The "Big Myth"

No...not the Plamegate Affair, but another "Big Lie":

A week ago, last Tuesday, I happened to catch Michael Medved in a debate with guest Ruth Rosen. Here are her credentials:

Historian and journalist Ruth Rosen, a former columnist for the Los Angeles Times and the San Francisco Chronicle, teaches at the University of California, Berkeley, and is a senior fellow at the Longview Institute. A new edition of her most recent book, The World Split Open: How the Modern Women's Movement Changed America (Penguin, 2001), will be published with an updated epilogue in 2007.

She wrote the following article, which Medved took her to task on. Actually, he raked her over the coals and made her look intellectually foolish. Well...at least she was polite. You can listen to his interview here. Thank goodness for Townhall.com. I miss a lot of programs and it is nice to be able to re-listen to some of the best in talk radio. I implore people to go listen to the interview. Aside from him getting a bit excitable (Rosen took his exasperation as his shouting at her- he was not; I think she was just looking for an easy exit), it shows Medved at his best; and reveals a university professor who clearly wrote an influential piece on a matter in which she is pathetically ill-informed.

Published on Wednesday, August 16, 2006

Oliver Stone, 9/11, and the Big Lie
by Ruth Rosen


When World Trade Center ended, I left the theater tense, my muscles aching. The superb directing and acting, coupled with still hardly imaginable scenes of death and destruction, had sent painful muscle spasms up my back, evoked tears, and left me, yet again, with searing and indelible images of that hellish morning.

I felt disoriented in the bright sunlight of a Northern Californian afternoon. As my mind regained its critical faculties, however, another kind of shock set in. I suddenly realized that Oliver Stone's movie reinforces the Big Lie -- endlessly repeated by Dick Cheney, echoed and amplified by the right-wing media -- that 9/11 was somehow linked to Iraq or supported by Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein.

Ok...now this is one of those "big lies" that the mainstream media pushes....kind of like the 16 words in the President's State of the Union Address. I have never been led to believe that Iraq/Saddam attacked us on 9/11 by the Bush Administration. And yet, this is what many of the critics keep telling us.

With a subtle touch, Stone shows us people all over the planet horrified by television images of the airplanes crashing into the towers. He reminds us that the people of the world expressed an outpouring of sympathy (since been squandered by the Bush administration).

Hmm....I also recall the cheering in the streets and the Osama T-shirts; and people who were sympathetic on the surface, but underneath, snickering that America finally received a "bloodied nose" in experiencing some of the harsh violence that happens in other parts of the world. Michael Medved also recently wrote a column on "Anti-Americanism", which has been around long before the Bush Administration took office, and touches upon the envy felt by others in the world.

Meanwhile, Stone introduces us to one ex-Marine who feels called by God to help rescue those buried alive. He gets his hair cut short, puts on his old uniform, and with all the authority of a former staff sergeant, does what he knows best -- uses his military skills to save people's lives. Determined and angry, he insists that we must avenge this horrendous attack.

We also watch a group of Wisconsin policemen viewing the terrorist attacks on television. One screams out, "The bastards!" Stone, in other words, captures the desire for revenge already in the air.

And yet, in none of these profoundly moving scenes is there even a mention of who might have committed this atrocity. Neither the name al-Qaeda, nor Osama Bin Laden, is so much as whispered.

You might say, "But everyone knows it was al-Qaeda."

The problem here, is that Rosen jumps ahead of herself to her own agenda and pet peeve. The movie is recreating history unfolding, and at the point in time, after the 2nd plane hit, we knew we were under attack, and we wanted to pay back those responsible for it.

And you'd be right, but do most Americans really know just who those terrorists were or that they had no connection to Iraq -- that not a single one of them even came from that country?

Okay...15 out of the 19 villains on 9/11 came from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. What's her point? Abdul Rahman Yasin, involved in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, is Iraqi. Al Qaeda operatives come from many nationalities, training outside of their native countries.

It doesn't sound very important until you realize that various polls over the last five years have reported from 20% to 50% of Americans still believe Iraqis were on those planes. (They were not.) As of early 2005, according to a Harris poll, 47% of Americans were convinced that Saddam Hussein actually helped plan the attack and supported the hijackers. And in February, 2006, according to a unique Zogby poll of American troops serving in Iraq, "85% said the U.S. mission is mainly ‘to retaliate for Saddam's role in the 9-11 attacks'; 77% said they also believe the main or a major reason for the war was ‘to stop Saddam from protecting al Qaeda in Iraq.'"

Many of these pollings are bogus; and Zogby has become rather partisan in recent times (remember his polling during Election 2004?)- something that Michael Medved also points out. I'm too lazy to dig up old links; but remember: Google is your best friend (well....sorta).

The Big Lie, first coined by Adolf Hitler in his 1925 autobiography Mein Kampf,was made famous by Joseph Goebbels, propaganda minister for the Third Reich. The idea was simple enough: Tell a whopper (the larger the better) often enough and most people will come to accept it as the truth.

Uh yeah...kinda like how the Left has repeated the mantra-phrase "Iraq and Saddam had nothing to do with 9/11" so often enough, that it's misled the general public into the false belief that this Administration has ever claimed that Saddam was responsible for 9/11. This is one of those insidious lies.

During World War II, the predecessor of the CIA, the Office of Strategic Services, described how the Germans used the Big Lie: "[They] never allow the public to cool off; never admit a fault or wrong; never concede that there may be some good in your enemy; never leave room for alternatives; never accept blame; concentrate on one enemy at a time and blame him for everything that goes wrong; people will believe a big lie sooner than a little one; and if you repeat it frequently enough people will sooner or later believe it."

Yup. That pretty well sums up the liberal lamestream and agenda-driven, Bush-hating propagandistic media. Whatever happens in the world- must be Bush's fault.

This is, in fact, just what the Bush administration has been doing ever since 9/11. As a result, in 2005, an ABC/Washington Post poll found that 56% of Americans still thought Iraq had possessed weapons of mass destruction "shortly before the war," and 60% still believed Iraq had provided "direct support" to al-Qaeda prior to the war.

