Ignoring the Scandal of the century

If circumstantial evidence, political speeches, and talking points from Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, and President Bush all suggested that the solitary goal of a gunwalking conspiracy was to put American weapons in the hands of criminals in hopes they would commit violent crimes in order to undermine the Constitution and Bill of Rights … the Washington Post columnists would call for impeachment and criminal prosecution each day.

But the outrage of the media is very selective indeed, as I explore in my latest Gunwalker post at Pajamas Media.

Gunwalker's Body Count Grows

I was on a conference call with Darrell Issa, Chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform committee, yesterday and was very impressed with his candor as we discussed Operation Fast and Furious. Quite frankly, the Congressman speaks with the confidence of a prosecutor who knows he has a solid case coming together.

I suspect we're going to see Obama Administration officials sent to prison when it is all said and done, but as I ask at the end of my newest Pajamas Media article, will that prison be in the United States or Mexico?

Prepping for Irene

I've been there and done that. Here's what you can do to prepare for Hurricane Irene.

This especially applies to those in the northeast, most of whom have never been through anything like this.

Good luck to you all.

Lawsuits, Criminal Probe Dog Obama DOJ

Citizens of two countries seek out legal redress for the crimes and edicts related to Gunwalker.

Go here to Pajamas Media for the story.

Mike Adds: As with everything else Bob has been writing on the Gunwalker scandal, this article is very much worth your time.

All Signs Point to the Top

Middle management doesn't make risky decisions in government. They "go along, to get along."

Anyone remotely familiar with government bureaucracy knows that Operation Fast and Furious had to have come from a directive from the top down, and the trail of bodies points directly to Attorney General Eric Holder... and maybe higher.

Always Wrong. Always Excused

We're talking about the mainstream media, of course, this time in relation to their consistent ignorance in reporting on firearms and firearms law. Politico reporter Reid J. Epstein offers himself up as an example of how to get almost everything wrong in a story, in my latest post at Pajamas Media.

Oh Hell, Hillary: State Department Allegedly Sold Military Weapons to Zetas Cartel

If this is true, it makes Gunwalker look like child's play, and would seem to make it very unlikely that this wasn't part of an Administration-wide conspiracy.

Forget impeachment. This is gas chamber-worthy.

Uh-Oh: DOJ Inspector General Launches Investigation into Fast and Furious Whistleblower Retaliation

The latest victim? ATF Agent John Dodson, who was apparently set up to be smeared by Department of Justice officials loyal the the Obama regime and capo Eric Holder.

It really seems that the Obama Administration is staffed with such vindictive people that they simply cannot help themselves, and will lash back at critics, no matter how illegal that retaliation is.

I'm glad the acting IG is doing what she can to rein in rampant and apparently pervasive agency corruption among political appointees in leadership positions at Justice, but she simply does not have the authority she needs as an acting AG to effect an effective investigation.

Congress must force the appointment of a special independent prosecutor to investigate the widespread illegality surrounding the Gunwalker operations.

Absolute. Moral. Authority.

For the media, the agony of the families of the dead only matters when the President is a Republican.

Not so many years ago, New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd asserted that "the moral authority of parents who bury children killed in Iraq is absolute."

The sentiment of "absolute moral authority" for anti-war parents of soldiers lost in battle was embraced, amplified, and echoed by the Times, the Washington Post, and the overwhelming majority of print and broadcast media pundits while those parents served as useful political props for the media and progressive politicians. When the left took over both houses of Congress and the White House — and the mother they used as a bludgeon turned out to be a hate-spewing, conspiracy-mongering anti-Semite — the media quietly let the "absolute moral authority" card slip out of their hand.

[murdered ICE Agent Jaime] Zapata's father is a Vietnam combat veteran with two Purple Hearts, and his siblings work in law enforcement. The family isn't demanding to see the president, or delivering ditch-side sermons to a fawning media. All they want is answers.

Where is the media to bestow them with absolute moral authority and to champion their cause?

My latest, at Pajamas Media.

Gunwalker Never Stops

Democrats continue to try to hide it, because the story just keeps getting worse.

I'll be on the air with WPTF this afternoon talking Gunwalker at 2:35, and on again with Cam and Company tonight at 10:20 on Sirius.

"Watergate with a Body Count" Continues to Fall Apart For the Obama Administration

I have two Gunwalker articles posted at Pajamas Media at the moment, and two more in the wings.

Teh first shows how the media continues to try to protect the Administration, while the second shows the "smoking gun" emails that prove that ATF officials were trying to use Fast and Furious to influence gun policy.

It's getting bad, and going to get worse, folks.

Gunwalker Scandal Deepens

Despite what the Obama Administration would like you to believe, it isn't just Fast and Furious and Arizona, and it never was.

Gunwalking In America

Bob continues to turn up the heat in a new article up at Pajamas Media (here) on the fact that Gunwalker firearms are turning up at crime scenes in America. This is, of course, an inevitable consequence of the Obama Administration's lunatic scheme. An article, like all of Bob's work on this case, very much worth your while.

C.Y. Bloggers Blowing Open Gunwalker

Yeah, I'm going to toot our horns a little bit.

Mike and I have a total of three Gunwalker-related stories that have broken today on Pajamas Media, and that doesn't include the Hans A. von Spakovsky's article about acting ATF director Ken Melson's Monday surprise testimony to Congressional investigators on Monday.

So, have at it:

The Future of Obama's Stealth Gun Control (by Mike)

The Assault Weapons Ban: How Silly Was It? (Part One) (by Bob)

Email Confirms ‘Gunwalker’ Known Throughout Justice Department (by Bob)

The MSM is welcome to keep trying to bury this story. We'll keep running down every source and angle, and we'll see who comes out on top.

Dems Set To Vilify Gun Owners To Deflect Gunwalker Blame

Disgusting, and entirely predictable.

Instead of trying to find out who in the Obama Administration authorized and colluded in the felonious Gunwalker fiasco, Democrat Elijah Cumming is setting up a hearing that features testimony from anti-gun groups.

Why indict your Party when you can try to blame the citizenry?

Pravda on the Potomac: WaPo at it Again

You know who's really to blame for the Gunwalker scandal?

The NRA.

White House Unleashes MSM to Run Interference for Them on Gunwalker Plot

And they suck at it.

The MSM must be utterly terrified of what will happen to the Obama Administration if the truth comes out. Otherwise, why the transparent and desperate lies?

Rhetoric and Violence: A Gunwalker Timeline

My latest article on the Gunwalker scandal at Pajamas Media tracks (some, not all) of the anti-gun political rhetoric of the Obama Administration, from the beginning of the 44th Presidency until Gunwalker was exposed by an ATF whisteblower.

It's just my latest post, and it won't be the last.

Admittedly, we don't have direct evidence, but we don't have to have any. You can yell "fire" in a crowded theater filling up with smoke without first seeing the flames. As bloggers and journalists, our job is the raise the alarm, not to put out the fire.

Hopefully, this continues series of exposes will force the appointment of an independent prosecutor to see if officials ATF, DOJ, DHS and the White House are guilty of breaking laws of two nations.

What — and Who — Made 'Gunwalker' Tick?

In a new post at Pajamas Media, Mike has done a masterful job of explaining the psychology behind Gunwalker, which may have led to the most deadly scandal in American law enforcement history.

Gunwalker: Now a 'Mega-Scandal' According to My Headline Writer

This is bad, folks.

And it is only going to get worse.

The Definitive Scandal: ‘Gunwalker’ Much Worse Than ‘Iran-Contra’

The horrible truth:

The more than 2,000 weapons that the Obama Justice Department allowed to be delivered to Mexican narco-terrorist cartels are thought to have been used in the shooting of an estimated 150 Mexican law enforcement officers and soldiers battling the cartels. Two American law enforcement officers have also presumably fallen prey to these weapons, along with an unknown number of civilians on both sides of the border.

