The winning entries in the Watcher's Council vote for this week are "Peace" and War on an Autumn Afternoon by Gates of Vienna, and Observations on Arabs by Rants and Raves.  Here is a link to and to the full results of the vote.  Here are the full tallies of all votes cast:

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Of all the unmitigated gall!

First your try to prevent a speech by interrupting the speaker.

Then you rush the stage and unfurl banners, stopping the program.

You drive the speaker from the stage.

And when the college you attend seeks to punish you for violating the First Amendment rights of the speaker and his sponsors, as well as the academic freedom of the university community, you claim that you are the real victims!

The protesters who rushed the stage at Columbia University Wednesday night when the founder of a volunteer border-patrol group tried to speak are crying foul, asserting that they were the victims of the violence and that they should not be disciplined by the university.

After the students climbed onstage, overturning tables and chairs and causing mayhem, President Lee Bollinger called the students' disruption of the event "one of the most serious breaches of academic faith that can occur at a university."

"It is unacceptable to seek to deprive another person of his or her right of expression through actions such as taking a stage and interrupting the speech," Mr. Bollinger said in a statement, adding that "of course" the university is investigating the incident.

Three students who claimed responsibility for taking the stage and interrupting the speech by the border-patrol group known as the Minutemen held a press conference yesterday on Broadway outside the university. One of the students, Karina Garcia, the political chairwoman of the Chicano Caucus, said that she and her fellow protesters were the victims of a "massive campaign of vilification and demonization."

Flanked by members of the Act Now to Stop War and End Racism group and the National Lawyers Guild, which have rallied to the student protesters' cause, Ms. Garcia said,"We wanted the whole world to know that the Minutemen are racists who terrorize defenseless immigrant families" and that the protesters set out to "sabotage them."

In other words, the arrogant Ms. Garcia claims that she and her Leftist colleagues have the right to determine what views are acceptable and may be expressed on the campus of Columbia University. They claim the right to respond with violence to silence any view that they disagree with. That is typical of a totalitarian mindset. I won't even get into the inaccuracy of the characterization of the Minutemen, whose group includes members of all ethnic groups and is concerned with stopping the illegal crossing of our nation's borders, not the race of the border-jumpers.

In a reversal of standard accounts of Wednesday evening's events, Ms. Garcia said that when the protesters stormed the stage, they were attacked by the Minutemen and other students. "Shame on the administration for launching an investigation into peaceful protesters," she said. Ms. Garcia referred to video footage captured by the Spanish television network Univision that she said depicted the violence.The video shows students fighting over a banner that the protesters unfurled, but the violence to which Ms. Garcia said she was victim is not evident.

Ms. Garcia said that no disciplinary action had been taken yet. She nonetheless called on the public to send letters to Mr. Bollinger demanding that the investigation be halted. She said that he has already received over 3,000 such notes.

Student protesters attesting to the violence they said had been inflicted on them by the Minutemen followed Ms. Garcia at the podium. The student leader of the International Socialist organization, Monique Dols, said that the Minutemen's "violent backlash" was "in the same tradition of the attackers in Birmingham and Montgomery," referring to events of the Civil Rights era. Comparing the plight of illegal immigrants to that of blacks in the 1960s, Ms. Dols advocated for granting full rights to illegal aliens, noting, "Every movement for social justice has always been deemed untimely or too extreme. It's time for immigrant rights."

Ms garcia, what those who had reserved the stage and sponsored the talk were doing was defending themselves and their civil rights from a lawless mob intent on denying them their liberties as American citizens. Given the history of violent attacks upon defenders of American sovereignty by those who support immigration criminals, their actions were reasonable. You engaged in mob action, and they treated you like the violent gang you and your supporters proved yourself to be.

Ultimately, Ms. Garcia, you reveal yourself in one comment from the press conference.

Challenged by reporters to square her advocacy of free speech with her decision to take the stage at last Wednesday's event, Ms. Dols said, "The nature of these questions shows there's more concern for the Minutemen than for helpless illegal immigrants."

Damn straight -- we are much more concerned with preserving our nation and the rights and liberties enshrined in our Constitution than in allowing and assisting the violation of American law and American sovereignty. That comment proves that you place foreign law-breakers ahead of American citizens. You should be ashamed of yourself. Here's hoping that Columbia expels the lot of you.

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I've got a Holocaust-deying troll who has been infesting my site for some time. He is an immoral, intellectually-deficient pseud-Christian hate-monger. But under no circumstance should he be considered a criminal for his holding and expression of a repugnant view that is contrary to the overwhelming weight of historical evidence.

A situation taking place in Europe now illustrates the folly of laws banning the publication of what the government decides is the only correct interpretation of historical evidence.

Turkey's painful progress towards European Union membership has been plunged into crisis by a dispute with the French over the massacre of Armenians during and after the 1914-18 war.

A Socialist-backed proposal, which could pass the National Assembly on Thursday, would make it illegal in France to deny that the killings amounted to genocide by Turkey.

The legislation, which has gained support from Right-wing assembly members, would see anyone denying that a genocide took place jailed for up to five years.

Armenians claim that as many as 1.5 million of their ancestors were killed between 1915 and 1923 in an organised campaign to eradicate them from eastern Turkey.

The Turkish government fiercely denies a genocide, saying that hundreds of thousands of Turks and Armenians died in a civil war.

Under Turkish law, it is illegal to accuse the state of genocide. Scores of Turkish writers and intellectuals who have debated the massacres publicly have faced prosecution under article 301 of the penal code, outlawing insults to "Turkishness".

The Turkish prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, reacted with indignation to the French proposal, asking: "What would you do if the Turkish prime minister came to France and denied that the genocide had taken place? Arrest him?"

And therein lies the problem. Such an official, while clearly wrong about the history of his own nation, would not be a criminal in any moral sense -- merely deluded. After all, the documentary evidence is too strong -- including pictures of soldiers standing next to piles of severed heads of Armenian men, women and children.

But neither is the scholar who dares to present that evidence to document the grave evil that took place betwen 1915 and 1923 a criminal, for all of Turkey's attempt to punish those who dare to speak the truth about the murder of millions of Christian Armenians by Muslim Turks acting (for at least part of that time) on behalf of the religious government of the Muslim Ottoman Empire.

The study of history is not a crime. Stating one's conclusions should not be, either.

Posted by: Greg at 10:44 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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So says Bill Gertz of the Washington Times, quoting US officials.

U.S. intelligence agencies say, based on preliminary indications, that North Korea did not produce its first nuclear blast yesterday.

U.S. officials, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said that seismic readings show that the conventional high explosives used to create a chain reaction in a plutonium-based device went off, but that the blast's readings were shy of a typical nuclear detonation.

"We're still evaluating the data, and as more data comes in, we hope to develop a clearer picture," said one official familiar with intelligence reports.

"There was a seismic event that registered about 4 on the Richter scale, but it still isn't clear if it was a nuclear test. You can get that kind of seismic reading from high explosives."

The underground explosion, which Pyongyang dubbed a historic nuclear test, is thought to have been the equivalent of several hundred tons of TNT, far short of the several thousand tons of TNT, or kilotons, that are signs of a nuclear blast, the official said.

The official said that so far, "it appears there was more fizz than pop."

A successful nuclear detonation requires a properly timed and triggered conventional blast that splits atoms, setting off the nuclear chain reaction that produces the massive explosions associated with atomic bombs.

Which means, of course, that the NorKs attempted to set off a nulear explosion, but that they failed to pull it off and instead got a blast far short of what they had anticipated.

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In her own words --Nancy Pelosi on the need for a missile defense program.

"The United States does not need a multi-billion-dollar national missile defense against the possibility of a nuclear-armed intercontinental ballistic missile."

Really, Mrs. Pelosi?

There once existed a Democrat Party filled with men and women who supported a strong national defense. Except for Joe Lieberman, rejected by his own party, they are gone.

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So not only does Mexico intend to continue violating American sovereignty by aiding its citizens as they illegally cross the border into the United States, now they want the UN to tell the United States it cannot act to stop the passage of these Mexicn citizens by building a fence inside the borders of the United States!

Mexico's foreign secretary said Monday the country may take a dispute over U.S. plans to build a fence on the Mexican border to the United Nations.

Luis Ernesto Derbez told reporters in Paris, his first stop on a European tour, that a legal investigation was under way to determine whether Mexico has a case.

The Mexican government last week sent a diplomatic note to Washington criticizing the plan for 700 miles of new fencing along the border. President-elect Felipe Calderon also denounced the plan, but said it was a bilateral issue that should not be put before the international community.

Derbez said Monday after meeting with French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy that it was a "shame" U.S. immigration policy had been used for what he claimed was a short-term political gain in the lead-up to midterm elections in the U.S. in November.

He said he discussed the issue with Douste-Blazy, and planned to bring it up in meetings with his Spanish and Italian counterparts during visits to Madrid and Rome. He vowed to work on the case until the "very last day" of President Vicente Fox's term, which ends Dec. 1.

The U.S. Senate approved the border fence bill last month and President Bush has said he will sign it into law - despite last-minute pleas from the Mexican government for a veto.

"What should be constructed is a bridge in relations between the two countries," Derbez said.

