A Manifesto Against Radical Islam

The Cartoon War has finally made some stand up and say enough is enough. Michelle Malkin picked up on this gauntlet just tossed down by those sick of the violence, and the death threats, and the bounties placed on those who embrace free speech.

MANIFESTO: Together facing the new totalitarianism

After having overcome fascism, Nazism, and Stalinism, the world now faces a new totalitarian global threat: Islamism.

We, writers, journalists, intellectuals, call for resistance to religious totalitarianism and for the promotion of freedom, equal opportunity and secular values for all.

The recent events, which occurred after the publication of drawings of Muhammed in European newspapers, have revealed the necessity of the struggle for these universal values. This struggle will not be won by arms, but in the ideological field. It is not a clash of civilisations nor an antagonism of West and East that we are witnessing, but a global struggle that confronts democrats and theocrats.

Like all totalitarianisms, Islamism is nurtured by fears and frustrations. The hate preachers bet on these feelings in order to form battalions destined to impose a liberticidal and unegalitarian world. But we clearly and firmly state: nothing, not even despair, justifies the choice of obscurantism, totalitarianism and hatred. Islamism is a reactionary ideology which kills equality, freedom and secularism wherever it is present. Its success can only lead to a world of domination: man's domination of woman, the Islamists' domination of all the others. To counter this, we must assure universal rights to oppressed or discriminated people.

We reject cultural relativism, which consists in accepting that men and women of Muslim culture should be deprived of the right to equality, freedom and secular values in the name of respect for cultures and traditions. We refuse to renounce our critical spirit out of fear of being accused of "Islamophobia", an unfortunate concept which confuses criticism of Islam as a religion with stigmatisation of its believers.

We plead for the universality of freedom of expression, so that a critical spirit may be exercised on all continents, against all abuses and all dogmas.

We appeal to democrats and free spirits of all countries that our century should be one of Enlightenment, not of obscurantism.

12 signatures

Ayaan Hirsi Ali
Chahla Chafiq
Caroline Fourest
Bernard-Henri Lévy
Irshad Manji
Mehdi Mozaffari
Maryam NamazieTaslima Nasreen
Salman Rushdie
Antoine Sfeir
Philippe Val
Ibn Warraq

I insist that we, too, have our names added to this list.

This is not an exercise in hypocrisy. YES, we do beat on the media, and usually on a daily basis. This critique of the media is based on the deception, the lies, the spin, and the misstatements of the media, in general. These people have no compunction about getting the story or facts wrong, and never really apologizing; a correcting is anything but an apology for their mistakes. Those who reside up on high, believeing themselves to be masters of all that they survey, are about to have a hard fall. No one trusts them any longer. The only reason they still have ratiings is because some people in this nation have them as a sole media source. That is changing, and has been for quite some time. Talk radio is now a major medium, and the blogosphere is just getting started.

However, civilized society has never called for the deaths of, or heads of, journalists that they disagree with. They call, snail mail, or e-mail executives to complain about this person or that. Talk radio ridicules these poor saps, and the blogosphere uses them as a punching bag, or as Hugh Hewitt puts it, we are "beating them like bongo drums." But we have NEVER resorted to violence over a column, an editorial, or a cartoon.

Radical Islam has. And to shrink from these animals now will only embolden them. There is such a thing as a "free press" in the West (though some of it is state-controlled in Europe), and with that freedom comes to freedom for them to speak and act like asses. This is their right, and ours is to ignore such outbursts of stupidity; no matter how offending they are, and even if it includes our faith. It is, to us, like water off of a duck's back.

To the Islamicists perpetuating this violence, they have no concept of "live and let live." An offense to Allah, no matter how misperceived, demands only one act and that is retribution. It is the acts of violence we have seen played out for almost four weeks now. And the media's silence on the issue--their refusal to show the public what these people are outraged over--is simple, basic appeasement in it's worst form.

It is appeasement through intimidation. So, where is this vaunted press? The ones so brave to venture to Iraq and Afghanistan, and watch the horrors of war? Where are the brave souls willing to throw all aside to get "the story?" They are nowhere to be found, and even when they are, it is paltry displays by media outlets with more courage than the media elites.

The moderate Muslims above have finally spoken--with one voice--that this is over, and that the cartoonists should not be facing this sort of issue. For a long time, the free world has been waiting for this day; a day in which the silent majority is speaking up, and saying "ENOUGH!" This is also a dark day for the radicals; it signals a significant loss of support amongst their brethren. It was not enough for Zarqawi to lose support in Iraq, and for al Qaeda forces in afghanistan to be crying for assistance. This is the nail in the coffin. This is the domino that will finish off the radicals. IF enough moderates join this movement, the radicals are finished. These are not just simple people.

Michelle's work on rounding up the relevant information was indispensible on this post. Below are snippets explaining who these people are. (TY Michelle)

Ayaan Hirsi Ali
Ayaan Hirsi Ali, from somilian origin, is member of Dutch parliement, member of the liberal party VVD. Writter of the film Submission which caused the assasination of Theo Van Gogh by an islamist in november 2004, she lives under police protection.

Chahla Chafiq
Chahla Chafiq, writer from iranian origin, exiled in France is a novelist and an essayist. She's the author of "Le nouvel homme islamiste , la prison politique en Iran " (2002). She also wrote novels such as "Chemins et brouillard" (2005).

Caroline Fourest
Essayist, editor in chief of Prochoix (a review who defend liberties against dogmatic and integrist ideologies), author of several reference books on « laicité » and fanatism : Tirs Croisés : la laïcité à l'épreuve des intégrismes juif, chrétien et musulman (with Fiammetta Venner), Frère Tariq : discours, stratégie et méthode de Tariq Ramadan, et la Tentation obscurantiste (Grasset, 2005). She receieved the National prize of laicité in 2005.

Bernard-Henri Lévy
French philosoph, born in Algeria, engaged against all the XXth century « ism » (Fascism, antisemitism, totalitarism, terrorism), he is the author of La Barbarie à visage humain, L'Idéologie française, La Pureté dangereuse, and more recently American Vertigo.

Irshad Manji
Irshad Manji is a Fellow at Yale University and the internationally best-selling author of "The Trouble with Islam Today: A Muslim's Call for Reform in Her Faith" (en francais: "Musulmane Mais Libre"). She speaks out for free expression based on the Koran itself. Née en Ouganda, elle a fui ce pays avec sa famille musulmane d'origine indienne à l'âge de quatre ans et vit maintenant au Canada, où ses émissions et ses livres connaissent un énorme succès.

Mehdi Mozaffari
Mehdi Mozaffari, professor from iranian origin and exiled in Denmark, is the author of several articles and books on islam and islamism such as : Authority in Islam: From Muhammad to Khomeini, Fatwa: Violence and Discourtesy and Glaobalization and Civilizations.

Maryam Namazie
Writer, TV International English producer; Director of the Worker-communist Party of Iran's International Relations; and 2005 winner of the National Secular Society's Secularist of the Year award.

Taslima Nasreen
Taslima Nasreen is born in Bangladesh. Doctor, her positions defending women and minorities brought her in trouble with a comittee of integrist called « Destroy Taslima » and to be persecuted as « apostate »

Salman Rushdie
Salman Rushdie is the author of nine novels, including Midnight's Children, The Satanic Verses and, most recently, Shalimar the Clown. He has received many literary awards, including the Booker Prize, the Whitbread Prize for Best Novel, Germany's Author of the Year Award, the European Union's Aristeion Prize, the Budapest Grand Prize for Literature, the Premio Mantova, and the Austrian State Prize for European Literature. He is a Commandeur of the Ordre des Arts et Lettres, an Honorary Professor in the Humanities at M.I.T., and the president of PEN American Center. His books have been translated into over 40 languages.

