Houston Wets Itself Over Glorified Pipe

Read this story and you'd think that Houston Police ran across a terrorist with heavy-duty, anti-tank weaponry.

It isn't until you get to almost the end of the article that they finally reveal that the "rocket launcher" is nothing more or less than a fiberglass tube.

Prosecutors said there are no state charges for having the unarmed launcher or possessing Jihadist writings, unless they contain some type of threat.

The former director of Houston's FBI office said rocket launchers can be dangerous if they're in the wrong hands.

"I don't know any other use for those weapons except in combat," Don Clark said. "I've had them in combat, used them in combat. That's what they are used for."

The weapon is the warhead and rocket; the tube is a single-use disposable item.

So one of two things happened here. This jihadi wannabe acquired a used (and therefore useless) AT-4 tube (probably via an online aution like this one), or he bought the Airsoft version.

I'm quite sure it can be terrifying. It just simply isn't a weapon, no matter how much drama the media attempted to stir up here to justify the amont of time they spent on this story.

All Charges Dropped Against Blackwater Guards in Nisoor Square Shooting

I'm sure that liberal heads are just spinning as they try to come up with a convoluted explanation of how Dick Cheney, Karl Rove, and Eric Prince kidnapped and waterboarded the judge's schnauzer to let this happen, but the simple fact is that this prosecution was always more suspect than the media let on. The investigation devolved into a politically-driven witch hunt before the echoes of the last shots went silent, with the Iraqi government seemingly destroying evidence at the scene and U.S. presecutors seemingly more driven by a desire to find a scapegoat than to determine the facts of the case.

And now it looks like that pig-headed mentality did the case in:

In a 90-page opinion, U.S. District Judge Ricardo M. Urbina ruled that the government violated the guards' rights by using their immunized statements to help the investigation. The ruling comes after a lengthy set of hearings that examined whether federal prosecutors and agents improperly used such statements that the guards gave to State Department investigators following the shooting on Sept. 16, 2007.

"The explanations offered by prosecutors and investigators in an attempt to justify their actions and persuade the court that they did not use the defendants' compelled testimony were all too often contradictory, unbelievable and lacking in credibility," Urbina wrote.

I don't think that this dismissal means that these contractors were necessarily innocent, but the political focus of the investigation means we long ago lost any chance there was of ever determining if there was any justification for the guards to open and then maintain their fire.

Would-Be Robber Killed With Concealed Handgun

It looks like someone made the wrong choice of victim at the ATM of my old hometown bank:

An off-duty Pitt County Sheriff's deputy on Wednesday night shot and killed a man who reportedly tried to rob him at an ATM on Charles Boulevard, the Greenville Police Department reported.

The deputy, whose name has not been released, was at the automatic teller machine at the State Employees Credit Union, 2296 Charles Blvd. when the incident occured, according to a news release issued at 1:30 a.m. Thursday.

I hope that the deputy that killed this armed theif is able to deal with the trauma that typically occurs following a shooting.

It is worth noting that the deputy was off-duty which made his appearance no different than the estimated 160,000 North Carolinians with concealed carry permits.

Obama Finally Issued First Veto

Predictably, it doesn't matter.

At this point the great difficulty in describing the Obama Presidency is determining whether the theme is that of a tragi-comedy or a horror film.

Finnish Mall Shot Up, Shooter Commits Suicide

Via my friend Jose Guardia comes news that a man walked into a mall in Finland's second largest city and killed four shoppers.

His body, and body of his wife, were later found:

Police say they found a body in the apartment of the suspected gunman, identified as 43-year-old Ibrahim Shkupolli.

His ex-wife has also been found dead in an apartment in Espoo, raising the total dead including the gunman to six.

According to Yle, Shkupolli used a 9-millimeter caliber hand gun.

Hundreds of people in the mall were panicked by the shots, witnesses said.

It wouldn't be surprising if Shkupolli murdered his wife over some sort of domestic dispute, decided that his life was over, and went to the mall to ruin as many lives as possible before returning to his apartment to commit suicide to avoid the consequences of his actions. Like many mass shooters, Shkupolli took the coward's way out.

People will not doubt focus on the fact that Shkupoli's first name is Ibrahim, and wonder if this was yet another case of a Muslim going on jihad. I suppose that is possible, but it doesn't seem likely based upon early reports.

Limbaugh in HI Hospital With Chest Pains

Via KITV:

Conservative radio talk host Rush Limbaugh was rushed to a Honolulu hospital on Wednesday afternoon with chest pains, sources told KITV.

Paramedics responded to the call at 2:41 p.m. at the Kahala Hotel and Resort.

Limbaugh suffered from chest pains, sources said. Paramedics treated him and took him to Queen's Medical Center in serious condition.

Sure, now Obama's motorcade isn't available as an ambulance service...

Update: Limbaugh now resting comfortably.

Obama's TSA Finally Going After Real Terrorist Threat

Which of course means those individuals that highlight the Administration's incompetence, in this instance, travel bloggers (via Instapundit).

You Know You're Screwed When Even Your Whores Stop Taking Your Calls

While the competition to verbally fellate Barack Obama has been intense in the op-ed section since he first started his presidential run, the various staffers of the New York Times have always been among the most reliable. From Krugman, Rich, Freidman, and Douthat, etc. when it came to the man who would become President, they always gave good ed. It is, after all, the service for which they are employed.

So it was a bit shocking to see one of the premier courtesans of the Times, Maureen Dowd, finally rip into the Administration for one of its characteristic failures:

If we can’t catch a Nigerian with a powerful explosive powder in his oddly feminine-looking underpants and a syringe full of acid, a man whose own father had alerted the U.S. Embassy in Nigeria, a traveler whose ticket was paid for in cash and who didn’t check bags, whose visa renewal had been denied by the British, who had studied Arabic in Al Qaeda sanctuary Yemen, whose name was on a counterterrorism watch list, who can we catch?

[snip]

Before he left for vacation, Obama tried to shed his Spock mien and juice up the empathy quotient on jobs. But in his usual inspiring/listless cycle, he once more appeared chilly in his response to the chilling episode on Flight 253, issuing bulletins through his press secretary and hitting the links. At least you have to seem concerned.

[snip]

Citing the attempt of the Nigerian's father to warn U.S. authorities six months ago, the president intoned: "It now appears that weeks ago this information was passed to a component of our intelligence community but was not effectively distributed so as to get the suspect's name on a no-fly list."

In his detached way, Spock was letting us know that our besieged starship was not speeding into a safer new future, and that we still have to be scared.

Heck of a job, Barry.

Now, if only Krugman will admit Obama is destroying the economy...

Question His Judgment

Mr. Obama, Dr. Whitaker and others had been golfing at the Luana Hills Country Club for about an hour when they suddenly jumped into the presidential motorcade and made a dramatic, high-speed departure. The unexpected move triggered concerns about whether the president was injured, particularly after an ambulance with flashing lights sped to the compound. The White House at first did not explain the incident out of concern for the privacy of the Whitakers, but later sent Mr. Burton to tell reporters the first family was uninjured.

The ambulance left after about 15 minutes at the compound, followed by a black sedan. Mr. Obama returned via motorcade to the golf course. An administration official said no stitches were needed.

Our President risked his own safety, the safety of his family, his friends and the lives of the Secret Service staff for an impromptu dash across the island so that a friend could attend to a very minor injury. I wonder if this egress was high speed, and if any side streets were hastily closed with seconds to spare so that the Presidential motorcade could pass by unimpeded.

I wonder if local police officers placed their lives on the line to race out in front and provide security. Officers have died escorting Hillary Clinton and George Bush, but we begrudging accept the lives lost as the cost of protecting those running for President and those currently in office.

Nobody elected Erik Whitaker, or his son. Barack Obama put God-knows how many lives at risk and abused his office to spare his friend a few minutes of travel time and uncertainly... all for a trifling boo-boo. It is a case of unnecessary dramatics, of tremendous effort and expense, wasted needlessly, when a less rushed and practical approach would have been both less dangerous and more productive.

But that's becoming the signature of his entire term in office, isn't it?

Obama Surrenders U.S. Sovereignty

Barack Obama quietly issued an executive order before Christmas that gives an international police force extraordinary new rights inside the United States. The most radical President ever elected has summarily given the International Criminal Police Organization (INTERPOL) the same diplomatic immunities granted nations, rendering them virtually immune from U.S. law and beyond the reach of our own law enforcement agencies.

But the powers granted to INTERPOL seems to be only a first step, as experts draw the logical conclusion that Obama is on a path to damn U.S. servicemen and politicians to the whims of a corrupt International Criminal Court.

Read it all at Pajamas Media, and be sure to follow the links.

Terrorist Not Only One With Pants On Fire

I'e been offline spending time with family over the past few days and so I'm behind the curve on the story of the terrorist that tried to detonate a bomb on a flight about to land in Detroit. The attempted detonation of a PETN device with a nitroglycerine detonator failed. Instead of bringing down the airliner, the explosive misfired and burned instead of exploding. A Dutch passenger is credited with being a hero for his actions in the immediate wake of the failed attack for subduing the would-be terrorist, but the simple fact of the matter is that if the device had functioned properly, the plane would have likely gone down, killing hundreds. Quite simply, God and bad chemistry was on our side.

It was therefore quite revolting to see DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano claim that "the system worked." The system was an utter and unmitigated failure.

The system allowed one of the most dangerous explosives known to man—one known to be a favorite of al Qaeda—aboard a flight into the United States in sufficient quantity to destroy a plane in midair. The device used one of the oldest known and most common explosives in the world as a trigger as well. As for the bomber himself, he was a known al Qaeda affiiliate who had been turned in by his own father for his extremism.

In what way, Janet Napolitano, did Homeland Security "work" when it let a known terrorist fly into the United States with a bomb strapped to his body?

The simple fact of the matter is that our security measures failed once again, and the DHS secretary is trying to cover for a group that repeatedly fail in their primary mission, while wasting time and energy and focus in attempts to demonize her political opponents.

The DHS failed, and failed miserably. Perhaps if they spent more time attempting to hunt down terrorists, and less time trying to smear Americans that don't like Barack Obama, terrorists like Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab wouldn't be able to make it onto US-bound flights in the first place.

