Confessions of a Convention-Watcher, Democrats Day 3

I was looking forward to Edwards speech. It was pretty obvious from earlier speeches that everyone else was as well. I'm not sure what I was expecting though: a new idea maybe? an alernative to the villification and bitterness?

First, Edwards was out of his element. He was behind a podium for one--and he was not running on his own ticket. He is clearly not comfortable in his new role. Nor do I think, is the party (re: Dowd in the NYT). Not to mention--speaking from the speech that was obviously mostly written by the same person/persons who orchestrated the speechs of Carter, Clinton, Clinton, Obama, and virtually everyone else on the DNC stage--this speech was the most negative yet. Hence, the discomfort on Edwards part.

What's with the "One America" mantra? I'm all for national unity and national identity. But I'm sorry the distinctions mentioned by the Democrats do exist and do define us. Notice I didn't say "divide us." I said: DEFINE us. How can we possibly discuss policy resolutions sanely or even creatly, God-forbid, if we do not acknowledge the differences and then work on solutions to create opportunity (not uniformity) for all. Hmmm, uniformity, haven't some people tried that before? I'll save my anti-Communist spiel for another day.

Equality of opportunity doesn't mean equality of resources or of income or of education even. Equality of opportunity means we all have the same shot--and we all have the same chance to royally screw it up. Some people (Democrats, who more often than not, are part of the famed "2%" bracket) would like us (the electorate) to believe that they (e.g., President Clinton) would give us their (his) tax cut in order that the middle class (whatever the hell that is these days) would not have to carry the burden. I for one was happy to get my first refund check. I'm sure the Clintons and Heinz-Kerrys and Edwardses were also pretty happy when they finished their taxes the last three years. They admit wanting to KEEP 98% of President Bush's tax cuts (cuts which Alan Greenspan has said have helped the recovery, re: AP story). Yet they want us to believe that rescinding 2% of the cuts (to the top 2% income bracket) would somehow mysteriously generate enough of a savings for the government to tackle all of the problems we face (which are in the hundreds of billions of dollars). . .

Real equality of opportunity? Real equality? Answer: Everybody is taxed the same amount (read: %)--period. That is equity and nothing else--no 98:2 formula, or any other cockamamie configuration.

I find it interesting for Edwards or Kerry either one to criticize U.S. intelligence and the pace (or lack of) regarding Intel reform when they BOTH sat, at one time or another, on the one body in the Senate that actually has oversight of that function. If anyone is complicit in the snail's pace of change, isn't it the Distinquished Gentleman from North Carolina and his Massachusetts brother? Especially complicit when you look at their voting records, as in the number of votes they actually attended?

And, finally, because I'm faint with fighting. . . and I paraphase: "let's finish the job to secure the loose nukes in Russia, that's how we'll keep America safe." Sure, that'd be great. But, as usual, I ask, "HOW?" Edwards makes claims that he and Kerry would keep AQ on the run. Yet their only solution offered to date (that I have heard) is to propound restoring alliances and other "consensus-building". Refer to my Day 2 notes: consensus building is great if you can build a consensus. But if some of your supposed-allies are lining their pockets in the UN Secretary-General's office with billions of dollars of Iraqi payoffs while common Iraqis starved for years on end, then it's probably going to be hard to build a consensus to take down a mad-man who gassed his own people (in the Anfal campaign).

Enough uncreativity-watching for one night.

Wanna know what China's like?

Pictures are worth a thousand words. . . In this case you'll have to go to, this story to and see both the story and the pic. . .

-An American Lover of the Middle Kingdom

PS-I'm serious. Take this image and imagine it on a daily basis: a sea of people. No wonder I was so freaked out upon returning to my 10x4 foot, single room at an all-male college rural Virginia. What was I thinking???

New Democrats Online: The Democratic Leadership Council's Online Community

Our counterparts on the left or just a DNC cover in new clothes?

New Democrats Online: The Democratic Leadership Council's Online Community

Iraq's economy remains troubled

No Sh*t!!!

We didn't invade Orlando! Listen to these "turn-over-and-die" whiners in Iraq.

"Walid K. Issa Taha was full of hope for Iraq's economic prospects. These days, that hope has vanished."

