"If we had left those fuel economy standards intact, Ronald Reagan rolled them back, we would not have had to import one drop of oil after 1986. Think of what that would have done to our history. The World Trade Center would probably still be standing. We would have avoided two Gulf Wars. We would be a prosperous nation. We wouldnt be bound down in this Mesopotamian quagmire that has destroyed our reputation and destroyed the reputation of democracy across the globe."
#5
We would be a prosperous nation
WTF? What, are we in a second great depression you twit? The market is at record highs, unemployment is at historic lows (and that's after 12 million jobs are taken by illegals). I don't get these dumocrats with their doom and gloom crap.
#1
It seems that the French blogosphere is well on the way to changing the political scene in France and give the MSM a good kicking. Yet the British blogosphere and its readership appears to go on kow-towing to the main stream media and the political elite. How is that possible?
Yea, riddle me that!
Actually, I am trying to think if I know any British blogs... Melanie Phillips comes to mind...
I guess she may be the exception from the rule.
#2
I don't see anything in the report that violates OpSec - similar information has been routinely released by CentCom. The one possible exception might be this:
"One local Mufti who was said to have always worn a hood and sunglassesand to have somehow disguised his voicewas pointed out to the Iraqi Army this weekend, who promptly captured him. Iraqi officials said today that although they did not previously know that this man was a Mufti, his name had been on their target list. The Mufti is being questioned and his name has not been released,"
but only if his capture was not already known to those who might get rolled up by his interrogation. Since the whole place is getting cleansed, it's not likely an issue.
I had submitted this in News, rather than Opinion - Yon is there and this is his report, which makes it a lot more 'news' and less 'opinion' than just about anything else you will find.
Here's one bit that is kind of interesting:
"The AQI installed Sharia court had sanctioned the amputation of the two smoking fingers for those who violated anti-smoking laws."
It helps explain why AQ seems to have such sympathy from the Western 'elite' - any nanny-state that wants to protect its people from the evils of tobacco cannot be all bad.
#3
Michael Yon's article is an interesting counterpoint to the pessimistic article that was posted about how the operation was a failure and the IA is incompetent:
"The Fifth Iraqi Army Division is considered an increasingly competent group of fighters, and from the limited scope of 5th IA that I personally witnessed, that judgment seems correct. The 5th is committed to battle."
The idea that the enemy escaped seems to be false also: The HVTs are forced to hide in neighboring villages and are being caught there.
Good hunting guys, and stay safe!
Al
Posted by: Frozen Al ||
06/25/2007 13:32 Comments ||
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Reading a zillion theories on Gaza, all arguing that the Hamas take over is awful, or of no importance, or actually encouraging, etc. with just as many ideas how to deal with Gazastan. What is odd is the eagerness with which the West is embracing the Palestinian Authority, as if its own terrorism was always only a reluctant resort to gain fides in competition with a more savage Hamas. And thus Arafats epigonoi are suddenly freed from such sinister influences, and have become moderates who can be enticed by Western largess into becoming something like Dubai or Oman.
Good luck. Any examination of the multimillionaire spoiled brat Bin-Laden, or the aristocratic and snobbish Egyptian Dr. Zawahiri, or the other middle-class 9/11 killers might suggest that poverty is no requisite for jihadism. In fact, most of the worst of the this very sad bunch are affluent and have had exposure to the Western affluence and liberality.
True, the miasma on the West Bank contributes to the attractiveness of terrorism there, but it is not the catalyst (otherwise suicide bombers would be sprouting up in Africa, Asia, and Latin America), and thus its elimination wont end the desire to destroy Israel.
One should read about the life of Sayyid Qutb, intellectual architect of the Muslim Brotherhood that we now apparently wish to embrace. He hated the very thought of Jews, though he had seen few if any in Egypt, and was only to encounter them in any real number in America. This middle-class Egyptiansubsidized generously by his own government, treated well and embraced by Americansgrew to detest the West for its liberality, its equality of the sexes, its material wealth, its friendship with the Jews.
In other words, his wretched life reminds us that envy, jealousy, anger at lost stature, these primordial emotions fuel jihadism. They may be enhanced by general misery, acerbated by statist failures and authoritarian governments, but ultimately the nihilist rages are attributable to the lethal mix of Middle East tribalism and Islams utter failure to account for and live with modernity.
Thinking that radical Islam will soften itself or evolve is analogous to a victorious Confederacy voluntarily ending slavery about 1870, a kinder, gentler Soviet Union without the gulags, Hitler in his dotage dismantling Auschwitz, or Tojo in the 1950s turning his old zeal to flooding the Co-Prosperity Sphere with cars and radios.
