Former Democrat Vice Presidential candidate Joe Lieberman was defeated in yesterday's Democrat primary.

Ned Lamont, a Connecticut millionaire whose candidacy for the United States Senate soared from nowhere on a fierce antiwar message, won a narrow victory in the Democratic primary last night over the incumbent, Joseph I. Lieberman.

Senator Lieberman, a national party leader and the Democratic nominee for vice president in 2000, conceded defeat in a phone call to Mr. Lamont shortly before 11 p.m. But then, in a combative speech to supporters in Hartford that was carried live on television news, the senator declared that he was not dropping out of the race, but would instead run for re-election as an independent this fall.

“As I see it, in this campaign, we’ve just finished the first half and the Lamont team is ahead — but in the second half, our team, Team Connecticut, is going to surge forward to victory in November,” Mr. Lieberman told cheering supporters.

The senator said he was staying in the race because Mr. Lamont had run a primary campaign of “insults” and “partisan polarizing” that relentlessly blamed Mr. Lieberman for President Bush’s wartime policies, which the senator has supported and defended but also criticized at various points.

“For the sake of our state, our country and my party, I cannot, I will not let this result stand,” Mr. Lieberman said of the Lamont victory.

Stand strong, Senator -- your party may have rejecdted you, but I believe an overwhelming majority of your fellow Americans support you as a man of integrity and decency.

By the way, such purges are common in the Democrat party. the far left became ascendant by adopting an America Last platform and running George McGovern in 1972. And back in the 1920s, former national candidate Oscar Underwood was purged from his position as Senator from Alabama for opposing the Klan. This is simply one more attack upon the decent center by the extreme elements of a party that puts ideology over America.

Posted by: Greg at 11:27 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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Aside from a few pacifists, terror supporters, and other folks who have never met a suicide-jihadi they didn't like, Israelis are strongly behind the war in Lebanon which was forced upon them by Hezbollah.

As IsraelÂ’s war with Hezbollah finishes a fourth difficult week, domestic criticism of its prosecution is growing. Yet there is a paradoxical effect as well: the harder the war has been, the more the public wants it to proceed.

The criticism is not that the war is going on, but that it is going poorly. The public wants the army to hit Hezbollah harder, so it will not threaten Israel again.

And while Israelis are upset with how Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has run the war, they seem to agree with what he told aides this week — that given the weaponry and competence of Hezbollah and the damage already done to Israel, “I thank God the confrontation came now, because with every year their arsenal would have grown.”

Abroad, Israel is criticized for having overreacted and for causing disproportionate damage to Lebanon and its civilian population and even for indiscriminate bombing. But within Israel, the sense is nearly universal that unlike its invasion of Lebanon in 1982, this war is a matter of survival, not choice, and its legitimacy is unquestioned.

Even the bulk of the Israeli left feels that way. There is no real peace camp in Israel right now, says Yariv Oppenheimer, the secretary general of Peace Now, which has pressed hard for a deal with the Palestinians and on June 22, before this Lebanon war, called for a halt to air raids over the Gaza Strip. “We’re a left-wing Zionist movement, and we believe that Israel has the legitimate right to defend itself,” Mr. Oppenheimer said. “We’re not pacifists. Unlike in Gaza or the West Bank, Israel isn’t occupying Lebanese territory or trying to control the lives of Lebanese. The only occupier there is Hezbollah, and Israel is trying to defend itself.”

In the daily newspaper Haaretz, a cartoon satirized the group, showing a Peace Now advocate, balding with a ponytail, in a coffee shop saying, “It won’t end until we wipe Beirut off the map.”

When even the peace groups are supporting the war, it becomes clear how deep the support runs -- and that even those who object to war in virtually every situation recognize that this si a fight for Israel's survival against jihadis who will be satisfied with nothing less than genocide.

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This was a bit much. It harmed the dignity of the court and was insensitive as to the purpose at hand.

A state panel has disciplined a judge who ordered cheers in court for the Super Bowl-bound Seattle Seahawks before issuing a manslaughter sentence.

Pierce County Superior Court Judge Beverly Grant asked about 100 people in court to say "Go Seahawks" before taking their seats on Feb. 3. Dissatisfied with the low volume of the response, she repeated the request.

That same day, Grant sentenced Steve Keo Teang to 13 1/2 years for manslaughter in the 2005 shooting death of Tino Patricelli, 28.

The Seahawks played in the Super Bowl that weekend. Patricelli's stepmother said she was offended in part because the game fell on the anniversary of her stepson's death.

Grant, who was appointed to the bench in 2003, apologized the following Monday. She eventually filed the formal conduct complaint against herself.

"Although my intentions were to defuse the courtroom situation, I realize now the inappropriateness of my opening comments," Grant told the commission.

The state Commission on Judicial Conduct gave the judge an admonishment, the panel's lowest-ranking punishment. An admonishment is a written reprimand.

At least the judge recognized teh error of her ways and had the decency to file her own misconduct complaint against herself.

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Or at least has been decisively rejected by the voters of her district for the second time in the last three elections.

A lawyer and former DeKalb County commissioner unseated Cynthia McKinney, the controversial incumbent congresswoman, on Tuesday night in a runoff election for the Democratic nomination in GeorgiaÂ’s Fourth Congressional District.

The winner, Henry C. Johnson Jr., must still defeat the Republican candidate, Catherine Davis, in November. But as the Democratic nominee in what has historically been considered a safely Democratic seat, he is presumed to already be on his way to Washington. Mr. Johnson led Ms. McKinney by 17 percentage points, winning 58 percent of the vote.

Mr. Johnson, 51, a trial lawyer in Decatur, Ga., said watching the returns “was kind of like waiting for a jury to come back.”

“I was glad to finally get to the end of the campaign,” he said.

At her campaign headquarters, Ms. McKinney began her concession speech by singing along to the song “Dear Mr. President” by the pop artist Pink. “I wanted you to hear this song, which says so much about why this election in Georgia was so important,” she said.

“Not only do we want our country back, we want our party back,” she said in a speech that criticized President Bush, the news media and electronic voting machines. She concluded, “I wish the new representative of the Fourth Congressional District well.”

This woman is whacked and on crack. It is nice that the voters of her district have had the sense to cry out "Enough!"

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Guess he needed to give it to us up the @$$ one more time before he departs the scene.

Former U.S. Rep. Tom DeLay will support a write-in candidate for his old seat, his daughter said today, one day after the state Republican Party lost its legal battle to replace him on the November ballot.

In a statement, DeLay said he would withdraw his name from the ballot. Since state law does not allow a party to replace an official nominee who withdraws from the race, no Republican candidate will be on the ballot.

Dani DeLay Ferro sent the Chronicle an e-mail confirming her father's intentions to support a write-in candidate.

"I will take the actions necessary to remove my name from the Texas ballot," DeLay said in his statement. "To do anything else would be hypocrisy."

"I strongly encourage the Republican Party to take any and all actions necessary to give Texas voters an up-or-down choice this fall between two major party candidates," DeLay said.

DeLay maintains that when he resigned from the House this June that he became a resident of Virginia to establish his new business.

"This decision was and is irrevocable, which I made clear from Day One," he said. "My action was taken in accordance with Texas law, federal precedent and common sense. I felt it was my duty to allow Texas Republicans to choose a new candidate for the Fall Election Ballot."

The write-in candidate ofptio is the worst of all worlds, in that it leaves room for multiple candidates and the process is combersome on the eSlate machines used in this area. Most folks will skip the race or vote for a regular candidate rather than take the time to do a write-in (which involves selecting and entering each letter individually with a dial-and-select set-up.

Besides, who will pick the candidate? DeLay? The party? Who?

I really think we just need to settle on the Libertarian for two years, so we can have a consensus candidate emerge from the grassroots.

And let me say it loud and clear, Tom -- Any attempt to get David Wallace on the ballot will result in the active opposition of most of the GOP precinct chairs in Harris County, and probably in Galveston and Brazoria Counties as well. I don't even know that he could command majority support among Fort Bend chairs. Don't even try it.

