January 2009 Archives

I haven't found a lot of buzz on the web on this, but today is the day Iraqis get to vote.  According to the Washington Post, the provincial elections will be one of the tests of whether the Iraqis can build a stable democracy.  During the last election, the Sunnis did not vote because they felt they were not going to be treated fairly.  This time the Sunnis are running for office.  Hopefully the result of this will be shared power and lively, but peaceful debate.

According to the article:

 "In Fallujah, Anbar's second largest city, women were arriving to polling stations to cast votes, unprecedented in a conservative tribal society where women are not allowed to mingle freely with men. Many wore customary veils; female volunteers searched the bodies of each woman for weapons and bombs. Female suicide bombers have committed numerous attacks in Iraq over the past year.

"I came to vote because I want to see women representing women of Fallujah and Anbar and to prove through my participation that women are here and will play an important role," said Iman Karkaz, a college professor in Fallujah and women activist. "For sure this election will bring changes. The more women who take part in the election that more likely this change will happen.""

Thank you, George W. Bush and General David Petraeus for your wisdom and dedication to the cause or Iraqi freedom. 

History can be a nasty thing that gets in the way sometime.  Charles Krauthammer reminds us of this in a column in the Washington Post on Friday.  President Obama has said that he wants to return to "same respect and partnership that America had with the Muslim world as recently as 20 or 30 years ago."   Hmm.  Now let's see.  Thirty years ago was 1979, the year Muslims stormed the American Embassy in Iran, took approximately seventy hostages, and held them for more than a year.  The Marine barracks in Lebanon were blown up in 1983.  There was the oil embargo of the US in the 1970's.  This does not sound like a loving relationship.

So let's see what we have done lately to change from this 'loving relationship' to the tension that we have now.  According to the article:

"The two Balkan interventions -- as well as the failed 1992-93 Somalia intervention to feed starving African Muslims (43 Americans were killed) -- were humanitarian exercises of the highest order, there being no significant U.S. strategic interest at stake. In these 20 years, this nation has done more for suffering and oppressed Muslims than any nation, Muslim or non-Muslim, anywhere on Earth. Why are we apologizing?"

"George W. Bush went to the Islamic Center in Washington six days after the Sept. 11 attacks, when the fires of Ground Zero were still smoldering, to declare "Islam is peace," to extend fellowship and friendship to Muslims, to insist that Americans treat them with respect and generosity of spirit.

"And America listened. In these seven years since Sept. 11 -- seven years during which thousands of Muslims rioted all over the world (resulting in the death of more than 100) to avenge a bunch of cartoons -- there's not been a single anti-Muslim riot in the United States to avenge the massacre of 3,000 innocents. On the contrary. In its aftermath, we elected our first Muslim member of Congress and our first president of Muslim parentage."

"Iran has already responded to the Obama overture. In perfect tune with Obama's defensiveness, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad declared that better relations might be possible -- after America apologized for 60 years of crimes against Iran. Note the 60 years. The mullahs are as mystified by Obama's pre-1979 (or 1989) good old days as I am."

Americans are smart enough to remember where we really are (I hope). 

 

 

This illustration comes from a website called Suitably Flip.  The picture says it all.

 

Trillions

One of the ways that politicians have gotten away with things in the past has been to distract us from the actual facts.  Sleight of hand is an amazing thing.  It's found in Saul Alinsky's RULES FOR RADICALS a number of times:

3.  Whenever possible, go outside the experience of an opponent.  Here you want to cause confusion, fear, and retreat.

5.  Ridicule is man's most potent weapon.  It's hard to counterattack ridicule, and it infuriates the opposition, which then reacts to your advantage.

11.  Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, polarize it.  Don't try to attack abstract corporations or bureaucracies.  Identify a responsible individual.  Ignore attempts to shift or spread the blame.

Take a close look at Rule 3 above.  How many times have we heard, "We are unchartered waters, we must pass the stimulus bill"?

Take a look at Rules 5 and 11.  What is being done to Rush Limbaugh now and to Republicans who oppose the stimulus?

One of the cures for corruption in government is an educated, informed voter.  All of us need to become that as quickly as possible.  The above rules are being used against us to take our money and eventually our freedom.

Hot Air ran an article yesterday containing statements by Senator Claire McCaskill on the stimulus bill.  She is justifying capping salaries and bonuses for executives of any company or bank that takes bailout money.  Why not?  Money rarely comes without strings attached.  Every move being made in the Democrat Congress right now is against free enterprise.  Since free enterprise is what has made this country great, we need to preserve it--not ruin it.  If you look at the causes of the housing bubble collapse, it was not the free market--Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were government entities who just happened to enrich a number of prominent Democrat politicians.

Senator McCaskill also admitted that a portion of the bill was pork (and she felt, unwise).  However, her justification for the pork in the bill was that some programs had simply been starved for cash, and that is why they were added.  Four million dollars to ACORN and fifty million to the National Endowment for the Arts are not stimulus--they are PORK!  For the sake of every American, their children, and their grandchildren, this bill needs to fail. 

 

According to an article in today's Power Line Blog, the Senate may follow the footsteps of the House of Representatives and show bipartisan opposition to the current economic stimulus bill.  (Even though the adds put out by George Soros are claiming that only the Republicans opposed the bill, the fact remains that eleven Democrats also opposed it.  Since only one party voted for it, and two parties voted against it, the opposition was bi-partisan, the support was partisan.)   Democrat Ben Nelson seems to be trying to put together another 'gang of 14' effort to change the bill in order to make it acceptable to more Democrats and possibly some Republicans.  I am not totally comfortable with this idea.  I didn't support the original 'gang of 14'--I felt it was an example of the Republicans choking and ignoring their conservative base.  This might turn out to be equally bad, but at least both parties are beginning to see how awful this current bill is.

Stimulus Package?

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There is an opinion piece in yesterday's New York Times about the current stimulus package being debated.  Evidently, during the Obama campaign, Larry Summers, the Harvard economist, built the case for a big but surgical stimulus package. Summers warned that a "poorly provided fiscal stimulus can have worse side effects than the disease that is to be cured." He proposes three clear guidelines--first, the money should go out immediately, second, it should help middle and low-income people, and third, deficits caused by the stimulus package should not last for more than a year or two.  Good grief--I could vote for that stimulus package!

Larry Summers has become a top economic advisor to the Obama administration, and his suggestions are being totally ignored!  That is a shame--the man is making worthwhile proposals.  This bill permanently and drastically increases the size and intrusiveness of the federal government.  It needs to be stopped before it does serious damage.

Just a note--who are middle income people?  It seems to me that middle income in Kansas is different than middle income in Boston, New York, or Los Angeles.  I suspect that in Kansas you could live reasonably well on $ 40,000 to $ 50,000 a year; in Boston, New York, or Los Angeles that would be a struggle.  In the case of economic stimulus, one size does not fit all, and the only size that will benefit everyone is a decrease in taxes on corporations and on people who actually work.  Four million dollars given to ACORN is a political payback--not an economic stimulus.

Breitbart.com is reporting today that a fired employee of Fannie Mae planted a vicious virus in their computer system that was intended to destroy all mortgage records.  Fortunately, somehow, the virus was found and stopped.  The employee was fired at the end of October, and the virus was scheduled to destroy all records this Saturday.

This is a very interesting story.  The employee is scheduled for arraignment Friday in U.S. District Court in Baltimore on one count of computer intrusion.   I suspect (and I may be wrong on this) that there are a lot of people who would like to see Fannie Mae's mortgage records disappear.  Remember that many of the executives who made millions in bonuses from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac for increasing the number of subprime mortgages during the runup to the failure are still very active and powerful in Democrat party politics.

About Those SUV's

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We all remember the quote:

"We can't drive our SUVs and eat as much as we want and keep our homes on 72 degrees at all times . . . and then just expect that other countries are going to say OK."

That was Barack Obama on the campaign trail.  That was then; this is now.  As a not-so-young person who is very sensitive to cold, those words were not comforting.  My house is probably at 70 degrees or so (thanks to two pellet stoves), and I like it that way.  I really have no intention of letting the rest of the world vote on what they think my comfort level should be.  Unless they are willing to pay my utility bills, I really don't think they should have a voice.  Ok, so why am I bringing this up?

On his first full day at the White House, President Obama was photographed in the Oval Office without his suit jacket on.  That's not a problem for me-- he's allowed to be comfortable in his own office--but there was a comment with the photo.  Barack Obama hates the cold and had cranked up the thermostat.  I can totally identify.  I wouldn't even by complaining except that his campaign quote sounded as if he was not willing to afford me the same privilege.  Tell you what--I won't complain about his warm office if he won't complain about my warm house.

According to an article in Power Line Blog yesterday, the snowy owl, a native of the far north has been moving south.  In Tennessee, bird watchers spotted the first snowy owl to be seen in the state in 22 years.  I'm not sure what this means long term, but it is obvious that at least for this winter, global warming has taken a holiday!  It seems as if the predictions of the late 1970's which heralded a coming ice age may have been more accurate.  I guess the bottom line is that you really can't expect a science that cannot successfully predict next week's weather to tell us what is going to happen twenty years from now. 

As I have said before, one of the best websites to refute global warming is wattsupwiththat.com.  Today, their lead article is about a mature Arctic Ivory Gull spotted in Plymouth, Massachusetts.  A mature Gull of this species has not been spotted in Massachusetts since the 1800's.  The entire article can be found at PatriotLedger.com.

So much for global warming.

There is a very interesting article at Townhall.com about the money from the initial bank bailout.  It seems that a number of local banks are backing out of the government bailout.  They are looking at the strings attached to the money and deciding that they are not interested.  One bank, Fidelity Bank in Dearborn, Michigan, had originally applied for bailout money in November, but when the directors realized that if they took the $29 million they had applied for, the government would have owned 25 per cent of the bank's stock, they decided to refuse the money.  Many of the smaller banks were not involved in the subprime market, so they are not in trouble, and the strings attached to the bailout money make it very unattractive unless a bank is desperate.

Congress is pushing any bailed-out bank to make loans to help the economy, but if the jobless rate is high, the number of good loans applied for goes down.  The smaller banks did not want the government telling them to loan money when they did not consider the loan wise.  It was pressure put on banks by the government and by such groups as ACORN that caused many banks to make bad loans and caused the lending crisis in the first place.

The smaller banks are also leery of the government changing the rules in the middle of the game.  Government regulations on banks and businesses are a nightmare now, if you add to that bailout money, the freedom of business to operate independently from government will be in jeopardy.  Just a note along those lines--I have heard it suggested that judges in bankruptcy court be allowed to change the terms of mortgages in order to avoid foreclosure.  Has anyone considered what that will do to contract law?  If a mortgage can be changed without the consent of the lender, what good is a mortgage contract?