#1
Reading a zillion theories on Gaza, all arguing that the Hamas take over is awful, or of no importance, or actually encouraging, etc. with just as many ideas how to deal with Gazastan. What is odd is the eagerness with which the West is embracing the Palestinian Authority, as if its own terrorism was always only a reluctant resort to gain fides in competition with a more savage Hamas. And thus Arafats epigonoi are suddenly freed from such sinister influences, and have become moderates who can be enticed by Western largess into becoming something like Dubai or Oman.
Eff almighty, Pappy! Every letter and dot of the entire article but especially the first paragraph. The "moderates" he refers to may as well be the Muslim "moderates" of such global fame. All of them are pretty much equally dedicated to halting global jihad and nearly as much worthy of continued existence.
Democracies, it is now well established, do not go to war with each other. But they often get into wars with non-democracies. Overwhelmingly the non-democracy starts the war; nonetheless, in the vast majority of cases, it is the democratic side that wins. In other words, dictators consistently underestimate the strength of democracies, and democracies provoke war through their love of peace, which the dictators mistake for weakness.
Today, this same dynamic is creating a moment of great danger. The radicals are becoming reckless, asserting themselves for little reason beyond the conviction that they can. They are very likely to overreach. It is not hard to imagine scenarios in which a single match--say a terrible terror attack from Gaza--could ignite a chain reaction. Israel could handle Hamas, Hezbollah and Syria, albeit with painful losses all around, but if Iran intervened rather than see its regional assets eliminated, could the U.S. stay out?
With the Bush administration's policies having failed to pacify Iraq, it is natural that the public has lost patience and that the opposition party is hurling brickbats. But the demands of congressional Democrats that we throw in the towel in Iraq, their attempts to constrain the president's freedom to destroy Iran's nuclear weapons program, the proposal of the Baker-Hamilton commission that we appeal to Iran to help extricate us from Iraq--all of these may be read by the radicals as signs of our imminent collapse. In the name of peace, they are hastening the advent of the next war.
Posted by: Mike ||
06/25/2007 06:31 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[11129 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Iran
#1
If there is to be peace in the middle east Iran and Syria must be dealt with.
Also on my radar is saudi and Pakistan which needs reforming as they threat our way of life!!!!
Posted by: Paul ||
06/25/2007 8:21 Comments ||
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#2
If I lived in a country that had 3 earthquakes since last Friday (June 22nd) I would be concetrating on other things, like why god hates us!
#3
Iran is guilty of believing their own B.S.--a very dangerous thing to do. The article reads like a description of "The Gang That Couldn't Shoot Straight." The mullahs are like many who have mistaken a desire for peace and freedom as a sign of weakness. Others have made this mistake at their own peril. They no longer exist.
By George F. Will
Sunday, June 24, 2007; Page B07 Marriage is the foundation of the natural family and sustains family values. That sentence is inflammatory, perhaps even a hate crime.
At least it is in Oakland, Calif. That city's government says those words, italicized here, constitute something akin to hate speech and can be proscribed from the government's open e-mail system and employee bulletin board.
When the McCain-Feingold law empowered government to regulate the quantity, content and timing of political campaign speech about government, it was predictable that the right of free speech would increasingly be sacrificed to various social objectives that free speech supposedly impedes. And it was predictable that speech suppression would become an instrument of cultural combat, used to settle ideological scores and advance political agendas by silencing adversaries.
That has happened in Oakland. And, predictably, the ineffable U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit has ratified this abridgement of First Amendment protections. Fortunately, overturning the 9th Circuit is steady work for the U.S. Supreme Court.
Some African American Christian women working for Oakland's government organized the Good News Employee Association (GNEA), which they announced with a flier describing their group as "a forum for people of Faith to express their views on the contemporary issues of the day. With respect for the Natural Family, Marriage and Family Values." Read the rest at the link.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
06/25/2007 12:04 ||
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Link ||
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#1
Oakland must be "whack job central" where nutiness is held on a pedestal and institutionalized. Always thought SF was the center of crackpotdom prior to this.
#2
This is where things really start to slide over the edge. As America's homosexual population increasingly insults and infringes upon the tolerant sensibilities of its heterosexual majority, they become a burden upon society.
Every single living homosexual is the product of a heterosexual union.
