Judicious Asininity

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Tue Jan 30, 2007

What time scale should be used when discussing global warming?

This critical question isn't being asked

I just looked at the hourly forecast for my city on weather.com. It said it was going to continue snowing for the next 36 hours. If I took one day as my time-scale I'd have to say it looks like we are headed towards the next ice age. Pretty obviously, a day is too short a scale. A year works better. You can say that next year will be much like this year and you won't be very wrong. But we know from records going back a century or two that there has been a gradual warming. The scientific consensus claims that warming is human-induced. To "prove" their point they cite the recent gradual warming. Their thinking is captured by Mann's infamous "hockey-stick" graph that showed no warming for a thousand years and a sharp increase over the last century. That graph has been debunked but the scientific consensus group-think talks as if the graph is still accurate.They assume that the current slight warming trend is just going to continue, possibly at an accelerated rate. Their elaborate computer models, that bear as much relationship to reality as a paper dart to a Boeing 747, are tweaked to deliver the results they want. In reality, assuming the warming trend will continue indefinitely is as useful as assuming that just because it is snowing today it will carry on snowing.

If we go back to Mann's Hockey Stick and replace it with a chart closer to reality we find that temperatures have warmed and cooled in cycles lasting a few hundred years. We'll learn that it was warmer than it is today 900 years ago during the "medieval warm period" and colder during the "little ice age". If we look at the historical records of life during those periods we find that the warmer period was far preferable to the cooler period. On the scale of a thousand years, the current warming phase does not seem to be out of the ordinary. Average global temperatures fluctuated by about 1° C over the millenium.

Lets step back by another order of magnitude. What does the weather look like over the last 18,000 years? The next chart shows temperatures rising by about 4° C over the first ten thousand years and then fluctuating on the time scales seen over the last 1000 years. It peaked about 6,000 years ago, about 1° C higher than today.

That steady rise is a worry, though. What lies before that rise. Stepping back again, we get to the final chart that covers the last 800,000 years. Now we can see a pattern. This paper, Global Warming: A Chilling Perspective, explains:

over the past 800,000 years the Earth has undergone major swings in warming and cooling at approximately 100,000 year intervals, interrupted by minor warming cycles at shorter intervals. This represents periods of glacial expansion, separated by distinct but relatively short-lived periods of glacial retreat.

The answer to the question, "what time scale should be used when discussing global warming?" is around a million years. And, when we get to that answer we'll get to a far more important question. What will we do about the next ice age when it really will snow for the next 36 millenium and bury my snow-belt city under a mile-thick sheet of ice?

Mon Jan 29, 2007

Who are my 2008 contenders?

So far, Giuliani, Gingrich and, now, Romney

I was real happy to read Romney's comments on the situation that Israel and the West faces. Via Powerline I read that Romney said:

“No, what we should have realized since 9/11 is that what the world regarded as an Israeli-Arab conflict over borders represented something much larger. It was the oldest, most active front of the radical Islamist jihad against the entire West. It therefore was not really about borders. It was about the refusal of many parts of the Muslim world to accept Israel’s right to exist – within any borders.

“This distinction came into vivid focus this summer. The war in Lebanon had little to do with the Palestinians. And it had nothing to do with a two-state solution. It demonstrated that Israel is now facing a jihadist front that from Tehran through Damascus to Southern Lebanon and Gaza.

“As Tony Blair astutely put it, Hizbullah was not fighting ‘for the coming into being of a Palestinian state…but for the going out of being of an Israeli state.’

“Yet we have still not fully absorbed the magnitude of the change. As far as our enemies are concerned, there is just one conflict. And in this single conflict, the goal of destroying Israel is simply a way station toward the real goal of subjugating the entire West.”

Romney knows what this war is about and can articulate it. Bush may know what this war is about but can't articulate it. Why do he and Rice carry on about a peace-process? The only peace the enemy would accept is the peace the Hitler imposed on Jews within his purview. If you know that, say it.

Instead Bush and Rice give the killers of Americans and Jews countless millions of hard-earned dollars. Never forget that every such dollar given to a Jew-killing Palestinian was earned by an American.

Romney understands the threat. He makes my cut.
Read more »

Sat Jan 27, 2007

Has the anti-war movement jumped the shark?

Resurrecting Jane Fonda might mark that moment

Jane made a name for herself aiding and abetting the North Vietnamese war effort. The pictures of her posing with North Vietnamese anti-aircraft guns and related activities earned her the sobriquet "Hanoi Jane". Here's Snopes on Hanoi Jane:

The most prominent example of a clash between private citizen protest and governmental military policy in recent history occurred in July 1972, when actress Jane Fonda arrived in Hanoi, North Vietnam, and began a two-week tour of the country conducted by uniformed military hosts. Aside from visiting villages, hospitals, schools, and factories, Fonda also posed for pictures in which she was shown applauding North Vietnamese anti-aircraft gunners, was photographed peering into the sights of an NVA anti-aircraft artillery launcher, and made ten propagandistic Tokyo Rose-like radio broadcasts in which she denounced American political and military leaders as "war criminals." She also spoke with eight American POWs at a carefully arranged "press conference," POWs who had been tortured by their North Vietnamese captors to force them to meet with Fonda, deny they had been tortured, and decry the American war effort. Fonda apparently didn't notice (or care) that the POWs were delivering their lines under duress or find it unusual the she was not allowed to visit the prisoner-of-war camp (commonly known as the "Hanoi Hilton") itself. She merely went home and told the world that "[the POWs] assured me they were in good health. When I asked them if they were brainwashed, they all laughed. Without exception, they expressed shame at what they had done." She did, however, charge that North Vietnamese POWs were systematically tortured in American prison-of-war camps.