What First Amendment?

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There is a posting at CNSNEWS (I had a lot of trouble linking to their website, hopefully whatever problem there was is fixed by now)regarding the dustup about the misquote of Rush Limbaugh last week.  If you listen to the whole quote, what Rush essentially said is that he hoped that if Barack Obama's policies were socialist, they would fail.  There was nothing in the quote saying that he wished failure for Barack Obama.  He further stated that his wish was for the success of America.  If you listen to the network news, that was not the quote you heard.  Well, the Democrats know a political opportunity when they see one, and their view of opposition is that it needs to be silenced.

The Democrats have launched an online website where anyone can express their outrage at the comments of Rush Limbaugh.  Why?  Isn't he entitled to an opinion just as everyone else?  He has earned his place in the political discourse, and to use a misquote to try to discredit him is dishonest and unAmerican.  Where was the website to express outrage at the comments of Jeremiah Wright or William Ayers?

Today's Wall Street Journal has the information on what is in the current stimulus bill.  I also found information at the Republicans House Budget Committee Website

This is what I found in the Wall Street Journal.  There is $1 billion for Amtrak, $2 billion for child-care subsidies, $ 50 million for the National Endowment for the Arts, $ 400 million for global warming research, $ 2.4 billion for carbon-capture demonstration projects and $ 650 million to pay for digital TV conversion coupons.  Less than 5% of the bill (about $ 30 billion) is for fixing bridges or highway projects.  There is also $ 40 billion for broadband and electric grid development.  There is $20 for business tax cuts.  According to Wall Street Journal estimates only about $ 90 billion out of the $ 825 billion (about 12 cents out of every dollar) is for something that could possibly be considered growth stimulus.

There is also a considerable amount of money for "transfer payments".  These are benefits given to individuals who are doing nothing to help the economy.  Some of these may be a good idea to help people in need, but they are not stimulus.  These benefits include an $ 83 billion earned income credit for people who don't pay income tax.  We are reaching a point where it will pay not to work in America. 

There is also $66 billion for education--$ 6 billion for university building projects.  Written into this part is the stipulation that none of the money shall go to provide financial assistance to students attending private elementary or secondary schools.  The Democrats have never liked voucher programs, but how many of them send their children to public school?

According the the Republican Caucus Committee on the Budget  (these figures are based on the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) analysis of the bill) only 7 per cent of this money will be spent in 2009 ($ 26 billion), and less than half--38 per cent--will be spent in the first 2 years.  The plan spends about $ 54 billion on 19 programs that the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) has analyzed and described as "ineffective" or "results not demonstrated".

This bill is going to create massive debt and little or no positive results.  The President can get this passed without the Republicans.  Let the Democrats pass it and take the credit for it.  If it succeeds (which will happen right after pigs fly), they can bask in their glory.  If it fails miserably (about a 99.9 per cent possibility), the Republicans may be able to pass something that might actually do some good. 

 

Economic Stimulus

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I haven't said much about the economic stimulus package that will be voted on tomorrow because I'm not really sure I understand it.  It seems to be changing as it goes.  There is a short article at AskHeritage.org detailing the amount of the bill and some of its effects. 

According to the article, passage of this bill would add $6,700 in debt to every household in America.  Barack Obama is stating that spending $800 billion will create 3.7 million new jobs.  This works out to a cost of over $200,000 per job.  Where can I go to find a job like that?

Basically, the plan has a lot of pork--it transfers wealth from the private sector to the government, which is not the way to grow an economy.  We have learned from history that growth comes when you shrink government--not when you grow it.

The New York Post is reporting today that former President Clinton received 5 million dollars from overseas sources for speaking engagements.  One of the main sources of the income was Saudi Arabia.  The former President is entitled to earn as much as he can legally, so I guess it makes no sense to complain, but it does make you wonder, when the situation is so volatile in the Middle East if we should have the spouse of the Secretary of State receiving large amounts of money from some of the countries in the region.

 

According to Monday's Investor's Business Daily the country of Brazil is going to expand offshore drilling as well as continue to lead in biofuels.  Brazil understands the concept that energy independence is a part of prosperity and economic growth.  The article recommends that we in the United States learn from the Brazilian example.  Offshore drilling would probably end the financial crisis in California within a year.  There are areas of the California coast where there is so much oil available that it is seeping up through the ground naturally.  The US Department of Interior has a website which talks about this phenomenon, see seepage.  Why not simply grab the oil and refine it?

We need to remember that reasonable prices of energy are not guaranteed.  We have learned this a number of times over the past thirty years.  Developing our own sources of energy makes sense financially and as a security measure.  Anytime the price of oil and gas has gone down, it goes right back up as soon as we get used to its being low.  We need our own sources of energy.

According to ABC News, Barack Obama's first formal television interview will be with Al-Arabiya, the Middle East cable channel.  Al-Arabiya is based in Dubai and has an estimated potential audience exceeding 23 million in the Gulf region.  I know he wants to reach out to the Arabs in the Middle East, but I wonder about the wisdom of this.  One of the things we need to remember is that there are cultural differences between western and Arab societies.  Any action in an Arab culture seem as weakness results in an attack on the person perceived as being weak.  I hope this interview is not viewed by the Arab street in that light.

According to Hot Air Timothy Geithner has now been confirmed as Secretary Of The Treasury.  The vote was 60 to 34 (ten Republicans voted yes).  The list of Republicans who voted yes is:

Corker
Cornyn
Crapo
Ensign
Graham
Gregg
Hatch
Shelby
Snowe
Voinovich

Susan Collins stated that she could not vote for a tax cheat as Secretary of The Treasury.  Orin Hatch commented that he thought there was a double standard for nominees--if Giethner had been a Republican, he would have been attacked by the Democrats and the press, and would never have made it out of committee.

I worry for our country when we put men in leadership who do not respect the laws they are supposed to be willing to support.

Representative John Conyers of Michigan has subpoenaed Karl Rove to testify before the House Judiciary Committee about the Bush administration's firing of U.S. attorneys and prosecution of a former Democratic governor.  According to the Washington Times:

"The subpoena commanded Rove to appear for a deposition on Feb. 2 on the firings of U.S. attorneys for political reasons. Conyers also demanded testimony on whether politics played a role in the prosecution of former Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman, a Democrat."

With all the current financial issues the country is facing, I believe that this is a total waste of time and money.  The U. S. Attorneys serve at the pleasure of the President.  There is nothing wrong with firing them.  This is not only a waste of time, it is a witch hunt designed to take attention away from a very unsuccessful Congress.

Whatever Happened To?

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Remember that ethics investigation of Charles Rangel that was supposed to be completed by early January?  Don't look now, but it's late January and nothing is happening.  According to an article in today's New York Post:

"The panel created on Sept. 24 to probe the Harlem Democrat's alleged ethical lapses has been virtually disbanded, after meeting only twice in four months on the matter, The Post has learned.

Of the four congressmen named to look into the powerful Ways and Means Committee chairman, only one remains - Alabama Republican Jo Bonner. The three others left the Rangel probe last month when they were "rotated" off the 10-member Committee on Standards of Official Conduct."

The investigation is currently inactive and won't become active until three incoming committee members are assigned to it later this month (they don't have much month left).  Congressman Rangel is charged with income tax evasion, failing to report income on his financial disclosure statements and various other financial missteps.  Since the Democrats choose not to deal with this problem, it will be left up to the residents of his district to remove him by voting someone else in.  Unfortunately, that is not going to happen, and there in a nutshell is the problem with Washington--the voters.  If the American voter does not care enough about ethics to vote an unethical congressman out of office, why should the congressman care about ethics? 

Guantanamo ?

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There is an article in todays New York Post written by former Army Lieutenant Colonel Gordon Cucullu detailing some of what actually happens (and does not happen) at Gauntanamo.  According to the article:

"Considering that Guantanamo is one of the most inspected, highly supervised and stringently disciplined facilities in the world, I'm surprised it continues to be so misrepresented. I toured Guantanamo five times over the past three years and was greeted with absolute transparency. "Where do you want to go, what do you want to see?" authorities asked. "We'll take you any where with no notice." I took them up on their offer and walked all of the blocks, hospital, library, food prep, and interrogations."

The article lists the details of the care of the detainees--they receive medical care and they are given special meals to celebrate their religious holidays.  The article also relates the fact that the detainees routinely mistreat the American military personnel guarding them there.

Before we spend too much of our energy sympathizing with these detainees, we need to look at what has happened when supposed 'innocent' detainees are released.  About 11 per cent of them have been recaptured on the battlefield.  One released detainee is now heading Al Qaeda in Yemen.  We need to think more carefully about what will happen to these people if we close Gauntanamo.

Vacation Notes

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There is nothing more boring than hearing about someone else's vacation, so you have my permission to stop reading now; however, I might have some interesting notes.

I spent the last week in Jacksonville, North Carolina, visiting children and grandchildren.  Jacksonville has the youngest population of any city in the United States.  That's because of a rather large Marine base hosting the majority of that population (and a few other military installations in the area).  During my week there, I was privileged to meet some of the young (and sometimes not so young) men and women who proudly serve this country in the military (and their families).  To say I was impressed is a total understatement.  If they are the future of our country, we are in good hands.

Just a few thumbnail sketches:

A Cobra (attack helicopter) pilot who had a college degree in Foreign Service Studies.  She was planning to get out before retirement because she believed in the concept of the "citizen soldier". 

A Cobra pilot who had gotten back from Iraq recently who had extended his tour there because he was single and wanted to give a married man a chance to go home before him.

An aircraft mechanic (of some sort) (actually, I met his wife) who had just left for Iraq.  She was proud of her husband and what he was doing and was calmly keeping things running smoothly at home.

An enlisted person about to enter training to be a drill instructor--sharp as a tack and dedicated to serving her country.

There were many others--these are the highlights.  My conclusion was that we need to thank all of our soldiers and their families for the sacrifices they make.  We can be proud of the soldiers who are defending us--they are a class act!

As we watch Barack Obama remove any blocks to abortion, I would like to post a quote from a letter written by Margaret Sanger, the founder of Planned Parenthood, many years ago.

"We should hire three or four colored ministers, preferably with social-service backgrounds, and with engaging personalities. The most successful educational approach to the Negro is through a religious appeal. We don't want the word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population. and the minister is the man who can straighten out that idea if it ever occurs to any of their more rebellious members."
Margaret Sanger's December 19, 1939 letter to Dr. Clarence Gamble, 255 Adams Street, Milton, Massachusetts. Original source: Sophia Smith Collection, Smith College, North Hampton, Massachusetts. Also described in Linda Gordon's Woman's Body, Woman's Right: A Social History of Birth Control in America. New York: Grossman Publishers, 1976.