Philippe Val
Director of publication of Charlie Hebdo (Leftwing french newspaper who have republished the cartoons on the prophet Muhammad by solidarity with the danish citizens targeted by islamists).
Ibn WarraqIbn Warraq , author notably of Why I am Not a Muslim ; Leaving Islam : Apostates Speak Out ; and The Origins of the Koran , is at present Research Fellow at a New York Institute conducting philological and historical research into the Origins of Islam and its Holy Book.

Antoine Sfeir
Born in Lebanon, christian, Antoine Sfeir choosed french nationality to live in an universalist and « laïc » (real secular) country. He is the director of Les cahiers de l'Orient and has published several reference books on islamism such as Les réseaux d'Allah (2001) et Liberté, égalité, Islam : la République face au communautarisme (2005).

And once again I say: Sign us onto this manifesto.

Bunny ;)

Flash Report From Drudge: Bush Likes Us ;)

Not the Asylum directly (oh Hell, that would be a coup, now would it not?) but the New Media in general. Drudge had this up earlier today, and is it ever a news flash. Though, due to the continued, unfettered idiocy of the MSM, I doubt they will report this at all.

BUSH CHEERS DECLINE OF MAINSTREAM MEDIA, RISE OF ALTERNATIVE PRESS
**Exclusive**
ROVE SLAMS DAN RATHER: NOT A 'SERIOUS' REPORTER

President Bush, for the first time, is hailing the rise of the alternative media and the decline of the mainstream media, which he now says “conspired” to harm him with forged documents.

“I find it interesting that the old way of gathering the news is slowly but surely losing market share,” Bush said in an exclusive interview for the new book STRATEGERY. “It’s interesting to watch these media conglomerates try to deal with the realities of a new kind of world.”

[STRATEGERY was ranked #5 on AMAZON.COM's sales chart early Tuesday morning.]

For example, journalist Dan Rather left the anchor chair at CBS News after Internet reporters revealed he had used forged documents to criticize Bush’s military record in September 2004. The forgeries, which Bush now calls a conspiracy, ended up helping his reelection campaign, he acknowledged in the Oval Office interview.

“It looks like somebody conspired to float false documents,” the president tells author Bill Sammon. “And I was amazed about it. I just couldn’t believe that would be happening [and] then it would become the basis of a fairly substantial series of news stories.”

He added: “Then there was a backlash to it. I mean, a lot of people were angry that this could have happened. A lot of Americans are fair people and they viewed this as patently unfair. So in a funny way, I guess it inured to our benefit, when it was all said and done.”

The episode, known as “Memogate,” inoculated Bush against further scrutiny of his National Guard record for the duration of the presidential campaign.“It also, frankly, gave us an opportunity, frequently, when things came out in the media that we didn’t believe or didn’t like, to say, ‘It’s another CBS story,’” said Republican National Committee Chairman Ken Mehlman, who was the president’s campaign manager. “I mean, it gave us a serious response to bad news.”

Although Memogate was initially expected to harm the president, it ended up backfiring spectacularly on the press.

“The guy that it hurt most was Dan Rather and the executives at CBS,” White House strategist Karl Rove said in an interview for STRATEGERY. “It further disgraced a network which is third in ratings and, if you look at the demographics of their consumers, it’s like 70 percent Democrat.” Rove said Rather’s eagerness to broadcast obviously forged documents proves he is “no serious reporter.” As for Rather’s insistence, to this day, that the documents are real, Rove said: “That’s really bias.”Memogate has helped accelerate the decline of the mainstream media, generally defined as CBS, NBC, ABC, The New York Times and other establishment news outlets. “I think what’s healthy is that there’s no monopoly on the news,” Bush said. “There’s competition. There’s competition for the attention of, you know, 290 million people, or whatever it is.

“And the amazing thing about this world we live in is that there’s a kind of free-flowing, kind of bulletin board of ideas and thoughts out there in the ether space, sometimes landing on somebody’s desk and sometimes not, but always available. It’s a very interesting period.” Having long been pilloried by the mainstream media, Bush now finds the rise of the alternative media nothing less than revolutionary. “It’s the beginning of the twenty-first century; it also happens to be the beginning of—or near the beginning—of a revolution in newsgathering and dissemination,” he said. “Not in newsmaking—that tends to be pretty consistent.”

Rove considers Memogate a watershed in the rise of the alternative media.

“The whole incident in the fall of 2004 showed really the power of the 'blogosphere',” he said in his West Wing office.“Because in essence you had now, an army of self-appointed experts looking over the shoulder of the mainstream media and bringing to bear enormously sophisticated skills,” he added.

Still, Rove cautioned that the Internet’s political potential has a darker side.

“There is so much ugliness and viciousness and fundamental untruths that the blogosphere transmits,” he lamented. “It also is a vehicle for ugly rumors, for scurrilous personal attacks, an avenue for the creation of urban legends which are deeply corrosive of the political system and of people’s faith in it.”

Rove said Rather and his producer, Mary Mapes, were gunning for the president and trying to help his challenger, Sen. John Kerry, by broadcasting the forged documents in the heat of the presidential campaign.

“From her body language and his body language, their enthusiasm for this story was in large measure fed by the belief that they were playing a constructive and perhaps determinative role in the presidential campaign,” Rove said of Mapes and Rather.

“They made a decision in this instance – I think quite prematurely and quite unfairly – to pursue a story that attacked the president,” he added. “And I thought it was, to me, one of the most incredible examples of how fundamentally unfair it was.”

Rove expressed astonishment that CBS ignored the warnings of document experts hired by the network to authenticate the National Guard memos.

“It goes back to the failure of the mainstream media, in this instance, to honor their own experts,” he said.

Rove is not the only senior Bush adviser who considers the mainstream media biased against the conservative president. White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card was outraged that the TV networks refused to declare Bush the winner on Election Night, even after all the votes were counted in the pivotal state Ohio and it became obvious Kerry could not win.

“Some of the talking heads,” Card said, “were rooting for a crisis in Ohio. It wasn’t just that they were afraid to admit we had won.”

Card became particularly incensed when Bush’s Ohio lead reached 120,000 votes, which was mathematically insurmountable.

“Nobody wanted to call it so that we had won,” he said. “It was like, c’mon, are they just afraid to say it?”

Developing...

Ouch, ouch, ouch. Dan Rather's not a "serious reporter?" Like this is a news flash? We have known for years that Rather is little more than a simple, partisan hack who has an agenda, and it is so blatantly obvious. His treatment of longtime friend, Bernie Goldberg, shwed where Rather's loyaties lay; it was evident that it was not with true, solid journalism.

The fall of the MSM has been more than evident in recent years as the "long knives" have come out against this president time after time. From the phony memos peddled by CBS and Dan Rather, to the Abu Ghraib, media-driven spin--likewise peddled by CBS--the media dislikes this president. That is so conspicuous that many Americans simply roll their eyes when the Old Media denies it's bias.

But the writing is on the wall, and even the administration sees it. This is a logical assertion with how the White House has embraced the New Media. The president and vice president have made efforts to be interviewed by talk radio hosts, and the administration has opened itself up to the blogosphere. It is time for the MSM to finally make the realization that the dinosaurs did.

"We are dying, and there is nothing we can do to stop our downfall."

That would be music to our ears, and America's ears, if the MSM would make that admission. And no, I am not holding my breath.

Bunny ;)

Hugh Hewitt Sits Down With Bill Sammon

Bill Sammon, journalist extraordinaire, had an interview with Hugh Hewitt today. For those unfamiliar with this man, shame on you. He has put together a number of solid books about President George W. Bush. His newest is Strategery: How George W. Bush Is Defearting Terrorists, Outwitting Democrats, and Confounding the Mainstream Media. And if this one is as good as the preivous one I read, Misunderestimated, then this one will be a guaranteed New York Times runaway bestseller.

