Don Miguel de la Piedra

What We Are Really Fighting For

2006-09-25T14:02:00.000-07:00

Don Ricardo tending to his garden in Afghanistan.

Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure

2006-09-02T17:42:00.000-07:00

Don Ricardo hanging out with his new friends "Bill" and "Ted."

Muncha$$hole Syndrome

2006-03-21T12:13:00.000-07:00

I have discovered a new illness that is very similar to the "disease" known as Munchausen syndrome. First, here is some information on Munchausen syndrome:

In Munchausen Syndrome, the sufferer feigns, exaggerates, or creates symptoms of illnesses in himself or herself in order to gain attention, sympathy, and comfort from medical personnel. The role of "patient" is a familiar and comforting one, and it fills a psychological need in people with Munchausen's.

Sufferers mimic real diseases, presenting a great problem to themselves and their healthcare professionals. The disorder is named after a literary figure, Baron Munchausen, a real person who was portrayed in fiction as a famous teller of tall tales.

The infirmity that I have discovered is very similar but is related to delusions of intellectual prowess and can mostly be found in celebrities who normally congregate in the Hollywood area. I have named the illness Muncha$$hole Syndrome. The following is a brief description of it:

In Muncha$$hole Syndrome, the sufferer feigns, exaggerates, or creates delusions of knowledge in himself or herself in order to gain attention, sympathy, and comfort from admiring supporters. The role of "intellectual" is a familiar and comforting one, and it fills a psychological need in people with Muncha$$hole's.

Sufferers mimic real expertise, presenting a great problem to themselves and their adoring fans. The disorder is named after a television drama figure, Detective John Munch, a fictional person who is portrayed in real life by actor Richard Belzer, an infamous teller of conspiracy theories.

Unlike most actors, in which a role played is of a person totally different from the actor in real life, Richard Belzer is actually playing himself as Det. John Munch with the single exception that the character Munch has a fictional police badge. Not only is he a cynical conspiracy theorist as a fictional character in television, he is also one in real life as noted by his book UFO's, JFK, and Elvis: Conspiracies You Don't Have To Be Crazy To Believe.

But the real indication of his condition as a sufferer of Muncha$$hole Syndrome was demonstrated in a recent appearance on HBO's Real Time with Bill Maher. He implied that since he reads “twenty newspapers a day” he is more knowledgeable of the situation in Iraq than the actual soldiers on the ground in Iraq who are “19 and 20-year-old kids who couldn't get a job.” You can view the actual segment or read the transcript here.

So just because Belzer, a junior college dropout who became a successful stand-up comic and actor, reads a lot of newspapers he is a fountain of knowledge of current events and the intricacies of the Iraq war? And he knows more than the people who are actually there?

Diagnosis: Muncha$$hole Syndrome.

Update: Many thanks to Mrs. Greyhawk for the link from her excellent Dawn Patrol over at the great Mudville Gazette military blog.

I also completely forgot to mention that Richard Belzer's statement about reading “twenty newspapers a day” is a great example of how art becomes reality. In the movie Team America: World Police, the Janeane Garofolo character says: "As actors, it is our responsibility to read the newspapers, and then say what we read on television like it's our own opinion." How true!

Update 2: I'm honored to say that the incomparable Emperor Darth Misha I at The Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler has linked to this post. If you like exciting and in-your-face reading please pay him a visit!

Update 3: One of my favorite bloggers Lou Minatti has linked to this post. Check him out for some interesting reading!

How Fitting!

2006-03-07T13:59:00.000-07:00

Notice the "Fascism Is On The March" sign being carried by one of the marchers? How right she is! Hop on over to the Indepundit and see what Smash has to say about his experience with Casey Sheehan's mom.

Jill Edwards, Student Dunce

2006-02-17T20:02:00.000-07:00

Jill Edwards is a student at The University of Washington. Jill Edwards is also a student senator at The University of Washington. Now, after reading the minutes of the February 7th general Senate meeting, Jill Edwards demonstrates that she is also a dunce (that's ignoramus for you dunces).

When discussing a resolution to call for a tribute for Col. Gregory “Pappy” Boyington, USMC, the minutes of the meeting state that she "didn’t believe a member of the Marine Corps was an example of the sort of person UW wanted to produce." Since Ms. Edwards doesn’t believe that a person who endured lousy food, primitive living conditions, hardship, torture and imminent death in service to his country and in defense of his fellow citizens isn’t “an example of the sort of person UW wanted to produce,” perhaps she was thinking of some other sort of person that UW actually has produced. For example, how about Dawn Wells, the one and only Mary Ann of Gilligan’s Island? I’m sure Boyington’s war-time experiences on real Pacific islands were nothing compared to her time on that fictional Hollywood island. Or how about Kitty Kelley, the "queen" of unauthorized biographies? I’m sure it is much more harrowing to dig up dirt on the rich and famous than it is to actually live a harrowing life as did Col. Boyington!

The real issue here should be is Jill Edwards “the sort of person” that UW wants to produce?

Moderate Muslims Speak Out Against Intolerance!

2006-02-10T17:55:00.000-07:00

Dr. Rusty Shackleford over at The Jawa Report shows that moderate Muslims all over the world are speaking out against intolerance. Check it out for yourself here.

How To Earn A Fatwa Without Really Trying

2006-02-05T09:41:00.000-07:00

Take a peek over at The Amazing Retecool and you can see dozens of hilarious Mohammed works of satire! Below is just a small sampling:

Update: Just for a little perspective when it comes to offensive cartoons, here is a look at the hypocrisy of the Muslim world (courtesy of Filibuster Cartoons):

Evo Morales Not Only Dresses Like an Idiot, He Is An Idiot

2006-02-05T08:32:00.000-07:00

Univision anchorman Jorge Ramos recently interviewed new Bolivian president Evo Morales. Actually I should say that Ramos attempted to interview Morales, because it didn't turn out like Ramos must have expected (as one can see by his facial expressions) and it didn't last very long. If you speak Spanish you can watch a video of the entire but short interview over at Barcepundit. If not, here is a translated transcript of the interview supplied by Fausta’s Blog:

Jorge Ramos (JR): What many fear is that you might imitate Chávez's authoritarianism or Castro's dictatorship. You've said that you admire Castro.
Evo Morales (EM): I ask for respect. They have a democracy [in Cuba] . . .
JR: (startled)
EM: . . . I've seen . . .
JR: Excuse me, you're telling me there's democracy in Cuba?
EM: Well, yes, if Fidel Castro's there, it's for the revolution.
JR: It's a very simple question: to you, is Fidel Castro a dictator or not?
EM: No, to me, he's a democratic man, who defends life, who thinks about the human being. If you think he's a dictator that's your problem, it's not my problem.
JR: You came to power through the power of vote, and you don't ask for democracy for Cubans?
EM: I demand much respect. Don't call me a hypocrite.
JR: I ask you, is that hypocritical?
EM: The hypocrisy surely comes from your questions. I demand much respect. Ask questions . . .
JR: It's a question
EM: . . . ask questions on my country's situation . . . You're turning this into an international confrontation and I won't allow it.
JR: (narrating) As Morales requested, we talked about Bolivia but when we got to the delicate subject of drug trafficking he ended the interview.
EM: (standing up)
JR: We have six minutes, forty questions . . .
EM: That's not my fault.

Yes, Morales is a real tool. Is he so vacuous that he really believes that Cuba is democratic and that Castro is not a dictator? Or is he just a hypocrite trying to play some sly game of public brown-nosing for the benefit of his mentors Castro and Hugo Chávez? Personally I think he’s nothing more than a classless idiot with a bad haircut and a penchant for wearing an Alpaca sweater that looks like he picked it up in a Salvation Army bin.

The Dhimmi Times

2006-02-04T15:17:00.000-07:00

Cartoon by concerned citizen Sam.

H/T: The Jawa Report

Freedom of Speech and Death

2006-02-03T15:31:00.000-07:00

Last September the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten (Jutland's Post) commissioned some drawings of the prophet Mohammed for an article on self-censorship and freedom of speech because writer Kare Bluitgen was not able to find an artist willing to illustrate his children's book about Mohammed. Given what has been happening in recent years in many European countries in relations with Muslims, artists were afraid of being attacked by Islamists. Considering what happened to Dutch film director Theo van Gogh and the threats to people such as Ayaan Hirsi Ali in the Netherlands there is no doubt the fear is justified. Below are the 12 drawings that Jyllands-Posten received and published:

At the time the cartoons were published some folks in the Danish Muslim community were offended (considering the tenants of Islam, rightly so). But Denmark, unlike most if not all of the Muslim world, has a concept known as freedom of speech. So while Muslims and their fellow travelers from the religion of multiculturalism are clamoring for apologies, retractions, censorship and retribution, some other newspapers in Europe have begun publishing the cartoons in solidarity with the press freedoms that the west holds dear. Of course this has just enflamed the masses of the "Religion of Peace" even more and we can now see in all of it's virtues of tolerance and peace the true face of Islam:

The following are just a few of the many bloggers who have covered this issue:

Captain's Quarters
Jihad Watch
Little Green Footballs
Michelle Malkin
¡No Pasarán!

Balcón del Cielo

2006-01-05T13:17:00.000-07:00

In the very tiny town of Azpitia, Peru there is a restaurant called the Balcón del Cielo, which translates to Sky Balcony or Balcony of the Sky. As you can see below it looks like a balcony that hangs out in the sky.

When you walk in you are actually on the third level. There is a small terrace to one side and a dining area to the other. Above the dining area is another dining area while below it there are two more.

Almost anywhere you sit you have a good view of the valley below where the Mala river passes. I took the following photo from my seat at the table.

The food there is decent, especially considering that it is on the side of a mountain almost out in the middle of nowhere. The last few kilometers of the drive there are on an unpaved road.

What is really good there are the camarónes. But they not shrimp as many Spanish-speakers might think -- they are what Louisiana locals call crawdads (i.e. crayfish) and they come right out of the river below.

If you happen to be in Lima and have a few hours to spare, I humbly recommend a visit to the Balcón del Cielo. It´s about a two hour drive south of Lima and is worth it just for the view.

Sand Tsunami in Ica, Peru

2005-12-29T17:04:00.000-07:00

How would you like to have this next to your house?

Erich von Däniken Is Right!