According to the CDC/National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion/Division of Reproductive Health, 1600 Clifton Rd., N.E., MS K-21, Atlanta, GA 30333. (E-mail:cdcinfo@cdc.gov.)--

"In the 35 reporting areas for which race was provided, classified according to the same categories used in previous years, approximately 53% of women who obtained legal induced abortions were known to be white; 36%, black; and 8%, other; for 3%, race was not known (Table 9). The abortion ratio for black women (491 per 1,000 live births) was 3.0 times the ratio for white women (165 per 1,000), and the ratio for women of the nonhomogeneous "other" race category (347 per 1,000) was 2.1 times the ratio for white women. The abortion rate for black women (29 per 1,000 women) was 2.9 times the rate for white women (10 per 1,000), and the abortion rate for women of other races (19 per 1,000 women) was 2.0 times the rate for white women."

The above information is taken from 2003.  To summarize all of the above numbers, we are legally killing three times as many black children as white children through abortion.  Is that the racial equality we want in this country?

On Friday, President Obama issued an executive order to rescind what is knows as the "Mexico City policy".  According to Yahoo News, there will no longer be a ban on giving taxpayer money to overseas organizations that perform abortions or provide abortion information.  At a time when America is struggling financially and Americans are struggling financially, why are we sending more money overseas for a purpose that many Americans do not support.  I have a few questions on this issue.

In reference to the war on terror, the supposed gripe the terrorists have with America is that we are an immoral culture (the great satan)--doesn't this ruling further justify their claim?   Is abortion a moral issue?  Now that we have ultrasound pictures of babies in the womb from a very early age, should we acknowledge that this is a human life that we are ending?  Has anyone noted the irony that our most pro-abortion president is a black man and that abortion statistics show that a disproportionate number of black babies have been killed by abortion.  

I firmly believe that if the life of a mother is at stake and a child needs to be aborted, the woman and her doctor should be allowed to make that decision.  I question the idea that killing a child for the sake of convenience is good for society or good for the woman involved (not to mention the child). 

Bailout = Pork

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One of the problems with the idea of the taxpayer bailout of any industry or financial institution with the right connections is that the right connections matter.  Many (not all) Congressmen love to bring home pork or money for their districts or states.  Massachusetts  was the poster child for that idea with the 'big dig', a highway project that went massively over budget and then had major problems.  Well, Massachusetts is still looking for federal money (despite high state taxes and major revenue problems of its own).

According to the Wall Street Journal, Representative Barney Frank interceded on behalf of Boston's OneUnited Bank, and the bank received $12 million of the TARP program money. The Treasure Department had stated that it would give money only to healthy banks, to jump-start lending.  OneUnited Bank was not a healthy bank.  Aside from its cash flow problems, there were other issues.  According to the article:

"On Oct. 27, the FDIC and Massachusetts bank regulatory officials, alleging poor lending practices and executive-compensation abuses by OneUnited, slapped it with a strong enforcement action, a cease-and-desist order. Among other things, the officials told the bank to get rid of a 2008 Porsche for executives.

Mr. Cooper, the bank's attorney, dismisses the order as a "hastily cobbled together" action. "What we are talking about is a hiccup, a blip on the screen of an otherwise-stellar enterprise," he says. Asked whether the bank had sold the Porsche, he said only that it was complying with the order."

This is not wise spending of our tax money.  It leads me back to the idea that the only way to fix Congress is with term limits.  With few exceptions, our Congressmen are not working for us--they are working to fill their own pockets and to stay in office.  It would be interesting to check the net worth of an incoming Congressman with his net worth upon leaving office and see how the two numbers compare.

 

According to The New York Times, Said Ali al-Shihri, released from Guantanamo, has become the deputy leader of Al Qaeda in Yemen.  He is linked to a deadly bombing of the US Embassy in Yemen in September.  He was released to Saudi Arabia in 2007 and completed the Saudi Arabian rehabilitation program for former jihadists before resurfacing with Al Qaeda in Yemen.

OK.  Let's look at this.  Saudi Arabia is the center of Wahhabism, the form of Islam that gave us the 911 terrorists.  Saudi Arabia has a 'rehabilitation program'.  This is like trying to rehabilitate Hitler's SS.  There is no rehabillitation for terrorists.  They have been brainwashed beyond the point of no return.  Compassion and humanity do not exist in their minds.  How else do you explain the making of videos and celebrating, as innocent people have their heads sawn off?

We need to find an inaccessible island somewhere with enough jungle growth to sustain life, and leave all the terrorists there to live together.  There could be no way off or on and no communication with the outside world.  These people will always be a threat to civilization.  The question is whether or not civilization will acknowledge the threat.

According to The New York Times, President Obama signed executive orders undoing three of the foundational items in George Bush's counterterrorism stategy.  First, the closing of Guantanamo within a year (with no stated plans of what to do with the terrorists imprisoned there), second, ending the CIA secret prisons (just for the record, that program began under Bill Clinton), and third, all  interrogations will now follow the noncoercive methods of the Army field manual.  This sounds very noble--the idea is that we have claimed the 'moral high ground'.  I would lilke to point out that all prisoners we have held and are holding still have their heads, their hands and their feet.  I'm not for mistreatment, but I think this one case when one man's comfort or discomfort cannot be valued above the well being of innocent civilians.

At some point it needs to be noted that there are people out there whose goal is to destroy our civilizaiton.  Not all Muslims are terrorists, but so far, the majority of terrorists are Muslims, and if you remember, they have no problem killing innocent civilians or removing the heads of anyone they happen to kidnap.  I am sure there are a number of terrorist leaders looking at these three executive orders by Obama and rubbing their hands with glee.  There will now be no real problem for terrorists who are captured.  We will go back to the Clinton days of "Take me to New York so I can see my lawyer" (approximately the words of one terrorist captured early in the Iraq war).

Bill Clinton dealt with the terrorist problem as a legal matter--he prosecuted the people responsible for the first World Trade Center bombing in a court of law.  There were no real consequences for the people who actually planned the operation overseas.  George Bush changed the rules--he said essentially to the terrorists-  you mess with us, we will mess with you.  During the Clinton years we were attacked overseas a number of times (embassies, the US Cole, etc.) and plots were stopped at home (LAX 2000), but the planning of terrorist attacks continued.  I am sure the planning of terrorist attacks continued under George Bush, but the terrorists knew that the consequences of an attack or of being captured by the Americans would be high.  The terrorists now have no reason to fear capture, and I am afraid they may not have to fear the consequnces of commmitting terrorist acts if we bring back the trials in American courtrooms for terrorists.  We may have regained 'the moral high ground', but we have probably put ourselves at risk by doing so.  Intellectually it's a great idea, practically, it's a formula for a major terriorist attack against America.

Minnesota (Again)

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There are two articles on the internet this morning dealing with the Minnesota Senate race.  The first at KSTP-TV Minneapolis has Norm Coleman stating that when the legal challenges are over, he will be declared the winner.  The issues involved are the double counting of a number of votes (almost thirty precincts have more votes than registered voters) and the absentee ballots that were disqualified (many were later counted, but not with standard rules).  Coleman was ahead initially by about two hundred votes.  A swing of four hundred votes in a recount would be very unusual.

Meanwhile, according to Yahoo News the Senate is moving toward seating Al Franken.  According to the article--

"We're going to try to seat Al Franken," Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., told reporters on Wednesday, a few hours before he posed with Franken for photos just off the Senate floor. "There's not a question in anyone's mind, an assertion by anyone, that there's been any fraud or wrongdoing in this election."

Also according to the article at Yahoo--

"If Al Franken truly believes he won this election, he should respect the laws of his state and allow this legal review to be completed," said Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee.

Until the State of Minnesota declares a winner, I don't understand how the Senate can seat anyone.  This may be another case of Harry Reid inserting himself into a losing sitation.  For the sake of future elections in this country and for the sake of the people of Minnesota, I do hope the eventual outcome of this is fair and honest.

According to the Deseret News, Hamas had declared victory in Gaza.  They held victory rallies on Tuesday and stated that "Gaza is just a stepping stone for eliminating the Jewish state. "Hamas today is more powerful," Ismail Radwan, a Hamas leader, told a crowd from a terrace overlooking Gaza's main square, with the demolished parliament building serving as a backdrop." 

How in the world can we expect Israel to make peace and give up land to a group of people who want to end her existence?  I do, however, love the irony of declaring victory with the backdrop of a demolished parliament building.  I really hope Israel does whatever is necessary to ensure its own survival.

There is an interesting post regarding the closing of Guantanamo Bay at National Review Online.  Gallop has taken a poll on whether or not we should close the base.  The results were as follows:  35 percent "yes," 45 percent "no," 20 percent "no opinion."  It doesn't seem that an overwhelming majority of Americans want to move the terrorists--particularly to their neighborhoods.

In a related story, The Charlotte Observer is reporting that-- "a judge on Wednesday quickly granted President Barack Obama's request to suspend the war crimes trial of a young Canadian in what may be the beginning of the end for the Bush administration's system of trying alleged terrorists.

The judge, Army Col. Patrick Parrish, issued a one-sentence written order for the 120-day continuance, without even holding a hearing on the question. Another judge was expected to rule later Wednesday on a similar motion to suspend the trial of five men charged in the Sept. 11 attacks."

Barack Obama has said that he would like trials of Guantanamo prisoners to take place in the United States.  This is somewhat ridiculous.  These are not enemy soldiers.  They are not fighting for any country.  In a sense, they are nothing but a bunch of violent, somewhat organized anarchists.  The have been brainwashed and trained to the point that it will never be safe to let them loose or to allow them to be anywhere that escape is a possibility.  The safety of American citizens is at risk here, and if the wrong decision is made, the consequences will probably bring down the popularity of this administration very quickly.


 

This is a picture from Kuwait.  It shows that American companies know how to meet needs and make a profit around the world!

 

Thank you to all our military that are over there making the world safer for us.

Another Thank You

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If you would like to say thank you to President Bush, click on this link Mission1accomplished,com.  You can just sign your name or leave a message.  According to the people at Little Green Footballs, the folks who built the site are planning to present the comments and logs to George W. Bush's Presidential Library on September 11, 2011.

It would take pages and pages to say what I am grateful to George Bush for in his presidency.  He kept us safe, he changed the rules on how we deal with terrorists, he gave victory and freedom to the people in Iraq, he gave other people in the world the hope of freedom, and he modeled steadfastness.  But--I am totally thankful for what he did yesterday in commuting two jail sentences.

According to Yahoo.com (Associated Press), President Bush, responding to heavy pressure from Republican and Democratic lawmakers alike, commuted the prison sentences of Ignacio Ramos and Jose Compean. The two guards from El Paso, Texas, each were sentenced to more than 10 years for the shooting, which they tried to cover up. They will be released within two months.