I see part of the problem as being the mainstream media misreporting and misrepresenting what the Bush Administration's statements and positions are. The other part may be that those being polled are actually a bit better informed than the dinosaur media and liberal professors who read from it. Intellectuals such as Professor Rosen have never heard of such things as the "Saddam documents", or read Stephen Hayes pieces, to know that some of us are several steps ahead of them.

In June 2006, Fox News ran a story once again dramatizing the supposed links between 9/11 and Iraq. And, as recently as July, 2006, a Harris poll found that 64% of those polled "say it is true that Saddam Hussein had strong links to Al Qaeda."

*Yawn*

The Bush administration's Big Lie has worked very well. Dick Cheney, the point man on this particular lie, has repeated it year after year. In a similar way, George Bush has repeatedly explained his 2003 invasion of Iraq, which had nothing whatsoever to do with 9/11, by insisting that we must fight terrorists in that country so that we don't have to fight them here. (It turned out to be something of a self-fulfilling prophesy.)

One of the things that Michael Medved did on-air, was corner Rosen to cite him specific examples rather than vague references and innuendos. She could not. She knew she was coming on a right-wing talk show to defend her article, and she did not have one specific example of where Vice President Cheney mispoke or told a lie. A caller brought up Cheney appearances on Meet the Press; often cited by those on the Left. What was brilliant, was during the commercial breaks, Medved dug up transcripts of the interviews Cheney gave in 2001 and 2003 with Tim Russert, and just like President Bush's 2003 SotU Address, what was actually said, and what the Bush-haters want to believe was said, are two different things.

What is so remarkably insidious, is the NYTimes will misrepresent what President Bush said; then others will pick up on it; and pretty soon a whole mythology is developed around something that never took place; but everyone believes it did, because they all end up citing from each other, never examining the actual source. The perception, however far from the truth, becomes "Bush lied". Or, for those on the Left who do examine and probe deeper, the excuse becomes, "It's cleverly worded, so as to cover themselves." Why can't they just flat-out admit, that something alleged to have been said, never was said?

Neither these, nor so many other administration statements had a shred of truth to them.

"not a shred" is pretty bold and sweeping. It would be nice to be given specific citations- and not "gotcha" moments of mistatements, but real, honest-to-goodness deliberate bold-faced lies!

Even the President, who repeatedly linked Saddam Hussein to the terrorist organization behind the September 11th attacks, admitted on September 18, 2003 that there was no evidence the deposed Iraqi dictator had had a hand in them.

One of the most frustrating things when arguing with those on the Left of this argument, is that so many of them can't seem to distinguish the difference between "Saddam and 9/11= no direct causal link" and "Iraq and al Qaeda= evidence of links". To what degree of operational links is not fully known. But believing there are links between al Qaeda and Iraq does not mean the same thing as Saddam masterminded or had a hand in bringing about 9/11. If liberals are such airheads as to confuse and conflate the two, that's their problem. I just don't get what is so hard to understand. I have never once felt misled about this war and the several cases made for going to war- which was more than just the w(s)md (weapons of mass destruction).

One of the dishonest arguments from some on the Left who believed along with the many of us that Saddam had wmd capabilities; and yet were still strongly against The War. And now they use the argument "no wmds" as a justification that they were right in opposing the war. That's dishonest since even if the mass stockpiles were there and Saddam unleashed chemical and biological weapons on our troops during the War, these peace fascists still would not have endorsed justification for war.

But that didn't stopped the Vice President from endlessly repeating the Big Lie that justifies this country's invasion and occupation of Iraq.

Again, Medved handled this beautifully by going through the transcripts. Here is an excerpt of what he wrote on his blog at Townhall.com:

I played her an excerpt of the President's Monday press conference in which he specifically, unequivocally acknowledged that Sadam had nothing to do with the 9/11 attacks so she quickly retreated to claiming that it was Cheney, not Bush, who promoted this "Big Lie" (which she explicitly compared to the techniques of Goebbels and Hitler). Amazingly, this "distinguished academic" provided not a single citation -- not one! -- for her insistence that Cheney "often" misled people about Iraq's involvement in attacking the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. A caller, hoping to rescue Professor Rosen, mentioned a 2005 appearance by Cheney on "Meet the Press." While the Vice President certainly discussed Iraq's long-standing support for terrorism, and many contacts with Al Qaeda (also cited by the bi-partisan 9/11 Commission) he never came close to claiming Saddam's direct involvement in 9/11--- saying twice, "We just don't know."

I'm cutting down some of the other whiny drivel in Ruthen's article. Here's the conclusion:

That evening, I wrote the words that should have appeared in the postscript: "Government officials later confirmed that the organization which plotted the destruction of the World Trade Center was al-Qaeda, led by Osama Bin Laden, a Saudi Arabian, and Ayman al-Zawahiri, an Egyptian. Nineteen men executed the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. Fifteen of them came from Saudi Arabia; the remaining four from Egypt, The United Arab Emirates, and Lebanon. None of them came from Iraq."

What happened to Oliver Stone, the filmmaker who gave us Platoon, Born on the Fourth of July, Wall Street, and Nixon? Despite his conspiratorial foibles in JFK, he has long been a movie-maker dedicated to raising tough questions about our American past. Where did his commitment to opening historical subjects for debate go?

You mean: "Why isn't this film laced with his Leftist views", don't you?

He was right not to politicize this film, but truth-telling required that he identify the terrorists. Truth-telling would have resulted in his helping to dismantle the Big Lie that has resulted in the deaths of so many American soldiers and Iraqi civilians, and has plunged Iraq into chaos and civil war.

In other words, "why didn't he politicize the hell out of it?", is what you'd really like to ask.

How could Oliver Stone leave it up to viewers to discover for themselves who committed this crime? And how could he leave the audience with the impression that there was a connection, as Dick Cheney has never stopped saying, between 9/11 and Iraq?