Jonah Goldberg wants Napolitano fired, but I'm not sure what purpose that would serve. Looking at this Administration's raft of failed and marginally competent appointees, do you really expect that any replacement nominee would be any less ideologically-drive or more effective?

Merry Christmas

I have a hyper toddler and her older sister raring to go downstairs and tear into their presents, so I'll keep this short and sweet.

May your Christmas be magical and filled with happiness.

Defining "Dictators"

The final hurdle to passing the Democratic Senate's version of government health care rationing is a challenge by Republicans that a requirement in both the House and Senate versions that Americans must buy government-mandated insurance is unconstitutional.

Conservative critics contend that the provision violates the Constitution's "takings clause," which says "private property [cannot] be taken for public use, without just compensation."

Democrats counter that the mandate is necessary to make the planned overhaul of the health-care system work, and ensure that as many people as possible participate in the system. Under the Senate bill, individuals who don't purchase coverage would face a financial penalty up to $750.

Democrats say the courts have given Congress wide authority to impose rules under its powers to regulate interstate commerce.

"We feel very sound in our position," Mr. Reid said.

Interesting. Reid doesn't even attempt to claim that his health care bill is constitutional, just that people must be forced to purchase it or the scheme won't work (utterly leaving out the fact that no large-scale government-run program has ever worked, fiscally). He only comes as close as saying that he has his bets on the courts allowing such a scheme, based upon hotly-disputed precedents.

Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, Barack OBama and all their radical allies in the Democratic Party are literally declaring that they have the power to force you to buy a specific product or a specific service. The only qualifier—according to Reid himself—is that the product or service must be necessary according to the arbitrary and capricious decisions of Democratic policymakers.

They are in word and deed dictators, dictating what we must buy in order to support and increase their control over us. This isn't the American dream. It is the beginning of an American nightmare.

"F" Obama: Is Race The Only Thing Keeping This President From Being Rated The Worst Ever?

No, you won't see it on White House organ MSNBC, the dinosaur media, or CNN, but the British have noticed that despite the fact our arrogant neophyte gives himself a grade of "B+" for his first year in office, the American people gave him an F:

Barack Obama gave himself a B+ on Oprah Winfrey's White House Christmas Special on ABC, but the American public is far less generous. The latest influential Rasmussen Daily Presidential Tracking Poll of likely US voters gives Obama a thumping 56 percent disapproval rating – an F grade by any measure. 46 percent strongly disapprove of the president’s job performance, while just 25 percent strongly approve. That’s a Presidential Approval Index rating of -21 percentage points, a staggering figure for a president just 11 months into his term of office.

These are historically low approval ratings for a US president, that concur with those released by several other pollsters, including NBC News/Wall Street Journal, who recently reported a 47 percent approval for Obama, and Quinnipiac and Marist, both at 46 percent.

The article then goes on to cite specific examples of just how bad fairs in comparison to other post-war Presidents (hint: not good), but what was really intriguing were the comments associated with the article.

The Telegraph is a UK paper and presumably most of the comments are therefore left by Brits and they are excoriating Obama's Presidency.

Among the more interesting claims was this one:

It is really far worse when you look at the breakdowns. Obama's STRONGLY disapproval is over 52% among the crucial swing independent voters and his strongly approve is only 47% among Democrats. When you consider that 98% of blacks still approve of his performance, and if they weren’t basically making their judgement on race alone, his actual approval amongst non-racially biased voters is close to a dismal 40%.

Are there any polling experts out there able to pass judgment on the accuracy of that claim?

Sometimes You Feel Like a Nut...

...And if so, this lady is for you:

Kristy Lee Roshia, 35, was charged with threatening a family member of the president and assaulting a federal agent after being arrested Saturday less than two miles from the Kailua home where the Obama family planned to stay during a holiday visit later this week.

Roshia called the Secret Service's Boston office last month and told a receptionist, "I will kill Michelle Obama" and "I will kill Marines," according to a Secret Service affidavit.

During the same call, she said she would "blow away" Michelle Obama, the document states.

A message left at the federal public defender's office in Honolulu was not immediately returned.

Roshia has a history of leaving rambling messages and sending poems, love letters and photographs of herself to the Secret Service, according to the affidavit.

As early as 2004, she told the agency that "although her mission is to assassinate the president, she has no desire to hurt him," the document states.

As Obama wasn't a blip on anyone's radar in 2004, we can only assume she was sending death threats throughout the Bush Presidency as well, and that the Secret Service simply didn't consider her any sort of a credible threat until she traveled to Hawaii.

Build-A-Bear Tries to Terrify Kids With Climate Change in Cartoon

Be sure to read the entire article by Maura Flynn at Big Government for the background and the transcript, but if you want to cut to the case, jump to 1:07 in the video below.

Any company that tries to scare the crap out of kids and put the thought in their heads that Christmas might not be coming because of [insert cause here] deserves to go out of business, just on the general principle that it isn't okay to terrorize children.

If you're irritated about this—and I can't imagine any reason any parent wouldn't be—you can dash off an email to the company by clicking this link.

Americans Strongly Opposed to Taxpayer-Funded Abortion in Democrat's Senate Bill

The American people overwhelming don't want to pay for abortions with the tax dollars Democratic Senators want to extort from them, a fact reflected in the 72 - 23 split in the latest Quinnipiac University national poll.

As the Senate prepares to vote on health care reform, American voters "mostly disapprove" of the plan 53 - 36 percent and disapprove 56 - 38 percent of President Barack Obama's handling of the health care issue, according to a Quinnipiac University poll released today.

Voters also oppose 72 - 23 percent using any public money in the health care overhaul to pay for abortions, the independent Quinnipiac (KWIN-uh-pe-ack) University poll finds.

[snip]

"While the Senate leadership reportedly has the votes to pass a health care overhaul plan this week, outside the Beltway there appears to be weak support, both to what voters understand as the plan, and the need to pass that plan now," said Brown. "Although a small majority favors abortion rights, allowing the use of public money for the procedure under a national health care plan, which has been a matter of some dispute in both houses of Congress, is extremely unpopular."

A super-majority of Americans do not want to pay for procedures that many equate to the murder of an innocent child. If Democrats continue to try to ram through such heinous legislation against the will of the American people, they have only themselves to blame for all they will lose as a result.

Camouflage FAIL

The British are breaking out a new camouflage pattern for the first time in 40 years, as their standard issue DPM (Disrupted Pattern Material) isn't faring well in the varied terrain of Afghanistan, where soldiers have to shift from sun-washed arid desert backdrops to the deeper and darker colors of lush green river valleys within the same mission. Instead of helping hide British troops, their current uniforms were making them stand out. The new uniforms, however, won't hide the poor material support British soldiers are otherwise receiving.

The new pattern is based upon Crye Multicam, a pattern originally developed for the U.S Army that was shelved in favor of the digital Universal Camouflage Pattern (UCP) currently being worn by the Army... which is the same pattern that is failing American soldiers in Afghanistan.

Now the U.S Army is taking a second look at Multicam, along with different and darker version of the current UCP.

My advice?

Better start stocking up on the discount flecktarn camo from your local Army/Navy store, before Uncle Sam recognizes the deal and buys it all up.

Tyranny in the Senate

Via the John McCormack and Erik Ercikson this morning comes the disturbing news that the Democrat-controlled Senate is moving—unconstitutionally—to impede or entirely block any future Congress from repealing the Independent Medicare Advisory Board—the death panel Democrats claim doesn't exist—created by Harry Reid's health care rationing bill.

The language of Section 3403 seems rather explicit:

SUBSECTION.—It shall not be in order in the Senate or the House of Representatives to consider any bill, resolution, amendment, or conference report that would repeal or otherwise change this subsection.

Ed Morrissey's take is that Congress lacks the Constitutional authority to bind the decisions future Congresses can make, which would including passing new laws, amending existing laws, or repealing laws. Reid is demanding not just power over the current Congress, but any future Congress as well.

Democrats deny that the death panels exist, but then take explicit steps that undermine the Constitution to make them unaccountable and untouchable.

Erickson says in his post that we are no longer a nation of laws, and cites the Declaration of Independence.

When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We are not yet to the point where a rebellion against or a separation from the current government is necessary, but those in power seem amazingly fixated on pushing this nation towards having to make that decision.

Another Police Ambush in Washington State

Here we go again:

Two Pierce County deputies were "basically ambushed" Monday night when responding to a domestic violence call near Eatonville, about an hour south of Seattle, a sheriff's spokesman said.

It was the third apparent police ambush in Western Washington since Oct. 31. Eight deputies or officers were shot in those cases; five fatally. Investigators say the incidents are unrelated.

Police said the latest shooter, identified as David Edward Crable, 35, was shot and killed during the incident, which happened shortly after 9 p.m. in the 34300 block of Tanwax Court East.

One deputy was flown to Harborview Medical Center in Seattle and was in critical condition Tuesday morning. The other was rushed to Madigan Army Medical Center and was upgraded to serious condition early Tuesday, Sheriff's spokesman Ed Troyer said.

Some of the officers that worked the case of four officers murdered in a coffee shop ambush several weeks ago are also working this crime scene.

In sharp contrast to the coffee shop ambush, however, in this instance the daughter and brother of the shooter apparently risked their lives to drag one of the wounded deputies to safety and begin first aid. Family members and friends of Maurice Clemmons helped him evade law enforcement even after they knew he gunned down officers in cold blood.

Note: I removed the word "Fatal" from the headline. While the suspect that ambushed the officers did in fact die during the attack, the headline could easily have misconstrued as meaning that the law enforcement officers seriously injured in this attack were killed at that time.

How Dare You Wish Our Klansman to Die! Die, Rethuglican!

It seems our friends on the political left are all but soiling themselves over a post I wrote last night, where I wished West Virginia Senator Robert Byrd to do his nation a favor and go into the light before the Senate votes to destroy the American health care system.

Matt Yglesias seems to think my musings are on par with that of a senator, and his friends Andrew Sullivan are attempting to claim that I speak for the entire political right. Not to be out-done, Larisa Alexandrovna chose to weave in a comparison to a anti-gay dog-park stalkerette in an effort to demonize Christians as well.