Well, that would mean we need to tell both Mexico AND the UN that they can go to hell. This is entirely an internal matter, not subject to UN interference according to the UN charter. No question of human rights is impacted here.

Of course, if the UN does order the US to stop building the fence and allow unfettered illegal immigration, they would have no reason to object when the 82nd Airborne chose to "illegally immigrate" to Mexico with the assistance of the US Air Force and the US demanded that the Mexican government accede to its demand that the Mexican authorities unconditionally surrender to the United States and submit to annexation.

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For national security reasons.

A MALE suspect in a major anti-terrorist investigation in Britain escaped capture by allegedly disguising himself as a Muslim woman dressed in a burka, The Times can reveal.

The man, who was wanted in connection with serious terrorist offences, evaded arrest for several days as police searched for him across the country.

The fact that a fugitive remained at large after disguising himself in an Islamic dress which covered his face will further fuel the debate sparked by Jack Straw, Leader of the House of Commons, about the wearing of the veil.

Details of the manÂ’s true identity were circulated to ports and airports to try to prevent him leaving the country.

He was eventually caught and is now one of more than 90 suspects in British prisons awaiting trial on terror charges.

The suspectÂ’s name and the detail of the offences he is accused of cannot be revealed because of the danger of prejudicing his forthcoming trial.

It is the first time that a male suspect has allegedly disguised himself as a Muslim woman in Britain. However, the tactic has been used frequently by Islamist fighters — including suicide bombers — in Iraq and Afghanistan. Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the former leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq, often dressed in a burka to evade American forces hunting him.

If it can be done there -- and it has been done elsewhere in the world -- then it can be done here. Such full face coverings are therefore a danger to national security and law enforcement.

Posted by: Greg at 11:50 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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No doubt the Left will be wanting to cry "retaliation!" However, I think there is significantly less to this story than meets the eye.

The Navy lawyer who led a successful Supreme Court challenge of the Bush administration's military tribunals for detainees at Guantanamo Bay has been passed over for promotion and will have to leave the military, The Miami Herald reported Sunday.

Lt. Cmdr. Charles Swift, 44, will retire in March or April under the military's ``up or out'' promotion system. Swift said last week he was notified he would not be promoted to commander.

He said the notification came about two weeks after the Supreme Court sided with him and against the White House in the case involving Salim Ahmed Hamdan, a Yemeni who was Osama bin Laden's driver.

``It was a pleasure to serve,'' Swift told the newspaper. He added he would have defended Hamdan even if he had known it would cut short his Navy career.

``All I ever wanted was to make a difference - and in that sense I think my career and personal satisfaction has been beyond my dreams,'' Swift said.

The Pentagon had no comment Sunday.

The problem with this story (by the anti-American Guardian) is that the promotion decision would have been made weeks before the Hamdan case was decided by the Supreme Court. There are only a limited number of promotion slots to captain available, particularly in the JAG Corps, and a lot of highly qualified attorneys seeking to make that next step. Much like we see each fall in the NFL when rosters are pruned, good men of talent and integrity do not make the cut and find themselves taking an unplanned career detour.

As my dad said to me some years ago when a friend's father retired under similar circumstances, such decisions are not a reflection on the man but are instead designed to make room for the next generation of officers coming up the ladder -- or else we would rapidly find the military full of 40-year-old lieutenants waiting for 60-year-old commanders and 70-year-old captains to die or retire. Military readiness dictates that we not allow such a situation to occur.

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When the Dems get hammered by a member of the Washington Post editorial board, you know ther policy proposals really suck, where they exist at all.

If Democrats cared about poor women and minorities, they would be clamoring to reform Social Security. But instead they get a childish gratification out of stamping their feet and refusing to discuss the subject.

They can't muster the courage to block the suspension of habeas corpus. But when it comes to blocking entitlement reform, the Democrats ride out to battle.

I'm not saying that Republicans are at all better, and of course elections breed some policy timidity. But the infuriating thing about the Democrats is that, just a decade ago, they knew how to empathize with voters' economic insecurities without collapsing into irresponsibility; they combined attractively progressive social policies with sensible pro-market fiscal responsibility. Now many in the party have lost interest in this necessary balance. If the Democrats win a measure of power next month, it's hard to see what they will do with it.

In other words, at least the GOP, for all its current problems, is trying to do something. It is difficult to find an agenda among the Democrats.

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I suppose there are a number of questions here. What was the content of the messages? What did Kolbe -- an openly gay Republican -- do about them? Who has been holding on to these messages since that time? What are the motives for releasing them now? And why is the Washington Post showing more deference to their secrets than to those involving America's nationl security?

A Republican congressman knew of disgraced former representative Mark Foley's inappropriate Internet exchanges as far back as 2000 and personally confronted Foley about his communications.

A spokeswoman for Rep. Jim Kolbe (R-Ariz.) confirmed yesterday that a former page showed the congressman Internet messages that had made the youth feel uncomfortable with the direction Foley (R-Fla.) was taking their e-mail relationship. Last week, when the Foley matter erupted, a Kolbe staff member suggested to the former page that he take the matter to the clerk of the House, Karen Haas, said Kolbe's press secretary, Korenna Cline.

Now this takes the date at which someone knew about the Foley problem back five years earlier -- but there is a problem. The Washington Post won't tell us what is in the messages in question.

A source with direct knowledge of Kolbe's involvement said the messages shared with Kolbe were sexually explicit, and he read the contents to The Washington Post under the condition that they not be reprinted. But Cline denied the source's characterization, saying only that the messages had made the former page feel uncomfortable. Nevertheless, she said, "corrective action" was taken. Cline said she has not yet determined whether that action went beyond Kolbe's confrontation with Foley.

In other words, the Washington Post knows what was in the messages, but we are expected to take it on faith that there is something improper about them. While the paper is prepared to spill national security secrets on the front page, it will hold back information needed for the American people to decide for themselves whether Kolbes actions were responsible or gross malfeasance. Neither will the Washington post share the source of their information with us, to permit us to assessits credibility -- or determine when the source knew of the emails and why that source did not come forward earlier. Also undisclosed is whether these messages have been shared with the House Leadership so that they can be investigated by the Ethics Committee -- or the authorities for criminal investigation.

Indeed, there are more questions than answers in this story -- and at least some of them need to be answered by the Washington Post.

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Well, the North Korean dictator has taken the dangerous and destablizing step of conducting a test of a nuclear weapon.

"The field of scientific research in the DPRK successfully conducted an underground nuclear test under secure conditions on October 9, 2006, at a stirring time when all the people of the country are making a great leap forward in the building of a great, prosperous, powerful socialist nation.

"It has been confirmed that there was no such danger as radioactive emission in the course of the nuclear test as it was carried out under scientific consideration and careful calculation.

"The nuclear test was conducted with indigenous wisdom and technology 100 percent. It marks a historic event as it greatly encouraged and pleased the KPA and people that have wished to have powerful self-reliant defense capability.

"It will contribute to defending the peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula and in the area around it."

The test resulted in a 3.56 earth tremor that was measured in Seoul.

North Koreas neighbors and the world community had expressed concern in advance of the test.

The move came as Japan's new Prime Minister Shinzo Abe began a visit to South Korea focused on pressuring North Korea to drop its planned nuclear test, and on improving bilateral relations soured by historical issues.

Abe arrived from Beijing, where he and President Hu Jintao had expressed "deep concern" about the test plan and vowed to push for the resumption of stalled disarmament talks.

North Korea's October 3 announcement that it plans to test a nuclear bomb in response to what it called US military threats and sanctions, had sparked worldwide alarm and condemnation from the UN Security Council.

What will be the reaction of South Korea and Japan? Of Red China? Of the US?

UPDATE -- Some world reaction here.

Although North Korea has long claimed it had the capability to produce a bomb, the test was the first manifest proof of its membership in a small club of nuclear-armed nations. A nuclear armed North Korea would dramatically alter the strategic balance of power in the Pacific region and would tend to undermine already fraying global anti-proliferation efforts.

"If the test (is) true, it will severely endanger not only Northeast Asia but also the world stability," Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Aso warned.

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, facing his first major foreign policy test since his recent election, called for a "calm yet stern response."

South Korea said it had put its military on high alert, but said it noticed no unusual activity among North Korea's troops.

China, the North's closest ally and the impoverished nation's main source of food, expressed its "resolute opposition" to the reported test and urged the North to return to six-party nuclear disarmament talks. It said the North "defied the universal opposition of international society and flagrantly conducted the nuclear test."

Britain's Prime Minister Tony Blair said the test was a "completely irresponsible act," and its Foreign Ministry warned of international repercussions.

The White House said a test defied world opinion.

"A North Korean nuclear test would constitute a provocative act in defiance of the will of the international community and of our call to refrain from actions that would aggravate tensions in Northeast Asia," Snow said.

Russia, which borders North Korea, had urged Pyongyang not to conduct a nuclear test. Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov last week voiced concern about the environmental consequences for Russia. The Foreign Ministry warned that a test would add to regional tensions and undermine the international nuclear nonproliferation regime.

And the Washington Post offers this analysis which comes down to "It's all Bush's fault!" Ditto MSNBC/Newsweek, which blames sanctions against North Korea for forcing the pathetic dictator in Pyongyang to act. NY Times, shockingly, blames the Red Chinese.