This is the tragic failure of Stone's World Trade Center. It undercuts the historical value of the film and reinforces the Biggest Lie of the last five years, still believed by far too many Americans -- that in Iraq, we are fighting those who attacked our country.

*Groan*....please go listen to Michael Medved's interview and his reading of the Meet the Press transcripts. It is quite entertaining. Unless, that is, if you are a liberal moonbat kool-aid-drinker.

(Psst...click photo to out the source)

Important to know...no time to blog about

It'll be interesting to hear what Steve Centanni's opinions are, once he's safely back in the States.

Go visit A Rose By Any Other Name to see what I am referring to.

Also, just to put some steam blowin' out your ears and nostrils.

Sorry folks, I'm off to work- my real job!

Hip Hop Smash Single in Mid-East; Plus Nasrallah says, "Oops...did we do that?"

In wake of the cease-fire between Israel and Hezbollah, there have been many who have perceived agreement to the cease-fire as a kind of defeat for Israel. Certainly, my own concern is that a cease-fire only returns us back to the status-quo, giving Hezbollah time to regroup and reinvigorate itself, for the next battle.

One thing that drives me ill, is how Israel was accused of reacting with a "disproportionate response"; how popular "world" opinion that might have been sympathetic at first, turned against them, and pressured Israel into this cease-fire. And when Israel apparently caved to the political will of the world, the world declares it a victory for Hezbollah.

At least that's my perception, if not the actual reality. I admit I haven't followed every single news and blog story on the conflict. (What do y'all make of the Palestinian boy band (s)hit single, "Hawk of Lebanon"? Go to Newsbusters for the MP3 of the smash anti-semitic single, praising Hezbollah, Nasrallah, and Allah).

Not everyone has seen this month-long war as a defeat for Israel. But the last person I expected to hear label the abduction of 2 Israeli soldiers as "a mistake" even as he declares victory, is ol' Nasrallah himself.

BEIRUT, Lebanon (CNN) -- Had Hezbollah known how Israel was going to respond, the group would not have captured two Israeli soldiers last month in northern Israel, Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah said Sunday.

I've often wondered, even knowing that bin Laden wanted this war with the West, if he has ever thought, "Maybe the U.S. isn't such a paper tiger after all...perhaps bringing down the Towers wasn't such a great idea." After all, he cannot possibly be living up the high life in a cave...nor is he enjoying the 72 virgins promised for martyrdom.

If someone had said July 11 that there was "a one percent possibility" Israel's military response would be as extensive as it turned out to be, "I would say no, I would not have entered this for many reasons -- military, social, political, economic," said Nasrallah, speaking in Arabic.

Not even the families of Lebanese prisoners held by Israel would have wanted to bring on such action, he said.

"If there was a one percent possibility, we would not have done that. We would not have done any capturing."

"One percent" probability?! Did the possibility not even come close to entering their "sheet-for-brains" turban-wearing heads? The blood of innocents is on their hands.

Another Idiot Living Among Us

For the most part, I have managed to avoid LAX since 9/11. I have always hated driving there and dealing with navigating through the traffic. Compound that the security delays. I appreciate the importance of security checks, but not the lack of efficiency.

Several years ago, I discovered the wonders of JetBlue, and Long Beach Airport, from which JetBlue flies to and from (Burbank also has JetBlue, but I've never been there). Absolutely love it! Anyway, on with the news item of the day...

I swear to God....people are idiots and morons and A-holes.

Man Arrested in Hoax Call Over Bomb on Jet
By Stuart Silverstein, Times Staff Writer
August 28, 2006

A late-arriving passenger who was denied permission Saturday night to board a JetBlue airliner leaving Long Beach Airport later called and falsely claimed there was a bomb aboard, authorities alleged Sunday.

The passenger, identified as Yechezkel Wells, 21, of Miami Beach was detained at the airport about 10 minutes after the bomb threat, FBI spokesman Kenneth E. Smith said.

The flight was delayed for 50 minutes after its scheduled departure time to Fort Lauderdale, Fla., while authorities used bomb-sniffing dogs to check whether an explosive was on board.

Authorities took Wells, a college student, into custody after interviewing him and three friends. All four were planning to return to Florida after attending a wedding in the Los Angeles area.

Wells admitted during his interview with authorities that there was no bomb, Smith said.

Wells, who was being held Sunday at the federal Metropolitan Detention Center in Los Angeles, faces a charge of providing false information and making threats that could bring a prison term of up to five years, Smith said.

Wells is scheduled to appear today in federal court in Los Angeles.

His three friends were released after being questioned.

Authorities said the telephoned threat was made about 9:10 p.m., just as Flight 243 was supposed to depart and about 10 minutes after Wells arrived at the airport departure gate.

Smith said it wasn't clear whether Wells was trying to delay the flight so he could get a chance to board or if it was simply a way to vent anger about being kept off.

"I just know he was upset," Smith said.

Well, he really made his life so much better, now didn't he?

9/11 Tribute Alert

A Soldier's Perspective reported on two fine bloggers who are participating in the 9/11 Tribute. They are 5 and 6 years old! Noah and Ben. Read their entry, here.

As the 5th anniversary of 9/11 looms on the horizon, we are approaching the goal of achieving 2,296 blogposts per each victim of that terrible day.

For those unaware, I will be posting about David Gamboa-Brandhorst, the 3 year old son of a man who was my boss. David and his two fathers were aboard the 2nd airliner that was crashed into the World Trade Center.

If you have not yet signed up, you are needed. We still have almost a thousand more to go.

I think I shall "sticky" this post for a week or so. The date today is August 26, 2006.

Asians on a Plane

They are the Kung-Funniest creatures on earth.....



They can karate chop yo' bad ass without warning...





..................and they've just been unleashed...




............30,000 feet in the air



Asians on a Plane....coming to a blog near you. (Click on it...you know you want to. Especially since this motherfrakkin' post makes no sense, otherwise)

Hat tip: The Conservative UAW Guy (another way to get you to click to the source).

