Quote of the day - Thomas Sowell

In a market economy, the costs created by our decisions are explicit. In a government-controlled economy, those costs are not explicit. This is a great advantage for government officials and a great disadvantage for the general public, which ends up paying the costs, whether or not they are aware of what those costs are.

Thomas Sowell

Qutoe of the day - Ann Coulter

Democrats always assure us that deterrence will work, but when the time comes to deter, they're against it.

Ann Coulter

Quote of the day - Ayn Rand

Do not ever say that the desire to "do good" by force is a good motive. Neither power-lust nor stupidity are good motives.

Ayn Rand

Goodnight Moon, Clement Hurd, The Commissar Vanishes, MSM Lie # 52

H/T Michelle Malkin for the story of the doctoring of the photograph of Clement Hurd, the illustrator of the classic childrens book, Goodnight Moon. The publisher has doctored the photograph of the illustrator in recent editions of the book to white out a cigarette in Hurd's hand.

from the New York Times

Check out Michelle Malkin for the whole story. I am pleasantly surprised that the Times would even mention this story, let alone publish the photos.

This story reminded me of a book I saw on the shelf years ago. "The Commissar Vanishes" is described as follows by Amazon.com:

In Stalinist Russia, it was commonplace for Soviet history to be rewritten with inconvenient participants removed--often men or women who had aided the Communist Revolution in the early days and then had somehow fallen afoul of Stalin himself. In The Commissar Vanishes, English art historian David King assembles an impressive body of photographs and artwork that shows the process whereby a hero could overnight be made into villain. "The physical eradication of Stalin's political opponents at the hands of the secret police was swiftly followed by their obliteration from all forms of pictorial existence," King rightly notes: in one noteworthy sequence reproduced on the cover, a photograph of Stalin with three revolutionary leaders is airbrushed and cropped and clipped until, one by one, those leaders disappear and only Stalin is left--conveying the message that Stalin carried the Russian Revolution by himself. Another photograph from the 1920s depicts a meeting of dozens of trade-union and Bolshevik leaders; by the late 1930s, all but a handful of them had been murdered at Stalin's orders. King's work restores some of these men and women to history and illustrates the essential inhumanity of totalitarian thought.

I never bought the book, so I will have to take Amazon's word at face value.



I realize that Stalinist Russia and Goodnight Moon are worlds apart. But the difference is only one of degree. I take the rewriting of history very seriously. If the left believes it can rewrite history for our own good, what else will it do?
The rewriting of history is a prerequisite for tyranny.
------------
previous photo lies - USA Today demonizes Condoleezza Rice.

- AP misprepresents the photos of a Giuliana Sgrena’s car.

Complete list of lies of 2005.

Quote of the day - Joe Sobran

When a tabloid headlined "HITLER IS ALIVE," one's first
reaction was: "Oh, rats!" Luckily the report appeared to be
baseless. But THE NEW YORKER reports that some of Hitler's
relatives wound up in the United States -- in, of all places,
the New York City area. (Of *course* they changed their
names, dummy!) Meanwhile, some of the German branch of the
family are still fighting legal battles over the royalties
from MEIN KAMPF. Hope springs eternal, doesn't it? All of
which reminds me: when I lived in New Jersey, I sometimes used
to see a plump little woman, vaguely familiar-looking, on the
morning bus to New York. At first I paid little attention to
her; but eventually I learned that she was Svetlana Stalin. I
wish I could have gotten to know her, but I could never quite
think of an appropriate way to introduce myself. You try it.

Joe Sobran

A Katie Couric/Matt Lauer mad-lib

I was never a big fan of mad libs, but Katie Couric and Matt Lauer gave us all an opportunity to play the mad lib game with their Thanksgiving day Macy's parade broadcast. The following is the Breitbart account of NBC's failure to mention the balloon that went off course and injured two bystanders:

During its live coverage of the [1] annual Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade, NBC did not tell viewers that [2] a giant balloon had caught on a street lamp and injured two sisters.

At the point in the broadcast when [3] the "M&M's Chocolate Candies" balloon was supposed to have crossed the finish line, announcers Katie Couric, Matt Lauer and Al Roker stuck close to their scripts and the network ran footage of [4] the balloon from last year's parade.

emphasis and numbers added

One can replace the highlighted portions with the following phrases, and the story would be equally true. The numbers on the list below correspond with the numbers in the parade story above.

1. war
election
economy


2. thousands of terrorists have been killed
Democratic candidate committed a gaffe
the leading economic indicators were up for the sixth months in a row


3. something positive happened in Iraq
the Democrats were imploding
the stock market was rallying


4. Cindy Sheehan
Vietnam
some homeless person


Just pick the items from the numbered list above and insert them into their proper place in the parade story. I will try to think of more examples later.

Quote of the day - T.S. Eliot

Half the harm that is done in this world is due to people who want to feel important. They don't mean to do harm-- but the harm does not interest them. Or they do not see it, or they justify it because they are absorbed in the endless struggle to think well of themselves.

-- T. S. ELiot

Two protests: Sheehan and Jordanians against Zarqawi

The MSM/DNC news outlets have spent much of the day focusing on Cindy Sheehan's latest protest, even though her protest features only about a dozen protesters.


Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of Jordanians take to the streets to demand Zarqawi's head, and the MSM/DNC falls silent. Mark Steyn sums up the anti-Zarqawi Jordanian protests:

True, he did manage to kill a couple of dozen Muslims. But what's the strategic value of that? Presumably, it's an old-fashioned mob heavy's way of keeping the locals in line. And that worked out well, didn't it? Hundreds of thousands of Zarqawi's fellow Jordanians fill the streets to demand his death.

Did they show that on the BBC? Or are demonstrations only news when they're anti-Bush and anti-Blair? And look at it this way: if the "occupation" is so unpopular in Iraq, where are the mass demonstrations against that? I'm not talking 200,000, or even 100 or 50,000. But, if there were just 1,500 folks shouting "Great Satan, go home!" in Baghdad or Mosul, it would be large enough for the media to do that little trick where they film the demo close up so it looks like the place is packed. Yet no such demonstrations take place.

So what is the difference between the Sheehan and the anti-Zarqawi protests? Sheehan believes that America is "not worth dying for", while the Jordanian protesters are demanding the head of one of America's leading enemies. So naturally the MSM/DNC provides free publicity to a dozen people who follow an America-hater, while ignoring hundreds of thousands who wish to eliminate one of America's enemies. Draw your own conclusions.
--------------------
previous - AP lies in support of Cindy Sheehan.

Quote of the day - Thomas Sowell

People on the political left not only have their own view of the world, they have a view of the world which they insist on attributing to others, regardless of what those others actually say. A classic example is the "trickle down theory," which no one has ever advocated, but which the left insists on fighting against.

Thomas Sowell

Classics of Conservatism - part XIII - Garet Garrett - Salvos Against the New Deal

Click here for previous editions of Classics of Conservatism.

This month's Classic book recommendation has been featured on the sidebar since the early days of this blog. "Salvos Against the New Deal" is one of several books featuring compilations of the writings of Garet Garrett. [I first recomended one of Garrett's books in December of 2004.]

[Click here for my Garet Garrett blog.]









"Salvos Against the New Deal" features a compilation of Garrett's articles from the Saturday Evening Post from 1932 through 1940. This compilation was edited in 2002 by Bruce Ramsey, today's leading expert on Garet Garrett. As I wrote at the Garet Garrett blog:

Garrett was an early to mid 20th century conservative writer whose books and articles challenged the New Deal policies of Franklin Roosevelt. He also did much more than that. As a novelist, essayist and editor for the Saturday Evening Post, Garrett provided a remarkable advocacy of capitalism and freedom.

"Salvos" is important for many reasons, not the least of which is that the rediscovery of Garrett's works signals possibly the end of a long retreat, during which conservatives have refused to challenge the basic assumptions underlying the New Deal. Conservatives have tried to challenge leftist policies on the basis that they were not "practical" or that today's policies go beyond the original intentions of the New Deal creators (e.g. the Social Security debate).