The best thing about listening to Bill Sammon is that this man is the senior White House correspondant originally for the Washington Times. He is now the senior White House correspondant for the Washington Examiner--a brand new paper created by a Denver tycoon who has taken Roger Ailes ideas about the media, and transferred it to a newspaper. In short, the paper will be the cage-liner version of FOX News; fair and balanced, and a return to the journalism of old.

Sammon had a lot to say about the White House, and the president, but he hammered on the media, and the fact that there is a vendetta underway to do what ever they can to derail the president. He is blunt and to the point about CBS, Mary Mapes, and Dan Rather, and he points out that CBS refuses to turn away from it's ideology. He pointed out that Dan Rather--a man who has interviewed every president since JFK--has not had one with George W. Bush. And Sammon points out that this is not an accident. Rather has virtually been banned from the White House, and that there won't be an interview with the president in his future.

In short, Sammon was upfront about what he has witnessed from this White House. He's not a band-wagoner; he's a solid journalist who is in the business of covering the White House, whether it's good news or bad. He doesn't spin his information, but rather lets the reader have a first-hand view of what he is privy to. He admitted in the interview that yes, a couple of mistakes have been made. He cited the Harriet Miers debacle, and the fact that President Bush doesn't blame his base for her implosion.

During that particular interview, Sammon asked the president is he misjudged the base's loyalty. The president answered as follows:

"People should stand on principle based on what they believe, not based on upon they should be loyal to me. I was just disappointed for her, as much as anything else. But I understand people who believe strongly about somethingwill speak out about it. And that's just part of the process."

So, to all of those moonbats on the Left that keep claiming this is an imperial presidency, and that the president has no respect for the rights of citizens, this quote kills your argument every time. Had this truly been the imperial presidency they believe in their little fantasy world, then the president would have been extremely upset over the derailing of his nominee. He would have clamped down on his base, and really applied the screws. No, the president didn't do that, and understood that in the great game of politics, you win some and you lose some. That time around he lost. But his track record of accomplishments--a point firmly made by Sammon--outweigh his defeats; the defeats that the MSM continue to hang on, push forward, and ultimately miss the point that the stories are long forgotten.

The transcript should be up soon at RadioBlogger before the end of the night. Please, I insist our readers scan this interview. Not only is it quite telling in the realm of expertise that Sammon possesses, but it lets everyone into the halls of power within the White House.

Publius II

A Couple Of Quickies From Both Of Us ...

First up is me, and I have new news regarding the UAE deal. The following report from the AP wires shows that even the Coast Guard warned the administration over this port deal.

Citing broad gaps in U.S. intelligence, the Coast Guard raised concerns weeks ago that it could not determine whether a United Arab Emirates-based company seeking a stake in some U.S. port operations might support terrorist operations.

The disclosure came during a hearing Monday on Dubai-owned DP World's plans to assume significant operations at six leading U.S. ports. It also clouded whether the Bush administration's agreement to conduct an unusual investigation into the pending takeover's security risks would allay lawmakers' concerns.

The administration said the Coast Guard's concerns were raised during its review of the deal, which it approved Jan. 17, and that all those questions were resolved. London-based Peninsular & Oriental Steam Navigation Co. now handles the port operations.

"There are many intelligence gaps, concerning the potential for DPW or P&O assets to support terrorist operations, that precludes an overall threat assessment" of the potential merger, an unclassified Coast Guard intelligence assessment said.

"The breadth of the intelligence gaps also infer potential unknown threats against a large number of potential vulnerabilities," said the half-page assessment. Officials said it was an unclassified excerpt from a larger document.

In a statement, the Coast Guard said the concerns reflected in the excerpt ultimately were addressed and that other U.S. intelligence agencies answered the questions raised.

The Coast Guard assessment raised questions about the security of the companies' operations, the backgrounds of people working for the companies, and whether other foreign countries influenced operations that affect security.

"We were never told about this and have no information about it," Michael Moore, DP World's senior vice president, said of the excerpt. However, he said it shows "serious and probing" questions were asked and that the initial approval of the deal indicates those questions were answered.

Sen. Susan Collins, chairwoman of the Senate Homeland Security Committee, released the excerpt at a briefing Monday. The Bush administration agreed Sunday to DP World's request for a 45-day investigation of the potential security risks related to the deal. The government did not do such an investigation before approving the deal, even though critics say the law required it.

"I am more convinced than ever that the process was truly flawed," Collins, R-Maine, said after the classified portion of the briefing. "I can only conclude that there was a rush to judgment, that there wasn't the kind of painstaking, thorough analysis that needed to be done, despite serious questions being raised and despite the involvement of a wide variety of agencies."

We are not fans of Sen. Collins here at the Asylum, however this issue goes beyond partisan politics. I share Thomas' apprehensive stance on this deal. We have military people assuring us that the UAE are very good at running their ports, and have done an excellent job in handling the movement and support of the military's hardware over there. However, in this debate, the one thing being missed is the human factor.

Anyone standing against this deal because this is an "Arab" country is a know-nothing relying on their own bigotry. Anyone who claims that they are not nearly the ally that Great Britain is--the previous owner of this contract--have next to no idea what they are talking about. The UAE has been a solid ally in the War on Terror. Do they have their faults and problems. Yes, and that is one of the reasons why we are concerned about the deal. And interview with Claudia Rosett will be up soon on Generalissimo Duane's soon, hopefully. She shed more light on the port deal, and it does not look good. Simply put, the 45 day wait will help the president prove his point, but as more information comes out, like the report above, it looks more and more like this deal is a dead one. That is not a knock against the UAE, but right now, we need to be in control of our ports. Al Qaeda is in the UAE, and the human factor--the possibility that someone may have sympathies for al Qaeda and their jihad, or someone possibly forced into doing something because of kidnapped family members--is simply too great a risk.

Bunny ;)

And now onto me. I picked this up from Hugh's site this afternoon. What is chilling about this statement is that Joel Rosenberg has almost been proven prophetic again, as he envisioned a similar move by Iran in his latest book "The Ezekial Option."

Iran’s president said Monday that his country supports calls for making the Middle East a nuclear arms-free zone, but he also urged the United States and Russia to give up all their atomic weapons as a threat to the region’s stability.

“We believe that these weapons, possessed by the superpowers and the occupiers in our area, are a threat to stability,” Ahmadinejad said.

Flaps Blog

has a full round-up of links regarding the steps in this brewing crisis at that link, in addition to the overhead photos of Iran's nuclear facilities. Please, by all means, go there, and read up on what this fool's been doing.

But to return to the scenario, in the book, it is Russia and Iran demanding that the US and Israel disarm. This comes on the heels of a coup in Russia. So, Mr. Rosenberg is only partially correct. At least, right now. He's been right before, which only creeps me out more about his uncanny knack for nailing the current situation in the world, and being able to prognosticate events unfolding.

But to Ahmadinejad, if he thinks that anyone is taking his "advice" seriously, he smoking too much of his hooka lately. The US will never remove it's last resort from our arsenal. We will stay armed with nukes if for nothing else than a deterent against nutters like this guy. Negotiations are done with Iran. It will stop it's weapons programs, or there will be serious consequences.

Publius II

Moonbats Call For A Coup

This has been covered by a few notable bloggers today including: Little Green Footballs, Michelle Malkin, and Capt. Ed Morrissey. Please take notice of this below; these are the same people advocating against the use of violence.

Storm the White House Multi-Day Event,
Beginning March 15, come when you can and stay as long as you can - we are taking over the White House until they leave.
Torture, Occupation, Genocide - Must End Now.
Wednesday, March 15th 2006 12:00 AM Washington, DC USA

TAKE THE WHITE HOUSE BY STORM - Stop Genocide, Torture and Occupation

For Nat Turner, For Martin and Coretta, For all the Torture and Assassination in Afghanistan, Iraq, Haiti and many others - We will not allow the Slave Holders that Still Prevail in this Country to Rule us any longer. Imprisonment and torture based on race, religion, resources or region is no different than the slavery we sought to abolish years ago. The Administration is Criminal and if they will not step down, we must storm in, show them how many of us do not accept a criminal government. How can we stand by and watch them kill our brothers, sisters, journalists and friends for their dollars?