Proselytizing for the Peace Fascists

Just kiddin'! No malice intended...Just wanted an excuse to use the term, "peace fascist".

Michael Westmoreland-White left this in a comment section:

Mr. Wordsmith [Hehe..."Mr."...so polite and formal],

Forgive me for hi-jacking this discussion off topic (something, I hate), but I have no other way to contact you. I have written about alternatives to war here.

I invite you and others who believe in war-as-a-solution to comment there. Not the tired "you're a traitor and objectively pro-terrorist" bull, but comments that deal seriously with the topic. Intelligent feedback, please.

Thanks for listening.

Have fun folks (and be polite...no "peace fascist" insults, please). Dan Trabue has worn me out on the topic; but if I have the energy I'll try and engage on it, later, Michael. I know the subject matter is important to you and Dan; but I have other things I'd rather be blogging on. Still, I thought I'd do you the courtesy of bringing attention to your fine post. I can see you put a lot into it and hope some commenters on the right do engage you and Dan in a civil discussion and debate. Just don't hold your breath.

A Muslim Woman Who Doesn't CAIR...

Irshad Manji is one of those brave Muslims who is an outspoken critic of Islam and the Jihadists. There is NOTHING WRONG with criticizing your own faith. It's healthy when there's much to be critical of. She has received praise from fellow Muslims for speaking out openly and vocally; and of course, she also receives many death threats, which she forwards on to the FBI. I first heard of her on the Dennis Prager Show about 2 years ago. She was on Laura Ingraham about a week ago. Here is what she wrote in an op-ed for the NY Times that week:

Muslim Myopia

By IRSHAD MANJI
Published: August 16, 2006

New Haven

LAST week, the luminaries of the British Muslim mainstream — lobbyists, lords and members of Parliament — published an open letter to Prime Minister Tony Blair, telling him that the “debacle” of both Iraq and Lebanon provides “ammunition to extremists who threaten us all.” In increasingly antiwar America, a similar argument is gaining traction: The United States brutalizes Muslims, which in turn foments Islamist terror.

But violent jihadists have rarely needed foreign policy grievances to justify their hot heads. There was no equivalent to the Iraq debacle in 1993, when Islamists first tried to blow up the World Trade Center, or in 2000, when they attacked the American destroyer Cole. Indeed, that assault took place after United States-led military intervention saved thousands of Muslims in Bosnia and Kosovo.

If Islamists cared about changing Iraq policy, they would not have bothered to abduct two journalists from France — probably the most antiwar, anti-Bush nation in the West. Even overt solidarity with Iraqi suffering did not prevent Margaret Hassan, who ran a world-renowned relief agency in Baghdad, from being executed by insurgents.

Meanwhile, at least as many Muslims are dying at the hands of other Muslims as under the boots of any foreign imperial power. In Sudan, black Muslims are starved, raped, enslaved and slaughtered by Arab militias, with the consent of an Islamic government. Where is the “official” Muslim fury against that genocide? Do Muslim lives count only when snuffed out by non-Muslims? If not, then here is an idea for Muslim representatives in the West: Go ahead and lecture the politicians that their foreign policies give succor to radicals. At the same time, however, challenge the educated and angry young Muslims to hold their own accountable, too.

This means reminding them that in Pakistan, Sunnis hunt down Shiites every day; that in northern Israel, Katuysha rockets launched by Hezbollah have ripped through the homes of Arab Muslims as well as Jews; that in Egypt, the riot police of President Hosni Mubarak routinely club, rape, torture and murder Muslim activists promoting democracy; and, above all, that civil wars have become hallmarks of the Islamic world.

Muslim figureheads will not dare be so honest. They would sooner replicate the very sins for which they castigate the Bush and Blair governments — namely, switching rationales and pretending integrity.

In the wake of the London bombings on July 7, 2005, Iqbal Sacranie, then the head of the influential Muslim Council of Britain, insisted that economic discrimination lay at the root of Islamist radicalism in his country. When it came to light that some of the suspects enjoyed middle-class upbringings, university educations, jobs and cars, Mr. Sacranie found a new culprit: foreign policy. In so doing, he boarded the groupthink express steered by Muslim elites.

The good news is that ordinary people of faith are capable of self-criticism. Two months ago, 65 percent of British Muslims polled believed that their communities should increase efforts to integrate. The same poll also produced troubling results: 13 percent lionized the July 7 terrorists, and 16 percent sympathized. Still, these figures total 29 percent — less than half the number who sought to belong more fully to British society.

Whether in Britain or America, those who claim to speak for Muslims have a responsibility to the majority, which wants to reconcile Islam with pluralism. Whatever their imperial urges, it is not for Tony Blair or George W. Bush to restore Islam’s better angels. That duty — and glory — goes to Muslims.

Irshad Manji, a fellow at Yale University, is the author of “The Trouble with Islam Today: A Muslim’s Call for Reform in Her Faith.”

Disproportionate Demands

Kidnapped from Gaza City on August 14th, FOX correspondent, Steve Centanni and cameraman Olaf Wiig were shown on videotape Wednesday to issue statements. From the LA Times:

The purported kidnappers spoke out as well. A heretofore unknown group calling itself the Holy Jihad Brigades claimed responsibility for the abduction and demanded the release of all Muslim prisoners held by the United States — "everybody without exception" — within 72 hours.

"Release what you have, and we will release what we have," the group said in a statement to reporters. "If you implement our conditions, we will implement our promise; otherwise, you will have to wait, and God will be the judge."

The statement, in elaborately religious language, included references to several Koranic verses, one of which alludes to the exchange of prisoners in wartime. It was not immediately clear whether the statement referred to prisoners in the U.S. or in American facilities in Iraq; Guantanamo Bay, Cuba; and Afghanistan.

Not to devalue the lives of the two kidnapped victims, but how does any terrorist group realistically expect such demands to be met?

I pray for the safe release of Centanni and Wiig, and that they are reunited with their families.

Check out Flopping Aces.