President Barack Obama’s Department of Justice has purposefully armed narco-terrorist drug cartels that have been accused of bombings, ambushes, mass murders, public executions, and the assassination of police, politicians, and civic leaders.

Obama's Justice Department armed the enemy of our neighbor and ally, providing enough arms to equip ten infantry companies, or two battalions, of violent drug dealers.

This could be very, very bad for the White House.

"Gunwalker" Under Fire

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder and Acting BATF Director Ken Melson are fighting a Congressional oversight committee that is attempting to investigate a botched plot within the Department of Justice that saw the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco (BATF) become a major supplier to narco-terrorist cartels that have been battling the Mexican government.

The plot, called Operation and Fast and Furious withing the Justice Department and also known as "Gunwalker" to the majority of Americans, saw the BATF encourage American gun shops to provide as many as 2,500 weapons to suspected "strawmen" gun buyers for the cartels.

At least 150 Mexican police and soldiers have been shot with Gunwalker weapons, a Mexican military helicopter brought down, and two American law enforcement officers have been killed with these guns as well.

Why won't the Obama Administration be transparent about their botched operation that supported narco-terrorism? That's a question I've asked in my latest article at Pajamas Media.

Update: Meanwhile, CNN continues to spread previously debunked propaganda and lies for the Administration.

Amuse yourself. Read the Pajamas article including the links, and then read the CNN article. The scale of journalist fraud they are promoting in service to the White House's gun control agenda is breathtaking.

Seventy-One Shots: The Death of Jose Guereña

A hard-working Marine veteran of Iraq was gunned down in his own home by a Pima County AZ SWAT team that originally claimed he fired and hit their men during a no-knock raid. Evidence shows, however, the combat veteran never too his safety off, and family members want to know why the cops kept an ambulance crew from the victim for more than an hour.

Another case of murder with a badge? Decide for yourself after reading my latest article at Pajamas Media.

Update: Jonn Lilyea of This Ain't Hell has been on this story from the beginning, and notes via email that this wasn't even a legitimate SWAT team, but instead a gaggle of officers "cobbled together from four LE agencies."

This was gross incompetence leading to the shooting of a good man, followed by the purposeful obstruction of potentially live-saving medical care, and an obvious cover-up and smear campaign in the process of going south.

I'm not ready to charge the officers in this shooting with murder, but they are at the very least candidates for some sort of variant of a "manslaughter with depraved indifference" charge that should lead to the end of their law enforcement careers.

A distinguished veteran died at the hands of overzealous cops who insist on smearing his reputation after gunning him down. This should never happen, much less become so commonplace.

U.S. Government a Major Supplier of Narco-Terrorist Weaponry in Mexico

Despite Barack Obama's repeated use of the "90% lie" in an effort to push gun control measures, civilian gun shops aren't responsible for arming the Mexican drug cartels.

For that, you can thank Uncle Sam.

History Repeating

My latest article at Pajamas Media deals with another faked hate crime at a university in North Carolina. And no, lacrosse players weren't falsely accused this time.

And yes, the community still plans to protest the faked crime.

Armed with... Beanbags?

Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry wasn't murdered by his management, but they sure made it easier for his killers.

I think it fair to hold the Obama Administration responsible for his death, and possibly others.

The Security of a Free State

Our young nation had just burst forth thanks to the grit of a disheveled army of citizen-soldiers — one which overcame what was then the greatest military power in the world. From firsthand experience, those citizen-soldiers knew that the civilian ownership of arms suitable for military use was vital, both to their new nation’s existence and to the continued existence of their liberty itself.

Hunting and target practice were not cited as justification for the amendment.

Thoughts on what the Second Amendment really protects in my latest article at Pajamas Media

There Be Monsters

There is a culture of murderous violence in this nation that is directly responsible for one of the most prolific serial killers in this nation's history. You won't be bombarded with wall-to-wall coverage, allegations, and idle speculation about the perpetrator and his numerous accomplices on MSNBC, CNN, the network news or among the heavyweights of the newspaper op-ed pages.

They've given this one a pass. After all, it's just a little genocide.

My latest article at Pajamas Media.

Before Talking About Guns...

First learn something about them. My latest at Pajamas Media, firmly directed with disdain towards an ignorant Congress and the dog-dumb journalistic class.

MIKE'S NOTE: By all means, read Bob's informative--as always--article. Of course, if they won't bother to read the bills they pass, how can we expect them to read anything about the topics of those bills? Feh.

They're Greek To Me

My latest article on understanding Progressive thinking is up on Pajamas Media. It can be accessed here.

Sorry, Gun Owners: Chris Christie No Better Than a Liberal Democrat

New Jersey Chris Christie commuted Brian Aitkens. Too bad he supports every idiotic left-wing gun law that put him in jail. So much for "President Christie."

My latest post is up at Pajamas Media.

Iran Just Shipped Missiles to Venezuela. Hello? Is This Thing On?

Where the Hell is the President?

Mikes' latest article is posted at Pajamas Media.

What Do the ‘Holiday Terror Warning’ Targets Have in Common?

Our lovely elected leader do such an effective job of making us into unarmed targets, don't they?

My latest at Pajamas Media.

Pardon or Perish

Chris Christie should pardon Brian Aitken, an 27-year-old graduate student that is just the latest victim of New Jersey's paranoid, confusing and restrictive gun control laws. But can Christie overcome his all-too-liberal anti-gun leanings?

All part of the discussion in my latest article at Pajamas Media.

Another Clark County Cop Kills and Walks

This time, a man a month into a trial separation from his wife goes to their home at 1:15 AM apparently attempting to catch her in the act of cheating. He succeeds, and gets four bullets for his trouble. The shooter—a Henderson Police officer—walks away without so much as a corner's inquest, and his department declared the shooting justifiable self defense.

Check out my latest disturbing look into questionable law enforcement oversight in my latest post at Pajamas Media.

Who Are You Calling Intellectually Incurious?

Mike's latest article at Pajamas Media. It contains—if not coins the phrase—"Faux-Masculinity Worship" (FMW) and is worthy of a read based upon that alone.

Gun Control Advocate to Head BATF

Barack Obama has been shy of acting on his radical anti-gun tendencies since he jumped on the campaign trail, but he has found someone with a similar agenda to run the BATF. Read about the nightmare that is Andrew Traver in my latest post at Pajamas Media.

Happy Birthday, Pajamas Media

Five years already?

My, how time flies. Pajamas has always been a great organization to work with, and Roger, Aaron and the other editors and executives I've worked with have always been straight-shooters. As Roger notes, there have been mistakes, but there have been solid scores as well, both in terms of content and personalities, which seems to have spread over to PJTV as well. It's been a great ride so far, and I' love writing for them.

In related news, progressives are going to war with themselves over the success of the Huffington Post, and I suspect it will get nasty.

Felon Gun Story Correction

Counsel for Lee Booth asked for a retraction of the Pajamas Media article, Felons Can't Own Guns. So How Did This Guy Acquire Three … Gun Companies?

Here are the corrections.

Gun Nightmare in Carolina [Updated with Corrections]

Update: Corrections to the Pajamas Media article have been posted.

In the dark fantasies of comic books, villains with pathological intent maniacally plot to build super-weapons to decimate cities, countries, and even planets. In Hollywood movies, the corrupt and evil plot to build cop-killing firearms to bring anarchy and chaos to our streets.

Imagine, if you can, a convicted kidnapper with additional arrests for communicating threats and simple assault acquiring not just a weapon or two, but an entire gun company while the federal government stood idly by.

Imagine that this same felon then started another gun company from scratch, and then used that company to acquire a third company that was licensed to build machine guns. Imagine further he was given a concealed carry license, and that local law enforcement and federal agents turned a blind eye to everything.

