in Detroit. A Delta/Northwest Flight 253. Repeat: Metro Airport spokesman John Witner said there was a report of suspicious activity on the Delta/Northwest flight 253 from Amsterdam Sunday. That is the same flight number as the flight that a Nigerian man was suspected of attempting to blow up over Detroit on Christmas Day. All 257 passengers and 12 crew have deplaned safely, said Delta spokeswoman Susan Elliott. The flight landed safely in Detroit at 12:34 p.m. Sunday. Apparently, this fellow, also from Nigeria, locked himself in a lav and wouldn't come out. Hey, Janet, is the system still working?

Kevin's Back

clipped from www.nytimes.com Ladies and Gentlemen, President Obama continues life in the H.O.V. lane, fawned over by the press and the crowned heads of Europe. In between apologies, the president should have reminded those pompous blowhards that without our interference, they would all be speaking German. Here are some reflections for 2009: To President Obama: Thank you for saving the Republican Party and for teaching all of us that too much of anything is a bad thing. To Bill Clinton: You did too much work on Northern Ireland for the Nobel committee. Next time, do nothing. To Harry and Nancy: “The Twilight Zone” once had an episode where the town got the exact opposite of what it wanted. Farewell, Harry! To John McCain: Thank you for your chivalry in banning Palin attack dogs — including my sister — from the campaign plane. To Al Gore: A global warming conference in the middle of a Copenhagen blizzard is not a good visual.

Denial

clipped from www.huffingtonpost.com I was on my third in-flight movie when the screaming started, shattering my tired half-awake travel state. I had gone from watching Up to Inglorious Basterds and had decided to try rounding things off with Land of the Lost. That was when my fellow passenger Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab decided to ignite his explosives 19 rows ahead of me. Most people seemed to be in denial of what I saw was evident. This guy wanted to kill all of us, he had wanted to blow up the plane. When I said this, they would just shake their heads; even those that had seen it happen didn't want to believe it.

RTWT. Very well written.

Shambles

clipped from pajamasmedia.com King’s talking points, including his suggestion of an investigation, are too similar to Hoekstra’s to be coincidental. The obvious working theory to cover this narrative is that there’s a worry among some Republicans that something big is in the works and the President is either sitting on it because he doesn’t want to tip his hand to the enemy, panic the public or — if you’re a conspiracy theorist — let on that the intelligence apparatus is in a shambles. It may in fact be a combination of all three. One possibility is that busy bees have been building information firewalls again. If that has happened, the databases and their schemas may have diverged and it will take time to sync them back again, provided someone wants to. Hoekstra’s warning that al-Qaeda may be seeking access “to other environments where they can do significant damage” was foreshadowed in this Online Times report: Scotland Yard has warned businesses in London to expect a Mumbai-style attack on the capital.

And Helped Obama ...

clipped from newsbusters.org How does someone qualify for description as an "eminent politician" by the New York Times?  Being very, very liberal seems to help. Today on its Web site, the newspaper reports "Percy Sutton, Eminent Politician, Dies at 89."  Mr. Sutton maintained a long list of liberal bona fides.  In a book last year he was quoted: "I like the fact that my family was a family of protesters. I like the fact that some of them were Communists." He also spoke of his satisfaction of "being in jail with Stokely Carmichael and other revolutionaries." The New York Times covers some of lawyer Sutton's more notorious associations: He represented Malcolm X and later his daughter when she was accused of hiring a man to kill Louis Farrakhan.  Sutton helped pay some of the slander damages owed by Al Sharpton in the Tawana Brawley case.  When Mike Tyson left prison and came back to Harlem, Sutton was there to welcome him.

... get into Harvard.

"Working"

clipped from pajamasmedia.com OUTCRY: “Napolitano should quit.” “I watched her on three shows and each time she was more annoying, maddening and absurd than the pevious appearance. It is her basic position that the ’system worked’ because the bureaucrats responded properly after the attack. That the attack was ‘foiled’ by a bad detonator and some civilian passengers is proof, she claims, that her agency is doing everything right. That is just about the dumbest thing she could say, on the merits and politically. I would wager that not one percent of Americans think the system is ‘working’ when terrorists successfully get bombs onto planes (and succeed in activating them).”

The Rub

clipped from www.zerohedge.com And herein lies the rub: The financial crisis delivered a clear verdict, in our view, on the limits to the Asian growth model. It no longer makes sense to pursue double-digit growth by lending cheaply to the US consumer. Yet change would require less reserve accumulation or – put another way – allowing the currency to appreciate against the US dollar, to which it is now effectively pegged. China needs to manage this “exit” carefully. Moving too fast risks a dollar crisis It is merely this moment that Bernanke and the administration are doing all they can to prolong as much as possible. Alas it may be too late, as China seems to have finally realized that in the global prisoner's dilemma game, it has taken the constant US defections for far too long enough. And with the benefits of perpetuating the charade at this point outweighed by the detriments, 2010 could just be the year when China decides it has had enough.

Liberty Today In Iran

clipped from www.dailyniteowl.com Anti-riot guard caught between people: Angry protesters, overturned security forces vehicle: Setting fire to security forces’ vehicle; loud chants of Allahu Akbar: 12:01 GMT Eye-witness accounts from Tehran tell a bizzare tale of special forces disobeying their superiors. According to these reports, in several parts of Tehran, even though the commanding officers were telling their soldiers to fire upon crowds, they did not. Commanders were heard shouting, “You will be court-marshaled!”, but the soldiers did not budge. Large swaths of central Tehran are completely devoid of security forces and protesters are chanting loudly. It has also now been confirmed that some Basiji bikes were set on fire by protesters. For the first time, across Tehran, protesters actively fought back against security forces. They put a vehicle belonging to the security forces on fire as well. Other videos showed Basijis being beaten by people.

When the people fear their government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty.
Thomas Jefferson