We are calling on all Member Nations of the U.N., All Representatives and Justices in the World Court and International Criminal Courts, all soldiers and CIA agents and government officials who have been blackmailed by the dictators to incarcerate Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld. The Political Cooperative will put a new government in place that is comprised of people from Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and all the organizations that have finally made us aware of the truth of the savage practices and illegal policies of our government in assassinating our own officials as well as people throughout the world who oppose their criminal activity. We need all of you to save U.S. citizens and Global Victims from their ongoing criminal activity. We are calling on the military, police, citizens and religious organizations to stand with us and help us to bring democracy back to the United States and by doing so, free the world from the wrath, occupation, theft, torture, blackmail and assassination by the Criminals in the United States Government. What they have done all over the world is much worse than what Saddam Hussein has done, so why are they not in jail too? They have admitted to international and national crimes, so why have they not been taken to Court too?

Location: White House, Washington DC 1600 Pennsylvania Ave Washington DC 20500
Contact: Darrow Boggiano admin@politicalcooperative.org 415.409.2611

Sponsored By: We are requesting participation from all members of the United Nations, PFAW, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, Code Pink, police, soldiers, ACLU, CIA, NSA and International Courts of Justice/World Court.

Now we know what these people want. They support an armed coup to take the government. It's now out in the open, and this should show every man, woman, and child in America the lengths these unhinged fanatics are striving for. Washington, DC, if memory serves me correctly, has banned the ownership or carrying of firearms within the city limits except for military and law enforcement officers. I dare these people to show up, armed, and ready to storm the White House as they're threatening. They won't make it too far.

And this should also send a clear message to the country how nutty these people really are. This borders on two-year old temper tantrums; completely unhinged in every way possible because they didn't get their way int he last election, and they don't like a president who refuses to bow at the alter of Kofi Anna, and international criminals like Saddam Hussein, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and Kim Jong-Il. To these people, those men are the patriots, not President Bush.

I don't seem to remember even the extreme conservative groups calling for such a march on Bill Clinton's White House during his eight years in office over his wars. Obviously, these people supported Kosovo, Bosnia, Haiti, and Somalia. When it comes to getting rid of a real threat, like Saddam Hussein, they're opposed to the move in their feeble belief that containment and detente works. When it comes to brutal thugs like those I've listed, appeasement never works; it only emboldens the dictators more than ever.

Let these idiots march on DC. Try to get into the White House (I'm betting that the Secret Service will be watching this crowd closely, and if on the off-chance--one in a million if you ask me--that they do become violent, the Secret Service will do their jobs and drop these moonbats literally dead in their tracks.) I doubt any of these people, or any of these groups actually have the intestinal fortitude to actually try something as hair-brained as their threats above.

I suggest watching this little demonstration. I'm almost positive that the MSM will cover this, and like always, they'll overblow the numbers involved. They'll be lucky to net 5000 at their retarded protest, and the media will peg the numbers at over 100,000. Anyone care to take bets on that? I'm pretty confident in the assessment. And I'm pretty confident that nothing will happen. The slogans and mantras will be out, the signs will read "Bush: War Criminal" and "American Hitler." Maybe they can drag Michael Moore out of the McDonalds he's been hiding in for the past few months, and get Mother Moonbat sheehan to attend and give her views of the president. Regardless, America will see that these people are as nutty as a fruitcake.

Publius II

The Red Cross Rivals Pork-Friendly Congress

Yes, you read that correctly. As Captain Ed points to this piece in the WaPo today.

The American Red Cross paid consultants more than $500,000 in the past three years to pitch its name in Hollywood, recruit stars for its "Celebrity Cabinet" and brand its chief executive as the face of the Red Cross -- just a year before ousting her, according to documents obtained by The Washington Post.

In a $127,000 contract, a Houston corporate image company agreed to create a plan to make Red Cross chief executive Marsha J. Evans the face of the organization as part of a "senior leadership branding project" that ran from October 2003 to November 2004.

At the same time, Evans was laying off workers at the Red Cross's blood-services operations and at its Washington headquarters, as well as eliminating merit pay and limiting travel in a bid to cut millions from the national headquarters' budget.

This sounds strangely familiar, and I liken it to the way the education system is run. Has anyone noticed how the NEA and the Department of Education do not want "merit pay" for good teachers, and instead opt to raise pay based on tenure? Meanwhile the high-ups at the local level are the ones reaping the greater share of their budgets? And yet every year there is more and more money thrown at a failing system, and the fiasco created hardly warrants the raise in budgetary allotments.

The contract with Public Strategies Inc. pledged to secure at least two "media opportunities" a month for Evans and to get her speaking engagements before influential groups.

In December, Evans abruptly announced her resignation after a falling out with the organization's 50-member Board of Governors.

On Friday, the Red Cross defended the contract, saying Public Strategies landed Evans appearances before high-profile business groups and at other get-togethers, thus boosting donations to the organization when it faced financial difficulties in 2003 and 2004, including a depleted Disaster Relief Fund.

Ah, but the question remains as to where that money was actually going. Based on what you read here by the WaPo, it sounds as though the money was spent on things that were not needed. Those in need needed the money more than a sampling of PR stunts and appearances.

One nonprofit leader said hiring consultants to raise the public profile of chief executives, while unusual, could be defended if it increased donations. Even so, she said, the subject is seldom discussed.

It is not the chief executive who needs their profile elevated. It is the organization, as a whole, which translates to advertising dollars to TV outlets to run your commercials asking for donations to needy causes. The Red Cross, in their desire to increase their donations, has basically lied to the public. The money did not go where it was intended to go.

"It surprises me that an organization would do that and spend that amount of money," said Diana Aviv, chief executive of Washington-based Independent Sector, which represents nonprofit groups.

Also in 2003 and 2004, the Red Cross paid a Beverly Hills, Calif., firm $113,900 to promote its name to writers and producers for television and film to get the charity included in story lines.

Red Cross spokeswoman Carrie Martin said the contract has resulted in such successes as Red Cross first-aid kits included in the MTV reality show "The Real World" and Red Cross emergency vehicles used in an episode of the TV drama "The West Wing."

I do not watch "The Real World," and I only tune into "The West Wing" when I need a good laugh. (Believe me, nothing will leave you in stitches more than watching Martin Sheen trying to play the role of the president, and handling crisis after crisis in the Oval Office; the show is anything but "dramatic.") And I am sure that a fair majority of people who tune into the idiot box to watch such tripe barely pay heed to such things in the show. It is like watching a movie that is nothing more than one, two-hour long advertisement for cars, soft drinks, water, or Leftist causes.

Martin said the contracts were a defensive move as well, "to make sure that the Red Cross name and symbol is used appropriately."

How appropriate is it when the money given to a relief organization, such as the Red Cross, is instead spent on a PR campaign? It does not seem too appropriate to me. How about you?

But Peter Dobkin Hall, a specialist on nonprofit groups and a Harvard University lecturer, questioned the strategy's usefulness to the organization, which annually receives more than $500 million in donations.

It's "not as though the Red Cross needed to do it," Hall said. "When disaster happens, people turn to the Red Cross and throw money at them."

Ah, the ability to cut through the garbage and get to the point; TY Mr. Hall. Indeed, the Red cross is one of the first organizations with it's hand extended when crises occur, and donations are needed. EVERYONE knows and recognizes the Red Cross for what it portrayed itself to be. NOW we know different.

In 2003, the charity began paying New York publicist Paul Freundlich $6,000 a month to work in the celebrity world and solicit high-profile personalities for its National Celebrity Cabinet.