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After all, the same Lebanese troops that would fill the void in southern Lebanon are the ones who have been unable to control Hezbollah in the past, unable to bring about the dsarming of that terrorist force in compliance with UN Resolution 1559, and which the Lebanese president has previously threatened to send against Israel if it fails to stop attacking the Hezbollah terrorists.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said Tuesday that Israel would "examine" the Lebanese government's proposal to deploy 15,000 soldiers to south Lebanon to replace Hezbollah militias, while an Arab delegation pressed the U.N. security council for an immediate cease-fire and withdrawal of Israeli troops from the country's south.

Olmert, who spoke as fighting continued on both sides of the Israel-Lebanese border, called the Lebanese government's proposal "an interesting step that we need to examine and investigate and see if it's all that it means."

Of course, the Arab supporters of terror want the UN to once again intervene in a manner detrimental to Israeli security.

In New York, Arab officials warned the U.N. Security Council Tuesday that Lebanon would erupt into a civil war unless there was an immediate cease-fire and the withdrawal of Israeli troops, Reuters reported.

Qatar's foreign minister, Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim bin Jabr al-Thani, representing a three-member Arab League delegation, told the council that adopting a nonenforceable resolution would have "grave ramifications" for Lebanon.

"If we adopt the resolution without fully considering the reality of Lebanon, we will face a civil war," the minister said. "Instead of helping Lebanon, we will destroy Lebanon."

Wellm perhaps these nations should begin by turning to Hezbollah and demanding that the terrorists lay down their arms and accept evacuation to Qatar or some other Arab state where they would no longer be a threat to Israel. Israel could then withdraw to its borders and have security. Unfortunately, that is not in the plans of the Arab League. All the concessions must be on Israel's part, under their proposal.

Prime Minister Olmert needs to just say "No!"

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The winning entries in the Watcher's Council vote for this week are They're Not What You've Been Told, They're Our Neighbors' Kids. by AbbaGav, and A Difficult Lesson by Treppenwitz. 

Here are the full results of the vote.

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I guess you can get the Left-nuts to spend %12 to buy a CD, but not shell out $50 a head to go to the concerts.

Several concerts on the Dixie Chicks' ''Accidents & Accusations'' tour have been canceled after slow ticket sales, but the group says it has replaced them with other dates.

Kansas City, Houston, St. Louis, Memphis and Knoxville are among 14 cities no longer on the original schedule released in May, according to a revised itinerary posted Thursday on the Dixie Chick's Web site.

Other shows, including Nashville, Los Angeles, Denver and Phoenix, have been pushed back to later dates.

The North American leg of the tour kicked off July 21 in Detroit. Billboard magazine and other trade publications have reported lackluster sales in some markets, particularly in the South and Midwest.

Group spokeswoman Kathy Allmand said Monday that the total number of North American dates remains the same, with several Canadian cities added in place of the U.S. shows.

Oh, dear -- they are going to focus on the mighty Canadian market! I guess that means that Americans still are unwilling to forgive and forget their continuous insults to their country, their president, and their troops -- and to country music fans, who at one time made the girls a success.

And I just love this statement.

The trio released a statement last week attributing the changes to attempts to ''accommodate demand'' and said more dates might be added next year.

Seems to me that they are attempting to accommodate a lack of demand.

Posted by: Greg at 11:48 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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After Justice Scalia refused to stay the unanimous Fifth Circuit's decision, it is clear that the options for the GOP in this district come down to Tom Delay or nothing.

Personally, I hope for nothing.

Texas Republicans on Monday abandoned their court fight to replace former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay on the November ballot after being turned back at the Supreme Court.

The decision came after Justice Antonin Scalia rejected Texas Republicans' request to block an appeals court ruling saying DeLay's name should remain on the ballot.

''I think all our legal avenues are exhausted in terms of affecting the ruling prior to the election,'' said Jim Bopp Jr., the attorney who argued the Republican Party's case to allow party officials to substitute another candidate for DeLay.

All I can say in response is "No shit." But then again, given teh fact that Bopp did such a pooor job litigating this case, the result was a foregone conclusion. I noted several places in the Fifth Crcuit's opinion where the judges simply said that an argument was unavailable to the GOP because it hadn't been raised at the District Court or because it was not presented until the final stage of briefs during the appelate process. That is simply sloppy lawyering. I sure hope the Party isn't paying this clown for his services.

For that matter, I'm somewhat relieved that things have turned out that way. The local powers-that-be had gone out of their way to ensure that the replacement candidate would be State Rep. Robert Talton, who stands to the right of Tom DeLay and has very few legislative accomplishments -- but does have the advantage of being the law partner Harris County GOP Chairman Jared Woodfill. Those of us who dared oppose Talton were left out of the loop during the process of selecting a representative to the committee that would have selected the replacement candidate -- though the selectee (Kathy Haigler) did reach out to the dissidents following her selection, a move which demonstrates her integrity but also underscores the problem with process up to that point.

My personal preference would be to see Tom DeLay withdraw from the race. Remove his name from the ballot and leave us with a race between Democrat Nick Lampson, Libertarian Bob Smither, and the Green Party candidate. In such a case, I believe that many of the voters in CD22 will vote for the Libertarian. Ron paul is the cCongressman in one of the neighboring districts, so I believe that most GOP voters will be comfortable with Smither's philosophy. i also believe this will help us to get the seat back into GOP hands in 2008.

I also have words for some party officials. Tina Benkiser had better realize that she misplayed this thing every step of the way, and her support in this area is severely weakened. She conducted a power-play in Harris and Fort Bend Counties which guaranteed that the establishment-backed Talton would get the votes of at least two of the selectees to the District Exectutive Committee. That didn't even go down well with the Talton backers, who saw her interference as inappropriate. She no longer has our confidence as a competent leader or an honest broker.

And I would suggest to Jared Woodfill that he consider the reality that he has alienated a chunk of the grassroots, and that he will likely face a challenge in two years when he seeks reelection to his current position. If he wants to do what is right by the party, he had better begin mending fences if he can.

So let me say again -- withdraw, Tom, and discourage any candidate from seeking to run as a write-in, especially your little clone David Wallace. You have taken a safe seat and made it a net-loss for the GOP in 2006, so give the grass-roots a chance to grow an acceptable candidate for 2008 without your input.

Posted by: Greg at 01:15 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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What will this do to gas prices?

Oil company BP has indefinitely shut down the nation's biggest oilfield after finding a pipeline leak, removing about 8 percent of U.S. oil production and stoking fears that already high gas prices will shoot up further.

Steve Marshall, president of BP Exploration Alaska Inc., said Sunday night that the eastern side of Prudhoe Bay would be shut down first, an operation anticipated to take 24 to 36 hours. The company will then move to shut down the west side, a move that could close more than 1,000 Prudhoe Bay wells.

Once the field is shut down, BP said oil production will be reduced by 400,000 barrels a day. That's close to 8 percent of U.S. oil production or about 2.6 percent of U.S. supply including imports, according to data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

BP officials said they didn't know how long the Prudhoe Bay field would be off line. "I don't even know how long it's going to take to shut it down," said Tom Williams, BP's senior tax and royalty counsel.

It is unclear if this is a case of production being down for a wek, or whether it will take longer.

But this should serve as a spur to opening up off-shore drilling and other oil exploration -- and put to rest the notion that oil companies are not good stewards of the environment. After all, BP is acting on its own, not based upon a government mandate to stop production.

Posted by: Greg at 11:18 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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From an interview with Chief Justice John Roberts aired on CSPAN this past weekend.

"Too many people think whenever there's any kind of dispute in our society, well let's take it to the Supreme Court and they'll decide," he said. "In a democratic republic that shouldn't be someone's first reaction. Their first reaction should be to resolve political disputes in the political process."

To my fellow educators -- this is a part of the CSPAN Classroom series, so it is available for your classroom.

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The New York Times has decided. Twenty-six days of war is too much.

It is now 26 days since Hezbollah and Israel began their latest combat — a very long time for the world to allow such a deadly conflict to rage in the Middle East powder keg. Yet the fighting still continues. Diplomats still dither over cease-fire details. Innocent people still keep dying.