Reaction from the blogosphere at Captain's Quarters, Stop the ACLU (twice), Blogs for Bush, Belmont Club

UPDATE II: Russia claims NorK nuke significantly larger than estimated by others.

Russia's defense minister said Monday that North Korea's nuclear test was equivalent to 5,000 tons to 15,000 tons of TNT.

That would be far greater than the force given by South Korea's geological institute, which estimated it at just 550 tons of TNT.

By comparison the bomb the United States dropped on Hiroshima during World War II was equivalent to 15,000 tons of TNT.

Posted by: Greg at 04:31 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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I've mentioned the 1980s page scandal and the anemic response of the Democrat controlled House of Representatives to the physical sexual misconduct with pages. Former Carter Administration official Joseph Califano, who headed the investigation, offers his defense of his work. I think it falls short.

The most troubling aspect of the Mark Foley scandal is not his conduct, disgusting as it was, but what the response of the leadership reveals about the rancid state of partisanship and the consequent decline of the House of Representatives. Speaker Dennis Hastert presides over a legislative body so infested with mistrust that it doesn't even have a functioning ethics committee. Since the House is incapable of washing its own dirty laundry and policing itself, the speaker has to turn over that responsibility to the attorney general and the executive branch of government.

Compare the current situation with the way Speaker Tip O'Neill and the House handled the last scandal involving sexual misconduct with pages, in the summer of 1982.

Yes, let's compare the responses -- because the GOP comes off looking much better than the Democrats, by any reasonable standard.

On The CBS Evening News With Dan Rather that June, two former pages, their teen-age faces silhouetted to hide their identity, claimed they were victims of sexual abuse by members of Congress. One described homosexual advances by members; the other shocked the nation when he said he had engaged in homosexual relations with three members and procured prostitutes for others. The CBS broadcast sparked a wildfire of reports and rumors about sexual abuse of pages and drug use by members and pages.

I cannot help but note that the original charges were later recanted by the pages , who claimed that the CBS reporter put words in their mouth and distorted what they said. Seems that Dan Rather's newscast was lying to the American people from a very early date.

But let's set aside the sins of CBS and note a difference. One situation involved charges of ACTUAL sex between members and pages. The other involved (initially) several emails that were weird but not overtly sexual. That explains the difference in how the leadership would respond.

Within a week the House had authorized its ethics committee to conduct a full investigation of allegations of "sexual misconduct, illicit drug distribution and use, and offers of preferential treatment in exchange for sexual favors or drugs by Members, officers or employees of the House." House Speaker O'Neill and Minority Leader Robert Michel asked me to be special counsel to the ethics committee, co-chaired by Ohio Democrat Lou Stokes and South Carolina Republican Floyd Spence. I was allowed to select my own staff and given a commitment that I could follow the evidence wherever it led, because, as O'Neill and Michel said, "The integrity of the House is at stake."

And within hours of the salacious IMs being made public, the House leadership had driven Foley from Congress. Within a week an investigation was announced, but the Democrat leadership refused to consent to the appointment of a respected former head of the FBI to head the investigation because he had criticized the Democrat president under whom he had served and had donated money to the current Republican president. Clearly the current Democrat leadership believes that something more important than the integrity of the House is at stake -- the chance to use the scandal as a wedge issue to seize control of the House.

Assistant Deputy Attorney General Rudolph Giuliani was the point man for the Justice Department and its grand jury investigation of the charges. We agreed to exchange all relevant information and that there would be no leaks. Allegations of sexual misconduct and drug use were raw meat for a voracious, scandal-hungry Washington press corps, and Giuliani and I came across rumors and fragments of information about many members of Congress. We shared them all with each other, and there were no leaks from him or me.

The big surprise came when the two pages whom CBS had put on its evening news show recanted. They testified under oath that they had lied and that CBS reporter John Ferrugia had put words in their mouths. But uncovering the lies of the pages and the reckless reporting of CBS didn't end our investigation. We had received a host of allegations of sexual misconduct and drug use and sale by other pages and House members. We interviewed, under oath, some 2,000 past and present pages, adults who had supervised and taught them, congressional staffers, and House members. We issued scores of subpoenas.

And the FBI (which concluded the initial set of emails was not a criminal matter) is investigating again now that the IMs have been turned over to it. The matter will be investigated by the Ethics committee. Remember -- we are only 10 days from the initial revelation of the IMs.

We found no evidence of widespread sexual misconduct. We did find that Rep. Daniel Crane, R-Ill., had had a sexual relationship with a 17-year-old female page and that Rep. Gerry Studds, D-Mass., had sexual relations with a 17-year-old male page and had made advances to other teen-age male pages.

When I reported our findings to O'Neill and Michel, the dishonor that these members had brought on the House infuriated the two leaders. "Get it out," they said, "and let the committee recommend disciplinary action," which its four Democratic and four Republican members did, unanimously, in July 1983. Crane and Studds were censured by the House. Crane resigned his seat. Studds chose to stay on and was retained in office by his constituents for 13 more years.

But O'Neill didn't want the Ethics Committee to expel either of the members who engaged in sexual conduct with pages. Rather than really deal with the integrity of the House and say that such conduct was wrong, he supported mere censure. Newt Gingrich argued for expulsion of both the abusive congressmen -- including close ally Dan Crane -- but the Democrat-controlled leadership firmly opposed such a move. Democrats kept Studds -- a sexual predator -- around for over another decade and even gave him a committee chairmanship. Sonds like they had no concern at all about the integrity of the House. On the other hand, Crane was thrashed in his reelection attempt.

But the ethics committee had done its job well, we believed. Our investigation found other misdeeds:

House members — two Democrats and a Republican — had used drugs. And between 1978 and 1982 a number of House and Senate employees were involved in illicit use and distribution of drugs. All were named (Barry Goldwater Jr., who retired from the House; Fred Richmond, who admitted buying and using drugs and later pleaded guilty to tax evasion; and John Burton, who entered rehab and became a recovering addict with a productive career in the California state legislature). The employees were fired and prosecuted. The House adopted all the changes we recommended to provide far more attentive supervision of pages.

Note again -- the Republican, scion of a major political family, was run out of Congress. The Democrats continued to have active careers in politics -- until one pleaded guilty to other crimes. The other is referred to with respect. Interestingly enough, only staffers and aides were prosecuted -- no member of Congress faced criminal charges.

The course the House took in that scandal, and its reaction to the current one, show the difference between a leadership that saw a threat to the integrity of the House of Representatives and one that sees a threat to its continuing control of the institution. It's useful today to remember that there was a time when partisanship took second place to trust and the House leadership had the strength to wash its own dirty laundry.

Califano dishonors his work with this closing paragraph. The Democrat leadership allowed child molesters to stay in the House after knowing they had sex with pages. The GOP ran a member out of Congress after discovering conduct that may well be criminal but which involved no physical abuse of pages, only sexual talk. Who is the partisan here? Clearly the Democrats -- who would be howling if a gay Congressman were outed and disgraced over the initial emails.

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I'd like to think I could achieve this level of forgiveness. I don't know that I could.

Dozens of Amish neighbors came out Saturday to mourn the quiet milkman who killed five of their young girls and wounded five more in a brief, unfathomable rampage.

Charles Roberts, 32, was buried in his wife's family plot behind a small Methodist church, a few miles from the one-room schoolhouse he stormed Monday.

His wife, Marie, and their three small children looked on as Roberts was buried beside the pink, heart-shaped gravestone of the infant daughter whose death nine years ago apparently haunted him.

About half of perhaps 75 mourners on hand were Amish.

"It's the love, the forgiveness, the heartfelt forgiveness they have toward the family. I broke down and cried seeing it displayed," said Bruce Porter, a fire department chaplain from Morrison, Colo., who had come to Pennsylvania to offer what help he could and attended the burial. He said Marie Roberts also was touched.

"She was absolutely deeply moved by just the love shown," Porter said.

I disagree with various points of Amish teaching and theology -- but I do respect the group. Acts such of this show why their witness among the Christian community is so important.

UPDATE: Got to Church this morning and guess what the sermon illustration was.

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Come on, guys -- get your mind out of the gutter.

I'm talking real, Texas-sized meat. Indeed, 72 ounces of sirloin goodness.

You used to have to travel to Amarillo to get it, but now it is just a mouse-click away -- meaning you can eat your meat in the privacy of your own home, instead of on display before a curious audience.

Since 1960, the Big Texan Steak Ranch in Amarillo has vigorously promoted its free 72-ounce steak dinner to thrill-seekers, hungry truckers and anyone else willing to pit human digestive capacity against 4 1/2 pounds of beef.

Now, they're offering the home version.

"At this point, I would say (the 72-ouncer) is accounting for at least 35 to 40 percent of total sales," said Kathie Greer, who oversees Big Texan's new mail-order business, www.ilovesteaks.com.

Although the gargantuan top sirloin is free in the fabled restaurant — provided the customer puts up a $72 deposit and also polishes off a salad, shrimp cocktail, baked potato and dinner roll in one hour — it costs $99.95 to get the same slab of beef delivered with extras, including an apron and spice rub.

"Already, in three months, we've sold more than we sold the entire previous year," she said.