Cabinet members agree to participate for a year, attending Red Cross events and taping public service announcements, said Darren Irby, Red Cross vice president of communications and marketing.
Irby said Freundlich has helped the organization negotiate the labyrinth of celebrityhood.

"Working with celebrities has become, over the last decade, a lot more complex with so many more nonprofits engaging with celebrities," Irby said.

Members of the Celebrity Cabinet include actress Keiko Agena of the WB show "Gilmore Girls" and filmmaker Spike Lee.

Nonprofit groups say hiring celebrity "wranglers" is increasingly common among large charities that want to maintain visibility in fame-obsessed America.

And it is also good for that worthless Hollywood ditz or stud to get thier mugs plastered all over my TV. Hollywood has become the town that embraced President Clinton's familiar mantra of "I care," but few uphold it, and even fewer could really care about anything other than themselves, their "buzz," and their latest dose of pap handed out to the mind-numbed people of our nation whose lives seem to revolve around giving these fools any credence whatsoever.

UNICEF has a staff member who solicits celebrities, Save the Children has hired consultants to handle the work and Habitat for Humanity recently designated a staff person to work with celebrities, spokesman Duane Bates said.

Take note of these organization, dear readers. Their hearts, though they may be in the "right place" are hardly worthy of donations; this is especially true for UNICEF, on the heels of the sexual abuse allegations surrounding the UN and its peacekeeping missions.

"We know it's important to engage with celebrities," Save the Children spokeswoman Kate Conradt said.

Daniel Borochoff, president of the American Institute of Philanthropy, which monitors how charities spend their money, isn't impressed.

"They're hoping people will send them money on the basis of celebrity as opposed to good works and effectiveness," he said.

A $3 billion charity, the Red Cross has stumbled in recent years, drawing criticism for its performance after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and Hurricane Katrina in the fall. Its leadership structure is under investigation in Congress. And in the past seven years, it has churned through five acting or permanent chief executives.

And that is what is the real tragedy of this whole story. Once considered one of the premier agencies for handling the needs of those in need--whether it was disaster relief or donations used to help people for health services, such as blood drives--it has been reduced to another petty organization working on it's image. The image it once had was more than enough for them. People knew that when disaster struck, the Red Cross could be counted on. 9/11 opened up a facet of the organization that most would have hoped had stayed swept under the carpet. Katrina showed even more of the mismanagement going on behind the scenes. And now, we have this piece from the WaPo showing just how bad that management really was.

Let this be a lesson for everyone to pay attention who you send your charitable contributions to. Check them out, and make sure that the money you send is going into the hands that need it, rather than those desiring it for their own little pet-project.

Bunny ;)

Time For The MSM To Admit They Were Wrong About WMDs

Saddam's WMDs and programs have been a long-standing point of contention in this nation. The common argument is that he had none, and that the president lied to get us into Iraq. Well, as John Hinderacker of PowerLine points out today, that just isn't true. And Investor's Business Daily backs him up with an editorial entitled "Saddam Had WMD."

Now that Leno and Letterman have had their way with Vice President Cheney's hunting accident and the port controversy, maybe we can get back to something really important — like Saddam's WMD program.

Yes, the linchpin of opposition to the Iraq War — never really strong to begin with — has taken some real hits in recent weeks. And "Bush lied" — the anti-war mantra about the president, Saddam Hussein and weapons of mass destruction — looks the most battered.

Inconveniently for critics of the war, Saddam made tapes in his version of the Oval Office. These tapes landed in the hands of American intelligence and were recently aired publicly.

The first 12 hours of the tapes — there are hundreds more waiting to be translated — are damning, to say the least. They show conclusively that Bush didn't lie when he cited Saddam's WMD plans as one of the big reasons for taking the dictator out.

Nobody disputes the tapes' authenticity. On them, Saddam talks openly of programs involving biological, chemical and, yes, nuclear weapons.

War foes have long asserted that Saddam halted his WMD programs in the wake of his defeat in the first Gulf War in 1991. Saddam's abandonment of WMD programs was confirmed by subsequent U.N. inspections.

Again, not true. In a tape dating to April 1995, Saddam and several aides discuss the fact that U.N. inspectors had found traces of Iraq's biological weapons program. On the tape, Hussein Kamel, Saddam's son-in-law, is heard gloating about fooling the inspectors.

"We did not reveal all that we have," he says. "Not the type of weapons, not the volume of the materials we imported, not the volume of the production we told them about, not the volume of use. None of this was correct."

There's more. Indeed, as late as 2000, Saddam can be heard in his office talking with Iraqi scientists about his ongoing plans to build a nuclear device. At one point, he discusses Iraq's plasma uranium program — something that was missed entirely by U.N. weapons inspectors combing Iraq for WMD.

This is particularly troubling, since it indicates an active, ongoing attempt by Saddam to build an Iraqi nuclear bomb.

"What was most disturbing," said John Tierney, the ex- FBI agent who translated the tapes, "was the fact that the individuals briefing Saddam were totally unknown to the U.N. Special Commission (or UNSCOM, the group set up to look into Iraq's WMD programs)."

Perhaps most chillingly, the tapes record Iraq Foreign Minister Tariq Aziz talking about how easy it would be to set off a WMD in Washington. The comments come shortly after Saddam muses about using "proxies" in a terror attack.

9-11, anyone?

In short, let us repeat: President Bush was right. We had to invade to disarm Saddam — otherwise, he would have completely reconstituted his chemical, nuclear and bio-weapons programs when inspectors left.

Saddam probably knew better than to use them himself against the U.S. But it's likely he wouldn't have hesitated giving one or more to terror groups with which he had routine contact.

Lest you think we're making the case entirely based on these tapes, let us assure you that other evidence — mounting by the day — points to the same conclusion.

We've been very impressed by the story told by Georges Sada, the former No. 2 in Iraq's air force. He has written a book, "Saddam's Secrets," that details how the Iraqi dictator used trucks, commercial jets and ships to remove his WMD from the country. At the time, the move went largely undetected, because Iraq pretended the massive movement of materiel was to help Syrian flood victims.

Nor is Sada alone. Ali Ibrahim, another of Saddam's former commanders, has largely corroborated Sada's story.

So how was Saddam able to use his "cheat and retreat" tactics without being found out? He had help, according to a former U.S. Defense Department official.

"The short answer to the question of where the WMD Saddam bought from the Russians went was that they went to Syria and Lebanon," said John Shaw, former deputy undersecretary of defense, in comments made at an intelligence summit Feb. 17-20 in Arlington, Va.

"They were moved by Russian Spetsnaz (special ops) units out of uniform that were specifically sent to Iraq to move the weaponry and eradicate any evidence of its existence," he said.

These are extraordinary developments. They deserve a full airing in the media, since they essentially validate part of Bush's casus belli for invading Iraq and deposing the murderous Saddam.

But once again, the mainstream media have dropped the ball. They seem more interested in Dick Cheney's marksmanship and American port management than in setting the record straight about one of the most important developments of our time.

Now, let's put this piece--detailing evidence the MSM doesn't want to cover--with this from John, this post where we covered the Weekly Standard piece revolving around Saddam's connections to terrorists, and this post I did documenting Saddam's specific ties to al Qaeda.

Now, I highlighted the point above of using terrorists as "proxies." Can anyone imagine the devestation that would have been caused had any of these animals would have gotten their hands on a WMD? The world dawdled in dealing with him, and those weapons are still out there. The intelligence coming out now not only jusitifies our invasion of Iraq, and the removal of Saddam Hussein, but it vindicates the president. The moonbats that refuse to see this are either simply sheeple afraid of straying from the lemming-like pack mentality of the Left, or they are literally that ignorant. I'm voting for the latter.

It literally matters not. The evidence is coming out left and right on this issue, and the Democrats were wrong. All the antiwar moonbats claiming that "Bush lied, people died" have no leg left to stand on. He had them. He was working on more, including a couple of things that even we didn't know about. His ties to terrorism coupled with his desire for more WMDs--more destructive WMDs--made him a threat that the region could ill afford to have around any longer. And, we're reaching that point wit Iran right now, and like Leno and Letterman, they have chosen to ignore that, too.