But Garrett challenges the original New Deal policies themselves. He gives conservatives reasons to be proud of their conservatism, especially when it comes to domestic policy.



"Salvos" provides a clear picture of how our government came to be ruled by bureaucrats and how Congress surrendered its constitutional authority to these unelected rulers.

Almost as importantly, Garrett provides descriptions of some of the labor battles of the 1930's. We can see the roots of how unionization eventually brought down the American automobile industry and the steel industry. The fruits of these battles loom large over our lives today.

Garrett prophetically discusses the New Deal's exercise of pharoah-like powers in building the pyramids of our time.

Most importantly, Garrett describes what the government did to our money. No domestic policy can be rationally discussed without understanding what money is and how government manipulates and destroys its value. [And the best part is, the discussion is written in layman's terms and is quite gripping.]

Once I discovered Garrett's writings, I discovered that any attempt to discuss modern economics, government, spending, taxing, regulating, business, etc. is useless without the background that Garrett gives us.

Quote of the day - C.S. Lewis

Humans are amphibians - half spirit and half animal. As spirits they belong to the eternal world, but as animals they inhabit time.

C. S. Lewis

Quote of the day - Mark Steyn

Happily for Mr Zarqawi, no matter how desperate the head-hackers get, the Western defeatists can always top them. A Democrat Congressman, Jack Murtha, has called for immediate US withdrawal from Iraq. He's a Vietnam veteran, so naturally the media are insisting that his views warrant special deference, military experience in a war America lost being the only military experience the Democrats and the press value these days. Hence, the demand for the President to come up with an "exit strategy".

Mark Steyn

Quote of the day - Chris Matthews

"The person on the other side is not evil -- they just have a different perspective."

Chris Matthews


See reverse vampyr for more on Chris Matthews and the "different perspective".

Previous quote-of-the-day from Chris Matthews here.

The leftist media bias is getting more overt and blatant.

Drudge's lead story tonight is the following (the Drudge link is expected to change, so I copy the entire post):

At 11:04:45 AM ET Monday CNN was airing Vice President Dick Cheney's speech live from the American Enterprise Institute in Washington -- when a large black 'X' repeatedly flashed over the vice president's face!

The 'X' over Cheney's face appeared each time less than a second, creating an odd subliminal effect.

As this DRUDGE REPORT screen capture reveals, while one 'X' flashed over Cheney's face CNN ran a headline at the bottom of its screen: "CHENEY: I DO NOT BELIEVE IT IS WRONG TO CRITICIZE."

One top White House source expressed concern about what was aired over CNN.

"Is someone in Atlanta trying to tell us something?"

A CNN spokesman did not return repeated calls late Monday night.

I don't pretend to know exactly what this means, but I think it helps reveal something about the growing blatantness of the MSM/DNC bias. Bias does not originate exclusively with producers or reporters. The technicians and bit players at the networks appear to be frustrated, angry and willing to vent in the form of unusual gimmicks aimed at Republicans.

This is not the first time something like this has happened in recent months. MSM/DNC bias remains somewhat of a mystery. We don't always know who originates individual instances of bias or how these attacks are approved. We can judge only by the results.

Thank you U.A.W.

for this . . . .


"If I went to work in a factory, the first thing I'd do would be to join a union." Franklin D. Roosevelt









mission accomplished

Quote of the day - Mark Steyn

Nonetheless, by 2010, more elderly white Catholic ethnic frogs will have croaked and more fit healthy Muslim youths will be hitting the streets. One day they’ll even be on the beach at St Trop, and if you and your infidel whore happen to be lying there wearing nothing but two coats of Ambre Solaire when they show up, you better hope that the BBC and CNN are right about there being no religio-ethno-cultural component to their ‘grievances’.

Mark Steyn

Clinton believes the war on terror to be inconsequential

NewsBusters provides this quote from Bill Clinton at Clinton's Global Initiative conference this fall.

"[W]e have become arrogant in the present. All of us. Osama bin Laden's arrogant in the present. I mean, he really thinks it matters if he blows us up and kicks a few thousand American soldiers out of Saudi Arabia or whatever. And we really think it matters if we blow him up, more than how we all live and how people will be living 100 years from now."

This is a peek into how the Clintons would treat the war on terror should they retake the White House in 2008.

Bill Clinton hopes that we never catch on to the historic nature of events now unfolding in Europe and elsewhere. Clinton hopes that we miss the fact that a millenium and a half of European history is coming to an end.

Previous - The End of Europe as we Know it.

Clinton also hopes that we forget the long list of Islamic terrorist acts against the West so that the Left can continue to blame George W. Bush and the invasion of Iraq for all such prior acts.
------------------------------------
update
I wonder how this "so what" meme will come into play if the stories of Al-Zarqawi's death prove to be true.

The MSM/DNC's playbook is very rich, deep and flexible. MSM/DNC will scream with rage because we haven't yet won the war, but every victory along the way is met with a ready-made "so what?" [I wonder if Howard Dean has yet figured out whether the world is safer without Saddam Hussein.]

Michelle Malkin fights back against necklacing

I am always happy for an excuse to put an attractive woman's photo on my blog - and I hadn't seen this particular photo before.

And, btw, Michelle's post is good also.

Her post speaks for itself.








The left's strategy these days seems to be:

1) Lie about history.

2) Surrender (if you don't have to vote openly for it).

3) Necklace minority conservatives to keep them in line.

Michelle's post today focuses on part 3 as it applies to her.

With regard to her husband, she writes:

He started off as a Berkeley-born Dukakis liberal; I was a congenital conservative who helped him see the light.

[I feel safe in making this next statement because my wife doesn't read my blog.] Michelle would not have had to help ME see the light, but I suppose that is water under the bridge now.

Quote of the day - Joe Sobran

The arguments against state-controlled churches apply with equal force to state-run schools. No free society allows the state to claim authority over the mind.

Joe Sobran

Ninth Circuit rules that Muslim indoctrination is acceptable in public schools

A year ago I posted an item about "Islamic methods for spreading their religion in American public schools." The most important part of the Islamic indoctrination in American public schools is the Muslims' long term strategy:

What is most dangerous about this indoctrination is the Islamic belief that once a person recites certain Islamic prayers, that person is a muslim, whether they intended to be or not. It does not matter, in the eyes of Islam, that the student did not understand or believe the prayer. If that person ever violates Islamic law -by marrying a non-muslim without clerical permission, for example, that person can lawfully (Islamic law) be killed as a traitor to the faith. It will be much easier for terrorists to rally their followers to commit mass murder in California now that thousands of children have recited certain Islamic prayers in public schools. The Islamist leaders will have much greater Islamic justification to rally their followers to commit acts of terror.

emphasis in original

Despite the inherent danger from continued Islamic indoctrination, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has given its permission to the dhimmis and muslims to push the indoctrination accelerator to the floor. H/T Jawa.

Even if the Islamic role playing in school creates no converts, Islamists are emboldened. Can't the school teachers in California at least warn the children of the consequences of reciting the Islamic prayers? Any school teacher that does not do so cannot claim to be concerned about the welfare of children (or any other noble sounding platitude). The teachers that lead the children to slaughter in this fashion are just as evil as a Congressman that denies the existence of 9/11 in order to advocate surrender in wartime.
----------------------------
11-21-05 update
Michelle Malkin posts more detail, including a recommendation for this book -



to counter the indoctrination.

John Murtha believes that 9/11 never happened.

"Well, I say that the fight against Americans began with Abu Ghraib. It began with the invasion of Iraq. That's when terrorism started."

Congressman John Murtha - 11/17/05

[H/T Lifelike Pundits for the link to the PBS transcript.]

