Author Archive

This according to 6:15 Pac Time in an update.

Too bad…..

Also press conference says female who shot Maj. Hasan went thru surgery and in stable condition. Add the official reports to comments for us all, if you please…

Lord Christopher Monckton has been making the rounds, warning against the December Copenhagen climate change conference and their proposed legislation to succeed the 1997 Kyoto Treaty. Monckton – not only known as Margaret Thatcher’s advisor, but as a clarion skeptic on the global warming propaganda machine – appeared on Fox News Happy Hour a couple of days ago. It ended with co-host, Rebecca Diamond, subtly expressing her disbelief at the end of the interview that Obama and the world leaders could possibly be involved in such nefarious doin’s.

On the same tangent today is Jeffrey T. Kuhner of the Washington Times, with his column today, Obama’s New World Order: Redistributionist revolution vs. sovereignty.

President Obama is on a path toward establishing a one-world government. This is the warning of Christopher Monckton, a former major policy adviser to British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher.

In December, world leaders will descend upon Copenhagen to sign a United Nations climate change treaty that will succeed the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, which is aimed at reducing greenhouse gases and set to expire in 2012. An agreement has been drafted.

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When you get the AP doing fact checking, you have to know something’s amiss in Obama fantasyland. In the POTUS’s desperate attempt to simplify his demand for remaking America’s health care system, he reverts to the proven Alinsky techniques of finding a demon, targeting that demon and isolating it to stir up public discontent.

His latest mantras have been focused on portraying those evil health insurers in the same light as Wall Street CEO’s.

Trouble is, facts get in the way of the rhetoric.

Per AP’s Calvin Woodward today, health insurers’ profits have barely exceeded 2% in the latest annual measures. With a traditional measure of a private enterprise’s financial health and growth potential generally hovering between 25-33% profit structure, one wonders how the heck they are surviving.

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You have to give it to the agenda driven media…. they just don’t let go of that bone easily.

Case in point, Chris Good and his little diddy at The Atlantic, “It’s Not (overtly) About Race”.

Centerpiece to the headline, and content of his op-ed, is James Carville and Stanley Greenberg’s polling/strategy/research firm, Democracy Corps, and it’s 18 pg study, “The Very Separate World of Conservative Republicans: Why Republican Leaders will have Trouble Speaking to the Rest of America” released Oct 16th, 2009.

Here the disconnect between Good’s op-ed, and the actual content of the study begin. Good has chosen to focus on race and racism… and dances around the study’s finding that the discontent of “weak” partisans… Republican and Independents… appears to have nothing to do with race.

From the Carville groups research document:

Race: Get Over It

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I’m not sure what the bigger story is here… that the troops are feeling less than confident in their new Commander in Chief, or that this story is being reported in the New York Times.

But here it is… yesterday’s byline by Elisabeth Bumiller under the Military Memo, As the Commander in Chief Deliberates, Frustration Builds Within the Ranks

A number of active duty and retired senior officers say there is concern that the president is moving too slowly, is revisiting a war strategy he announced in March and is unduly influenced by political advisers in the Situation Room.

“The thunderstorm is there and it’s kind of brewing and it’s unstable and the lightning hasn’t struck, and hopefully it won’t,” said Nathaniel C. Fick, a former Marine Corps infantry officer who briefed Mr. Obama during the 2008 presidential campaign and is now the chief executive of the Center for a New American Security, a military research institution in Washington. “I think it can probably be contained and avoided, but people are aware of the volatile brew.”

Last week the national commander of the Veterans of Foreign Wars, Thomas J. Tradewell Sr., gave voice to the concerns of those in the military when he issued a terse statement criticizing Mr. Obama’s review of Afghan war strategy.

“The extremists are sensing weakness and indecision within the U.S. government, which plays into their hands,” said Mr. Tradewell’s statement on behalf of his group, which represents 1.5 million former soldiers.

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Ah yes… another day in the O’news cycle. It was predictable that Snowe would cave and side with the liberal health care crowd, and that the Senate Finance Committee’s plastic surgery on the Baucus bill would pass.