2005-12-29T16:10:00.000-07:00

Convicted criminal, proven liar and con-man Erich von Däniken is right! I know for a fact that aliens did visit the earth in the distant past because I have seen the landing site with my own eyes. And now, due to the miracle of modern technology known as the digital camera, you can see the same thing I did. As seen in the following photo that I took a few days ago, there is a clear landing strip in Nazca, Peru that only can be seen from outer space (or a small Cessna from an altitude of a little more than 1,000 meters). There is even the figure of a large bird pointing at the landing site so even the most imcompetent of aliens could find it. See for yourself:

Apparently the local inhabitants actually saw the aliens that came down in the spacecraft. It seems that they looked a bit like earthly spiders as shown below:

Like everyone else in the world (who is not trying to make money off of wild theories), I really have no clue who made the Nazca Lines. But they are huge!

Comida y Cerveza Peruana

2005-12-18T16:56:00.000-07:00

Only two more days to go and then this is how I will spend my Christmas vacation:

Drinking and eating and drinking!

And since it is summer in Peru, I will have to do even more drinking!

R.I.P. Richard Pryor

2005-12-10T15:48:00.000-07:00

Richard Pryor 1940 - 2005

Victor Davis Hanson Nails It Again

2005-12-04T18:46:00.000-07:00

In a recent column about Iraq titled A Moral War, Victor Davis Hanson lays into journalists. I think he is being polite:

How strange that journalists pontificate post facto about all the mistakes that they think have been made, nevertheless conceding that here we are on the verge of a third and final successful election. No mention, of course, is ever made about the current sorry state of journalistic ethics and incompetence (cf. Jayson Blair, Judy Miller, Michael Isikoff, Bob Woodward, Eason Jordan). A group of professionals, after all, who cannot even be professional in their own sphere, surely have no credibility in lecturing the U.S. military about what they think went wrong in Iraq.

Read the whole thing here.

Christian Terrorism (in Hollywood)

2005-11-17T11:10:00.000-07:00

Last night I watched an episode titled "Delta Does Detroit" of a TV series called E-Ring. I was astonished to learn of a new danger to the Muslim world: Christian Terrorism! A group of terrorists took over a mosque in Detroit to demand that the U.S. government release the brother of the leader of the group. Apparently his brother got a job as a contractor in Iraq and managed within a day of his arrival to murder two innocent civilians. Eventually the worshipers in the mosque were saved from these terrorists by some military personnel working with the FBI. (Yes, the show brought up the Posse Comitatus Act, but that is not important here)

What is important is that the "Christian terrorists" never said a thing about Christianity or used it as a justification for their actions. The reason, of course, is that Christian terrorism is a figment of the imagination of Hollywood writers (nutjobs like Eric Rudolph are not Christian). Now I realize that a show like this is fiction (if not fantasy), but if the entertainment industry is going to give us Christian terrorists, shouldn't it give us a plethora of Muslim terrorists? At least that would be more realistic. Unfortunately if would be politically incorrect and not fit in with the upside-down Hollywood world view where Christians are all right-wing zealots and Muslims are all misunderstood victims of persecution.

But really, what can you expect from an industry that glorifies suicide bombers?

Happy Veterans Day

2005-11-11T11:44:00.000-07:00

Happy Veterans Day to all American veterans who have fought against the hideous ideologies of despotism, totalitarianism, fascism, communism and last, but not least, the current evil of Islamic fascism.

To all of those heroes, living, passed on or having made the ultimate sacrifice, I give you my heartfelt thanks for my freedom and the freedom of the peoples all over the world who now are not the subjects of the failed ideologies which led to the enslavement and deaths of untold millions of human beings.

2005 Veterans

From World-Class Athlete to World-Class Ignoramus

2005-11-05T16:58:00.000-07:00

Diego Maradona was one of the greatest soccer players of all time. Very few in the sport could match him in ability and vision. Twenty-five years ago he was at the top of the soccer world. Now he is a drug-addled, out of shape and ill-bred ignoramus who is taking full advantage of his legend. Demonstrating his limited education and minimal knowledge of geopolitics, he can be seen these days kissing Fidel Castro's ass or wearing a shirt that contains a good portion of his entire vocabulary.

Cream Reunion: October 24, 2005

2005-10-30T09:56:00.000-07:00

Well, I guess miracles do happen! Cream decided to do another set of shows at Madison Square Garden in New York after their successful reunion last May at the Royal Albert Hall in London. This time, fortunately, I was aware ahead of time of the time and method of ticket sales. Waking up at 5:30 in the morning and using three different computers, I was able to submit requests almost to the second that they became available. Lo and behold, I was rewarded with almost perfect seats: fourth row right in front of Eric Clapton! As an old bass player I would have preferred to be in front of Jack Bruce, but first of all beggars can't be choosers and second, I had already seen him close up in a very small club many moons ago.

Section 2, Row 4 ... Read 'em and weep!

I took my 4 mexapixel digital camera just in case I could sneak a few shots of the group. It turned out that although cameras are forbidden, no one seemed to care. So I snapped away and got almost 80 photos. As you can see from the photos below, I am not a professional, I didn't have a zoom lens and I was not in a great position to take unencumbered photos. In any case, some of them did turn out OK. I've cropped most of them to cut out the tops of people's heads since almost everyone was standing up for the entire concert.

Jack Bruce seemed to be very animated when the concert began. For a while he was actually moving around the stage more than I had seen him do even twenty years ago. In fact, it seemed to me that he was more energized than either Baker or Clapton. As the concert went on his 62 years of age and liver transplant didn’t diminish his abilities that much, although towards the end he seemed to get a cramp in his left hand and could be seen dropping it from the fret board and shaking it. This is the sixth time I’ve seen Bruce, with the first time being in 1969. Although in playing and singing ability he is not what he once was, he can still play most bass players off the stage and still has the great voice (although not as strong as what it was thirty years ago).

Ginger Baker

Eric Clapton

Sunshine of Your Love

Farewell

NOTE: I will write more when I have some more spare time.

Ben Stein is still ticked off!

2005-09-12T10:13:00.000-07:00

Ben Stein has another go at those who seem to believe that George Bush is the cause of Katrina. He says the real story is that "the mainstream media rioted." Here is his main point:

They used the storm and its attendant sorrows to continue their endless attack on George W. Bush. Wildly inflated stories about the number of dead and missing, totally made up old wives' tales of racism, breathless accounts of Bush's neglect that are utterly devoid of truth and of historical context -- this is what the mainstream media gave us. The use of floating corpses, of horror stories of plagues, the sad faces of refugees, the long-faced phony accusations of intentional neglect and racism -- anything is grist for the media's endless attempts to undermine the electorate's choice last November. It is sad, but true that the media will use even the most heart breaking truths -- and then add total inventions -- to try to weaken and then evict from office a man who has done nothing wrong, but has instead turned himself inside out to help the real victims.

Read the whole thing here.

Five Days with Katrina

2005-09-10T19:24:00.000-07:00

Alvaro R. Morales Villa has a great slide show of almost two hundred photos of New Orleans entitled Five Days with Katrina. There's a caption with each photo giving a nice visual and written history of what Alvaro witnessed over his last five days in New Orleans.

What really piqued my interest was a photo (somewhere around the 180th) of the MSNBC reporter. The caption says what anyone who’s been around reporters in the field knows and what every one else should know:

I don't know her name, but she works for MSNBC. My apologies for my wordage, but this wench didn't know what the hell was going on. She made up 75% of what she was saying and exaggerated about 95% of everything that she did know. The message: do you want to be a reporter? All you need to do is have a pretty face and buy a Thesaurus!

(H/T: Sir George Turner at the Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler)

Logistics Primer for the Left Wing Media

2005-09-05T11:07:00.000-07:00

Here is a good one in its entirety from Teflon:

As a former Air Force logistics officer, let me clarify the following for the idiots in the Left Wing Media:

1. Things can get destroyed far more swiftly than they can get fixed.

2. The United States military can wipe out the Taliban and the Iraqi Republican Guard far more swiftly than they can bring 3 million Swanson dinners to an underwater city through an area the size of Great Britain which has no power, no working ports or airports, and a devastated and impassable road network.

3. You cannot speed recovery and relief efforts up by prepositioning assets since the assets are endangered by the very storm which destroyed the region.

4. We do not yet have teleporter nor replicator technology like you saw on "Star Trek" in college between hookah hits and waiting to pick up your worthless communications degree while the grownups actually engaged in the recovery effort today were studying engineering.

5. Getting people out of the stricken areas is the most pressing concern, since we cannot get enough supplies into it to safely sustain them.

6. Getting the airport, bridges, and roads repaired is the next priority, since the supplies and people needed to fix levees, drain the city, and repair the infrastructure cannot be transported via aircraft. You need to truck them in.

7. Once the infrastructure is repaired, it is vital to get the ports in working order. Equipment and supplies can only be moved into the area in large quantities by sea.

8. Only then can recovery efforts begin in earnest.

9. The above will take weeks and months, not days or hours.

10. No amount of yelling, crying, and mustering of moral indignation will change any of the facts above. Facts are facts. Opinion is cheap.

11. You could do more help actually keeping your damned satellite trucks out of the way of the folks doing the real work.

12. If you must vent your indignation, how about targeting the Louisiana officials who did absolutely nothing to protect their constituents? At least you can help ensure the populace doesn't elect these clowns again.

While Officials Jabber, Jabbar Acts

2005-09-04T14:52:00.000-07:00

While Louisiana Governor Kathleen Blanco, New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin and Terry Ebbert (head of New Orleans' emergency operations) whined, complained and blamed, a young man named Jabbar Gibson did what local officials were too incapable and too incompetent to do -- he took matters into his own hands.

Eighteen-year-old Jabbor Gibson jumped aboard the bus as it sat abandoned on a street in New Orleans and took control.

"I just took the bus and drove all the way here...seven hours straight,' Gibson admitted. "I hadn't ever drove a bus."

The teen packed it full of complete strangers and drove to Houston. He beat thousands of evacuees slated to arrive there.

You can read about Jabbar Gibson and what he did here, here, here and here.

