Category Archives: Uncategorized
Earmark, “Congressionally Directed Spending.”
Earmark smearmark, where is the will to forbid them? Not in Washington DC that’s for sure. Washington’s fix regarding earmarks works as good as their answer to campaign financing. It still goes on but it now has a different name, “congressionally directed spending.” Take Rahm Emanuel for example. He is chairman of the House Democratic Caucus and has been a major proponent of making earmarks in spending bills more transparent. Rahm speaks with forked tongue.
Rep. Rahm Emanuel was extremely proud when the House passed a major spending bill
early this year that contained not a single special-interest project. “This is an earmark-free bill,” the Illinois Democrat jubilantly declared on Feb. 1.
A week later, however, he and 18 other Illinois lawmakers signed a letter to the Energy Department to “express our strong support” for a bio-energy project at the University of Illinois. Emanuel also sent his own letter to the department seeking “support and assistance in securing” $500,000 for Children’s Memorial Hospital in Chicago and $750,000 for the Illinois Institute of Technology.
Such requests for specific institutions are commonly known as earmarks. But Emanuel, a member of the Democratic House leadership, declines to call them that. “Letter-writing is not an earmark,” he said in an interview.
What perfect Clinton-speak. Letter-writing for earmarks is not an earmark. That and, it depends on what the definition of is is. Pelosi and Reid are doing a bang-up job on their ethics reform campaign, beginning with William (Dollar Bill) Jefferson (D-LA). And it goes downhill from there.
Washington Post link: Pet Projects’ Veil Is Only Partly Lifted
CNN, Bin Laden Is Right
The CNN take on “Osama bin Laden’s Message to Americans” is pretty much what bin Laden said. And by its content could have passed for something out of the DNC. No, I’m not saying it was from the DNC, I’m saying the message is the same as that of the DNC.
Aside from the part where he wants to kill us all unless we submit to cavemen, he says if we would just quit fighting the war in Iraq, then he would stop fighting us. That is the same thing that every democrat candidate running for president is saying. Only difference is, the democrats really believe it. Both he and these democrats forgot the part about we were not in Iraq on 9/11/2001. But I digress.
Michael Scheuer, the former chief of a CIA bin Laden unit, said that the war with bin Laden is a result of our policies in the US. And, that the administration has misled us about the motivations of this enemy. IE. They don’t want to kill us because we are not Islamofascists, they want to kill us because of the way we live and the laws we make. So just change the law (and our way of life) and then we won’t be attacked any more. Now I know why he is a former chief. Well, aside from the fact that he didn’t find bin Laden. Scheuer says . . .
We continue to hear that it’s about freedom and liberty, and they hate women in the workplace, or the fact that I might have a beer after work, and that has nothing to do with it. What we’re at war about is the impact of our policy in the Islamic world. That — that’s what motivates al Qaeda and its allies. And that is what gives al Qaeda and its allies unity.
Help me, I’m having trouble understanding how the way we live in the United States, policies and all, have any effect whatsoever on cavemen on the other side of the world that Scheuer calls ‘the Islamic world?’ The only thing he has right is the scope of the Islamofascists, they are all over the “world.”
Curiously enough, bin Laden is apparently a fan of Michael Scheuer, and why wouldn’t he be? Scheuer believes bin Laden’s propaganda. In his speech, bin Laden said . . .
“If you would like to get to know some of the reasons for your losing of your war against us, then read the book of Michael Scheuer in this regard.”
This is an ideological war for us. For the enemy it is a religious war. And according to Michael Scheuer, its just that lying Bush.
CNN transcript
Vietnamese Boat People Come Full Circle
A family rescued from drifting in the Gulf of Thailand, escaping the North Vietnamese after the Vietnam War, get to meet and to thank the sailors who rescued them 25 years ago.
h/t Democracy Project
Capital Online:Â ‘Boat people’ thank sailors who helped them escape Vietnam
Air America Radio Exits Memphis
Air America Radio loses Memphis WSMB 680 AM, to be replaced with sports talk. I’m still waiting for that swell of demand for the ‘progressive’ message. WSMB is going from this to this. That should tell them something.
Frustrated by the fact that they can’t get any traction with their brand of rabid radio, they don’t see it as a loss, but rather as justification to whine for the Fairness Doctrine.
To liberals, free markets are fine as long as they are not on the losing side. Imagine for a moment that the popularity of talk radio is overwhelmingly liberal, and conservative talkers just couldn’t cut the mustard. Do you see the liberals calling for the Fairness Doctrine then?
Another Murder For Geraldo Rivera To Ignore
Did you ever hear something about a murder and recoil at the thought of what kind of person could do such a thing? Like the recent execution of 3 out of 4 college students, this is one of those. Try a 2 year old baby boy being kicked to death by the mother’s boyfriend, Michael Hernandez . Contrary to what Geraldo Rivera would say, this is not just another brutal murder. This is another preventable murder. You see, Michael Hernandez is an illegal alien.