While I'm flattered by their attention, I suspect they've overestimated my political clout or my ability to accurately serve as a totem of whichever particular group they'd like to demonize today.

I take full responsibility for posting a blog entry that calls for Senator Robert Byrd to die at a politically-convenient moment, and I won't attempt to walk it back and pretend that I said or meant anything else. I still would find it quite convenient if the senior Senator from Pangea expired prior to the Senate Democratic plot to force through rushed, potentially catastrophic legislation.

But much to the (assured) dismay of of these critics and others, I can only claim to speak for myself.

Likewise, I will not assume that the dozens of comments and emails sent to me by the readers of these sites are representative of the sentiments that these bloggers would publicly profess.

I've found the enraged responses of some of my detractors (primarily in the form of emails and comments) to be mildly amusing. By saying that they wish me to die for posting my preference for Byrd's timely demise, they've exposed the fact that they are entirely comfortable with calling for someone's death over politics.

They just lack the intellectual honesty to admit it.

Is There a Breaking Point?

To say that the American political landscape has become highly polarized is to describe our nation's current state of affairs mildly. Debates over health care, climate change, the economy, terrorism and war have revealed increasingly great divides not just between the radicals on the left and right, but the vast rift between the citizenry and a political class that seems to fancy itself as a permanent ruling class.

The debate over health care is just one example how radically different the left and right view the essence of the United States. The widening gap between the will of people of this nation and actions of our elected representatives is an example of this gaping void.

Conservatives, moderates, and independents are overwhelmingly against the current rushed scheme of Obamacare, where votes are purchased with publicly-funded bribes, with one senator reaching into our wallets to pay off the vote of another. The American people wold rather no vote pass than a rushed hidden bill that no Senator has read, but the political class doesn't care. The big debate in Congress and the Senate between Democrats and Republicans isn't specifically against stealing our tax dollars, but instead over how much to steal, and how long they think they can tax us before we break as a nation or revolt.

We all read blogs (or you wouldn't be here) and follow news stories from the major media, many of which have comment sections. Increasingly, calls to violence and cries for revolt are becoming more commonplace. People rightly fear a federal government that seems to be usurping our freedoms at a great pace, and with a growing appetite.

The very government feeding on this corruption has responded by labeling those who feel this way as fringe extremists, and attempts to marginalize them. It appears that the rhetoric will only get worse on both sides... but will it stop at rhetoric?

As we are all well aware, there has been a tremendous surge in the sale of firearms and ammunition that started in mid to late 2008. Part of the reason for the surge is a growing desire for personal security at a time where the economy is faltering and criminal activity is on the rise. But a significant number of the firearms being purchased—and much of the ammunition being hoarded—are potentially military in nature. Semi-automatic rifles based upon the world's most popular military arms are sold out in many locations, and those stores with access to AR-15 and AK-47 clones are busy filling orders for customers that don't even seem to blink at the premium prices these firearms demand.

In a time where the real unemployment rate is north of 17% (and the official number is still more than 10%), people are buying weapons that regularly approach or exceed $1,000, only to follow that up by stockpiling thousand-round cases of ammunition. It is a pattern that has continued now for more than a year, and shows only little sign of slowing.

Americans are armed to the teeth, are increasingly marginalized by their government, and rightly fearful of the sweeping changes being pushed with a breakneck pace by legislators who don't even bother to read the massive and costly plans for encroachment and expansion they pass. Presently, Democrats are attempting to seize one-sixth of the U.S. economy and put it under government control. Could this massive power grab of the health care system by Democrats trigger violence? Could the economy-killing cap-and-trade legislation become a trigger? Something else?

The simple fact is that it is almost impossible to know the future. No one understands beforehand the precise moments where grumbling dissent becomes open revolt, governments collapse, and nations fall. Nor can anyone predict what kind of state and governance would arise in the aftermath of such an upheaval.

We simply don't know if we are close to a breaking point, because such events are rarely predictable. What we do know is that governments that begin to treat armed citizens as servants are typically faced with the choice of disarming them or being deposed by them. It's been quite a few years since blood has been shed is a major revolt on American soil, but it has happened, and there is no reason to think it will not eventually happen again.

When. Why. How... We simply don't know. But we do know in our guts as a nation we are flowing towards a confrontation, and we can only hope that it stops with a war of words, and the use of ballots instead of bullets.

Wanted: Dead, or Alive?

If they can't tell the dead from the living, can the anti-gun Violence Policy Center be trusted to get anything right?

In a word, no.

Note: This article was written Dec. 15, and the VPC web site was updated again December 16. They have new information... but can you trust it?

All I Want Is A Byrd Dropping For Christmas

Senator Robert Byrd (D-WV) has seen far better days, and is often little more than a warm body when he is helped into the Senate. Granted, lucidity and coherence is not a priority among Senate Democrats, but Byrd is an embarrassment even for a party that regular drafts the imaginary or dead to vote.

Robert Byrd has been around a very long time, and his many decades of service have made West Virginia a wonderful state in which to manufacture methamphetamine or frame the locals for murder*. But it's time for Senator to do the right thing, and expire.

It isn't too much to ask for Byrd to step off for that great klavern in the sky before the Senate vote that may force this nation to accept government-rationed health care. Even a nice coma would do.

Without his frail, Gollum-like body being wheeled into the Senate's chambers to cast the deciding vote, the Senate cannot curse our children and grandchildren with crushing debt and rationed, substandard healthcare.

I suppose some will be shocked and appalled that I'd wish for the former kleagle to die on command. I'd remind them that the party wheeling in a near invalid to vote in favor of this unread monstrosity of a bill is the one that should feel shame.

12-21 Update: Dana Milbank of the Washington Post notes I'm not the only person to think this way with the lede of his most recent op-ed:

Going into Monday morning's crucial Senate vote on health-care legislation, Republican chances for defeating the bill had come down to a last, macabre hope. They needed one Democratic senator to die -- or at least become incapacitated.

At 4 p.m. Sunday afternoon -- nine hours before the 1 a.m. vote that would effectively clinch the legislation's passage -- Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) went to the Senate floor to propose a prayer. "What the American people ought to pray is that somebody can't make the vote tonight," he said. "That's what they ought to pray."

It was difficult to escape the conclusion that Coburn was referring to the 92-year-old, wheelchair-bound Sen. Robert Byrd (D-W.V.) who has been in and out of hospitals and lay at home ailing. It would not be easy for Byrd to get out of bed in the wee hours with deep snow on the ground and ice on the roads -- but without his vote, Democrats wouldn't have the 60 they needed.

Final Update: Some amusing revelations about our liberal visitors.

* As noted by a commenter, the death of the census worker that left-wing bloggers blamed on right-wing extremists (but that was actually a suicide banking on the predictable left-wing hysteria for an insurance payoff) occurred in Kentucky, not West Virginia. My apologies.

Milblogs Go Silent [Bumped: New Posts Below Until Saturday]

On Wednesday 16 December 2009, many milblogs -- including This Ain't Hell, From My Position, Blackfive, Miss Ladybug, Boston Maggie, Grim's Hall, and those participating in the Wednesday Hero program -- are going silent for the day. Some are choosing to go silent for a longer period of time.

The reason for this is two-fold. First, milblogs are facing an increasingly hostile environment from within the military. While senior leadership has embraced blogging and social media, many field grade officers and senior NCOs do not embrace the concept. From general apathy in not wanting to deal with the issue to outright hositility to it, many commands are not only failing to support such activities, but are aggressively acting against active duty milbloggers, milspouses, and others. The number of such incidents appears to be growing, with milbloggers receiving reprimands, verbal and written, not only for their activities but those of spouses and supporters.

The catalyst has been the treatment of milblogger C.J. Grisham of A Soldier's Perspective (http://www.soldiersperspective.us/). C.J. has earned accolades and respect, from the White House on down for his honest, and sometimes blunt, discussion of issues -- particularly PTSD. In the last few months, C.J. has seen an issue with a local school taken to his command who failed to back him, and has even seen his effort to deal with PTSD, and lead his men in same by example, used against him as a part of this. Ultimately, C.J. has had to sell his blog to help raise funds for his defense in this matter.

An excellent story on the situation with C.J. can be found at Military Times:
http://www.armytimes.com/offduty/technology/offduty_blogger_120809/
While there have been new developments, the core problem remains, and C.J. is having to raise funds to cover legal expenses to protect both his good name and his career.

One need only look at the number of blogs by active duty military in combat zones and compare it to just a few years ago to see the chilling effect that is taking place.

Milblogs have been a vital link in getting accurate news and information about the military, and military operations, to the public. They have provided vital context and analysis on issues critical to operations and to the informed electorate critical to the Republic.

On Wednesday 16 December, readers will have the chance to imagine a world without milblogs, and to do something about it. Those participating are urging their readers to contact their elected representatives in Congress, and to let their opinions be known to them and to other leaders in Washington.

Some milblogs will remain silent for several days; some just for the day. All have agreed to keep the post about the silence and C.J. at the top of their blogs until Friday 18 December.

The issues go beyond C.J., and deserve careful consideration and discussion. We hope that you will cover this event, and explore the issues that lie at the heart of the matter. Contact the milbloggers in your area or that you know, and hear the story that lies within.

A Partial List of Participating Blogs:

This Ain't Hell http://thisainthell.us/blog/
Boston Maggie http://bostonmaggie.blogspot.com/
Blackfive http://www.blackfive.net/main/
Miss Ladybug http://miss-ladybug.blogspot.com
Drunken Wisdom http://beerbrains.com/
Grim's Hall http://grimbeorn.blogspot.com/
Frommyposition http://frommyposition.com/
CDR Salamander http://cdrsalamander.blogspot.com

Grisham Legal Fund
c/o Redstone Federal Credit Union
220 Wynn Drive
Huntsville, AL 35893

Please write "Grisham Legal Fund" in the memo line if you use this option.

Milblogs have been a vital link in getting accurate news and information about the military, and military operations, to you. Today, many milblogs are gone and others are under attack from within and without. Today, you have the chance to imagine a world without milblogs, and to do something about it. Make your voice heard by writing your congressional representatives and others, and by making donations as you see fit.