KR Washington Bureau | 07/28/2004 | Iraq's economy remains troubled

Confessions of a Convention Watcher-Day 2

OK, I'm a bit behind, but thanks to the glories of DVR (digital video recorders) I'm slowly getting back on track and . . . bored as ever.

Tuesday was Barack Obama's much-anticipated keynote speech to the DNC. I have a few reactions:

Speaking of life in the U.S.: "Votes will be counted most of the time." Voting inaccuracy accusations and bloodlust are getting really old. Someone should send that memo around the DNC. The Democratic lieutenants are seeming desperate. The speeches are cold, pedantic and lacking in creativity, if not occasionally (deceptively) rousing in rhetorical tone.

Speaking on (the longshot of) a Kerry White House: "faith will not be used as a wedge to divide us". I'm not sure what he meant. I wish he would have been more clear and pointed his finger more precisely with this quip.

"War should never be the first option" (paraphased). Uh, does the 18th option count as "not the first option"? Refer to UN Security Council Resolutions (in reverse chronological order) 1441, 1284, 1205, 1194, 1154, 1137, 1134, 1115, 1060, 1051, 979, 715, 707, 688, 687, 686, and 678. Is that sufficient rational patience?

"President Kerry will not hesitate to use military force to keep America safe." OK, so how does this make Kerry uniquely positioned to be the next President?

"If there's an Arab-American family being rounded up without benefit of a attorney or due process, that threatens my civil liberties." St. Senator Obama, please cite the evidence of any Arab-American family being rounded up as a family.

"I am my brother's keeper." OK, so how does that differ from Republican-based foreign policy the last, say, 84 years?

"There's not a liberal America or a conservative America but a United States of America." Are we supposed to want to be robots, all cut from the same political page? I thought our Founders' America was a place where political discourse--liberal/conservative, Federalist/Anti-Federalist--flourished.

Is Sen. Obama a good public speaker? Sure. Does it end there? Sure.

Where are the original ideas that are supposed to define the party and, chiefly, Kerry so that election day is a success for the Democratic Party? I don't see them, which is why I am confident that the President has nothing to worry about . . . except another 9/11.

Worth a Visit

The Political Edge - Blog

Animal extremists face crackdown

Hmmm...I don't know if I dislike these guys more than post-modernist Leftists, but it is close. If I had the energy this morning, I would have written about the arguments supporting the animal loving extremists' viewpoint, and then would have broken them down until their suppositions are shown to be false, but I need more coffee.

If the net result of their (the animal lovers') attacks is more humans dying from preventable diseases, then the suppositions are no better than the Christian Right's opposition to stem cell research on moral grounds.

I am a humanist, after all.

Animal extremists face crackdown

US Arabs 'fear for their family'

But the rest of America sleeps very well at night, thank you.

This assertion, that US Arabs feel more scared than before the 9/11 attacks, should have been balanced with the fact that the other 280M Americans are too.

I'm trying not to be silly, but the reporter sounds deadly serious, while being blind to the reality that it wasn't 19 surfers from Santa Barbara who killed 3000 people in the name of "fun, sun and waves, dude!"

I do not advocate wholesale elimination of civil rights for muslims and Arabs in the US. Just as with police searches in high risk neighborhoods that get the Left all hot and bothered, restricting your searches to the most likely suspects is common sense, the application of scientific method to an othewise uncontrollable problem.

BBC NEWS | Americas | US Arabs 'fear for their family'

Beijing warns of war with Taiwan

What's the proper response here?

For those who oppose war, all war, only war, war, war, war? If Kerry is elected, he may well have something on his hands the size of a brontosaurus. A Chinese war contra Taiwan would threaten the peace of the Asian Pacific region, the economic relationships between our nations, China's modernization, etc. But, unopposed, would the Chinese juggernaut continue to consume the countries on its borders -- not necessarily a given.

If Bush wins and war begins, will we be forced to listen to "No Blood for Semiconductors?"

BBC NEWS | Asia-Pacific | Beijing warns of war with Taiwan

Kerry Vows to Command 'a Nation at War'

First, an admission: I did not watch a single minute of the DNC convention, not a single quip from his holiness Al Sharpton or from the wise President Carter. Nope, not a moment.