I was not on the jury that tried this case, so I don't have all the information that the jurors have, but from where I sit the sentencing was extreme and the whole situation was out of hand.  The man who was shot was a drug dealer avoiding capture.  They fired.  He was shot.  There were circumstatces linking him to a van of drugs, and evidently he had a history of drug trafficking.  Again, I wasn't on the jury, but it seems to me that we need to look at the whole picture in terms of protecting our citizens and country from drug dealers and criminals coming across the border.  I'm sorry if the belief is that excessive force is used, but the conviction of the policemen rather than the drug dealer does not send a good message..

It's funny how new beginnings are in the eye of the beholder.  According to the New York Post, Nancy Pelosi says she is open to prosecuting officials from the Bush administration for high crimes and misdemeanors.  She is wondering if the Democrats have the right to ignore all the 'crimes' of the Bush administration.

Meanwhile back at the ranch.  George Bush is out of office.  He is no longer involved in any decisions effecting this country--but there are people in the House and Senate who are still making decisions and who have ethical problems that have not been investigated.  Charles Rangel chairs the House Ways and Means Committee.  Rangel has tax problems--both with reporting income to the IRS and the Congress, and campaign contribution problems--but he is the man in charge of the committee writing our tax laws.  Barney Frank, House Financial Services Committee Chairman, has some very interesting ties to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and was one of the people blocking reform of those organizations.  Chris Dodd, Senate Banking Committee Chairman, received a special mortgage from Countrywide Financial (part of the mortgage meltdown) as he was blocking tighter regulation on Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and the mortgage market.

The people listed above are still in a position to effect tax policies and laws that will impact the financial health of our country.  Is there a reason why they have not been investigated (other than the fact that they are Democrats)?  Let President Bush retire in peace--I am sure he will be as classy an ex-president as his father has been.  The antics (and non-antics) of the living ex-presidents ought to give us some real insight into their honesty and character.

Unfortunately human nature has a way of showing up  very quickly in any political situation.  Barack Obama is no exception.  According to Power Line Blog, the delay in converting our television sets from analog to digital may have more to do with a telecommunications industry executive that contributed to the Obama campaign than any practical considerations.

R. Gerard Salemme, an executive vice president at a company called Clearwire, advised Obama's telecom transition team and was a substantial contributor to the Obama campaign.  Timothy Carney, a columnist for the Washington Examiner, contends that delaying the transition from analog to digital will assist Sprint and Clearwire while injuring Verizon, one of Sprint's major competitors. 

According to the article:

"As Carney explains it, the switch from analog to digital will free up a huge swath of frequencies, which the FCC has auctioned off to other telecommunications firms, including Verizon, who will use this spectrum for its wireless broadband networks, providing Internet for Blackberries and similar devices. But Sprint and Clearwire already own specturm which they have used to launch their their fourth-generation wireless broadband network, known as 4G network. Verizon cannot do so yet because it lacks the necessary spectrum. Thus, says Carney, "the longer broadcasters use analog signals, the longer Verizon has to wait to get the spectrum it needs for its 4G network--which gives Sprint a longer honeymoon as the only network offering 4G speeds.""

You can find the original article at deexaminer.com

I wouldn't call the Dalai Lama a politician, but he is definitely a voice on the world stage.    On Saturday, the Dalai Lama made a statement that terrorism cannot be tackled by applying the principle of ahimsa because the minds of terrorists are closed.

According to Gateway Pundit the Dalai Lama, while delivering the Madhavrao Scindia Memorial Lecture, stated,  "It is difficult to deal with terrorism through non-violence.".

The article reports that:

"He said that the only way to tackle terrorism is through prevention. The head of the Tibetan government-in-exile left the audience stunned when he said "I love President George W Bush." He went on to add how he and the US President instantly struck a chord in their first meeting unlike politicians who take a while to develop close ties."

As George Bush leaves office, the world is beginning to see how much he did to stop the success of terrorism around the world.  America has always been a force for good, and the policies of George Bush have helped to keep the world safe.  I hope Barack Obama will continue that tradition.  

According to The Flint Journal columnist John Tomlinson, we need to begin to pray for global warming.  His column in The Flint Journal states that:

"At December's U.N. Global Warming conference in Poznan, Poland, 650 of the world's top climatologists stood up and said man-made global warming is a media generated myth without basis. Said climatologist Dr. David Gee, Chairman of the International Geological Congress, "For how many years must the planet cool before we begin to understand that the planet is not warming?""

The University of Illinois' Arctic Climate Research Center has discovered that the Arctic ice is now at the same level it was in 1979, and Antarctic ice has increased 5 per cent since 1980.  The Russian government has just released a study saying that we are headed for a 100,000 year ice age.  This is not related to carbon dioxide levels--core samples taken from the earth show that carbon dioxide levels follow the earth's temperature rise--not lead it.   Carbon dioxide fluctuations follow the change in sea temperature. As water temperatures rise, oceans release additional dissolved carbon dioxide.

The cost of 'fixing global warming' on the successful economies of the world would be enormous.  Somehow, someone has gotten the idea that taking money from people or economies that are successful and giving it to people or economies that have failed is a good idea.  The missing part of this idea is that economic success if generally based on actions--for people, it involves freedom to pursue goals, for countries, it involves giving freedom to people so that they can create what is needed for a successful society.   If your goal is to eliminate as much poverty from the earth as possible, all you would have to do is abolish dictatorships and communist and socialist societies.  Look around and see which countries are prospering.  Admittedly, this is a hard time for any country to prosper, but generally, the countries with the most freedom are doing the best economically.  Where you have a ruling cadre that controls all the wealth of a country and no middle class--just poverty, no amount of money given by successful countries is going to make a difference.  Any money given will simply wind up in the pockets of the corrupt leaders.  Carbon credits and other similar plans are only ways to take money away from the people who have earned it and give it to people who have no intention of working for it.

According to Hot Air, President-elect Barack Obama has slightly modified his promise on embryonic stem cells.  He has stated that he would prefer legislative action by Congress rather than an Executive Order on his part.  That's a mixed blessing. 

The government does not ban embryonic stem cell research--what they do ban is federal money being spent on embryonic stem cell research.  Generally speaking, if a science advancement has great potential, private money is willing to fund it (we are a profit-driven society).  Because the advancements in stem cell research have been more common in adult stem cells, that is the research that has received the most private funding.  Funding embryonic stem cells is like someone who is looking for his car keys under the street light rather than where he dropped them--he won't find them, but the light is better! 

I hope that Americans who care about the destruction of human embryos and also care about how our tax dollars are spent will contact their congressmen and let their voices be heard.  The success in stem cell research has come in the area of adult stem cells.  Private funding for that research will continue because it will eventually reap financial and practical rewards.  Why should we throw our tax dollars into something that has consistently proven to be unsuccessful?

My husband and I were supposed to leave for the balmy shores of North Caroline (40 degrees or so) yesterday morning.  We headed off to the airport (our youngest daughter was nice enough to pick us up as the sun was coming up) to catch a flight to Charlotte, North Caroline.  We are visiting children and grandchildren (including our favorite Marine in Jacksonville, NC).  Well, to make a long story short, we paid our $30 for luggage, got on the plane, and the plane was broken and never took off.  We rented a car, drove home, and hope to leave at some ungodly hour this morning (in the snow).  If the pilot says the plane is broken and won't fly it, I'm ok with that--I'd rather not be flying on a broken plane.  However, it seems to me that some compensation would have been very nice.

Blogging will be intermittent over the next week or so as I will be in balmy North Carolina (when you live in Massachusetts, anything above thirty degrees in January in balmy).  Hopefully it will be a quiet week where we can all enjoy the pomp and circumstance of the inauguration of the new President.  We need to pray for wisdom for Barack Obama as he takes office.  We also need to remember, as the loyal opposition, to be loyal opposition--not people who attack the President for anything and everything, tearing down the respect for the Office of President in the process.  You will hear from me frequently in the battle of ideas that is coming--but Barack Obama is a good, family man who has been chosen as our President.  He does not deserve to be personally attacked.

Israel has declared a unilateral cease-fire in Gaza today according to Reuters.  The announcement was made three hours before the actual truce was to start, and immediately after the announcment three missiles were fired into southern Israel.  Hamas has vowed to fight on, despite the 'truce'.

I asked a former military person I know what victory for Israel would look like in Gaza.  He gave me a short answer--"When Hamas surrenders unconditionally, Israel has won."  He then went on to site the two atomic bombs we dropped on Japan and the bombing of Dresden, Germany during World War II.  Unless the enemy of civilization (a terrorist who takes millions of dollars from the democracies of the world and does not use in on infrastructure, but only on weapons and military training) surrenders, there will never be peace in that area of the world.  Israel would live at peace with Hamas, but Hamas cannot abide the existence of Israel.

Adventures In Wind

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According to the Chicago Tribune (reported on January 16th) the new Minerals Management Service report said developer Cape Wind Associates' plans for a wind farm off Cape Cod pose no major environmental problems.  The  federal agency rejected high-profile opponents' arguments that the giant turbines would damage the environment off Cape Cod.  The final decision on this wind farm will be left up to the Obama administration.  The interesting part of this discussion is who is for it and who is against it.  Obama supports 'green' energy (on Friday he was visiting an Ohio company that makes parts for wind turbines); Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick has been a stong supporter of the wind farm; Senator Kennedy of Massachusetts has been a strong opponent of the wind farm.  Kennedy's family compound at Hyannis would have a clear view of the windfarm.  John Kerry and Walter Cronkite have also opposed it.  This is going to be a prolonged fight if Barack Obama supports the wind farm.  If he does not support the wind farm, the idea will die a slow and agonizing death.

I have a few comments on this (surprise).  I live in Massachusetts.  I live in an all-electric house.  That's not really too bad (considering the cost of oil and gas in the recent past), but my electric bill last month was approaching $300.  I also buy fuel for two pellet stoves ($150 to $200 a month depending on how cold it is).  I'm a Senior Citizen not yet retired.  There is no way I could afford to retire in Massachusetts even if I wanted to.  If a wind farm would lower my electric bill, make America more energy independent, and be non-polluting, I would totally support it.  John Kerry, Walter Cronkite, and Ted Kennedy may not even notice when their electric bill goes up, but mine has tripled over the past five years.

It has also been proven that whenever something relatively free of pollutants is placed on the ocean floor, it becomes a magnet for marine life.  That is why the US Navy often sinks its old ships off the Atlantic Coast after stripping them of anything that might harm the sea environment.  They form artificial reefs.  The wind farm might also help restock some of the depleted fishing areas off the coast of Cape Cod.