This isn't the plot latest reboot of the RoboCop or Lethal Weapon movie franchises, but the extraordinary alleged real-life story of Lee Franklin Booth, 51, a Greensboro, North Carolina resident with an incredibly checkered past.

If you aren't scared, you aren't comprehending the implications of my latest investigative report at Pajamas Media.

Update: Well... look who stopped by for a visit on their way to Pajamas Media.

The Long Gray Line Sets Its Sights on Las Vegas Metro PD Over Erik Scott Shooting

My latest article is up at Pajamas Media.

If I were a betting man, I'd take the Army.

Gunned Down in Vegas: What Really Happened to Erik Scott?

I've written about war, rape, massacres, mass murders and terrorism, so I don't easily get disturbed by the content of the stories I cover.

Erik Scott's senseless death is different.

The Propaganda Presidency

I was afforded an embargoed copy of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform's report, "Analysis of the First Year of the Obama Administration: Public Relations and Propaganda Initiatives" this weekend, and it made for an interesting read.

You can ready all about it at Pajamas Media.

I'd also recommend Ed Morrissey's take on it at Hot Air.

WikiLeaks: A Whole Lot of Nothing Going On

Sure, there isn't much in the way of news in WikiLeaks frantically-promoted Afghanistan War Diary, but doesn't Julian Assange have fantastic hair? After all... that's what this is really about.

My latest article is up at Pajamas Media.

What Are We Doing in Afghanistan?

Asking the hard questions that must be asked, in my latest article at Pajamas Media.

Stephen Glass, Redux? ThinkProgress.org Publishes Completely Fraudulent Video Labeling Tea Partiers Racists

Heads should roll.

My latest article, at Pajamas Media.

Will General Petraeus Change the Afghan RoE?

Soldiers and civilians alike have complained that Gen. Stanley McCrystal's rules of engagement in Afghanistan. Now that Gen. David Petraeus has taken over the fight since McCrystal's self-immolation, will new RoE lead to fewer US and Afghan civilian casualties?

I ask the question in my latest article at Pajamas Media.

"Violent Bob" Etheridge On the Way Out of Congress?

Bob Etheridge's assault of a student reporter last week went viral this morning when the videos went out on Brietbart.com and BigGovernment.com. Frankly, the thug should resign for his behavior, but that requires more honor than I think he retains.

It remains to be seen if his victims will press charges.

Even if Etheridge doesn't have the decency or sense of shame to resign, disgust at his assault has led to a huge increase in donations for his Republican challenger, nurse Renee Ellmer, in a district that leans conservative.

Etheridge was supposed to be a lock in November. Now it appears he's just as likely to be locked up.

Concealed Carry: Rights and Responsibilities

I mentioned several weeks ago in passing that I spent a weekend at the local shooting range taking the NRA Personal Protection Outside the Home course. Some of the students in the class had questions for the senior-most instructor on whether or thought we needed more rigid training and competency standards to acquire a concealed handgun permit in North Carolina.

How do we balance our right to arms with the responsibility of employing them?

It Isn't The Gun, But The Cartridge

Granted, the gun itself is in need of at least a piston upper receiver, but the biggest problem with the M4 carbine and M16 rifle seems to be the anemic ballistics of the 5.56 cartridge, which should be replaced.

Calderon Lied, and Democrats Applauded

And no, it isn't about the issue you think it is.

Agents of Incompetence, Part 423

Just when you think that Customs and the ATF have plumbed the depths of ignorance regarding claims that airsoft guns can be converted into machine guns, A dim-witted Fox News account dives deeper into the abyss.

Making the Right Call: Marines Need to Scrap the Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle

Amphibious assault is synonymous with the U.S. Marine Corps, a combined-arms military force that is simply the best in the world at what it does.But are generals in charge of current procurement guilty of the costly mistake of "fighting the last war" when it comes to the future of Marine assaults?

Recent advancements in weaponry in the past few years have made the decades-old concepts behind the Marines next-generation Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle obsolete before the vehicle even entered production. In my latest article at Pajamas Media today I argue that Secretary of Defense Robert Gates is doing what is best for our Marines when he threatens to scrap the EFV.

The question now becomes, what should replace it?

I'm all in favor of airborne armored insertion if it can be made feasible (an armored Super Osprey carrier for over-the beach IFV insertion?), or fully submersible amphibious armored personnel carriers to be launched from stealthy submarine assault ships.

Launching the still relatively slow EFV in the face of today's and tomorrow's threats simply seems insane.

Ammo Shortage Continues

It started before Obama was elected, and shows no signs of abating.

The Appalling Media Double Standard on Reporting Political Violence

The majority of political violence in this country comes from the radical left... but you'd never know it, as the ideologically-aligned media does it's very best to conceal crimes ranging from riots to murder committed by progressives.

Progressives will be sure to point out that some of the instances I cite are the work of anarchists, not progressives. I'd suggest they look at lot closer at the groups and individuals implicated. Many if not most of those cited are adhere to variants of anarchistic thought that have ties to Marxist/Leninist philosophy, and are cut from much of the same cloth as Bill Ayers and his Alinsky-trained protégé in the White House.

Doubt that the media are covering for their blood-thirsty left wing allies?

Decide from yourself in my latest article at Pajamas Media.

Just don't tell professional racist Andre Carson. Finding out that his side is the side with along history of domestic terrorism would make his poor little hateful head explode.

Open Carry Advocates Are The Shooting Community's Second-Worst Enemy

We can count on gun control advocates to tell lies and twist truths in an effort to demonize gun owners, but most citizens realize the mindless zealotry and distortions up, front, and so pay these groups little mind.

Far worse for gun owners are those in our midst that confuse their right to bear arms with their imagined right to shove them in your face... metaphorically speaking, of course. While guns rights seem to be gaining ground across the nation, the confrontational, combative nature of some open carry advocates is detrimental to all gun owners, a fact many readers don't seem to agree with in my latest article at Pajamas Media.

Agents of Incompetence, Part IV

What do you do when you can't apparently justify claiming a toy is a machine gun?

Misdirect!

Welcome to the Freak Show

I'll eventually have to head out to the Bay area on business, and while I'm there, I think I'll have to sign up for the ZomGuide Walking Tour.

Seems to kind of be like a walking tour of a zoo, only with more a exotic and bizarre collection of specimens.

The Other 95%... Seriously?

The so-called "Coffee Party" organized by Obama propagandist filmmakers was a farce. I don't know if it is even still around, but what is certain is that friendly media was unable to make that astroturf grow into something to counter the Tea Party movement.

Not content to crash and burn just once, desperate Obamaphiles have attempted to bring back the Coffee Party under another name, with a different group of professional activists pushing a slightly different message. "The Other 95%" reveals the desperation of the far left as we approach the November elections.

It's pretty bad when your best attempt at faking bipartisanship grassroots support is an effort fronted by a professional far left radical basing a group on a lie.

Numerous Bigots Photographed At Tea Party Protests

I've written several articles about the Tax Day Tea Party protests this past week for Pajamas Media and PJTV, noting that left wing groups hoping to infiltrate the movement and portray themselves to the media as racist Tea Party protestors largely never materialized.

But that isn't to say there weren't distinct examples of bigotry and hatred on display at some rallies. We've posted pictures of some of these this racists and bigots at Pajamas Media in a post entitled, 'Left' Behind: Tolerance and the Tea Party.

Update: Zombie finds the few spasmodic counter-protesters at the San Francisco Tea Party, doing a very bad job of fitting in... if they were even trying at all.

Boston Leftists Just Not That Sharp

Some hipsters tried to heed Scott Levin's cry to "crash the tea party" yesterday in Boston.

Their efforts were, well, see for yourself.