To balance out this heinous shortcoming of mine, I don't plan to watch even a single minute of the RNC convention, either. It would bore me, or put me in a bad mood as soon as someone walks on the stage to speak about social issues (typically poorly). Nope, to quote a famous man, "not gonna do it."

Instead, I want to make a broader point about the message that Kerry is putting forth to differentiate himself from Bush: credibility.

"I defended this country as a young man and I will defend it as president," Mr. Kerry said. "Let there be no mistake: I will never hesitate to use force when it is required. Any attack will be met with a swift and a certain response."

This is good speechifying (itself a good expression of Southern english), but hardly anything that let me know what's different about Kerry. He indicated at some point in the speech that this stance is what separates him from Bush, his willingness to go to war for the right reasons, without ulterior motives or half truths...

To this argument, I can only laugh.

Kerry voted for the war in Iraq, admitted later that it was the right thing to do at the time (does that mean that he wouldn't do it again?). He has no plans to withdraw American forces from Iraq, only to "internationalize" them, which I think is liberal code for make them eat more fortune cookies while wearing lederhosen.

With our newly internationalized troops in Iraq, somehow the Sunni fighters in Falluja will forget that they have lost power to their age old rivals -- everyone else in Iraq -- and the Kurds will run away with the spoon.

I see, empirically, that the anti-war protesters hate, despise and loath Bush, seemingly anything Republican (never really defined outside of having an insatiable appetite for alchemically transmuting blood into oil), and war itself.

Leaving aside many obvious rebuttals to each of the above points, can someone please explain to me (or make a construction paper explanation) of the bad faith that Bush had, his half-truths that he personally knew about, and the ulterior motives that he believed would never come to light when he invaded Iraq?

The Occam's Razor test here is passed most easily by believing (the key word) that Bush simply took less BS than anyone before him, especially given 9/11. The obstruse argument that backroom oildeals led him to lie to Amreican people (however cleverly and eloquently alluded to in Kerry's speech) are much more difficult to believe than that Bush thought that Saddam had defied the UN for too long.

If the logic (supplied by ANSWER?) that Bush went to war for oil is valid, can we suppose that Kerry will go to war to secure vast plantations of tomatoes? Or that Edwards will make the world safe for trial lawyers?

I'm still laughing...

PS -- Wasn't war the "problem, not the solution?"

Kerry Vows to Command 'a Nation at War'

Blasts Said to Hit U.S. and Israeli Embassies in Uzbekistan

Tashkent is not exactly the most fortified place on the planet. Hopefully the embassies make up for it (which they do, presumably).

Seems almost silly, this little attempt at....well, at what exactly? One suicide bomber wouldn't even dent the perimeter wall of most US Embassies overseas.

Did they want to let us know that they were mad? Or that they were gonna get us?

Like this?

The New York Times > International > Blasts Said to Hit U.S. and Israeli Embassies in Uzbekistan

Counter-Terrorism Mantra

"Terrorist attacks are not caused by the use of strength. They are invited by the perception of weakness." -Vice-President Dick Cheney, at Camp Pendleton, CA, Tuesday 7/27/2004

I.R.S. Says Americans' Income Shrank for 2 Consecutive Years

A most damning admission from the mother of all newspapers...

Falling incomes, rather than tax cuts, appear to count for the greatest share of the decline in income taxes paid. That is because the higher one stood on the income ladder the greater the impact was likely to be from the stock market crunch.

The implication, then, that the Bush tax cuts were disproportionately targeted at the rich seems to be made much less potent by the fact that the rich lost most of the money in the previous years.

The budget deficit too would have to be seen as a function in part of the lower total government revenue from income taxes paid on a smaller total income tax amount, i.e. the economic pie shrunk.

The New York Times > Business > I.R.S. Says Americans' Income Shrank for 2 Consecutive Years

Political Correctness Kills

I'm still laughing...

Political Correctness Kills

Bin Laden Brother Disputes Moore Film

First, high-ranking members of the U.S. Government have said Moore's film is full of false speculations and poor "facts," but now BIN LADEN's BROTHER says it is full of deceit. Man, hit from both sides! Now that has to hurt.