Enough. This is the week that the international community must impose a truce, to be followed, in short order, by a political settlement and the dispatch of a robust international force to patrol LebanonÂ’s oft-violated border with Israel.

The Israeli government needs to thell the international community "Thanks, but no thanks." There has been an international force in Lebanon for three decades, and its presence has done no good. Israel has repeatedly had to enter Lebanon to stop attacks taking place from the very shadow of UNIFIL facilities, while hezbollah and other groups have operated with impunity. Indeed, the last UN resolution on the issue of southern Lebanon required the disarming of Hezbollah and disbanding of its military forces. That did not happen, leading to the current situation.

The time has come for Israel to complete the job at hand -- and to say that the UN is incompetent and incapable of bringing peaces to the region.

Posted by: Greg at 11:03 PM | Comments (9) | Add Comment
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Imagine that -- what goes in their ears impacts kids' thinking and sexual behavior.

Teenagers whose iPods are full of music with raunchy, sexual lyrics start having sex sooner than those who prefer other songs, a study found.

Whether it's pop, rock, hip-hop or rap, much of popular music aimed at teens contains sexual overtones. Its influence on their behavior appears to depend on how the sex is portrayed, researchers found.

Songs depicting men as "sex-driven studs," women as sex objects and with explicit references to sex acts are more likely to trigger early sexual behavior than those where sexual references are more veiled and relationships appear more committed, the study found.

Teens who said they listened to lots of music with degrading sexual messages were almost twice as likely to start having intercourse or other sexual activities within the following two years as were teens who listened to little or no sexually degrading music.

Exposure to lots of sexually degrading music "gives them a specific message about sex," said lead author Steven Martino, a researcher for Rand Corp. in Pittsburgh.

This is sort of intuitive, if you ask me. We have known for generations that advertising impacts the consumeproductpreferences and purchasing decisions of consumers. That is why so much money is spent on advertising, and why government restricts certain sorts of advertising. Why would the constantly repeated messages oin music not have a similar impact?

Not that there really needed to be this sort of study. Those of us who teach could have supplied researchers with all the anecdotal evidence necessary to reach this conclusion.

Posted by: Greg at 10:57 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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And it is trying to get it from Africa.

IRAN is seeking to import large consignments of bomb-making uranium from the African mining area that produced the Hiroshima bomb, an investigation has revealed.

A United Nations report, dated July 18, said there was “no doubt” that a huge shipment of smuggled uranium 238, uncovered by customs officials in Tanzania, was transported from the Lubumbashi mines in the Congo.

Tanzanian customs officials told The Sunday Times it was destined for the Iranian port of Bandar Abbas, and was stopped on October 22 last year during a routine check.

The disclosure will heighten western fears about the extent of IranÂ’s presumed nuclear weapons programme and the strategic implications of IranÂ’s continuing support for Hezbollah during the war with Israel.

When even the UN admits that Iran is seeking this material, there ought to be an outcry from the international communty and the American Left. But they really don't care -- after all, there are Jews to be bashed for defending themselves. Who cares about the actions of a rogue state ruled by a genocidal maniac?

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And do the same to Hamas, too.

That is the proposal of libertarian columnist Vin Suprynowicz, who acknowledges that war is a terrible thing and should be avoided in most instances.

But there are two major exceptions.

Rather than live as slaves, rather than watch our loved ones picked off one at a time while we stand by and do nothing, it is better to risk our lives -- and to kill as many of the enemy as humanly possible, by whatever means -- until such danger is decisively eliminated. It is better to respond to aggression by going to war. Not "going to social work." War, as in, "If everything around you is exploding, that's probably us."

Indeed, demanding cease-fires and temporary truces allows one side to initiate war with impunity, knowing that it will never be permitted to lose. Instead, those who cry "Peace!" will serve as the guarantors that there is no cost to unpovoked aggression by a weak party seeking to improve its position vis-a-vis a stronger and more restrained neighbor.

War in the Middle East has been a constant for some 58 years, since the founding of the modern state of Israel. That state has survived endless assaults upon its people and territory, but has never been allowed to follow through on its right to guarantee its own security by crushing its enemies. Instead, international pressure has been the basis for providing succor to the enemies of the Jewish state. The result has been more war and a constant threat to Israel's survival.

If war is evil, how much more evil is it to impose on anyone an endless stop-and-start war, which the righteous and aggrieved victim is never allowed to pursue to a victorious end -- the aggressor always allowed to rest and refit and then to come again at a time of his choosing, pecking relentlessly at the victim's liver?

Some will say Israel has committed aggression simply by existing. But to say that is to violate the U.N. charter, which guarantees the right of all member states to exist.

"But the Palestinians have no state!" the war-lovers cry.

Sure they do. It's called Jordan. In fact, the Palestinian Arabs got by far the larger part of the old British protectorate of Palestine -- and no one attacked them for daring to set up an essentially one-religion nation where Jews find scant welcome. The masses now huddled around the borders of Israel were kicked out by King Hussein in 1972 after they tried to overthrow him. How is that Israel's fault?

The defeatists cry that "Nothing can be accomplished by violence; war only breeds more terrorists who will fight forever."

Really? Sixty years later, is America still under attack by the aggrieved suicide-belted grandchildren of the Germans and Japanese whose cities we flattened and burned to rubble in '44 and '45?

No. Because wars usually do resolve these issues -- if one side is allowed to fight to a decisive victory. It's just that the pink petticoat gang shriek hysterically and threaten to faint dead away when confronted with the reality of how real wars really end.

Someone raises a white flag, and promises to fight no more if only you'll give the survivors some food and water and stop burning them out of their holes. Many of the conquered women marry the conqueror's soldiers and move home with them, giving up their native dress and learning to drive Buicks.

Israel can and has made peace with its neighbors. Nearly three decades ago, the actions of Begin and Sadat proved that. So, too, did the decision of King Hussein to follow the path that resulted in his grandfathers murder -- for Jordan and Israel are at peace as well. But when one side is unambiguously opposed to peace, no good can come of giving in to peaceful impulses -- for the end is ever the same.

But things could be different.

Today, Hezbollah and Hamas have a problem. All their planning was based on the fact that the world and the United States have never allowed Israel to really win a war -- they always call a cease-fire after a maximum of 20 days.

Can anyone see the terrorists looking around now, wondering when they get their next three years off for rest, refit and resupply? "Hey, it's been the full three weeks. Guys? Anyone? Hello?"

We started out saying war is horrible and is to be avoided whenever possible. But there is a corollary doctrine. If you want a generation of peace, those who launch wars have to be shown this, good and hard.

And that means forcing Hezbollah to its knees in southern Lebanon and Hamas in the territory it controls. That means a stark refusal to make nice when the world community demands it -- for the destruction of these two forces will not only pacify them in the long run, but may also have a salutary effect on those who seek to harm Israel while counting on being shielded by the international pacifist movement.

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I understand all the media arguments against requiring reporters to give evidence to under subpoena like every other American citizen -- it is based upon the notion that the First Amendment makes the self-defined "press" some sort of aristocratic elite that isn't bound by the same rules as the riff-raff -- read that "other Americans".

So listening to them whining is simply music to my ears.

ournalism groups on Saturday decried the jailing of a video journalist and other recent court rulings pressuring media workers to divulge information to the government.

The news media becomes an information-gathering arm of law enforcement when journalists are ordered to give up confidential sources or unpublished material, said Tony Overman, president of the National Press Photographers Association.

"When news sources believe that statements or actions observed or reported by journalists find their way into the hands of police or prosecutors, those sources will be less willing - or flat-out afraid - to cooperate with the media," Overman said at a news conference.

The photographers association and the Society of Professional Journalists announced they would help pay for the legal defense of freelance video journalist Joshua Wolf.

A federal judge in San Francisco ordered Wolf jailed this week for refusing to hand over unaired video shot during a July 2005 protest in which a police car was vandalized and an officer injured.