CNN's "In the Footsteps of bin Laden"

"You can never understand them, if understanding means sympathising. But in battle you have to know your enemy."-Christiane Amanpour

The two-hour film, reported by Christiane Amanpour, CNN's chief international correspondent, constructs an account of Osama bin Laden's life based on dozens of worldwide interviews, 21 of which were with people who had direct contact with him, including childhood friends, university classmates, fellow jihadists and a former English teacher. -Source...

...to be aired tonight, and repeats over the weekend, Saturday and Sunday.

Finally: When Radical Militant Buddhists Go Bad!

Stop the presses! I guess I take back any slander I might be responsible for in singling out Islam as the sole instigator of mucho violence in the world, today. Now we have militant Buddhist extremists on the war-path to beating the peace into ya:

An anti-violence demonstration in Colombo, Sri Lanka went Jerry Springer, Thursday, when hard-line monks stormed the stage of their pro-peace brethren. First the speaker and a hardliner went at it, punches were exchanged, and then it was on, with robes, fists, and monks flying across stage. The "peace protest" had been organized to find non-violent solutions to the 20 year civil war between Buddhists and Tamil Tiger rebels; and since today's brawl consisted mostly of Buddhist on Buddhist violence it sounds like they're moving in the right direction.

Like Jonathan Livingwell, can someone tell me what in the devil a "hard-line monk" is?!


Anyway: Islamic terrorists better watch out! There's a new, old breed of fanaticism-hardened extremist in town:

See No Terrorism, Hear No Terrorism, Speak No Terrorism

Old Soldier linked to a great analysis by Seth at Hard Astarboard. This is my comment there:

We often speak of "going on with our daily lives and not living in fear" as the best way to show the terrorists that they have not won. But the reality is, they have changed our way of life, and we have no choice but to do so, in order to protect ourselves from the reality of terrorism.

News must be reported; but everytime a terrorist act is broadcast, it is another victory for the terrorist. Because it means getting their message of violence out into the public consciousness. I sometimes wonder what if we never allowed any terrorist activity any airtime at all. Would it continue? After all, part of the motivation is to garner as much media attention as possible. They want the spotlight; they want the media to be complicit in their propaganda of terror.

If we only showed more resolve and a harder stance, it would minimize the impact terrorists see that they have on us. But when we broadcast our grief, our fears, our internal political bickering and dissention, they know that terrorism is effective..and that it works.

Cease-fires are not the Answer

Being anti-war does not equate to being pro-peace, in terms of achieving the desired result...which is peace. Not all wars need be fought, nor lead to peace. Yet some wars must be fought. And what of cease-fires? What is achieved, when one side has long desired peace and the other side has long desired destruction? All it does, is perpetuate the status quo; and allows one side to reinvigorate its hatred and regroup and restrengthen itself for the next armed conflict.

Thomas Sowell wrote another great peace...er, piece...during the month-long Hezbollah-Israel war. The whole thing should be read, but here I give you what I found to be the relevant excerpts. On second thought, it's difficult to cut out anything. So I'll just highlight what I found to be exceptional:

One of the many failings of our educational system is that it sends out into the world people who cannot tell rhetoric from reality. They have learned no systematic way to analyze ideas, derive their implications and test those implications against hard facts.

"Peace" movements are among those who take advantage of this widespread inability to see beyond rhetoric to realities. Few people even seem interested in the actual track record of so-called "peace" movements — that is, whether such movements actually produce peace or war.

Take the Middle East. People are calling for a cease-fire in the interests of peace. But there have been more cease-fires in the Middle East than anywhere else. If cease-fires actually promoted peace, the Middle East would be the most peaceful region on the face of the earth instead of the most violent.

Was World War II ended by cease-fires or by annihilating much of Germany and Japan? Make no mistake about it, innocent civilians died in the process. Indeed, American prisoners of war died when we bombed Germany.

There is a reason why General Sherman said "war is hell" more than a century ago. But he helped end the Civil War with his devastating march through Georgia — not by cease fires or bowing to "world opinion" and there were no corrupt busybodies like the United Nations to demand replacing military force with diplomacy.

There was a time when it would have been suicidal to threaten, much less attack, a nation with much stronger military power because one of the dangers to the attacker would be the prospect of being annihilated.

"World opinion," the U.N. and "peace movements" have eliminated that deterrent. An aggressor today knows that if his aggression fails, he will still be protected from the full retaliatory power and fury of those he attacked because there will be hand-wringers demanding a cease fire, negotiations and concessions.

That has been a formula for never-ending attacks on Israel in the Middle East. The disastrous track record of that approach extends to other times and places — but who looks at track records?

Remember the Falkland Islands war, when Argentina sent troops into the Falklands to capture this little British colony in the South Atlantic?

Argentina had been claiming to be the rightful owner of those islands for more than a century. Why didn't it attack these little islands before? At no time did the British have enough troops there to defend them.

Before there were "peace" movements and the U.N., sending troops into those islands could easily have meant finding British troops or bombs in Buenos Aires. Now "world opinion" condemned the British just for sending armed forces into the South Atlantic to take back their islands.

Shamefully, our own government was one of those that opposed the British use of force. But fortunately British prime minister Margaret Thatcher ignored "world opinion" and took back the Falklands.

The most catastrophic result of "peace" movements was World War II. While Hitler was arming Germany to the teeth, "peace" movements in Britain were advocating that their own country disarm "as an example to others."

British Labor Party Members of Parliament voted consistently against military spending and British college students publicly pledged never to fight for their country. If "peace" movements brought peace, there would never have been World War II.

Not only did that war lead to tens of millions of deaths, it came dangerously close to a crushing victory for the Nazis in Europe and the Japanese empire in Asia. And we now know that the United States was on Hitler's timetable after that.

For the first two years of that war, the Western democracies lost virtually every battle, all over the world, because pre-war "peace" movements had left them with inadequate military equipment and much of it obsolete. The Nazis and the Japanese knew that. That is why they launched the war.

"Peace" movements don't bring peace but war.