To add insult to injury, when American POWs finally began to return home (some of them having been held captive for up to nine years) and describe the tortures they had endured at the hands of the North Vietnamese, Jane Fonda quickly told the country that they should "not hail the POWs as heroes, because they are hypocrites and liars." Fonda said the idea that the POWs she had met in Vietnam had been tortured was "laughable," claiming: "These were not men who had been tortured. These were not men who had been starved. These were not men who had been brainwashed." The POWs who said they had been tortured were "exaggerating, probably for their own self-interest," she asserted. She told audiences that "Never in the history of the United States have POWs come home looking like football players. These football players are no more heroes than Custer was. They're military careerists and professional killers" who are "trying to make themselves look self-righteous, but they are war criminals according to law."

We should all remember, though the Left would rather we forgot, that America's retreat from S.E. Asia directly led to:

The death or "re-education" of hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese.
A massive outflow of Vietnamese fleeing Communist oppression (the boat-people), many of whom perished at sea.
The rise of Pol Pot and the mass murder of at least 1.5 milion Cambodians.

The indirect impact sees us in our current predicament. Our enemies saw that the US really was a "paper tiger". What did they do?

The Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan, and we know how that worked out.
The Iranian revolutionaries ousted the Shah and occupied our sovereign embassy, the first of many unanswered acts of war by Iran against the US.

The first event led to the radical Sunni war on the US. With covert US assistance, a coalition of Afghanis and foreign Jihadists defeated a super-power and became convinced they could defeat the sole remaining super-power. They began a series of unanswered terrorist attacks against US interests, culminating in 9/11.

The second event led to the rise of Iran's rulers as the primary sponsor of Islamic terrorism and an imminent nuclear threat to Israel, Saudi Arabia, Europe and the world's oil supply.

Good work, Ms. Fonda and your loathsome ilk.

Thu Jan 25, 2007

I think we're winning in Iraq

Just give it time and report it honestly

The capture of top Iranian operatives in Iraq is a major coup. The haul included:

Iranian colonel Fars Hassami, No. 3 in the Revolutionary Guards al Quds Brigade's hierarchy, two below the Brigades commander, General Qassem Sulemaini. Officers of the al Quds Brigade also serve with Hizballah combat units in Lebanon and Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

Question for Senator McCain: How far should the US go in extracting information from Fars Hassami, a man directly responsible for the deaths of hundreds of US military personnel? Actually, putting him on trial for war crimes would put Iran on the spot.

We're also getting reports that Al Sadr's mob is running scared. If Al Sadr wants to survive, he'll need to rat out the worst of his death squad leaders.

The Sunnis are finally realizing that the only force standing between them and Shi'ite revenge for their persecution under Saddam, is the US. That means that they will be ratting out Al Qaeda and the few remaining Baathist hold-outs.

While the Democrats' victory in the mid-terms may have given our enemies hope, Bush's surge announcement tells them that they are going to have to hold out for two more years. That is a long time when you are facing a force as resourceful and adaptable as the US military.

Then there is the lone Jew problem. Lieberman ran on a pro-war platform and trounced his anti-war opponent. If the Democrats go too far in sabotaging the war, he will switch sides. He probably won't need to. The Democrats will do public displays of opposition to Bush but won't do anything to stop him prosecuting the war as he was authorized to do by congress.

My sense is that Iraq will calm down a lot over the next year. By 2008 it will be seen as a victory in the larger war against ancient Islam.

Wed Jan 24, 2007

Climate change seen fanning conflict and terrorism

If Bin Ladin is for Kyoto, I'm against it

This Reuters report is beyond belief. I'll quote a lot:

Experts at the conference hosted by the Royal United Services Institute said it was likely that global warming would create huge flows of refugees as people tried to escape areas swamped by rising sea levels or rendered uninhabitable by desertification.

Tickell said terrorists were likely to seek to exploit the tensions created.

"Those who are short of food, those who are short of water, those who can't move to countries where it looks as if everything is marvelous are going to be people who are going to adopt desperate measures to try and make their point."

BIN LADEN ON CLIMATE CHANGE

John Mitchell, chief scientist at Britain's Met Office, noted al Qaeda had already listed environmental damage among its litany of grievances against the United States.

"You have destroyed nature with your industrial waste and gases more than any other nation in history. Despite this, you refuse to sign the Kyoto agreement so that you can secure the profit of your greedy companies and industries," al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden wrote in a 2002 "letter to the American people."

Birds of a feather, again. Osama picks up on a leftist theme and spews it back at us.

Tue Jan 23, 2007

Jim Webb hints at the nuclear option in Iraq

Believe it or not, that's what he implied

Here's what Jim Webb said in the Democrat's response to the State of the Union Address:

As I look at Iraq, I recall the words of former general and soon-to-be President Dwight Eisenhower during the dark days of the Korean War, which had fallen into a bloody stalemate. "When comes the end?" asked the general who had commanded our forces in Europe during World War II. And as soon as he became president, he brought the Korean War to an end.

These presidents took the right kind of action, for the benefit of the American people and for the health of our relations around the world. Tonight we are calling on this president to take similar action, in both areas. If he does, we will join him. If he does not, we will be showing him the way.

Just how did Dwight Eisenhower bring the Korean War to an end? Col. Tom Snodgrass, writing at American Thinker, explains:

This disparity of total vs. limited war objectives first became apparent as the Korean War dragged on and President Truman's administration could find no way to conclude the conflict. When President Eisenhower assumed the presidency from Truman in 1953, he quickly recognized the logical solution to the strategic conundrum was shifting U.S. war-fighting from limited to total war means, and he thereby ended the Korean War by communicating to the communists his intention of escalating with nuclear weapons if the communists persisted in their total war objectives. Civilian limited war advocates should have seen the glaring fallacy of their theory at this point, but they didn't. For his part, Eisenhower did not believe that limited war could remain limited.