Jabbar Gibson (also spelled as Jabbor and said to be twenty in some articles) "stole" a school bus and carried between 60 and 100 people to safety by driving them from the streets of New Orleans to the Astrodome in Houston, Texas. In fact, he and his passengers were the first group of refugees to arrive there, beating out the thousands of evacuees from the Superdome. Young Mr. Gibson may also be in a bit of trouble since technically he did steal the bus. If he had been stopped in New Orleans, he probably would have been arrested! But one thing is clear -- Jabbar Gibson is a man of action. He may have saved some lives, but he definitely prevented days of suffering for the passengers on the commandeered bus. In my book, Jabbar Gibson is a hero!

Ben Stein is ticked off!

2005-09-04T13:39:00.000-07:00

Ben Stein, writer, economist, lawyer and actor, has a go at those who seem to believe that George Bush is the cause of Katrina and the shameful aftermath to the catastrophe. Here is just a sample of the truths for "those who have ears and eyes and care to know the truth:"

1.) The hurricane that hit New Orleans and Mississippi and Alabama was an astonishing tragedy. The suffering and loss of life and peace of mind of the residents of those areas is acutely horrifying.
2.) George Bush did not cause the hurricane. Hurricanes have been happening for eons. George Bush did not create them or unleash this one.

3.) George Bush did not make this one worse than others. There have been far worse hurricanes than this before George Bush was born.

4.) There is no overwhelming evidence that global warming exists as a man-made phenomenon. There is no clear-cut evidence that global warming even exists. There is no clear evidence that if it does exist it makes hurricanes more powerful or makes them aim at cities with large numbers of poor people. If global warming is a real phenomenon, which it may well be, it started long before George Bush was inaugurated, and would not have been affected at all by the Kyoto treaty, considering that Kyoto does not cover the world's worst polluters -- China, India, and Brazil. In a word, George Bush had zero to do with causing this hurricane. To speculate otherwise is belief in sorcery.

5.) George Bush had nothing to do with the hurricane contingency plans for New Orleans. Those are drawn up by New Orleans and Louisiana. In any event, the plans were perfectly good: mandatory evacuation. It is in no way at all George Bush's fault that about 20 percent of New Orleans neglected to follow the plan. It is not his fault that many persons in New Orleans were too confused to realize how dangerous the hurricane would be. They were certainly warned. It's not George Bush's fault that there were sick people and old people and people without cars in New Orleans. His job description does not include making sure every adult in America has a car, is in good health, has good sense, and is mobile.

6.) George Bush did not cause gangsters to shoot at rescue helicopters taking people from rooftops, did not make gang bangers rape young girls in the Superdome, did not make looters steal hundreds of weapons, in short make New Orleans into a living hell.

7.) George Bush is the least racist President in mind and soul there has ever been and this is shown in his appointments over and over. To say otherwise is scandalously untrue.

Here are some of the "More Mysteries of Katrina" that Mr. Stein has recently updated in his article:

Why is it that the snipers who shot at emergency rescuers trying to save people in hospitals and shelters are never mentioned except in passing, and Mr. Bush, who is turning over heaven and earth to rescue the victims of the storm, is endlessly vilified?

What church does Rev. Al Sharpton belong to that believes in passing blame and singling out people by race for opprobrium and hate?

What special abilities does the media have for deciding how much blame goes to the federal government as opposed to the city government of New Orleans for the aftereffects of Katrina?

Your can read the whole thing here. On a personal note, I met Mr. Stein a couple of months ago at a financial seminar. Unlike his screen and television persona as a seemingly monotone robot, he is a very nice guy and quite knowledgeable. When he found out that my son is serving in the military, he asked some very detailed questions about his job and showed genuine interest and care about the troops.

Shoot To Kill

2005-08-31T11:52:00.000-07:00

Looters are the scum of the earth. Yes, I can understand breaking into a grocery store for food and supplies. But breaking into stores on Canal Street for basketball shoes, big screen TVs, stereos, liquor and everything under the sun that you want? And how about rampaging through the wealthier neighborhoods to rob homes? How about attempting to break into the Children's Hospital -- which happens to have around 100 children inside as patients?

New Orleans is under martial law. There is one simple solution to this disgraceful problem: shoot to kill! And the sooner the better.

Ernie Pyle Lives On

2005-08-27T10:00:00.000-07:00

Ernie Pyle was an American journalist who worked as a roving correspondent for the Scripps Howard newspaper chain from 1935 on. During World War II, while covering the North African, European and Pacific theaters of operation, he became America's most famous and beloved war correspondent. His sympathetic and caring reports of the ordinary GI made him a celebrated advocate and supporter of America’s fighting men.

His following was so great that in 1944, after he wrote a column urging that soldiers in combat get "fight pay" the same as airmen were paid "flight pay," Congress passed a law giving soldiers 50 percent extra pay for combat duty. That legislation came to be known as "the Ernie Pyle bill."

His articles were about the out-of-the-way places he visited and the people who lived there, written in a folksy style as if he was writing a personal letter to a friend. He wrote in an intimate style from the perspective of the common soldier instead of covering the goings-on of general officers and the operations of armies. You need only to read some of his columns such as Digging and Grousing, The God-Damned Infantry and The Death of Captain Waskow to see why he was so popular and beloved.

Today in Iraq the mainstream media's inability to cover this war accurately should be apparent to anyone who is familiar with the men and women on the ground and the dearth of stories that don’t involve a civilian or member of the coalition forces being blown-up, shot or executed. But fortunately, for those who care to look, there is at least one committed journalist who is able to produce week in and week out writing that hasn't been seen since that of Ernie Pyle. His name is Michael Yon.

If you want perspective in your war coverage, read Michael Yon. If you want the good, the bad and the ugly, read Michael Yon. If you want a reporter that puts his butt on the line the same as our soldiers do, read Michael Yon. If you want what the mainstream media is not giving you, read Michael Yon.

While the fact that he has little support outside of his own readers and has no large media affiliation is a devastating indictment of the mainstream media, Michael Yon is still the single best combat reporter on the ground in Iraq today.

NOTE: If you like what you read, please help Michael Yon continue reporting from Iraq by clicking the Support the Next Dispatch button on his website!

The Biteback Effect

2005-08-19T11:55:00.000-07:00

Victor Davis Hanson provides another great analysis in his latest article. In this one he coins the term "biteback" effect, which he defines here:

But in the interest of simplicity, I'll call it the "biteback" effect. Every time one hears a strident censor bring up a purported American sin, expect that he'll be bitten right back by proving the opposite of what he intended — and looking foolish in the bargain.

Here is a recent example of biteback:

On the basis of an FBI agent's e-mail alleging loud rap music, cold room temperatures, and the rough handling of a Koran, former president Jimmy Carter and Illinois Democratic Senator Dick Durbin advanced Guantanamo as a national scandal and proof of our amorality in this war.

"I think what's going on in Guantanamo Bay and other places is a disgrace to the USA," Pius Maximus Carter pontificated, adding that the detention center had "given impetus and excuses to potential terrorists." Sen.Durbin earlier had assured us of Guantanamo that, "You would most certainly believe this must have been done by Nazis, Soviets in their gulags, or some mad regime — Pol Pot or others — that had no concern for human beings."

But the more one learns about Guantanamo, after having it raised constantly by such self-righteous and anguished censors, the more it seems unlike any wartime detention center in recent memory — but in ways exactly opposite from the Stalag its detractors imply.

And here is why we see so much biteback these days:

In the age of utopianism we demand impossible standards of perfection. Then when they cannot be met, we conclude that we are not good at all, but the equivalent of a Pol Pot, Hitler, or Saddam himself — an elected American president who is a worse terrorist than Osama bin Laden.

And in a war with enemies like few other in our recent history, the contrast between rhetoric and reality is only accentuated: panties over the head of an Iraqi inmate, no head at all on an American prisoner; Korans given to the enemy terrorists in jail, Bibles outlawed for visitors to our friends the Saudis; our elected president becomes a member of the "Bush crime family" as we worry about proper barristers for Saddam Hussein's genuinely criminal family. As we fear that we have fallen short of the postmodern therapeutic age, Islamic fascists brag they are avatars of the Dark Ages.

Read the whole thing here.

Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus

2005-08-08T22:06:00.000-07:00

Someone sent me this hilarious story which was posted in another blog. I'm sorry I don't know who to give credit to for it (or even if it is real), but when I do, I will note the source. Now, here we go:

Here's a prime example of "Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus" supposedly offered by an English professor from the University of Phoenix. One day he split the class up into pairs and where possible the pairs were mail and female. He gave them the following assignment. One of them would write the first paragraph of a story and send it to their partner. The partner would then add a paragraph and send everything back. This process would continue til both agreed the story was completed. The professor was to receive a copy of each email. They would be graded. Here's a classic....

At first, Laurie couldn't decide which kind of tea she wanted. The chamomile, which used to be her favorite for lazy evenings at home, now reminded her too much of Carl, who once said, in happier times, that he liked chamomile. But she felt she must now, at all costs, keep her mind off Carl. His possessiveness was suffocating, and if she thought about him too much her asthma started acting up again. So chamomile was out of the question.

(second paragraph by Gary) Meanwhile, Advance Sergeant Carl Harris, leader of the attack squadron now in orbit over Skylon 4, had more important things to think about than the neuroses of an air-headed asthmatic bimbo named Laurie with whom he had spent one sweaty night over a year ago. "A.S. Harris to Geostation 17," he said into his transgalactic communicator. "Polar orbit established. No sign of resistance so far..." But before he could sign off a bluish particle beam flashed out of nowhere and blasted a hole through his ship's cargo bay. The jolt from the direct hit sent him flying out of his seat and across the cockpit.

(Rebecca’s response paragraph) He bumped his head and died almost immediately, but not before he felt one last pang of regret for psychically brutalizing the one woman who had ever had feelings for him. Soon afterwards, Earth stopped its pointless hostilities towards the peaceful farmers of Skylon 4. "Congress Passes Law Permanently Abolishing War and Space Travel," Laurie read in her newspaper one morning. The news simultaneously excited her and bored her. She stared out the window, dreaming of her youth, when the days had passed unhurriedly and carefree, with no newspaper to read, no television to distract her from her sense of innocent wonder at all the beautiful things around her. "Why must one lose one's innocence to become a woman?" she pondered wistfully.