For homosexuals to feign ignorance of this simple fact is an affront to reason and all those who have labored so hard to build this tolerant society. I don't give a damn if a child is conceived by artificial insemination it is still a form of heterosexual union. While marriage may not be the absolute foundation of the natural family, responsible conduct and spousal fidelity certainly are. The natural family is without question the very bedrock of civilization itself. By almost unanimous definition, it is the heterosexual nuclear family that describes this sociological component.
Regardless of what gay women have to say about men folk, parthenogenesis is not an option. Even if cloning were to become available, it would still be the byproduct of endeavors largely made by heterosexual people. While homosexuals like Leonardo da Vinci, Oscar Wilde and many others have made significant historical contributions to human progress, this world is largely the byproduct of heterosexual society shedding its blood, sweat and tears in the name of advancing civilization and its inherent liberties.
A time has come for homosexuals to begin showing a lot more respect towards those who are responsible for their corporeal existence. The tolerance shown for what is sometimes incredibly offensive public appearance or behavior is a thing that homosexuals had better stop taking for granted. A convergence of liberal and multicultural agendas is gaining popularity in the homosexual community that places it directly at odds with both national security and the continued well-being of America's tolerant Christian community. Insistence upon politically correct newspeak that purposefully erodes freedom of expression within the majority's domain solely for the sake of protecting the actions of those who intentionally flaunt and offend that tolerant majority represents ingratitude on a massive scale.
This vocal, overt and aberrant faction of homosexuals that is laboring to overturn the world built by its heterosexual majority are fast wearing out what little welcome there ever might have been for them in the first place. A case in point is Rosie O'Donnell and her unreasoning adherence to patently false viewpoints that only serve to undermine American morale and spirit. This is homosexual activism at its absolute worst and a slap in the face to a public that has struggled to accept those who are different from them. Homosexuals had best begin showing some real appreciation for those who are different from them or they can brace themselves for a substantial and well-deserved backlash in the near future.
#3
The vast majority of people who came to this country from wherever left those places. Family is really what's important. The Liberals don't want or have many children. The few children they do have are either only child or have one sibling. When parents, granparents, uncles etc. die off there is no Fmily left. I have family all over the US. I think the same thing can be said about most homosexuals. They don't have "Family" and envy and hate those of us who do. That's why they (liberals and homosexuals) feel threatened when Conservatives and other Family oriented groups talk about "Family Values". They really have no idea what the term means so it's threatening.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
06/25/2007 19:26 Comments ||
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#4
I'm ashamed to admit it, but I'm a Bay Area pilgrim.
And to the native population there, those are fightin' words!
Like some robber baron capitalist of yore, the New York Times is telling the remaining full price readers of its print product that they will pay more and get less, the same message it has been sending advertisers for years. But far from a sign of strength, this move is an indicator that the slow motion business collapse of the New York Times Company may be picking up its pace.
Rest at the American Thinker. Bwha-ha-ha.
Posted by: Steve White ||
06/25/2007 00:00 ||
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[11127 views]
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#2
In the jargon of strategic consulting, this sort of price increase, asset liquidation and quality cut is known as "milking a cash cow" and indicates that a company is "harvesting" a business - realizing that it has no growth prospects, and that its role is to provide cash to invest in other more promising ventures. How long the business will limp along is anyone's guess. People still buy The Farmer's Almanac today.
The railroads that were doing this in the 60's and 70's re-invented themselves when freed of the yoke of regulation, and are quite prosperous now. If only Pinch could blame regulation.
Posted by: Bobby ||
06/25/2007 5:58 Comments ||
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#3
Oops. That was supposed to be italic, not bold. PIMF.
Posted by: Bobby ||
06/25/2007 6:02 Comments ||
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#4
It became known several years ago now that the Sulzberger family that owns the preferred stock of the NYT wants to crash the stock price, so they can re-privatize the paper under their sole ownership.
Their common shareholders are going bananas about this, because according to the rules, even though they should determine how the company is run, only the special stockholders, the Sulzbergers, do, because of a special weird rule of NYT stock.
And the common shareholders lost the court fight to assert their rights, so there is nothing left they can do except watch themselves lose money until either their shares are worthless, or they are near worthless and the Sulzbergers buy them back at a fraction of their purchase price.
#5
The Sulzberger family's ambitions are all very nice, but neither subscribers nor advertisers are going to come back just because the New York Times is privately owned. Were I so foolish as to still be a stockholder, I'd sell for whatever I could get. Why ride the airplane into the ground when there's a parachute with only a few holes in it?
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