As a warrior who knew war first-hand, President Eisenhower opted for a historically-based defense doctrine of "Massive Retaliation," which promised an all-out nuclear attack on the Soviet Union in the event of aggression. Throughout the better part of the 1950's, Eisenhower's national security strategy insured that there was no military superpower confrontation. Because Eisenhower had doubts that a "limited war" would remain such, his over-all national security policy, called the "New Look," was based on the unstoppable nuclear striking power of Strategic Air Command. During this period of relative peace, Democrat political opponents and social-science civilian theorists were in constant chorus that the New Look Massive Retaliation was simply too risky for the country and the world.

(My bold) If we are to take Webb at his word, and we assume he actually knows how Eisenhower ended the war, then it appears we should use the nuclear option to end the war in Iraq. A previous Democrat president used the nuclear option to end World War 2. Nice to know the Democrats have a simple solution to the war. A lot of Americans, frustrated at the PC way this war has been fought, would agree.

Mon Jan 22, 2007

What use is college, anyway?

It is probably the biggest waste of time and money one could imagine

Take Duke university. What sane person would pay Duke's tuition fees to have their children indoctrinated by left-wing loonies, such as the gang of 88? Reputation is all Duke has and it is losing that fast. The administration is beholden to the likes of the gang and the people paying the bills are now beginning to understand just what they are paying for. Would you send your kid to an institution that tries to brainwash its students with leftist propaganda of the most extreme kind? How bad was Duke? This case of a Lacrosse player suing because he was failed by one of the gang is very dangerous to Duke's reputation. The first rule of business is to treat your clients with respect. Duke is a business first and a university second. Breaking the first rule of business is not wise. It will make the customers question the value of the product.

Greg Richards at American Thinker writes:

But occasionally we get such a controlled experiment, and we have one here. And what do we find? That the worldview, the "model" of society that is held and promulgated at least by this radical element of the Duke faculty is a failure. Their fantasies of white power and privilege and their expectation of physical abuse of others reveal their own view of the world, not the reality of the situation. Their model, their scholarship is a failure. What does that say about the value of the courses that they teach? Every time the radical left view of human nature or of society can be judged objectively, it fails. As it did here. Let's not forget it. And let's not let the Duke faculty forget it.

And let's not let the parents forget it.

Duke is not the exception but the rule.

Personally, I've found college reputations worthless in evaluating computer science graduates. The best test I found was to set job candidates a simple programming test. Could they produce a program that could calculate a person's age in years, months and days, given their date of birth? It turned out that few candidates could do that. A 4.0 GPA was no guarantee of success, as one tearful candidate found out. I know that the top people in the field are doing great work inside academia. I just don't see any signs of that work in the average computer science graduate.

Sun Jan 21, 2007

So, what's wrong with a little global warming?

Nothing much; sure beats the alternative - an ice age

We know, and scientists should, that CO₂ atmospheric concentrations have been much higher in the Earth's past. That CO₂ was absorbed by plants that took it to their graves. We call that carbon coal and oil. This site explains that distant past:

Average global temperatures in the Early Carboniferous Period were hot- approximately 20° C (68° F). However, cooling during the Middle Carboniferous reduced average global temperatures to about 12° C (54° F). As shown on the chart below, this is comparable to the average global temperature on Earth today!

Similarly, atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide (CO₂) in the Early Carboniferous Period were approximately 1500 ppm (parts per million), but by the Middle Carboniferous had declined to about 350 ppm -- comparable to average CO₂ concentrations today!

Earth's atmosphere today contains about 380 ppm CO2 (0.038%). Compared to former geologic times, our present atmosphere, like the Late Carboniferous atmosphere, is CO₂- impoverished! In the last 600 million years of Earth's history only the Carboniferous Period and our present age, the Quaternary Period, have witnessed CO₂ levels less than 400 ppm.

If you check out the chart at the link you will see little correlation between CO₂ concentration and global temperatures.

We know, and scientists should, that we are currently in an interglacial period. Within that relatively balmy period global temperatures have fluctuated. History has recorded the impact of those fluctuations on humanity. Hillbilly White Trash links to a climate history lesson from The Great Mortality:

In the European heartland the Little Optimum gave way to the Little Ice Age around 1300 [3]. People noticed that the winters were growing colder, but it was the summers, suddenly cool and very wet, that alarmed them. By 1314 a string of poor and mediocre harvests had sent food prices skyrocketing. That fall, every peasant in every sodden field knew: one more cold, wet summer, and people would be reduced to eating dogs, cats, effuse – anything they could get their hands on. As the summer of 1315 approached, prayers were offered up for the return of the sun, but, like a truculent child, the cold and wet persisted. March was so chilly, some wondered if spring would ever return to the meadows of Europe. Then, in April, the gray skies turned a wicked black, and the Rain came down in a manner no one had ever seen before: it was cold, hard, and pelting; it stung the skin, hurt the eyes, reddened the face, and tore at the soft, wet ground with the force of a plow blade. In parts of southern Yorkshire, torrential downpours washed away the topsoil, exposing the underlying rock. In other areas, fields turned into raging rivers. Elsewhere in Europe in the bitter spring of 1315, men and animals stood shivering under trees, their heads and backs turned against the fierce wind and rain.

[. . .]