(Gary’s second response paragraph) Little did she know, but she had less than 10 seconds to live. Thousands of miles above the city, the Anu'udrian mothership launched the first of its lithium fusion missiles. The dim-witted wimpy peaceniks who pushed the Unilateral Aerospace disarmament Treaty through the Congress had left Earth a defenseless target for the hostile alien empires who were determined to destroy the human race. Within two hours after the passage of the treaty the Anu'udrian ships were on course for Earth, carrying enough firepower to pulverize the entire planet. With no one to stop them, they swiftly initiated their diabolical plan. The lithium fusion missile entered the atmosphere unimpeded. The President, in his top-secret mobile submarine headquarters on the ocean floor off the coast of Guam, felt the inconceivably massive explosion, which vaporized poor, stupid Laurie.

(Rebecca’s response) This is absurd. I refuse to continue this mockery of literature. My writing partner is a violent, chauvinistic semi-literate adolescent.

(Gary’s Response) Yeah? Well, my writing partner is a self-centered tedious neurotic whose attempts at writing are the literary equivalent of Valium. "Oh, shall I have chamomile tea? Or shall I have some other sort of F--KING TEA??? Oh no, what am I to do? I'm such an air headed bimbo who reads too many Danielle Steele novels!"

(Rebecca’s Response) Asshole.

(Gary’s Response) Bitch.

(Rebecca’s) F__K YOU - YOU NEANDERTHAL!

(Gary) Go drink some tea - whore.

(TEACHER) A+ - I really liked this one.

Where Is The Real Steve Benson?

2005-08-04T18:57:00.000-07:00

Steve Benson, editorial cartoonist for the Arizona Republic, has actually drawn something that isn't anti-American or anti-Bush!

And he has already gotten a reaction from non other than CAIR! Apparently this one really ticked them off too:

The problem with CAIR is that they just cannot handle (when other people know) the truth.

Oil For Palaces

2005-07-23T00:35:00.000-07:00

Would you like to see what some of the Oil For ~~Food~~ Palaces kickback money bought?

Thank you, United Nations!

Bad Boys With Many Toys

2005-07-22T22:15:00.000-07:00

About three months ago, Junior and some of his friends caught some of Michael Moore's "Minutemen" preparing for a big party.

It seems that they had a lot of toys and fireworks with them!

And not only were they way over the legal limit, it looks like they did their shopping at an interesting place.

Are You Listening Sen. Durbin?

2005-06-19T13:06:00.000-07:00

As one who was held in a North Vietnamese Prison for nearly seven years and whose definition of torture and bad treatment is somewhat at variance with yours, I deplore your senseless comments about alleged "barbaric treatment" at our terrorist detention facility at Guantanamo.

Your remarks comparing Guantanamo to the regimes of Stalin, Hitler and Pol Pot are outrageous. I tried to think of why a rational human being could make such an outlandish statement but I keep coming up short. I thought I'd seen it all when Howard Dean performed his infamous scream in Iowa but your diatribe yesterday eclipsed Dean's moment of Hannibal Lecter lunacy. And your moment of pique will be infinitely more damaging to members of our Armed Forces serving in harm's way.

I noted, when searching for your contact information, that the first item Google came up with was al Jazeera's joy at your comments. You, sir, for having aided and abetted the enemy in time of war, have been relegated in my mind to the status of Jane Fonda and your colleague, John Kerry as contemptible traitors.

I hope not too many of our valiant members of the Armed Forces have to suffer for your stupid comments. Shame on you.

Paul E. Galanti, Commander, U.S. Navy (Ret.)
POW for seven years in North Vietnam

Congressmen who willfully take actions during wartime that damage morale and undermine the military are saboteurs and should be arrested, exiled, or hanged.

President Abraham Lincoln

Raven 42: Update

2005-06-17T21:32:00.000-07:00

Back in April I wrote a post about an ambush involving a remarkable military police unit under the call sign Raven 42. This unit was part of the 617th Military Police Company, a National Guard unit out of Richmond, Kentucky. On June 16th, Staff Sgt. Timothy Nein, Sgt. Leigh Ann Hester and Spc. Jason Mike received the Silver Star for their actions during the ambush on their convoy.

Hester's squad was shadowing a supply convoy March 20 when anti-Iraqi fighters ambushed the convoy. The squad moved to the side of the road, flanking the insurgents and cutting off their escape route. Hester led her team through the "kill zone" and into a flanking position, where she assaulted a trench line with grenades and M203 grenade-launcher rounds. She and Nein, her squad leader, then cleared two trenches, at which time she killed three insurgents with her rifle.

When the fight was over, 27 insurgents were dead, six were wounded, and one was captured.

Hester, 23, who was born in Bowling Green, Ky., and later moved to Nashville, Tenn., said she was surprised when she heard she was being considered for the Silver Star.

"I'm honored to even be considered, much less awarded, the medal," she said.

Being the first woman soldier since World War II to receive the medal is significant to Hester. But, she said, she doesn't dwell on the fact. "It really doesn't have anything to do with being a female," she said. "It's about the duties I performed that day as a soldier."

As I noted in my previous post, the media (in what little coverage there is) will play up the fact that she is a woman. But the fact is, more than anything, Sgt. Hester is a damn fine soldier! And that goes as well for SSgt. Nein, Spc. Mike and the rest of the unit.

You can read more here and here.

Durbin and Rhetorical Excess

2005-06-17T21:00:00.000-07:00

ShrinkWrapped, a practicing Psychoanalyst and Psychiatrist, has an interesting take on the rhetorical excesses of the left in which he has concerns that they could ultimately lead to violence. Here is a very salient part of what he wrote:

Durban (sic), et al, who assert that that Gitmo and Abu Graib have rendered us indistinguishable form Pol Pot, the Nazis and the Soviets, are objectively wrong. There is, in fact, no resemblance of what we are doing in Gitmo to what constitutes actual torture.

If Durban, et al, actually believe in the literal truth of their statement, then, at best, they have lost the ability to differentiate their own fantasied elaboration of reality and reality. This is to be expected in the fever swamps of DU, but is frightening coming from a United States Senator.

If Durban, et al, know they are making outrageously exaggerated statements, then they either are overtly opposed to their own country and are willing to risk the death of Americans in Iraq and at home in order to damage an evil administration that has plunged us into a horribly immoral adventure for reasons hidden to most of us, or they are cynically risking the deaths of American military people abroad and innocents in Iraq and elsewhere, in the service of their corrupt needs, for power and narcissistic gratification.

In the former case, their stupidity is dangerous. These statements offer reinforcements to our enemies in the information war, convince the Jihadists they can win if they persist long enough, and give impetus to the more radical elements on the left. Further, the risk of violence increases with every statement that legitimizes the kind of paranoid fantasies that are being supported by such talk.

Now here is the kicker:

If the Bush administration is the equivalent of Pol Pot, the Nazis, and the Soviets, all right thinking Americans must oppose the evil, even with violence. In fact, violence against such a state would be a moral necessity.

If they do not believe their own rhetoric, and recognize the hyperbolic nature of their assertions, their opportunism puts people in danger in the same way as above, but with even less justification; it is, if anything, more despicable.

You should read the entire post Dangerous Portents II and his previous post on the subject, Dangerous Portents.

(h/t: Roger L. Simon)

Senator Dick "Dumbass" Durbin

2005-06-15T18:24:00.000-07:00

Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill) made a complete ass of himself last night during a debate on the Energy Bill -- and he did it on the Senate floor and therefore in the congressional record. During a debate of the Energy Bill, he managed to bring up the Guantanamo Bay "torture" issue. And this is what Durbin thinks is torture:

On one occasion, the air conditioning had been turned down so far and the temperature was so cold in the room, that the barefooted detainee was shaking with cold. ..... On another occasion, the [air conditioner] had been turned off, making the temperature in the unventilated room well over 100 degrees. The detainee was almost unconscious on the floor, with a pile of hair next to him. He had apparently been literally pulling his hair out throughout the night. On another occasion, not only was the temperature unbearably hot, but extremely loud rap music was being played in the room, and had been since the day before, with the detainee chained hand and foot in the fetal position on the tile floor.

But he didn't stop there. He just had to continue and not only make a complete and utter fool of himself, but insult the United States, past victims of Nazi and Communist atrocities and the American military.

If I read this to you and did not tell you that it was an FBI agent describing what Americans had done to prisoners in their control, you would most certainly believe this must have been done by Nazis, Soviets in their gulags, or some mad regime—Pol Pot or others—that had no concern for human beings. Sadly, that is not the case. This was the action of Americans in the treatment of their prisoners.

Can you believe this? He equates having no air conditioning and crappy music to victims of the Holocaust, the Soviet gulags and the mass murder of Cambodians! Man, does this guy need a reality check.

I am so glad this ignorant dumbass does represent me, but if he did I would be looking into impeachment possibilities. What a disgrace to Illinois, the United States and humanity in general.

Who Is The Real Star?

2005-06-11T23:14:00.000-07:00

Noted Hollywood actor Sean Penn, member of Maoist anti-war front group Not In Our Name, supporter of web-based leftwing activist network MoveOn.org, fellow traveler of moonbat anti-war activist Medea Benjamin, and all-around useful idiot, is continuing his "other" career as a journalist by visiting Iran on a brief assignment for the San Francisco Chronicle. Penn is covering the upcoming June 17th presidential election and undoubtedly will use his vast knowledge of Iran, his fluency in Farsi and his far-reaching education in Middle Eastern politics and foreign relations to do his job.

Penn, who has written at length about a visit to Iraq for the paper, was spotted in Tehran on Friday at a prayer service as worshippers chanted "Death to America." Penn, 44, confirmed he was in Iran to cover the June elections. Using a translator, “Penn took copious notes as hardline cleric Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati urged the congregation to vote en masse ‘to make America angry,’” acccording to Reuters. The actor told Reuters he had decided to come to Iran because of growing tensions between Washington and Tehran.

Sean Penn checking out Friday prayers in Tehran.

Sean Penn carefully listening to chants of "Death to America."

Now, does any sane person really believe that Sean Penn has a clue about what is causing the "growing tensions between Washington and Tehran?" Does his ability to act and read lines from a script make him any more knowledgeable about Iran than the average American on the street? Has his previous stint as a "journalist" in Iraq for the Chronicle earned him the right to displace real journalists that have been denied the necessary accreditation from the Iranian authorities to cover the elections?