Not to worry. At least bloggers know how to keep up with "real" news, as opposed to another agenda-driven, MSM-concocted "conspiracy" theory about who is guilty of what. In closing, I'd just like to add this:

We told you so. Time to wake up, smell the coffee, and pay the piper. Maybe the new mantra should be "The MSM lied, and people continued to die." That is until the US showed up, and put an animal in his own, private cage where he couldn't hurt anyone, or threaten anyone, any longer.

Publius II

The Reason That The Papers Hire Journalists ...

...is because they stink as lawyers. And the New York Times makes no exception in today's editorial.

The administration's tendency to dodge accountability for lawless actions by resorting to secrecy and claims of national security is on sharp display in the case of a Syrian-born Canadian, Maher Arar, who spent months under torture because of United States action. A federal trial judge in Brooklyn has refused to stand up to the executive branch, in a decision that is both chilling and ripe for prompt overturning.

Mr. Arar, a 35-year-old software engineer whose case has been detailed in a pair of columns by Bob Herbert, was detained at Kennedy Airport in 2002 while on his way home from a family vacation. He was held in solitary confinement in a Brooklyn detention center and interrogated without proper access to legal counsel. Finally, he was shipped off to a Syrian prison. There, he was held for 10 months in an underground rat-infested dungeon and brutally tortured because officials suspected that he was a member of Al Qaeda. All this was part of a morally and legally unsupportable United States practice known as "extraordinary rendition," in which the federal government outsources interrogations to regimes known to use torture and lacking fundamental human rights protections.

The key to this case, and one I am sorry to see the New York Times overlook, is that Mr. Arar is not a US citizen. He has no legal rights to protect him. And for them to bring up rendition flights is foolish; President Clinton also ran rendition flights, and those went completely unchallenged by press or courts.

The maltreatment of Mr. Arar would be reprehensible — and illegal under the United States Constitution and applicable treaties — even had the suspicions of terrorist involvement proven true. But no link to any terrorist organization or activity emerged, which is why the Syrians eventually released him. Mr. Arar then sued for damages.

Just a moment here. Is the New York times actually arguing on behalf of our enemy. Read the italicized, bolded statement above. This is reprehensible as far as I am concerned by a press outlet in the United States while the nation is at war. Who out there believes that if such an attempt was made during World War II that there would not have been outrage from the public? Arguing on behalf of the enemy is a clear sign that that person or group is not to be trusted. Of course, the press has not been trusted except by sheeple for quite some time. This really is no surprise, but it is blatant enough for people to see; see, that is, that a media outlet seems to be voicing support of legal protections for the enemy. Yes, Mr. Arar was found not to have any connections to al Qaeda. However, he is still not an American citizen, therefore having no rights, and should not have the right to sue this nation. It was a mistake. We are sorry, but in this day and age--where our enemy likes to blend in with the populace until they strike--I can understand why we moved the way we did.

The judge in the case, David Trager of Federal District Court in Brooklyn, did not dispute that United States officials had reason to know that Mr. Arar faced a likelihood of torture in Syria. But he took the rare step of blocking the lawsuit entirely, saying that the use of torture in rendition cases is a foreign policy question not appropriate for court review, and that going forward would mean disclosing state secrets.

It is hard to see why resolving Mr. Arar's case would necessitate the revelation of privileged material. Moreover, as the Supreme Court made clear in a pair of 2004 decisions rebuking the government for its policies of holding foreign terrorism suspects in an indefinite legal limbo in Guantánamo and elsewhere, even during the war on terror, the government's actions are subject to court review and must adhere to the rule of law.

This is the paragraph in which the times shoots itself in the foot. First off, the two decisions in 2004 (Hamdi v. Rumsfeld, Rasul v. Bush) were indeed in reference to detainees ... at Gitmo. That means those people were caught on the field of battle. The Supreme Court ruled incorrectly on both, in my opinion. However, my opinion does not matter. What the court said does. In Hamdi, as Hamdi was a US citizen, he was entitled to his legal protections under the Constitution. In Rasul, the court ruled that the detainees in Guantanamo Bay had access to the US legal system, and were guaranteed certain leghal protections. Rasul was the grossly inept decision that Mr. Arar's argument is based on. However, Rasul, like Hamdi, had been caught on the field of battle. Not in uniform, not recognized by a commander or a foreign power, he had no protections as a POW. Deemed an illegal combatant--a definition upheld by the Supreme Court in Hamdi; the court did not argue that he had to be held as anything other than an illegal combatant.

With the Bush administration claiming imperial powers to detain, spy on and even torture people, and the Republican Congress stuck largely in enabling mode, the role of judges in checking executive branch excesses becomes all the more crucial. If the courts collapse when confronted with spurious government claims about the needs of national security, so will basic American liberties.

And you just knew they were going to throw the spying charge in. To this day, we still have no solid proof that "torture" is going on abroad. That is not naivete; that is fact. We have only the detainees' word that they have been tortured. As we all know, according to the al Qaeda handbook that detainees are to cry "torture" when they are released. Mr. Arar has done just that. Now, whether that is because he actually was connected to al Qaeda, and it was missed during his interrogation, or that he simply is looking for attention over this will have to be determined by the courts. Furthermore, it will have to be dealt with by the Supreme Court, under Article III provisions ("to Controversies to which the United States shall be a Party"). As for his claim he was tortured, let me just say that through tortured logic, I am taking it with a grain of salt; I honestly do not believe him.

As for the implication that the president and the administration are using "imperial powers," the Times has no clue as to what it is talking about. The detainment of combatants has been upheld by the courts as legal. (Yes, they must have some legal protections, which I disagree with entirely, but they still may be detained; an effort to curb their reentry onto the battlefield.) The "spying" is not that in any sense of the NSA intercept program as it is not targeting US citizens. It is targeting international communication, either originating here in the US or abroad, to keep an eye on our enemy. Many of these intercepts directly target foreign nationals here in the United States, which, like Mr. Arar, have no rights as they are not citizens subject to the Constitutional protections that we possess.

In addition, the United States does not engage in torture, nor do we endorse it's use. We have laws on the books against it. We do not do it. However, media outlets like the Times and the Washington Post seem to think that the interrogation we run in Guantanamo Bay and elsewhere is "torture." There is no torture involved. I suppose that the Times would prefer we serve these people tea and crumpets, and speak politely and civiliy to these people; they might believe that will loosen some lips. Unfortunately, they do not comprehend the religious zealotry utilized by these people, nor do they understand the harsh conditions these people live under, as it is. Being nice is not going to obtain us the information we need from these people. Getting one's hands dirty, and even getting a tad bit surly, can garner more information for us.

What is pure torture, for citizens, is having to endure the utter stupidity of the Times editorial staff. As is common in the past, and has been pointed out on several occasions by blo9ggers far better than myself, is that the times has no concept of jurisprudence whatsoever. The editorial board should be banned from discussing such things unless they have a lawyer look over it to correct the mistakes stated.

Of course with such editorial control over them on such subjects, the Times would not have an editorial to print. The lawyer would laugh himself/herself silly at the ignorance of the staff.

Bunny ;)

Mark Steyn On The Fall Of Europe

Mark Steyn is a regular guest on Hugh Hewitt's show, and the man is positively brilliant. In today's Sun Times, Mark shows the world exactly what is goin on over in Europe when it comes to the rise in Muslims "pilgrims" going to the old country.

In five years' time, how many Jews will be living in France? Two years ago, a 23-year-old Paris disc jockey called Sebastien Selam was heading off to work from his parents' apartment when he was jumped in the parking garage by his Muslim neighbor Adel. Selam's throat was slit twice, to the point of near-decapitation; his face was ripped off with a fork; and his eyes were gouged out. Adel climbed the stairs of the apartment house dripping blood and yelling, "I have killed my Jew. I will go to heaven."