The early winter months of 1316 brought more suffering. As food grew costlier, people ate bird dung, family pets, mildewed wheat, corn and finally, in desperation, they ate one another. In Ireland, where the thud of shovels and the tearing of flesh from bone echoed through the dark, wet nights, the starving “extracted the bodies of the dead from the cemeteries and dug out the flesh from their skulls and ate it.” In England, where they consider the Irish indecorous, only prisoners ate one another. “Incarcerated thieves,” wrote the monk John de Trokelowe, “. . . devoured each other when they were half alive.” As the hunger intensified, the unspeakable became spoken about. “Certain people. . . because of excessive hunger devoured their own children,” wrote a German monk; another contemporary reported, “In many places, parents, after slaying their children, and children their parents, devoured the remains.”

Nice times indeed but the Global Warming Alarmists would have us belive those bad time never happened and the slight warming during the last century is a catastrophe rather than a relief from the horrible little ice age. The next ice age is coming. Our real task is to figure out how to prevent it. If recycling fossilized CO₂ back into the atmosphere would help, then we just need to do it.

Fri Jan 19, 2007

Why haven't we been hit again?

It would be so easy for Al Qaeda to attack America again

Al Qaeda has been throwing suicide bombers against US troops and native civilians in Afghanistan and Iraq like there's no tomorrow. It would seem very easy for Al Qaeda to organize a few strategic suicide bomb attacks on US soil. Yet, it hasn't happened. No malls got hit. No sports stadiums got hit. No New Year's Eve celebrations got hit. Nothing got hit. Why?

Well, I give no credit to the FBI or the Department of Homeland Security.

My theory is that Al Qaeda has to top 9/11 in its next attack on US soil. A few dozen killed in a shopping mall won't do it. A thousand killed fleeing a sports stadium, after a suicide bomber detonates, won't do it. Worse, such attacks would rouse Americans to do something about the disloyal Muslims in our midst and lead to the rounding up of Al Qaeda sleeper cells and agents. So, Al Qaeda will bide its time, just as it did between the two WTC attacks.

How will they attack next time? How do they top 9/11? The likely answer is WMD. A dirty bomb is a pretty cheap way to cause a lot of panic and destruction. An aerial anthrax attack wouldn't be too hard either.

This is the worst of times to relax our defenses, such as they are.

Wed Jan 17, 2007

Maybe there is a God

And he has a sense of humor

How else to account for the Gore effect? Hollywood wants to give Gore an Oscar for his silly global warming movie. God's response: It snowed in Malibu.

In fact, snow has been turning up in all sorts of unusual places, like Melbourne, Australia. Aussies were truly amazed to discover that the latest round of bushfires would be quelled by snow in the middle of summer.

Personally, I'm worried that these odd climate fluctuations presage the next ice age. A slightly warmer planet would be a good thing for humanity. The next ice age would not. The little ice age was bad enough. The real thing would be catastrophic. God save us from that.

The Evil Bush/Cheney junta is powerless against the entrenched elites

Look who gets prosecuted for leaking

Sandy Berger abused his high security clearance to steal and destroy highly classified documents, apparently related to after-action report on the Millenium bomber. He got a wrist-slap and was never forced to explain his actions.

The various leakers who betrayed national security secrets to the New York Times and Washington Post have been pursued half-heartedly by the bureaucrats tasked with the job, despite the enormous damage done to our nation at a time of war.

Joe Wilson lied about national security issues in a NYT Op-Ed piece. His claims were false yet no thought has been given to disciplining him for his actions.

If you are a Democrat you cannot be prosecuted for any action that undermines our national security.

But God help a Republican if he gets accused of leaking anything. The fate of "Scooter" Libby is an object lesson in how the elites will go to any lengths to take-down a Republican. Even if Libby gets off, which is going to be tricky in a Washington trial where the jury pool is Democratic, his life has been destroyed.

Another such scandal is the treatment of Larry Franklin, the Pentagon Iran analyst convicted of revealing classified information. Eli Lake's NY Sun article explains what was going on:

Nearly a year ago, Judge T.S. Ellis III, sentenced this Pentagon Iran analyst to almost 13 years in a federal prison after he pleaded guilty to discussing classified information with two former lobbyists from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee. The case, which is thus far the Bush administration's only successful anti-leaking prosecution, illustrates the strategic confusion of our national security bureaucracy in a time of war.

Franklin, it turns out, was trying — unconventionally — to influence a debate in the administration in 2003 over a national security policy directive regarding Iran. He provided Aipac's Iran specialists, Steve Rosen and Keith Weissman, with his own list of specific instances of how Iran was sending teams from its Quds Force to sow terror, kill American soldiers, and pose a threat to Israeli operatives in northern Iraq. He hoped his list could find its way to the National Security Council, through the two lobbyists, to counter the intelligence from other channels suggesting that Iran had an interest in stabilizing Iraq.

You can read more about this national disgrace by checking out Rachel Neuwirth's American Thinker article The Rosen/Weisman Prosecution: A National Disgrace. If Bush/Cheney actually had any power, Sandy Berger, Bill Keller, Joe Wilson, Valerie Plame, dozens of reporters, and all leakers in the CIA, Foggy Bottom and the Pentagon would be sharing the fate of the Rosenbergs. I can dream.

The least Bush could do is pardon Libby, Rosen, Weisman and Franklin. I kinda doubt he has the power to do even that.

Tue Jan 16, 2007

F-14 parts sold to Iran

Unbelievable

Tigerhawk highlights this AP report that describes how Iran is getting spare parts for its F-14s. He writes:

So we shut down our Tomcat program and shipped all the spare parts to the office in the Pentagon charged with squeezing every penny out of surplus stuff, whereupon we auctioned them off to front companies which resold the stuff to, er, Iran. As if there were any other buyer for surplus F-14 parts.

Probably too late now, but the parts should have been sabotaged before resale. Or maybe they were. Be nice if the Iranians thought that.