You must remember that this is the same Sean Penn that went to Iraq in December, 2002, before the war, for his "obligation to (at least attempt to) find my own voice on matters of conscience" and to "pursue a deeper understanding of this frightening conflict." I guess that he couldn't find his "voice on matters of conscience" for a government that built palaces while children went without medicine and food. And I guess a "deeper understanding" of a fascist dictatorship propped up by an internal security system modeled after that of Stalin was not possible for Penn.

Sean Penn in pre-war Iraq, November 2002. What you don't see in the picture is his Iraqi "minder."

With the constant barrage of political idiocy coming out of the mouths of Hollywood stars (believe me, Sean Penn is by far not the worst), one would believe that they are all far-left politically and even anti-American. In fact, many of them are. Whether it is Sean Penn, Danny Glover, Oliver Stone, Tim Robbins or a plethora of others too numerous to name, many of them actually support political movements that would not allow for their libertine lifestyles if implemented. But they still support them with money and sometimes their own valuable time. Although I guess you can't expect too much from a group of people in which, except for a very few, a high school diploma is the highest educational achievement reached!

Once in a while though, one of them shows that not only does he have a heart, but actually puts his money where his mouth is (and shuts up about it)! Take a look at the following pictures:

Denzel Washington with some of the troops on a visit to Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio,Texas.

Denzel Washington meeting with a patient at Brooke Army Medical Center.

Star fulfills vow to Fisher House

Months after visiting a military hospital and promising to help families of wounded U.S. soldiers, actor Denzel Washington has come through in a big way.

Washington gave one of the biggest donations ever made to Fisher House Foundation Inc., which operates guest facilities for families with loved ones recuperating in military hospitals, an official at the nonprofit said Wednesday.

Washington and his wife also accepted the foundation's invitation to serve on its board of trustees, he said.

The actor's involvement with Fisher House resulted from a stop six months ago at Brooke Army Medical Center, where many troops who served in Iraq and Afghanistan have been treated for injuries.

During the December visit, after learning Fisher House provides inexpensive lodging and other support for recuperating soldiers' families, Washington vowed to help the organization.

Now who is the real star here?

Oh, by the way Sean, Mr. Washington actually graduated from Fordham University with a B.A. in Journalism.

Is Europe Dying?

2005-06-07T15:46:00.000-07:00

George Weigel, a Senior Fellow of the Ethics and Public Policy Center, has an interesting take on Europe in a new article for the Foreign Policy Research Institute.

America's "Europe problem" and Europe's "America problem" have been staple topics of transatlantic debate for the past several years. Political leaders, media commentators, and businessmen usually discuss those problems in terms of policy differences: differences over prosecuting the war on terrorism, differences over the role of the United Nations in world affairs, differences over the Kyoto Protocol on the global environment, differences over Iraq. The policy differences are real. Attempts to understand them in political, strategic, and economic terms alone will ultimately fail, however, because such explanations do not reach deeply enough into the human texture of contemporary Europe.
To put the matter directly: Europe, and especially western Europe, is in the midst of a crisis of civilizational morale. The most dramatic manifestation of that crisis is not to be found in Europe's fondness for governmental bureaucracy or its devotion to fiscally shaky health care schemes and pension plans, in Europe's lagging economic productivity or in the appeasement mentality that some European leaders display toward Islamist terrorism. No, the most dramatic manifestation of Europe's crisis of civilizational morale is the brute fact that Europe is depopulating itself.

Read the whole thing here.

Amoral Retard

2005-05-29T18:14:00.000-07:00

Normally I don't even bother thinking about pseudo-intellectuals like Professor Timothy Shortell, but flipping channels the other day I happened to see this photo of him.

It reminded me that he had recently called religious people "moral retards." So I read up on him and found out that he was recently elected chairman of the sociology department at the Brooklyn College Midwood campus. Given statements that he made such as "Christians claim that theirs is faith based on love, but they'll just as soon kill you," one has to wonder just as much about the other professors that elected him chairman.

I decided to take a peek at his website and found some gems. For example, he states that "I am proud to be among a group of intellectuals who have argued for a free, secular society, including Voltaire, Marx, Freud, Bertrand Russell, Mark Twain, Richard Dawkins, and many others." Really! This guy thinks he is like Voltaire or Mark Twain? Look at what he has published and it looks like he should be lucky to get a post at the crappiest community college in Mississippi (no disrespect intended to Mississippians).

He also shows how intellectually vacuous he is by offering up links to articles by Maureen Dowd, Frank Rich, Bob Herbert and Paul Krugman. Now there is a group of diverse and intellectual heavy hitters! He reminds me of the Janeane Garafolo puppet in Team America that says something like "We will read newspaper editorials and repeat them as if they were our own opinions."

Shortell and his electors really make me wonder about the status of higher education these days.

Oh, yea ... I wonder what PETA thinks of that chair cover?

French Voters Say ‘Screw You’ To Chirac!

2005-05-29T17:55:00.000-07:00

While French President Jacques Chirac was plotting to disregard the ‘non’ vote and even had support from jungle tribes, the French voters decided not to screw themselves and dealt a decisive defeat to the EU constitution and Chirac himself. If the proposed EU “constitution” was a bit less than 852 pages and the French voters could have actually read it, the margin for the ‘non’ vote might have been much greater.

You can keep up with the latest on the vote at ¡No Pasarán!.

Newsweek lied and people died?

2005-05-18T10:56:00.000-07:00

I don’t think so. Sure, Newsweek and other members of the mainstream media demonstrate a liberal bias and even an ignoramus can see that they don’t like President Bush. In fact, they use every mistake made by the administration and the military to bash Bush. And it is obvious from the Newsweek report that they did not (or didn’t even know to) take into account the ramifications of what could happen in the Muslim world. But let’s get real here. Did Newsweek kill the at least 17 people that died? Of course not! If you want to know why those people died, Andrew C. McCarthy has a good take on it:

That's right. The reason for the carnage is said — again and again, by media critics and government officials — to be a false report of Koran desecration. The prime culprit here is irresponsible journalism.

Is that what we really think?

Here's an actual newsflash — and one, yet again, that should be news to no one: The reason for the carnage here was, and is, militant Islam. Nothing more.

Newsweek merely gave the crazies their excuse du jour. But they didn't need a report of Koran desecration to fly jumbo jets into skyscrapers, to blow up embassies, or to behead hostages taken for the great sin of being Americans or Jews. They didn't need a report of Koran desecration to take to the streets and blame the United States while enthusiastically taking innocent lives. This is what they do.

And Robert Spencer also talks about the gorilla in the room that no one wants to talk about:

The bigger story here, and the gorilla in the living room that no one wants to notice, is that flushing a Qur'an down the toilet should not be grounds to commit murder. Note the total absence of moral judgment in Marshall's piece, except that which he directs toward Newsweek. His argument is this: Newsweek should have known that this story would lead to deaths. Therefore, they shouldn't have printed it. But he says nothing whatsoever about a culture that condones -- celebrates -- wanton murder of innocent people, mayhem, and destruction in response to the alleged and unproven destruction of a book.

The question here is one of proportionate response. If a Qur'an had indeed been flushed, Muslims would have justifiably been offended. They may justifiably have considered the perpetrators boors, or barbarians, or hell-bound unbelievers. They may justifiably have issued denunciations accordingly. But that is all. To kill people thousands of miles away who had nothing to do with the act, and the fulminate with threats and murder against the entire Western world, all because of this alleged act, is not just disproportionate. It is not just excessive. It is mad. And every decent person in the world ought to have the courage to stand up and say that it is mad.

The Party Is Over ... And I Missed It!

2005-05-07T13:42:00.000-07:00

Well, Cream successfully finished their fourth and final reunion concert last night at the Royal Albert Hall in London.

I've read every review of the concerts that I could find from magazines and newspapers around the world. Every single one of them said that they were good or even better. But considering the musical talent that these three musicians have, could one really expect anything else?

For those who are interested, I am including the links to several of the concert reviews (unfortunately, some of the younger reviewers spent more time writing about the age of the performers and the audience -- but what else could be expected from music critics):

Modern Guitars Magazine (Night 1, Night 2, Night 3, Night 4)

New York Times

Washington Times

Update: I talked to my brother today, who just returned from Europe yesterday (May 13th). He said the concert (May 3rd) far exceeded his expectations! The band was tight, the sound excellent and the musicianship exceptional considering that the "lads" were playing the kind of music in their 60's that they had been playing in their 20's. With the help from his connections at a famous London insurance company, he sat in the stalls 15 yards from Jack Bruce and right at eye level. Apparently, everyone in that section had connections since Bryan Adams sat right behind him and Pete Townsend sat a couple of rows back! I just hope that the DVD comes out soon so I can see and listen for myself what I missed!

Godspeed David Hackworth

2005-05-05T18:19:00.000-07:00

Yesterday Col. David "Hack" Hackworth, age 74, died from cancer in Mexico where he was being treated. Col. Hackworth will be remembered as a legendary figure in the United States Army and, until he died, as the most highly-decorated living soldier. But he will mostly be remembered as a lifelong champion of the average soldier, an endeavor he pursued with vigor until the end.

I first became aware of Col. Hackworth years in the early 90's when he was Newsweek magazine's Contributing Editor for defense issues. Since then I have read several of his books, all of his Defending America columns, and finally became a supporter of Soldiers for the Truth, an organization he founded to give a voice to our military personnel and veterans.

To get a measure of what he stood for, I suggest that you read some of his past columns here and here . Other people that knew Col. Hackworth well will write much more about him than I ever could. But I will say that I thought so highly of him that when my son was shipping out for Iraq, I insisted that he take this one important item with him: The Vietnam Primer by Col. David Hackworth. He agreed and he did.

Why America needs to be Defeated in Iraq

2005-05-02T20:33:00.000-07:00

Yes, that's what I wrote: Why America needs to be Defeated in Iraq. That is the title of an article written by someone that has no clue, to say the least. Here's a person that cares more about his own life than the life of his son (if he really has one). You can read the whole thing at the Axis of Logic, although it is a little short on valid logic and very short on factual premises. Here are some of the ~~highlights~~ lowlights (be prepared to be sick):

For myself, I can say without hesitation that I support the insurgency, and would do so even if my only 21 year old son was serving in Iraq. There’s simply no other morally acceptable option.

We should remember that the war (which was entirely based on false or misleading information) was both illegal and immoral.