When Former U.S. Presidents Attack

"I think I represent the vast majority of Democrats in this country."
-former President Jimmy Carter

Uh..okay. I think we're good to go in November, now, folks.

"San Francisco....where you will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy"

Over the weekend, I was in downtown Little Tokyo, for Nisei Week. I think I must have missed out on the weekend protests, as I've been checking out Zombie's photos from the San Francisco anti-U.S./Israel rally.

I should have known that something was going on, as a couple of people walked by my booth with placards. I tried to catch up to them, to find out what their signs said, but it was crowded and I had to return back to my booth. I suspect there must have been a San Francisco equivalent going on by city hall, which is only blocks away from Little Tokyo.

I did manage to get a couple of photos of Japanese-American war veterans in the parade:


Instead of republishing some of the vile photographs of the leftie-lunatics this time around, I'll just provide you with the link. Although, this one seriously made me chuckle:


I wonder if the sign-holder is aware?

As Laura Ingraham said on her radio program yesterday morning, political ads should be made of these fringe-fanatics, come election time. Showing them off to middle America, and knowing which political party these nutters are more closely aligned to, can only be good for the Republican Party.

The pro-Israel counter-protestors, however, is a thing of beauty, and I have no problem, viewing and publishing these:


As AirForceWife put it, in a previous comment thread, in order for there to be peace, both sides have to want it. Israel has ached for peace...so much so, that with the help of President Clinton, 97% of the West Bank and 3% of Israeli land was brokered on behalf of peace. But Palestinians and the Arab world have not wanted peace with Israel: they have ached for Israel's destruction.

Tell me of an instance when Israelis have marched and chanted, "Death to Palestinians!" , "Death to Muslims!". Yet in the Islamic States, we have heard it so often from those practitioners of "the religion of peace", that we have grown desensitized to it. And the pro-Palestinian/anti-Israel left excuse their behavior. Instead of recognizing the hatred of radical-Islamists (which infects even mainstream Muslims) as a source of the world's woes, they'd rather blame the U.S. and Israel for the evil conduct of others. After all, they can do this with the security of knowing we won't behead them for it. Criticizing Islamists, however, might get you killed. God forbid, we should be "creating more terrorists" by standing up to terrorism.


Born Again Redneck had also blogged the photos.

Who is Joe Tomci?

Just one of our many fallen heroes you should know about. Please pay your respects at Anna's.

Old Soldier made an important post a while ago, regarding retired veterans benefits you should check out. They deserve our support.

"Ready the photo(n) torpedoes..."

The real, undoctored Beirut photograph reveals intervention by the Federation flag ship:


EU Referendum is on top of this conspiratorial cover up by Reuters.

AP Defends Green Helmet

Important update on this. Begin at Flopping Aces.

Bumpersticker Refresher Post

One of the things that I find most scenic during my drives through the "mean streets" of Los Angeles, are all the whacked out bumperstickers on the road. The Kerry/Edwards bumperstickers especially warm the cockles of my heart.

I took this photo back in February of this year. Hullo! Earth to moonbat!


Ah! The chickenhawk argument!


Hmm....must be a message to the Islamo-fascists out there in the wide world. That's right you terror-Nazis: FEAR BUSH!


The driver was going so fast, I couldn't catch up to him to make sure that he had buckled on his tinfoil hat as he sat behind the wheel, moving through life so recklessly.

Of course it is! Which is why we went to war.


This past Tuesday, I finally "came out of the closet" and told a very liberal client of mine that I was....*gasp*...a CONSERVATIVE REPUBLICAN and a strong supporter of President Bush. I love this gal, and to my relief, like a true, sane liberal, she still accepted and loved me for who I am. She had a bumpersticker that said "No blood for oil". I think she now owns a hybrid.

Where do I get one of these energy bars?


That's just plain messy!


These last two are examples of liberal moonbatmobile. I found the first one above, parked alongside the road around the block from where I live. Why would one deface one's personal property like this? Click it to enlarge. Notice the one that says "I'm moving to Canada"? I wish I had a post-it response to tag the vehicle with, "then why are you still here?".

I posted this video before, under my old YouTube account. I won't do that again; but through Livedigital, I bring you back this clip from Malcolm in the Middle. What made it hilarious for me, was the bumpersticker, "War is not the Answer". I can actually see the liberals who are deranged Bush-haters, resorting to violence to get their message of peace across.

Enjoy the weekend video, and drive safe. If you see any Kerry/Edwards bumperstickers out on the road, don't roll your eyes and fret; we won! Just point, honk, and laugh as you drive by.




Previous Posts:

Christmas stocking stuffers

Bumper Car Wars

Blog-Sitting Over at Ex-Donkey

Gary's taking a mini-vacation and asked me to guest-blog at his place. Skye the moonbat-slayer will also be guest-blogging...not sure who the other 2 mystery bloggers are. But come pay a visit to Ex-Donkey Blog. Gary is my blogfather, as it was his blog that inspired me into the ridiculous notion that "I could do this!", when it came to running a blog.

Recently, he shut down his comments section, due to spambots attacking mu.nu. But you are more than welcomed to talk about Gary behind his back in this post. That is...until he discovers this post and the ever-so-clickable area where it says "0 comments".

This Got My Goat

Ace of Spades HQ brought this to the attention of the blogosphere a few days ago:

Iraq Still Manages to Shock

Listen to this story... by John Hendren

Morning Edition, August 7, 2006 · Sectarian strife continues to worsen in the Iraqi capital of Baghdad.

...the killing in Iraq is getting: shepherds in the rural western Baghdad neighborhood of Gazalea have recently been murdered, according to locals, for failing to diaper their goats....

Yes, you read that right. According to the audio:

The sexual tension is apparently so high in regions where sheiks take a draconian view of Sharia Law, that they feel the sight of naked goats poses an unacceptable temptation. They blame the goats.

Not only that, but at a grocery store in east Baghdad, the grocer and 3 others were shot to death and the grocery store firebombed because the grocer had "suggestively arranged his vegetables".

