Political Digest December 7, 2009

I post articles because I think they are of interest. Doing so doesn’t mean that I necessarily agree with every—or any—opinion in the posted article.

Pearl Harbor Day
Leave us pause to remember those killed in the sneak attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, by forces of the Empire of Japan, and those who died and those who suffered in the long war to put down Nazism, fascism and Japanese militarism and it’s evil twin, the conquest-minded religion of Shinto. The current war is not the first time religious extremists have attacked freedom.

Call your senators
Want to call your Senators about the healthcare boondoggle? It’s supposed to be free at this site: http://www.actionarmy.org/
Unfortunately, my Senators are Dick Durbin (D-Trial Lawyers) and Roland Burris (D-Blagojevich) so I don’t waste my breath.

Scientist e-mails raising serious factual concerns http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/opinions/articles/2009/12/04/20091204fri1-04.html
From the reliably-liberal Arizona Republic: No one expects scientists - especially climatologists at the center of one of the most important science debates of all time - to argue without passion. But shouldn't we at least expect them to argue fairly? Of all the insights into the arguments over climate change revealed by the e-mails hacked from the computer files of the University of East Anglia in Great Britain, the most discouraging revelation appears to be that even scientists don't always fight fair.

Climategate: it’s all unravelling now http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100018556/climategate-its-all-unravelling-now/
Excerpt: So many new developments: which story do we pick? Maybe best to summarise, instead. After all, it’s not like you’re going to find much of this reported in the MSM.

Were Russian security services behind the leak of 'Climategate' emails? http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1233562/Emails-rocked-climate-change-campaign-leaked-Siberian-closed-city-university-built-KGB.html
Excerpt: Suspicions were growing last night that Russian security services were behind the leaking of the notorious British ‘Climategate’ emails which threaten to undermine tomorrow’s Copenhagen global warming summit. An investigation by The Mail on Sunday has discovered that the explosive hacked emails from the University of East Anglia were leaked via a small web server in the formerly closed city of Tomsk in Siberia. The leaks scandal has left the scientific community in disarray after claims that key climate change data was manipulated in the run-up to the climate change summit of world leaders.

Dutch: Gore Wrong on Snows of Kilimanjaro
http://www.google.com/ig?refresh=1
Follows Gore’s scientifically-ignorant statement that the temp at the center of the earth is millions of degrees, when it’s really around 5,000. But he’s gotten rich off the scam—what does he care? Excerpt: Newspapers and news sites in the Netherlands today extensively broke the news of the findings of a research team led by Professor Jaap Sinninghe Damste — a leading molecular paleontologist at Utrecht University and winner of the prestigious Spinoza Prize — about the melting icecap of the Kilimanjaro, the African mountain that became a symbol of anthropogenic global warming. Professor Sinninghe Damste’s research, as discussed on the site of the Dutch Organization of Scientific Research (DOSR) — a governmental body — shows that the icecap of Kilimanjaro was not the result of cold air but of large amounts of precipitation which fell at the beginning of the Holocene period, about 11,000 years ago. The melting and freezing of moisture on top of Kilimanjaro appears to be part of “a natural process of dry and wet periods.” The present melting is not the result of “environmental damage caused by man.”

Swiss Vote to Ban Mosque Minarets
http://news.aol.com/article/swiss-vote-to-ban-new-minarets/788109
Everyone’s up in arms. They should allow as many minarets there as churches and synagogues are allowed in Mecca. No one complains about that.

Ghosts of Hasan Past, Present and Future http://stupidfrogs.org/articles/ghosts_of_hasan_past_present_and_future.htm
Excerpt: After the tragedy at Fort Hood, we hear calls for action to explain how a military "Columbine" could happen. Investigating the background of the attacker, Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, Monday-morning quarterbacking suggests the signs were clear - a malcontent, a loner, a man driven by religious conviction that his country was wrong to be fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq, his giving away all his personal possessions, his donning religious garb hours before the attack, etc. It was only after the fact that we wondered how such obvious signs of a man determined to do harm to others, fulfilling his destiny in doing so, were ignored. "Hasan" is proving to be a foreboding Muslim name for Americans. In 2003, we were visited by "Hasan Past" in Kuwait. We have now been visited by "Hasan Present" at Fort Hood. And, as Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad forewarns, we are to be visited by "Hasan Future" before 2013. And, Mr. Ahmadinejad tells us, he will be the one to pave the way for Hasan Future's arrival. The Iranian president firmly believes the arrival of Hasan Future spells doom for both America and Israel.