The character of the future Iraqi government will evolve from the groups who successfully expel the US forces from their country, not the American-approved stooges who rose to power through Washington’s “demonstration elections”.

The Bush administration hasn’t shown any willingness to loosen its grip on power either by internationalizing the occupation or by handing over real control to the newly elected Iraqi government. This suggests that the only hope for an acceptable solution to the suffering of the Iraqi people is a US defeat and the subsequent withdrawal of troops.

At this point, we should be able to agree that the people of Iraq were better off under Saddam Hussein in every quantifiable way than they are today.

Support for the Bush policy is, by necessity, support for the instruments of coercion that are used to perpetuate that occupation. In other words, one must be willing to support the torture at Abu Ghraib, (which continues to this day, according to Amnesty
International) the neoliberal policies (which have privatized all of Iraq’s publicly owned industries, banks and resources), an American-friendly regime that excludes 20% (Sunnis) of the population and, worst of all, “the return-in full force-of Saddam’s Mukhabarat agents, now posing as agents of the new Iraqi security and intelligence services.”

The Bush administration is fully prepared to carry on its campaign of global domination by force unless an unmovable object like the Iraqi insurgency blocks its way. Many suspect, that if it wasn’t for the resistance, the US would be in Tehran and Damascus right now. This, I think, is a rational assumption.

We should be clear about our feelings about the war and the occupation. The disparate Iraqi resistance is the legitimate manifestation of a national liberation movement. Its success is imperative to the principles of national sovereignty and self-determination; ideals that are revered in the Declaration of Independence.

The peace and security of the world’s people depends on the compliance of states with the clearly articulated standards of international law and the UN Charter. Both were deliberately violated by the invasion of Iraq. Crushing the insurgency will not absolve that illicit action; it will only increase the magnitude of the crime.

Therefore we look for an American defeat in Iraq. Such a defeat would serve as a powerful deterrent to future unprovoked conflicts and would deliver a serious blow to the belief that aggression is a viable expression of foreign policy.

Proof that ideology and reality don't mix. Excuse me while I go throw up.

No Miracle For Me!

2005-04-29T12:04:00.000-07:00

Well, I'm screwed! My sister-in-law refused to give me her ticket to the upcoming Cream reunion at the Royal Albert Hall in London. I offered money and everything else under the sun, but I couldn't change her mind.

I guess I can only wait for the DVD of the concerts to see Jack Bruce, Ginger Baker and Eric Clapton. Maybe they'll do it again in another 35 years ...

Bush: Pitcher? Catcher? Dhimmi?

2005-04-26T18:14:00.000-07:00

President George W. Bush and Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah had a meeting at his Crawford, Texas ranch Monday. When strolling through the Texas Bluebonnets the two were photographed holding hands. So, the questions are:

1. Are they going steady?

2. Are they just demonstrating an Arab expression of "friendship, respect and trust."

3. Are they "sending a real political message that they are partners and friends and intend to remain that way."

4. Did Bush insult Abdullah by using his left, or ass-wiping, hand?

5. Was Michael Moore right?

6. Is Bush a dhimmi or is he just playing a dhimmi?

Answers:

1. Yea, right.

2. Maybe.

3. Probably.

4. No. Someone has to use the left-hand!

5. Ha! Michael Moore has never been right in his whole life.

6. Yes. But is he one or is he playing one?

Here Is A Scary Possibility

2005-04-25T13:38:00.000-07:00

It looks like Israel and Europe are not the only ones that could face a direct strike from the mullahs of Iran:

Iran is not only covertly developing nuclear weapons, it is already testing ballistic missiles specifically designed to destroy America's technical infrastructure, effectively neutralizing the world's lone superpower, say U.S. intelligence sources, top scientists and western missile industry experts.

The radical Shiite regime has conducted successful tests to determine if its Shahab-3 ballistic missiles, capable of carrying a nuclear warhead, can be detonated by a remote-control device while still in high-altitude flight.

Scientists, including President Reagan's top science adviser, William R. Graham, say there is no other explanation for such tests than preparation for the deployment of electromagnetic pulse weapons – even one of which could knock out America's critical electrical and technological infrastructure, effectively sending the continental U.S. back to the 19th century with a recovery time of months or years.

I hope that the Department of Homeland Security gets in gear on this. There is nothing new about the idea of using an EMP weapon. Hardening critical infrastructure is a bargain compared to the cost of what could happen if nothing is done.

UPDATE: More evidence that Iran is seriously planning an EMP strike against the U.S. from an Iranian military journal (via WorldNetDaily).

Relaxing After A Hard Day At Work

2005-04-22T18:03:00.000-07:00

Junior sitting where Saddam's fat ass use to sit.

Appeasement and Dhimmitude in Europe

2005-04-21T12:47:00.000-07:00

Sara Townsley, a graduate student at Cornell, demonstrates that not all college students are infected with Marxist ideology, multiculturalism and political correctness.

Europe is now home to a human flood of North African immigrants who reject integration, don't speak the local language and flock to mosques to soak up radical imams preaching jihad. Violent crime against Jews and young women has skyrocketed; native Europeans are emigrating in record numbers; and churches, synagogues and cemeteries are regularly defaced. Through the EAD, Europe has imported all the problems of failed states, while the Arab side of the table basically gives the Euros a pat on the head for being so tolerant and multicultural.

Read her entire opinion piece here.

Who Needs Enemies When You Have France?

2005-04-21T12:20:00.000-07:00

It appears that while France is against the removal of a brutal oppressive dictator, it has no problem with supporting a communist dictatorship with designs on an independent democratic nation.

At the outset of a three-day visit to China, French Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin said he supported Beijing's "anti-secession" law on Taiwan, and vowed to keep pushing for an end to an EU arms embargo that could open the door for Paris to sell weapons to the Asian giant.

Raffarin also signed or finalized major business deals with Beijing valued at around $3.2 billion (2.4 billion euros).

Appearing to put his government at odds with the European Union, Raffarin said at the outset of the three day visit that Paris had no objections to the anti-secession law.

"The anti-secession law is completely compatible with the position of France," he said in a joint press conference with his Chinese counterpart Wen Jiabao.

France has no problems with China using "non-peaceful means" to prevent Taiwan from establishing independence, but does have problems with the United States using “non-peaceful means” to grant independence to the oppressed people of Iraq. Why is that? Well, the second paragraph of the article quoted above gives the answer: money!

In this case, $3.2 billion worth of business deals with China. Just as with Iraq, France has no principles when money is involved. Whether it is oil concessions for French companies and oil-for-food kickbacks for French politicians and businessmen with Iraq or large sales of Airbus airliners to China, money talks and ethics walk for the French.

Raven 42: A Profile In Courage

2005-04-14T12:58:00.000-07:00

Last month a group of 40 to 50 heavily armed insurgents attacked a large supply convoy of civilian trucks driving down a highway near Salman Pak, Iraq. A squad of Military Police from the Kentucky National Guard following the convoy immediately went into action to defend the convoy. The following, taken from the After Action Review (AAR) of the incident, demonstrates how well led, trained and disciplined the MP unit is (emphasis is mine):

About this time, three armored Hummers that formed the MP Squad under callsign Raven 42, 617th MP Co, Kentucky National Guard, assigned to the 503rd MP Bn, 18th MP Bde, arrived on the scene like the cavalry. The squad had been shadowing the convoy from a distance behind the last vehicle, and when the convoy trucks stopped and became backed up from the initial attack, the squad sped up, paralleled the convoy up the shoulder of the road, and moved to the sound of gunfire. They arrived on the scene just as a squad of about ten enemy had moved forward across the farmer's field and were about 20 meters from the road. The MP squad opened fire with .50 cal machineguns and Mk19 grenade launchers and drove across the front of the enemy's kill zone, between the enemy and the trucks, drawing fire off of the tractor trailers. The MP's crossed the kill zone and then turned up an access road at a right angle to the ASR and next to the field full of enemy fighters. The three vehicles, carrying nine MPs and one medic, stopped in a line on the dirt access road and flanked the enemy positions with plunging fire from the .50 cal and the SAW machinegun (Squad Automatic Weapon).

The AAR continues with a description of how the attack played out and how the MPs reacted to it. Here you can see how the unit discipline and bravery of the individual soldiers is apparent:

Immediately the middle vehicle was hit by an RPG knocking the gunner unconscious from his turret and down into the vehicle. The Vehicle Commander (the TC), the squad's leader, thought the gunner was dead, but tried to treat him from inside the vehicle. Simultaneously, the rear vehicle's driver and TC, section leader two, open their doors and dismount to fight, while their gunner continued firing from his position in the gun platform on top of the Hummer. Immediately, all three fall under heavy return machinegun fire, wounded. The driver of the middle vehicle saw them fall out the rearview mirror, dismounts and sprints to get into the third vehicle and take up the SAW on top the vehicle. The Squad's medic dismounts from that third vehicle, and joined by the first vehicle's driver (CLS trained) who sprinted back to join him, begins combat life-saving techniques to treat the three wounded MPs. The gunner on the floor of the second vehicle is revived by his TC, the squad leader, and he climbs back into the .50 cal and opens fire. The Squad leader dismounted with his M4 carbine, and 2 hand grenades, grabbed the section leader out of the first vehicle who had rendered radio reports of their first contact. The two of them, squad leader Staff Sergeant and team leader Sergeant with her M4 and M203 grenade launcher, rush the nearest ditch about 20 meters away to start clearing the natural trenchline. The enemy has gone into the ditches and is hiding behind several small trees in the back of the lot. The .50 cal and SAW flanking fire tears apart the ten in the lead trenchline.

The media is going to play up the fact that one of the team leaders is a female, Sgt. Leigh Ann Hester, and a very competent, courageous and effective one at that. But the real issue is not women in combat. And, even though it seems obvious, it is not the courage of the soldiers in this squad. The real issue is found in this section of the AAR:

They believed even before this fight that their NCOs were the best in the Army, and that they have the best squad in the Army. The Medic who fired the AT-4, said he remembered how from the week before when his squad leader forced him to train on it, though he didn't think as a medic he would ever use one. He said he chose to use it in that moment to protect the three wounded on the ground in front of him, once they came under fire from the building. The day before this mission, they took the new RFI bandoliers that were recently issued, and experimented with mounting them in their vehicles. Once they figured out how, they pre-loaded a second basic load of ammo into magazines, put them into the bandoliers, and mounted them in their vehicles---the same exact way in every vehicle-load plans enforced and checked by leaders! Leadership under fire--once those three leaders (NCOs) stepped out of their vehicles, the squad was committed to the fight.