It was also predictable that the media will ignore Robert Reich’s comments that prove Rep. Alan Grayson was right about many looking at health care reform as simply “die quickly”… he was just wrong about the source of that ‘tude… as it was coming from his own party czars/appointees/Obama cronies.

Speaking of Grayson, that would be the same Alan Grayson who was wounded severely when he went up against Neil Cavuto INRE the Performance for Pay Act he introduced… a bill that sniffs suspiciously of the same manure that makes up Charlie Rangel’s HR 1586…. aka the template for the Senate health care bill.

So rather than address the predictable, here’s some very enjoyable stuff to kick around… the hot heads of state. Naw… not temperment. This was a beauty contest poll of the heads of state around the world conducted by the bloggers, Kate, JD and Derek at The Hottest Heads of State website. They’ve got quite the “onion” humor going there… ala

For too long, citizens of the world have suffered under the tyranny of unattractive leaders. Some people say that this is just the way things are: unattractive people have a death grip on the levers of power that will never be loosened. We say: Not with that attitude it won’t. By ranking the world’s leaders by looks, we hope to heighten voter awareness of this problem and shame the citizens of countries with unattractive leaders into rising up and staging coups or something.

And don’t forget to check out their FAQs page for a few more grins..

But… ta daaaaa… The top ten winners: ( check out the full list of 172 here)

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I’ve spoken often about “puzzle pieces” on a variety of political subjects in my posts. Rarely can we, Joe Q Public, see one news event and piece it into the entire puzzle until someone assembles all the pieces in one place.

Thus is the case with the plot for usurping traditional input from the public, and passing a bill reforming remaking America’s health care system… with very little cost savings measures included.

Yesterday, the puzzle piece assembler happened to be Brian Darling, posting at Heritage Foundation’s blog, The Foundry. Yes yes, many of you will say… the *conservative* Heritage Foundation?? Lest you embarrass yourself resorting to the typical “attack the messenger” defense, you’ll find that Mr. Darling’s facts and events have been confirmed by many a traditional and prominent liberal leaning media, as well as Congressional events. However, as the MSM constantly demonstrates, they are math challenged and – in this case – they have failed to put two and two together.

Allow me to ’splain…

My first heads up came with a morning Senate Brief email update from McConnell’s office, discussing the Baucus bill, with the following comments that piqued my curiousity…

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I got excited when I saw Wordsmith’s post about Rush on The Jay Leno show. Since I missed it, I thought I be able to catch the prime parts.

….. bummer. Word, da man, missed the best part (IMHO). So to bracket his post, I’m adding Rush’s record breaking performance for the worst race time and most penalizations in Leno’s infamous electric car race.

Then again, that was Rush’s quest… so did he lose? Or win? It’s all a matter of perspective.

It’s rather interesting that Obama constantly insists that it’s improper to meddle in other nation’s affairs. It become even more ironic when, in his… and his TOTUS twins… address to the UN, he touts America’s committment to nations’ populations who fight for the basic freedoms we enjoy.

And I pledge that America will always stand with those who stand up for their dignity and their rights, for the student who seeks to learn, the voter who demands to be heard, the innocent who longs to be free, the oppressed who yearns to be equal.

I’d say the Iranians and the Hondurans had to be rolling on the floor in hysterical laughter at that one…

So in Obama’s “just words”, he doesn’t meddles … or maybe he does… if is politically expedient. And proof in the pudding is a White House, now exercising the backroom bully pulpit over Massachussetts laws, and New York gubernatorial races.

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Obama took office, confident he would fulfill his campaign promise to close Club Gitmo in a year’s time. To head up the closure details, he appointed White House Counsel Gregory B. Craig… a leading voice for instituting a closure deadline. Despite the advice of other of Obama’s top advisors, warning against any such deadlines, he chose political posturing and poll bumps, signing the EOs… thereby obligating himself to a deadline he was doomed to miss.

Today, as reported by WaPo staffers, Anne E. Kornblut and Dafna Linzer, Obama’s WH is not only quietly backpeddling on his false “hopes”, but has already arranged for Craig’s payment for his scapegoat services – dangling a possible seat on the bench or a diplomatic position.