Mon Jan 15, 2007

Jimmy Carter and Michael Moore

Birds of a feather...

Powerline links to a NY Post story that quotes from Jimmy Carter's new book. Here's the passage in question:

It is imperative that the general Arab community and all significant Palestinian groups make it clear that they will end the suicide bombings and other acts of terrorism when international laws and the ultimate goals of the Roadmap for Peace are accepted by Israel.

Nobody should have been surprised to see Moore in Carter's box at the 2004 DNC. INDC Journal lists some of Michael Moore's more disgusting anti-American statements. Moore is famous for saying:

The Iraqis who have risen up against the occupation are not "insurgents" or "terrorists" or "The Enemy." They are the REVOLUTION, the Minutemen, and their numbers will grow -- and they will win.

The Iraqi insurgents use the terrorist tactics that the Palestinian terrorist groups have employed against Israeli civilians. Seems that Carter and Moore both think "suicide bombings and other acts of terrorism" are acceptable. The big question is whether or not their views are mainstream Democrat views. If they are not, then Jimmy Carter needs to be cast aside, like Ramsey Clark. If they are, then the country is in a heap of trouble.

Sun Jan 14, 2007

In WW2 Generals were media personalities

Today, it's Cindy Sheehan and Michael Moore

'Nuff said.

Sat Jan 13, 2007

Supporting the Palestinian cause is immoral

It rewards terrorism against the West

Sports Illustrated highlights the role of the present Palestinian president in one of the worst Terrorist atrocities in history:

Though he didn't know what the money was being spent for, longtime Fatah official Mahmoud Abbas, a.k.a. Abu Mazen, was responsible for the financing of the Munich attack. Abu Mazen could not be reached for comment regarding Abu Daoud's allegation. After Oslo in 1993, Abu Mazen went to the White House Rose Garden for a photo op with Arafat, President Bill Clinton and Israel's Yitzhak Rabin and Shimon Peres. "Do you think that ... would have been possible if the Israelis had known that Abu Mazen was the financier of our operation?" Abu Daoud writes. "I doubt it."

More recently, Abbas has been reported to have called for Palestinian unity so they can concentrate on defeating Israel. LGF is on the case, linking to a Jerusalem Post report:

“When Fatah was established, it was accused of treason and we were chased in every place,” Abbas told the crowd. “But with the will and determination of its sons, Fatah has and will continue. We will not give up our principles and we have said that rifles should be directed against the occupation.”

Appealing to Palestinians to avoid civil war, Abbas said: “We are all one people regardless of differences of opinion. My top priority is to preserve national unity because Palestinian infighting and blood are a red line that must not be crossed.”

Defending his call to use weapons against Israel, he added: “We have a legitimate right to direct our guns against Israeli occupation. It is forbidden to use these guns against Palestinians. The occupation has perpetrated brutal attacks in Jenin, Bet Hanun and Ramallah.”

Note the reference to Jenin, the massacre that wasn't, not that our MSM would ever headline that. So, how does the US punish such terrorists. Back to LGF:

And based on this ridiculous mythical “moderation,” we’re going to reward Abbas and his thuggish terrorist government with 86 million dollars in military aid.
WASHINGTON (AFP) - The administration of President George W. Bush has asked Congress to authorize 86 million dollars in military aid to boost security forces loyal to moderate Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas, a senior US official said.

“Eighty-six million is the figure we’re looking at with Congress, that’s our starting point,” said State Department spokesman Sean McCormack. He said the aid would be “non-lethal assistance” including communications gear, vehicles and uniforms as well as training.

“It’s needed, and we think it’s an important part of helping to build up responsible security forces that report directly to president Abbas,” he told reporters.

I think the State Department should give the aid package a name. I'd suggest the Ambassador Cleo Noel Jr. Palestinian Reward Program. Check the link (to Powerline) to see why.

Fri Jan 12, 2007

Our MSM in action

How the AP got the Jamil Hussein story

Dafydd ab Hugh, blogging at Michelle Malkin's must-visit blog, analyzes the various scenarios involving AP and their ace reporter Jamil. Of all his scenarios I suspect this is the one:

What does this mean? Basically, that anyone can call up an AP reporter in Iraq, claim to be a police captain with a story to tell... and that story -- propaganda -- will wind up in an AP war dispatch without the slightest checking. Rumor central -- and a lovely example of the big-box media's "multiple layers of editing" in action.

Thu Jan 11, 2007

How to spoil your TV viewing

Watch our Senators interrogate the Secretary of State

What a bunch of ill-informed, grandstanding, know-nothing egomaniacs.

Maybe Boxer tops the list, but some Republicans, such as Sununu, Snow, and Coleman, were almost as bad. Boxer had no idea of what the consequences would be if the US abandoned Iraq.

But what really struck me was how ill-informed everyone was. Rice spoke about the bombing of the Golden Mosque as the trigger for much of the sectarian violence. She failed to mention the recently discovered intelligence that showed Iran's involvement. Why? Any blog reader knows about that. But our elected representatives and our Secretary of State seem to be unaware of the fact that Iran has been supporting both Shi'ite and Sunni terrorists in Iraq.

Update: It was pointed out to me that this post seems to lump Rice in with the Senators. Not so. On the other hand, the administration does seem to have a hard time using the ammunition that it has available. Did you ever hear a senior administration official talk about the 500 tons of yellowcake that Saddam had at Al-Tuwaitha? Especially after Joe Wilson made such a fuss about Saddam not trying to buy yellowcake from Niger.

Wed Jan 10, 2007

Vilsack

Moron

He wants to lose the war against radical Islam. Yet another moronic Democrat presidential candidate. Thank God for Joe Lieberman. The Democrats would do well to understand why Joe won and the Kos candidate lost. But that's asking too much of the party that has moved to the side of Castro and Chavez.