CrashTheTeaParty.Org Founder's Twitter Page Goes Dark

Jason Levin's twitter account, http://twitter.com/xenex11/ no longer exists.

I wonder why.

Reminder: Expose The Party Crashers

If you attend one of today's Tax Day Tea Party protests and run across those looking to malign the movement, capture them in photos or video and send it to tpcrashers@pjtv.com.

More on how to do that (and constructive advice how to interact with those involved) at Pajamas Media.

Reasonable Men

Bill Whittle—one of my favorite thinkers, writers, and PJTV personalities—has transcribed his latest Afterburner segment entitled "Reasonable Men."

I found myself especially drawn to a line drawn from a collaboration between Thomas Jefferson and John Dickinson, where Dickinson smoothed over the rhetoric of a too militant Jefferson.

"We are reduced to the alternative of choosing an unconditional submission to the tyranny of irritated ministers or resistance by force. Honour, justice, and humanity, forbid us tamely to surrender that freedom which we received from our gallant ancestors, and which our innocent posterity have a right to receive from us."

The document this was drawn from was the July 6, 1775 Declaration of Taking Up Arms of the Second Continental Congress. It was a warning to England that the rights of men—not the newly-imagined "rights" of today's usurpers that involve the appropriation of the rights of others—are not forfeit to any government, but granted by our creator and not to be surrendered. This was not yet a call to revolution, but a clarification of intent.

It is worth noting that this declaration took place even after the battles at Lexington and Concord that left more than a hundred dead and hundreds wounded. At this late hour, they still strove for a peaceful accord.

Peace was always the goal... but not at the expense of liberty.

The Man Behind CrashTheTeaParty.Org

My latest article is up at Pajamas Media, providing some of the details about the man who created a Web site dedicated to organizing left-wing radicals to smear their fellow Americans.

As disgusting as their tactics are, the group has preemptively failed in their April 15 mission. By making a public declaration of their plans to create the worst stereotypes possible, they've already identified and marginalized themselves, creating a situation where the media knows well in advance that these agent provocateurs will be the likely sources behind any disturbances at famously sedate and friendly Tea Party rallies.

Tea Party protestors champion liberty, delight in each other's company, and relish the expression of American exceptionalism, past, present, and future. The other side champions deception, delights in fraud, bigotry, division, the creation of paranoia and distrust, and desires to radically remove this nation for it's core principles to align with lesser states they admire.

Chose your side, and chose it wisely as reasonable men should, America.

You cannot afford to do nothing.

NSFW: No Shame For WikiLeaks, Part 2

The founder of WikiLeaks admits he is an activist first and a journalist second in interviews. That label applies equally well to WikiLeaks, a group that attempts to turn video if combat deaths into a fundraising vehicle.

Read Shame on WikiLeaks: Framing Lawful Engagement as Anti-American Propaganda (Part Two), and you'll never feel the same about them again.

(For those who missed it yesterday, I suggest first reading Part One) and the excellent work done by the Jawa Report here and here.

NSFW: No Shame For WikiLeaks, Part 1

The WikiLeaks videos calling American helicopter pilots responsible for "collateral murder" hit the mainstream earlier this week, and now the backlash against the group's dishonest propaganda is beginning to explode.

Fox News is currently covering the controversy in its lead story, and does present a decent overview of some of the issues.

If you want a true understanding of just how deceptive WikiLeaks was, however, you need to read these posts by the investigative team at the Jawa Report, and a pair of articles I've written for Pajamas Media that tell the true story of what happened, starting with Part 1.

Knocking Down Another NY Times Smear

The ideologues at the increasingly partisan Times managed to slip in another attack against the Tea Party Movement several days ago, comparing them to the domestic terrorists of the Weather Underground.

Larry Grathwohl, who infiltrated the Weathermen and helped stop one of their attempts at mass murder, is understandably disgusted with the comparison of today's patriots with the left-wing terrorists the Times has all but embraced.

Blinded by Hate

One thing we have learned in the last few weeks is that hate speech is alive and well... on the editorial page, and directed squarely at people like you.

Off Target

Has Josh Sugarmann of the Violence Policy Center ever been right?

EXCLUSIVE: Media Falls For Pallywood Production...Again

European media has been falling all over itself this week to report that Israeli soldiers slaughtered a pair of innocent Palestinian boys near the sight of a protest. A human rights group is parading around an X-ray that they say is proof that Israeli forces used live ammunition instead of rubber-coated less lethal ammunition.

It is too bad for them that all the X-ray does is provide considerable evidence of deliberate fraud.

An interesting aspect of the story is the commentary of a radiologist who looked at the image, and provided his feedback after this story was written.

He noted:

Is the bullet actually inside the skull? If somebody wanted to, he/or she could take an xray with the bullet overlying the person's head and make a similar appearance. On the limited image I don't see any shards of bone/fractures to indicate entrance into the skull. I would need some kind of cross sectional image to confirm that the bullet is ACTUALLY inside the skull.

A different angle (frontal xray or crossectional imaging i.e. CT/MRI) would definitely be able show fractures or fragments of bone, but unfortunately i'm only provided with a low quality image of a one-view skull xray.

"Agents of Incompetence Series" Noted by Field & Stream

This may not be that big a deal to many of you, but growing up I devoured every issue of Field & Stream as it came in. Their writers were (and are) superb, and of those, David E. Petzal has always been one of my favorites.

So I thought it was very cool this morning when I found out Petzal had written a post on The Gun Nut that linked approvingly to my "Agents of Incompetence" series at Pajamas Media.

And now, we have our friends in the U.S. Customs and their pals in the ATF, who have impounded 30 M4-replica Airsoft rifles, claiming that they can be converted to real M4s. This story comes our way courtesy of reporter Bob Owens, and it has to be read in full to be appreciated. Go to it by clicking here, and if you don’t drink now, you will afterward.

Pretty cool, to me at least. If you didn't see the series yet, you can catch it via the links below:

Agents of Incompetence: ATF Seizes Gun Shipment Labeled 'Toys' — But They Really Were Toys

Agents of Incompetence: ATF Seizes ‘Toys,’ Then Touts Their Danger (Part II)

Agents of Incompetence: Customs, ATF Dodging All Questions About Toy Guns (Part III)

I sent in a Freedom of Information Act this morning asking the BATF for all communications, documentation, video and photographic evidence, along with a record of emails and communications between BATF and CBP.

Considering the Obama Administration's track record with FOIA I can't say I'm confident I'll get the answers I seek, but it it worth trying, all the same.

Agents of Incompetence, Part III

Watch this news report closely, and you'll notice the Special Agent in Charge (SAC) of the BATF's Seattle Field Division attempt the insert the Airsoft gun's magazine in the gun backwards before finally getting it right.

According to an ATF whistleblower blog, this same Special Agent was demoted two levels to his current level for incompetence, and has cost taxpayers hundreds of thousands of dollars... and that's just before this latest incident.

The stench of a BATF cover-up is growing stronger.

This article may be the last planned installment in my three part series (here are part 1 and part 2 if you missed those) at Pajamas Media, but there is so much done wrong, so badly, by these two federal agencies that I have a feeling that this story is far from over.

Agents of Incompetence, Part II

U.S. Customs inspectors and BATF agents claim that a shipment of Airsoft guns are machine guns, because of a BATF determination that claims that these toys can easily be modified into automatic weapons.

In the second installment of Agents of Incompetence, two teams of experts take the BATF determination apart:

In short, the gunsmith determined that the entire upper receiver would have to be replaced by an upper from a real M4/M6 type rifle to have a hope of functioning, and a trigger pack from a real M4 would have to undergo extensive modification to even fit. And even when modified to fit, it wouldn't fire. If this gunsmith is correct, then all the effort to take a $400 toy and $600-plus of real gun parts — plus significant labor from a proficient gunsmith — would result in a thousand-dollar club less functional than the original toy...