Somebody at Fort Hood Should Be Walking the Plank
http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=Y2QxNWFlZDM5MDQ0NzM4MDg3ZjA3MDE5ZjNmYzBjYzU=
Excerpt: It's been brought to my attention by several reliable sources that the Defense Department has brought Louay Safi to Fort Hood as an instructor, and that he has been lecturing on Islam to our troops in Fort Hood who are about to deploy to Afghanistan. Safi is a top official of the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA), and served as research director at the International Institute of Islamic Thought (IIIT). Worse, last evening, Safi was apparently permitted to present a check (evidently on behalf of ISNA) to the families of the victims of last month's Fort Hood massacre. A military source told the blogger Barbarossa at the Jawa Report: "This is nothing short of blood money. This is criminal and the Ft. Hood base commander should be fired right now." ISNA was identified by the Justice Department at the Holy Land Foundation terrorism financing conspiracy trial as an unindicted co-conspirator. The defendants at that trial were convicted of funding Hamas to the tune of millions of dollars. This should have come as no surprise. ISNA is the Muslim Brotherhood's umbrella entity for Islamist organizations in the United States. It was established in 1981 to enable Muslims in North America "to adopt Islam as a complete way of life" — i.e., to further the Brotherhood's strategy of establishing enclaves in the West that are governed by sharia. As I detailed in an essay for the April 20 edition of NR, the Brotherhood's rally-cry remains, to this day, "Allah is our objective. The Prophet is our leader. The Koran is our law. Jihad is our way. Dying in the way of Allah is our highest hope.” The Brotherhood's spiritual guide, Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, who issued a fatwa in 2004 calling for attacks on American forces in Afghanistan, openly declares that Islam will "conquer America" and "conquer Europe."

Former GITMO detainee now al-Qaida brass http://www.upi.com/Top_News/Special/2009/12/04/Former-GITMO-detainee-now-al-Qaida-brass/UPI-74051259944600/
Got away from our friends, the Saudis. Excerpt: Guantanamo Bay detainee released to Saudi Arabia in 2006 has become a top ideologue for al-Qaida in the Arabian peninsula, an intelligence review said. Pakistani officials captured Ibrahim Suleiman al-Rubaish in 2001 and turned him over to U.S. officials who then sent him to the naval detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Rubaish while in U.S. custody at Guantanamo told his interrogators he received training at al-Farouq camp run by al-Qaida near Kandahar, Afghanistan, prior to the U.S.-led invasion in 2001. He was transferred to Saudi Arabia in 2006 where he was placed in a national rehabilitation project. At some point, he escaped across the southern border of Saudi Arabia into Yemen and has now emerged as a top theologian for al-Qaida, the online Long War Journal reports.

Female jihadis training on U.S. soil
http://www.jihadwatch.org/2009/12/female-jihadis-training-on-us-soil.html
Excerpt: Watch this brief video. It is clear that this is not play-acting, not comic opera soldiery, but very real training -- and for what? What do authorities think these women are doing this for? To stay in shape? They're training for battle. For combat. The Christian Action Network sent me the full video of which this is a part. It shows veiled women marching and engaging in hand-to-hand combat training, firearms training, and more -- in a Muslim compound in the U.S. The implications are clear. Americans, for the most part, have no clue that this sort of this is going on in the United States. They need to see this video. Watch for it to break in the mainstream media on Monday.

Woman Killed in al-Shati Refugee Camp to "Maintain Family Honor" http://www.pchrgaza.org/files/weapon/english/2009/report23.html
Another woman dead without a peep from American “feminists.”

Al-Qaida Kills Eight Times More Muslims than Non-Muslims
https://mail.google.com/mail/?hl=en&zx=14oatgdswq79r&shva=1#inbox/1255eda594c00474
Excerpt: Few would deny that Muslims too are victims of Islamist terror. But a new study by the Combating Terrorism Center in the US has shown that an overwhelming majority of al-Qaida victims are, in fact, co-religionists.

This will not end well
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/12/02/AR2009120202044.html?hpid=opinionsbox1
Excerpt: But after 11 months of graceless disparagements of the 43rd president, the 44th acts as though he is the first president whose predecessor bequeathed a problematic world. And Obama's second new Afghanistan policy in less than nine months strikingly resembles his predecessor's plan for Iraq, which was: As Iraq's security forces stand up, U.S. forces will stand down. Having vowed to "finish the job," Obama revealed Tuesday that he thinks the job in Afghanistan is to get out of Afghanistan. This is an unserious policy. Obama's surge will bring to 51,000 his Afghanistan escalation since March. Supposedly this will buy time for Afghan forces to become adequate. But it is not intended to buy much time: Although the war is in its 98th month, Obama's "Mission Accomplished" banner will be unfurled 19 months from now -- when Afghanistan's security forces supposedly will be self-sufficient. He must know this will not happen.

Alinsky Does Afghanistan - Obama’s radical inspiration would have loved his speech on the war. https://mail.google.com/mail/?hl=en&zx=bw30bzti3t3y&shva=1#inbox/1255b4f96e32b43d
Excerpt: If there is one word that captures President Obama’s much-anticipated Afghanistan speech, it is “cynical.” Yes, the speech was also internally contradictory, counter-historical, and premised on fatally flawed assumptions about Islam and the Afghan people. Cynicism, however, is the defining feature of Obama speeches. This one was no different: from its use of the United States Military Academy as a prop to its concluding assertion that “our resolve is unwavering” . . . after the president had spent the preceding 40 minutes in full waver mode.