If my wife had such photos, nobody would bat an eyelash if a court ordered her to turn them over. If I, an "independent journalist and commentator of the new media" (AKA a blogger) had such photos, the courts would surely have the authority to order me to hand them to the authorities on pain of imprisonment. Why should Josh Wolf be exempt from the duty to obey a lawful court order to produce materials relevant to an investigation -- especially after the federal courts have repeatedly and definitively determined that the First Amendment grants no exemption from such obligations?

Similarly, in the Judith Miller cas, why should she have been exempt. If she had not been a reporter for the NY Times, but rather had been Scooter Libby's third cousin four times removed, nobody would have argued that she had a right to defy a lawful court order.

Of course, tehre is this arrogant claim from professional journalist groups.

"We must stand together as journalists, scholars, educators and American citizens for freedom of the press, on behalf of our country," said Julianne Newton, a professor at the University of Oregon's journalism school.

Freedom of the press, Ms. Newton, is the right to write and publish. It is not the right to withhold evidence or obstruct justice. Indeed, just as the right to freedom of the press does not adhere only to "professional journalists" (an oxymoron if there ever was one) but to every American, so too does the obligation to produce evidence fall upon every American -- journalists included. And particularly in cases where the illicit disclosure of information to journalists is th matter under investigation, the obligation is that much more clear.

But an option does remain. Journalists could stat claiming their rights under the Fifth Amendment, implicitly acknowledging that, in many cases, they are accessories to (if not direct perpetrators of) the crimes being investigated.

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Listening to these folks, you would think acting to end WWII was a bad thing.

Tens of thousands of people from around the world gathered in Hiroshima on Sunday to pray for peace and urge the world to abandon nuclear weapons on the 61st anniversary of the first atomic bombing.

In an annual ritual to mourn the more than 220,000 people who ultimately died from the blast, a crowd including survivors, children and dignitaries gathered at the Peace Memorial Park, near ground zero where the bomb was dropped.

"Radiation, heat, blast and their synergetic effects created a hell on Earth," said Hiroshima Mayor Tadatoshi Akiba.

Remember -- the planned invasion of the home islands was expected to cost the US military over one million dead soldiers, sailors, and airmen. The Japanese death toll was expected to be higher, incuding the civilian dead (the Bushido code required suicide rather than capture or surrender).

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Premature detonation -- no virgins for you, jihadi pig!

A suicide bomber was killed early Sunday in southwestern Pakistan when the explosives belt he was wearing exploded prematurely, police said.

No one else was injured in the blast in Hub, an industrial town in Baluchistan province, local police official Munir Hussain said.

"This man was riding a cycle. He had strapped explosives to his body for a suicide attack and they exploded," Hussain said of the blast in Hub's Zehri Street neighborhood.

The man's intended target was not immediately known, and police were investigating, Hussain said.

That's one more dead terrorist in Hell with Allah.

Posted by: Greg at 02:24 AM | Comments (14) | Add Comment
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1 From what I have seen elsewhere, that word "virgins" actually said "Virginians" in the ancient text.  It was meant to discourage martyrdom because no one in his right mind would want to face 72 angry Virginian fighting men in the afterlife. 

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On May 26, 1968, the following column by American social commentator Eric Hoffer was published in the Los Angeles Times. Hoffer (who was not a Jew) noted certain realities regarding Israel's situation in the world.

Interestingly, nearly four decades later, the words still ring true and can be applied to the current situation in the Middle East.

ISRAEL'S PECULIAR POSITION

The Jews are a peculiar people: things permitted to other nations are forbidden to the Jews.

Other nations drive out thousands, even millions of people and there is no refugee problem. Russia did it, Poland and Czechoslovakia did it, Turkey threw out a million Greeks, and Algeria a million Frenchman. Indonesia threw out heaven knows how many Chinese -- and no one says a word about refugees.

But in the case of Israel the displaced Arabs have become eternal refugees. Everyone insists that Israel must take back every single Arab. Arnold Toynbee calls the displacement of the Arabs an atrocity greater than any committed by the Nazis.

Other nations when victorious on the battlefield dictate peace terms. But when Israel is victorious it must sue for peace. Everyone expects the Jews to be the only real Christians in this world. Other nations when they are defeated survive and recover but should Israel be defeated it would be destroyed.

Had Nasser triumphed last June he would have wiped Israel off the map, and no one would have lifted a finger to save the Jews.

No commitment to the Jews by any government, including our own, is worth the paper it is written on. There is a cry of outrage all over the world when people die in Vietnam or when two Negroes are executed in Rhodesia. But when Hitler slaughtered Jews no one remonstrated with him. The Swedes, who are ready to break of diplomatic relations with America because of what we do in Vietnam, did not let out a peep when Hitler was slaughtering Jews. They sent Hitler choice iron ore and ball bearings, and serviced his troop trains to Norway.

The Jews are alone in the world. If Israel survives, it will be solely because of Jewish efforts. And Jewish resources. Yet at this moment Israel is our only reliable and unconditional ally. We can rely more on Israel than Israel can rely on us. And one has only to imagine what would have happened last summer had the Arabs and their Russian backers won the war to realize how vital the survival of Israel is to America and the West in general.

I have a premonition that will not leave me; as it goes with Israel so will it go with all of us. Should Israel perish, the next Holocaust will be upon us.

UPDATE: This analysis by a Clinton Administration official shows how true these words are today.

The track record of many of Israel's most powerful accusers--including China, Russia and the European Union--is not nearly as good at balancing civilian risk against military goals.

China killed hundreds of peaceful Tiananmen Square protestors in 1989. It has for five decades occupied Tibet, slaughtering tens of thousands; and it vows to invade Taiwan if it declares independence. Neither the Tiananmen protesters nor Tibet nor Taiwan has ever threatened to "wipe China off the map."

Russia has fought since 1994 to suppress Chechnya's independence movement. Out of a Chechen population of one million, as many as 200,000 have been killed as Russia has leveled the capital city of Grozny. Chechen rebels pose no threat to "wipe Russia off the map." All of the leading EU countries actively participated in NATO's 78-day bombing campaign against Yugoslavia in 1999. The military goal was to stop Yugoslavia from oppressing its Kosovar minority. NATO bombs and missiles hit Yugoslav bridges, power plants and a television station, killing hundreds of civilians. Yugoslavia posed no threat to the existence of any of the EU countries that bombed it.

Compared with how China, Russia, and the EU have dealt with non-existential threats--and despite the law-flouting behavior of Hezbollah, Iran and Syria--Israel's responses to the threats to its existence have been remarkably restrained rather than disproportionately violent.

Indeed, the response has been restrained -- but Israel is not allowed to defend itself at all. In the eyes of much of the international community, the only appropriate response of a Jew under attack is to cooperate by dying quickly and without a struggle.

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Posted by: Greg at 01:35 PM | Comments (5) | Add Comment
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Since everyone else is making proposals, why shouldn't I?

When every last jihadi in Lebanon is dead, Israel will cease firing.

And the nice thing about my proposal is that there is no ambiguity or opportunity for Hezbollah to rearm again.

Posted by: Greg at 11:54 PM | Comments (6) | Add Comment
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Jonathan Medved offers a view from Israel on why this war is almost universally supported in that country.

And herein lies a great secret of why we fight, why we have gone to war after the kidnappings of Gilad Shalit in Gaza , and Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev on the Lebanese border. Why the Israeli public completely backs this war with approval ratings of over 90%. Because our army is our kids, and Jewish kids will not be kidnapped and slaughtered ever again without having hell to pay. Because we will not sit idly by while our enemies openly call for our destruction and amass the means to carry out their threats.

Everyday’s paper brings new pictures of fallen soldiers—their smiles, their backgrounds, their unbelievable stories. Major Benji Hillman, 27, an English immigrant, who died leading his troops into Ras A Maroun, only three weeks after his wedding. Major Roi Klein, 31, died by jumping on a hand grenade, thereby shielding his soldiers from certain death—he leaves a wife and two young sons. Seargeant Michael Levine, 22, a new immigrant from Pennsylvania, rushed back to his unit after visiting his family in the states, to find death fighting Hizbollah in Ayta A-Shab. These heroes will not be forgotten nor will their deaths be turned into mere casualty statistics of a war viewed by cynics as “disproportionate”.