Agents of Incompetence

Don't you think that U.S. Customs and the ATF should be able to tell shipments Airsoft guns from machine guns? And if they did determine that such toys could be converted into real weapons, that they should stop all imports of the toys, and not just the imports to a single store?

In the first article of a three part series at Pajamas Media, I tackle what can only be descried as Agents of Incompetence.

Tea Party Knockoffs: Watered Down, Bitter

It looks like our friends at the NY Times and Washington Post are thrilled to jump on the bandwagon of the left-wing Coffee Party.

Too bad their articles cheerleading the group just happened to come out on the day Pajamas Media published my article exposing them as the front-end of a left-wing astroturfing campaign.

Group Obama Was a Director of Calls to Reinstitute Black Codes

If a conservative think tank called for the civl rights and liberties of the black community to be removed because they could not exercise them responsibly, then every news outlet in the country would cry out in anger.

So why does a left-wing special interest get away with the exact same thing?

One can only hope that Josh Sugarman, executive director of the Violence Policy Center, is completely ignorant of the many mob actions and the thousands of deaths that resulted from laws that stripped African-Americans of their rights and liberties. Considering his long-running and strident anti-gun advocacy, it seems likely that Sugarman and the organization are well aware of history but made a political calculation in asking that African-Americans be disarmed.

Barack Obama is a former director of the Joyce Foundation, one of the groups that funded the so-called research. I'd love to see someone in the White House Press Corps asked Robert Gibbs what the Administration's view is of the report.

ABC Raids Message Boards to ‘Break’ a Decades-Old Story

Calling the staff of the ABC News blog The Blotter "journalists" is to insult those that actually do journalism.

Let us call them what they are: message board trolling stenographers of liberal orthodoxy and manufactured outrage.

That it appears they additionally stole content from these same message boards and claimed it as their own merely means that in addition to being intellectually lazy, they are likely guilty of content theft as well.

I spoke with a highly-placed media executive yesterday via email, who says that the international news organization he works for would have taken ABC's content theft very seriously.

One can hope that ABC will treat this suspected content theft with seriousness even if they avoid commenting on the shoddy work of Brian Ross and his team.

Or do they even pretend to have standards any more?

Slowing Brown Down

What tactics and evasions can Democrats use if Scott Brown defeats Martha Coakley in today's Massachusetts Senate race?

I go over the options in my latest post at Pajamas Media.

Did Abdulmutallab Want to Fail? Eh, No

Most days, I don't think about him at all. Some days, I question his sanity. And then there are days when I have no doubts at all.

Glenn invokes Jane's law.

Yeah... that fits.

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.

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?

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.

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.

Another Leftist-Motivated Cop-Killing in the Northwest?

My latest is up at Pajamas Media, discussing the previous murders of police officers from leftists educated in the area, and the possibility that the murder of four police officers yesterday by Maurice Clemmons may have been a copycat crime inspired by the most recent of those shooters (Monfort), aggravated by his own stated hatred of police and mental instability.

In the meantime, I'm following accounts of the shooting on Twitter at #WAshooting and listening to Seattle police continue their manhunt of the suspect via an online police scanner.

The Opportunism of Ghouls

That was my preferred headline for this article at Pajamas Media, but hey, somebody else gets paid to write the heads and subheads. I just provide the content.

I guess I shouldn't be surprised that liberal anti-gun groups are hoping to use the bodies of our soldiers killed in a terrorist attack as a weapon against our Constitutional rights.

The Unrequited Dream of Smart Guns

My latest article is up at Pajamas Media.

Are Iranian Weapons Flowing Through Your Country's Ports?

The 500 tons of Iranian rockets, grenades, ammunition and mortar shells that Israel intercepted on the MV Francop was destined for Hezbollah terrorists in Lebanon, a fact that Iran's friends in the Obama White House will not doubt seek to downplay if not outright ignore. That means that a media largely compliant to the Administration's wishes will fail to pick up on the alarm sounded by Israel, which noted the weapons they intercepted had first been shipped into an unsuspecting third country, unloaded, transferred, and shipped out again without anyone in that nation knowing.

The weapons were not segregated or controlled, were not properly stored or packed, and highly explosive.

And it could happen any any port at any nation on earth.

"When you deal with those containers without any precautions at all, they can explode almost anywhere. And any one of your ships could carry one of those containers one day, and any one of your ports could deal with those explosives."

This isn't a secret.

So why isn't anything being done about it?

PJTV: National Security Report on Iranian Arms Smuggling to Terrorists

My appearance with Bill Whittle of EjectEjectEject and AfterBurner fame on PJTV, talking about Iran arming terrorist groups, based upon this article from yesterday at Pajamas Media and this one here.

Thanks for having me on, Bill!

Iranian Rockets Captured by Israel Identical to Rockets Fired At U.S. Bases in Iraq

107mm rockets of recent Iranian manufacture are among the 500 tons of ordnance recovered by the Israeli Navy, and the rockets they recovered precisely matched those captured outside of U.S FOB Hammer in July of 2007.

And in case you are wondering, yes, those same rockets are still being used, and are still killing American soldiers today.

An American logistics contractor known to readers of this blog as "Big Country" says via email that those same rockets are still being used against American bases:

...between the hours of 2000 and 2200 (8pm to 10pm) drop, yep you guessed it, 107mm rockets on us. Some days they don't drop at all, which is even worse. The waiting ya know? The largest number was 6 in short order, and the lowest was a single one. Guess it depends on how confident they are about getting caught. One of them KIA'd a guy on the pad across from me a few weeks back… 4 WIA, 1 KIA. (That one made FOXnews and CNN) I'm getting my intel firsthand on this, (it's pretty common knowledge on post) and the Army is fully aware of the whole thing, but whether or not it helps, I dunno... wheels within wheels as they say. I hope they put the zap these jokers soon.

Will President Obama man-up and stop Iran from supplying weapons being used against our soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan, and against our allies and national interests? Or will he continue to pretend these weapons are not being used against Americans, so he can play at gutless diplomacy?

Somehow, I think we all know the answer.

Thank Goodness fo "Cop-Killer" Weapons

For once, an anti-gun organization's spurious claims may have saved lives.

My latest article is up at Pajamas Media.

The Victims of Fort Hood

My latest article is up at Pajamas Media.

Sure Sounds Familiar

Lots of acclaim, and undeserved kudos that became an embarrassment.

I was just ahead of my time...

A Man’s Wal-Mart Is His Castle?

An employee fight at Wal-Mart that ended in a gunshot to the head challenges Montana's new law regarding the use of deadly force in self-defense.

At Pajamas Media.

How Much Op-Sec is Too Much?

Thoughts on the Marine Corps social media ban, at Pajamas Media.

The Nation Claims Blackwater's Founder Prince Committed Murder... with This?

Jeremy Scahill reports in a stunning article in The Nation that Blackwater founder Eric Prince committed murder to cover up a multitude of crimes committed by his companies. Scahill relies heavily on the allegations from two "John Doe" declarations. Doe #1 is reputedly a former Marine that worked for Blackwater as a security contractor, but the most damning claims from Doe #2,who claims to have been a Blackwater executive for four years.

The problem is, his most damning testimony hinges upon claims that don't even make sense.

If you're going to allege weapon smuggling,try something that sounds more credible than imaginary weapons, such as "sawed-off semi-automatic machine guns with silencers," or non-existent exploding bullets.

Cartel "Anti-aircraft Machine Guns" Neither Anti-aircraft, Nor Machine Guns

And please, don't blame me for the title.

FBI Lab Raises More Questions Than Answers About Nisoor Square Shooting

Frankly, it sounds like crap science geared towards a predetermined political verdict.