The restaurant has long sold mail-order meat but didn't dedicate a Web site to it until this summer.

Of course, long-distance conquests of the signature cut don't count toward Big Texan's records. Of about 42,000 in-house attempts, only about 8,000 have succeeded. Women make up a small minority of contestants, but have won their meals about half the time while the macho men have racked up an impressive failure rate.

If you ever get a hankering for a huge steak, Greer offers a tip: Make it medium rare. Overcooked steaks can be dry.

So try your luck with a Texas legend!

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Looks like the Dictator of Havana will be taking up residence in hell before too long. It seems that they Cuban strongman may be so ill with cancer that he will be unable to ever resume power.

Fidel Castro has terminal cancer and will not return to power as Cuba's leader, anonymous U.S. officials tell TIME magazine.

However, the officials said the intelligence reports on the ailing, 80-year-old Cuban president are not definitive.

Last month, Castro said in a statement that he has lost more than 41 pounds since he had intestinal surgery but added that the "most critical moment" was behind him.

The statement was accompanied by 10 photographs of Castro during his convalescence, in all of them sitting up and wearing either short-sleeved navy blue or light-blue pajamas. In several he is reading or writing.

Start chilling the champagne -- the parties in Miami and other places where freedom is still loved will begin immediately upon the announcement of the good news.

Posted by: Greg at 11:22 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Women don't participate in sports at the same rate as men. Why then should men be denied the opportunity to compete in order to achieve some sort of "balance" in opportunities for women?

The James Madison University menÂ’s and womenÂ’s cross-country teams had run especially well against an elite field during a competition late last month in eastern Pennsylvania. Afterward, Coach Dave Rinker gathered a giddy, excited group of athletes with tears in his eyes.

RinkerÂ’s runners noticed he was not smiling. In the middle of the meet, back here on the James Madison campus, the university had announced it was eliminating menÂ’s cross country and track, along with eight other, mostly menÂ’s, sports to comply with Title IX, the federal gender-equity law.

“Title IX was created in 1972 to prevent sex discrimination, and it was needed,” Jennifer Chapman, a senior on the women’s cross-country team, which is not being eliminated, said four days later as she led a protest rally of 400 students on campus. “But look what’s happening now. We rode the bus home from Pennsylvania for four hours, 14 guys and 19 girls all crying together. How is that supposed to have been Title IX’s intent?”

* * *

James MadisonÂ’s student body of 17,000 is 61 percent female, and one provision for complying with Title IX instructs institutions to have the percentage of participating athletes match the ratio of men to women on campus. At James Madison, the elimination of seven menÂ’s sports (swimming, cross country, indoor and outdoor track, gymnastics, wrestling and archery) and three womenÂ’s sports (gymnastics, fencing and archery) will boost the proportion of female athletes to 61 percent from about 50 percent.

When the cuts take effect in July, James Madison will be left with 12 womenÂ’s sports and 6 menÂ’s sports, the minimum required to participate in N.C.A.A. Division I competition. Three full-time coaches and eight part-time coaches will lose their jobs, and 144 athletes will be without a varsity team.

Officials conceded that the three womenÂ’s sports eliminated might not be termed exclusively Title IX cuts. Rose said that fencing had struggled with a dwindling roster, that archery was a niche sport that might be better suited as a club team, and that gymnastics was not a conference sport and had few nearby rivals for competition.

Title IX is a good idea gone horribly wrong. The interest is there for the eliminated men's sports. The eliminated women's sports were struggling programs with limited interest. But because it has become a results-oriented game rather than an issue of providing the opportunity to participate in sports, men are consistently denied the chance to participate in activities in which they are interested and which women are not. Shouldn't the real measure not be matching the percentage of students enrolled, but rather the percentages of students interested in participating in sports?

Maybe we can start applying that logic to academic programs. We'll cap enrollments based upon sex, and eliminate programs that are so seriously out of balance that they are unredeemable. I suspect that we will then see a drop in the number of Women's Studies programs around the country.

Posted by: Greg at 02:02 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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That is how this case should be handled.

Deny the claim.

Dismiss the suit.

Deport the plaintiffs.

A group of illegal immigrants who worked for Wendy's International Inc. is suing the restaurant chain because the company fired them after discovering it had missed a deadline for joining a federal program that would have helped them attain legal status.

The lawsuit, filed Friday in state district court in Houston, is a companion to a similar class-action suit filed last month in Dallas against Dublin, Ohio-based Wendy's, its subsidiary Cafe Express and the Houston-based business law firm Boyar & Miller.

The immigrants, who worked for Cafe Express, are seeking unspecified damages.

Between the two lawsuits, 40 illegal immigrants say they were fired after the company recently found that Boyar & Miller, the law firm Wendy's had hired, never filed paperwork for a 2001 legalization program that allowed immigrants with employer sponsorship or an American spouse to apply for citizenship.

Once the discovery was made, Wendy's was forced by law to fire the employees because of their illegal status. Immigrants in the program would have been insulated from being fired.

They are here illegally.

They had no right to be employed.

The company had no obligation to participate in the program.

The law required the firings.

As such, I don't see the basis for any legitimate claim -- and indeed, I only see the basis for the federal government to impose sanctions against Wendy's for employing the border-jumping immigration criminals in the first place.

So it is time for the federal government to do their duty in this case.

Round 'em up!

Ship em's back!

Rawhide!

Posted by: Greg at 01:49 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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After all, the Democrats blamed every negative event over the last six years on George W. Bush -- including a recession that began a year before he became president and misdeeds at Enron that happened under Clinton's watch -- so it is obvious that the good news is also entirely the responsibility of George W. Bush.

The nation's unemployment rate fell to 4.6 percent last month, down from 4.7 in August, and average wages rose by 4 percent over the previous year -- the best performance for both measures in five years.

The monthly Labor Department report released yesterday revealed that 51,000 new jobs were reported last month, a disappointing figure, but job gains were stronger than reported earlier for the previous year and a half.

"The economy is actually stronger than these employment numbers suggest," said Bernard Baumohl, executive director of the Economic Outlook Group, a Princeton, N.J., economic-advisory firm. The figures were mixed and elicited widely varying reactions from financial markets and analysts.

Add to that record-high stock prices and dropping oil prices -- along with a deficit that is decreasing at a rate even greater than that predicted by the administration, and it is clear that George W. Bush and the GOP Congress are doing a fantastic job with the economy.

Let's hope America doesn't mess with a good thing and elect the Democrats to enact the economy killing policies they support.

Posted by: Greg at 01:41 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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He couldn't pass the bar exam, but he has tried to pass himself off to the voters of Tennessee as a lawyer.

Democratic U.S. Senate hopeful Harold Ford Jr. referred to himself as a lawyer earlier this week, but the congressman has not passed the bar exam.

Michael Powell, senior adviser to the Ford campaign, said U.S. Rep. Ford took the Tennessee bar exam in February 1997 and failed. He said that was the only time Rep. Ford has taken the test.

Rep. Ford, of Memphis, got his law degree from the University of Michigan Law School in 1996, according to his congressional Web site.

He said Tuesday during a meeting with Chattanooga Times Free Press editors and reporters that Republican opponent Bob Corker has said the next senator should be a businessman and not a lawyer.

"I told Senator (Lamar) Alexander, I said, ‘I won’t hold it against you if I’m elected, and there’s two lawyers in the delegation who try their hardest to work through the issues," Rep. Ford said.

Corker campaign spokesman Todd Womack said, "If Congressman Ford will stretch the truth about his own resume, what else will he stretch the truth about?" Mr. Powell said it is his understanding that Rep. Ford was joking when he made reference to being a lawyer during TuesdayÂ’s meeting.

Sorry, that explanation makes no sense. It is obvious that Ford was not joking -- he was lying about his qualifications.

Posted by: Greg at 02:26 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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That is the charge made against Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) after they filed a Freedom of Information Act request on Wednesday.

A liberal government watchdog group has asked the Secret Service to release its records of prominent conservative Christian leaders' visits to the White House, but one of those leaders called the request "an act of Christianophobia."

Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request on Wednesday. The group said in the request that the records are "likely to contribute to the public's understanding of the influence that conservative Christian leaders have, or attempt to have, on the president in the exercise of his authority."

The Secret Service has 20 business days to respond to the request for records pertaining to James Dobson of Focus on the Family, Gary Bauer of American Values, Wendy Wright of Concerned Women for America, Louis Sheldon and Andrea Lafferty of the Traditional Values Coalition, Paul Weyrich of the Free Congress Foundation, Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council, Don Wildmon of American Family Association, and Jerry Falwell of Liberty University.

"These are people that are publicly identifiable as leaders of what I would call the Christian right, and we are interested to know the extent of influence that they may have had on the president and his policies," Anne Weismann, chief counsel for CREW, told Cybercast News Service.

"It's one thing to know that people have influence and have support of the president, but I don't know that that answers the question about the degree to which they have access and influence to the president and his staff on a day-to-day basis," Weismann added.

I’m curious – what would the response be to a conservative group if it requested access to the records of the visit of prominent black leaders, Jewish leaders, Muslim leaders, homosexual leaders or other minority group leaders? I think the question answers itself – and clearly indicates the despicable nature of the request.