My Way News

Pakistan: President Calls For Provision Of Quick, Inexpensive Justice To All

President Pervez Musharraf is tackling one of the great obstacles to economic prosperity in the Third World: corrupt and/or inefficient legal systems. A Pakistani friend of mine once said that a credit card receipt in the United States carries more legal weight than a deed to property in Pakistan. This gets to the heart of Hernando de Soto's theory in his book "The Mystery of Capital." The systems exist, they are just not legitimized via a working judiciary.

President Calls For Provision Of Quick, Inexpensive Justice To All

Cheney to Democrats: Weakness Invites Terror

"President Bush is determined to remove threats before they arrive instead of simply awaiting for another attack on our country. So America acted to end the regime of Saddam Hussein," Cheney said.

Barring the Neocon philosophy of Wilsonian democracy building, I see the merit in a policy that identifies potential threats, exhausts all diplomatic means to remove the threat (repeated appeals to the U.N.), and finally acts to remove the threat. In the past, I would not have been as fired up about attacking a nation based on a potential threat, but after September 11th, the stakes have become too high to simply hope that nothing happens. In a world where the next terror attack could be the destruction of huge U.S. population center, what choice do we have but to vigorously pursue our own security. If the Democrats are planning to use the European's ostrich-method of threat analysis, we could be in considerably more danger under a Kerry Administration.

My Way - News

Rock the Vote, others are going after 'missing': Groups seek out the under-30 crowd

Green's "nonpartisan" group is hoping to bring a million young voters to the polls.

Excerpts from the article:
"[One 18 year old Democratic activist] said he senses a shift toward greater voter involvement among his peer group and credits the efforts of hip institutions such as MTV and WWE SmackDown for raising awareness. He also cites the war in Iraq, which has triggered at least some discussion of reinstituting a military draft.

"54 percent of young voters live at home with their parents because they have been unable to find a job that pays enough to start out on their own."

"Young people will be the deciding factor in this election," said Green, 32 "We will make history."

__________________________


MTV is partly responsible for those 54 percent of young voters at home. This "missing" generation learns about reality from "the Real World" and their fashion from the corporate advertisers they would claim to loathe. They watch MTV's "Cribs" and feel they are entitled to one of these small kingdoms rather than taking the 22K/year job to get started on the road to financial stability. They go into heavy debt so they can imitate their pop-idols through clothing and a lifestyle of glamorous nightlife. Generally speaking of course, these kids of the MTV generation have been handily guided in the directions dictated by the advertising trend-setters. Knowing that Bush is a "freakin' moron" and that Kerry is "better than someone who lies" is all the politics these kids need. Their code stresses materialism, shallowness, and petty social drama over intellectualism, compassion, and a deeper understanding of human nature. Rather than hailing groups like "Rock the Vote" for seeking to give them a voice on the political stage, they should resent "Rock the Vote" for their reliance on this generation's ignorance and lackluster attitude towards politics. Rock the Vote, as is clear from their website, has no real intention to help the MTV generation develop a political compass, but rather to bombard them with their point of view to the beat and backdrop of soda-commercials, hip musical themes, flashy graphic-enhanced two-second soundbites, and that uninterested aloof attitude that has been popular since the days of James Dean.


Ventura County Star: County News

Young voters could make the difference=The Hill.com=

This article has led me to some interesting new findings. First of all, the Democrats are mobilizing a hardcore under-30 get-out-the-vote campaign. My guess is that they will have much success considering the venues they are planning to target.

At a recent gathering of the College Democrats and the Young Democrats, several notables spoke to a crowd of "college-age Kerry supporters." Among the speakers was Jehmu Green, the Executive Director of the Rock the Vote campaign. According to RtV's website, the group is non-partisan:

Rock the Vote is a non-profit, non-partisan organization, founded in 1990 in response to a wave of attacks on freedom of speech and artistic expression.

As soon as you sign on to their homepage you will see a picture of John Kerry and there is a place on the site to sign up for the RtV at the Democratic National Convention. But don't worry, they want you to weigh the pros and cons of both candidates before you perform your civic duty (note sarcasm).
Here is some valuable advice from their "Voting is Easy" section:

6. DON’T BE INTIMIDATED
You don’t have to be a genius or even politically oriented to be qualified to vote. Really, you just need to have an opinion.