Bush's new strategy on Iraq

Better than I expected

He put Maliki & Co. on notice. It was Maliki that got in the way of security operations against Al Sadr's militias. That won't happen again. Maliki now knows that his choice is between supporting Al Sadr and supporting the US. He can no longer play both sides against the middle.

Nice that he mentioned independent Senator Joe (the only serving Democrat that I admire) Lieberman. That's a nice reminder to Nancy and Harry that Joe holds the trump card.

Forget Iraq - the problem is Iran

Iraq is just the battlefield

The capture of high-level Iranians and their documents revealed the extent of Iran's interference in Iraq. We now know that Iran has been helping the Sunni Al Qaeda and the Shi'ite militias. We know that the most lethal weapon in the enemy's arsenal, sophisticated IEDs, are being supplied by Iran. With the aid of the MSM, Bush's domestic enemies, and our erstwhile allies, Iran has been able to tie up the US military in Iraq at minimal cost to itself. Its objective is to force the US to leave the Middle East. If the Democrats were in charge that would already have happened.

The US reaction to Iran's provocations follow a long historical pattern. The US did nothing in response to the Iranian takeover of the US Embassy in 1979. The US did nothing in response to the 1981 bombing of the US Marine barracks in Beruit that killed 241 Americans. The US did nothing in response to Iran sheltering high-level Al Qaeda operatives, including Bin Ladin's son and heir, who fled Afghanistan.

Iran is at war with the West on multiple fronts and is winning. The President needs to tell the American people that we defeated Saddam's regime and most of the Baath insurgency but we are now fighting a war against Iran and its junior partner, Syria, in Iraq. He can use the captured Iranian documents to make the case. I doubt he will finger Iran, though, more's the pity.

Mon Jan 08, 2007

How to win the war on radical Islam

Help its enemies get an advantage

Reports are coming in that an AC-130 gunship took out a bunch of Al Qaeda thugs in Somalia. They were fleeing Mogadishu after being hit hard by the Ethiopian army. If the US got the targets, the Al Qaeda operatives responsible for the US embassy bombings, then that would be very good news.

A few weeks ago we were lamenting the loss of Somalia to Al Qaeda. We lamented too soon.

But we are now seeing a better model for dealing with Al Qaeda, similar to the successful strategy used in Afghanistan. That is to use US special forces and technological assets to assist Al Qaeda's natural enemies.

If that strategy had been used against Saddam back in the aftermath of the Gulf war we would not be in our current poor position. We sacrificed the Iraqi Shi'ites to Saddam back then and it seems they haven't forgotten. Had Bush I ignored the UN and international consensus and supported the Shi'ite rebellion that the US encouraged, Saddam would have been deposed. We have paid a huge price for that mistake.

That brings us to Iran. The mullahs are not popular. Various ethnic and religious groups in Iran hate the mullahs. The average Iranian hates them. The US strategy should be to launch an intense campaign to undermine the mullahs. If that involves predator strike, special forces insertions, and surprise attacks then, as the Nike slogan goes, "just do it". It should far surpass the campaign that the mullahs have been caught running in Iraq. Unfortunately, the CIA seems to be constitutionally incapable of doing anything that might offend an enemy and serve the President.

Give the job to the military. Without rules of engagement. This is no longer a limited war. It's all out war and needs to be fought as such.

Sun Jan 07, 2007

Revisiting previous disasters/terrorist attacks

Oklahoma and flight TWA 800 are top of the list

Official story on Oklahoma: Two right-ring crazies build a fertilizer bomb (yokels, after all) and blow-up a federal building to avenge FBI operations at Ruby Ridge and Waco, killing 168 people.

Official story on TWA 800: The central fuel tank in a 747 explodes soon after take-off and destroys the aircraft, killing 230 people.

Consider this quote from a piece by Annie Jacobs (the Womens Wall Street writer who wrote about the Iman-like behaviour of a group of Syrian muscians):

That terrorists want to build bombs in aircraft bathrooms is not news. The tactic dates from at least 1994, when Ramzi Yousef, along with his uncle, Kahlid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM), set out to blow up eleven or twelve U.S. passenger jets over the Pacific Ocean, simultaneously, by building bombs in the aircrafts' bathrooms. The terrorists involved in the plot were not to be suicide bombers. Instead, they would each build a bomb on one leg of the eleven or twelve flights, set the bomb's timer for later, and then deplane. If the plan seems overly ambitious, its two masterminds were certainly capable of pulling it off. Ramzi Yousef was the terrorist who tried to bring down the World Trade Center (WTC-1) in 1993 with a truck bomb. Yousef's co-conspirator, KSM, would go on to mastermind the 9/11 attack.

The plot was called Operation Bojinka (bojinka being slang in many Arabic dialects for explosion), and it was Yousef's next big operation after WTC-1. Yousef had been a kind of one-man terrorist show, barely funded and not very well organized. After his success with WTC-1, that changed. Yousef became respected as an international terrorist. The U.S. government wanted him so badly that they put a $2 million bounty on his head and air-dropped 32,000 matchbooks with Yousef's photo on them in rural Pakistan, hoping to find him. Yousef was able to evade authorities as he traveled extensively throughout South East Asia. He was now funded by his wealthy uncle, KSM, as well as his uncle's wealthy business partner, Mohammed Jamal Khalifa, -- Osama Bin Laden's brother in law.