Tonight, starts the fast of the 9th of Av, when we read the book of Lamentations as we mourn the destruction of our Temples and other calamities that have befallen the Jewish people on this day. Sitting in the moonlight on a hill across from the Temple Mount, hundreds of our neighbors and friends read together the scary verses about the tragedy that has followed our people for generations. Yet there is a quiet determination which is palpable among the mourners---a feeling that this war, our war, will ultimately be won, that redemption is finally on the way, and that our families will prevail.

May God continue to bless the Children of Abraham, Issac, and Jacob as they defend themselves against those who would kill them for believing in and living out the promises God made to their forefathers.

Posted by: Greg at 11:15 PM | Comments (6) | Add Comment
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As Israel conducts its War of Justice against the Hezbollah swine, many of us feel it is important that we lend our personal support to Israel in any manner possible. The Washington Post has an article about a new campaign by American Jews to help their brothers and sisters under attack by jihadis..

An umbrella organization of North American Jewish charities said yesterday that it will seek to raise a minimum of $300 million in emergency humanitarian funds for Israel this year, one of the largest short-term goals in its history.

The fund drive drew immediate criticism from at least one prominent rabbi who called on American Jews to raise money for the reconstruction of Lebanon, not just Israel. But experts on Jewish philanthropy predicted that the campaign would receive broad support, following a well-established pattern of giving by U.S. Jews in times of crisis for the Jewish state.

* * *

[Howard Rieger, president and chief executive of United Jewish Communities,] said that since Hezbollah kidnapped two Israeli soldiers in a cross-border raid, triggering three weeks of fighting between Israel and Lebanese militants, UJC has spent $12.5 million a week to evacuate children and elderly residents of northern Israel beyond the range of Hezbollah rockets.

He said the additional funds would be used to set up summer camps for up to 15,000 displaced children in southern Israel, provide trauma counseling, create a $20 million fund for victims of the rocket attacks and their families, rebuild social services and refurbish bomb shelters that lack air conditioning and are in disrepair.

Doron Krakow, senior vice president of the UJC's Israel division, said the campaign is "fundamentally committed to helping Israeli communities under siege, and that means helping Israeli Arabs and Druze, as well as Jews."

There are, of course, some Jews opposing aid for israel and instead looking for support for the jihadis and their lebanese allies. I guess that is just proof positive that today, six decades after the Holocause, there still are would-be Kapos and judische Polizei in 2006, ready to cooperate with the enemies of the Jewish people rather than aid their brothers and sisters.

To learn more about the campaign, click here.

Posted by: Greg at 10:55 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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I'm not surprised by the ruling of the 5th Circuit in the DeLay case. The ruling, which I believe is wrong, was not implausibly so. It was therefore a long shot that the appellate court would overturn the trial court's ruling. This means that we in CD22 are stuck with Tom DeLay as the GOP nominee -- sort of.

A federal appeals court panel on Thursday refused to let Texas Republicans replace Tom DeLay's name on the November congressional ballot.

The finding upheld a July ruling by a federal judge that the ballot must list DeLay, who won a March primary before resigning from Congress on June 9. He now lives in Virginia but is awaiting trial in Texas state court on money laundering and conspiracy charges alleging that illegal corporate cash helped pay for legislative campaigns in 2002.

"This was a victory for fair and ethical elections protecting the integrity of the democratic process. Both parties have nominees for the general election and it's time to move forward," said Cris Feldman, a lawyer for the Texas Democratic Party.

The problem, of course, is that Texas law requires that a candidate be ineligible to be replaced -- and the Constitution only requires eligibility on the day of election. Frankly, I don't thingk the GOP lawyers handled this case well at all. And the real culprit in all f this is DeLay himself, who decided to bail out at the first sign of trouble.

Frankly, I don't see a ruling by the Supreme Court happening in a sufficiently timely fashion as to make a difference, so I hope the party just drops that Hail Mary tactic.

Where does that leave us as a party?

1) DeLay can become an active candidate again. To be honest, I think this district is Republican enough that he could win. But I only want to see that happen if he is serious about serving out the entire term. A post election refusal to serve will simply piss-off too many people to guarantee that the seat will stay out of Democrat hands.

2) DeLay could withdraw from the race, leaving the GOP without a candidate. Local conservative forces could unite behind one write-in candidate. Unfortunately, the method for doing write-in votes on teh eSlate machines is cumbersome and would discorage many voters from doing so. I therefore find this an unsatisfactory option.

3) DeLay could withdraw and the GOP could throw its support to Bob Smither, the Libertarian in the race. While certainly not a Republican, he is preferrable to Nick Lampson.

4) DeLay could withdraw and the GOP could concede the race. This would have teh effect of putting Lampson in office for the foreseeable future, given the difficulty of defeating an incumbent.

I Tom Delay stays in the race, I will back him -- not with enthusiasm, but I will back him. After all, I didn't vote for him in the 2002 or 2004 primary, and voted Libertarian for Congress in both of those elections. Those votes were protests against a Congressman that I had (and have) some serious questions about. But the reality is that I believe that holding this seat for the GOP is of vital importance for the United States. I can sum up the reason for this in two words -- Speaker Pelosi. It is why I endorsed Tom DeLay for renomination this past spring, and why I had done so for the general election. Democrat control of either house of Congress would not be good for America.

The party needs to quickly figure out what is going on, and then act accordingly. The leadership has already f*cked this one up enough, and we need every moment we can get to make sure that we hold this seat in trust for future generations of Americans -- even if that means that Delay's butt sits in it for one more term.

But make no mistake. There will be serious primary challenges if he tries to run in 2008, and he will not be the nominee of the GOP in 2008.

Posted by: Greg at 04:01 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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Frankly, I don't care about the notion of a trial for such as these -- lynching seems to be in order to me. After all, a crime like this is simply evil.

An Iraq war veteran who lost an arm and leg in a roadside bombing was mugged during a night out from the Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, according to an Associated Press report.

Lance Cpl. Mark Beyers, 27, and his wife were attacked and robbed as they left a restaurant in Bethesda, Md. on July 22.

The Marine from western New York was dining out while finishing up rehabilitation at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center.

As they left the restaurant, five men approached them and asked for a cigarette.

Denise Beyers told The Buffalo News they gave the men a cigarette -- but then the men grabbed her purse, kicked her and knocked the couple to the ground.

The thieves made off with $500 just wired to them by a relative.

Mark Beyers expects to be back home in the Buffalo area this weekend.

His family is planning a fundraiser for him on Aug. 12.

If someone will help me track down an address on where to help Lance Cpl. Bryers and his wife, I will be pleased to post it here.

Posted by: Greg at 03:33 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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First day of staff development today.

Do I have to go back to school, Mommy?

Posted by: Greg at 10:55 PM | Comments (155) | Add Comment
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Looks like Hezbollah is trying to step up the terror.

Hezbollah rockets struck Israel in record numbers and deeper than ever Wednesday, pushing the three-week total over the 2,000 mark and killing a Boston-born man fleeing on his bicycle toward shelter.

The barrage, which followed a two-day lull, came despite the Israeli army chief's claim that the offensive in south Lebanon had eroded Hezbollah's firepower. Lt. Gen. Dan Halutz also threatened to resume air raids against the Lebanese capital.

One missile fell near the Palestinian town of Jenin, leaving a 6-foot crater in a rural area of the West Bank. It caused no casualties, and Palestinians said the mistake would not change their support for Hezbollah.

Rockets also landed near the town of Beit Shean, 45 miles from the border — the deepest penetration so far. Hezbollah's satellite TV network, Al-Manar, reported the guerrilla group used its longer-range Khaibar-1 missiles, which Israel says were supplied by Iran. The Khaibar rocket debuted last week when the town of Afula was targeted.

The army said more than 230 rockets had hit Israel by Wednesday night. The highest previous daily total was 157 on Sunday.

Fortunately, Hezbollah's attacks caused only a single civilian fatality, though there were over thirty civilians wounded in the attack -- the hand of God is protecting his people Israel.

But unfortunately, this still leads some to argue that Israel should not be making such a serious attempt to root out Hezbollah. One person told me yesterday that Israel's actions in Lebanon were unwarranted since Hezbollah couldn't hit the broad side of a barn and was doing so little damage.