West Pointer reads anti-Obama book awaiting president
Author who questioned Islam getting unique publicity
http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=117855
Excerpt: Brad Thor, the author of a series of best-selling thrillers, is getting unique publicity because of a news photo of a West Point cadet reading his anti-Obama novel "The Apostle" while awaiting the president's speech at the U.S. military academy.

Dodd, Mikulski join Brown effort on GOP healthcare amendment http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/70667-dodd-mikulski-join-brown-effort-on-gop-healthcare-amendment
Excerpt: Two Senate Democrats have joined Sen. Sherrod Brown’s (D-Ohio) effort to jump onto a GOP healthcare amendment. Sens. Chris Dodd (Conn.) and Barbara Mikulski (Md.) filed a unanimous consent request with Brown on Friday to co-sponsor an amendment being drafted by GOP Sens. Tom Coburn of Oklahoma and David Vitter of Louisiana. The legislation would require lawmakers to join a public insurance plan included in healthcare legislation. Vitter is also considering proposing banning physician services currently available to legislators at the Capitol as well as taxpayer-funded services they are allowed at Bethesda Medical Center and the Walter Reed Army Medical Center.

Why Dems Are Obsessed by Health Reform http://online.wsj.com/article/SB20001424052748704007804574575584229775884.html?mod=djemITP
Excerpt: Voters are increasingly worried about unemployment, but Democratic leaders in Congress remain obsessed with passing health- care reform. Senate Majority Whip Richard Durbin was asked recently if a health-care bill would pass the Senate by the end of this month. "It must," he said. "We have to finish it." Still, many in the trenches are uneasy about the sprawling, complex bill they privately acknowledge has no bipartisan support, doesn't seriously tackle soaring costs and will increase insurance premiums. That may explain Majority Leader Harry Reid's haste—he has ordered a rare Sunday session this weekend to hurry up the debate. Public support for the bill averages only 39.2% backing in all polls compiled by Pollster.com. But buried in the surveys is an explanation for the Democratic obsession to pass the bill: An overwhelming 76% of Democrats back it. "They believe the liberal base expects them to deliver and will punish them if they don't," says Democratic pollster Doug Schoen, who worked for Bill Clinton in the 1990s. That fear is backed up by a new poll taken for the Daily Kos, the left-wing Web site: 81% of self-described Republicans say they are certain or likely to vote in 2010 compared to 65% of independent voters and only 56% of Democrats. "Democrats have simply not been given enough of a reason to come out and vote yet," writes liberal blogger David Dayen. "The left is waiting for that long-promised 'change' they can believe in."

I wonder if Max Baucus believes in coincidence
http://legalinsurrection.blogspot.com/2009/12/hey-max-do-you-believe-in-coincidence.html
Excerpt: In March 2008, Max Baucus (D-MT) had separated from his wife. That same month, Andrew Ramanos was in his final undergraduate semester at George Washington University, where he worked on the school newspaper, the GW Hatchet. In the summer of 2008, Baucus started dating a former staffer, Melodee Hanes. Sometime very early in 2009, Hanes was one of three names submitted by Baucus as possible U.S. Attorney nominees. In March 2009, Hanes withdrew her name from consideration.

America Truly is the Greatest Country in the World. Don’t Let Freedom Slip Away http://www.examiner.com/x-25060-Fort-Worth-Christianity--Culture-Examiner~y2009m11d29-America-Truly-is-the-Greatest-Country-in-the-World--Dont-Let-Freedom-Slip-Away
Excerpt: I am an eyewitness to history. I cannot tell you that Hitler took Austria by tanks and guns; it would distort history. We elected him by a landslide – 98% of the vote. I’ve never read that in any American publications. Everyone thinks that Hitler just rolled in with his tanks and took Austria by force.

Death Threats Against US President Have Not Increased Under Obama http://commonamericanjournal.com/?p=7087
Excerpt: The MSM has been spreading the notion that death threats against the US President have increased since President Obama came to power. The implication being that racists and “right wing” crazies can’t stand the idea of an African American president and pose an increasing threat to Obama’s security. Here Washington D.C. Representative Eleanor Holmes Norton, questions US Secret Service Director Mark J. Sullivan on the subject. Turns out that threat levels are pretty much the same as they were under Bush and Clinton.

They need one
Saw an electronic job ad for a “Quality Assurance Manger” this week. Looks like they need one desperately.

Christmas Humor
There are some funny photos going around the net, and Saturday we saw a similar setting in person. We were returning from a Marine vets functions, and looking for a restaurant in Menomonie Falls, WI, when my bride said, “Look at those lights! Turn in.” There was a house that was well over-done with Christmas: Merry-go-round, airplane with prop turning, huge chorus of caroling snow people, several displays on the roof, and many thousands of lights. On the house next door was, spelled out in white lights over the garage, was “ditto.”