For Operation Bojinka, Yousef set about perfecting a tiny explosive device that could be smuggled onto an aircraft in separate parts -- parts disguised as seemingly innocent items. Yousef first tested one of these bombs, on December 1, 1994, in the Greenbelt Theatre in Manila. By placing one of his miniature bombs under a theatre seat, Yousef simulated the physical conditions he'd later face on a plane. The bomb successfully exploded a few hours later. Fortunately the seat was empty. No one was killed but a few, local theatergoers were hurt.

Yousef worked for another ten days to perfect his tiny bomb. On December 11, he carried out another test for the Bojinka plot, only this time he did it on an actual plane. Posing as an Italian member of parliament -- he traveled with a fraudulent Italian passport identifying himself as one 'Armaldo Forlani' -- Yousef bought a one-way ticket, from Manila to Cebu, on Philippines Air flight 434. Yousef carried the components of his bomb on him, including nitroglycerin hidden in a bottle of contact lens solution and bomb stabilizers disguised as cotton balls. In the hollowed-out heels of his shoes, Yousef hid batteries.

During the flight, Yousef asked the flight attendant if he could change seats, telling the flight attendant he needed a better view. In truth, he wanted to occupy a seat over the plane's fuselage near the exit door. Half-way through the flight, Yousef assembled
the bomb in the aircraft's bathroom. He returned to his seat and placed the bomb inside the life vest underneath. He set the timer for several hours later and deplaned.

On the next leg of the flight, the bomb exploded. The twenty-three-year-old Japanese businessman, Haruki Ikegami, who was sitting where Yousef had sat died a miserable death, his legs separated from the rest of his body. Fortunately for the 273 other passengers and twenty flight crew on board the 747, the captain was able to make a heroic, emergency landing on nearby Okinawa Island. The bomb was too small to destroy the plane in mid-air and Yousef set about fine-tuning his calculations.

According to received wisdom, the only time a 747 has encountered a problem with a fuel-tank explosion was flight TWA 800. On the other hand, Pan Am flight 103 was brought down by a terrorist bomb, Philippine Airlines Flight 434 was nearly brought down by a Yousef bomb, and Air India Flight 182 was brought down by a Sikh terrorist bomb. I've previously pointed to a Frontpage article that makes the case that Yousef was also responsible for downing TWA 800.

Can the Oklahoma bombing be linked to Yousef? The modus operandi was the same as the first WTC attack: same type of bomb deployed in a rental van. Where did Terry Phillips learn to build such a bomb? Would you believe the Phillipines? That's where Yousef was based. He was the Al Qaeda terrorist who nearly destroyed the WTC in 1993 and nearly brought down a 747 with a fuel tank explosion in 1994.

Where does the late Saddam (npbuh) fit in? Yousef's accomplice, Abdul Rahman Yasin, fled to Bhagdad, after being released by our ever-competent FBI, and was sheltered by Saddam.

It's nice to know that some in Congress are challenging the received wisdom about Oklahoma. About time. Add TWA 800 to your list.

Fri Jan 05, 2007

Ellison's swearing-in was a double-edged sword

Kinda funny when you think about it

He chose President Thomas Jefferson's copy of the Koran. That President had the guts to stand up to Muslim aggression, as explained in this Frontpage article by Andrew Walden:

By 1800, the annual tribute and ransom payments first agreed in the mid-1780s amounted to about $1 million--20% of the federal budget. (For fiscal year 2007, 20 percent of U.S. revenues would equal $560 billion.) In May, 1801 Yussif Karamanli, the Pasha of Tripoli, declared war on America by chopping down the flagpole in front of the U.S. Consulate. Seventeen years after appeasement and tribute payments had begun, President Thomas Jefferson led America into the First Barbary War.

From May of 1801 to June 10, 1805, sailors and Marines of the young American nation fought battles immortalized in a line of the Marine Hymn: “to the shores of Tripoli.” As American forces approached Tripoli on land threatening to capture it, Karamanli suddenly became interested in negotiations. The war ended with a treaty exchanging prisoners, Americans giving Karamanli another $60,000 in ransom and an agreement from the Muslims to cease attacks on U.S. ships.

Then LGF links to a photo that shows Ellison swore with his left-hand on the Koran. That is haram (forbidden) in Islam.

Thu Jan 04, 2007

Should Senator Ellison have been allowed to swear on a Koran?

Or, could a future "David Duke" Senator be allowed to swear on Mein Kampf?

I've always held that giving Gitmo prisoners Korans is no different than giving Nazi prisoners copies of Mein Kampf. After all, the inspiration of those who piloted American airplanes into American buildings came was the Koran. Who can doubt that the last words of the 9/11 Hijackers were "Allāhu Akbar (الله أكبر)"? Their inspiration came more directly from the Koran than the Nazis' inspiration to genocide came from Mein Kampf.

If Ellison wanted to swear on a Koran, let it be. Let it also be remembered that America's worst enemies also swear by the Koran.

Wed Jan 03, 2007

Sunni or Shi'ite?

We better understand the difference or we'll fail in Iraq and Iran

Silvestre Reyes, Pelosi's pick to be the Chairman of the U.S. Congress’ House Intelligence Committee, didn't have a clue. This post from The Source illustrates the problem:

In the second half of a 40 minute taped interview, Reyes was given a cupcake question, “Al-Qaeda is what – Sunni or Shia.” Reyes quickly responded, “Al-Qaeda, they have both.” Well yes, there may be elements of both somewhere in the global ranks of Al-Qaeda, Mr. Chairman, but we’re speaking in majorities. “You’re talking about predominately? Predominantly – probably Shi’ite.” As the journalist, Congressional Quarterly Editor Jeff Stein, remarked in a subsequent column, “He couldn’t have been more wrong. Al-Qaeda is profoundly Sunni. If a Shi’ite showed up at an Al-Qaeda club house, they’d slice his head off and use it for a soccer ball.”