I urge my Israeli readers to share tehir experiences in the comment section for the benefit of my readers from the rest of the world. After al, the press won't tell us about the impact of these attacks on Israel.

Posted by: Greg at 10:49 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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Remember -- this means there are five weeks during which they cannot pass any more stupid, unnecessary, liberty-infringing laws designed to protectu us from ourselves.

Posted by: Greg at 10:38 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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After all, if leading figures in the organization are so loathe to classify Hezbollah as a terrorist organization, why do we even stay a member?

[U.N. Deputy Secretary-General Mark] Malloch Brown was quoted in a British newspaper Wednesday suggesting that he does not think that Hezbollah, the Syrian- and Iranian-backed group currently fighting Israeli Defense Forces, is a terrorist organization.

"It's not helpful to couch this war in the language of international terrorism. Hezbollah employs terrorist tactics; it is an organization, however, whose roots historically are completely separate and different from Al Qaeda," he said, according to a transcript of an interview.

So Hezbollah may look like terrorists and act like terrorists, but they are not terrorists because they are not al-Qaeda. This ignores the minor detail that one can be a terrorist without being a part of al-Qaeda, just as one could be a pirate without being Blackbeard.

Can't we just admit that the UN is a failed experiment in utopian diplomacy and dismiss the organization from both our budget and our shores?

Posted by: Greg at 03:36 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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I'm not about to make nasty comments about Elena White, who was arrested for DUI on Monday night here in Houston. I'm not even going to take any cheap shots at her daddy, Houston Mayor Bill White, or his parenting skills. I believed such things were wrong when it involved the Bush twins, and I believe that they would be wrong now.

Even though Elena smelled of alcohol when she was pulled over after cops spotted her weaving in and out of traffic with no headlights at around 11:00 PM (which I must note is after the curfew that her father and the City Council want to impose on every teen in the city).

Even though she failed the field sobriety test.

Even though she refused the Breathalyzer test.

Even though daddy has now hired high-power defense attorney Rusty Hardin to handle her case.

But I will note that Elena is 17.

And I will note that Mayor White, whose office initially issued a very responsible statement on the situation, has shifted direction and adopted a position that I can only call irresponsible.

"My daughter believes that she was not intoxicated and was not dangerous and wouldn't be impaired in her condition to drive," White said, calling her a "good kid" who has "always shot straight with me."

He added, "I personally, based on what I've heard today, think that it (the arrest) may have been a mistake."

Excuse me, Mr. Mayor.

I believe the legal drinking age here in Texas is 21. That makes it pretty clear that your daughter broke the law and deserved to be cited.

Your daughter couldn't walk a straight line or track objects with her eyes during the field sobriety test -- would you accept the assurances of any other drunk that they weren't impaired and could safely drive in that situation? Would you consider their arrest "a mistake"? Would you ever consider issing an order that the police release any driver who, having failed those tests, assured them that they weren't impaired and could make it home safely? I think we all know the answers to those questions.

It is clear you love your daughter, sir. And it is clear that she made a stupid mistake of the sort that many kids make in high school and on into college. As you point out, it doesn't make her a wild child or of bad seed, or proof of your moral failings as a parent, politician, or human being.

But might I urge you to reconsider that quote I cited above. It sends the wrong signal -- to her, and to young people all over this area. While it may be the first impulse of a loving parent, it is wrong for you to try to help her avoid the consequences for something she clearly did.

The best thing you can do for your daughter is to get her to 'fess up to what she did, accept her punishment, and learn from the mistake. And might I suggest that you teach her by example, by issuing a statement and conceding that your comments above, while made out of the purest love of a parent for his child, were wrong.

Because while I disagree with you on many things political, I know beyond all doubt that you are a good man. Prove me right.

Posted by: Greg at 09:00 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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I love it when a public figure goes against the Left-wing conventional wisdom to speak an inconvenient (for the Left) truth.

Charging Fidel Castro with the deaths of his relatives, Cuban-American Red Sox third baseman Mike Lowell declared last night: “I hope he does die.”

“Castro killed members of my family,” Lowell told the Herald before last night’s game against the Cleveland Indians at Fenway.

Some news reports have suggested the Cuban dictator, nearly 80, is gravely ill after undergoing surgery for intestinal bleeding, even as Cuban news media say he is recovering. He has handed power to his brother, Raul Castro.

Lowell, 32, recounted the trauma the Castro regime has caused his family.

“My dad had to pack up his suitcase at 10 years old with his three brothers, who had nothing. And my mother was 11 years old and my grandfather, who’d been a dentist for 15 or 20 years, had to go back to school to be (politically) re-educated,” Lowell said.

“My cousins were political prisoners. My father-in-law was a political prisoner for 15 years because, at 19, they asked him if he agreed with communism and he said, ‘No,’ so they sentenced him to death. That’s not the way to live. I know it’s terrible to say, but I think of all of that and I hope he (Castro) passes away.

“I don’t care if he dies,” Lowell said. “There are so many people who have died because of him and there’s been so much wrongdoing and so many human rights violations that I hope he does die. That sounds bad, but it’s the truth.”

It's time for more Cuban-American celebrities to speak out and slap down the Leftist propaganda that paint's Castro as a good guy.

Posted by: Greg at 07:44 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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Dan from Gone Mild chides me below for having been "fooled" by a chopped up transcript of an interview with Congressman Dingell. While I didn't initially believe him, I have since come across a more complete transcript of the interview, both at one of my original sources (PowerLine) and über-Left site Think Progress. But I think there are some areas that need to be highlighted here -- areas that make it clear that the original quote was not that dramatic a misrepresentation of Dingell's position.

DINGELL: First of all, our problem is that we must be a fair and honest broker and a friend to all parties. The resolution didn’t make us that. We have to have the trust of both of the people of Israel and the people of the Arab countries around it, in order to help resolve the problem. If we don’t, the possibilities of regional war, calamitous situation with regard to Israel which has 5 million people amidst a billion and a half Arabs are a real potential for calamity. Having said at that, what we have to do is to see to it that finally we begin to address the problems that exist to abate the difficulties that are preventing a–a honest solution to the problem and a negotiated end. It takes–it takes a lot of work to get the trust that it takes to do this. The resolution did not instill that kind of trust and the end result would be quite frankly, the real solution to the problems that exist in the middle east would probably have been and probably will be put off.

ANCHOR: Overall majority of your colleagues didn’t see it that way and some would suggest that if–even though there are obviously a lot of issues with Lebanon and with Palestinian cause wrapped up in this, that this largely boils down to Israel against Hezbollah and Hezbollah is a group that the United States has deemed a terrorist organization, that there’s only one side for the Americans to come down on in this fight.

DINGELL: Well, we donÂ’t, first of all, I donÂ’t take sides for or against Hezbollah or for or against Israel.

ANCHOR: YouÂ’re not against Hezbollah?

DINGELL: No, I happen to be—I happen to be against violence, I think the United States has to bring resolution to this matter. Now, I condemn Hezbollah as does everybody else, for the violence, but I think if we’ve got to talk to them and if we don’t — if we don’t get ourselves in a position where we can talk to both sides and bring both sides together, the killing and the blood let is going to continue.

Now let's look at those highlighted sections. Hezbollah is a terrorist organization. That is utterly beyond dispute. Their main stock-in-trade is violence. Yet despite is claim of opposition to the violence -- which has included the cold-blooded murder of American military personnel -- Dingell wants to treat Israel and Hezbollah as equals and find some middle ground. ABSURD!

And when asked if he is against Hezbollah -- a client of Syria and Iran which uses the intentional targetting of innocent civilians as a standard tactic -- Dingell clearly says that he is not. Oh, yeah, he says he opposes the violence, but he is apparently not opposed to the platform, which is the destruction of Israel.

PowerLine nails it.

If I have this right, Dingell's "actual view" is that the United States should be a friend of Hezbollah, though he condemns the organization for its "violence" even if he does not quite deem it a terrorist group. In other words, according to Rep. Dingell, the United States should serve as an "honest broker" between a murderer and the murderer's intended victim. Thanks to ThinkProgress for introducing the nuance necessary to appreciate Rep. Dingell's true view fully.