The battle for freedom of speech and the marketplace of ideas is fought on many fronts and in many ways. Without your help, the battle may well be lost.

Mr Wolf
Blackfive.net

There are good reasons for the military to restrict what milbloggers post—kissing up to small-minded, small-time local politicians isn't one of them. Make sure you read the entire story, and if you can help Sgt. Grisham in his fight please donate via the PayPal link at Blackfive.

It Is Time To Treat Climategate As A Crime

A Russian claim that the Hadley Center for Climate Change tampered with Russian climate data—which would gut the validity of the data provided by the CRU and NOAA/NASA, which was used in turn by the United Nations International Panel on Climate Change—was released during a most contentious time during the Copenhagen conference, with the obvious intent of causing the widest possible damage.

That doesn't mean in any way that the claim is anything other than accurate.

...On Tuesday, the Moscow-based Institute of Economic Analysis (IEA) issued a report claiming that the Hadley Center for Climate Change based at the headquarters of the British Meteorological Office in Exeter (Devon, England) had probably tampered with Russian-climate data.

The IEA believes that Russian meteorological-station data did not substantiate the anthropogenic global-warming theory. Analysts say Russian meteorological stations cover most of the country's territory, and that the Hadley Center had used data submitted by only 25% of such stations in its reports. Over 40% of Russian territory was not included in global-temperature calculations for some other reasons, rather than the lack of meteorological stations and observations.
The data of stations located in areas not listed in the Hadley Climate Research Unit Temperature UK (HadCRUT) survey often does not show any substantial warming in the late 20th century and the early 21st century.

The HadCRUT database includes specific stations providing incomplete data and highlighting the global-warming process, rather than stations facilitating uninterrupted observations.

On the whole, climatologists use the incomplete findings of meteorological stations far more often than those providing complete observations.
IEA analysts say climatologists use the data of stations located in large populated centers that are influenced by the urban-warming effect more frequently than the correct data of remote stations.

In short, the Russians are claiming that the Hadley CRU cherry-picked and manipulated data, essentially faking the appearance of temperature change across Russian territory.

This seems entirely consistent with previous revelations discovered when the East Anglia CRU hack triggered Climategate by showing behind the scenes attempts by climatologists and their computer programmers to manipulate data and then cover up both their manipulations and real but conflicting data.

If the Russia's can prove their claims, then this will be another compelling argument that the climatological community is part of the largest scientific fraud in human history. It would also mean that these same untrustworthy scientists have destroyed the credibility of the scientific community, and no doubt severely undercut what we know or think we know about climate change.

Quite simply, we can't trust any of their claims at this point. It seems the claim that man is responsible for global warming or climate change is utterly without credible scientific merit at this point because of the politicization of the process. We simply don't know—can't know—what our impact is on the climate because of their corruption of the data.

I have yet to find anyone with a solid idea of how long it will take to regenerate accurate, scientifically-valid data, and once that data is compiled, it is going to now be a very difficult sell to a world that has seen the scientific community destroy their credibility.

James Delingpole notes that if the Russians are right, "the entire global temperature record used by the IPCC to inform world government policy is a crock."

Thanks to significant willful fraud, we know know that billions"perhaps trillions—of dollars wee about to we wasted, the economies of nations crippled, and the freedoms of billions of people usurped or curtailed.

This apparently widespread fraud, collusion, attempted coverup and attempts at political manipulation should be regarded and legally viewed as treason. If it can be proven that any individual scientist or group of scientists willfully corrupted the data, they should face jail time up to and including life in prison. If they willfully corrupted the data and then took steps in a conspiracy to hide their manipulation, up to or including destroying the real data, the doctored data, or their models, they should face the possibility of execution. Any politician, policymaker, or advocate that was privy to these schemes should also face the same, sobering sentences.

I'm not overstating the seriousness of these crimes. The climate change community attempted to make victims out of the entire human race.

It's time to begin the criminal investigations that will be needed to put them on trial.

So... Sully Isn't Sully?

Apparently, Andrew Sullivan's blog isn't solely his work, and turns out to have been a group blog largely ghost-written by two other people.

I'm not sure if I find any solace at all in discovering that his logical inconsistencies and bizarre fixations are instead part of a group psychosis.

How about you?

Ohio Man Wanted For Arson, Law-Making

Via Fox8:

Less than 24 hours after the firebombing of the municipal court offices in Mansfield, State, Local and Federal investigators have a suspect they believe is responsible and late Monday were sparing no effort to try and find him.

40-year-old Kevin Dye of Mansfield is wanted for aggravated arson and manufacturing a dangerous ordinance.

Under those same standards, can we get the FBI to move on Capitol Hill and arrest House and Senate Democrats?

(dear editor: the word you were looking for is ordnance)

Shovel Ready

I have to give it to the Democrats: they can create a villain out of thin air at a moment's notice. This time, they decided to finger Joe Liebermann as some sort of a backstabber with renegged on a deal, even though his publicly announced position has never changed, and there is no indication that he had agreed to anything.

This would seem to suggest that the Democratic attempts to take over healthcare are in serious trouble in the Senate. The various schemes may not be dead yet, but they do seem to be in very serious trouble.

Obama Gives Himself a B+

You know, Mr. President, you may have been following the right path when you decided to keep then American public in the dark regarding your grades, because when they see how you grade yourself, they're all going to laugh at you.

Beyond Doubt: Iran Working on Nuke Trigger

There is no more point in denial:

Confidential intelligence documents obtained by The Times show that Iran is working on testing a key final component of a nuclear bomb.

The notes, from Iran’s most sensitive military nuclear project, describe a four-year plan to test a neutron initiator, the component of a nuclear bomb that triggers an explosion. Foreign intelligence agencies date them to early 2007, four years after Iran was thought to have suspended its weapons programme...

[snip]

"Although Iran might claim that this work is for civil purposes, there is no civil application," said David Albright, a physicist and president of the Institute for Science and International Security in Washington, which has analysed hundreds of pages of documents related to the Iranian programme. "This is a very strong indicator of weapons work."

And there is little doubt that when Iran has what they consider "enough" nuclear weapons, they will not be used to deter war, but to trigger Armageddon.

It seems our dithering President has a very simple choice.

He can be remembered as the American President who did nothing, the President that let Iran build nuclear weapons and trigger a nuclear exchange with Israel that killed tens of millions, including hundreds of thousands of American servicemen and civilians in the region. Barack Obama—the man who did nothing and watched the world burn.

Or Obama can be vilified by his left fringe as a warmonger, and try to use military force to deny Iran the last few critical components that separates them from becoming the world's more dangerous nuclear-armed regime.

I don't envy his decision, but given the choices, it still seems to be rather easy one.

Update: Sky News claims it has confirmed the authenticity of the evidence:

Sky News foreign affairs editor Tim Marshall said: "Sources confirm that the document is genuine. However, the Government and the US will be reluctant to wave it about just yet.

"There's three weeks to go until President Obama's end-of-the-year deadline for his policy of engagement with Iran.

"The big push for sanctions will not begin until January. No-one wants to pre-empt that."

Dither, dither, dither...

Lefty Blogger Jane Hamsher Lobbies For Her Own Death

Jane Hamsher of firedoglake says she has survived breast cancer three times, but she is organizing a campaign against the Susan B. Komen Foundation because, "Hadassah Lieberman – wife of Senator Joe Lieberman (I-CT) – is currently a compensated 'Global Ambassador'" for the group.

Why? Because Senator Joe Lieberman stands against the costly and potentially deadly incompetencies in the Senate version of Obamacare. Of course, it runs deeper than that. Hamsher's Lieberman Derangement Syndrome is so bad that she infamously mocked Senator Lieberman in blackface during the last campaign, despite the obvious racial insensitivity of such distasteful displays.

And now Hamsher's hatred of all things Joe Lieberman now extends to his wife—and apparently anyone else facing breast cancer.

Hadassah Lieberman uses her status as the wife of a famous Senator and former Vice Presidential candidate to help wage war against a deadly form of breast cancer, but Hamsher can't let herself see beyond her own anger and hatred of Lieberman. She'd rather Komen waste their time and precious money responding to her frivolous politicized anger and give up a precious asset... all because Hamsher hates the politics of her husband.

That Hamsher is campaigning for an approach to health care that is far more dangerous for people with cancer seems to be irrelevant to her. That she might already be dead if she forced to be a victim of the very socialist medicine she champions simply doesn't seem to matter to this hate-filled ideologue.

Attacking those she hates is far more important for Jane Hamsher than any good work Hadassah Lieberman may do in the fight against breast cancer.

It seems she'd rather die... and put your loved ones at risk as well.

Obama Dithers. Will the Middle East Burn?

The media is trying to ignore reporting on how crazy the Iranian leadership is because reporting the facts would undermine the President's Chamberlainesque foreign policy of doing nothing while Iran seeks to acquire nuclear weapons, weapons that they seem certain to use to trigger a nuclear war.

The MSM wants to give Obama the cover to act surprised if everything between Cairo and Calcutta is erased in a flash, along with several hundred thousand American servicemen and civilians in the region.

I would deny him that excuse, in my latest post at Pajamas Media.

Horrors! NT Times Slams CIA/Blackwater for... Poor Project Managment Skills

The New York Times is still deeply involved in fighting the ghosts of President's past, trumpeting the headline, Blackwater Guards Tied to Secret Raids by the C.I.A.

Considering the hype, I was expecting something explosive—maybe they helped snatch potential terrorists off the streets of Cairo, or maybe even here in the U.S.—or at least something mildly titillating.

Instead, the Times delivers this:

Private security guards from Blackwater Worldwide participated in some of the C.I.A.’s most sensitive activities — clandestine raids with agency officers against people suspected of being insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan and the transporting of detainees, according to former company employees and intelligence officials.

Really? This is the big story? While the confirmation that Blackwater operatives might have participated in raids in combat zones is newsworthy, it isn't exactly surprising, is it? That they've also escorted detainees being transported from one location to another is frankly boring.

But maybe there's more too this story than the lede suggests.

The raids against suspects occurred on an almost nightly basis during the height of the Iraqi insurgency from 2004 to 2006, with Blackwater personnel playing central roles in what company insiders called "snatch and grab" operations, the former employees and current and former intelligence officers said.