Over the past four years, we have been treated to numerous theories about what "really" happened on 9/11, including (1) the idea that Bush planned the attack in order to start a war for oil and (2) the belief that the attack was perpetrated by the jooooooos. [I don't have citations to those responsible for these theories. Check out the archives of Daily Kos or Howard Dean's hard drive if you are really interested.] We also heard from the left and the perpretators of the 9/11 commission that George Bush is at fault for failing to prevent the attacks. If only Bush had listened to Richard Clarke. . . .

But now we learn the real truth from Congressman Murtha. The 9/11 attacks never happened at all! Terrorism actually started in 2003 - not in 2001 or before.

For years the MSM/DNC has tried to erase the memory of the terrorist attacks on the U.S. embassies in Africa, the Achille Lauro, flight 847 and others. As I wrote on the anniversary of the Achille Lauro attack:

The MSM/DNC prefers to remain silent about this anniversary because it wants us to believe that terrorism began during the Presidency of George Bush - just like hurricanes.

Murtha has taken this strategy one step further by coming as close as one can to explicitly denying the existence of 9/11.
As Lifelike Pundits wrote:

These are the words of a liar or an idiot.

As I wrote on the anniversary of the embassy attacks more than four months ago:

The slightest emphasis on today's anniversary would destroy the MSM/DNC meme, which blames George Bush for all terrorism. Even the slightest mention of this story would remind Americans that terrorism began BEFORE the U.S. led invasion of Iraq.

For the benefit of the left and the MSM/DNC, here is a chronology:

(1) Global terrorism occurred many times over the past thirty or more years.

(2) We began to fight back, including the liberation of Afghanistan and Iraq.

(3) The MSM/DNC began a relentless campaign to reverse the order of ## 1 and 2 in the minds of the public. That is a very difficult task. Judging from the last election, this strategy has worked with only 47% of the voters.

That task requires the MSM/DNC to bury many facts down the memory hole. The victims in Nairobi and Tanzania are mere inconveniences to be forgotten in the MSM/DNC's mad rush to play politics and rewrite history.

This never happened, according to "Decorated war hero" and Democratic "hawk" John Murtha















--------------------
Update - Mudville Gazette posts an additional history lesson to counteract the left's revisionism. H/T Michelle Malkin.

Quote of the day - C.S. Lewis

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

C. S. Lewis

Those Ann Coulter archives really come in handy - Democratic hypocrisy on Iraq

One of the reasons we love Ann is that her predictions so often come true. This quote is from Ann's column of January 29, 2003:

In 1991, Kerry voted against the Gulf War, saying the country was "not yet ready for what it will witness and bear if we go to war." Having been taunted for that vote and that prediction ever since, this time Kerry made sure to vote in favor of war with Iraq. This will allow the New York Times to describe him as a "moderate Democrat" forevermore. Indeed, a surprisingly large number of Democrats voted for the war resolution last October. But as soon as the November elections were over, Democrats like Kerry began aggressively attacking the very war they had just voted for.

These Democrats want to have it both ways. If the war goes well – a lot of them voted for war with Iraq, didn't they? But if the war does not go well, many of the very Democrats who voted for the war resolution will have emerged as leading spokesmen for the anti-war position. A vote for the war, surrounded by Neville Chamberlain foot-dragging, is a fraud.

emphasis added

Ann Coulter predicted the John Murtha scam almost two years ago.

"The Democrats didn't invent war heroes. What they invented is the scam of deploying war heroes to argue for surrender."

Ann Coulter [from a column that originally appeared February 4, 2004]
--------------------------------------
Update
Wizbang comments on Murtha.

Walter Williams, Tony Blankley, The West's Last Chance

Walter Williams is guest hosting today for Rush Limbaugh. Walter's guest this hour is Tony Blankley, who is discussing this book:



I haven't read it, so I cannot endorse it. But the concept is similar to the issues that the French riots and the entire war on terror have raised.

------------
Update
Previous - The End of Europe as we Know it and The French riots have taught us nothing.

Congressman Murtha does it again

On May 6th, 2004 - six months before the Presidential election - Democratic Congressman Murtha stood side by side with Nancy Pelosi and declared that "we cannot prevail" in the war in Iraq.

Yesterday, Murtha once again read from a prepared statement and called for American troops to cut and run in the face of Al Qaeda.

Instead of pointing out that Murtha's position has not really changed, the MSM/DNC has predictably treated Murtha's prepared statement as some sort of epiphany or revelation. Reduced to its essence, the MSM/DNC position this morning is that we are supposed to flee from Al Qaeda because a Democratic Congressman said essentially the same thing he and Nancy Pelosi have been saying all along.

[If you wonder why I keep referencing Al Qaeda in this post, your own confusion on that point reflects the extent to which the MSM/DNC has caused you to forget who it is that is fighting American and coalition forces in Iraq. I will post more on that point later.]

------------------------------------------------------------------
Bryan Preston [guest blogging for Michelle Malkin] writes that Murtha "was against the war before he was against it." Follow Preston's links.

Quote of the day - Mark Steyn

I love the way those naysayers predicting doom and gloom in Baghdad scoff that Iraq's a totally artificial entity and that, without some Saddamite strongman, Kurds, Sunnis and Shias can't co-exist in the same state. Oh, really? If Iraq's an entirely artificial entity, what do you call a state split between gay drugged-up red-light whatever's-your-bag Dutchmen and anti-gay anti-whoring anti-everything-you-dig Muslims? If Kurdistan doesn't belong in Iraq, does Pornostan belong in the Islamic Republic of Holland?

Mark Steyn

Vote for me at Politburo Diktat's new poll.

The Commissar has posted a new poll that seeks to answer the burning question, "What is the best ever post?" Click on the above link and vote for me on the left side of the page. The individual post that is referenced from the Cassandra Page is this one. Thanks.

The French riots have taught us nothing.

Previous - The End of Europe as We Know it.

The MSM/DNC is still flooring the accelerator as we race down the road of multiculturalism.

The events of the past few weeks have served as a crash course in multiculturalism for millions of Americans who get their news from sources other than the MSM/DNC. The riots in France and the advance of Islam throughout Europe have provided grim warnings for those in the United States of what the future may hold.

Yet the MSM/DNC seems to prefer this future. The MSM/DNC acts as if the fate that France has endured and will continue to endure is preferable to life as we now know it.

Debbie Schlussel has summarized two of NBC's programs from last night - programs that predictably identify the victims as the guilty parties and the enemies of America as the victims.

"E-Ring" showed a gang of Christian thugs (is there such a thing?) capturing a Detroit area mosque, killing mosque members, and trying to blow the place up. Like that ever happened--or would. (The Christians also murder FBI agents who are surveilling the mosque, as if the FBI in Detroit is actually monitoring, instead of kowtowing to, extremist mosques. It isn't.)

. . . .

Then, there is NBC's franchise player, "Law and Order"--a show, which can always be counted on to support America's enemies and attack American patriots, soldiers, and any reasonable policy designed to help America in the War on Terror.

On Wednesday Night, the show portrayed the Minutemen--unarmed civilians who patrol the border looking for illegal aliens and report sightings to Border Patrol--as bigoted murderers.

As long as television programs continue to present the standard MSM/DNC multicultural line, you can be sure that we are speeding down the road to Eurabia.

Quote of the day - Oriana Fallaci

"The moment you give up your principles, and your values . . . the moment you laugh at those principles, and those values, you are dead, your culture is dead, your civilization is dead. Period."

Oriana Fallaci

Charter Schools in the blogosphere; Raleigh Charter High School; Downtown College Prep; "Our School" - Joanne Jacobs

By reading posts from Michelle Malkin's guest bloggers, I have discovered a couple of standout charter schools and related blogs. Also check out Joanne Jacobs' blog and book on the San Jose Downtown College Prep Charter School:



These blogs and websites contain a wealth of information about charters schools and the charter school movement. Here is a link to a sample post on kindergarten preparedness.

Also, check out this Pennsylvania charter school.
-----------------------------------------
Update - 11-17-05
Charter schools in New Orleans in the wake of Katrina - a new post from Michelle Malkin guest blogger Betsy Newmark.