The POTUS, ever conscious of never wanting to be the focus of blame for failure, tapped Pete Rouse back in May as Craig’s replacement, and pulled in message strategist, Axlerod and deputy communications director Dan Pfeiffer to craft the new talking points when the manure of broken promises hit the proverbial fan.

With four months left to meet its self-imposed deadline for closing the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, the Obama administration is working to recover from missteps that have put officials behind schedule and left them struggling to win the cooperation of Congress.

Even before the inauguration, President Obama’s top advisers settled on a course of action they were counseled against: announcing that they would close the facility within one year. Today, officials are acknowledging that they will be hard-pressed to meet that goal.

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If Van Jones was feeling lonely and singled out, he’s got some friends headed to join him under the bus…

Obama appointee, Robert Grove, has dashed off a letter, notifying the national ACORN headquarters he is severing all ties with the community organizing group for all 2010 census work.

“Over the last several months, through ongoing communication with our regional offices, it is clear that ACORN’s affiliation with the 2010 Census promotion has caused sufficient concern in the general public, has indeed become a distraction from our mission, and may even become a discouragement to public cooperation, negatively impacting 2010 Census efforts,” read a letter from Census Director Robert M. Groves to the president of ACORN.

“Unfortunately, we no longer have confidence that our national partnership agreement is being effectively managed through your many local offices. For the reasons stated, we therefore have decided to terminate the partnership,” the letter said.

ummmm, yeah. So while the FBI investigations and corruption charges couldn’t sway Obama’s devotion to his pet non-profit, an entrepreneurial journalist-wannabe correction… activist filmmaker and his trusty female sidekick topple the group’s cushy position with the POTUS… armed merely with a hidden camera, a good plot line, and a spot on YouTube and a website. All they needed to complete a quest obviously unachievable by federal law enforcement agencies was a few over eager ACORN mortgage advisors… apparently not too difficult to find.

The two ACORN workers are, of course, history… employee Sherona Boone and volunteer mortgage consultant Lavernia Boone were fired after advising the pair of stealth reporters how to commit mortgage fraud.

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To the other authors who have done a stellar job of remembrance today, I say thank you. It was a somber walk thru those times, and a moving memorial.

Yet on this day mourning the loss of loved ones, revisiting the vunerability we felt, and even the anger that still lives in many of us, there is a spot of good news that may give you a small smile.

For the second year running, top jihad sites affiliated with Al Qaeda have mysteriously started exhibiting “technical problems” on the eve of 911, forcing the militants to shut down and lose their cyberspace presence.

A U.S.-based group monitoring militant Web sites said Friday that jihadist forums have been experiencing technical problems on the eve of Sept. 11, finally going offline a day before the 8th anniversary of the al-Qaida attack on the U.S.

The SITE Intelligence Group said the same thing happened last year, promoting consternation in militant circles.

“As happened last year … top jihadist forums affiliated with al-Qaida began experiencing technical problems, culminating in their ultimate closure on September 10, 2009,” the group said in a statement.

According to SITE, members of other jihadist forums expressed annoyance and “confusion” at the inability to access the Web sites and forums where they share updates and messages.

Couldn’t have happened to a lower class of humans…

I sure don’t know who the masked cyber crusader is, and no one is taking public credit for the second anniversary of jihad internet chaos. But this is one hacker to whom I sure would like to say, *thank you!*

H/T to Photoonist, regular over at Lucianne.

It was back on Sept 5th that I posted about the Taliban vow of revenge for the Kundiz province bombing. During that time, New York Times journalist, Steven Farrell and his 34 year old interpreter, Sultan Munadi, were captured by Taliban.

In a daring and successful raid, British NATO commandos rescued the journalist. The price for Farrell’s freedom was heavy… PM Gordon Brown heaped solemn praise on one, as of yet unnamed British soldier who gave his life in the rescue, and Munadi died in bullets crossfire, just feet from cover and freedom.

According to Farrell’s account in the Times, the captors moved the two men several times and eventually put them in a tiny room. On the third day, some new fighters, apparently more senior Taliban figures from elsewhere in Afghanistan, arrived and discussed moving their hostages out of the Kunduz area.