About Those Geese

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The problem of geese at airports is not new.  A lot of our airports are located near water (commerce generally centers at ports) and have marshland of some sort around them.  Washington D.C. is essentially a filled-in swamp, also parts of Boston are former wetlands claimed before ecology was in vogue.  Anyway, one of National Review's blogs has an interesting article pointing out that in January of 2004 Senator Charles Schumer helped pass a law for a 'non-lethal, environmentally friendly solution for controlling New York City's Canadian Geese' (giving $200,00 in tax money to the US Fish and Wildlife Service).  Evidently, what caused him to bring up the earmark and get it passed was the fact that Greenpeace was trying to save a flock of geese from Riker's Island (in the flight path of Laguardia) rather than have the geese killed.  I couldn't figure out from the article what was or wasn't done to the geese, but I guess the question at hand should be, "Are people more valuable than geese?".  I personally think sometimes you have to do hard things to protect people--move the geese or have them for dinner--but we need to protect the lives of passengers on airplanes.
The American Thinker has a quick note about yesterday's plane landing in the Hudson River (it wasn't a crash--it was more of a glide).  He points out that the experience and training of the pilot (as well as his courage in checking all the seats to make sure they were empty and being the last one out) allowed him to safely put the plane down and get everyone out.  There is a place for experience.  Let's here it for the old (although this pilot was not actually old) people!!!!
According to Amanda Carpenter at Townhall.com, Harry Reid may not immediately bring up the 'card check' bill in this Congress.  Evidently, Reid does not have the votes to get it passed and will not bring it up until he does.  Meanwhile, big labor is running ads to the effect that the only way workers will get reasonable wages and health care benefits is to join a union.  The use of the word 'change' in the ads may be an attempt to put pressure on Barack Obama to keep his campaign promise to big labor and push the bill through.
There is a great poll going on at Hot Air to find the best conservative movies over the past twenty-five years.  Their selections to vote on are interesting, and it will be interesting to see which movies win.

It may be time for the next election before Minnesota sorts this one out.  My favorite source of information about the Coleman vs Franken election (other than the Minnesota Star Tribune (which filed for reorganization in bankruptcy last night) is the Power Line Blog.  They have a post up today referring to a column in yesterday's Wall Street Journal by MIchael Stokes Paulsen arguing the unconstitutionality of the Minnesota Senate recount.  The column is entitled  "The Minnesota recount was unconstitutional."   His point was that there were so many inconsistencies in the way ballots were counted in the recount that the rule of all votes being equally counted was violated.  It is disturbing that more than 25 of the reporting precincts reported more votes than registered voters.  It brings me back to the following quote:

"It's not the people who vote that count. It's the people who count the votes." (Josef Stalin)

This quote and the events in Minnesota should wake us up to the fact that all people and parties running for election are not necessarily on the side of honesty.

The New York Post has a number of stories about the US Air crash into the Hudson River yesterday.  The stories are wonderful to read.  The youngest survivor was 9 months old and the oldest was 85.  Everyone got out.  There were some injuries, but it sounds as if they are minor compared to what they could have been.

There were a lot of things that went into the fact that everyone on the plane survived.  The airlines in America are very thorough in training their flight crews for emergencies.  Obviously, as they are being trained, they hope they will never have to use the training, but it is there.  The calmness of the pilot and the flight crew prevented panic among the passengers, and the passengers helped each other where there were special situations (the nine-month-old baby and the 85-year-old woman).  It's nice to know that when situations are difficult, we still know how to help each other so that everyone gets out!

This is rant from a friend of one of my daughters in New York.  It convinces me that we all need to take a deep breath.

 

"Subject: But other than that, how was the play Mrs Lincoln?

great time to be a securities or bankruptcy lawyer.  BOA caught lying yest re Federal backstop on the MER takeover, was material and not disclosed prior to merger.  They gonna take a beating.  AAPL caught in lies re Jobs, this could get really messy.  Somebody lied/mislead a couple idiot media folks, discovery will be a disaster for Apple.  Ugly but overdue, they got a pass when they were caught red handed on the backdating.  Wild, wild days, when will the media stop talking about Obama's smooth transition?  This is the  worst transition in memory.  Hillary got a pass, Bill is still allowed to collect donations/bribes.  She acted on behalf of 6 of his major donors as a senator, in each case taking formal action either 1 month before or after the money changed hands.  Richardson DOA, and he was the second choice.  Blago fiasco that obama should have been able to control and kill in DC.  Now Giether is hanging by a thread.  Wish I had some cash, intrade kept him in high 90's follow the disclosure.  Insane, he has limited Dem backing, now Republicans have the ability to kill if they wish (which is an open question).  Tax cheat running the IRS?  Does that make sense?  And he has been neck deep, #2 or 3 player in TARP fiasco, how's that working?  As Pres NY Fed he was chief Regulator of all the NYC based IB's that levered up and destroyed the economy.  But other than that he's perfect.
If we turn back the clock, go back to the way unemployment was historically calculated (LBJ and Clinton both altered the statistical calculation) we are around 16/17%, not the 7.2 you see in headlines.  keep that in mind when they tell you it's not bad. 
http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSTRE5077TM20090109
when we hit 9-10%, and we will, we have have more unemployment than the great depression.  And the mets will still suck in Sept."

He thinks he's got problems--I'm a Jets fan!!!

Henry Waxman has stated his goal of pushing through legislation dealing with the 'climate crisis' before Memorial Day.  The story is in Breitbart.com.  He wants to protect us from 'global warming' just as the figures show that the last ten years has been a period of global cooling.  How like Congress to show up ten years too late.
Wow.  All 155 people on Flight 1549 are safe after it crashed into the frigid Hudson River according to Breitbart.com.  Thank God for the clear heads of the pilot, the flight crew, the passengers and the rescue people.  This story could have had a very different ending.  Sometimes when we fly, we take for granted the professionalism of the flight crew, next time, we might not.
This is post for everyone who is still complaining that George Bush started a war in Iraq.  There is a report at Archaeology.org about the evidence forensic archeaologists are uncovering of mass executions in Iraq by the Saddam Hussein regime.  The victims of these executions were men, women and children--some children as young as seven years old.  My comment is this--we were in a position to put an end to this sort of thing in Iraq and we did.  This was a crude version of what Hitler did--only it was more political than racial.  Thank God we put an end to it.  Thank God for the bravery, courage, and determination of our American military and President.  The article is lengthy and emotionally difficult to read, but it is worth reading.

I'm still waiting for the most eithical House of Representatives in history and the most ethical Presidency.  Nancy Pelosi promised that the ethics investigation into Charles Rangel's tax problems would end in early January.  Actually, according to an article at Townhall.com, the investigation into Charles Rangel's activities has been expanded to include whether he granted special tax favors to an oil company in exchange for a million dollar college center bearing his name.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch--according to Breitbart.com, Timothy Geithner's tax problems have slowed his confirmation process, but Senators of both parties do not see the issue as a problem in his confirmation.  Have we lost our minds?

The two people most responsible for tax laws and tax policy in America both have had problems paying their taxes.  This is amazing.  What crimes do I have to commit to be considered for public office?

If I believed that Charles Rangel and Timothy Geithner (because of their own tax problems) would be totally intent upon simplifying the tax code so that a third grader could successfully file their taxes, I would be thrilled to have both of them in charge of tax policy.  However, that belief is off somewhere with my belief in the Easter bunny.

It seems to me that people used to be punished for income tax evasion, but with the current Democrats it has become resume enhancement!

As word gets out that Barack Obama will sign an executive order to close Guantanamo early in his Presidency, the facts keep getting in the way.  The real question is, "What do you do with the prisoners?"  The latest statistics show that 11 per cent of the Guantanamo prisoners that have been released have shown up later on the battlefield.  As a military mom of an active duty Marine, the idea of releasing people to shoot at our soldiers is obscene.  One of the suggestions to put the prisoners in prisons on military bases in America has already met with strong resistance.  Terrorists have been trained to kill innocent people.  Why in the world would we want to run the risk of bringing them into this country?  I also heard one suggestion that if Barack Obama closes Guantanamo, he should put the prisoners in a tent city on the White House lawn.

James Lileks' Blog has a wonderful piece on his blog about driving in the cold and snow.  I strongly recommend reading it.  One of his suggestions:

"If you are on the highway and traffic is moving slowly, consider putting distance between yourself and the car in front of you. How far? Well, put your hand about two feet from your face. Is your palm smaller than the numbers on the license plate of the vehicle in front of you? More space."

Definitely good advice. 

If you repeat a lie often enough, some people begin to accept it as truth.  We have spent the last eight years hearing that the world hates us because of George W. Bush.  Well, President Bush is headed for some well-earned peace and quiet, and there's a new man in charge who was supposed to end all of the hatred for America.  Guess again.  Power Line Blog has pictures of a pro Palestinian gathering in Tehran showing Iranians walking on a picture of Barack Obama, burning a picture of Barack Obama, and generally defacing the posters.  The radical element of the Muslim faith hates us because we are free.  It really doesn't matter who the President is.  For some reason, our freedom and prosperity are seen as a threat to them.  In a sense they are a threat, because our freedom and prosperity stand in the way of the extremist Muslim goal of a one-world caliphate.  As long as we care to defend our freedom, their goal of ruling a world of Muslims will not be complete.

According to Power Line Blog, Al Franken's request to the Governor and Secretary of State of Minnesota that they issue him a certificate of election so that he can fill Norm Coleman's Senate seat was denied.  According to the article:

"So why did Franken bother? Many people don't realize that under Minnesota law, post-election proceedings take place in three stages. Two of those stages, canvassing and recount, are complete, while the third, the election contest, is just beginning. Several important issues that will result in Norm Coleman gaining votes have not yet been addressed in either of the first two phases. I suspect that Franken is trying to don the mantle of inevitability on the theory that the more people think he is destined to win, the more likely he is to do so."

There is a possibility that Al Franken will wind up in the Senate.  If that happens, it will be unfortunate.  One of the issues in this election is the fact that there were more votes counted than actual registered voters.  I'm not really sure either side will be happy if the other side is declared the winner.  I know that holding another election would be expensive and would not immediately seat a Senator, but an honest election (and recount) is needed.  The other alternative is to realize that the last reliable count was the machine count at the end of the election .  Nothing since then seems to have been uniform or certifiable.

The Legacy

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I'm sure that as we await the Obama inauguration there will be many comments (from both sides) about the George Bush legacy.  I personally like the one written by Fred Barnes at The Weekly Standard.  I don't agree with everything George Bush did, and I don't totally agree with Fred Barnes' list, but I think it's a fair evaluation of the past eight years.  I do think that whenever we talk about the George Bush presidency, we need to remember how we felt on September 11, 2001, and celebrate the fact that our country has not been successfully attacked since then.  I believe that fact is due to the anti-terrorism policies of the George Bush administration.