Quote of the day - Ann Coulter

"The portrayal of Senator Joe McCarthy as a wild-eyed demagogue destroying innocent lives is sheer liberal hobgoblinism. Liberals weren't cowering in fear during the McCarthy era. They were systematically undermining the nation's ability to defend itself while waging a bellicose campaign of lies to blacken McCarthy's name. Everything you think you know about McCarthy is a hegemonic lie. Liberals denounced McCarthy because they were afraid of getting caught, so they fought back like animals to hide their own collaboration with a regime as evil as the Nazis."

-- Ann Coulter, Treason - p. 10

A real spy story: Chinese agents endanger U.S. aircraft carriers, submarines and electronics.

The Washington Times recently posted this story about a major Chinese spy ring that had operated in the United States for 15 years:

Key compromises uncovered so far include sensitive data on Aegis battle management systems that are the core of U.S. Navy destroyers and cruisers.

Officials said based on a preliminary assessment, China now will be able to track U.S. submarines, a compromise that potentially could be devastating if the United States enters a conflict with China in defending Taiwan.
Mr. Chi, an electrical engineer, also had access to details on U.S. aircraft carriers and once was aboard the USS Stennis. A Pentagon report made public earlier this year said China's military is building up capabilities to attack U.S. aircraft carriers.
China also is thought to have obtained information from the spy ring that will assist Chinese military development of electromagnetic pulse weapons -- weapons that simulate the electronic shock caused by a nuclear blast -- that disrupt electronics.

emphasis added

This news is quite sobering. War is now more, rather than less, likely as a result of the information that this spy ring stole. If you don't understand that point, stop wasting your time reading blogs and go back to watching Oprah.

This particular spy story has far greater implications for the future of all Americans (and the world) than the Libby case. Yet which story has received more attention from the MSM/DNC?

The MSM/DNC's lack of coverage thus far of the latest Chinese spy ring indicates that the MSM/DNC is having a hard time finding a way to blame Bush.

Previous - The Clinton/China scandal.

Quote of the day - Thomas Sowell

One of the dumbest things you can do is have taxpayers supporting idle adolescents who have nothing but time on their hands to get into trouble. The money it costs is the least of the problems.

Thomas Sowell

MSM Lie # 51 - Chris Matthews misrepresents the reasons for war

Click here for the 2005 list of lies.

NewsBusters exposes an example of a recurring lie of the MSM/DNC. It has become an article of faith among the left that President Bush won reelection because many voters wrongly believed that Saddam Hussein planned the 9/11 attacks. The left repeatedly accuses Bush of making that argument - that Hussein planned 9-11. The problem is, Bush and the administration said no such thing. We didn't go to war because we believed Hussein had anything to do with 9/11.

But that did not stop Chris Matthews from repeating the lie last week:

In his opening introduction, Matthews plugged the upcoming segment as "a look at the rhetoric the Bush administration used to perpetuate the idea of a connection between Iraq and the 9/11 attacks," as if this motive were fact. In a setup piece for the segment, MSNBC correspondent David Shuster contended that before the war, President Bush "started claiming that Iraq and the group responsible for 9/11 were one and the same," and backed up this assertion using a soundbite from Bush that was selectively edited to distort an answer Bush made to a reporter’s question.

Shuster showed a clip of Bush saying "you can't distinguish between al-Qaeda and Saddam," which omitted Bush's subsequent clarification that "I can't distinguish between the two because they're both equally as bad, and equally as evil, and equally as destructive," thus throwing water on Shuster’s characterization of Bush’s words. A full transcript of this exchange appears farther down before the transcript from Friday night’s Hardball.

NewsBusters posts an extended transcript.

[There were connections between Al Qaeda and Hussein, but the MSM/DNC has ignored those connections in favor of promoting an easy strawman (see above) for Chris Matthews and others to knock down.]

It is difficult sometimes to decide which MSM/DNC outrages belong in the lie category instead of some other category of leftwing bias. But when reporters or editors make an honest mistake and genuinely want to correct that mistake, they have the opportunity to apologize and correct the record [h/t Michelle Malkin]. If they don't do this and continue to promote the same falsehood, it is a pretty good indication that the falsehood was/is intentional. [Even when they pretend to apologize, such apologies are often misleading and should not allow the MSM/DNC to get off the hook.]

Quote of the day - Mark Steyn

I find it easier to be optimistic about the futures of Iraq and Pakistan than, say, Holland or Denmark.

Mark Steyn

MSM Lie # 50 - MSNBC misrepresents Bill O'Reilly

Click here for the entire 2005 list.

Check out NewsBusters for lie # 50.

MSNBC posted the following paragraph as part of an article about Bill O'Reilly:

San Franciscans have been in an uproar this week over apparent comments by the host of Fox News' "The O'Reilly Factor" that it was A-OK for terrorists to wipe the city off the map.

Even MSNBC's subheadline used the slur:
"Fox host reportedly said it was OK for terrorists to target the city"

The only problem is, O'Reilly said no such thing. As NewsBusters explains:

That's not what he said at all. I was listening when he said it. The article reads:

At issue are comments from O'Reilly's Election Day broadcast radio show about a San Francisco ballot measure opposing the presence of military recruiters in city schools. "Listen, citizens of San Francisco, if you vote against military recruiting, you're not going to get another nickel in federal funds. Fine. You want to be your own country? Go right ahead," O'Reilly said, according to a transcript and audio posted by liberal media watchdog group Media Matters for America, and by the San Francisco Chronicle. "And if al-Qaida comes in here and blows you up, we're not going to do anything about it..."

What they left out was the paragraph before that where O'Reilly suggested that because San Francisco routinely rejects the military, if the measure passed, Federal officials may want to consider pulling military protection from the city. He didn't at all say it was "A-OK for terrorists to wipe the city off the map," only that if they do attack San Francisco the rest of us shouldn't have to come bail them out, and everyone should know that from go.

MSNBC does not exonerate itself merely because it prefaced the slur with words like "apparent" or "reportedly." It comes as no surprise that MSNBC's article contained no byline.

MSM Lie # 49 - New York Times misrepresents Robert Novak's war views

Click here for the complete list of MSM lies of 2005.

In its continuing effort to achieve illegitimate mileage from the Libby indictment (what was that all about again?), the MSM/DNC has misrepresented Robert Novak's views on the war.

Novak's opposition to the war in Iraq is well known. Novak has become isolated from other conservatives because of these views. Yet the New York Times (registration required) refers to Robert Novak as a "conservative hawk" who sought to punish Joseph Wilson for Wilson's opposition to the war. In the Times' world of make-believe, Novak and the administration work together to silence critics of American foreign policy. NewsBusters has more details.

The Times needs to make Wilson into a martyr (in order to discredit our efforts at self-defense in the war on terror). It is easier for the Times to accomplish that goal if pro-war motives can be imputed to Novak. The Times has its story and it is sticking to it. The Times will not let truth get in the way.

Quote of the day - Mark Steyn

Well, it’s true there are Muslims and there are Muslims: some blow up Tube trains and some rampage through French streets and some claim Mossad’s put something in the chewing gum to make Arab men susceptible to the seduction techniques of Jewesses. Some kill Dutch film-makers and some complain about Piglet coffee mugs on co-workers’ desks, and millions of Muslims don’t do any of the above but apparently don’t feel strongly enough about them to say a word in protest. And it’s also true that it’s better to have your Peugeot torched than to be blown apart on the Piccadilly Line. But what all these techniques — and those of lobby groups who offer themselves as interlocutors between bewildered European elites and ‘moderate’ Muslims — have in common is that they advance the Islamification of Europe.

Mark Steyn

Iowahawk has written a musical about the Paris riots

Check this out. It helps if you are familiar with some classic musicals.

Quote of the day - Arnold Toynbee

Civilizations die from suicide, not by murder.