Afghan officials believed the two Times journalists were originally held by a Mullah Qadir, but were handed off to a commander Mullah Salaam and held in the village of Ghor Tepa, said Lt. Gen. Mirza Mohammad Yarmand, an Afghan army investigator sent to Kunduz by President Hamid Karzai to look into the case.

The Times reported that the militants taunted Munadi, reminding him of the case in 2007 when kidnappers released Italian journalist Daniele Mastrogiacomo but beheaded his translator and another Afghan colleague.

Farrell, an experienced reporter who was once held captive in Iraq, thought the atmosphere turned menacing.

Before dawn on Wednesday, they could hear helicopters approaching.

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ISAF/NATO Commander, General Stanley McChrystal, has his hands full these days. Within hours of forwarding a strategic analysis of the situation in Afghanistan – describing it as “…serious, but success is achievable…” – to U.S. Central Command, General David Petraeus, and the Commander, Joint Force Command Brunssum, General Egon Ramms, the German NATO troops called for NATO back up air support after the theft of two fuel tankers by the Taliban, and the beheading of the drivers.

NATO fighter-bombers attacked two fuel trucks after the Taliban hijacked the vehicles in Kunduz province and beheaded the drivers. The trucks stalled while crossing a riverbed in the Taliban-controlled Ali Abad district and were reportedly hit just as local villagers swarmed the tankers to siphon fuel. The Taliban reportedly encouraged the villagers to take the fuel just before the airstrike.

Casualty reports on the number of Taliban and civilians killed have varied, but 93 people have been reported killed. Kunduz Governor Engineer Mohammad Omar claimed 45 Taliban fighters as well as their commander, Mullah Abdul Rahman, were killed during the attack. Razaq Yaqoobi, the provincial chief of police, said 65 Taliban fighters were among those killed.

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“After ISAF [International Security Assistance Force] observed the insurgent activity and assessed civilians were not in the area, a local ISAF commander authorized an air strike,” the initial ISAF press release on the incident stated. “A large number of insurgents were reported killed or injured and the fuel trucks were destroyed in the attack.”

When US Secy of Defense, Robert Gates, hand picked McChrystal to command both the ISAF and American/NATO troops in Afghanistan in June, had stressed the reduction of civilian collateral damage as one of the highest priorities. In July, Within weeks, McChrystal issued new ROE tactical directives to all foreign forces under ISAF/NATO command, which essentially said if any civilians were present, let the enemy go and do not shoot.

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With the Labor Day weekend upon us, it cannot be said enough that the engine of the US is us, her citizens. From those that are perceived to carry the lowliest of jobs to the highest CEO, it is the fruits of our labor, and the regulations we must abide by to harvest those fruits, that enable the elite in the beltway. Truly a fact I believe they have long since discarded as inconvenient.

Today, I am reminded that our military are also toiling daily… sans days off and always on call. And while all deserve mention and our respect, I’m here to tell you the story of just one crew, from one crew member’s personal story.

On Sept. 14th, the Crew of Torqe 05, 40th Airlift Squadron, Dyess AFB, Texas, will be the recipient of the Lt. General William H. Tunner Award for 2009 in a ceremony at the Air & Space Conference and Technology Exposition in Washington DC.

Al's crew

To examine the honor of this award, we might want to first examine the man for whom it was named… Lt. Gen. William H. Tunner, the most outstanding authority on airlift operations of the United States Air Force (and Army Air Corp in WWII). The below are excepts from a biography, written by a grateful recipient of Tunner’s “Candy Bombers” in Germany as a young girl.

Lt. Gen. Tunner first helped orginally create, the “Air Corps Ferrying Command” divisions in the early 40s.

July 1942, the name “Ferrying Command” was changed to Air Transport Command. General Tunner, by now a Colonel, was made Commanding Officer of the Ferrying Division. At that time, this division was ferrying 10,000 aircraft monthly to the Allied Forces, which was of vital importance in the early days of World War II.

In Sept of 1944, then Col. Tunner was called to command “The Hump” airlift transport of supplies to the Chinese people in the China-Burma-India theatre of the war. It was there he demonstrated his exceptional abilities to organize efficient and successful airlift missions.

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