Yes, these soldiers are very disciplined, effectively trained and well led. All they had to do was react. These citizen-soldiers attacked a group far superior in numbers and routed them since they knew they could because of their confidence in their leaders and training. This is why there were 24 insurgents killed on the spot. This is why the insurgents and terrorists cannot defeat the U.S. military head-on. This is why the insurgents and terrorists are more comfortable killing innocent civilians. This is why the insurgents and terrorists will lose.

Remodel

2005-04-12T18:30:00.000-07:00

I haven't had much time to blog recently because La Doña (my wife) and I are remodeling one of the bedrooms in the house. The house is about fifteen years old and this bedroom had just about had it! It was entirely painted in an off-white color that we repainted in what is called "red red wine." We replaced the trim and added molding around the ceiling in a beige-chamois color to offset the dark red. Then, for the fun part, we replaced the old, ratty carpet with maple laminate flooring. We were going to do a real wood floor, but when we saw that laminate wood flooring was cheaper, almost as good looking and ten times easier to clean and install (the slats are glueless and just snap together!) -- we went for it!

The photo sucks, but the room is only 130 square feet so I couldn't get a decent overall view of it. Anyway, here it is:

Obesity Tourism

2005-04-04T19:09:00.000-07:00

I was reading this posting over at ¡No Pasarán! and just about died laughing when I read this linked article in the The Sunday Times from last November. Apparently Robert Mugabe’s government in Zimbabwe has come up with a very unconventional method to solve the food crisis threatening half its population with starvation. Quoting from The Herald, the article said:

“Tourists can provide labour for farms in the hope of shedding weight while enjoying the tourism experience,” it said, adding that Americans spent $6 billion a year on “useless” dieting aids.

“Tour organisers may promote this programme internationally and bring in tourists, while agriculturalists can employ the tourists as free farm labour."

“The tourists can then top it all by flaunting their slim bodies on a sun-downer cruise on the Zambezi or surveying the majestic Great Zimbabwe ruins.”

I guess that once you come up with a proposal for something like the so-called Obesity Tourism Strategy, the sales pitch just writes itself!

Loaded Questions

2005-04-03T18:43:00.000-07:00

It is of interest to me to see how polls and the press may slant questions to reflect their own opinions and to achieve a pre-determined, or desired, result. Recently, in An Audience With Saudi Arabia, Victor Davis Hanson responded to some questions from Idris A. Ahmed, the editor of the Saudi daily newspaper Al-Watan. What caught my eye was the manifest bias of some of the questions, or should I say questioner. Check out some of the questions (the emphasis is mine):

8.The U.S. refusal to sign the Kyoto Protocal, in favor of its industry, was regarded by many environment protection groups as a deliberate intention to pollute the world and threaten the human existence. Can you comment on this?

9.The U.S. declared withdrawal from the treaty of nuclear arsenals reduction with Russia. How do you see the future of the world under such insane armament race?

10. The U.S. major pharmaceutical companies endangered millions of lives in the poor countries through its monopoly of the patents of life-saving drugs. How do you see this claim?

I realize that the Al-Watan is not exactly a household name outside of Saudi Arabia and, in any case, what else could be expected from any of the media in that country. But I believe that the partiality is so blatant that it is a good example of what one can find from more professional and polished reporters in newspapers such as the New York Times, the Guardian and the L.A. Times. Of course, those newspapers are better at couching their bias so that it is much less noticeable. The entire interview with Hanson can be found here.

Bush-Chimp Again, But No Hitler

2005-03-31T23:49:00.000-07:00

The latest episode in the BushChimpHitler follies (but without the Hitler reference this time) was brought to you by the Belgian Interior Minister Patrick Dewael. Apparently he signed a letter promoting a training package used to help police deal with unruly soccer fans. But the package included a presentation which pictured President George W. Bush's face in various expressions alongside photographs of a chimpanzee.

Mr. Dewael said he was unaware of the pictures when he signed the letter and that the idea was "of bad taste."

Interior Minister Dewael relaxing after a hard day at the office signing letters that he did not bother to read.

Where Have I Seen This Before?

2005-03-28T20:36:00.000-07:00

Fatah at Hebron University?

Palestinian Authority Police?

Janeane Garofalo?

Ah, yes ... The Reichstag!

Baghdad Residents Kill Three Militants?

2005-03-25T23:36:00.000-07:00

Recently The Guardian printed an article about an event in Iraq with the headline Baghdad Residents Kill Three Militants. It read just like any other article in The Guardian covering Iraq. You will find the words militant, insurgent and gunmen used throughout the article -- just like any other article about Iraq in The Guardian. The problem is that when you read the article, you realize that it is not about militants, insurgents or gunmen but is about terrorists. Here are the first three paragraphs of the article which I have "corrected" to be more accurate:

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - Shopkeepers and residents on one of Baghdad's main streets pulled out their own guns Tuesday and killed three ~~insurgents~~ terrorists when hooded men began shooting at passers-by, giving a rare victory to civilians increasingly frustrated by the violence bleeding Iraq.

The clash in the capital's southern Doura neighborhood erupted when ~~militants~~ terrorists in three cars sprayed bullets at shoppers. Three people - a man, a woman and a child - were wounded.

The motive was unclear, but there have been previous attacks in the ethnically mixed neighborhood. Earlier in the day, ~~gunmen~~ terrorists in the same quarter killed a policeman as he drove to work, police Lt. Col. Hafidh Al-Ghrayri said.

This article is a good example of bias in certain media outlets and news agencies. While the writers and editors may believe that they are being impartial and avoiding any political meaning in their terminology, they in fact are committing a political act. People that are deliberately "shooting at passers-by" and that "sprayed bullets at shoppers" are terrorists. Not militants, not insurgents, not gunmen -- terrorists!

Unfortunately, using misleading definitions and terminology is also a common practice at Reuters, the BBC, AP, The New York Times and other major media outlets. I know that journalists are taught ethical standards, but what I don't understand is why don't they follow them?

Just Desserts for a Deserter

2005-03-24T22:56:00.000-07:00

"I, Jeremy Hinzman, do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God."

This is the Enlisted Oath of Office for the U.S. Military and these were the words spoken by one Jeremy Hinzman when he enlisted in the United States Army in November, 2000. He later served with the 82nd Airborne Division and was deployed to Afghanistan. But right before his unit was scheduled to depart for Iraq in early 2004, Hinzman deserted his regiment and deployed for Toronto, Canada where he applied for asylum. That oath he took really meant a lot to him!

Hinzman said he feared he would be unfairly court-martialled if he was returned to the United States. But today the Canadian Immigration and Refugee Board "found that the claimants would be afforded the full protection of a fair and independent military and civilian judicial process in the U.S." So much for being unfair!

During his refugee hearing in December of last year, Hinzman said any violent acts he would have committed had he gone to Iraq would have amounted to an atrocity because the war itself was illegal. I didn't know the Army trained their recruits in international law!

I am sure this result will be appealed and the process will drag on for another year or two. But sooner or later, Jeremy Hinzman is going to pay the piper. No matter what kind of excuses he can come up with, nothing will change the fact that he dishonored himself, his country and, worse of all, his fellow soldiers. Hinzman is a coward, and not for refusing to fight -- but for deserting and running away to Canada instead of having the cojones to stand up for his beliefs and accept the consequences like a man.

Update: Here is your laugh for the day: After the ruling yesterday, the lawyer for Hinzman told CBC TV "'We don't believe that people should be imprisoned for doing what they believe is illegal." Don't you just love lawyers?

Arafat Killed By High Tech Laser Attack

2005-03-22T07:33:00.000-07:00

At a news conference on March 18th, the Palestinian ambassador in Sri Lanka, Attallah Quiba, claimed that two Israelis attempted to assassinate Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat. The Malaysian National News Agency reported that Quiba stated that they "used a laser device to attack Arafat." Quiba said "they tried to flee after using the device but were wrestled down by the Palestinian Authority security personnel."

Fortunately, the well known Palestinian cameraman Talal Abu Rahma was at the scene of the attack and he was able to get a shot of one of the assassins just as he was taking aim to fire the laser weapon in the attempt on Arafat's life.

In the melee that ensued after Arafat was fired upon, the Zionist killer dropped his weapon. The crack Palestinian Authority forensics team was able to snap a photo of the laser weapon before it disappeared in the confusion.

Quiba did not explain why an attack with a high tech laser did not kill Arafat immediately. But he did state that the two Israeli assassins "were carrying Canadian passports." The Canadian government has not yet responded to a request to explain why two of its citizens are Israeli assassins.

HAT TIP: Many thanks to Darth Misha I at The Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler for putting my humble attempt at humor into the appropriate perspective!

Communiqué No.7

2005-03-21T16:22:00.000-07:00

The General Headquarters of the Mujahadeen Army in Iraq has issued a communiqué to the American people. You can read the whole thing here. It is a tortured read and has a heavy does of leftist propaganda and media reports. Here are some excerpts for which I have supplied comments:

It is your right to lead the world, as it is the right of any nation which chooses to do so, yet this does not allow you to conquer others. There is a belief of a large number of our people, that a lot of facts do not reach you, facts that may be classified as unsuitable for the general public. Facts, that are twisted to gain a positive image here or there. Nothing new to an emperor who represents deceptions, lies, crimes, half victories, & total defeats. Your administration, time after time, lied & presented you with achievements directed by Hollywood & preformed in Iraq.

Obviously, these scumbags have read the rantings of the far left in Europe and the U.S. But it’s just as obvious that they don’t know anything about the politics of Hollywood!

You have elected these criminals, & thus, you are responsible for their actions. We hope that your future decisions will be based on reason & belief, for your emperor tomorrow will mirror the image of America to the world, & by his actions, will your new empire be Measured. And for the first time in history, a mafia of the weapons plants represented by Bush, Oil companies represented by Dick Chayne, & the Zionists by Paul Wolfowitz & Richard Pearle, hijack the United States of America in an ingenious plan to control the world. This type of Administration is exactly what Benjamin Franklin once warned you of.