Now, that is a bit more interesting. They were engaging almost nightly, and played central roles. The C.I.A. partnering with mercs... sounds like a thousand B-rated action movies, but hey, I like those.

Let's see what else they've got.

Several former Blackwater guards said that their involvement in the operations became so routine that the lines supposedly dividing the Central Intelligence Agency, the military and Blackwater became blurred. Instead of simply providing security for C.I.A. officers, they say, Blackwater personnel at times became partners in missions to capture or kill militants in Iraq and Afghanistan, a practice that raises questions about the use of guns for hire on the battlefield.

Okay, NYT. You had me, and then you lost me.

If I understand this right, the Blackwater guys weren't originally a planned part of the raids, but were there playing security for the C.I.A. guys much as they did the State Department. At some point, there was the need for an extra active participant or more in the raid, and the Blackwater guys, being former military and there were the obvious and logical choice to step in.

I can see a logical (and quite human) progression from being an impressed team member who stepped in as part of his overarching mission to protect his principle (which seems to arguably still be within the scope of his assignment), to the more murky and politically problematic normalized use of Blackwater guards in these missions. There is certainly what the project managers among us with recognize as "scope creep," but the Times still isn't giving us much meat. Were the guards involved in overwatch roles, setting up a perimeter? Or were they intimately active in the actual door-kicking, room-clearing, Tango-bagging searches themselves? If so, to what extent? Did they shoot anyone the shouldn't have? Did they shoot anyone, at all?

The Times doesn't tell us. That seems to be a very important distinction to make if the newspaper is going to level charges of wrong-doing. Lacking that, the story seems to fall flat.

Indeed, a close reading of the story leaves the reader more perplexed than informed. The Times writers certainly set a dark and ominous tone, but what they delivered was anti-climatic.

Other than vague insinuations of wrong-doing and the rehashing of historical events involving the company—stories the paper has already covered ad nauseum—there seems to be very little actual substance in what the authors present .

Scope creep? Really? That is the big story?

If I didn't know better about the Times stellar reputation for politics-free, objective reporting, I might be tempted to offer up an allegation of my own. If I were so inclined, I might suggest they were offering up a red herring to their readers... perhaps to distract them from the sort of things the editors might not want their readers thinking about.

Editor & Publisher Leads By Example

The unreadable and reliably-biased editorship of Greg Mitchell comes to an end.

Obama's Nobel Peace Prize Speech

I thought President Obama did a stellar job reciting his Nobel Peace Prize speech in Oslo today, and that Presidents Clinton and Bush did an excellent job writing it.

E.J. Dionne Gets His Stupid On

It is usually so depressingly easy to pick apart the pro forma op-eds from Washington Post columnist E.J Dionne that it isn't any fun at all to make the effort, but since his latest, Beyond the NRA's absolutism, is pre-demolished by an article I already wrote last week and the effort is minimal, I may as well go ahead and make the effort.

Dionne complains that a survey of the National Rifle Association's membership found that members polled by Frank Luntz actually went against the NRA's official position on a number of issues.

In his survey of 832 gun owners, including 401 NRA members, Luntz found that 82 percent of NRA members supported "prohibiting people on the terrorist watch lists from purchasing guns." Sixty-nine percent favored "requiring all gun sellers at gun shows to conduct criminal background checks of the people buying guns," and 78 percent backed "requiring gun owners to alert police if their guns are lost or stolen." Among gun owners who did not belong to the NRA, the numbers were even higher.

On the surface and without reflection, these all superficially sound like reasonable ideas and I completely understand why most people would agree.

But if you take away someone's right to purchase a firearm for being on a terrorism watch list, you just tipped off that potential terrorist that he is under investigation. You've just helped the terrorist. The counterpoint of that, that civil libertarians have been harping on since early in the prior administration, is that these lists are wildly inaccurate, with even Senators being erroneously tagged a s terrorists in federal lists. Compound that with the fact Americans hate to see a citizen's rights denied without the due process of law, and you have a host of very good reasons for the NRA to dig deeper and oppose an idea that sounds good as a theory, but which is horrible in practice.

Likewise, while I would like to see all gun sellers at gun shows be required to follow the laws that FFL dealers do, including requiring a NICS background check, I know that such restriction would be a fig leaf. Non-dealers would still be able to sell guns outside of the show with no restrictions at all, and no felon would be significantly inconvenienced.

And while I would certainly hope that a citizen would report a stolen weapon, I find the idea of the government compelling citizens to report stolen property of any kind offensive, and I fail to see what reporting a gun as stolen with have any impact on what the criminal does with a stolen gun. It is—again—a law that enables politicians to claim they "did something" without any real benefit.

But what really amuses me about Dionne's whining column is when he shows the innocence of a child—one not burdened with being academically gifted—when he bleats propaganda from the front group, Mayors Against All Guns.

NRA members also oppose the idea behind the so-called Tiahrt amendments passed by Congress. Named for Rep. Todd Tiahrt (R-Kan.), the rules prevent law enforcement officials from having full access to gun trace data from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and require the FBI to destroy certain background-check records after just 24 hours. Talk about handcuffing the police.

The mayors' poll offered respondents this statement, antithetical to the Tiahrt rules: "The federal government should not restrict the police's ability to access, use, and share data that helps them enforce federal, state and local gun laws." Among NRA members, 69 percent agreed.

As it turns out, the group—largely self-financed by anti-gun New York RINO Michael Bloomberg—blatantly lies about the Tiahrt Amendment, and what it does, while also obfuscating the fact that the BATF and Fraternal Order of Police want the law kept in place to protect the lives of police officers and informants.

I'm having a hard time to find who is more repulsive here. Is it Dionne for his intellectual laziness, or Bloomberg for his continued dishonesty?

It's a big world.

I think we have the space to revile them both.

Thank God for Incompetence

A would-be murderer missed his teacher twice before jamming an almost unjammable gun:

A community college student was upset about his grades when he walked into a classroom and fired two shots at his professor before his new rifle jammed, police said Wednesday.

Jason M. Hamilton, 20, was unable to continue shooting at mathematics professor Tatyana Kravchuk, who ducked behind a desk and was not hit, Prince William County police Maj. Ray Colgan said. No one was injured.

"Probably what prevented a further tragedy was that the gun jammed," Colgan said.

Hamilton bought the Marlin .30-06 bolt-action rifle Monday at a Dick's Sporting Goods store near the campus, police said.

There isn't any political angle to this story, just a failed human being looking to take out his frustration on someone else, unsurprisingly finding he's incompetent at that as well.

I suspect, however, that he'll excel as a prison girlfriend.

Ice Rubes Upset With Obama, But They Have Only Themselves to Blame

Just the latest in along line of arrogant gaffes:

"The American president is acting like an elephant in a porcelain shop," said Norwegian public-relations expert Rune Morck-Wergeland. "In Norwegian culture, it's very important to keep an agreement. We're religious about that, and Obama's actions have been clumsy. You just don't say no to an invitation from a European king. Maybe Obama's advisers are not very educated about European culture, but he is coming off as rude, even if he doesn’t mean to."

It isn't that complicated to understand. When someone is given an award or honor they clearly don't earn, it holds little meaning for them—it is a devalued trinket, and little more.

The Nobel committee whored itself to the unearned image of a political pop-star.

They do not deserve to be surprised or offended when he acts like one.

Howl

If you have some time to kill, you could amuse yourself by watching various left wing bloggers and pundits try to undermine Sarah Palin's op-ed discussing the politicization of climate change science that appears in today's Washington Post.

The Op-ed, titled "Copenhagen's political science" contains what appears to be a few rhetorical embellishments and minor factual inaccuracies based upon what we now know, but overall, is more or less accurate.

Climategate and questions about the validity of data sets maintained and possibly manipulated by several other research gatekeepers should be taken very seriously, and the raw data reexamined and opened to public review. Instead, climate change scientists have conspired to hide their data, and in the case of the East Anglia CRU, "lost" their raw data, a very improbable claim according to career scientists.

Likewise, the code for the CRU's climate modeling software was exposed in the Climategate leak, and reveals that the the modeling of temperature trends was all but fraudulent, and compromised repeatedly by manual "adjustments" designed to provide advocates of anthropogenic global warming the manufactured evidence they desired.

The outrage on the left was loud and predictable.

Alan Colmes claimed the op-ed was "false and misleading," but instead bogged down in minutia. Perhaps Palin was incorrect in claim that AGW advocates deliberately destroyed data, but those scientists were forced to admit admit the raw data was destroyed. The rest of his "evidence" includes an ad hominem attack from a former Post correspondent and an attempt at obfuscation by a left-wing think tank over the damage cap-and-trade would do the to economy. The later still included an admission that Palin was essentially right on main basic point, that cap-and-tax would cost American jobs.

Think Progress also screams in indignation, but does no better a job of explaining why admittedly polarized and deceptive practices lead to science that should be trusted.

Taylor Marsh repeats similarly unimpressive arguments, and quite unscientific claims that climate change is leading polar bears to cannibalism (simultaneously, other advocates complain that the bears are in danger of extinction even as their population grows).

A survey of progressive blogs responding to Palin's op-ed seem to focus primarily on variations of the argument that:

• the data is accurate and unaltered, but doesn't need to be released to the public
• that the scientists involved have unimpeachable integrity, even though they admit in private emails to attempting to manipulate peer review and data to achieve desired results (which is why the CRU's head has stepped down and others in the cabal are under investigation)
• the data models are accurate, even though programmer's notes in the CRU code reveals it to have been manually corrupted to achieve specific results, thereby corrupting an other models that use the CRU's code or data, as apparently all other significant models used by the United Nations apparently do

If critics of anthropogenic climate change are correct, then billions of lives will be affected and trillions of dollars wasted for a minimal or non-existent impact to the natural process of climate change.

It is therefore only logical to open the raw data to public scrutiny outside of the closed enclaves of pro-AGW theorists so that independent scientists and statisticians can validate the data and conclusions drawn thus far.

If supporters of anthropogenic climate change are correct, then billions of lives will be affected and trillions of dollars must be spent for the most effective impact to reversing anthropogenic climate change.