Is that an gripping story? You'd think so. Particularly when, in the same city, on the same night, a Jewish woman was brutally murdered in the presence of her daughter by another Muslim. You've got the making of a mini-trend there, and the media love trends.

Yet no major French newspaper carried the story.

Stop!. Does this surprise anyone at all. I mean, seriously. We were warned years ago by none other than John Bolton that anti-Semitism was on the rise in Europe. This is why he worked closely with those in the UN to take notice of it. Of course, this lasted as long as the ink was wet on the agreements signed by signatories claiming that they would work to curb such actions. The UN, for the most part, is anti-Semitic in nature if not demeanor. How many times has Israel been condemned by the UN for it's retaliatory strikes against terrorists in Gaza? How many nations threw a hissy fit when Israel obtained nuclear weapons? I'm not surprised to find out that no one paid any heed to these stories, especially in snobbish, elitist France.

This month, there was another murder. Ilan Halimi, also 23, also Jewish, was found by a railway track outside Paris with burns and knife wounds all over his body. He died en route to the hospital, having been held prisoner, hooded and naked, and brutally tortured for almost three weeks by a gang that had demanded half a million dollars from his family. Can you take a wild guess at the particular identity of the gang? During the ransom phone calls, his uncle reported that they were made to listen to Ilan's screams as he was being burned while his torturers read out verses from the Quran.

We can discuss moderate Muslims to our heart's content. However, they're not the problem in the world right now. It's the radicals that are, and those same radicals are not only driving the debate, but they're driving the press; that is, of course, when the press wipes that yellow streak down their backs away. Has anyone asked the serious question of why the MSM won't cover events such as this, or why they downplay the Cartoon War? They won't admit it in the open, but I'm sure it's got something to do with their cowardice in the face of an enemy that cares nothing for the vaunted ideals they supposedly uphold. They have an ideology that is bloodthirsty, and as unforgiving as an Arizona summer.

This time around, the French media did carry the story, yet every public official insisted there was no anti-Jewish element. Just one of those things. Coulda happened to anyone. And, if the gang did seem inordinately fixated on, ah, Jews, it was just because, as one police detective put it, ''Jews equal money.'' In London, the Observer couldn't even bring itself to pursue that particular angle. Its report of the murder managed to avoid any mention of the unfortunate Halimi's, um, Jewishness. Another British paper, the Independent, did dwell on the particular, er, identity groups involved in the incident but only in the context of a protest march by Parisian Jews marred by ''radical young Jewish men'' who'd attacked an ''Arab-run grocery.''

Notice how the papers seemed to dwell on the talking points of the anti-Semites? "Jews equal money." This is a constant swipe made by those that dislike Jews. Jews, according to anti-Semites, control everything from the media to the money. Funny that, as the papers pointed out by Mark refused to address both of those issues, and instead the Independent opted to go from reporting on one extreme crime to another, which was nothing compared to the original.

At one level, those spokesmonsieurs are right: It could happen to anyone. Even in the most civilized societies, there are depraved monsters who do terrible things. When they do, they rip apart entire families, like the Halimis and Selams. But what inflicts the real lasting damage on society as a whole is the silence and evasions of the state and the media and the broader culture.

BINGO! Give Mark the fuzzy bunny. The governments of Europe and it's willing press (state-run or controlled, most of them) love to turn a blind eye to the rampant radical Muslim population infiltrating Europe. I know it's been a couple months, but anyone remember the riots in France? All started over two Muslims youths running from the police that were killed, and the Muslim population took to the streets in weeks of rioting night after night. The European press, while it did cover it, refused to tie Muslims to the rioting. And it didn't just apply to the Euro-press. It was going on right here in America, too. As the Washington Times pointed out in an editorial dated 10 November 2005:

In a recent editorial, The Washington Post went so far as to deny any Islamist influence. "[The riots are] not the European version of an intifada: Islamic ideology and leaders play no role in the disturbances, and many of those participating are not Muslim," said the editorial. This is clearly wrong, especially since one week before the riots, The Post reported how Algerian terrorists were singling out younger French citizens for indoctrination.

Other newspapers have been careful to avoid labeling the rioters as anything other than "youths." An article in yesterday's New York Times about the riots never once mentioned the words "Muslim" or "Islam." In stark contrast, the Arab media is all over the story. The Middle East Media Research Institute translated one Saudi columnist who seems to have a better understanding of the conflagration than his Western counterparts. "The fires in Paris also set fire to all [the problems] that had accumulated with regard to Arab immigration... Whoever blames only the French government for the grave situation in these Parisian suburbs is mistaken," he wrote.

The point of this is simple. No one wants to call a spade a spade. And in the politically-correct world, the PC people are going to lose badly. They can't seem to see the forest through the trees when it comes to radical Islam. Treating these people with kid gloves is not the answer.

A lot of folks are, to put it at its mildest, indifferent to Jews. In 2003, a survey by the European Commission found that 59 percent of Europeans regard Israel as the "greatest menace to world peace." Only 59 percent? What the hell's wrong with the rest of 'em? Well, don't worry: In Germany, it was 65 percent; Austria, 69 percent; the Netherlands, 74 percent. Since then, Iran has sportingly offered to solve the problem of the Israeli threat to world peace by wiping the Zionist Entity off the face of the map. But what a tragedy that those peace-loving Iranians have been provoked into launching nuclear armageddon by those pushy Jews. As Paul Oestreicher, Anglican chaplain of the University of Sussex, wrote in the Guardian the other day, "I cannot listen calmly when an Iranian president talks of wiping out Israel. Jewish fears go deep. They are not irrational. But I cannot listen calmly either when a great many citizens of Israel think and speak of Palestinians in the way a great many Germans thought and spoke about Jews when I was one of them and had to flee."

If I may correct Mr. Oestriecher, Jews in Israel don't dislike or distrust all Palestinians. There are many Palestinians that have abided by the Israeli government's laws, and live peacefully there. They vote, they work, they participate in the political process. Again, the Jews dislike and distrust the radicals within the Palestinian Authority. Remember those radicals? The same ones who after getting their noses wacked with a Hellfire missile, they cry foul, demand a truce, only to retunr later renewed and reinvigorated, and start lobbing missiles and sending suicide bombers into Israel proper? Yeah, sorry, but the Anglican chaplain's way off base on his assessment. And why is it that in his statement he practically justifies the rhetoric emanating from Tehran. Ahmadinejad is a completely insane nut, and if he gets a nuke--just one--he's going to drop that rock on Jerusalem. Make no mistake, radical Islam has been waiting for the day to remove their enemies from the face of the planet. Israel is target number one, and the West is target number two. The West was put on notice last November with the riots that broke out in France. Of course, Europe was asleep at the wheel, and missed the memo.

It's not surprising when you're as heavily invested as the European establishment is in an absurd equivalence between a nuclear madman who thinks he's the warm-up act for the Twelfth Imam and the fellows building the Israeli security fence that you lose all sense of proportion when it comes to your own backyard, too. "Radical young Jewish men" are no threat to "Arab-run groceries." But radical young Muslim men are changing the realities of daily life for Jews and gays and women in Paris, Brussels, Amsterdam, Copenhagen, Oslo and beyond. If you don't care for the Yids, big deal; look out for yourself. The Jews are playing their traditional role of the canaries in history's coal mine.

Something very remarkable is happening around the globe and, if you want the short version, a Muslim demonstrator in Toronto the other day put it very well:

''We won't stop the protests until the world obeys Islamic law.''

HELLO! ANYONE LISTENING TO THIS? It can't be said any plainer that what is above. The radicals are our enemy. They have made this more than apparent. And if the appeasers, the kumbaya crowd, and the ostriches in the world want to ignore this. Fine. Stick your heads in the sand. Better yet, go back to the sandbox with the children. The adults will handle this. We'll deal with the radicals. All we ask is that you stay out of our way.