Posted by: Greg at 01:54 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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The Mark Foley scandal is not about sexual orientation. It is about sexual deviancy and inappropriate exploitation of young people by a powerful politician. As such, I want to echo the comment of Ann Lowry, from her column published in the Star-Tribune.

The bottom line is that it does not matter that Mark Foley is gay.

Now I may disagree with her next conclusion (that the GOP leadership ignored evidence of a problem), but that statement is the one that really matters.

This is not a scandal about homosexuality – no matter how much a few on the Religious Right and many on the Homosexual Left want to turn it into an opportunity to purge Congress and of Republicans who are gay. The problem is that Foley is a sick freak with a serious psychological and moral problem who likely has broken laws and probably cannot be safely permitted to remain at large in society or on the Internet.

Posted by: Greg at 01:53 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Let’s hope this doesn’t give the NEA any ideas.

A teacher was hacked to death in this historic Mexican city that has been paralyzed for months by protests and violence, police said late Thursday. A colleague claimed the man was killed for opposing a teachers' strike.

Thousands of trade unionists and leftists have been camped out in Oaxaca since May, building barricades, taking over buildings and burning buses. The protesters are demanding the resignation of Oaxaca Gov. Ulises Ruiz, accusing him of rigging the 2004 election to win office and sending armed thugs against dissenters.

Victor Alonso Altamirano of the Oaxaca state police said teacher Jaime Rene Calva Aragon was on his way to a meeting Thursday evening when he was killed by two assailants wielding hefty ice picks.

Fellow teacher Alma Rosa Fernandez accused militant leftists of killing Calva for opposing a statewide teachers' strike that was a catalyst for the wider protests. Fernandez, who also opposes the strike, said the dissident teachers have been receiving death threats.

"We blame this murder directly on the radical teachers' wings," Fernandez said.

And lest you think this couldn’t happen here, consider the history of union violence in this country. Union opponents are regularly stalked, threatened and assaulted. When will union thugs recognize that the right to join a union and the right to strike can exist only insofar as there is the equally valid right to refuse to join a union and to refuse to strike? Until they do, unionism is not about freedom – it is merely about who gets to do the oppressing of the workers.

Posted by: Greg at 01:52 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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LetÂ’s hope this doesnÂ’t give the NEA any ideas.

A teacher was hacked to death in this historic Mexican city that has been paralyzed for months by protests and violence, police said late Thursday. A colleague claimed the man was killed for opposing a teachers' strike.

Thousands of trade unionists and leftists have been camped out in Oaxaca since May, building barricades, taking over buildings and burning buses. The protesters are demanding the resignation of Oaxaca Gov. Ulises Ruiz, accusing him of rigging the 2004 election to win office and sending armed thugs against dissenters.

Victor Alonso Altamirano of the Oaxaca state police said teacher Jaime Rene Calva Aragon was on his way to a meeting Thursday evening when he was killed by two assailants wielding hefty ice picks.

Fellow teacher Alma Rosa Fernandez accused militant leftists of killing Calva for opposing a statewide teachers' strike that was a catalyst for the wider protests. Fernandez, who also opposes the strike, said the dissident teachers have been receiving death threats.

"We blame this murder directly on the radical teachers' wings," Fernandez said.

And lest you think this couldn’t happen here, consider the history of union violence in this country. Union opponents are regularly stalked, threatened and assaulted. When will union thugs recognize that the right to join a union and the right to strike can exist only insofar as there is the equally valid right to refuse to join a union and to refuse to strike? Until they do, unionism is not about freedom – it is merely about who gets to do the oppressing of the workers.

Posted by: Greg at 01:52 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Bt then again, why should anything different be expected of the party of slavery and segregation?

httpBlack business owners and religious leaders say there is an undercurrent of discontent with the Maryland Democratic Party's lack of black statewide candidates and think it will encourage support for Republicans -- especially Lt. Gov. Michael S. Steele's run for the U.S. Senate.

"There's a lot of nervousness. You got a whole lot of black folks who are going to move towards Steele and possibly [Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr.]," said Wayne Frazier, a black business leader in Baltimore and a supporter of Mr. Steele's opponent, Rep. Benjamin L. Cardin.

The Rev. Grainger Browning Jr., pastor of the 10,000 member Ebenezer A.M.E. Church in Fort Washington, said: "The Democratic Party does have a challenge now to show that it wants to make sure the African-American leadership is included in decision making."

The Baltimore Sun yesterday reported that Maryland's 10 black state senators met last week with Mr. Cardin and Baltimore Mayor Martin O'Malley, the Democratic nominee for governor, to register complaints that the party's top candidates for statewide office are white men.

The black senators, dubbed the "Committee of Ten," told Mr. Cardin and Mr. O'Malley, who are both white, that they are hearing about discontent among their constituents over the party's lack of diversity.

One participant complained that blacks get nothing but lip-service from the Democrats, despite the overwhelming loyalty of African-Americans to that party. This points up two things. First, because of their monolithic voting patterns, Democrats don’t need to even throw a sop to the black community because their votes are secure. Second, it demonstrates that too many blacks have bought into the myth that the GOP is racist, despite the fact that the Republicans do run minorities for major offices for substantive offices and reach out to the black community despite having their hand slapped away by black “leaders” who have been bought and paid for by the Democrats.

Posted by: Greg at 01:51 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Bt then again, why should anything different be expected of the party of slavery and segregation?

httpBlack business owners and religious leaders say there is an undercurrent of discontent with the Maryland Democratic Party's lack of black statewide candidates and think it will encourage support for Republicans -- especially Lt. Gov. Michael S. Steele's run for the U.S. Senate.

"There's a lot of nervousness. You got a whole lot of black folks who are going to move towards Steele and possibly [Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr.]," said Wayne Frazier, a black business leader in Baltimore and a supporter of Mr. Steele's opponent, Rep. Benjamin L. Cardin.

The Rev. Grainger Browning Jr., pastor of the 10,000 member Ebenezer A.M.E. Church in Fort Washington, said: "The Democratic Party does have a challenge now to show that it wants to make sure the African-American leadership is included in decision making."

The Baltimore Sun yesterday reported that Maryland's 10 black state senators met last week with Mr. Cardin and Baltimore Mayor Martin O'Malley, the Democratic nominee for governor, to register complaints that the party's top candidates for statewide office are white men.

The black senators, dubbed the "Committee of Ten," told Mr. Cardin and Mr. O'Malley, who are both white, that they are hearing about discontent among their constituents over the party's lack of diversity.

One participant complained that blacks get nothing but lip-service from the Democrats, despite the overwhelming loyalty of African-Americans to that party. This points up two things. First, because of their monolithic voting patterns, Democrats don’t need to even throw a sop to the black community because their votes are secure. Second, it demonstrates that too many blacks have bought into the myth that the GOP is racist, despite the fact that the Republicans do run minorities for major offices for substantive offices and reach out to the black community despite having their hand slapped away by black “leaders” who have been bought and paid for by the Democrats.

Posted by: Greg at 01:51 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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I think that Lt. Gov. Michael Steele has clearly articulated the record of Democrat racism and criminal activity in the Maryland Senate race.

October 4, 2006

Congressman Ben Cardin
Ben Cardin for Senate
22 Bloomsbury Avenue
Catonsville, Maryland 21228

Governor Howard Dean
Chairman, Democratic National Committee
430 South Capitol Street, SE
Washington, DC 20003

Senator Chuck Schumer
Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee
120 Maryland Avenue, NE
Washington, DC 20002

Mr. Terry Lierman
Chairman, Maryland Democratic Party
188 Main Street, Suite 1
Annapolis, Maryland 21401

Dear Congressman Cardin, Governor Dean, Chairman Lierman and Senator Schumer:

For several months, I have been trailed by Democrat operatives filming my public events. At these events – speeches, press conferences, county fairs and parades – my every word and move has been recorded.

I realize this has become a part of modern campaigning and I welcome the scrutiny. In fact, I always make a point to say a friendly hello to whomever the Democrat Party sends to follow me. However, recent actions have crossed the line from political activity to an invasion of privacy.

On the morning of September 30, I participated in a homecoming ceremony for the Army National Guard 243rd Engineers. The event – as fitting for the occasion – was non-political. Republicans and Democrats joined together to welcome home brave men and women returning from Iraq and I attended in my official capacity to spend time with the troops and their families.

While speaking with two mothers whose sons had died in Iraq, I noticed the ever present Democrat operative filming our conversation. A conversation with parents who have lost a loved one in combat is private in nature and has no place in partisan politics, and certainly not in the smear campaign you have waged against me even before I entered the race for United States Senate. The filming of this conversation demonstrates a callous disregard for families who have lost a loved one and is an indefensible invasion of privacy.

Unfortunately, I have come to expect such ugly, gutter politics from you. Congressman Cardin, while saying you have expressed outrage to “all concerned parties” for the racist comments on your senior staffer’s blog, you have yet to apologize to me. Chairman Dean, your personal pollster, Cornell Belcher, advocated racist attacks to “knock” me down and “discredit” me, and yet I have received no apology from you. And, Senator Schumer, your staffers pled guilty to a crime when they stole my credit report and violated my privacy and that of my family, but I have had no apology from you either.