Have I mentioned how much I love my country, lately? Not that we don't get our own "news of the weird" over here...but, God bless America and our *ahem* liberal attitudes and acceptance of naked goats and erotic vegetables!

The Mystery of Green Helmet Coming to Light

Little Green Footballs has been on a tear this past week. Besides the photoshopped Reuters photos, the Wailing Woman mystery, the Passion of the Toys, there is the mystery of Green Helmet. Well, mystery no longer. What has been suspected is now confirmed: All the World's a Stage.



Hat tip: Flopping Aces

Also check out these vids:

True or Reuters?

Reuters faked photos

Critical Update at EU Referendum.

A Tale of the Postmaker and His Gnomes

Last night I had the tv on FOX late at night, listening to the repeat of Cavuto while on the computer. He was interviewing a relative of a 9/11 victim who did not appreciate the message in the new World Trade Center movie, when *BOOM*- breaking news.

I clicked over at Flopping Aces and couldn't believe it: that pajama-clad, blogging cop already had a post up! I swear....it's like the Shoemaker and the Elves, and he's got little blogging gnomes that come out when he goes to bed.

Anyway...it could have been a drastically different morning sometime this month (Aug 22nd?), had the plot been carried out.

Toy Story

Shamelessly pilfered and pillaged from Slublog:

A child's toy lies amidst broken glass from the shattered windows of an apartment block near those that were demolished by Israeli air strikes in Tyre, southern Lebanon, Monday, Aug. 7, 2006. Israeli bombs slammed into a complex of buildings flattening four multi storied apartment blocks, including the one apartment that had been the target of Saturday's Israeli commando raid, whilst a civil defense ambulance was hit in the rear and slightly damaged with emergency workers who had gone to the bomb site to search for bodies being forced to flee. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)
A toy lies among the wreckage of a demolished building in the Hizbollah stronghold that was targeted by Israeli air strikes in southern Beirut July 26, 2006. REUTERS/Sharif Karim(LEBANON)
A toy is seen near Hizbollah political headquarters that were demolished in southern Beirut July 21, 2006, that it was targeted by Israeli air strikes. REUTERS/Issam Kobeisi (LEBANON)
A building is destroyed in a Hizbollah stronghold targeted by Israeli air strikes in southern Beirut July 28, 2006. REUTERS/Sharif Karim (LEBANON)
A toy is seen in Beirut suburbs, after it was targeted by Israeli air strikes in southern Beirut July 21, 2006. REUTERS/Sharif Karim (LEBANON)

Toys at a demolished building after it was targeted by Israeli air strikes in the suburbs of Beirut, July 20, 2006. (Mohamed Azakir/Reuters)
Hat tip to Michelle Malkin for this find from Slublog. Tell me these don't just tug on your heartstrings.

Check out Zombie's Comprehensive Fauxtographic Taxonomy of Fraud

What's the significance of this photo? Click it and find out.

Remember: Photos can lie...they never tell a whole story...they shape perspective and perception.

Update on Reuters photo and Adnan Hajj.

Another example of either shoddy photojournalism and/or agenda-driven bias.

"Where there's smoke...."

Well, it seems bloggers are making deep inroads into the mainstream press, once again. This time, by pointing out the doctoring of a Reuters photograph, posted on Saturday. Flopping Aces has some of the best analysis and blog roundup on this.

Reuters has since retracted the photo, as well as issuing a statement. The Lebanese freelance photographer in question is Adnan Hajj. His reason for the doctoring?

He told Reuters on Sunday that the image of the Israeli air strike on Beirut had dust marks which he had wanted to remove.

He really did an excellent job removing those dust marks, now didn't he? Reuters mentions that a hasty review of his work over the weekend reveals at least one other image of his also had "dust marks"; apparently those dust marks were covering 2 other flares instead of just the one that originally appears in a photograph of an Israeli F-16 firing a missile in an air strike on Nabatiyeh. Jawa Report has the analysis.

Hajj's photos are 2 out of 43 photographs he has filed directly to the Reuters Global Pictures Desk, since the start of the current conflict. Here is the complete work of Adnan Hajj, found through Power Line. Also at Power Line, is this interesting remark by Ken Sanders,

There is NO WAY this one guy could be taking all of these pictures - look at the images and dates. Does he have a flying car? The question: is he simply a clearinghouse for Hezbollah propaganda, routed expeditiously through Reuters? Looks like they pay the guy to forward unverified images (sometimes doctored or staged, as you've helped explain) taken by others.

I think the bias and the dishonesty in reporting stretches beyond one "mere" photographer caught with his hand in the photoshop jar.

I'm still in the middle of Stephanie Gutmann's "The Other War". If you have not heard of it, I strongly recommend you pick it up if you are still reluctant to believe that Reuters, the AP, CNN, and much of mainstream media is not trustworthy and not impartial in the way they report the news. Many people have had their opinion on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict colored by the agenda-driven AP photographers pushing an image of an Israeli military goliath bullying boys throwing stones; had their views shaped by liberal journalists and by Academia, sympathetic to the Palestinian cause. As Bret Stephens, former editor-in-chief of the Jerusalem Post, wrote: "...the norm tends to be one of strict factual accuracy and routine contextual dishonesty."

Other links worth checking out:

Michelle Malkin mentions The Dissident Frogman who has a very cool video demonstration of how the photoshop alteration was done.

Intimidation of the press in the Middle East

Why Israel is losing the media war

The Other War in Qana

Pallywood over at Mike's America

EU Referendum on "Who is this man?"
and "The 'Green Helmet' mystery continues"

Assorted Babble has a good roundup.

"YouTube is Pissing Me Off!" Rant

I feel as though YouTube is actively trying to sabotage my abilities to screen out child pervs from viewing my videos.

Many of my readers probably don't know much about me, but I teach gymnastics. Making music videos of people I know has become a hobby for me. If you aren't aware of it, I do have a gymnastics blog, primarily for the purposes of hosting my vids from the gym. I have over a hundred videos uploaded to YouTube from almost 2 years of video-making. Many of them involve children.