I guess I have a vision of Dingell and the ThinkProgress crowd coming upon a woman using a can of mace to defend herself from a would-be rapist and demanding that the woman drop the canister so two sit down and achieve a mutual understanding where they can both achieve their goals. The problem is that doing so in such a situation -- and in the case of Israel and Hezbollah -- means suspending all sense of justice and morality in order to materially cooperate with evil.

I repeat my earlier position on the issue -- one I feel is fully supported by the much longer transcript.

Utterly obscene!

And remember -- your vote for a Democrat Congressional candidate is a vote to make John Dingell Chairman of the House Energy & Commerce Committee -- which has a lot to do with setting our policies vis-a-vis the Middle East.

Assigning moral equivalency to the two sides in this conflict is unacceptable. Demanding that we be an "honest broker" with terrorist groups is a position which is beyond reprehensible -- but apparently acceptable in the Democrat Party and on the Left in general.

Posted by: Greg at 02:59 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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That is the argument made by a Jordanian bank seeking to have a lawsuit against it dismissed. The suit claim that the bank, which has a New York office and therefore is operating freely in the United States, facilitates the funding of terrorism.

The Jordan-based Arab Bank yesterday asked a federal judge in Brooklyn to dismiss a lawsuit brought by thousands of Israelis who claim the bank fueled terrorism by providing payments to the relatives of suicide bombers.

Lawyers for the bank said that the 4,000 foreign citizens who are plaintiffs should not be allowed to have their case heard in the American court system. They argued that terrorism against Israel does not violate any "international norm." Lawyers for the bank said that some 80 countries, most Islamic or African, do not consider Palestinian Arab suicide bombers to be terrorists.

"One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter — that holding is binding on this court," said an attorney for the bank, Kevin Walsh of LeBoeuf, Lamb, Greene and MacRae.

The plaintiffs who are suing Arab Bank in U.S. District Court in Brooklyn are the victims of terrorist attacks during the second intifada and the relatives of victims. While the overwhelming majority are citizens of Israel, some plaintiffs are from Afghanistan, Moldova, and several other countries.

They claim that Arab Bank — which has an office in New York — used offices in the West Bank and Gaza Strip to distribute payments to people who could prove they were relatives of recent suicide bombers.

The plaintiffs are suing under a 217 year-old-law, the Alien Tort Statute, which has been used by foreign citizens to bring lawsuits in America's federal courts stemming from human rights violations that occurred anywhere in the world.

Got that, folks -- international law supports Jew-killing! Terrorism directed at destroying Israel is not terrorism -- it is freedom-fighting.

Time for the State Department to place this bank on the list of prohibitted terrorist organizations.

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Posted by: Greg at 12:16 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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But since the group is composed of black racists, these politicians probably won't suffer for it.

Ald. Todd Stroger, the Democratic nominee for Cook County Board president, and the 8th Ward organization he represents have given almost $8,000 to a group that believes blacks should not be taxed and should not be involved in interracial relationships, and which supports the creation of a separate state for blacks.

Records show that since 2000, the Coalition for the Remembrance of the Honorable Elijah Muhammad (C.R.O.E.) has received $2,000 more from the campaign committee for Ald. Stroger's father, longtime county Board President John Stroger.

The Nation of Islam splinter group calls for "former slave masters" to provide the land for a black state and 20 to 25 years of supplies for those living there, along with free schooling for black students, who should be taught only by other blacks, its Web site says.

Other local politicians who have given financial support to the group include Chicago Mayor Richard Daley, state Senate President Emil Jones, Cook County Assessor James Houlihan, Cook County State's Attorney Richard Devine, interim Cook County Board President Bobbie Steele and Chicago Ald. William Beavers. I won't supply the party label for any of these folks -- but will remind you that this is Chicago.

Now could you imagine the outrage if there were politicians giving money to a white group that supported such white separtist principles? How long would it take for such indivivuals to be driven out of office? Want to be that doesn't happen here, even though the views are just as repugnant?

Oh, and by the way -- Munir Muhammad, the groups's leader, is a member of the Illinois Human Rights Commission.

Disgusting.

Posted by: Greg at 06:03 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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ZioNation, a website devoted to news aboutIsrael from the perspective of "Progressive Zionism" notes this from a French-language Lebanese news source.

The Lebanese Web site Libanoscopie reports that the massacre in Qana was set up by Hezbollah, in order to defeat the seven point plan of the Lebanese government, which would have disarmed the militia:

Knowing full well that Israel will not hesitate to bombard civilian targets, Hizbullah militants placed a rocket launcher on the roof of a building in Qana and brought disabled children inside, in a bid to provoke a response by the Israeli Air Force, to create a new situation, using the massacre of innocents to regain the initiative in the negotiations."

The report is believable because the place, Qana, where there had been an Israeli "massacre" in 1996, and also the timing were very very convenient for Hezbollah.

Both the original French text and an English translation are available at ZioNation.

Posted by: Greg at 05:30 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Because a group of politicians intervened in the case.

And also so that the deportation order will be mooted if Congress passes amnesty.

Eleven illegal immigrants from the Chicago area, arrested in a high-profile nationwide sweep, received an unexpected reprieve Monday after elected officials and the public weighed in on their behalf.

An immigration judge in Chicago granted the former employees of IFCO Systems a one-year stay of deportation. In return, the immigrants pledged not to appeal the deportation orders.

The delay gives the immigrants a chance to stay in the country if Congress approves a bill granting legal status to many of the nation's 11 million to 12 million illegal immigrants. That measure has stalled, for now, but many analysts think the prospects will improve after the November elections.

DHS officials are weighing the option of appealing this decision.

Marc Raimondi, a Department of Homeland Security spokesman, said the department was still evaluating the judge's decision but would likely appeal a one-year extension.

"In order for the immigration system to have any integrity, the laws have to be enforceable," Raimondi said. "We aren't going to be influenced by public sentiment. We are going to be influenced by enforcing the immigration laws."

That doesn't sit well with one politician.

[Congressman Luis] Gutierrez will ask the Department of Homeland Security to suspend all deportations to give Congress time to pass a legalization bill, the congressman's spokesman Scott Frotman said. Frotman said it does not make sense to deport illegal immigrants "because these are people who would ultimately be affected by the law."

And I'm asking DHS to expedite every single deportation case -- and I'm asking the people of Gutierrez's district to vote him out and replace him with a congressman who believes in enforcing American law.

Posted by: Greg at 05:23 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Yeah, they are terrorist. Yeah, they have murdered Americans -- including members of America's armed forces. But condemning them might make it look like he is taking sides!

"I don't take sides for or against Hezbollah; I don't take sides for or against Israel." Asked, "You're not against Hezbollah?" Dingell answers, "No..."

Utterly obscene!

And remember -- your vote for a Democrat Congressional candidate is a vote to make John Dingell Chairman of the House Energy & Commerce Committee -- which has a lot to do with setting our policies vis-a-vis the Middle East.

H/T PowerLine, Right Wing News, Expose the Left

Posted by: Greg at 05:16 AM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
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And it isn't like they believe in either morality of the censorship of sexually explicit material -- so how they can object to a clearly non-obscene book is beyond me, other than hypocrisy.

The book is back in Susan Combs' life like an old boyfriend who is best forgotten but keeps popping up at the most inconvenient times.

A Perfect Match is a steamy romance novel published in 1990 by Combs, who was in between jobs when she wrote it but is now the state's agriculture commissioner and the Republican nominee for state comptroller.

It tells the story of Emily Brown, a "cryptanalyst" for the National Security Agency, who "spent her days decoding secret messages with the zeal that most people applied to solving crossword puzzles," the book jacket says. Then she meets her match in superspy Ross Harding.

"Their mouths had fused hotly, desperately, a feverish urgency in his touch," reads one passage, referring to the pair's passion for each other.

Now those words, and others, are being used against Combs by her Democratic opponent, Fred Head, who has labeled the torrid tale pornography.