It is therefore only logical to open the raw data to public scrutiny outside of the closed enclaves of pro-AGW theorists so that independent scientists and statisticians can validate the data and conclusions drawn thus far, in order to establish the best policies and procedures to make sure we do things correctly.

Those that still argue that the science is settled and insist that we must act now are not looking for the best solutions for mankind or the planet. They are opportunists drumming up fears based upon uncertainty, motivated by political or financial gain. They are the ones now howling the loudest, fearing that their mad dash will come to naught.

Such souls should be watched, monitored, investigated, and sentenced appropriately, regardless of station.

Krauthammer: EPA Totalitarianism May Leave A "Revolution on the Administration's Hands"

Great. I'd hate to think Americans have been hoarding cases of ammunition and pallets of "assault rifles" for nothing.

Marcellus Was Right

Something is rotten in the state of Demark:

The UN Copenhagen climate talks are in disarray today after developing countries reacted furiously to leaked documents that show world leaders will next week be asked to sign an agreement that hands more power to rich countries and sidelines the UN's role in all future climate change negotiations.

The document is also being interpreted by developing countries as setting unequal limits on per capita carbon emissions for developed and developing countries in 2050; meaning that people in rich countries would be permitted to emit nearly twice as much under the proposals.

The so-called Danish text, a secret draft agreement worked on by a group of individuals known as "the circle of commitment" – but understood to include the UK, US and Denmark – has only been shown to a handful of countries since it was finalised this week.

The agreement, leaked to the Guardian, is a departure from the Kyoto protocol's principle that rich nations, which have emitted the bulk of the CO2, should take on firm and binding commitments to reduce greenhouse gases, while poorer nations were not compelled to act. The draft hands effective control of climate change finance to the World Bank; would abandon the Kyoto protocol – the only legally binding treaty that the world has on emissions reductions; and would make any money to help poor countries adapt to climate change dependent on them taking a range of actions.

What the leak to the Guardian reveals is that the Obama administration, the Brown government, and unknown co-conspirators know that the Climategate emails and other revelations have severely damaged the credibility of the cause of anthropogenic climate change. They are now fearful that they would fail to ram through the radical changes that they originally desired, and are instead focused on building a coalition of rich nations to adopt a still-radical but less-aggressive agreement that quite frankly guts the support that developing nations that thought they stood to gain from "Hopenhagen," while significantly undercutting their influence at the same time.

But the so-called "Danish text" is far more damning than even the Guardian lets on.

It conclusively shows that the nations involved in preparing that document don't actually believe that anthropogenic global warming is a threat. If they did, they wouldn't secretly be preparing a document that does less than what their so-called "settled science" says is the absolutely minimum necessary to avoid a global catastrophe.

They're charlatans, and this document is the smoking gun that unmasked anthropogenic climate change as a cynically-motivated bid for power, and nothing more.

Obama's Prestige, Job Approval Sinking Fast

And down she goes:

President Obama's job approval rating has fallen to 47 percent in the latest Gallup poll, the lowest ever recorded for any president at this point in his term.

The new low comes as Obama enters the home stretch in his push to enact his signature initiative, an overhaul of the nation's health care system, and escalates America's involvement in the Afghanistan war.

That's only a fraction of his problems.

As Obama's blind faith in the anthropogenic climate change cult threatens to decimate what remains of our economy, expect his approval to dive even further beneath the waves. Resistance will deepen against his Administration's attempts at totalitarianism.

It's just starting to get ugly.

Stay Classy, Google

I was mildly irked that Google let December 7 pass by without any reference to the anniversary of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor that plunged us into World War II, but in and of itself, it wasn't a huge deal. Many Web sites chose not to cover the anniversary (including this one), and that is simply a matter of choice.

But when you skip Pearl Harbor, and the very next day celebrate the birth of E. C. Segar—the creator of Popeye—it comes across as something of a slap in the face to those who fought and died in our first battle of the Second World War.

Corporate marketing departments dole millions in payroll every year to protect their brands. I can only wonder what kind of message Google thought they were delivering here.

Beta-Male Throws Tomatoes at Palin, Hits Cop Instead

What kind of outcome did this loser expect?

A man was arrested for throwing tomatoes at Sarah Palin during her book signing on Monday at the Mall of America.

Jeremy Olson, 33, allegedly threw two tomatoes from the second balcony, however did not come close to hitting Palin.

Bloomington Police report that Bloomington Commander Mark Stehlik was struck in the face with one of the tomatoes and may face charges for assaulting a police officer. Olson was booked at the Bloomington jail. He was arrested for suspicion of assault and disorderly conduct.

Even as a best-case scenario, this guy hits Palin with some produce and still ends up in jail. Not a very bright guy.

I'll be very interested to discover if Olsen's attack had political motivations, or if he was just some nut looking for a few moments of infamy.

Nuke-Crazed Dwarf Claims America is More Powerful Than Islamic Jesus

At least that is what Ahmadinejad is claiming between his "treatments" at Tehran's Madhi Ali Small Engine Repair and Psychiatric Institute to Dubai-based Al Arabiya.

Ahmadinejad reportedly claims he has documented evidence that the U.S. is blocking the return of Mahdi, the Imam believed by Muslims to be the savior.

"We have documented proof that they believe that a descendant of the prophet of Islam will raise in these parts and he will dry the roots of all injustice in the world," Ahmadinejad said during a speech on Monday, according to Al Arabiya.

"They have devised all these plans to prevent the coming of the Hidden Imam because they know that the Iranian nation is the one that will prepare the grounds for his coming and will be the supporters of his rule," Ahmadinejad was quoted as saying.

Ahmadinejad continued the rant by claiming there have been plots by both the West as well as countries in the East to wipe out his country, according to Iranian news Web site Tabak.

"They have planned to annihilate Iran. This is why all policymakers and analysts believe Iran is the true winner in the Middle East," Ahmadinejad was quoted as saying by the site. He also alleged that foreign nations seek to control Iran's oil and natural resources.

For those of you not familiar with Ahmadinejad's religion, he belongs to a radical Shia sub-cult that even camel-sex-approving Ayatollah Khomeini thought was nuts. The mad dwarf's belief is that his messiah will only return after the world is burned in a cleansing fire, and somehow America is blocking their trip to Paradise. If it sounds to you like someone is laying the groundwork for a mass suicide to put Jonestown to shame, then you are on the right track.

When you understand their belief system is premised on triggering a nuclear war that obliterates their country in order to jump-start their End of Days and trip to Paradise, then you understand why Iran's fanatical leaders are so driven to obtain nuclear weapons.

It also showcases why our ignorant President is running us full-speed towards a nuclear war with his failure to even attempt disarming them preemptively with all necessary measures. Cowardice always leads to greater casualties than standing up for what is right.

Obama's EPA Declares Naturally-Occurring Air Gases Are "Pollutants;"
Asserts Sweeping Power To Regulate Every Aspect of American Life

These radical left-wing zealots constitute a clear and present danger to our way of life:

The Environmental Protection Agency has concluded greenhouse gases are endangering people's health and must be regulated, signaling that the Obama administration is prepared to contain global warming without congressional action if necessary.

EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson scheduled a news conference for later Monday to announce the so-called endangerment finding, officials told The Associated Press, speaking privately because the announcement had not been made.

In short, the unelected Lisa Jackson—with Barack Obama's blessing—has just declared herself to be more powerful than Congress, laying the groundwork for the Obama Administration to dictate business emissions, vehicle use, energy use, punitive taxes or penalties and even the kind and numbers of livestock that can be raised. Frankly, this declaration would seem to leave the EPA as the most powerful part of the federal government not specifically trained in how best to kill people.

This is underhanded, anti-democratic, and a serious threat to our economy, our way of life, and standard of living.

By the way, Lisa Jackson, you produce CO2 every time you exhale. Be a leader.

You stop first.

Let's Put That Treason Charge Where it Belongs

Late last month Andrew Breitbart earned the ire of a couple of excitable left-wingers when he tweeted:

Capital punishment for Dr James Hansen. Climategate is high treason.

If you've been hiding in a cave for much of the past few years, Hansen is the chief climate change evangelical leader at NASA, and a serial contributor to the belief system of the climate change cult.

Now, those who got infuriated with Breitbart did so because they did what lefty bloggers typically do: they exaggerated Breitbart's tweet and focused on the capital punishment part of it and utterly ignored that charges of high treason lead to a trial, and it is the result of the trial that can lead to capital punishment.

Was Breitbart guilty of a little hyperbole? Perhaps, but certainly less than it took for those lefty bloggers to start screaming that Breitbart tweet was attempting to incite Hasen's murder by vigilantes.

The thing is, Breitbart may be on to something. If we have learned anything in recent weeks, we have learned that the "science" underlying claims of climate change was highly politicized and almost certainly corrupted by scientists that willfully doctored data to provide an end result they had already predetermined.

In the immediate-term, this constitutes massive fraud. Multiple communications from multiple climate change scientists also strongly support the case for criminal racketeering, and RICO investigations in the United States and equivalent investigations in other countries. The investigations will not only presumably indict the researchers, but journalists, activists, and politicians that conspired with them when they either knew the data was purposefully corrupted, or when they should have expected it was fraudulent.

The international climate change conference in Copenhagen that started today should also be considered as the basis for treason charges for any signatory of any treaty that comes out of the meeting in the face of overwhelming evidence that the basic science of climate change is completely compromised and represents a threat to national security no less dire than espionage, no less dangerous than a terrorist attack.

Andrew Breitbart had the right idea when he tossed out the idea of trying those responsible for their roles in climate change fraud, but Hansen and other scientists are powerless to actually cause any real damage, and should instead face only prison sentences if they are indeed guilty as it appears. Not, the weighty charge of treason will fall entirely upon the shoulders of the politicians attending Copenhagen with a dream of establishing more control and restraints over the lives of their people.

Politicians that embrace Copenhagen's rush to judgement amid the recent and ongoing revelations will deserve charges of treason if they willfully ignore the unmasking of scientific fraud to commit a political swindle. If they are willing to betray their nations, they deserve to be placed on trial and potentially forfeit their lives.

Nothing More.

Nothing Less.