My favorite accomplishments of George Bush are first, the number of Muslims who now live in freedom because he stood up to the Taliban and stood up to Al Qaeda in Iraq; and second, the appointment of Justice Roberts and Justice Alito.  Women are going to school in places where that was never possible; they are running for and being elected to public office; and they are on their way to being treated as people--not possessions in countries where that was not possible.  George Bush did not actually change the composition of the Supreme Court--he didn't replace a liberal with a conservative--but he appointed quality judges who will continue to have an impact on our society after he leaves office.

I believe history will be much kinder to George Bush than today's journalists.

Energy Independence

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Energy independence is not a Democrat Party goal, despite what you may have been told.  According to Amanda Carpenter at Townhall.com Harry Reid has advanced his $10 billion land grab.  According to the article:

"Basically, by using "federal wilderness" laws and other environental designations, the Democratic Congress is locking-up energy-rich domestic lands. Instead of putting a new energy ban in place, they are just going to let the federal government absorb them so they'll never be developed."

The bill will now be sent to the House of Representatives where hopefully the House Republicans wil ammend it.  However, with the new rule changes Nancy Pelosi has put in place, that will be extremely difficult. 

It seems to me that in a time of economic crisis, the exploration and development of America's own natural resources would be a wonderful way to help the economy.  I really do wonder why the Democrats have such a hard time with that concept.

According to Hotair.com some of the photography coming out of the war in Gaza is staged and fake.  There is a video at CNN (posted also at HotAir) of two boys evidently injured while playing on a roof in Gaza.  Upon closer examination, there are some problems with the video, such as the amount of blood on the operating table, the damage to the roof of the building, and an undisturbed chair and closeline on the roof.  CNN is challenging the charges of fakery, but has taken the video down, then put it back up.  In the past, the video would have gone unchallenged, and the propaganda war would have turned against Israel.  The propaganda war may still turn against Israel, but at least the obvious fakery is being challenged.
According to Yahoo News, when Barack Obama gave his speech on the economy on Wednesday, he referred to Social Security and Medicare as massive government entitlement programs that needed to be reformed.  Yes, they need to be reformed, but let's go back to the words he used.  Social Security is not an entitlement program.  Everyone (except Congress, Government Workers, and a few select others) under the age of seventy has put more money into Social Security than they will ever get back.  Calling Social Security an entitlement program is either an innocent mistake or a clue to dangers to the program ahead.  Before you begin to complain about Social Security as an expensive entitlement, I think you need to address the concept of generational welfare and what it has done to destroy the American family.  Anyone who is retired, approaching retirement, or working needs to pay attention to what happens next.

Somehow I Missed This

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According to January 7, 2009, The Smoking Gun, in an unbelievable blooper, U. S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald accidently e-mailed to reporters the true identities of nearly 20 of the confidential witnesses he interviewed during an investigation of a fraud case.  The mailing was actually a 62-page U.S. District Court complaint filed against John Walsh and Charles Martin, principals of the now-defunct One World Capital Group.  Unfortunately, the key to the named sources in the document (which were supposed to be confidential) was also included, so that there was no confidentiality.  Fitzgerald spokesman Randall Samborn immediately sent an urgent follow-up e-mail asking journalists to destroy the complaint due to the "non-public information disclosing the identities of persons not named in the affidavit. 

Patrick Fitzgerald is currently involved in the Rod Blagojevich investigation and was one of the main investigators in the Tony Rezko case (which supposedly was leading to an investigation of ACORN).  Anyone can push a wrong button or e-mail something extra unintentionally, but I suspect the people whose names were accidently released are not feeling too comfortable. 

Just an aside, I haven't heard anything lately about the investigations of Tony Rezko or ACORN.  I wonder where those investigations are standing.  I know that Tony Rezko has already been tried, but I am not sure if any links to ACORN were actually followed up on.  That would be interesting to know.

As I have previously noted, the best website I have found on the subject of climate change is wattsupwiththat.com.  It's very well done and has a lot of back-up information on why global warming is a hoax.  But sometimes things are just plain obvious.  Here are some stories that the global warming alarmists might want to take a look at.

First, according to the Calgary Herald. Rex Tillerson has told the press that Exxonmobil Corporation, the world's largest crude oil refiner, supports taxing carbon dioxide as the most efficient way of curbing greenhouse gas emissions.  Think about this for a minute.  When you breathe, you exhale carbon dioxide.  Trees use it in photosynthesis.  Just think, if governments can find a way to tax everyone on the amount of air they breathe, they would never have to worry about revenue again.  Most of the population would be broke (except those that figured out how to get in on the gravy train) and our society would be changed forever.  Where is common sense in this debate?  It gets worse.

Second, as the alarmists scream 'the sky is falling, we are going to overheat tomorrow', Breitbart.com is reporting Siberia-like conditions in Europe.  Madrid's airport was closed due to a rare, heavy snowfall, and several rivers in Germany were frozen.  Meanwhile, the Dutch are enjoying skating over frozen canals and lakes.

Third, according to AccuWeather.com a hugh snowstorm is headed for the east coast of the US, followed by what is expected to be the coldest weather in fifteen years.  In Massachusetts, we have a winter storm warning in effect from 6 pm today to noon tomorrow.  We are expected to get somewhere around 8 to 14 inches of snow, followed later next week by temperatures remaining in the teens during the day and single figures at night (not factoring in wind chills).

The bottom line on this, to me, is that we are not getting both sides of the story.  As sunspot activity has decreased since 1998, global temperatures have cooled.  You can do a graph of global temperature and sunspot activity and you will see that the patterns are similar.  The warming and cooling periods over the last century have not been related to human activity; they have been related to cyclical sunspot activity.  I am sure that the activity of man has had some small impact on the ecology of the earth, but actually, we are not that important in the grand scheme of things.  I believe we need to be careful about pollution--we need to use every scientific method we can to keep our negative impact on the earth as low as possible--recycle, treat chemical and human waste so that it is non-polluting, etc., but I think the whole global warming hype has more to do with economics than science. 

According to Power Line Blog PETA has started a new campaign to discourage people from eating fish.  They evidently have decided that the fish PR people have not done an adequate job of convincing us that we should not eat them.  In keeping with the current depth of the popular culture in America, PETA has decided that a name change should do the trick.  Fish will now be called (if PETA has its way) 'sea kittens'.  After all, you wouldn't want to eat something that has the name 'kitten'.  Correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems to me that kittens are warm, fuzzy, loveable things.  They sit on your lap and purr.  Try doing that with a fish.

The campaign is aimed at children (as usual), teaching them that fish are really very intelligent animals and that we should not eat them.  Any educator taking part in this campaign should be charged with brainwashing--this is ridiculous.

According to an article in The Sun Chronicle an Attleboro, Massachusetts, newspaper, while the state of Massachusetts is facing a $1 billion budget deficit, state lawmakers will be receiving a 5.5 per cent pay raise.  It's an automatic pay raise based on the increase in median household income over the past two years, and because it is based on median income, in two years, their salary will probably go down. 

Some of the representatives have said that they will give the money to charity.  State Represetative Betty Poirier said that she fears that if she refuses the raise, the state will spend it in a wasteful way, so she will be giving it to charities in her district.

I object.  Why not give the money to the taxpayers where it came from?  Charity is a wonderful thing, but how about some charity for those of us who work for a living.  We pay our bills and if you are a middle income family, your tax burden is ridiculous.  Massachusetts missed its chance in November for a taxpayer revolt, but this kind of thinking will cause one in the not too distant future.

The Illinois House has voted to impeach Governor Blagojevich.  The vote was 114 to 1, impeachment required 60 votes.  The legislature accused the Governor of 'letting down the people of Illinois by letting ego and ambition drive his decisions.'   Would we have any state governors left if they could be impeached for this?

It's amazing to me that the criminal charges include plans to sell a Senate seat (which he never actually did).  The other charges listed included expanding a state healthcare program without proper authority, going around the law and giving jobs to political allies, and misspending money on a flu vaccine that wasn't needed and couldn't be brought into the country.  This just doesn't sound like the stuff of which impeachment is made.  It sounds like the normal cronyism and insider baseball that goes on in our government.  If I believed that this was the beginning of a nationwide effort to clean up government, I would be impressed.  However, I'm not quite sure what this is.  It may just be a governor that crossed the Chicago machine somehow.

There was an article in the Washington Times on Wednesday about the rules changes made in the House of Representatives on the first day of the 111th Congress.  The article details the changes the Democrats have made in order to lessen the impact of the Republican minority in the house.  During the past two years, Republicans have been able to slow down or block legislation they did not support, and the measures taken will make that much more difficult. 

Another rule that was eliminated was the rule of term limits for committee chairmen.  The chairmen were limited to three two-year terms--now there will be no limits at all.  It will be interesting to see how these rule changes play out.

The U. S. Interior Department has lifted a 79-year old executive order banning oil-shale development in Wyoming and Utah.  According to Bloomberg.com, the Department issued a notice that will open up 6 million acres in Wyoming and 1.7 million in Utah for leasing pending analysis to determine if the land warrants special protections. The plan would take effect next month.

There are two things to note here.  First, Barack Obama would have the power as President to overturn this measure.  Second, I have a question--in the current era of relatively cheap gasoline and oil, is oil-shale available at a price that would be competitive? 

Just as a note, I would like to say it would be wonderful to have sources of energy here that didn't have diplomatic strings attached.  Europe is learning that lesson now as Vladimir Putin is consolidating his control over the oil that flows into Europe.  We need to learn from what is happening there and from what has happened to us in the past.

Barack Obama gave his ecomony speech today.  He painted a picture that would make Shirley Temple give up her smile.  I realize these are challenging times economically, but I think we need a little perspective.  According to Department of Labor statistics, things have been much worse at other times.

The unemployment rate in November of 2008 across the Commonwealth of Massachusetts was 5.5 per cent.  In Attleboro, Massachusetts, it was 6.7 per cent.  The national unemployment rate in 1980 was 7.1 per cent.  In 1982 it peaked at 9.7 per cent.  In 1980, inflation peaked at about 14 per cent annually.  The cost of fuel rose 60.4 per cent.  In January 2008, the cost of fuel rose 34.4 per cent.

During the Jimmy Carter administration, a term was invented to measure the economic situation--the misery index.  It was derived from some calculation of unemployment, interest rates, and inflation--all of which were climbing.  We are not there yet, in fact we are coming out of the recession.  The stock market is a leading indicator, and it has remained above 8,000.  Increased government spending is going to weigh the economy down and slow down the recovery.  I hope there are some members of Congress that can stop the runaway train that government spending has now become.

There is an aarticle at The Hill quoting Harry Reid as saying, "I don't work for Obama."  Ok, would someone please tell me who he actually does work for.  Senator Reid is making the point that the Senate will not just be rubber stamp to Barack Obama's ideas.  However, at the end of the article, he points out that he only needs two Republican votes to pass 'card check'.