This is a Democratic political action committee. This is not a group concerned with young people being involved with the political process. This is a group concerned with young people being involved with the political process as long as they are liberal and not Republican. Check out the site: www.rockthevote.com

The New Republicans will continue to investigate...

Young voters could make the difference=The Hill.com=

We have to defend ourselves against

a motley assortment of war protesters, waving everything from Puerto Rican flags to images of former Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide. One group of feminists, the Axis of Eve, donned "protest panties." Another cluster called for a communist revolution.

Really. This is the Left that I know and love. Such happy, sweet people.


Protesters leave a modest footprint, so far

The Fabled Middle

The fight for the middle is always a political goal -- even if the parties' platforms are taken straight from Marx and Moses.

Problematically, though, the Dems are putting forth nonsensical statements, the most important of which is about the economy.

They claim that the middle class (to which nearly all people except Bill Gates claim descent or inclusion in) was better off under Clinton, jobs didn't migrate, etc, etc, etc.

Their arguments are flawed on economic logic on several fronts. For brevity, I will keep the argument short [though if anyone is so inclined, we can continue in the comments section].

Empirically, the US was awash with easy cash during Clinton's time. We should have been, as we had an asset price bubble that articificially inflated GDP numbers (and hence, most parts of the economy). To an extent, you can claim that Clinton had something to do with it, in that he didn't do much to interfere with it. Yet, it is false advertising to claim credit for more than getting out of the way of something as complicated as an economic expansion.

The confluence of market factors (interest rates, technological shifts, favorable international conditions for investment, the Japanese and Chines centra' banks' need for T-Bills) and the individual actions of every worker in this country is not something that Clinton (or any President) can claim.

I'll discuss the deficit and tax numbers later. Suffice it to say that Georgie II hasn't pleased most people with his budget decisions (war aside), and I don't believe that the Left will exercise more restraint than he has.

What, then, can the fabled middle do? Believe that the Dems have lost their congenital urge to please by spending, or believe that Bush will suddenly take on the AARP and repeal the worst legislation of the past 25 years (Medicare increases worth $400B) and is serious about curbing spending?

On this answer rides the future of the economy.

Confessions of a Convention-Watcher, Democrats Day 1 ½

OK, this is no confession, rather a couple of simple questions:

Is it just me or does everyone get a wee bit more excited when they talk about John Edwards versus when they speak of John Kerry?

With that answer locked away safely on the other side of your computer screen, I ask another question:
 How does that bode for the Democrats in November?

Confessions of a Convention-Watcher, Democrats Day 1

First thought: “What a bore!”

Second thought (upon hearing Clinton): Damn, he’s good!

(Mind you there were a few more thoughts in between these two. . .)

Despite the whirling passion of his rhetoric, I find it unsettling to be quoted Scripture from a most unlikely source, saying to us all: “Be not afraid!” I find it unsettling not because of the source but because of the message.

Being afraid does not mean living in fear. Fears can be confronted. Fears are defeated best when faced head on.

As much as I would like not to be, I am afraid. Am I afraid of my own death? No. Am I afraid of sacrificing my life to save another? No. But I am afraid. I am afraid every day of riding the subway to work. I am afraid at night when we sleep. I am afraid of walking through Times Square or by the Empire State Building and the dozens of other targets—soft and hard—that I walk by on any given New York day. I am afraid for myself at times but even more afraid for my neighbors, friends, and family. I am afraid for New York just as I am afraid for Nashville. And I am afraid that my government is not. Just as it has not sufficiently been afraid for 15 years.

I will not make any claims on perfection. I am as imperfect as any man or woman who walks this earth. However, I choose to be hopeful and pragmatic. The same man who said “Be not afraid!” also said “Be as shrewd as snakes and as innocent as doves.” We should choose both, without forsaking the other: our innocence should never belie our cunning resolve to remain free and at peace.

In the words of the ancient King, “There is a time for everything. . .” In the view of this confessor, this time is not one for looking back in bitterness nor for looking forward with willing malaise.

There is a time for vigilance and shrewdness. That time is now. Lest confessions, prognostications, and politicking be possible no more.

Kerrys wife doesn't practice what she preaches - but most crazy rich liberals don't

http://www.thepittsburghchannel.com/index.html

Watch the video and bear in mind she just gave a speech on the lack of civility in politics.