Did Obama Administration Try to Silence NPR Reporter?

Executives at National Public Radio recently asked the network's top political correspondent, Mara Liasson, to reconsider her regular appearances on Fox News because of what they perceived as the network's political bias, two sources familiar with the effort said.

According to a source, Liasson was summoned in early October by NPR's executive editor for news, Dick Meyer, and the network's supervising senior Washington editor, Ron Elving. The NPR executives said they had concerns that Fox’s programming had grown more partisan, and they asked Liasson to spend 30 days watching the network.

At a follow-up meeting last month, Liasson reported that she'd seen no significant change in Fox's programming and planned to continue appearing on the network, the source said.

NPR’s focus on Liasson's work as a commentator on Fox's "Special Report" and "Fox News Sunday" came at about the same time as a White House campaign launched in September to delegitimize the network by painting it as an extension of the Republican Party.

So NPR—a reliably left-leaning organization—has a problem with Liasson's appearances on Fox News—which she had been doing for a decade—at precisely the same time that the Obama Administration was trying to destroy the network's credibility.

The real question here is whether someone in the Obama Administration asked Elving and Meyer to pressure Liasson to leave Fox News, and if such influence is unethical or illegal.

I know... we can ask the Justice Department to investi—

Dang. Never mind.

HuffPo: Palin is a Racist, or Something

Sarah Palin must really scare the crap out of Ariana Huffington. Really... is this the best they have?

Palin, though notoriously ill-traveled outside the United States, did journey far to the first of the four colleges she attended, in Hawaii. She and a friend who went with her lasted only one semester. "Hawaii was a little too perfect," Palin writes. "Perpetual sunshine isn't necessarily conducive to serious academics for eighteen-year-old Alaska girls." Perhaps not. But Palin's father, Chuck Heath, gave a different account to Conroy and Walshe. According to him, the presence of so many Asians and Pacific Islanders made her uncomfortable: "They were a minority type thing and it wasn't glamorous, so she came home." In any case, Palin reports that she much preferred her last stop, the University of Idaho, "because it was much like Alaska yet still 'Outside.' "

Wow.

So in the worst case scenario, Palin went to a place where the culture and people were radically different than what she was accustomed to, found it uncomfortable, and wanted to leave for someplace where she felt more at home. Outrageous.

According the Southern Poverty Law Center, Palin would like have had a good reason to feel uncomfortable, considering the violent prejudice of natives towards non-natives, whites in particular. A tall, pretty white 18-year-old female completely unexposed to the culture would have been quite a target, don't you think?

Curtains for Obama?

Injured British soldiers refused to meet with Prime Minister Gordon Brown when he came to visit them at a hospital because of complaints that his government doesn't support troops fighting in Afghanistan. Those unable to physically leave their hospital beds requested for their privacy curtains to be drawn shut.

After President Obama's speech at West Point where he promised to implement a surge before self-imposed defeat, will American soldiers and Marines wounded in the conflict give their coldly-calculating Commander in Chief the same treatment?

Obama: The Climate Change Denier and Threat

As Barack Obama commits to heading to a climate change summit despite strong evidence of scientific fraud, it certainly appears that denial is his course:

The controversy swirling around the leaked e-mails of climate scientists apparently trying to downplay data and exclude dissenting opinions has led to calls for President Obama to skip this month's climate summit in Denmark until the e-mails can be investigated.

Instead, the White House announced Friday that Obama was doubling down on his commitment to the summit's goals and moving his visit later in the month, hoping it will secure a "meaningful" agreement.

The scandal being referred to as "Climate-gate" has rallied global warming skeptics, who say the threat is exaggerated -- let alone caused by humans. In some of the e-mails stolen by hackers and posted online, scientists at Britain's University of East Anglia's Climatic Research Unit appear to discuss hiding or deleting data that may contradicts global warming claims. Others discuss ways of keeping competing research out of peer-reviewed journals.

While deniers have repeatedly claimed that the "science is settled" the simple fact of the matter is that the President's own science advisor has some of his emails disclosed in the East Anglia CRU scandal, the CRU's head has had to step down, other researchers (including at least one in the United States) are under investigation, the code of the CRU's data model exposes it as clearly being compromised, and the integrity of the raw data being used by NASA is also being called in question.

Not only is the science not settled, it now appears that the scientific process was entirely corrupted and the process of peer review politicized.

No credible person can now claim that the science is settled, and any objective person would have to agree with the UK's Met Office that the existing value-added data is worthless and that the raw data and raw data alone must be re-examined, a process that will not be complete before 2012.

But our President is not an objective one. His is a radical left-wing ideologue, and man-made climate change is a matter of theological faith for him. For Barack Obama, compromised or even blatantly falsified data is irrelevant. He is as committed a zealot as Al Gore, and addicted the the thought of the control he can exert over Americans if he can simply ram through his agenda... facts or fraud be damned.

Barack Obama does not have the best interests of the United States at heart... and that makes him dangerous to our nation's future, not a potential savior of it.

Earning the Reputation of a Bird-Cage Liner

What do you get when you let a ideologically driven sensationalist with an economic interest in rabble-rousing use a suspected fraud as his key source of information?

Why, an article in The Nation, of course.

Bloomberg Tries to Politically Profiteer From Fort Hood Shooting

"Mayor Mike" may be beloved in some circles, but the billionaire gun control advocate is willing to put the lives of police at risk and use the tragedy of a terrorist attack that killed American soldiers and an unborn baby in an underhanded end run targeted at bankrupting the gun industry.

At Pajamas Media.

Sounds Like a Downer

Ecstasy pills shaped like Barack Obama have hit the streets of Palmview, Texas.

First-time users report an immediate and intense feeling of elation which quickly fades into confusion, disillusionment, and denial.

Repeat users find the drug makes them more lethargic and dependent, but otherwise does nothing for them, even as every additional dose triples in cost.

Palin Goes Birther? Probably Not, But Expect to Hear It Repeated

I've not always been a fan of Sarah Palin the politician, but I've been warm to what I can divine of Sarah Palin the person. I've been disgusted with how she has been unfairly savaged by the lip-service feminists of the progressive left, and an army of critics in the media that have made a cottage industry of ripping every aspect of her life—personal, political, or manufactured—to shreds.

I find her authentic "Caribou Barbie" schtick to be refreshing, and her pre-fame accomplishments as a politician to be impressive, just as I find her work-life balance to be admirable. While it infuriates elites and wannabes, she seemed to be the epitome of the "local girl done good." Palin became successful by sticking to her principles, being herself, and working hard. I think she'd make an above-average public servant in the House of Representatives, the Senate, or maybe even the White House... after all she was far more technically qualified for the position than either Barack Obama, Joe Biden, or John McCain, being the only one of the bunch with any executive experience in either the private sector or government.

But as much as I'd like to be able to get behind Sarah Palin and be a real supporter, stuff like this simply makes it difficult for people such as myself to put their faith in her.

I don't care if she really believes the validity of President Obama's birth certificate is fair game for debate. I find it entirely possible that she simply mangled an attempt to point out that any "debate" over Obama's birth certificate was as nutty as the "debate" over whether Trig is her son... but I'm not sure.

To stand a chance against the vicious left-wing media, Palin has to be perfect, all the time. She won't get the continual burying of gaffes the media affords the President, and instead of burying her shortcoming as they do his, they'll magnify and echo every mistake.

She can't give them any ammunition. She can't afford to even hint at supporting conspiracy theories. This comment, hopefully taken out of context, will hurt Palin. She can't do this again, and she better explain herself quickly and forcefully.

I'd like to find a politician worth listening to, and those that play to conspiracy theories won't be getting my support.

Oh, Deer

When I was younger, my father and I used to drive through Tarboro, NC, on the way to hunt deer on a farm outside of Enfield. If we knew we could have hung outside the jewelry store on Main Street in Tarboro, it would have saved us some gas.

Fort Hood Hero Cop's Career Cut Short

Sgt. Kim Munley, one of two civilian police officers that were among the first to respond to jihadist Nidal Hasan's rampage at Fort Hood, may have her career as a street cop cut short as a result of her injuries.

Sgt. Kimberly Munley said doctors have told her she needs a total knee replacement, a surgery set for January, but that her new knee is likely to wear out sooner if she runs or carries the 15- to 25-pound gear pack required by her job.

"I do want to stay in law enforcement. I'm not going to be able to do what I did before, which is basically work the street," she told Wilmington, N.C., television station WECT on Wednesday. "It's going to give me another avenue to look in as far as possibly teaching and instructing."

Hopefully she'll be able to find other law enforcement duties as rewarding as her role as a street cop.

Hasan, the radical Muslim soldier that shot Munley and more than three dozen others, remains hospitalized, paralyzed, and potentially facing the death penalty.

The Inupiat Story CNN Missed

John D. Sutter, not content to mill around while continuing revelations rock the integrity of the AGW community, decided to write a an article for CNN called Climate change threatens life in Shishmaref, Alaska.

It's actually quite a pleasant read, but Sutter seems to miss the real lesson to be learned from the world's impact on the Inupiat people.

You see, the Inupiat were once a nomadic people until a distant federal government saw fit to intrude into their lives, telling then that their children must live by government rules, forcing them to live as the government saw fit and undermining their culture.

Over time, the people adapted to the conditions the distant government bureaucrats forced them into, and as a result, they now have their very existence as a culture jeopardized because the government turned a mobile society into a sedentary people ill-suited to live a life that nature in that part of the world conspired against. Now seemingly helpless and conditioned to look for handouts, their culture faces extinction because they've lost the nomadic ways of their forefathers, thanks to the intervention of the government.

Sutter seems to think his article is about climate change. The climate always changes. The real problem here is a government crippled a society already engineered to deal with that change by arrogantly imposing their will, insisting their ways are better.

Something to think about.

The AGW Racketeering Deepens

NASA has joined the list of key AGW research mainstays that has conspired to hide real climate data in hopes of keeping the theory of man-made global warming alive.

The fight over global warming science is about to cross the Atlantic with a U.S. researcher poised to sue NASA, demanding release of the same kind of climate data that has landed a leading British center in hot water over charges it skewed its data.