What is card check?  It is the legislation the unions have been dreaming about for years.  It takes the secret ballot out of union elections and allows the unions to muscle their way into a company without a really fair election.  It then forces the company to negotiate with the union within a matter of months with the threat of arbitration hanging over the company's head.  It is nightmare legislation that if passed will probably result in serious job losses in this country as businesses move overseas.  That is just one of the nightmare possibilites of the anti-business administration that is about to come into power.  The saving grace may be that Barack Obama is an ambitious man.  When he sees the damage to the economy that his policies are doing and the effect on his chances for reelection, many of those policies may abruptly change.  The left will be unhappy, but he will be reelected.  This could be a very interesting four years.

Just a note.  The economy is beginning a slow turnaround as we speak.  If it is not weighed down by too much regulation, too many taxes, and a sudden large expansion of government, we will probably be in good shape by June.  If we are, watch Obama take the credit!

It's OK To Disagree

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I posted an article yesterday about Barack Obama's choice of Leon Panetta to head the CIA in the new administration.  I'm not thrilled, but I really don't know enough to have any strong objections.  Well, it didn't take long to find someone who did.

There is an opinion piece in today's New York Post by Ralph Peters strongly opposing the nomination.  Ralph Peters was a career intelligence officer in the U. S. Army, so I feel as if his opinion on this might be much more knowledgeable than mine.

He points out that Mr. Panetta was part of the Clinton administration which never took the threat of terrorism seriously. Mr. Peters feels that based on his experience working in the intelligence community during the 1990's, the Clinton administration seriously undermined the integrity of the CIA.  He also states that Mr. Panetta is unfamiliar with the intelligence community and the way it interacts around the world.

Intelligence is one of our weapons in the War on Terror.  I guess the question I have after reading this New York Post editorial is, "Does Barack Obama believe that there is a War on Terror and that there are people in the world plotting the demise of America even as I write this?"  If not, we could be in for a rough four years.

There is a man named Yoni Tidi who has a blog called YoniTheBlogger.com.  He was born and raised in America, but moved to Israel as a young adult.  He served in the IDF for twenty years and has fought in Gaza.  He was interviewed on the Hugh Hewitt show on Tuesday, January 6.  The link to the podcast is Hugh Hewitt podcasts.  It's the second hour of the show and I am not sure how long the link will be active.  Anyway, his perspective on the war in Gaza is different than anything I have heard so far, and I wanted to share it.

Yoni opposes warning terrorists ahead of time that you are going to bomb them.  There have been polls taken within the Palestinian territories by Palestinians showing the 67 to 80 per cent of the residents support the firing of rockets into Israel.  Why do you show mercy to a society that is that warped?  He also states that the victory of Israel is the only way to peace--that is, the only way Hamas will stop firing rockets into Israel.  He points out that he does not feel that the mission of Israel is well defined--what is their actual goal? 

There were two other facts he mentioned that I have not heard.  The first was that there is war going on between Hamas and Fatah (both terrorist groups).  In Gaza, Hamas is murdering Fatah, and in the West Bank, Fatah is murdering Hamas.  Neither group is interested in peaceful co-existence either with Israel or each other.  The second fact was the reporting of an incident at the Gaza-Egypt border last week.  Some Palestinians blew a hole in the border wall, and as they came through, the Egyptian border guards machine gunned them down.  Where was the reporting of that incident?  Evidently it's ok for Arabs to kill Arabs and its ok for Arabs to kill Jews, but it's not ok for Jews to kill Arabs.  Go figure.

Anyway, a cease fire is not the answer unless it permanently stops the firing of rockets into Israel.  Otherwise it isn't worth the paper it's printed on.  Remember that part of the Oslo Accord was that Israel would give up land in exchange for peace.  Israel gave up the land, where is the peace?

Barack Obama has appointed Leon Panetta to head the CIA.  This is a very interesting appointment.  Ed Morrissey has an article posted at Hot Air commenting on the appointment:

"Even the notion of "change" doesn't apply here.  Obama has no executive experience in government, and neither does Panetta, but Panetta hardly represents a breath of fresh air in Washington.  He's another Clinton-era retread, only in this case, put in charge of an organization about which he knows nothing.  He's there to exercise Obama's political will and nothing more.

Obama deserves the benefit of the doubt on his political appointments, but this is one selection that should get a lot of scrutiny from Congress.  If Obama wants a political hatchet man in a high-level appointment, have Panetta run OMB -- or Commerce, where there's a late opening.  America deserves the benefit of experience and wisdom in the position of CIA director."

One of the things to consider here is the fact that anyone with any connections to the current CIA would have been strongly opposed by the political left.  Remember, the Patriot Act and other measures that have kept us safe for the last eight years were not popular with the political left.  Another thing to consider is the fact that for the past eight years, the CIA and the State Department have waged on undeclared war on the Bush administration through leaks of classified information and other tactics.  Barack Obama might be wise to appoint someone he knows will be an ally to lead the CIA.

More Minnesota

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One on the things that should be noted when attempting to sort our the recent election in Minnesota is the fact that more votes were counted than voters voted.  Senator Coleman will be filing an 'election contest' to protest the results of the last recount.  One of the things that is being challenged is that there were no uniform standards applied during the recount process.  One of the best sources of information on this election is Power Line Blog.  Two of the lawyers who author the blog are from Minnesota and understand how elections work there.  I just wish they could explain to me how Al Franken got any votes at all! 

As Israel is being condemned for an attack on a UN School, there are a few facts (and videos) being left out of the condemnation.  There is an article (and a video) at Little Green Footballs of the terrorists firing mortar shells at Israel from this school.  The date of the video is October of 2007.  How long was Israel supposed to let Hamas fire rockets at her without firing back?  I heard the Hamas whining described on the radio today as "the he-hit-me-back defense".   Anyone who has raised children has probably heard that argument at some point.  Generally speaking, it doesn't work on Mom, and it shouldn't work on the world community.

Another example of the propaganda war that is going on is related at Power Line Blog.  According to thier post:

"Public television network France 2 has admitted that earlier today, it showed photos of dozens of bodies of members of Hamas and civilians who it said were killed in an Israeli bombing raid on January 1. Only problem: the photos were actually taken in 2005, and the people depicted were killed not by Israel, but when "a truck full of explosives blew up in the Jabaliya Refugee Camp." The terrorists, in other words, blew themselves up accidentally and took a number of civilians with them."

John Travolta

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The New York Post is reporting that John Travolta's son died of a seizure while vacationing with his family.  My heart and prayers go out to Mr. and Mrs. Travolta and their family.  I wish them comfort, wisdom, and peace as they move through the days ahead.

Israel vs Hamas

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William Kristol has an op-ed piece in Sunday's New York Times commenting on the war in Gaza.  He points out that the negative opinions say the war is a threat to peace in the Middle East and explains why that assessment is backwards.  He points out that Israel might succeed in Gaza due to the fact that Gaza does not have allies to resupply it with arms from its borders--it borders the Mediterranean Sea, Israel, and Egypt.  It is very easy for Israel to cut off the resupply of Hamas.

William Kristol makes these points in the article:

"But a defeat of Hamas in Gaza -- following on the heels of our success in Iraq -- would be a real setback for Iran. It would make it easier to assemble regional and international coalitions to pressure Iran. It might positively affect the Iranian elections in June. It might make the Iranian regime more amenable to dealing.

With respect to Iran, Obama may well face -- as the Israeli government did with Hamas -- a moment when the use of force seems to be the only responsible option. But Israel's willingness to fight makes it more possible that the United States may not have to."

If the world community succeeds in intervening in this war and stopping it with a truce, it will not be a lasting truce.  Hamas had made it clear that it would like to exterminate Israel and the Jewish people, and as long as they have a base to work from they will continue in that effort.  The only way to peace in through an Israeli victory in Gaza that destroys Hamas' influence.  This will also push back at Iran, which will also increase the chances for peace.  Again the thing to keep in mind--Israel has nukes (and has had them for some time) and Hamas in Gaza was allowed to exist as long as they were peaceful--if Hamas had nukes, how long would Israel be allowed to exist?

The thing to note in this war is that even though the Arab street is doing the expected protest, it is a very muted protest.  Many of the Middle Eastern countries see Iran as a bigger threat to their security than Israel is, and because they realize Iran is funding Hamas, they would not be all that unhappy to see Hamas lose.  The Iranians are Shiite Muslims,and they are Persians--not Arabs.  The Sunni countries in the Middle East are aware of Iran's funding and instigating terrorism in the region and would not be unhappy to see Iran stopped. 
 

According to MyWay.com the recount in the Minnesota election has been certified by the Minnesota Canvassing Board.  This allows Norm Coleman seven days to challenge the results legally.  Secretary of State Mark Ritchie pointed out that the board was simply certifying the results of the recount--not certifying the election.

According to Power Line Blog, there are few problems with this recount.  According the their post:

"Franken's campaign was aggressive about getting lists of voters whose ballots were excluded, checking those lists against the DFL database, and interviewing voters who they thought were sympathetic. My impression is that the Coleman campaign was nowhere near as aggressive in trying to identify rejected ballots that favor their candidate. It may be, therefore, that Franken's campaign consistently agreed to include ballots that they knew were for their candidate while objecting (regardless of the merits) to ballots that they believed were for Coleman. If that's the case, the remaining ballots (i.e., those on which the campaigns did not agree) may tend to favor Coleman. That's speculation, of course, but at the moment some such scenario will have to be true for Coleman to have a chance."

There is no way everyone is going to be satisfied with either result of this election.  My message to the people of Minnesota is, "Enough of you voted for Al Franker to trigger the recount, if you find yourself represented by Al Franken and you are not happy, learn from the experience."

There has been a bit of a 'dust up' lately about a book entitled "Angel at the Fence."  The book is supposedly a true story of a man in a concentration camp who was given an apple a day by a local girl during his time in the camp.  The story has proved to be false for many reasons, but there is an interesting article on the ins and outs of the whole thing at the American Thinker.  The holcaust was not a sweet story of local people helping people in the camps--it was an ugly story of many people closing their eyes to what was happening to their fellow human beings.  There are exceptions to that rule--the people who hid Jewish people or smuggled them out of Nazi territory--but unfortunately, they were exceptions.

There are many people in the world who would like to spin the holocaust as 'not really that bad' because they don't want to deal with the fact that anti-semitism is still a huge world-wide problem.  Look at the way the current war in Gaza is being reported.  I don't remember seeing any protests reported when Hamas was lauching rockets into Israel every day.  Unless Israel completes its mission to end the reign of Hamas in Gaza, those rockets will not stop.  If the international community (including the UN) wants peace in the Middle East, they would do well to let Israel complete its mission without interference.