Yesterday morning I painstakingly went through each gymnastics video, and changed the setting to private. There's no feature that allows me to mass-set them on private. I do have a few vids hosted by Livedigital. So you can see an example of one of my recent vids if you click here.

Let me sort of start at the beginning of my woes...

It's hard not to love something that comes for free. I love discovering blogger and YouTube has been great in so many ways. It's hard to complain about a free service. That being said, YouTube's customer service stinks to high heaven. I can only guess that they were ill-prepared for their own success. They come across to me as disheveled, disorganized, and unprofessional. A while ago, they closed my account, with little warning, when they all of a sudden began cracking down on copyright infringement (I had a couple of 60 Minute segments up, and a clip from Malcolm in the Middle- "War is not the Answer"). This person reflects some of what I experienced. Within a short space of time, all of a sudden I found that my account had been shut down. I wrote to them repeatedly, to no avail. In the end, I opened up a new account, and kept my uploads limited to the hundred plus music videos I have made for the gym I work for. Hosting them on blogger was an easy way to share the videos with family and friends. I once used Yousendit.com, but it was wearisome.

Being naive without realizing I was being naive, I categorized and tagged my videos. I knew there were child predators on the internet (how many times has MSNBC shown their Dateline specials?); I just didn't know they all had YouTube accounts.

Initially, I set most of my vids to a private setting, willing to share a few that I was proud of, with the public. But YouTube changed their feature in such a way, that in order to be viewable from my blog, I had to make the video publically accessible. The private setting only seemed to be of use if I directly sent out an invite to specific videos to those on my contact/friend list. At this point, I had begun noticing that people who were listing my vids as "favorites" had profiles that made my skin crawl. I hit the "block user" button each time, and even looked up their friends to preemptively block them as well. I also removed all of my tags. YouTube makes it so that you have to tag it with something, so I would try to come up with gibberish. You also have to fill in the category field. They made it challenging for me to make my vids the least accessible.

I began fretting all over again, when I was getting pervs who I had blocked, listing a new video of mine as their favorite. Not too long ago, they took away the feature that allowed you to examine who was listing your vids as a favorite. Just within the past few days, I imagine, they once again updated so as to make it hard to determine who has subscribed to your videos, and completely stripped you of your ability to "unsubscribe" people from being alerted to new vids. I found this out yesterday morning when I got a notice that a blocked user just subscribed to my videos.

Also, I had recently figured out that labeling and tagging my videos with "^", made it impossible to click on the video; the tag search also came up in "error". But the embedded videos still worked from my blog. My only problem was the playlists (another power I wanted to have over my vids was removing them from people's playlists), from which my vids were still accessible. I liked being able to see "links" to my vids; but not comfortable with others being able to see it, as I didn't want the pervs to track my vids back to my gymnastics blog.

A couple of users wrote me, wanting to let me know that they could not access my vids. Good. Unfortunately, they must have complained to YouTube as well; because now the "^" no longer sends the link into "error".

Added to this, there are many things that aren't working properly. It's like everything is scrambled (and as I said earlier, "disheveled and disorganized").

I have written their contact dept a number of times, offering my suggestions and complaints as professionally and politely as I could. The response is a cut-and-paste of their general "rules and guidelines" and "faq's". At every turn, I feel like YouTube has done everything they can to disarm me of my abilities to control my videos on their site, making things worse off than before when I had initially opened an account. Shouldn't it be the other way around?!

I don't want to close myself off from the world, as the safest thing to do is not to share my videos online at all. Or not to even make them at all. To never photograph a child. But that's no way to live, either.

Other share services, like Livedigital, doesn't have any kind of screening features. But at least I can get away without tagging or labeling my videos with any kind of description, so as to not be found.

Let me add, that not all viewers have been pervs. I gained an adult client, because she had seen one of my vids and thought it would be a fun gymnastics place to workout at. And I've met someone else across the country who shares my same hobby and whose daughter is a gymnast. But like many things, it only takes a few bad apples in society to terrorize the whole orchard and rain on your parade.

More frustrations here (comments section is worthwhile also).

New Link for the movie "Obsession"

From the comments section at Always on Watch: New Google link.

Life is as good as you make it

In light of Angel's post on optimism, this story comes to mind:

Each day on a construction site, when the lunch whistle would blow, Sam, would open up his lunch pail and exclaim, "God bless it! Peanut butter and jelly sandwich again?! I HATE peanut butter and jelly sandwich!"

This outburst went on day after day; and as weeks passed, Sam's coworkers grew irritated by his irrational behavior. Until finally one of them went up to him and said, "well, fer crissakes, Sam....if you hate peanut butter and jelly so much, why don't you have your ol' lady make you something different?"

"My 'old lady'?! What do you mean 'My old lady'? I'm not married....I make my own peanut butter and jelly sandwiches."

The story is from memory, recited and paraphrased from Dan Millman's "Way of the Peaceful Warrior", read 20 years ago.

So, you see, folks: the moral of the story is that we each make our own sandwiches in life. Life is as good as you make it....we dig our own graves....we reap what we sow....etc.

"Need to Know" Open Post

Well, I'm approaching two weeks of being behind in the news. I know that means I've missed a lot of "in-depth" analysis and opinionating and important news items or "should be"-news-items-of-the-day from the blogosphere. Since work is still kicking my butt, what I'd like is for my visitors to tell me what they think are the "need to know" stories. I don't care if they are conservative or liberal, just link me up. Lead me to the light, and show me what you believe to be the most important, read-worthy blogposts of last week and this one. Link me up!

One thing I have to announce, is that yesterday I became the 1,138th blogger to sign up for the 9/11 2,996 Tribute project. It took me a while. I will be blogging on David Brandhorst, who is the 3 year old adopted son of my former manager, Ron Gamboa. Ron, Daniel, and their 3 year-old were all aboard Flight 175, the 2nd plane to hit the Towers.