Arnold Toynbee

Debbie Schlussel's inbox

*************** Graphic photo warning ****************

Debbie Schlussel provides copies of a couple of e-mails she has received from practitioners of the Religion of Peace. In response, the FBI provided an example of why the U.S. seems to be headed the way of France. Check it out.

Quote of the day - Joe Sobran

Government is now larceny by other means.

Joe Sobran

The end of Europe as we know it - part II - Paris "youths" and the new media

Click here for part I.

We can learn something from the rioting muslims in Europe. Brussels Journal shatters one myth that is prevalent among the MSM/DNC regarding the Paris intifada:

It is not anger that is driving the insurgents to take it out on the secularised welfare states of Old Europe. It is hatred. Hatred caused not by injustice suffered, but stemming from a sense of superiority. The “youths” do not blame the French, they despise them.

By the same token, the readers and listeners of the new media have earned a sense of superiority over those who receive their news only from Ted Koppel or the ladies on the "View".

As I pointed out yesterday, new media sources have been predicting this month's European carnage for years. Writers like Ba'at Yeor, Mark Steyn and Spengler have predicted the demise of Europe and provided warnings for the United States. But the MSM/DNC focuses instead only on daily polls, human interest stories and someone named Scooter Libby.

Years after new media readers learned of the fate of Europe, CNN's anchor referred to some of the participants in the Paris fiasco as "African-American" (apparently for lack of a better euphemism).

Thinks "African-Americans" started the Paris riots.















While Little Green Footballs (and its readers) regularly kept track of dhimmitude and terrorist attacks around the world over the past few years, Katie Couric has, like, talked about politics and stuff every morning in that perky little way of hers.

The union shills who call Sean Hannity's radio program to yell at him about Republican hypocrisy over the Miers nomination or something are probably only vaguely aware that there are Islamic riots taking place in Paris. The Oprah viewers who are concerned that women achieve equal representation in government and the workplace or whatever probably know that there is a place called France. All of them will be shocked someday when France (and other European countries) endure a lengthy, bloody insurgency followed by partition and, utlimately, complete Islamic domination.

When that happens, new media writers will once again say "I told you so," while old media viewers will be asking, "who are these 'youths' that now dominate Europe and what happened to Jacques Cousteau?" [CNN viewers will ask, "who are these African-Americans?"]

The point is, new media readers and listeners have earned the right to a superiority complex. We have earned the right to despise those who think they are well informed because they listen to Today with half an ear while ironing their clothes in the morning. Just as the Islamic "youth" are on the rise in Europe, the new media is on the rise in this country. Even if we can't save Europe, we can do our best to displace the old media in this country and achieve the kind of dominance that would rival that of a European Islamic "youth."

Four steps to suicide for the Pennsylvania legislature.

Here is a brief summary of events related to the Pennsylvania legislature over the past five months:

1) Summer - 2005 - The Pennsylvania legislature (both parties) passed a very large legislative pay raise for themselves and appellate judges.

2) The resulting uproar among voters continues to this day. One Pennsylvania Supreme Court Justice was voted out of office two days ago in an unprecedented retention vote loss, even though repeal of the pay raise may be imminent.

3) Members of the legislature now cower in fear that the voters will remember the pay raise in 2006.

4) The legislature plans to vote on November 21 on a proposal to impose an average of $4,000 in higher taxes on the purchase and sale of homes in Pennsylvania.

The first three items are well known to Pennsylvania voters. The last item is not a joke. With their political lives virtually teetering on the edge of a cliff, some legislators will actually be stupid enough to support an increase in the realty transfer tax.

James Lileks once wrote that the worst campaign speech begins with the phrase, "let me explain why I voted to raise your taxes."

Referenda for tax increases regularly lose at the polls. Politicians who support tax increases are routinely thrown out of office. George Bush I was defeated in 1992 largely because he reneged on his "no new taxes" pledge.

In fact, the proposed tax increase could cost home sellers as much as $10,000 or more. Sellers will have to pay the tax twice if they are buying a new home to replace the home they are selling. The sellers will also be faced with the need to lower the price of their old home by several thousand dollars just so a buyer can afford the buyer's portion of the new taxes. The seller will still owe the seller's portion. The seller will then pay an additional transfer tax when he purchases his new home (unless he is smart enough to buy his new home in a different state).

Voting the responsible legislators out of office will be a small consolation if we face losses like those that are contemplated in the new tax. Contact your legislator before November 21st. Remind them that the primary election is only six months away - unless you have a few thousand dollars you don't mind throwing away.

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Update

The text of the proposed bill is here.

Quote of the day - Mark Steyn

The notion that Texas neocon arrogance was responsible for frosting up trans-Atlantic relations was always preposterous, even for someone as complacent and blinkered as John Kerry. If you had millions of seething unassimilated Muslim youths in lawless suburbs ringing every major city, would you be so eager to send your troops into an Arab country fighting alongside the Americans? For half a decade, French Arabs have been carrying on a low-level intifada against synagogues, kosher butchers, Jewish schools, etc. The concern of the political class has been to prevent the spread of these attacks to targets of more, ah, general interest. They seem to have lost that battle. Unlike America's Europhiles, France's Arab street correctly identified Chirac's opposition to the Iraq war for what it was: a sign of weakness.

Mark Steyn

The end of Europe as we know it

Very few commentators (almost all of which operate through the new media) have recognized the historic nature of what we have seen over the past two weeks in France. A war is on that will continue long after these particular riots stop. France (and the rest of Europe) are not only involved in a war, they are seeing the end of their civilizations as we have known them.


The riots that envelope France result from immigration from muslim countries, as most of you already know (except those that watch the Today show).

no mystery to the blogosphere [H/T Atlas Shrugs for graphic]






Mark Steyn has labeled this episode an "Early skirmish in the Eurabian civil war." Steyn further summarizes what we can expect from Europe in the coming decades:

. . . the rioters aren't doing a bad impression of the Muslim armies of 13 centuries ago: They're seizing their opportunities, testing their foe, probing his weak spots. If burning the 'burbs gets you more ''respect'' from Chirac, they'll burn 'em again, and again. In the current issue of City Journal, Theodore Dalrymple concludes a piece on British suicide bombers with this grim summation of the new Europe: ''The sweet dream of universal cultural compatibility has been replaced by the nightmare of permanent conflict.'' Which sounds an awful lot like a new Dark Ages.

Steyn also provides a grim warning for the rest of Europe, including England:

As to where Britain falls in this grim scenario, I noticed a few months ago that Telegraph readers had started closing their gloomier missives to me with the words, "Fortunately I won't live to see it" - a sign-off now so routine in my mailbag I assumed it was the British version of "Have a nice day". But that's a false consolation. As France this past fortnight reminds us, the changes in Europe are happening far faster than most people thought. That's the problem: unless you're planning on croaking imminently, you will live to see it.

That assessment is backed up by the revelation following the London subway attacks that the British policy of allowing unfettered immigration would lead to disaster:

Intelligence chiefs are warning Tony Blair that Britain faces a full-blown Islamist insurgency, sustained by thousands of young Muslim men with military training now resident in this country. . . . As police and the security services work to prevent another cell murdering civilians, attention is focusing on the pool of migrants to this country from the Horn of Africa and central Asia. MI5 is working to an estimate that more than 10,000 young men from these regions have had at least basic training in light weapons and military explosives.

A well-connected source said there were more than 100,000 people in Britain from “completely militarised” regions, including Somalia and its neighbours in the Horn of Africa, and Afghanistan and territories bordering the country. “Every one of them knows how to use an AK-47,” said the source. “About 10 per cent can strip and reassemble such a weapon blindfolded, and probably a similar proportion have some knowledge of how to use military explosives. That adds up to tens of thousands of men.”

[check out LGF for larger quotations without having to register]

Cox and Forkum







None of this news surprises those of us who receive our news from the new media. Debbie Schlussel wrote about France's fate as early as 2002:

That's France's problem. With few controls on immigration, there are now between 5 and 10 million Muslim Arabs in that country of 60 million. The range in numbers of Muslims there is so vast because nobody knows for sure exactly how many there are. One thing is for sure: in the next 50 to 100 years-maybe sooner-France will become a Muslim nation. Demographics dictate it.