Israel Needs Friends

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The good news of the propaganda war between Israel and Hamas is that the Czech President of the EU has gone on record, as reported at Haaretz.com, saying that the ground war Israel is launching in Gaza is defensive--not offensive.  Contrast this statement with the recent reporting of the Gaza invasion by Christiane Amanpour referenced in Commentary Magazine.  Ms. Amanpour stated in her report that in the past year only two Israelis were killed by Hamas rocket fire--insinuating that Israel is overreacting to something that is basically harmless.  Now wait a minute--she left out a few facts mentioned in the above linked article:

"Hamas' attacks in 2008 more than doubled -- to 3,278 -- from the 2007 number. And this figures in the six-month "lull" period, during which "only" around 100 rockets were fired. She also did not mention that the range and deadliness of Hamas' rockets increased as well, putting around 15 percent of the Israeli population under Hamas' missile umbrella. (The "disproportionality" fetishists also never get around to noting that Israel has conducted less than a thousand air strikes in response to over 7,000 Hamas rocket attacks since 2005.)"

Just for the record eight Israelis were killed by Hamas in 2008.  Somehow I think that if Mexico or Canada were lobbing rockets into the US at the rate Hamas has been lobbing them into Israel, we might respond the way Israel has responded (only sooner and stronger)!

The new President of the EU understands freedom and he understands tyranny.  Unless the world begins to understand the difference between the two, we will find ourselves living under the latter. 

 

Charles Krauthammer has an article at the American Thinker about the war between Israel and Hamas.  He sums up the situation beautifully:

"The grievance? It cannot be occupation, military control or settlers. They were all removed in September 2005. There's only one grievance and Hamas is open about it. Israel's very existence.

Nor does Hamas conceal its strategy. Provoke conflict. Wait for the inevitable civilian casualties. Bring down the world's opprobrium on Israel. Force it into an untenable cease-fire -- exactly as happened in Lebanon. Then, as in Lebanon, rearm, rebuild and mobilize for the next round. Perpetual war. Since its raison d'etre is the eradication of Israel, there are only two possible outcomes: the defeat of Hamas or the extinction of Israel."

 

Please read the whole article--it's worth reading.  Objectivity and honesty in Middle East reporting are hard to find.  This is a propaganda war as well as a ground war, and the American media has ofter bought into the propaganda.

 

 

Mosab Hassan Yousef is the son of one of the leaders of Hamas.  He has denounced Hamas and the Muslim religion and has converted to Christianity.  He is speaking out against Hamas and their tactics and talking about the things that he saw that drove him from the movement.  There is a video of Mosab Yousef being interviewed at You Tube and a longer article on his life at Fox News.  The courage of this young man in speaking out is amazing.  I hope the world will listen to what he has to say.

According to Yahoo News President Bush has given Israel free rein in its handling of the situation in Gaza.  Little Green Footballs has a chart released by the Intelligence and Information Center showing the number of rocket and mortar attacks on Israel since Hamas took over Gaza.  I can't think of any country in the world that would have put up with eight years of having rockets and mortars fired at their civilian population without retaliation.  The only way to bring peace in the Middle East is to put an end to those people who want to destroy Israel.  Otherwise there will always be war because Israel will have to fight for its existence.  I'm not sure exactly what Israel needs to do, but I think American needs to let Israel make its own decision on how to handle this.  Remember, when Israel controlled the territories they have given up since the Oslo Accord, those territories had infrastructure and people had ways of making a living.  One of the things the Palestinians have done is to destroy the infrastructure and destroy the greenhouses that provided jobs and income for the people living there.  Hamas knows how to do terror--they do not know how to run a peaceful society--that is not one of their aims.

There Is A Price

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I believe America is about to lose its place of power on the world scene.  While some Americans (even politicians) think that is a good thing, I do not.  We have been a force for good for a long time--without American, Hitler would be in control in Europe and a cruel Japanese dictator would be ruling Asia.  Be that as it may, as we come into the new year, our power will drastically decrease.  The good news is, however, that I believe the influence of radical Muslims will also be decreasing.  As moderate Muslims begin to see more of what radical Islam is doing, they tend to move away from it.  Unfortunately, there will still be places where hate is taught in school, but I believe their effect will begin to decrease rather than increase.  Where has our power gone?

Somewhere along the line integrity became an outmoded value in our election of leaders.  MR. SMITH GOES TO WASHINGTON was released in 1939; it was a portrait of where we were headed, only in real life, the good guys were not necessarily winning.  Let's look at some of the decisions our leadership has made recently.

1.       I seriously doubt we will see offshore drilling in this country.  Congress is not able to pass a workable bill to allow American to become energy efficient.  Has it occurred to anyone that California could stimulate its economy and begin to solve its tax problems by drilling offshore?

 

2.      By denying a trade agreement with Columbia, we turned out backs on a country that desperately wants to be our ally in South America.  Columbia has much to fear from their next-door neighbor Venezuela, and we have shown them that they cannot rely on us.

 

3.      The repercussions of the financial bailouts have yet to be seen.  There are stories out there about bonus money being used to finance spa weekends, outrageous bonuses for executives, and other things the money was not intended for.  There is probably much more of that to come.

 

4.      We have forgotten fiscal responsibility.  Where is the money the government is spending coming from?  How is any of this government spending related to the spending priorities stated in our Constitution.  Does anyone remember the Constitution?

 

5.      Instead of the common man going to Washington and serving a term or two then going back home to live under the laws he has written, we have created career politicians.   Congress has the best health care and the best retirement program in America.  They are not under Social Security and they also have separate health care coverage.  Where is their incentive to fix Social Security if it doesn't apply to them?  Why are they planning to meddle in health care for other people when it does not apply to them?  Can they be trusted with other peoples healthcare?

I believe that answer to a lot of our problems is term limits, but I am not sure an average American can be elected to State or national office with today's rules.  The amount of money it takes to run a campaign is astounding, and the job really doesn't pay that much (although they just gave themselves a raise).  I'm not up for a taxpayers' revolt, but we do need to vote more carefully as a nation.

 

According to The Hill, Senator John Cornyn has threatened to filibuster any attempt to seat Al Franken as the Senator from Minnesota.  He has based this threat on the fact that Al Franken will not have a certificate of election as long as the election results are being challenged in the courts.  According to the article, Senator Cornyn stated, "I think it is very clear that the people of Minnesota and the courts in Minnesota should make the decision about who won the Minnesota Senate election, and not political leaders in Washington, D.C. That process is ongoing and will not be resolved, in all likelihood, for weeks and maybe longer."

The past year was a geniunely strange year for politics, and I have a feeling that 2009 might be equally strange.

Michael Barone has an article in U S News and World Report on the Senate Democrat's statement that they will not seat Roland Burris.  He points out in the article that there is no indication that Roland Burris is guilty of anything (other than accepting this appointment, which might indicate poor judgment).  The negotiations that went into the appointment we are totally unaware of, but again, suspicion does not confirm guilt.  Until there is a conviction or at least a public hearing on the charges against Rod Blagojevich, there is no reason not to seat Roland Burris.  The whole situation is interesting--it's like watching a slow-motion chess game.  The appointment of Roland Burris was accompanied by an immediate playing of the race card to make it more difficult for the Democrats in the Senate to refuse to seat him.  It is politically easy to take a stand against seating this man in the Senate, but in doing that are we assuming guilt instead of innocence on the part of the accused.

Pirates Again?

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Yahoo News is reporting that a Greek cruise ship fended off an attack by pirates in the Gulf of Aden with water hoses and the help of some EU aircraft scrambled from a nearby group of EU ships.  Pirates in three speedboats armed with guns and rocket-propelled grenades twice tried to board the Greek-flagged Kriti Episkopi.  I guess the thing that bothers me about this is that the pirates sailed off into the sunset.  In another case, a French warship on Thursday captured a boat with eight Somali pirates as they were preparing to board a Panamanian ship.  This was revealed in a statement released late Thursday by the office of French President Nicolas Sarkozy.  The crew of the "PM L'Her" dispatch boat seized weapons and munitions on board. The French navy will hand over the men to Somali authorities. 

I'm really not sure handing the pirates over to the Somali authorities is the answer.  I think that the way to end piracy in this area is to make it unprofitable and dangerous for the pirates, rather than for ships in the area.  I really don't like to idea of arming cruise ships with rocket propelled grenades, but at least we need to give them armed escorts in dangerous areas.  I don't think water hoses would have worked for very long without the arrival of air and sea support.

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Happy 2009

According to today's New York Post Israel destroyed a mosque in Gaza that had been used to store weapons and as a terrorist hiding place.  When the worldwide protest happens, you might want to remember this fact taken directly from the article:

"The military said terrorist cells had been firing rockets from the mosque grounds as early as yesterday morning. The airstrike touched off explosions from stockpiled munitions inside the mosque."

The above fact will probably not be mentioned in a lot of the reporting of the incident.  Meanwhile, Hamas is launching rockets at schools and kindergartens in Israel that are not being used for military purposes.  This is a very uneven war in terms of which side wants civilian casualties and which side is trying to prevent them.

Perspective in 2009

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Jonah Goldberg has a very interesting article in National Review Online about where we are in the war on terrorism.  Sometimes change happens so slowly that we don't see it until after it is over.  I believe his article points that out.  The name of the article is "The Squeegee Men of the New World Order". 

In case you don't remember, the 'squeegee men' were the street people in New York City who used to come up to your car when you were stopped at a traffic light, wipe your windshield with a dirty rag, and expect a tip.  Basically, it was a form of intimidation that people accepted and ignored.  When Rudy Giuliani become mayor of New York City he got rid of the squeegee men, fixed broken windows, ending immodest acts on the streets, and generally dealt with the 'small crimes' first.  After that, he went after some of the more obvious things and eventually made a real difference in the City.  One of my daughters was in college in and later lived in New York City during that time, and the change in the city was amazing--particularly if you randomly visited.  It's like a young grandchild you see only three or four times a year--his or her parents may not realize how much the child has changed in a short time because they see it gradually--but you are amazed!

Anyway, as we enter the new year, we need to examine how we think about the war on terror.  Is it ok for terrorists to randomly shoot rockets at civilians in Israel?  Is it ok for terrorists to torture and murder a man and his wife in Mumbai simply because they are Jews?  The Jews are the canary in the coal mine, if we allow inhumane treatment of them, it will eventually come to us.  Remember, the terrorists have stated the goal of bringing the entire world into a great caliphate.  The fact that they have not begun with American does not mean that America is exempt.  I believe that America is a very special country, but I don't believe that we are immune from the future the terrorists are planning.  Unless something changes, the demographics of Europe will cause it to become a Muslim continent within thirty years, and the Muslims who will be running it are not moderate--they are the ones rioting in Paris and the Netherlands.

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