Chris Horner, a senior fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, said NASA has refused for two years to provide information under the Freedom of Information Act that would show how the agency has shaped its climate data and would explain why the agency has repeatedly had to correct its data going as far back as the 1930s.

"I assume that what is there is highly damaging," Mr. Horner said. "These guys are quite clearly bound and determined not to reveal their internal discussions about this."

The more this scandal unfolds, the more I'm stunned by the scale of it all. It appears that the entire AGW movement is based upon politically manipulated data designed to keep providing billions of dollars in research grants flowing to those who would forsake their integrity and objectivity in an organized conspiracy to defraud every last human being on planet Earth.

This shouldn't be just a matter of questioning science, but the subject of an international racketeering investigation that should encompass thousands of scientists and researchers, grant writers, scientific advisors in the world's governments, politicians (up to and including current heads of state) and activists such as former Vice President Al Gore.

It would seem to me that if individuals and groups in the investigation knew about or were manufacturing compromised, manipulated, or outright false data that were being used to determine the laws and policies of states, nations, and the international community, then those colluding would be guilty of something akin to treason.

Do you thank that overstated? Entire economies would be drastically and fundamentally altered by suggestions made by these perpetrators, affecting the lives of billions of people far more profoundly than espionage, terrorism, or even most wars.

I think a death sentence would be too extreme for even the worst of the culprits, but serious felony charges should be considered, and life sentences would seem more than fair for those that would put billions of lives at risk over what increasingly seems to be nothing less than naked greed and the pursuit of power and influence.

ROK to Deploy World's Most Advanced Combat Rifle To Afghanistan

The U.S. XM-29 program faltered, then split, then was shelved, but the South Korean K-11 dual-caliber air-burst weapon is about to deploy to Afghanistan:

South Korean troops to be deployed in Afghanistan will be armed with the latest K-11 airburst assault rifles for self-defense, according to the Ministry of National Defense.

[snip]

Developed by the state-funded Agency for Defense Development, the K-11 consists of a semi-automatic 20mm smart grenade launcher, an under-slung assault rifle firing a standard 5.56mm NATO round, and a top-mounted computer-assisted sighting system with integrated rangefinder and thermal infrared night vision capabilities.

Using a self-detonation system, the 20mm round from the rifle can track its target and explode three to four meters above it. And it is also capable of penetrating walls of buildings.

I wouldn't want to tote this beast, but it gives South Korean troops some very interesting capabilities.

Barbara Boxer: Lincoln's Assassination in Ford's Theater Was Really About Whether or Not Booth Got His Gun Legally

The key to being a liberal Senator seems to be the ability to ignore the body on the ground in order to whine about the origins of the smoking gun.

Enjoy Senator Barbara Boxer's warped brand of climate change fraud denial:

Leaked e-mails allegedly undermining climate change science should be treated as a criminal matter, Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) said Wednesday afternoon.

Boxer, the top Democrat on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, said that the recently released e-mails, showing scientists allegedly overstating the case for climate change, should be treated as a crime.

"You call it 'Climategate'; I call it 'E-mail-theft-gate,'" she said during a committee meeting. "Whatever it is, the main issue is, Are we facing global warming or are we not? I'm looking at these e-mails, that, even though they were stolen, are now out in the public."

She's far more concerned about catching the (probable) insider that released the information to the public than dealing with the very real probability that the cult of man-made global warming is based upon fraudulent, manipulated, and politicized data.

It takes quite a woman to stick her head in the sand while it's still up her own butt, but Babs seems to be capable of that, if very little else.

Tiger Admits to Sinking His Putz

Shameful.

More "Settled" Science

Professor Plimer said climate change was caused by natural events such as volcanic eruptions, the shifting of the Earth’s orbit and cosmic radiation. He said: "Carbon dioxide levels have been up to 1,000 times higher in the past. CO2 cannot be driving global warming now.

"In the past we have had rapid and significant climate change with temperature changes greater than anything we are measuring today. They are driven by processes that have been going on since the beginning of time."

He cited periods of warming during the Roman Empire and in the Middle Ages – when Vikings grew crops on Greenland – and cooler phases such as the Dark Ages and the Little Ice Age from 1300 to 1850.

Note the part where he states "CO2 cannot be driving global warming now," because the political event occurring next week in Copenhagen hinges upon CO2 being the greenhouse gas that "must"be regulated... a fact that is nothing but a fraud, like the AGW movement itself.

Obama Splits the Baby

The key to mimicking Solomon-like wisdom is to understand when the great biblical king was making an absurd suggestion to prompt truth, and when he was being direct.

The President's speech at West Point was anything but wise; it was instead the purest display of strategic incompetence and political pandering of an arrogant and self-serving career.

He put more troops in harm's way and conceded defeat in just three paragraphs.

Obama does not have the intestinal fortitude to win the war, nor the character to declare that the war (in his opinion) is not worth fighting. Nor does he have the courage to admit he lied to the American people as he campaigned, when he repeatedly said Afghanistan was the war we must fight and win.

Instead, our Commander in Chief abdicates his responsibility to the men and women who serve this nation in uniform, and commits 30,000 more American soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines to a war he has already conceded.

Every wound and death in Afghanistan from this moment on is blood spilled needlessly by a craven coward who lacks the basic integrity and leadership required of the office of the Presidency.

Damn him.

The Few. The Proud. The Frum.

"The Marines are elitist too."

The Marines have a right to be.

From the oh-so-important http://www.frumforum.com/

ASU Journalism Students Start Practicing Early

Today they're in the media; tomorrow they'll be writing for it:

Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio was asked by a panel of journalists Monday night to explain his relationship with the media, his various law enforcement policies and whether his office conducts racial profiling.

Arpaio told the panel that his office is an "equal opportunity law enforcement agency" that will arrest anyone who violates the law.

Later in the interview at ASU's Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication, protesters began singing a version of "Bohemian Rhapsody" and chanting as Arpaio was asked about a federal investigation and his policies on illegal immigration.

Personally, I think Arpaio should have responded to these dunces with a drawling, "What we have heah is a fail-yah to communicate," but I doubt the protestors would have been bright enough to pick up on the reference.

Adidas=All Day I Duck Aimed Shoes?

Muntadhar al-Zeidi, the Iraqi who infamously threw his shoes at President Bush during a December 2008 press conference in Iraq, was himself the target of a shoe thrower today at a news conference in Paris.

Fittingly enough, al-Zeidi's brother chased today's show thrower, winging his shoes at him during the chase.

Socks to be them.

The Real Climate Change Deniers

Claims of pending catastrophic destruction caused by man's influence on the climate is far older that the technology you a reading this blog on.

Long before Macs and PCs were commonplace and decades before the World Wide Web, there were the equivalent of pseudo-scientific madmen screaming to anyone who would listen that a massive, sudden ice age was about to descend and snuff out humanity if we didn't dramatically change our ways.

And yet, the planet survived the decade of disco and the AMC Pacer without either destruction or investing heavily in snow boots, and the crazies were mercifully ignored. They retreated back to their dusty hovels to lick their wounds and find another sky that was about to fall. The better part of a generation later, the faithful reemerged, convinced that it wasn't massive cooling that was going to kill us all, but massive warming. They were off by 180-degrees, that's all.

And so in the 90s and up until recently the cult has grown louder and more insistent, braying that the science is "settled" and if we didn't do something immediately, they would fail to get rich on their investments in unproven alternative energy sources and Denver would be awash with whales.

Of course, those of us who have even a minimal amount of exposure to science or computers know that the "settled science" is anything but, and recent disclosures have proven that both the data and the computer models have been fudged to the point of completely invalidating them as legitimate evidence of anything other than fraud. As it was before with global cooling, global warming (now called climate change since the warming, uh, failed to happen) has been exposed as a matter of faith among some, funding among others, and opportunism by nearly all of it's adherents.

President Barack Obama likes to style himself as an intellectual—even as he refuses to let anyone see his transcripts—and tries to cultivate an aura of Vulcan sobriety and reason as he stumbles from gaffe to gaffe. Next week he will attend a summit in Copehagen Denmark with many other world leaders, and they will do what politicians always do, and attempt to arrogantly insert themselves into matter they lack the education or experience to understand.

If Obama is actually the intellectual he pretends to be, he'll use his time on the world stage to discuss the recent disturbing revelations about the leading proponents of the climate change theology. He will bring up their destruction of the raw data that forms the very foundation of the movement, serial manipulation of data to achieve a desired result, conspiracy to silence or stonewall critics, and the utter corruption of computer data models riddled with manual "adjustments" to create climate change on paper even as it stubbornly refused to manifest in the climate of the real world.

But we know better than that, don't we?

For some it is far more important to ignore the science undermining their ideological position, and these climate change cultists are the sad souls truly in denial.

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Maurice Clemmons Killed By Seattle Police After Manhunt

It appears Clemmons was shot in an area where police had been investigating friends and family members who were thought to have been harboring the cop-killer.

Maurice Clemmons, the suspect in the murders of 4 Lakewood Police Officers has been fatally shot by Seattle Police. It happened around 2:30 a.m. Tuesday morning along South Kenyon Street in the Rainier Valley.

Authorities suspected 37-year old Clemmons of gunning down 4 police officers at a coffee shop Sunday morning in Lakewood, a suburb about 35 miles south of Seattle.

His death comes just one day after Pierce County Sheriff's authorities said they believed Clemmons was being helped to escape capture by a network of friends and family.

On Monday night, officers had surrounded a house in the south Seattle suburb of Renton, questioning residents who may have aided Maurice Clemmons since the Sunday morning shootings. Pierce County Sheriff's spokesman Ed Troyer said no one was arrested.

It was believed that Clemmons was shot in the abdomen during the attack on the Lakewood officers at a coffee shop near Tacoma.

Troyer also said some of those who have helped Clemmons have tried to mislead police. "Yes, we think we've been given misinformation. Our main goal is to get him into custody, then we'll deal with everything else," Troyer told reporters in Renton Monday night.

Police scanner audio indicates that Clemmons ran from a home when he was shot, and that people inside the home acted suspiciously, requiring officers to pull back while Clemmons was on the ground until they could secure the scene.

Hopefully, all of murderer's friends and family member will face felony charges for assisting this thug's attempt to evade justice.