Stated that baldly it sounds ridiculous. But, simply as a matter of fact, every year more and more of the world lives under Islamic law: Pakistan adopted Islamic law in 1977, Iran in 1979, Sudan in 1984. Four decades ago, Nigeria lived under English common law; now, half of it's in the grip of sharia, and the other half's feeling the squeeze, as the death toll from the cartoon jihad indicates. But just as telling is how swiftly the developed world has internalized an essentially Islamic perspective. In their pitiful coverage of the low-level intifada that's been going on in France for five years, the European press has been barely any less loopy than the Middle Eastern media.

What, in the end, are all these supposedly unconnected matters from Danish cartoons to the murder of a Dutch filmmaker to gender-segregated swimming sessions in French municipal pools about? Answer: sovereignty. Islam claims universal jurisdiction and always has. The only difference is that they're now acting upon it. The signature act of the new age was the seizure of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran: Even hostile states generally respect the convention that diplomatic missions are the sovereign territory of their respective countries. Tehran then advanced to claiming jurisdiction over the citizens of sovereign states and killing them -- as it did to Salman Rushdie's translators and publishers. Now in the cartoon jihad and other episodes, the restraints of Islamic law are being extended piecemeal to the advanced world, by intimidation and violence but also by the usual cooing promotion of a spurious multicultural "respect" by Bill Clinton, the United Church of Canada, European foreign ministers, etc.

The I'd-like-to-teach-the-world-to-sing-in-perfect-harmonee crowd have always spoken favorably of one-worldism. From the op-ed pages of Jutland newspapers to les banlieues of Paris, the Pan-Islamists are getting on with it.

The one-worldism that the radicals believe in is anything but peace and harmony. Even if we were to imagine a world like Robert Ferrigno paints for us in his newest novel, it would still be one where sharia would rule. That's what these people keep forgetting. The radicals don't want moderation, they want domination. Europe can turn a blind eye to it, much the way it did when Hitler rose to power in 1933, but we can't afford to. Not with our enemy willing to resort to the measures they went to in 2001.

Mark's correct on so many levels, and it's a shame that the Euro appeasers and the kumbaya crowd can't see it. That's their problem. And like Ike, we'll save the world from itself again.

Whether it likes it or not.

Publius II

Iran's Newest Threat

OK. If I were Iran and Ahamdinejad, I'd quit while I were ahead. They haven't though, and Haaretz, out of Israel, has the latest.

If the United States launches an attack on Iran, the Islamic republic will retaliate with a military strike on Israel's main nuclear facility, an advisor to Iran's Revolutionary Guard said.

The advisor, Dr. Abasi, said Tehran would respond to an American attack with strikes on the Dimona nuclear reactor and other strategic Israeli sites such as the port city of Haifa and the Zakhariya area.

Haifa is also home to a large concentration of chemical factories and oil refineries.

Zakhariya, located in the Jerusalem hills is - according to foreign reports - home to Israel's Jericho missile base. Both Israeli and international media have published commercial satellite images of the Zakhariya and Dimona sites.

Abasi, a senior lecturer at Tehran University, was quoted in the Roz internet news site, identified with reform circles in Iran.

Iranian affairs experts believe Abasi's statements are part of propaganda battle being wages by all sides - including Israel and Iran - in the lead up to next months United Nations Security Council debate on Iran's nuclear program.

At this stage, the possibility that sanctions will be leveled at Iran are extremely low.

Regardless of the outcome of the Security Council meeting, a move must be made by the West to prevent them from reaching the point where they have these weapons. If this involves funding and supplying the dissident movement there, so be it. But this clear threat--the umpteenth one in months--towards Israel is only making matters worse. We're not saying they have to best buddies with Israel, but they've got to know that Israel isn't taking this announcement lying down.

The IDF and air force have been preparing for a strike on Iran for months. They know that an airstrike is a virtual suicide mission; distance alone being a highly contentious matter in the planning for such a strike. I support the move by Israel, but I also support the US helping Israel, and in doing so we'll be helping the world. Iran isn't a threat if you defang them, and soon. But time is running out, and the rhetoric flying around right now is sucking all of the oxygen out of the room.

One thing is certain:If Iran gains the ability to create nuclear weapons, the world will have crossed the Rubicon, and there will be no turning back at that point. We will consistently stand on the brink of nuclear war, perpetuated by a madman who believes he will usher in the mahdi. It's time to deal with Iran, and I can assure our readers that this won't be pretty.

Publius II

No Civil War Today, Guys ...

Before I get started, I would like to urge our readers to check out Laura Lee Donohoe's new digs. Like when Thomas and I left AOL's journals for a better site, she has done the same. Please, by all means, visiting Laura over at the newWide Awake Cafe.

The civil war that had been predicted in Iraq--the one breathlessly waited for by the Left--is not coming. According to The Australian, Moqtada al Sadr, the Muslim cleric that gave us so many problems in Fallujah, has averted the war by negotiating a peace between Sunnis and Shiites. The violence was sparked when the Al Askari mosque was blown up on the 22nd of this month.

THE movement of Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, alleged to have played a role in the anti-Sunni violence over the last few days, publicly made peace with political and religious Sunni leaders overnight.Four sheikhs from the Sadr movement made a "pact of honour" with the conservative Sunni Muslim Scholars Association, and called for an end to attacks on places of worship, the shedding of blood and condemning any act leading to sedition.

The agreement was made in the particularly symbolic setting of Baghdad's premier Sunni mosque Abu Hanifa where the Shiite sheikhs prayed under the guidance of Sunni imam Abdel Salam al-Qubaissi.
The meeting was broadcast on television and the religious leaders all "condemned the blowing up of the Shiite mausoleum of Samarra as much as the acts of sabotage against the houses of God as well as the assassinations and terrorisation of Muslims".

The statement made reference to the key concerns of both communities with the violent aftermath to the attack on the Samarra mausoleum which saw more than 119 people die.

The sheikhs condemned "those who excommunicate Muslims" a reference to the "takfireen" or Islamist extremists like Abu Musab al-Zarqawi who justify killing fellow Muslims by declaring them non-Muslims.

"It is not permitted to spill the Iraqi blood and to touch the houses of God," said the statement, adding that any mosques taken over by another community should be returned.

The meeting also announced the formation of a commission to "determine the reasons for the crisis with a view to solving it", while also calling for a timetable for the withdrawal of US troops.

So, let me get this straight ... a truce has been reached, and the bloodshed ends. Both sides agree that they need to address some issues. And they are also considering coming up with a timetable to finally give the US military their leave. Hmm ... that does not sound like a nation on the verge of civil war.

That sounds like a brand new nation, embracing it's newly-founded freedoms, that was left to their own for the most part during this problem. And that mature nation is now dealing with it's issues in a mature way. They are addressing their problems in a peaceful, meaningful manner.

Maybe the reast of the world on fire in the Cartoon War could take a few notes. After all, the Al Askari mosque is considered one of the most holy sites in all of Islam, behind Mecca and Medina. The remains of the tenth and eleventh imams rest there. Those that perpetuated the bombing carried out the operation in the hope that they could plunge the nation into civil war. It did not work.

And in my opinion, we may wish to look no further to prime suspect number one--Musab al Zarqawi--and suspect number two--Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Both would have benefitted greatly from such an outcome. Zarqawi would have received his unrest to tear the rest of Iraq apart. Ahmadinejad, the one who blamed the US and the Jews for the bombing, would have destabilized a country that has been a blood enemy for years, and would have allowed him to send in his people to finish the job, thereby taking Iraq right from under our noses.

Kudos to Sadr, though I still do not trust the cleric from Iran, for working more towards peace, and less towards jihad and violence.

Bunny ;)