What War On Islam?
Unless you are deaf, dumb, and blind, you have already heard Islamofascists justify their holy war on us as a defense of Islam. That Islam is being attacked. So who is attacking Islam? Nobody. But Saudi Arabian Airlines had a helpful Travel Guide on their website, warning prospective tourists of certain dangerous items that may not be brought with you “into the Kingdom” due to religious reasons. From their website . . .
These include alcoholic beverages, pork and pork products, prohibited drugs and narcotics, firearms, explosives, edged weapons and pornographic materials.
For PR purposes, the following paragraph was removed from their Travel Guide. Try flying with a cross around your neck.
Items and articles belonging to religions other than Islam are also prohibited. These may include Bibles, crucifixes, statues, carvings, items with religious symbols such as the Star of David, and others.
Not sure why swords are banned. Aren’t swords religious items in Islam? But with policies like this, one has to wonder what the alleged war on Islam is all about?
From all that I have seen going on around the world, it seems to me that Islam is at war with everything that is not Islamic. Examples can be found in France, Great Britain, Spain, United States, Russia, Philippines, Sweden, Darfur, Somalia. Who is attacking who here? No one is out to destroy Islam. If there was a war on Islam, don’t you think that their holiest sites would be turned to dust like the Taliban did to the statue of Buddha in Afghanistan? The facts argue to the contrary.
Admitting my ignorance on the difference between good Islam and bad Islam, I am reminded of the way that cults behave. My way or the highway. The 1978 Johnstown cool-aid massacre. The 9/11/2001 attack on America.
A religion that puts so much emphasis on things here on earth, like farm animals (pigs), books (Bibles v Korans), and jewelry (crucifix), and cartoons, instead of living a peaceful and spiritual life with your fellow man while preparing for the hereafter, sounds more like a kind of witchcraft to me than anything you can find among Christianity or Judaism. A little bat’s blood here, rat hair there, an infidel’s eyeball, two pig ears, and just a pinch of garlic (garlic goes good on anything), and the religion is safe? It seems more akin to the Wizard of Oz, where the guy behind the curtain has a bomb or sword.
Bathroom-Cruising, What?
With the Larry Craig arrest in the headlines, Slate feels they have information you need to know. Frankly, I’m not sure which I distaste most, ‘bathroom-cruising’ or the tutorial from Slate entitled Bathroom Sex FAQ, “all your bathroom-cruising questions answered.”
Democrats Soft On Terror
Set aside the Democrats’ claim to support the troops by bringing them home prematurely. This is worse. And when the left pretends to be insulted at the suggestion that they are soft on terror, show them this. The Democrats are not happy. They are not happy that they were not successful in killing the most effective anti-terror tools in the toolbox. This is what being soft on terror is, beginning with the notion that ‘enemy combatants’ be afforded constitutional protections, including lawyers at taxpayers expense (of course).
The Democrats‘ failure to rein in wiretapping without warrants, close the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay or restore basic legal rights such as habeas corpus for terrorism suspects has opened the party’s leaders to fierce criticism from some of their staunchest allies — on Capitol Hill, among liberal bloggers and at interest groups.
A reminder to liberal bloggers and liberal interest groups . . .
to believe this
is to ignore this.
Washington Post link.
related link: Free, but not free to kill.
Welcome Home Soldier: Manny Alvarez
Pensacola welcomes home Army Major Manuel Alvarez from the Iraq/Iran border area. And Troy
Moon at the Pensacola News Journal interviewed Manny on making the transition from being in Iraq to being back at his law office. But along the way, Manny tells us what is bothering him now that he is back.
“You turn on the news and hear people say we’re losing the war, and that’s not true,” he said. “The people who are saying those things are scholars, politicians and talking heads who never spent a day doing
the job I did. It just disappoints me. I saw Iraqis killed, there are American soldiers killed. So when I hear the news media, it’s a slap to their faces.”
Alvarez said that the insurgency is weakening in Iraq. “The media don’t show that we’re eliminating a lot of insurgents,” he said. “We’re killing them wholesale. But all the media shows is our guys being killed.”
An immigrant himself, Alvarez knows first-hand what fighting for freedom is all about. What is disappointing is that there are too many Americans who don’t know that our freedom needs defending. Defending from Islamofascists and not George Bush.
Showing the measure of the man, a hero in my book, and a great American, Alvarez says this about how he does it . . .
Alvarez said there were close calls in Iraq “all the time,” and some of the Iraqi soldiers he worked and lived with lost their lives in battle, just as Alvarez was prepared to do. The premise I work with is that sacrifice is giving up something good for something better,” he said. “That’s what someone told me a long time ago, and I tried to remember that when times got difficult. You try to remember what moves you forward.
Pensacola News Journal link