I did not think until this past Saturday, however, that such ugliness would intrude upon the return of our troops from Iraq. As I told your colleague, Congressman Steny Hoyer, who attended the event, this action represents a new low in Maryland politics and has no place in this campaign.

My campaign is focused on having a conversation with the voters of our state about the issues affecting Maryland and I am committed to building bridges over that which divides us. But, ugly partisan political tricks only work to divide our communities and represent the very type of political behavior voters are sick of.

If your respective organizations are as concerned as I am about the use of such poor judgment by your staff(s), you would take immediate steps to hold all responsible parties accountable.

I eagerly await your prompt response.

Sincerely,

MICHAEL S. STEELE

No apologies to the victim of illegal and racist activities and statements by Democrat political operatives. I guess that doing so would legitimize the right of a black man to stray off the Democrat plantation.

Mr. Cardin, Mr. Dean, Mr. Schummer -- do the right thing. Apologize PERSONALLY to Steele for the misdeeds you and your staffs have perpetrated.

Posted by: Greg at 10:36 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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One would think that the former head of the FBI under Bill Clinton would be an acceptable selection to head up any investigation of the House Page Scandal. That isn't the case, though -- because he is an honest man and independent thinker on political matters. Who objects to his selection? The Democrats, especially Nancy Pelosi.

House Speaker Dennis Hastert said Thursday he is looking for a high-caliber figure to step in and fix flaws in the congressional page program that left the teenagers vulnerable to sexual advances.

Hastert was on the verge of naming former FBI Director Louis Freeh, who boasts a long, high-profile career in law enforcement, for the post. But the speaker held off because of objections from Democrats.

Hastert had called House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi on Thursday to notify her that he intended to hire Freeh to overhaul the program, their aides said. But Pelosi suggested it was too soon to make decisions about changing the program, and that Freeh might be the wrong man for the job.

“That's about public relations for the Republican leaders, it's not about protecting the children,” Pelosi, D-Calif., said in an interview with The Associated Press. “It smacks of 'blame the victim.'"

The possibility that Republican leaders covered up evidence that Rep. Mark Foley, R-Fla., was making inappropriate overtures to pages needs to be investigated first, before any changes in the program are considered, said Pelosi spokeswoman Jen Crider.

But Crider noted that Hastert, R-Ill., could name Freeh without Pelosi's support if he chose.

At his news conference Thursday about the House ethics committee's investigation of the page scandal, Hastert didn't cite any candidates for the job of overhauling the page program.

“We're looking for a person of high caliber to advise us on the page program,” he said at a news conference in Illinois. “I reached out to the Democrat leader and shared with her some of the ideas and we hope to resolve this soon.”

What are the real objections to Freeh?

Freeh urged Justice Department superiors to seek an independent counsel to investigate the 1996 presidential fundraising scandal, which focused largely on Democrats and the White House. The Justice Department turned him down.

After leaving office, Freeh was harshly critical of Clinton in his book, “My FBI.” He wrote that, during Clinton's presidency, “whatever moral compass the president was consulting was leading him in the wrong direction.”

“His closets were full of skeletons just waiting to burst out,” said Freeh, who said he was preoccupied for eight years at the FBI with Clinton investigations, including Whitewater, 1996 presidential fundraising and the Monica Lewinsky affair.

In other words, there seems to be concern that Freeh might be an honest and impartial figure to head up the investigation, and that he might look under Democrat rocks to find misconduct or malfeasance. The Democrats are looking for political advantage -- the Republicans are looking to safeguard children.

Mr. Speaker, name Freeh to the post over teh objections of Nancy pelosi and the Democrats. It is the right thing to do.

Posted by: Greg at 10:19 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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This from Pace University in New York City.

A paperback copy of the Koran was tossed into a toilet on the lower Manhattan campus of Pace University - the latest in a spate of bias incidents upsetting students and administrators at the college, officials said yesterday.

The NYPD Hate Crime Task Force is investigating the vandalism of the Koran, and the university's private security also is probing the incident, sources said.
"A Koran thrown into the toilet? I am hurt, not just as a Muslim but as a human being," said Zeina Berjaoui, 20, president of Pace's Muslim Student Association.

In the past two weeks, vandals also scrawled a swastika and .anti-black slurs on the same bathroom wall at Pace's campus near City Hall. Someone also sprayed the N-word onto a car parked at the school's Westchester County campus, cops and university sources said.

"One of our university's greatest strengths is its diversity," Pace President David Caputo wrote in a letter describing the incidents. "When speech is hurtful towards a class of people or incites violence, we must condemn it and take measures to stop it."

The copy of the Koran had been taken from the university .library before being defaced Sept. 21. It turned up in the toilet approximately two weeks ago. Today, cops will quiz the student who last withdrew the book, police sources said.

Well maybe there is a crime here – someone stole the book from the library.

But apart from the theft, how exactly does the act of placing a Koran in a toilet constitute any sort of crime? Indeed, is it not like flag burning, expressive conduct that communicates a point of view -- perhaps “Islam is a bunch of shit.” Would a Bible in a toilet elicit a similar response from the University? How about an American flag? An Israeli flag?

I find the statement that the university wishes to “take measures to stop” speech that is “hurtful to a class of people” particularly chilling. Does this mean that expression of the “wrong” views on abortion, homosexuality, religion, or race are prohibited at Pace University? Will speech that targets conservatives, Christians, Jews, or white people be stopped by the University, or will the offended students and faculty members be told that they need to butch up and accept the right of their antagonists to speak out? Just wondering – but pretty sure about the answer.

Posted by: Greg at 12:08 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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I posted this last night, and want to give the flip side of the issue as prominent play as I gave the original arguments of Drudge and Passionate America.

For the past two days, a conservative blogger has ginned up publicity for his work outing a 21-year-old young man--a former congressional page and current deputy campaign manager for a heartland Republican congressman--who received sexually explicit instant messages from disgraced Florida GOP Rep. Mark Foley when he was 17 and 18 years old. I have received several e-mails from the blogger and readers flogging the post.

I refused to link to the blogger then and even though the Drudge Report has plastered screaming headlines about the blogger's scoop, I refuse to link to it now. There was absolutely no good reason to expose the former congressional page's name and identity. Seizing on ABC News' redaction failure and reporting errors (more on that in a moment) to play gotcha in a feeble attempt to avenge Foley is not a sufficient reason to obliterate the young man's privacy. The young man was the prey, not the predator.

Nobody is acting well here. ABC News seems to have made an honest error when it failed to completely redact the young man's AOL IM handle. That's how the conservative blogger traced the exposed man's identity. But in the wake of the Drudge pounding tonight, the news network surreptitiously edited its misreporting on the young man's age at the time of one of the IM exchanges without bothering to make clear it was a correction.

ABC's website now reads as follows.

ABC News now has obtained 52 separate instant message exchanges, which former pages say were sent by Foley, using the screen name Maf54, to two different boys who began their exchanges with Foley at the age of 16 and 17, and continued through the age of 18.

That does change matters -- and indicates sloppy work by the ABC reporters and editors involved.

But even that still raises some of the legal issues noted in the MSNBC article I linked below -- while disgusting and repugnant, Foley's actions may well have been legal due to the requirement of state and federal laws that obscene communication be with someone under 16 amd the whole age of consent issue. These matters could impact the investigations in an interesting way -- and make the Gerry Studds comparison more pertinant, as he actually engaged in sex with a 17-year-old. Is talking dirty to a page really worse than sodomizing one?

Posted by: Greg at 10:38 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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While the actions of former Rep. Mark Foley are beyond acceptable, it is possible that they were not criminal -- because he was engaged in an exchange with an 18-year-old adult!

A posting on ABCNEWS.COM of an unredacted instant message sessions between Rep. Mark Foley and a former congressional page has exposed the identity of the now 21 year-old accuser.

The website PASSIONATE AMERICA detailed the startling exposure late Wednesday.

ABCNEWS said in a statement: "We go to great lengths to prevent the names of alleged sex crime victims from being revealed. On Friday there was a very brief technical glitch on our site which was overridden immediately. It is possible that during that very brief interval a screen name could have been captured. Reviews of the site since then show no unredacted screen names."

SEX CHAT WAS WITH 18 YEAR OLD

On Tuesday ABC news released a high-impact instant message exchange between Foley and, as ABC explained, a young man "under the age of 18."

ABC headlined the story: "New Foley Instant Messages; Had Internet Sex While Awaiting House Vote"

But upon reviewing the records, the DRUDGE REPORT has learned, the young man was in fact over the age of 18 at the time of the exchange.

A network source explains, messages with the young man and disgraced former Congressman Foley took place before and after the 18th birthday.

Now Democrats and homosexual activists have for years claimed that Rep. Gerry Studd's sexual dalliances with a 17-year-old page were a private matter and acceptable because the boy was above the age of consent at the time. Should this young man prove to be an adult, will they now acknowledge that they would have been making an issue over LEGAL sexual activity by a homosexual -- and that they have been applying a different standard to a gay Republican than to gay Democrats?

Will ABC and Brian Ross admit that they have deceived the American public if the conversations were with an adult rather than a juvenile?

And will pigs sprout wings and fly round the Capitol Rotunda?