Pat Buchanan predicted (in 2001) the general trend that we are starting to see emerge in Europe. The Death of the West was ignored by the MSM/DNC, but helped prepare the rest of us for the events that will continue to unfold across the Atlantic and, later, in the U.S.


Buchanan's warnings might have reached a wider audience this week, in light of recent events:

This is the larger meaning of the ritual murder of Theo Van Gogh in Holland, the subway bombings in London, the train bombings in Madrid, the Paris riots spreading across France. The perpetrators of these crimes in the capitals of Europe are the children of immigrants who were once the colonial subjects of the European empires. . . .

The rioters are of Arab and African descent, and Muslim. While almost all are French citizens, they are not part of the French people. For never have they been assimilated into French culture or society. And some wish to remain who and what they are. They live in France but are not French.

. . . The soaring Muslim population is a Fifth Column inside Europe.

Nevertheless, their numbers must grow. For not only do they have a higher birth rate than the native-born Europeans, no European nation, save Moslem Albania, has a birth rate (2.1 births per woman) that will enable it to endure for many more generations. The West is aging, shrinking, and dying.

Spengler's fictional letter from Osama has been a featured link on the right toolbar of these pages for more than a year, with its succinct diagnosis for the decline of the West:

In half a century the number of Europeans will fall by 50 million, because the Europeans no longer love life enough to bring new life into this world. Three hundred and twenty years ago a Muslim army stood before the gates of Vienna, and Europe barely escaped conversion to the true faith at swordpoint. During the next half-century Muslims will wander into Europe and replenish the half-empty towns with people, and the sound of children's voices once again will be heard - but in Arabic.

"Because they hate life, your supposed allies are cowards. Half a millennium ago the Spanish empire drove Islam from its territory; this year a few bombs at a railway station panicked the pathetic remnants of Spain into retreat from Iraq.

Readers of Bat Ye'Or have expected this week's events and have been trying to help the U.S. avoid Europe's fate long before the London bombings and the Paris intifada became the source of more appeasement from followers of Oprah and the New York Times.


France will always exist as a land mass. But once the French people are gone, they are not coming back. Once France is populated with Muslims, the French culture will be gone forever. France is only one example of the path that the rest of Europe is taking.


h/t Atlas Shrugs graphic





Those who cannot accept this reality should ignore the above writers and content themselves with allowing Katie Couric, CNN or "West Wing" to lull them to sleep and into dhimmitude.

Election returns - Pennsylvania Supreme Court and Dover "intelligent design" school board

Scroll down for election updates and analysis from this morning for the Pennsylvania election returns.

Quote of the day - Mark Steyn

After four somnolent years, it turns out finally that there really is an explosive ''Arab street,'' but it's in Clichy-sous-Bois.

Mark Steyn

Election results - Pennsylvania judicial retention votes

The following article summarizes what is at stake in the PA judicial retention races:

Never has a Supreme Court judge not been retained. Let's start with that - most voters don't know Supreme Court judges or what exactly they do. But the two candidates Tuesday might be in the wrong place at the wrong time - namely on the ballot when voters are still steamed over the July 7th pay raise.

The two candidates are Democrat Russell Nigro and Republican Sandra Schultz Newman, both from the Philadelphia area. Both are seeking 10 year terms. It's a simple yes or no vote but since the pay raise, nothing is simple. They are the first statewide candidates to run since the pay raise. A number of grass roots organizations have campaigned across the state calling for a no vote. The governor and several major newspapers have argued it's unfair to take out frustration on these supreme court judges..critics say the judges are too cozy with the legislature. Gene Stilp/activist, "I always like to say follow the money. July 7th legislators voted the money. July 8th the judges started taking the money. So follow the money right from the legislature to the judges pocket." Eric Epstein/rockthecapitol.org, "We've investigated the record of both Newman and Nigro and found that 50 percent of the time they side with the legislature. That's too high. We need new blood, need new justices."

The local source of this article usually oversimplifies the issues (and there is greater justification for laying this pay raise at the feet of the Pennsylvania courts than the media outlet reveals), but that is not as important as the voter rebellion that has taken place over the legislative pay raise. That rebellion has been kept alive by talk radio and the internet.

The state legislature is on the verge of repealing the pay raise, but the judicial candidates are sweating anyway. Preliminary results appear to be close. Further details to follow.

------------------------------------------------------
update

At 10:40 PM, ABC 27 is calling the statewide judicial retention race "too close to call."

At this point, even if the judges win retention, the message will be clear. Never again will the state legislature be so cavalier about a pay raise.

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update

Michelle Malkin posts more on races around the country.

At 10:45, it appeared that the "NO" votes exceeded the "Yes" votes for the Democrat Supreme Court justice. The Republican appears to be doing better.

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11:05

It appears that the opponents of "intelligent design" have defeated all or most of the incumbent Dover School Board members. As you may recall, Dover is the school district at the center of the lawsuit over intelligent design. The effect on the lawsuit from this election result is unclear.

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11:40

Re: Dover School District - One would think that the election of anti-intelligent design school board members would end the controversy in this district. But both sides in the election promised to follow the judge's ruling, whatever it might be. That promise is meaningless for the ID opponents, who could lawfully order the end to ID teaching even if the ID side wins the suit. The lawsuit retains its importance as a precedent for other districts. And because it was ID opponents that filed suit in the first place, it is unlikely that the new Board would reverse the policy without getting a ruling from the judge. The ruling is what they really want - not merely to reverse the ID policy in one district.

If this reasoning is hard to follow, wait a few months and see what happens.

re: Statewide judicial retention - the results are little different now than one hour ago, with heavily Republican areas still unreported. The prevailing opinion is that the races are much closer than they would have been had the pay raise issue not existed. The Democrat candidate - Nigro - is behind by 4,000 votes with 85% of the returns counted.

We may not know the result until tomorrow morning.

But it is clear that the pay raise [despite its apparently imminent repeal] is having consequences. Look for the MSM/DNC to spend the next year trying to lay the entire blame for the raise at the doorstep of the Republican Party in an effort to unseat the Republican majority in both houses of the legislature in 2006. [They will even try to blame Rick Santorum. I don't know how they will do that, but they will find a way.]

P.S. ABC 27's coverage has been hopelessly condescending. The reporters repeatedly emphasized that most voters never think about Supreme Court races and don't even know what Supreme Court Justices do. The media coverage is another topic for another time.

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7:45 AM update

The results are more or less official.

Supreme Court retention. Democrat Supreme Court Justice Russell Nigro has last his bid for retention. This is the first time a Supreme Court Justice has lost a retention vote in Pennsylvania. Credit for the defeat is widely attributed to the legislative pay raise that also included appellate judges.

Justice Newman won her retention bid. It is interesting to note that the Republican was retained, while the Democrat lost.

Dover School Board - intelligent design. Eight anti-ID candidates defeated the incumbents in the Dover School Board race. The effect on the intelligent design lawsuit is unclear at this point.
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8:15 AM Wednesday update

The Dover School Board results appear to be very narrow - in one race as narrow as 26 votes.

The Supreme Court vote was also very close.

In an unprecedented vote, Pennsylvanians denied a Supreme Court justice a second term as public anger at state lawmakers over a pay-raise law apparently spread to the state's highest court. A second justice won another term only narrowly.

Justice Russell M. Nigro won only 49 percent of the vote with three percent of the state's precincts still unreported, becoming the first statewide judge to be turned out of office in a yes-or-no "retention'' election in the 36 years such elections have been held.

A Democrat, Nigro received strong support in and around his native Philadelphia but was overwhelmed by lopsided margins in south-central and southwestern regions of the state, where opposition to the pay raise was concentrated. Justice Sandra Schultz Newman won a second term with 54 percent of the vote, a close margin for a retention election.