"Would you vote for a candidate who wrote a trashy, pornographic romance novel that glorifies premarital sex and seeks to arouse sexual interest as your State Comptroller of Public Accounts?" Head asks in a campaign flier.

Oh, puh-LEEEEEEEEZ! Have you no dignity Mr. Head? Don't you have any qualifications to run on, rather than objections to the current incumbent's literary skills? Especially since your a member of a party whose former president performed significantly more pornographich acts in the Oral Orifice Oval Office? And on a related note, how can you and your party possibly expect us to vote for anyone with such an indecent name as "Head", which clearly seeks to arouse sexual interest?

Maybe we in the GOP should just let them have CD-22 -- it might be the only way the Loser-Crats can win an office currently held by a Republican in the state of Texas. Nah!

Posted by: Greg at 06:26 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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1 I think the quality of romance writing is as relevant as most of the nonsense that gets raised as campaign issues . . .

(While I agree with you that this is stupid, it is also the sort of thing that could swing the votes of stupid people, and that's a significant constituency.)

Posted by: Dan at Tue Aug 1 01:25:22 2006 (aSKj6)

2 "how can you and your party possibly expect us to vote for anyone with such an indecent name as "Head", which clearly seeks to arouse sexual interest?"

snicker, snicker.

Is that the worst of the book? Seriously, I've not read the book, and it probably wouldn't interest me, but that's hardly damning. It's just plain silly, in fact. This from the party that sees nothing wrong in condom distribution, birth control or abortion for minors all of which tend to encourage and glorify "premarital sex and seeks to arouse sexual interest". Can you say "hypocrisy"?

Posted by: Anna Venger at Tue Aug 1 03:40:19 2006 (ZXStJ)

3 I think it takes great courage to write, and even get published genre of this nature.

I think it takes even more insight, and creativity to think of new ways to describe and define by either name or action, acts of romance.

If Susan did this during the "lean" years for her. At least she was doing something creative and not destructive.

I've met her on many occasions, and find her reasoning, and politics to be very refreshing. We need people like her in these positions that know how to think and create solutions outside the box of conventional wisdom and be effective at the same time, and be able to express themselves in a way that doesn't make me go to sleep!

I doubt we'll see anything mentioned in any reports from her office concerning the plight of "Lance" and "Holly Goodbody" in regards to the current task at hand in her professional life. But its good to know she's not afraid to address things like this in her past either.

Good for her! I'm glad the dunderheads in the liberal party have to stoop so low to think this revelation is going to do them any good in November.

I say keep it coming Dems! At least your consistent, pathetic but consistent.

Posted by: boyo at Tue Aug 1 08:59:30 2006 (iL9qH)

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The dictator in Havana has given power to his brother because he is having abdominal surgery that could have a long convalesence.

Cuban President Fidel Castro was undergoing intestinal surgery and provisionally handed over power in the Communist island nation to his younger brother Raul, according to a statement read on Cuban television Monday night.

Fidel Castro, 79, has led Cuba since a 1959 revolution. Raul Castro, 75, is the first vice president of the country, and as such, the designated successor to his brother.

Castro's secretary, Carlos Balenciago, read a letter he said was from the president in which he said stress had forced him into surgery and that he would be in bed for several weeks after the operation was complete. Castro turns 80 on August 13.

Raul Castro also assumes control over the armed forces and the leadership of the Communist Party, according to the statement.

The State Department reacted with caution.

White House spokesman Peter Watkins said: ''We are monitoring the situation. We can't speculate on Castro's health, but we continue to work for the day of Cuba's freedom.'' The State Department declined to comment Monday night.

In Florida, the Cuban community has greeted this news as any lover of freedom must.

The announcement drew cheering in the streets in Miami. People waved Cuban flags on Little Havana's Calle Ocho, shouting "Cuba, Cuba, Cuba," hoping that the end is near for the man most of them consider to be a ruthless dictator. There were hugs, cheers and dancing as drivers honked their horns. Many of them fled the communist island or have parents and grandparents who did.

Don't get well soon, Fidel. In fact, don't get well at all -- do the Cuban people a favor and die on the table so that they can hang your putrid corpse from a lamp post by its heels, like the Italians did to Mussolini.

Babalu Blog has a running post on this most recend deathwatch, noting that we have seen this before.

¡Cuba Libre!

Posted by: Greg at 06:15 PM | Comments (5) | Add Comment
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Or leeches.

What else can you call such folks, who could work but don't want to settle for anything less than their previous job and level of earnings? I can accept living off your assets, but this is intolerable.

But the fastest growing source of help is a patchwork system of government support, the main one being federal disability insurance, which is financed by Social Security payroll taxes. The disability stipends range up to $1,000 a month and, after the first two years, Medicare kicks in, giving access to health insurance that for many missing men no longer comes with the low-wage jobs available to them.

No federal entitlement program is growing as quickly, with more than 6.5 million men and women now receiving monthly disability payments, up from 3 million in 1990. About 25 percent of the missing men are collecting this insurance.

The ailments that qualify them are usually real, like back pain, heart trouble or mental illness. But in some cases, the illnesses are not so serious that they would prevent people from working if a well-paying job with benefits were an option.

The disability program, in turn, is an obstacle to working again. Taking a job holds the risk of demonstrating that one can earn a living and is thus no longer entitled to the monthly payments. But staying out of work has consequences. Skills deteriorate, along with the desire for a paying job and the habits that it requires.

“The longer you stay on disability benefits,” said Martin H. Gerry, deputy commissioner for disability and income security at the Social Security Administration, “the longer you’re out of the work force, the less likely you are to go back to work.”

Not only that, but it becomes harder for those who really are disabled to gain benefits.

Posted by: Greg at 03:22 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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I was disturbed that Israel would give Hezbollah a chance to recover, reposition, and rearm when I heard about the agreement to stop the bombing for 48 hours.

Israel agreed to suspend air attacks in southern Lebanon for 48 hours after one of its raids on the southern town of Qana left dozens of civilians, many of them children, dead on Sunday, the bloodiest day of the conflict so far.

* * *

J. Adam Ereli, the deputy spokesman for the State Department, which announced the 48-hour pause in strikes, said Israel would use the suspension in bombing to coordinate with the United Nations safe passage for 24 hours for residents who wish to leave southern Lebanon.

Israeli officials said nothing publicly about the suspension early Monday, and Mr. Ereli noted that Israel reserved the right to strike at militants preparing attacks against it.

An Israeli official in the prime minister’s office, who did not want to be identified, simply confirmed the State Department statement, saying, “Israel will be suspending aerial activity over southern Lebanon for 48 hours until the end of the Israeli investigation into Qana.”

At midnight Sunday, Israeli aircraft hit targets in eastern Lebanon, a spokesman for the Israeli Army said Monday morning. The suspension of airstrikes went into effect two hours later, he added.

It is pretty clear what did not happen -- Israel did not target that building and did not intentionally kill civilians. It is also pretty clear what did happen -- in violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention, Hezbollah operated from in the midst of what the convention calls "protected persons" in order to use them as human shields.. Somehow, though, those who demand that the US abide by the strictedst possible interpretation of those documents (and even exceed those standards) have failed to condemn Hezbollah for failing to live up to those same standards of civilized behavior.

Fortunately, Israel has not abandoned all military common sense.

Israeli warplanes did conduct air strikes this morning, but army officials said they were in support of ground forces and so not covered by the 48-hour halt.

And IsraelÂ’s defense minister, Amir Peretz, made it clear in a speech to the Knesset today that Israel intends to continue its ground operations against Hezbollah positions in southern Lebanon.

“We must not agree to a ceasefire that would be implemented immediately,’’ Mr. Peretz said. “If an immediate cease-fire is declared, the extremists will rear their heads anew.’’

So let's make the situation clear -- while there is a pause in bombing generally, bombing in support of ground forces will continue in order to continue to purge the jihadi swine from southern Lebanon. Israel rightly recognizes that a cease-fire at this time is not in its strategic interest, and so will not accept any proposal that stops the fighting without ensuring Israeli security.

Posted by: Greg at 03:12 AM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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