UPDATE: MSNBC has this piece on why thre may be no crime (or at least no prosecution) at all in the emails or IMs.

Investigators could consider federal obscenity laws, experts said, but the law prohibiting disseminating obscene material to children applies only to those under 16.

Benjamin Vernia, a former federal prosecutor specializing in such cases, compared Foley’s online conversations with pages to “grooming,” a law enforcement term for the way sexual predators bring along their underage victims. Grooming is a red flag for authorities, Vernia said, but it’s rarely enough to bring charges.

The question for federal investigators is whether FoleyÂ’s online chats ever led to real encounters. One chat transcript suggests Foley and a page had met in San Diego, but the chat doesnÂ’t indicate what took place.

Even if a sexual encounter occurred, however, that wonÂ’t necessarily be enough to lead to charges. It depends on how old the pages were at the time and what the age of consent was in that state.

If a state law was broken and authorities can show Foley used the Internet to facilitate it, that could trigger federal jurisdiction, experts said.

Foley is scum. That is beyond question. But he may not be a criminal -- and this may all be much ado about legal actions with individuals above the age of consent in their respective jurisdictions. This may highlight that the real difference between Democrats and Republicans is that we get rid of our perverts, while Democrats reelect them.

Posted by: Greg at 02:32 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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In various conversations, I’ve had folks tell me that the Foley emails were sexual in nature. When I’ve stated they were not, I was accused of lying, of covering up, or of “parsing words.” But that simply is not the case. Let me reproduce for you the text of the emails that the GOP leadership, the press, and the FBI were aware of prior to last week.

HereÂ’s the second (the first is just confirming that the email address is correct).

glad your home safe and soundÂ… we donÂ’t go back into session until Sept 5Â…. si itÂ’s a nice long breakÂ…. I am back in Florida nowÂ… its nice hereÂ… been raining todayÂ… it sounds like you will have some fun over the next few weeksÂ…how old are you now?

In other words, just a chatty email. Except for that last question, I don’t see a thing that raises an eyebrow – and given the preexisting relationship between the two, it is not an outrageous question to ask in a breezy conversation.

The next email reads as follows.

I am in North CarolinaÂ…and it was 100 in New OrleansÂ…wow thatÂ’s really hotÂ… well do you miss DCÂ… Its raning here but 68 degrees so who can argueÂ… did you have fun at your conferenceÂ… what do you want for your birthday coming upÂ… what stuff do you like to do

Again, fairly innocuous stuff in a fairly breezy style – though since I don’t know the relevant dates I am unsure if the birthday is close to the time of the email. That might be a natural part of the conversation.

That was followed by this.

I just emailed willÂ…heÂ’s such a nice guyÂ…acts much older than his ageÂ…and hes really in great shapeÂ….i am just finished riding my bike on a 25 mile journey now, heading to the gymÂ….whats school like for you this year?

Talk about mutual acquaintances is hardly outrageous – and since Foley was known to be something of a fitness buff, the comments about biking and working out shouldn’t surprise anyone. And more importantly, I see nothing sexual in this.

And then there is this email – the one that caused the young man to drop all communication.

how are you weathering the hurricaneÂ…are you safeÂ…send me an email pic of you as wellÂ….

An expression of concern following a natural disaster, and a request for a photo. I guess I donÂ’t see the sexual content here.

Overly friendly? Definitely. Unprofessional? I’d agree. Indicative of Foley’s immaturity? Yep. But a sign of sexual predation? I don’t think so – unless you have some OTHER information to add, information that the House leadership did not have.

On the other hand, someone did have this information – possibly Democrat officials or political operatives. What did they know and when did they know it? I hope that the investigations that have begun examine those questions as well.

This development is troubling – and I think the firing of this staffer is the minimum action needed.

The chief of staff for Republican Congressman Tom Reynolds, Kirk Fordham, resigned after questions were raised about his role in the handling of the congressional page scandal, according to Republican sources on Capitol Hill.

Those sources said Fordham, a former chief of staff for Congressman Mark Foley, had urged Republican leaders last spring not to raise questionable Foley e-mails with the full Congressional Page Board, made up of two Republicans and a Democrat.

"He begged them not to tell the page board," said one of the Republican sources.

ABC, however, wants to paint this as a case of scapegoating.

FordhamÂ’s resignation was demanded by Speaker Hastert.

Fordham was also instrumental in orchestrating Foley's abrupt resignation last week hours after ABC News confronted the congressman with sexually explicit instant messages allegedly sent to pages.

Fordham offered ABC News a deal if it would not publish the content of the instant messages.

"He said we could have the exclusive on the resignation if we did not run direct quotes from the instant messages," said Maddy Sauer, the ABC News producer who dealt with Fordham.

ABC News refused to make any such deal.

It is clear that FordhamÂ’s actions were not in the best interest of the House of Representatives or the page program, but were rather a case of covering for a friend. I suspect that when all is said and done we will find that Fordham knew much more than he claims at this time. IÂ’ll withhold judgment on his boss, Rep Tom Reynolds, until the situation become clearer.

Posted by: Greg at 11:11 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Israel has fulfilled its obligation under the resolution – and Hezbollah has responded by reoccupying positions it is supposed to give up and restricting the access of everyone else – including UNFIL – to those bases.

On Yom Kippur, Oct. 2, 24 hours after the last Israeli soldier left South Lebanon and the day before UNIFIL published its rules of engagement, Hizballah placed roadblocks on all the approaches to the central sector of the South and the entrances to the towns and villages reoccupied by its forces and their rocket units.

These enclaves were declared “closed military zones.”

DEBKAfile’s exclusive military and Western intelligence sources report that neither the Lebanese army which moved south nor the international peacekeepers of UNIFIL venture to set foot in these enclaves. Nor did they raise a finger to block the first broad-daylight consignment of advanced Iranian weapons to be delivered in Lebanon via Syria since the August 14 ceasefire.

This coordinated Hizballah-Iranian-Syrian ploy has brought into question the point of UN Security Council Resolution 1701 which was to prevent the resumption of hostilities and Hizballah’s rearmament while helping the Beirut government and army assert its sovereignty in the South. It has also made a mockery of the UN Force and its missions.

These developments effectively assign UN Security Council resolution 1701 to the same dustbin as resolution 1559 which ordered Hizballah disarmed.
It is especially noted that the Israeli government has made no military or diplomatic response to these violations, or even informed the public that Hizballah has redeployed in the precise positions from which it blitzed Haifa, Nahariya, Carmiel, Acre and W. Galilee for more than a month.

Tuesday, Oct. 3, after Hizballah completed its redeployment, the southern commander who orchestrated the rocket bombardment of Israel, Sheikh Nabil Qauq, made his first appearance since the war. He announced that his forces had regrouped, fully armed and in command of rocket supplies, in exactly the same positions facing the Israeli border as they had occupied when they went to war on July 12.

As I states back at the time of the Israeli incursions into Lebanon, it appears that an insufficient number of terrorists were killed by the Israelis to guarantee their security.

Posted by: Greg at 11:09 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Israel has fulfilled its obligation under the resolution – and Hezbollah has responded by reoccupying positions it is supposed to give up and restricting the access of everyone else – including UNFIL – to those bases.

On Yom Kippur, Oct. 2, 24 hours after the last Israeli soldier left South Lebanon and the day before UNIFIL published its rules of engagement, Hizballah placed roadblocks on all the approaches to the central sector of the South and the entrances to the towns and villages reoccupied by its forces and their rocket units.

These enclaves were declared “closed military zones.”

DEBKAfileÂ’s exclusive military and Western intelligence sources report that neither the Lebanese army which moved south nor the international peacekeepers of UNIFIL venture to set foot in these enclaves. Nor did they raise a finger to block the first broad-daylight consignment of advanced Iranian weapons to be delivered in Lebanon via Syria since the August 14 ceasefire.

This coordinated Hizballah-Iranian-Syrian ploy has brought into question the point of UN Security Council Resolution 1701 which was to prevent the resumption of hostilities and HizballahÂ’s rearmament while helping the Beirut government and army assert its sovereignty in the South. It has also made a mockery of the UN Force and its missions.

These developments effectively assign UN Security Council resolution 1701 to the same dustbin as resolution 1559 which ordered Hizballah disarmed.
It is especially noted that the Israeli government has made no military or diplomatic response to these violations, or even informed the public that Hizballah has redeployed in the precise positions from which it blitzed Haifa, Nahariya, Carmiel, Acre and W. Galilee for more than a month.

Tuesday, Oct. 3, after Hizballah completed its redeployment, the southern commander who orchestrated the rocket bombardment of Israel, Sheikh Nabil Qauq, made his first appearance since the war. He announced that his forces had regrouped, fully armed and in command of rocket supplies, in exactly the same positions facing the Israeli border as they had occupied when they went to war on July 12.

As I states back at the time of the Israeli incursions into Lebanon, it appears that an insufficient number of terrorists were killed by the Israelis to guarantee their security.

Posted by: Greg at 11:09 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Those who object to Harry Potter books being in the public or school library simply need to sit down and shut up. Not every library book can or should reflect your views.

A suburban county that sparked a public outcry when its libraries temporarily eliminated funding for Spanish-language fiction is now being asked to ban Harry Potter books from its schools.