Not deterred by his ridiculous response, Stein ventured one more query. Perhaps Reyes would redeem himself and smack this softball right out of the park. After being asked about Hezbollah, the world-renowned Middle-Eastern Terror Network, Reyes responded, “Hezbollah. Uh, Hezbollah…” After laughing and dismissing the question, Reyes quipped, “Why do you ask me these questions at 5 O’Clock? Can I answer in Spanish? Do you speak Spanish?”

Maybe Reyes should learn Arabic and Farsi instead.

By contrast I found this Muslim's explication of the Sunni/Shi'ite Schism a valuable history lesson. I've extracted a few nuggets that show how differently a Muslim sees the situation in Iraq in particular and the Middle East in general:

Here is that narrative: Iran and Saudi Arabia are setting up a power struggle that is going to encompass the heart of the Muslim world; a smaller version of the cold war; with satellite states; and lots of covert, decentralized mercenary usage. In fact, there is some evidence that this struggle has already started. However, this is not just a geo-political struggle. It is colored by almost 1400 hundreds years of inter-Islamic strife. It is colored by brutal massacres. It is colored by theology. It is colored by religious authority. In other words, the battle between Saudi and Iran is not a battle between two random countries. It represents the longest-standing and most violent face-off within Islam. If people thought that Protestant versus Catholic was bad; appreciate the fact that the Islamic face-off was around for almost 900 years before a Protestant even existed.

And the worst thing about this coming battle is that the United States has absolutely no idea that 1) it is coming, 2) or what to do about it.
...
What is relevant today is what Shi'a masses and Sunnis masses are taught.

Sunnis masses are taught that shortly after the death of the Prophet Muhammad, a man who was formerly a Jew (and was probably not really a convert at all), helped to stoke the flames that created the Shi'a/Sunni division in Islam. This means that immediately a Sunni equates a Shi'a with a Jew, and that means that today, a Sunni can immediately equate Shi'a with a global Zionist conspiracy. It is why I found this fatwa by a Saudi cleric important enough to link to. This fatwa perpetuates this already long-standing propaganda.

Shi'a masses are taught that Ali, the cousin of the Prophet Muhammad to whom Shi'a are connected, was inappropriately denied the Caliphate, not once, but on three separate times, and that the worst offender in the usurpation was the third Caliph, Usman, who only cared about nepotism and consolidating power for his family (which is actually kind of true). Thus, Shi'a immediately dislike anyone that comes from Usman's stock -- and that, my friends, has been a huge problem because numerous Muslim leaders since that time have been from Umayyad stock.

The Shi'a -- by way of today's Iran -- have attempted to neutralize the lie that is perpetuated against them (i.e. they are a Jewish conspiracy), by going after Israel. If they kill Jews, and free Jerusalem, surely no one will think they are a Jewish conspiracy. It is why Hizbollah exists. Not to free the Palestinians. It is a PR campaign by the Iranians. It works.
...
How exactly did Wahhabism spread to Chechnya, Bosnia, Indonesia, the US and elsewhere? Very simply: a mosque got founded, people argued as to who should lead it, the reply was: anyone trained by the Saudis. Why? Because Muslims just assume that if you studied in the shade of Mecca or Medina you are more religious than anyone else. It is this psychological power which transforms into actual power that gives Saudi Arabia its big time status in the Muslim world (and the oil money is just a tool that it uses to rely on this psychological power). For the longest time Saudi Arabia -- relying on this psychological power -- spread its tentacles. It went into the Soviet-Afghan war. It went into Europe. It went into anywhere there were Muslims.

On the other hand, we should note, as Powerline does, that Shi'ite Iran gave sanctuary to top Al Qaeda operatives fleeing Afghanistan, and that Iran has been caught red-handed assisting both Shi'ites and (Sunni) Al Qaeda in Iraq.

Here's my take. The simmering war between Shi'ite and Sunni is heating up with the Iranians on one side and the Saudis on the other. Al Qaeda is ostensibly Sunni but it has directed its fire against the Infidels and the Sunni hierarchy in Saudi Arabia. That makes them natural, if temporary, allies of the Iranians. Our problem in Iraq is that some of the Shi'ites have allied themselves with the Iranians instead of the US. They need to be told that that is a bad deal. Step 1. Arrest Al Sadr on that long outstanding murder rap, the one where Al Sadr's followers killed a leading Shi'ite cleric. If the Mahdi army doesn't like it, send in the Marines with very liberal rules of engagement. Step 2. Destroy the Iranian nuclear program.

Update: My wife suggested I link to Krauthammer on the cost/benefit analysis of taking out Iran's nuke capability.

Mon Jan 01, 2007

Iraqi hanging vs Iranian Hanging

Legal execution vs state-sanctioned murder

Saddam was executed after a fair trial. The executioners used a trapdoor. Once Saddam hit bottom he was dead. It was a far more merciful death than any that Saddam and his thugs inflicted on his millions of victims. To read the MSM you would think his execution was hasty, unfair and illegal.

Here's how they execute women in Iran. Warning - distressing image. The image shows a burqa-clad women hanging from a crane. The method used is not the relatively humane trapdoor system that (usually) ensures a quick death by breaking the victim's neck; rather they use the suspension system and the victim slowly dies from strangulation. The victims' crimes are only crimes when viewed through the perverted prism of Sharia law. Take the case of Ateqeh Sahaleh who was on trial for sexual offenses and hung because the judge didn't like her sharp tongue. Or the case of Nazanin who was sentenced to death when she defended herself from a gang of rapists and stabbed one of them to death. Thanks to international outrage, she has earned a retrial. These cases are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to Iran. You don't read much about the Mullahs' murderous ways in the MSM.

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