In the last judicial election in 2001, the three jurists on the ballot all were retained by margins of three-to-one.

Quote of the day - Mark Steyn

[I]t doesn't take much time in les banlieus of Paris to discover that the rioters do not think of their primary identity as ''French'': They're young men from North Africa growing ever more estranged from the broader community with each passing year and wedded ever more intensely to an assertive Muslim identity more implacable than anything you're likely to find in the Middle East.

Mark Steyn

Election day tips; prevent Democrat election fraud

For those of you for whom tomorrow is election day, please check this post for instructions on volunteering and the need to volunteer on election day. Volunteers are needed to prevent the Democrats from stealing elections in various states. This is no less important than it was last year.

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Update - Michelle Malkin posts a summary of some of the crucial elections this year.

There are Supreme Court judicial retention votes on the ballot in Pennsylvania. These judicial rentention votes have been affected by a notorious legislative pay raise and the backlash from that pay raise. It will be interesting to see if the voters decide against retaining two Supreme Court judges as a result of the pay raise. Such a "no" vote would be quite rare. I will try to blog the results tomorrow evening as they come in.

Quote of the day - Mark Steyn

Ever since 9/11, I've been gloomily predicting the European powder keg's about to go up. ''By 2010 we'll be watching burning buildings, street riots and assassinations on the news every night,'' I wrote in Canada's Western Standard back in February. Silly me. The Eurabian civil war appears to have started some years ahead of my optimistic schedule.

Mark Steyn

Somali "Pirates" whitewashed by MSM/DNC

The MSM/DNC strives mightily to hide the identity and affiliation of the "pirates" that attacked the cruise ship off the coast of Somalia. See the Reuters and CBS/AP stories.

But Debbie Schlussel properly identifies these "pirates" [and their leader Mohamed Abdi Hassan] as practitioners of the religion of peace.

Exclusive reliance on the MSM/DNC for news is a recipe for ignorance.

The Democrats' Presidential nominee for 2036 - Jimmy Massey

Michelle Malkin has idenfitied the Democrats' Presidential nominee for the year 2036.

Mark Steyn gets it; the end of Europe

Read today's Mark Steyn column. Nothing else needs to be said.

Quote of the day - Ayn Rand

A desire presupposes the possibility of action to achieve it; action presupposes a goal which is worth achieving.

Ayn Rand

Sweden suffers the effects of Islamic colonization no less than France.

France is not the only European country that is slowly succumbing to Islamist colonization:

Because Sweden has some of the most liberal asylum laws in Europe, one quarter of Malmo's 250,000 population is now Muslim, changing the face and the idea of what it means to be Swedish. Asylum seekers may bring spouses, brothers and grandparents with them. Civil servants say the city is swamped.

"You have 1,000 students in a Swedish school. How many are Swedes? Two," said Lars Birgersson, principal of the Rosengrad School.

Students arrive at age 10 or 12 from countries like Iraq, Iran and Lebanon with no knowledge of Swedish; some have never been to school at all and many classes require interpreters.

Still, more than half won't graduate.

"They are not a part of Swedish society, so to speak. It is difficult for them to get inside society," said Torsten Elofsson of the Malmo Police Department.

However, they are the most rapidly growing segment of Swedish society — outsiders who are already inside, posing a challenge to legendary Swedish tolerance that has now been stretched to the breaking point.

Malmo's main mosque was recently set ablaze by arsonists. When firefighters arrived on the scene, they were attacked by stone throwers.

Remember that this news item first appeared on November 26, 2004. Do you think things have improved over the past year?

MSM Lie # 48 - New York Times misrepresents Corporal Jeffrey Starr

I have carefully considered this item before including it on the list of lies of 2005.

As most of us [except for readers of the New York Times] know by now, The New York Times has been caught ommitting crucial portions of a letter written by a serviceman who was killed in Iraq. [H/T Michelle Malkin.] I usually try to include only false statements on this list [or doctored photos]. The Times' quotation was, in fact, accurate. But the deliberate omission of the majority of the letter created the opposite impression that the letter sought to convey. By quoting one sentence out of context, the Times misrepresented the meaning intended by the departed Corporal Starr. This practice is consistent with the Times' history.

The Times' misrepresentation is so blatant that inclusion in this list is justified. This list is intended for slam dunks, where there is no question as to the guilt of the MSM/DNC. In this case, the Times' guilt can be proven by simply comparing the quoted sentence with the entire document. One need not argue ideology or extraneous facts to prove bias in this case.

The Times' intent was to campaign against continued prosecution of the war. It is interesting to note that the Times and other MSM/DNC outlets allege that the public no longer supports the war. But they feel the need to wage a campaign of misrepresentation against the war anyway. If the public has already turned against the war, why does the Times bother to lie about the war and our soldiers?

Quote of the day - Thomas Sowell

Some ideas seem so plausible that they can fail nine times in a row and still be believed the tenth time. Other ideas seem so implausible that they can succeed nine times in a row and still not be believed the tenth time. Government controls in the economy are among the first kinds of ideas and the operation of a free market is among the second kinds of ideas.

Thomas Sowell

The week in pictures, brought to you by the Religion of Peace

Paris
Paris

Cox and Forkum
Cox and Forkum
Indonesia
India

The RoP rampages; MSM/DNC fixated on polls

The following events failed to get the attention of the MSM/DNC for the past few days:

1) Muslim leaders in Australia openly preach terror:

MUSLIM clerics in Sydney and Melbourne - led by radicals Sheik Mohammed Omran and Sheik Abdul Salam Mohammed Zoud - are still preaching hatred against the West, urging followers in Arabic to resist peace and support insurgents waging war against Australian soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan.

H/T LGF

2) The Islamic Society of Boston has filed suit against various public figures for the purpose of silencing critics of terror. H/T LGF.

3) Islamic rioters rampage in Denmark, set fire to a nursery and other buildings and businesses.

4) The Paris riots have continued for eight days in a row, and appear to be well organized. H/T LGF.

5) One of the Madrid bombers (from 3/11) has been arrested in Pakistan after hiding in Venezuela.

6) The Canadians have arrested an Algerian terror cell, including an Al Qaeda-bomb maker.

And what was the Today Show's top headline this morning? The latest poll results regarding President Bush.

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

Michelle Malkin posts an excellent roundup of the blogosphere Paris coverage:

The blogosphere has the best ongoing coverage, commentary, and analysis of the Muslim immigrant gang violence (otherwise known in the politically correct MSM as the "Paris unrest") . . . .

She quotes at length from this post at Brussels Journal:

If you want to know what is the matter with those that are described by the mainstream media as rioting “youths,” read Theodore Dalrymple’s poignant analysis in the latest issue of City Journal. We are just witnessing the beginning of Europe’s problems: “The sweet dream of universal cultural compatibility has been replaced by the nightmare of permanent conflict.”

Our mainstream media, in attempts to preserve the Left’s chimera of “universal cultural compatibility,” hardly write about all this. Nevertheless, for some years now West European city folk and police officers have been familiar with the reality that certain areas of major European cities are no-go areas, especially at night and certainly if you are white or wearing a uniform. Three years ago, a French friend who had his car stolen learned that the thieves had parked the car in a particular suburb. When he went to the police he was told that the police did not operate in that neighbourhood and consequently would not be able to retrieve his car. This is Western Europe in the early 21st century.

emphasis added

Brussels Journal cites examples from Sweden, Denmark, France and Brussels of how the authorities have lost control of certain portions of major European cities.

By ignoring these trends, the MSM/DNC hopes to make this scenario a reality in the United States.

quote of the day - Abu Bakar Bashir

“If the West wants peace, they’ll have to accept to be governed by Islam:”

Abu Bakar Bashir - spiritual leader of Jemaah Islamiyah

The ghost city of Varosha

Chalk up another victory for the Religion of Peace. H/T Michael J. Totten and James Lileks. The part I found most interesting:

Directly across the street is the edge of the Varosha ghost city. That crane in the upper-left corner has been idle for 31 years. Supposedly, according to Lonely Planet, there is a car dealership somewhere in the city that still has 1974 models in the showroom.