If nothing else, Kerry being in the WH means she would be first lady. Scary!

 

Political Parties

The New Republicans content that something like this is happening to our GOP. Did anyone see the protestors at the DNC convention shouting "Jesus! Jesus!" and being hauled away in handcuffs? It was the worst caricature of the right made manifest.

From the very beginning, whenever one party has gotten strong enough to start passing horrible laws such as the Alien and Sedition Acts, it has crumbled soon thereafter. Empowered, the parties overreach. Or members let some element of the party push its dogmas to the extreme, thus driving away moderate supporters. Or they calcify and then find themselves unable to deal with emerging problems. Something happens, and the pendulum swings. This happened to the Federalists. Years later, outrage at the tyrannical airs of the populist strongman Andrew Jackson split Jefferson's party into two camps -- the Jackson Democrats vs. the Whigs of Henry Clay -- and left it unable to cope with the issue of slavery. Then the Republicans had a heyday after winning the Civil War, but they, too, soon got to infighting. More recently, the Democrats deflated like a leaking dirigible after Franklin D. Roosevelt.

In other words, there is something about our parties, some power-sensitive self-destruct button lodged deep in the machinery, that keeps them from getting too big. On the surface, that might not seem like much. It is so much a part of American history that we take it for granted. But think about it -- what did the 20th century teach us about parties that grow too strong? The fact that our parties, at their most powerful, just . . . fall apart . . . would have seemed like a priceless blessing to the Jews of Nazi Germany or to the gulag prisoners of the Soviet Union.

washingtonpost.com: Origin of the Species

BATTLE OVER PRO-BUSH SIGN AT BOSTON PIZZERIA

Now this guy has got some big... uh... guts. Anyone in the P.R. of Massachusetts, who gives even a nod in Bush's direction, is in risk of being lynched. I have to hand it to him, he's taking a gamble. If I was back in Boston now, I would make it a point to eat pizza at least once a week. I'm half-considering making a 400 mile pizza-run...

MATT DRUDGE // DRUDGE REPORT 2004�

Latest Stats Back New Republicans

Reading a new poll put out jointly by the Economist and YouGov, one of the largest online polling consultancies in the world, I found some interesting data.

One of the premises of the New Republicans is that the GOP is loosing -- quickly -- the young voters. Since party identifications tend to change glacially, this is big news.

These polling data clearly show the strongest, most vehement hatred of Bush is coming from women voters, 18-25. In just about every catergory, even of Bush supporters, the group most likely to find Bush too conservative is the young voter.

While the New Republicans are not advocating a party-wide shift in favour of whatever the youngest (and presumably most ignorant) members of the party want, we are advocating a less rigid policy on social issues (designed, in our opinion to capture and keep the Christian Right voters happy).

It is my personal opinion that the Christian Right has no choice but to vote for the Right because the Democrats will always be to their left and the Christian Righties don't have enough votes to carry the nation.

If the youth are being lost to safeguard the votes of people already bound to you, then what is the party's future?

The road to success is simple: drop opposition to popular causes like stem cell research and most types of abortion. Be strong in dealing with terrorists without eliminating the concept of civil liberties. Reduce the size of government. Tax less. Govern better. Pay attention to infrastructure (a typical democratic idea, but who is happy with our streets?). And finally, stand up to Israel when needed. We don't have to agree with everything they say (especially when they take our development aid monies, but refuse to stop building new settlements).

These changes take away vast amounts of animus against the party. While they are not enough to satisfy everyone, they move us closer to the principled center and away from a mythical utopia of moral citizens and foreign friends.

Economist.com

Abu Hamza faces extradition hearing

It seems unfair that the solicitor representing Hamza would argue that he (Hamza) would not get a fair trial in the US. That argument feeds directly into the crazy Left's The-US-Is-A-Nazi-Country mentality.

As far as I know that limits placed upon defenders of alleged terrorists are not such as to fundamentally shift our (Western) notion of justice.

Though definitions differ, Plato's description of justice as (roughly) to each his due, might require punishments that would make us gag with horror. Unlike many of the lower level guys caught in Afghanistan, Hamza has been openly, militantly preaching against the US from his Finsbury Park mosque.

He can say what he wants -- the UK's freedom of speech allows that -- but he can't then deny that he said such things.