Laura Mallory, a mother of four, told a hearing officer for the Gwinnett County Board of Education on Tuesday that the popular fiction series are an "evil" attempt to indoctrinate children in the Wicca religion.

Board of Education attorney Victoria Sweeny said that if schools were to remove all books containing reference to witches, they would have to ban "Macbeth" and "Cinderella."

"There's a mountain of evidence for keeping Harry Potter," she said, adding that the books don't support any particular religion but present instead universal themes of friendship and overcoming adversity.

The books are age appropriate and of high quality among other works of the juvenile fiction category. Eliminating them would leave the library impoverished in many ways.

Posted by: Greg at 11:03 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Proof that past mistakes can be corrected.

Just before 6 p.m. on a recent evening, students began to fill a lecture hall at Vanderbilt University. Some pressed cellphones to their ears, others sipped cups of coffee. Flip-flops scuffed the carpet as the students shed book bags and opened laptops

A typical class, perhaps — until the teacher with the shock of white hair rose from the table at the front of the hall, greeted the students and asked a question: “How many of you have experienced a hate crime against yourself? Let’s see the hands.”

So began the lecture by the Rev. James M. Lawson Jr., 78, who returned to teach at Vanderbilt this fall, 46 years after the university expelled him for his role in lunch-counter sit-ins that made Nashville a springboard for a generation of civil rights activists.

The expulsion of Mr. Lawson, a Methodist divinity student who was one of the nationÂ’s leading scholars of civil disobedience and Gandhian nonviolence, was quickly dubbed the Lawson affair, and tarnished VanderbiltÂ’s reputation for years. University officials apologized to Mr. Lawson long ago, honoring him and inviting him back for periodic lectures. Even Harvie Branscomb, the chancellor who presided over Mr. LawsonÂ’s ouster, apologized before his death.

But the invitation to return as a visiting professor is a new chapter in relations between Vanderbilt and its famous former student.

“It isn’t often that an institution gets the chance to correct for a previous error,” said Lucius Outlaw, Vanderbilt’s associate provost for undergraduate education, who first proposed that Mr. Lawson be asked here for the year.

This is a course I would love to be able to take. It isn't often that you get to hear from the participants in historical events.

Posted by: Greg at 10:33 PM | Comments (24) | Add Comment
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Remember -- if the drop of the Dow (begun under Clinton and deepened by 9/11) and the increase in oil prices (caused by short supply, increased demand, and natural disasters) were all George Bush's fault, so is this.

The Dow Jones industrial average leaped into record territory Tuesday, highlighting Wall Street's long recovery from the popping of the technology bubble, the 2001 terrorist attacks and a wave of corporate scandals.

The new closing high of 11,727.34 highlights how much things have changed. In January 2000, it was all technology all the time. Internet firms without real business plans and pajama-clad day traders were the glamour kids. Then the bubble burst, Enron Corp. and WorldCom Inc. collapsed, and small investors ran for the hills.

And interestingly enough, the stock market today is much more solid than it was when teh slide began in January of 2000, when the Internet bubble propelled the rise in stock prices.

And oil dropped below $59.00 a barrel yesterday -- and I'm paying $1.89 a gallon for gas.

I love how George W, Bush is managing the economy and bringing down gas prices!

And I won't comment on the great job he has done preventing hurricanes this year.

Posted by: Greg at 10:30 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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This is not a positive development.

North Korea declared Tuesday that it would conduct a nuclear test to bolster its defenses against the United States, raising tensions in the region and marking the communist government's first unambiguous pledge to prove it has become a nuclear power.

Though North Korea has previously said it possesses nuclear bombs -- U.S. intelligence officials have estimated it could have as many as 11 -- a test detonation would dramatically change the region's power dynamics. Analysts have said the United States and area neighbors including China, Japan and South Korea would be forced to deal far more harshly with the North Koreans.

A test would be a "very provocative act," Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said during a visit to Cairo. It would create a "qualitatively different situation on the Korean Peninsula" that would spill over into the entire region, she said. Rice declined to predict what the U.S. response might be.

In a statement issued through the official KCNA news service, North Korea's Foreign Ministry said the government would "conduct a nuclear test under conditions where safety is firmly guaranteed." The statement did not say when the test might occur, but added that the North's "nuclear weapons will serve as reliable war deterrent for protecting the supreme interests of the state and the security of the Korean nation from the U.S. threat of aggression."

If such a test occurs, the US and other nations must respond to eliminate the remaining weapons and North Korea's nuclear program.

I'd suggest bombing North Korea back to the Stone Age, except for the fact that most North Koreans are already living in conditions pretty close to that due to the policies of the corrupt dicatorship of Kim Jong-Il. I guess we'll just have to bomb them back to the Paleolothic Age from the Neolithic.

And by the way -- what president's ineffective policies allowed for the North Koreans to develop nuclear weapons while receiving US assistance? The same president whose ineffective policy on terrorism allowed Osama to remain at large to plan the 9/11 attacks. Thanks, Bill!

Posted by: Greg at 10:21 PM | Comments (8) | Add Comment
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Looks like the internet is a place where Gov. Mitt Romney has a lot of support.

There are the Texans for Mitt, the Tennesseeans for Mitt, the Iowans for Mitt. Then there are the Evangelicals for Mitt, the Catholics for Mitt and the Law Students for Mitt.

Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney isn't a declared candidate for president yet, but already several Web logs, or blogs, are sprouting up to promote the Republican for the White House in 2008.

Like the grass-roots efforts of old, this is the newfound Web-roots.

About 20 states now have their own Web sites with fans marketing Romney as the best choice to succeed President Bush. And that's in addition to other sites popping up with other groups, such as Women for Romney, Students for Romney and even "My Man Mitt," which is jumping the gun to ask readers to vote on who would make a great vice president for Romney.

"The Internet's such a powerful force in politics now that I think we could do some good things to get his name out," says Nathan Burd, who runs AmericansforMitt.com and is one of the founders of the movement to host sites in every state.

The blogs - the founders of which all say they are independent of the campaign - focus on a variety of issues, with some rounding up statements the governor has made about taxes, abortion or terrorism. Others post news clippings about Romney and commentary about his positions or the coverage he's getting.

Now IÂ’ve made no secret of my support for Romney, and recently became one of the co-bloggers over at Texans for Mitt Romney. And I keep seeing more and more support springing up for the man around the Internet.

I believe that Mitt will be teh man to beat in 2008.

Posted by: Greg at 10:58 AM | Comments (8) | Add Comment
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Saturday is the christening of AmericaÂ’s next aircraft carrier. President George W. Bush will be on hand for the event, which will have special meaning for him and his family. You see, the ship will be named for the 41st President of the United States, George H. W. Bush, his father.

President Bush will join his parents at Saturday's christening of the nation's newest aircraft carrier, named for his father, at shipbuilder Northrop Grumman Newport News.

The carrier, CVN-77, is called the George H.W. Bush, after the country's 41st president.

President Bush will participate in the ceremony, said Blair Jones, a White House spokesman.

"This is a tremendous honor for the president's father, and he's looking forward to the christening," Jones said Monday.

The elder Bush's daughter, Doro Bush Koch, the ship's sponsor, will break the traditional bottle of sparkling wine on the flattop's bow.

Northrop Grumman's Newport News sector began construction of the approximately $6 billion nuclear-powered ship in 2001 and plans to deliver it to the Navy in late 2008.

It is the last of 10 Nimitz-class carriers and includes technology and improved features that will serve as a bridge to the Navy's next-generation carrier, the CVN-21, now under design and planning at Newport News.

A well-deserved honor for a man whose life has been devoted to public service.

Posted by: Greg at 10:57 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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This foreign-born Muslim's actions are beyond the pale. If he objects to the memorializing of those killed by his co-religionists, send him back where he wonÂ’t have to look at displays honoring infidel victims of his jihadi brethren.

A man described by police as a Turkish-born Muslim was charged yesterday with destroying a Queens memorial to a fallen 9/11 cop while screaming, "This is political!" The Post has learned.

Adnan Emre, 26, tore down a portion of Officer Paul Talty's tribute attached to a light post at 50th Avenue and Vernon Boulevard in Long Island City, police sources said.

It consisted of 5-inch-by-7-inch picture of the late officer, a cross, a plaque and crossed American and Irish flags. The plaque is inscribed, "Rest in Peace, Paul. We miss you. God Bless."

Emre ripped down the cross at about 7:52 a.m., cops said, and announced his deed by screaming, "This is political!"

"There are so many deranged people," said the officer's mom, Barbara Talty. "This doesn't surprise me, but it's sad."

Talty's sister, Patricia Dougan, said the suspect must be unstable.
"I just have to think whoever would do this isn't right in the mind," Dougan said.

A passing MTA booth clerk witnessed the vandalism and called cops, who responded from the 108th Precinct station house just down the block.

Emre was charged with criminal mischief and disorderly conduct, said a spokeswoman for Queens District Attorney Richard Brown. He faces a maximum penalty of a year in jail and a $1,000 fine.

I don’t think this guy is unstable – simply evil. We don’t need evil foreigners in this country, so box him up and ship him back to Turkey.

Posted by: Greg at 10:42 AM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
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