I think both the Bush Administration and the Obama Administration would consider a show trial that results in across-the-board convictions to be in their best diplomatic interests in dealing with the Iraqi government, who have rather foolishly (IMHO) decided to push the issue as a matter of national pride.

It takes only a layman's understanding of ballistics and metallurgy to see the obvious questions that the FBI laboratory seems to have failed to adequately answer.

I'm not giving Blackwater blanket immunity for their actions in Iraq by any stretch of the imagination, but there are certainly enough questions about the quality of the investigation and the forensic research thus far released, the forensic evidence being withheld under the rubric of religious customs, the chain of evidence, and prosecutorial political influence to cast serious doubt on whether there can be a fair trail for the accused.

A Call to Arms in Mexico

The solution to the expanding drug cartel violence in Mexico isn't for our anti-gun President and Attorney General to pass even more restrictive gun laws in the United States, but instead change Mexican laws to increase the flow of guns into the right hands in Mexico, paralleling the success of the Sawa or "Awakening" movement in Iraq that drove a similarly violent Sunni insurgency out of al-Anbar.

Read my latest, A Call to Arms in Mexico, at Pajamas Media.

The Best President Money Can Buy

My latest at Pajamas Media.

W W C N D?

My latest is up at Pajamas Media.

(link fixed)

What's The Matter with Illinois?

And why do they keep freedom-hating urban Democrats?

Political Cartoons and Race-Baiting Goons

When your standards are this low to start with, the lying comes easy.

Why Stupid People Shouldn't Blog

Let me type this  s l o w l y  so that certain people who don't seem to be able to read with any level of detail can follow along.

The Pajamas Media advertising network—responsible for those ads you generally ignore see in the sidebar over there to your right—is going the way of the digital dodo on March 31. Pajamas Media, the portal site that features news and opinion, is not closing. The blogfather, Glenn Reynolds, will still be found at http://pajamasmedia.com/instapundit/

Only the advertising network, which never made any money, is going away. Pajamas Media and PJTV.com live on, and are in an apparent expansion phase.

The network going down to hurt some good bloggers who depended upon the network as their primary sources of income. They have my sympathy and sincere prayers. As someone who worked in web development contracting for many years, I know the fears of suddenly becoming jobless with a family to support as well or better than many, and the stress that can cause.

But I'm equally confident that those bloggers who were drawing enough traffic to draw significant income from their advertising, like Ace and Jeff and Rusty, have the kind of unique voices and talent that may fair well on their own or other blog advertising networks. They, like the cheesy song says, will survive.

And while we get along on almost nothing, I think John Cole over at Ballon Juice strikes just the right tone.

So I don’t have to keep answering this repeatedly in the comments, yes, I will no longer be with the PJ Media network starting 1 April. They are apparently moving on/the business model didn't work/whatever. Life goes on.

I understand there is an inordinate amount of bad feelings and some hostility being chucked around, and I want no part in it. Roger Simon and the others at PJ always kept their word to me. From where I sit, PJ Media was an ad portal that provided advertising content for this site, and that was about it. I never understood claims at the beginning of this several years ago that somehow I was "losing my independence" or the rest of the nonsense for signing up with them. As I have stated repeatedly, maybe others had different experiences, but the company was great to me. They always kept their word, their staff was top-notch and great to work with (and I really hope they find jobs quickly/keep their jobs), and Roger Simon was a great person to do business with the past couple years. I signed a contract through the end of March, PJ Media and I are both honoring it, and they are moving on to something different. This sort of thing happens hundreds of thousands of times every day all over the world, and is really rather unremarkable.

Life goes on, indeed.

As you might guess, the dissolution of the Pajamas advertising network will not disrupt things greatly here at CY. I'll still write feature stories for Pajamas Media published at the still very active (And judging by the growing comments sections, more active) pajamasmedia.com portal, and I'm already in discussion with another exciting potential partner who may be rolling some advertising and writing opportunities my way.

We encounter, we adapt, and overcome.

So let's move forward, shall we?

Shooting Suspects in the Back is Bad

My post at Pajamas Media this morning is drawing a lot of heat for labeling President Bush's commutation of former Border Patrol agents Ramos and Compean his "final mistake."

I can certainly see the other side of the equation, as I personally prefer a walled, wired, and if necessary mined border with Mexico, but this case isn't as hard—for me at least—as some people would like to make it.

Cops that shoot fleeing suspects in the back, leave the wounded suspect to fend for himself, and then attempt to cover-up the incident deserve considerable jail time, and sentences of 11 and 12 years don't seem excessive in that context from where I sit.

Do I wish their aim had been a little better? Certainly. I despise drug dealers as well. But the suspect's profession doesn't mitigate the decisions made by these two former officers, and in my opinion, they didn't deserve their commutations (and certainly do not deserve the pardons some were lobbying for).

Update: The Dallas Morning News had a similar reaction to the commutation:

...this newspaper does not agree with Bush's decision to commute the sentences of former border agents Ignacio Ramos and Jose Compean, who, respectively, were serving 11- and 12-year federal prison terms for shooting a Mexican drug dealer. This was a despicable crime: The two officers had no idea the unarmed man was trafficking in drugs when they shot him in the back side as he ran for the border near El Paso. They then took extraordinary steps to cover up the shooting with a false report.

Their actions are an affront to Border Patrol agents who perform a difficult and thankless job, and the pair's sentences were upheld last year by a federal appeals court.

It’s regrettable that Bush shortened their jail time but significant that he found middle ground and didn’t grant them pardons. Their convictions will remain on the record.

Perhaps the commutation will end the undeserved celebrity status that had erupted around these two former agents. Anti-immigration organizations have used them as poster boys to perpetuate a myth that they were in prison for doing their jobs while drug smugglers were allowed to go free.

Nothing could be further from the truth. Ramos and Compean committed felonies and were rightly brought to justice. Perhaps now the Obama administration can have a comprehensive immigration discussion without this distraction clouding the conversation.

Perhaps appropriately enough, they've been greeted with a similar response by their readers, who claim that they must favor the rights of drug dealers over that of police officers.

If that was the case, I'd agree as well.

But Compean and Ramos did not know the suspect was a drug dealer at the time. They followed a suspicious vehicle on a chase, then immediately engaged in a foot pursuit of the driver without having a chance to know why his was running. Should we really write our laws to allow law enforcement officers to do whatever they want, allowing themselves to justify it after the fact?

Ramos and Compean shot at a guy who could have stolen copper, had a warrant for failing to appear in court for a parking ticket... they simply didn't know. If you've ever watched COPS, you know that stupid people run for the police for all sorts of idiotic reasons, and officers are almost never justified at shooting at a fleeing suspect 14 times (Compean) or Ramos (once).

That the suspect in the case was later determined to be an illegal, and a drug smuggler with hundreds of pounds of drugs, cannot justify what they did before they had that knowledge.

I strongly suspect the vast majority of support for these officers would have never existed if the officers had fired upon a fleeing middle-aged white guy poaching wild game.

Please tell me where I'm wrong.

Joe the Plumber in Israel

Pajamas Media published a pair of articles today about Samuel Joseph Wurzelbacher (a.k.a. "Joe the Plumber") going to Israel for ten days to talk to Israelis and provide commentary for PJTV. I wrote the pro-Joe article three days ago; Jazz Shaw wrote the anti-Joe article since then.

In my post, I don't think I made any unreasonable demands of the man whom admirers like to refer to as "JTP."

I’m not expecting Pyle's humanizing folksiness, nor Yon's gritty incisiveness, nor Crane's vivid imagery from Wurzelbacher. I don't know if he can craft a coherent sentence or conduct an revealing interview. And perhaps he'll be an absolute disaster as a journalist, even as he's created a PR explosion for PJTV.