The story is still unfolding, but it seems difficult to deny that he was at the center of a jihadist group operating freely in central London.

Oh, someone else might confirm this, but didn't Reid attend his mosque?

BBC NEWS | UK | England | London | Hamza faces extradition hearing

Clinton W. Taylor on Nour Mehana & "Terror in the Skies"

I feel better now. The last word is reasonable and factual.

Clinton W. Taylor on Nour Mehana & "Terror in the Skies"

9/11 Panel Calls for a National Intelligence Chief

The New Republicans are a broadly libertarian righty block. Why do we sound like old-fashioned, string 'em up cowboys over something that harmed no one?

According to the 9/11 Commission Report:

"'The most important failure was one of imagination,' the report says, according to news services. 'We do not believe leaders understood the gravity of the threat.'"

This sentiment is what we believe to be missing (incredibly in a post 9/11 world) from other, sometimes decent, people: the ability to imagine the worst.


9/11 Panel Calls for a National Intelligence Chief:

Terror in the Skies, Again?

If this article is real, then both parties have some explaining to do. 14 Syrians looking at each other, going to the bathroom in groups and seated in a random pattern throughout the aircraft when they were travelling as a group?

Also, what could a sky marshall have done against 14 men who went to the bathroom in turn, assembling one piece of a bomb at a time? Once the damn thing is assembled, pick a god and believe.

Terror in the Skies, Again?

Tour director says fans spat at Armstrong

Reuters | Latest Financial News / Full News Coverage

Europeans. You can't live with them, ... what? That's it.

How many european athletes do Americans spit on? Would those same degenerates spit on Bin Laden? I wonder? If I was Lance, that would have made me double my efforts. Go U.S.A.!

9-11 panel fuels turf war

9-11 panel fuels turf war=The Hill.com=

This is a story near and dear to my heart. In a nutshell, various Committee chairman oppose the creation of a permanent House Committee on Homeland Security. The way I see it, the Department of Homeland Security is a huge agency and it should have a centralized legislative oversight body. Defense has one, State has one, Interior has one, etc. It's true that many of these other committee's have expertise in areas covered by the current Homeland Security Committee. The idea, however, is provide an efficient link between the new department and Congress. Having the Department report to five different committee's seems like a disaster waiting to happen. Heck, it's hard enough to get anything done when departments report to a single legislative entity.

Saudis Find Head of American Who Was Held by Militants

Why would they keep it in the freezer? Why keep it at all? Future media event?

Seriously?

Saudis Find Head of American Who Was Held by Militants

Nuclear Arms Reportedly Found in Iraq

Interest!ALERT: Quality Content

The key word here is "reportedly". Could this be the good news Bush has been waiting for. It's not good news for the rest of us. If three were found in a desert bunker, you can be sure there are more. Right now, I'd give this article a 15-20% accuracy rating. I will watch as events unfold.

Saudis Fight Militants

I might be in the minority here in rooting for the regime, but they are better able to handle the militants than anyone else. I say that because the moral authority necessary to control the font of Islam more or less requires that no liberal democracy is established there. With the coming of western style democracy, the full wrath of pseudo protectors of the holy places would come from all sides, guns ablaze.

Hit me.

Story Here

The Real Ronstadt

Why is it acceptable for a celebrity to pitch her political beliefs to you, but not for the janitor at Burger King?

This issue is not about freedom of speech -- her right to such is undeniable -- but class. It is rude and unprofessional to pitch politics while someone is paying you to work.

Would Ronstadt like it if her staff told her "I hate Michael Moore" every time they did something for her?

She would probably fire them. Just as she was fired from the casino.

Read her opinion of those who disagree with her below.

The real deal | The San Diego Union-Tribune:

"'This is an election year, and I think we're in desperate trouble and it's time for people to speak up and not pipe down. It's a real conflict for me when I go to a concert and find out somebody in the audience is a Republican or fundamental Christian. It can cloud my enjoyment. I'd rather not know."

I Have A Dream

That the right shall not be defined by religion alone;
That common sense has a place in politics;
That reason is more important than emotion;
That liberty and its protection are the most important values of government;
That we, long-suffering classical liberals are greater in number and power than the religious right;

That we should take back our party.

The King is Dead. Long Live the King!