No mention of Zionists in the first two paragraphs – must be a record! Benjamin Franklin? I guess they are referring to the Nazi fabrication "The Franklin Prophecy."

This administration, will enforce on you as it tries to enforce on our people, new laws that will result in a police state similar to those your consecutive governments back in our region. Legislation will soon be drafted by the appointed puppets to allow foreign ownership of land & structure & soon our people will be the foreigners on the land of their for-fathers. This new world order, will enslave people of all religions & race& Soon your children as well as ours, if they survive, will truly live in a planet of apes, & with a reduced population for ease of control, this can only be the implementation of a plan once presented by Henry Kissinger.

I guess they’ve been reading the Ward Churchill school of thought on the Patriot Act.

Your representatives, & their media, have portrayed an image that an insurgency is in Effect & that it is led by elements of foreign fighters entering from Syria & neighboring Countries; yet we assure you, that it is only a continuation of what Bush once claimed, “Mission Accomplished”. This resistance movement was prepared for, & is only the second chapter of this War. And we are mostly if not all Iraqis, Proud Iraqis who kept their oaths to defend people & country. And because this war may last longer than what the invaders anticipated, we have all promised to make their stay long, costly & painful. Blaming other countries, is nothing but creating new pretexts to invade other sovereign states & back future expeditions.

Now I know that they listen to the BBC, read Reuters and watch Fahrenheit 9/11.

Life under Dictatorship is far more safer, than behind the bars of your democracy.

Finally, they get to the point!

Have you not asked yourselves, where are the weapons of mass destruction, & where are the links between our previous government & the once CIA sponsored AL-Qaida? Or is that all now a thing of the past?

In Syria and on the run in the badlands of Pakistan?

What happened to the thousands of innocent people who died & continue to die of cancer, Women who give birth to deformed babies, caused by the effect of your military’s depleted Uranium shells. Since 1990, our first encounter with your troops on the battlefields, thousands on both sides of the conflict have suffered unknown illnesses, many have died since then, & others lack medical attention. Large parts of Iraq will be radioactive for millions of years to come, & if we were to return this radiating material to the U.S. & Britain, we would be no different than those who use them.

I guess they don’t know the meaning of the word depleted.

This war has taught us, that one man on the field can change the outcome of a day, One man, who believes in true freedom, can do what nations put together dare think of.

Yes, we call those men United States Marines.

If it was not for the fact that Communiqué No.7 is badly written and has an annoying use of the ampersand character, one would think that it was written by one of the cadres of the communist front organization International ANSWER!

La Reconquista de España

2005-03-11T15:37:00.000-07:00

One year ago the first shots in the reconquest of Spain were fired. On March 11, 2004, 191 people were massacred and 1,800 wounded by Islamofascists in the train stations of Madrid, Spain. Initially, the government perpetuated a pathetic attempt to blame the bombings on ETA (Euzkadi Ta Askatasuna), the Basque separatist and, might I add, terrorist group. It didn't take long for enough facts to get out, as if it wasn't obvious all along, that the bombings were the work of jihadists. Unfortunately, the Spanish people, being the good consumers of European leftwing propaganda that they are, began to blame the Spanish government's involvement in the war in Iraq and ultimately the United States. And, given that a national election was going to be held three days later (what a coincidence!), it was no surprise that the Spanish people took advantage of a golden opportunity to emulate the French and surrendered!

In an amazing turn around in the poll numbers over a three day period, Spaniards managed to oust Prime Minister Jose Aznar of the Popular Party, a man who understands the threat of worldwide jihadism, and replace him with Jose Zapatero of the Socialist Workers' Party, a man who understands appeasement to terrorism. It was very clear from the election results that a majority of the Spanish people agreed with Zapatero to follow the example of Neville Chamberlain and answer terrorism with appeasement. So what have the Islamofascists learned from the Spanish? Simple -- attack us and we will cower before you.

The question is whether the Spanish will learn anything from the Islamofascists. All they really have to is go back a little more than five centuries in their own history when they drove the Moors out of their country to find the reason they are under attack by modern jihadists. It is not because the previous government supported the United States in Iraq -- the terrorists were working in Spain before George W. Bush was even elected to the presidency. It is well known now that since the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks there have been dozens of arrests of Al-Qaeda suspects in Spain, including three of them that were charged with helping plan the attacks. But even that is not the principal reason that Spain is a prime target of modern jihadism. The fact is, under Islam, once a land is Islamic it is always, in perpetuity, Islamic. Therefore, the Islamofascists are only going after what is rightfully theirs.

To paraphrase an American phrase about race and gender, once you go Islamic ... you never go back.

Miracles Do Happen!

2005-03-07T20:42:00.000-07:00

I didn't thing I would ever see the day. I've waited more than thirty-five years for this!

The bad news is that I found out about it after the tickets went on sale. And from what I have read, they were sold out immediately! The good news is that my brother has managed to get a hold of a couple of tickets via contacts in London. Now if I can only convince his wife to give me hers ...

Rough men ...

2005-03-02T15:04:00.000-07:00

People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf.

-- George Orwell

Are his 15 minutes of fame over?

2005-02-28T20:57:00.000-07:00

I guess everyone has heard of Ward Churchill by now. He is the professor of Ethnic Studies at University of Colorado at Boulder. His essay on the 9/11 attacks contained the following gem:

As for those in the World Trade Center, well, really, let's get a grip here, shall we? True enough, they were civilians of a sort. But innocent? Gimme a break. They formed a technocratic corps at the very heart of America's global financial empire – the "mighty engine of profit" to which the military dimension of U.S. policy has always been enslaved – and they did so both willingly and knowingly.

And even worse, this tripe:

If there was a better, more effective, or in fact any other way of visiting some penalty befitting their participation upon the little Eichmanns inhabiting the sterile sanctuary of the twin towers, I'd really be interested in hearing about it.

With the extensive but recent coverage of his essay it has come to light that his Indian heritage is a sham, he exploits Indians, he may have broken copyright law, he has been accused of plagiarism and fabricating evidence, he is a Baathist sympathizer, he advocates terrorism, he hates The Simpsons, he drives a Ferrari and he is a Log Cabin Republican (OK, I made up the last three items).

While the free speech issue is being bandied about, it is really just a red herring. Churchill has no business being a tenured professor in Ethnic Studies. A master’s degree in Communications and teaching the Weather Underground how to build bombs is not good enough. Free speech is not a trump card for plagiarism and lying in scholarly work. I wouldn’t doubt that this guy is a lousy teacher.

I say fire the guy not for what he says but for what he has done. He’s had more than his 15 minutes.

Bat Ye'or and Eurabia

2005-02-27T13:31:00.000-07:00

Early this morning on C-SPAN2, Book TV had a presentation that Bat Ye'or gave at The Hudson Institute in which she discussed her new book Eurabia: The Euro-Arab Axis. Unfortunately I have not read it since my order has not arrived yet. But I have read some of her other works and found them to be excellent. Bat Ye'or is an historian and an authority on dhimmitude. Here is her description of Eurabia from an interview done last year:

Eurabia represents a geo-political reality envisaged in 1973 through a system of informal alliances between, on the one hand, the nine countries of the European Community (EC) which, enlarged, became the European Union (EU) in 1992 and on the other hand, the Mediterranean Arab countries. The alliances and agreements were elaborated at the top political level of each EC country with the representative of the European Commission, and their Arab homologues with the Arab League's delegate. This system was synchronised under the roof of an association called the Euro-Arab Dialogue (EAD) created in July 1974 in Paris. A working body composed of committees and always presided jointly by a European and an Arab delegate planned the agendas, and organized and monitored the application of the decisions.

The field of Euro-Arab collaboration covered every domain: from economy and policy to immigration. In foreign policy, it backed anti-Americanism, anti-Zionism and Israel's delegitimization; the promotion of the PLO and Arafat; a Euro-Arab associative diplomacy in international forums; and NGO collaboration. In domestic policy, the EAD established a close cooperation between the Arab and European media television, radio, journalists, publishing houses, academia, cultural centers, school textbooks, student and youth associations, tourism. Church interfaith dialogues were determinant in the development of this policy. Eurabia is therefore this strong Euro-Arab network of associations -- a comprehensive symbiosis with cooperation and partnership on policy, economy, demography and culture.

Eurabia is the future of Europe. Its driving force, the Parliamentary Association for Euro-Arab Cooperation, was created in Paris in 1974. It now has over six hundred members -- from all major European political parties -- active in their own national parliaments, as well as in the European parliament. The creation of this body and its policy follow the 23 resolutions of the "Second International Conference in Support of the Arab Peoples", held in Cairo in January 1969. Its resolution 15 formulates the Euro-Arab policy and its all-embracing development over thirty years in European domestic and foreign policy.

It stated: "The conference decided to form special parliamentary groups, where they did not exist, and to use the parliamentary platform for promoting support of the Arab people and the Palestinian resistance." In the 1970s, pursuant to the wishes of the Cairo Conference, national groups proclaiming "Solidarity with the Palestinian Resistance and the Arab peoples" appeared throughout Europe. These groups belonged to different political families, Gaullists, extreme left or right, communists, neo-Nazis -- but they all shared the same anti-Americanism and anti-Zionism. France has been the key protagonist of this policy, ever since de Gaulle's press conference on 27 November 1967 when he presented France's cooperation with the Arab world as "the fundamental basis of our foreign policy".

This certainly helps explain the increase in anti-Semitism in Europe and the seemingly ease in which many Europeans are letting their cultures become diminished by the influx of Islam into their countries. The plethora of stories out of the Netherlands, France, Belgium, Britain and other countries in which Muslim immigrants not only do not integrate into the societies but actively undermine them with little resistance from the natives is amazing to me. In the question and answer session after her presentation, Bat Ye'or stated that it is virtually impossible to get any kind of criticism of the Eurabian phenomena published or even discussed.

It has been almost twenty years since I lived in Europe. From what I have read in the media, discussions with friends and colleagues there, and what I have gathered from academics such as Bat Ye'or, it looks like the Europe I knew is disappearing. With the rise of Islamofascism and the capitulation of Europe, I don't doubt that in two or three generations Sharia Law will be the law of the land in Europe.

Merchants of Despair

2005-02-26T19:16:00.000-07:00

Here is an excellent article by Victor Davis Hanson.