But there is an obvious fear among so many members of the media so defensively and preemptively dismissive of "Joe the Plumber" trying his hand at reporting. Deep inside, they must wonder if an Ohio plumber could really be much worse than the so-called professionals we already have. There lies the fear that underlies those mocking Wurzelbacher in the media. It is a bruise to their egos when they realize that almost anyone can do what they do.

Since writing that post, Joe hasn't dazzled the world as a reporting prodigy, and has most recently been mocked today for telling a group of reporters that the media should be banned from reporting the conflict he was sent to report on:

"I think media should be abolished from, you know, reporting," Wurzelbacher said. "You know, war is hell. And if you're gonna sit there and say, 'well, look at this atrocity,' well you don't know the whole story behind it half the time, so I think the media should have no business in it."

The media, of course, lapped up Wurzelbacher's comment with great glee and held it up as if it were their vindication. I'm not sure it was, as there are good reasons to ban journalists from war zones on occasion.

While an outright ban on media coverage is generally considered undemocratic and is certainly unpopular in a culture told we should have access to almost any thing at any time, the simple fact of the matter is that irresponsible and often ignorant just-in-time journalism endangers combatants and civilians, and far too often reports completely false information as undisputed fact.

This conflict is no different.

Certain heavily-biased Middle eastern and European journalists have castigated Israel for using illegal incendiaries against civilians. It turns out those "illegal incendiaries" are quite legal 155mm M825A1 shells used to create smoke screens.

An aid organization temporarily stopped shipments of food and medical supplies into Gaza based upon definitive claims reported by the media that an Israeli tank targeted and shot at one of their trucks with a tank shell, killing the driver. Days later, after many came to accept this as fact, it was revealed that tank fire was not involved in the death of the driver, and that Hamas sharpshooters armed with rifles may have killed him.

Two news organizations—CNN and Channel 4—uncritically reported the claims of a Palestinian cameraman who stated his brother and cousin were killed by an IDF drone that fired a missile at them as the played on a rooftop. That no known missiles could cause the cartoonishly minimal damage shown on the rooftop, and that critics in the medical field quickly denouced the CPR performed on the boy in the hospital by a known propagandist dcotor as poorly pantomimed fakery, is buried by both networks, who defend the footage created by a cameraman who was later determined to have ties to Hamas.

France 2 is the latest to fake journalism, airing footage they claimed was from Israeli attacks, when the carnage aired actually come from a blast caused by Palestinian militants in 2005.

Another news organization can't tell the difference between dropping flares and dropping bombs. One pathic professional that reports from the region can't tell the difference between airplanes and helicopters.

So perhaps Joe the Plumber may turn out to be not much more than a media stunt. If so, he may still be more of a success if simply for causing less damage than our so-called professionals.

Reuters: In The Service of Hamas

I've got post at Pajamas Media highlighting Reuters using deceptive captions to suggest that photos capturing the deployment of defensive flares (uses to thwart heat-seeking surface-to-air missiles) are weapons being fired on targets in Gaza.

This is an Israeli helicopter deploying a weapon (a Hellfire, most likely), as is this. No one with any competence could ever confuse a bomb, missile, or rocket with a flare.

Associated Press photographer Ariel Schalit can ever photograph and properly label both missiles and flares in the same picture.

Reuters, masters of fauxtography, don't even try.

It doesn't serve their interests of cashing in on anti-Israeli propaganda by selling biased and inflammatory photos to an always-enraged Islamist-friendly media in Europe, the Middle East, and Asia.

What's the Difference Between Bill Ayers and Timothy McVeigh?

Competence.

Debunking the Proofers

I'd love to see Obama ask the state of Hawaii to produce his long-form birth certificate. While there is no procedural mechanism in place as some have noted before, that is merely a matter of process, not a legal hurdle.

Anyway, I took a stab at debunking the common "Proofer" claims in an article at Pajamas Media.

Do you think it sufficiently makes the case to the rational people who have been misled by the half-truths of the proofers? And is there anything that can ever be done to convince those conspiracy theorists that they are wrong?

Giving Thanks...

...for their sacrifices and service.

And if you'd like to give thanks to a milbogger deployed far away from home in a combat zone, you can do so here.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone.

Eyewitness to the Revolution

Several days ago I created something of a fuss when I linked to a clip of FBI informant Larry Grathwohl, where he revealed that the domestic terrorists known as the Weather Underground plotted to kill 25 million Americans in Soviet-style reeducation camps.

I asked, "well what is going to happen to those people we can't reeducate, that are diehard capitalists?" and the reply was that they'd have to be eliminated.

And when I pursued this further, they estimated they would have to eliminate 25 million people in these reeducation centers.

And when I say "eliminate," I mean "kill."

Twenty-five million people.

I want you to imagine sitting in a room with 25 people, most of which have graduate degrees, from Columbia and other well-known educational centers, and hear them figuring out the logistics for the elimination of 25 million people.

And they were dead serious.

Thanks to CL Lucas, I found Larry Grathwohl and interviewed him this past weekend about the Weathermen, their leaders then and now, and what he thinks about the relationship between Bill Ayers and Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama.

Watching the Watchers

What's more fun that getting a press pass to see Sarah Palin speak at your alma mater? Getting a seat where you can watch every move of the press corps.

Watching the Palin Watchers, at PJM.

Update: I just watched the press in action. A local reporter had a chance to listen to them today.

As you might have heard, I am covering the McCain/Palin appearance today. At the media breakfast at the Pfister Hotel about an hour ago, you would simply not believe the vicious, nasty conversation I just overheard between several "elite" media types from the McClatchey news service, AP, and a couple of other sources I didn't quite catch. Over the course of just a few minutes, I heard that "Sean Hannity gives Dick Cheney the best head of his life," and that he and Lou Dobbs are "mean-spirited sycophants," and that McCain himself is "angry" and "crusty. One even recalled a recent campaign event at which Sarah Palin autographed a supporter's Bible, prompting this "objective" journalist to remark "these people terrify me." And this was just in the span of a 10 minute conversation! I simply cannot believe that these are the people entrusted to cover the McCain/Palin campaign fairly and accurately. I have never before wanted to do a show like yours quite as badly as I do right now--so that I can expose these people for who they really are: unabashed, unashamed partisans whose callous, bitter attitude towards conservatives very clearly permeates their work.

Obama, Ayers, and Dohrn, Oh My

The ties between Barack Obama and terrorists Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn go back over 21 years.

The long and short of it? Barack Obama knew, and knew well, that Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn were terrorists when he met them. He just didn't care.

Roger Simon has more on Dohrn's celebrity.

Did Obama Attempt to Undermine the President in Iraq?

Amir Taheri raised the issue in yesterday's NY Post. I try to help provide some answers in my latest post at Pajamas Media.

Still Milli Vanilli

Kathy N, a reader from Barack Obama's home state of Hawaii, wrote this morning to say that in late August she came to the conclusion that Barack Obama has a lot in common with Milli Vanilla, and that she was rather impressed that I'd come to the same conclusion six months earlier.

Does the comparison still hold up?

As more comes out seeming to indicate that Barack Obama was nothing more than a lip-synching puppet for Bill Ayers funneling tens of millions of dollars in grant money to Ayers, Mike Klonsky, and other former radicals it seems only one conclusion is possible.

Girl you know it's true.

Just Following Orders?

Does knowing of serious crimes being covered up by your superiors compel a moral obligation to expose the crimes, even if it potentially costs you your career to blow the whistle?

More than substantiated 300 Vietnam-era war crimes, and more than 200 possible war criminals were never prosecuted, even though those in charge had the opportunity to seek justice for rape, murder, torture, and other atrocities... so who is to blame?

AT PJM: D.C.'s Handgun Restrictions

Go ahead. Make my day.