Lileks has his own unique thoughts:

Can you imagine the riches, so to speak, that reside in these abandoned buildings? Can you imagine what it would be like to perform cultural anthropology on the remains of this city? Most people wouldn’t like to be the last person on earth, but I think many wouldn’t mind being one of the last. You, a group of friends – including a doctor and a dentist – and the vast riches of an empty city to explore at your leisure. If you didn’t have to deal with pasty plague victims, it could be quite interesting. I mean, it would take me a year just to plunder the houses around the lakes to the north.

This must have happened because the Greek Cypriots supported George W. Bush' war for oil.

Quote of the day - Joe Sobran

Consider the implications of the Clinton fund-raising scandals. It seems possible that the president may have had to cheat in order to beat Bob Dole!

Joe Sobran

Election anniversary.

In case you have forgotten, today is the one year anniversary of the day we dodged a bullet.

Prosecutors around the country have failed to follow through on prosecutions of those who attempted to rig the election. As a result, we endured a rigged election in Washington State and are in the process of a rigged election in Detroit.

The information relating to the Detroit scandal taints Kerry's Michigan victory in 2004:

So if even half of the 380,000 phony absentee ballots were used in 2004, the Michigan result is invalid. If all of those phony ballots were used, then Bush earned a decent victory in Michigan. In a way, this is good news. A few high profile prosecutions could place Michigan back in the Red column where it belongs.

The real point is, this anniversary is not so much about a celebration, but about the need to follow through on the breather we have been given in the MSM/DNC's endless war to wreck our democratic institutions.

Quote of the day - Patrick Fitzgerald

This indictment is not about the war. This indictment's not about the propriety of the war. And people who believe fervently in the war effort, people who oppose it, people who have mixed feelings about it should not look to this indictment for any resolution of how they feel or any vindication of how they feel....The indictment will not seek to prove that the war was justified or unjustified. This is stripped of that debate, and this is focused on a narrow transaction. And I think anyone who's concerned about the war and has feelings for or against shouldn't look to this criminal process for any answers or resolution of that.

Patrick Fitzgerald

Did you think I was kidding?; Alito accused of mob ties.

Yesterday I listed some of the tactics that the MSM/DNC might use against Judge Alito, the second of which reads as follows:

Or how about a New York Times investigation into Alito's family, neighbors, etc? He sounds Italian. Maybe he has mob ties.

Little did I know that the Dems were at that moment preparing a talking points memo, the very first point of which implies that Alito let mobsters off the hook in 1988. Redstate.org nails the culprit that circulated this anonymous memo.

P.S. Don't soften on Chris Matthews just because he failed to take the bait on this one. He knows that the blogosphere would roast him alive if he joined this mob-smear.

Election fraud and MSM/DNC thuggery

In my previous post, I argued that election fraud and MSM/DNC thuggery go hand-in-hand. As if to prove my point, The Detroit News reveals that 380,000 absentee ballots have been sent to dead people. H/T Debbie Schlussel. Many of the ballots already had the votes filled in. The rest will undoubtedly be filled in by individuals resembling the folks in these mugshots.

If Michigan's Democrat machine has a data base of 380,000 names with which to pad the vote every time there is an election, how did that database impact the Michigan election in 2004? When I have a moment, I will research Kerry's Michigan margin of victory (and Gore's in 2000).

At the same time as the Democratic Party's election strategy kicks into high gear in Michigan, the left trots out their analysis of Judge Alito's nomination:

You've just stepped in it now, ****. This one's personal -- ***** everything else written on this site, and on every other site, about Alito for the time being.

See, here's the thing. I'm Italian American. I'm also an at-this-point-happily-lapsed but still **** respectful Roman Catholic.

And I will be *** *** *** Dead And In a Hole In The *** Ground before I let you claim "Italian American" OR Roman Catholic as a *** code phrase for bat*** conservative reactionaries whose dismissal of womens' ***, civil rights, worker rights, and pretty much everything else that has made America great make it clear they think all those things are akin to something they would normally scrape off their shoes.

There's nothing *** "Italian American" about being an ultra-far-right conservative ***. You will not drag my heritage into this like you shoved Alito's well-groomed hand up Rosa Parks' ***, or I will bury you, you loathsome little egg-*** ***. And unlike most of the victims of your only-like-a-minority-when-they're-dead *** huggings, I'm still very much alive.

edited for content

If the thugs that carry out Democrat strategy could write, their writing would look like the above quote. In fact, it is only for the purpose of inciting the animals that commit election violence that the weasels in the "intellectual" wing of the Party produce such vitriol.
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Thanks to Brain Droppings for the following research on Kerry/Michigan 2004:

Per CNN, Kerry was credited with 600,047 votes in Wayne county. His Michigan vote total was 2,479,183; his margin of victory 165,437.

So if even half of the 380,000 phony absentee ballots were used in 2004, the Michigan result is invalid. If all of those phony ballots were used, then Bush earned a decent victory in Michigan. In a way, this is good news. A few high profile prosecutions could place Michigan back in the Red column where it belongs.

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another update. I have done some research of my own. According to CNN, Gore beat Bush in Michigan in 2000 by a margin of 194,721 votes. There are many unanswered questions. We don't know how many years the Michigan authorities have been using absentee ballots in the name of dead people. We don't know how many of the ballots mailed to dead people were actually counted in the totals.

But all of these questions can be answered with some grand jury proceedings and a few subpoenas. A high profile prosecution would begin to expose this practice. If we can ensure that only the legitimate votes were counted, there would be no reason for Michigan to be blue.

The future of democracy in America

The new face of the Democratic party.











Michelle Malkin unveils her new book today, in which she exposes the violent tactics of Democratic Party operatives and enforcers. Her post today is full of pictures like the one above. Each one tells the story of some thug who attacked Republican volunteers, vandalized Republican headquarters or threw food in order to disrupt conservative speeches. She even includes a mugshot of a leftwing professor who damaged her own car in order to generate false claims of racism.

The pictures are worth studying and I am sure the book is worth reading. I don't agree with the humorous treatment that Ms. Malkin appears to give the people in question. This is a major problem that is not going away. The left is becoming increasingly violent as their goals move further and further from the mainstream of American cultural and political thought.

The Commissar sums it up well:

. . . . the Dems are in love with their own hatred and venom. It feeds, energizes, and stimulates them; they can no more do without it than they could stop breathing. It’s all they have.

citations ommitted

See also the Commissar's Brownshirt Meter.

Of all of the people pictured in Michelle's photographs (and described in her book), there is a solid chance that at least one of them will be a Democratic nominee for Congress, Senate or the Presidency within 30 years. There is an even greater chance that one of them will hold state or local office within the next 15 years. And the chances that some of them will become professors, copy editors in the MSM/DNC, hollywood writers and directors, UN administrators, authors, etc. is near one hundred percent. John Kerry got his start somewhere and so did Ward Churchill. The violent thugs of today become the leftist leaders of tomorrow.

These are not random idiots like the man who stole the football at yesterday's Packer game. These people have a political purpose. They do not seek souvenirs or fame. They have nothing to gain except for power.

They are the future enforcers of the socialist tyranny that the MSM/DNC wants to create in America. They are the equivalent of the Iraqi/Al Qaeda insurgency disrupting free elections with violence.

When you combine this upsurge in violence with the Democrats' propensity for election fraud, you have the makings of a constitutional crisis (h/t Powerline):

Electoral fraud. It is a grave and growing threat to our democracy. Major elections have turned on it, and it is only a matter of time until voter fraud precipitates a constitutional crisis.

Voter fraud, combined with the raw muscle necessary to enforce the fraudulent results and protect the wrongdoers, will continue to erode our system and the remaining freedoms that we enjoy.