At PJM: "Performance-Based" Gun Regulation

Should brewers be responsible for lowering the number of drunk driving fatalities? Should pharmaceutical companies be held responsible for reducing the number of deaths due to the abuse of prescription drugs? Should paint companies be responsible for reducing graffiti?

Of course not.

And the suggestion is even more unhinged when applied to products we have a Constitutional right to own.

Calcified

John McCain may be the older of the two, but Barack Obama is the candidate hopelessly lost in the past.

Up Close and Personal with an EFP

You've heard of EFPs (Explosively-formed penetrators or projectiles), a kind of IED, being used against American armored vehicles.

Very few people outside of the military have seen the results of an EFP strike in detail. Thanks to confidential sources inside Iraq, I have relatively rare photos of an EFP strike in my post at Pajamas Media, How Iran Is Killing U.S. Troops in Iraq.

Hangman

"No one should start a ministry with lynching, no one should end their ministry with lynching."

Rev. Otis Moss, Trinity United Church of Christ, March 23, 2008

"The person that I saw yesterday was not the person that I met 20 years ago," he said. "His comments were not only divisive and destructive, but I believe that they end up giving comfort to those who prey on hate, and I believe that they do not portray accurately the perspective of the black church."

"They certainly don't portray accurately my values and beliefs," he said.

"If Reverend Wright thinks that's political posturing, as he put it, then he doesn't know me very well and based on his remarks yesterday, I may not know him as well as I thought either."

"I gave him the benefit of the doubt in my speech in Philadelphia, explaining that he has done enormous good in the church," he said. "But when he states and then amplifies such ridiculous propositions as the U.S. government somehow being involved in AIDS; when he suggests that Minister Farrakhan somehow represents one of the greatest voices of the 20th and 21st century; when he equates the U.S. wartime efforts with terrorism – then there are no excuses. They offend me. They rightly offend all Americans. And they should be denounced, and that's what I'm doing very clearly and unequivocally here today."

Barack Obama, Winston-Salem, NC, April 29, 2008

Ace pretty much sums up my thoughts on the matter, if in language a bit more colorful than I typically use.

Too little, too dishonest, and too late. Obama cuts into Wright for being precisely the man he has been for the past 20 years.

Wright has been consistent, and Obama has proven to be precisely what everyone feared—just another cheap empty suit, willing to say or do anything according to the requirements of the polls.

Far from being the Messiah, he makes for even a shoddy secondhand Brian.

At PJM: Bilal Hussein Released

AP's Terror Operative Freed but Not Cleared.

Please spay or neuter your pet insurgents.

At PJM: Good News on Iraq Is No News

My latest article is posted at Pajamas Media.

AT PJM: Barack Obama and the Politics of Personal Distraction

Is Barack Obama black enough to be president of the United States? Is he too black? Does he belong to a church that is too radical? Is he too unpatriotic? Too Muslim? Is he too … Somali?

My latest article is up at Pajamas Media.

Obama Off Target

Obama Shooting Himself in the Foot with Anti-Gun Stance, at Pajamas Media.

His long-held desire to ban entire classes of firearms won't play well in "flyover country," and could cost him the 2008 election.

At PJM: Gunning For a Concealed Carry Permit

While most of you were getting ready for the Super Bowl, I was in a concealed carry course to obtain certification to apply for North Carolina's concealed carry permit.

What did I learn?

That I need a lawyer small enough to shove in a holster.

Truth in Gaza

Hard to find. Harder to get printed.

At PJM: Study on Bush's Iraq Deception and Lies: Full of Deception and Lies

I finally got a chance to look at CPI/FIJ's Iraq: The War Card—Orchestrated Deception on the Path to War, and was greatly underwhelmed.

In fact, I'd go so far as to label it naked advocacy by a political group posing as neutral authorities.

Oh wait, I did: Study on Bush's Iraq Deception and Lies: Full of Deception and Lies

Thanks to Bryan for finding Dr. Jim Kuypers in this post at Hot Air.

At PJM: The New York Times Hits Veterans Yet Again

Did you read the article at the New York Times this past Sunday about the astronomical homicide rates among veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan?

If you didn't, Samantha Sault captured a nice roundup of earlier blog reaction, which discovered that the Times left out key statistics in order to complete their smear.

It only gets worse from there.

At PJM: Assassinating Obama?

There have been quite a few articles written in the past week speculating that Democratic Presidential candidate Senator Barack Obama might be assassinated by a shadowy cabal of gun-toting racists (or Halliburton and Blackwater).

In my latest Pajamas Media article, I trace that rumor back to it's true source, and find that that paranoia stems from the media's own stilted views of the American people.

Harper's Horton Scandals Heat Up

Horton Hears a Boo: Journalistic Hijinks at Harper's Exposed is now up at Pajamas Media and has already been linked by both Instapundit and Powerline.

It turns out that Harper's writer Scott Horton, who has been a leading cheerleader for imprisoned Associated Press photographer and terrorism suspect Bilal Hussein, was a former investigator for Hussein's defense team, a disclosure that he has failed to make in his recent attacks against the U.S. military's handling of the Hussein case.

This particular bit of journalistic malpractice is unrelated to another budding scandal surrounding Horton's still unsupported August 24 claim that an unnamed "thuggish neocon" journalist fabricated a story while Horton was in Iraq.

Repeatedly pressed for comment and proof of the anonymous article Horton alludes to, Harper's Editor Roger D. Hodge, Managing Editor Ellen Rosenbush, Vice President of Public Relations Giulia Melucci and Horton have thus far refused to support or retract his claim. Hodge, Rosenbush, and Melucci were contacted as recently as December 30, but remain mute, apparently hoping to stonewall their way through this scandal.

In light of these developments, perhaps Andrew Sullivan may want to reconsider his statement that, "Scott Horton has as much integrity as anyone I know."

At PJM...

Lethal Weapon: Could Romney's Gun Position Kill His Campaign?

When a Presidential candidate doesn't understand the Constitution and Bill of Rights, it's time to look elsewhere (and I'm looking at you, too, Rudy and McCain-Feingold).

At PJM: The Jamie Leigh Jones Rape Case

I have a pair of posts up at Pajamas Media this morning regarding the alleged July, 2005 gang-rape of a young female contractor in Iraq. ABC News blog The Blotter broke the story and it seems to have triggered an investigation in the House Judiciary Committee as a result. Unfortunately, what came off the pages of The Blotter has significant discrepancies with the claims made in the legal documents.

It isn't fabulism, but it is sensationalism.

The second post at Pajamas this morning is the chronology of Jaime Leigh Jones experiences that was once published as "Jamie's Journal" that was pulled down yesterday and delinked in the site navigation as if it ever existed.

I'd emailed Ms. Jones' attorney yesterday morning with questions, and within several hours, the page was down. Those are the facts. I'm not yet sure if there is any cause and effect involved, but I should be able to clear that up with I speak with her attorney, Todd Kelly, later today.

For those of you who might expect me to be trying to debunk the case... don't.

Though there are some inconsistencies with certain aspects of the case and the way it has been reported, absolutely nothing seems to contradict the key claim that she was savagely, brutally raped. Nothing contradicts the fact that she has not be able to find justice for 2 years.

I think she's a brave young woman, and hope that she can find both emotional and physical healing.

Democrats Determined to Miss the Good News from Iraq

My newest post is up at Pajamas Media.

No Heart of Darkness

Perhaps due to all the words of praise over the Fred Thompson War on Terror Conversation, Pajamas Media has brought me on to write a weekly "column" the first of which is posted today.

I put the word column in quotes because we--Pajamas and I--are hoping to use this as a chance to post original reporting as much or more so than the opinion pieces normally associated with the term "column."

Without further adieu (or Freddy Adu), here's my first post as a "regular" at Pajamas Media, No Heart of Darkness: An Ex-Sunni Insurgent Becomes US Ally.