THERE IS NO SECOND PLACE

United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea Treaty (LOST).

Source;   Conservative-Insurgent

In the quest to globalize the United States we as a nation are inching closer toward ratifying the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea Treaty (LOST).

President Bush endorsed this treaty in May and has since urged the Senate to ratify it. Initial reports indicated that the Senate may have attempted to ratify LOST before adjourning for the August recess.

The Law of the Sea Treaty (LOST) entered into force in 1994 and has been ratified by 153 countries (click here for a list of recent LOST developments)..

The treaty gives the UN complete jurisdiction over the oceans and everything in them, including the ocean floor with all its resources, along with the power to regulate 70 percent of the world's surface.

LOST would encompass almost every aspect of the oceans whether the president, members of Congress, or other government officials will admit it or not.

According to a recent WALL STREET JOURNAL ARTICLE, the treaty is "set to come before the U.S. Senate next month for ratification." Former President Ronald Reagan originally rejected the ratification of LOST in 1982, but recent appeals from the Bush administration, some members of Congress, and the Council on Foreign Relations, has caused the treaty to resurface.

What does LOST mean to the United States?

National sovereignty: The treaty limits U.S. legal authority by granting power to a U.N.-created agency with its own court and bureaucracy, as part of a general expansion of international power. Ultimately, treaty-based laws could be enforced against the United States. Hell, we won't even be able to enforce the border laws we have with out going through the United Nations first and begging for their sanction.

National security: The treaty limits U.S. military activities especially relevant to anti-terror operations, such as intelligence collection and submerged travel in coastal waters (Articles 19, 20) and the boarding of foreign-flag ships on the high seas (Art. 110). Other provisions such as Articles 88 and 301 limit the sea to "peaceful purposes," which is said to restrict all military operations.

Navigation rights: One of the treaty's main selling points, legally recognized navigation rights on, over, and under straits, is unnecessary because these rights are not currently threatened. WTF, this means the UN will have jurisdiction over our shipping, commerce and our Navy.

Redistribution of wealth: The treaty would force U.S. corporations involved in seabed mining operations to pay taxes to the United Nations, further increasing the U.N.'s power. Oil drilling and recovery are considered mining operations, if you think your gas and heating taxes are high now, just wait until the U.N. taxes you and redistributes that resource.

Redistribution of technology: The treaty would force U.S. businesses involved in seabed mining operations to turn over economically and militarily relevant technology to other countries. Wow, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Libya would just love that.

SPP might be a smoke screen. We need to watch Law of the Sea Treaty.

         

March 18, 2004, 11:56 a.m.

The bad news is that the Bush administration risks grievously blurring where it stands on the appropriate, limited role of the United Nations in determining our security and other interests with its advocacy of a treaty that President Reagan properly rejected 22 years ago. As was noted in this space on February 26, the administration's declared support for the Law of the Sea Treaty (LOST) caused it to be approved unanimously by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee — even though this accord would constitute the most egregious transfer of American sovereignty, wealth, and power to the U.N. since the founding of that "world body." In fact, never before in the history of the world has any nation voluntarily engaged in such a sweeping transfer to anyone.

This is the case because LOST creates a new supranational agency, the International Seabed Authority (ISA), which will have control of seven-tenths of the world surface area, i.e., the planet's international waters. That control will enable the ISA and a court created to adjudicate and enforce its edicts the right to determine who does what, where, when, and how in the oceans under its purview. This applies first and foremost to exploration and exploitation of the mineral and oil and gas deposits on or under the seabeds — an authority that will enable the U.N. for the first time to impose what amount to taxes on commercial activities.

LOST, however, will also interfere with America's sovereign exercise of freedom of the seas in ways that will have an adverse effect on national security, especially in the post-9/11 world. Incredibly, it will preclude, for example, the president's important new Proliferation Security Initiative. PSI is a multinational arrangement whereby ships on the high seas that are suspected of engaging in the transfer of WMD-related equipment can be intercepted, searched, and, where appropriate, seized. Its value was demonstrated in the recent interception of nuclear equipment headed to Libya.

Similarly, LOST will define intelligence collection in and submerged transit of territorial waters to be incompatible with the treaty's requirements that foreign powers conduct themselves in such seas only with "peaceful intent." The last thing we need is for some U.N. court — or U.S. lawyers in its thrall — to make it more difficult for us to conduct sensitive counterterrorism operations in the world's littorals.

Since my last column on this subject, there have been several notable developments with respect to the Law of the Sea Treaty:

It has become clear that one of the prime movers behind the Bush administration's support for this U.N.-on-steroids treaty is none other than John Turner, a man property-rights activists kept from assuming a senior position in the Interior Department. Correctly seen by that community as a wild-eyed proponent of conservation at the expense of landowners' equities, he was given a consolation prize: a seemingly innocuous post as the State Department's assistant secretary for Oceans and International Environmental and Scientific Affairs. It turns out that in that position — and thanks to his longtime friendship with Vice President Cheney — Turner has greatly advanced what is arguably the most egregious assault on property rights in history.

The United States Navy has trotted out arguments for this treaty that reflect what might be called the River Kwai Syndrome. Like the British senior POW in World War II who couldn't bring himself to blow up a bridge his captors would use to their military advantage, Navy lawyers seem convinced that a bad deal is better than none.

Even though this accord will manifestly interfere with important peacetime naval operations, JAG types tell us they think it will be good for their business if freedom of the seas is guaranteed by a new, U.N.-administered international legal system rather than by U.S. naval power. They speciously assert that a 1994 agreement negotiated by President Clinton fixes the problems that caused President Reagan to reject LOST — never mind that the Clinton accord does not amend or otherwise formally modify one jot of the treaty.

Fortunately, this nonsense will be exposed to critical examination in coming weeks as two Senate committees, Environment and Public Works and Armed Services, hold hearings on LOST. Their chairmen, Sen. Jim Inhofe (R., Okla.) and John Warner (R., Va.), respectively, deserve credit for inviting critics of the treaty (including this author) to provide testimony Indiana Republican senator Richard Lugar refused to permit the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to hear before it approved the resolution of ratification. (Other committees that have equities in this fight — like Governmental Affairs, Commerce, Energy, Intelligence and Finance — have yet to be heard from.)
The prospect these hearings and the attendant public scrutiny of the Law of the Sea Treaty will precipitate a time-consuming and politically costly debate has prompted Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R., Tenn.) to say that he sees no opportunity for the foreseeable future to bring this accord to the floor. Assuming he is good to his word, still more time will be available to awaken the American people to what is afoot.

Most importantly, one of those people, President George W. Bush, may recently have been awakened to the dangers — political, as well as strategic and economic — inherent in this treaty. In response to a question recently put to him by Paul Weyrich, the legendary conservative activist and president of the Free Congress Foundation, President Bush indicated that he was unaware of the Law of the Sea Treaty and his administration's support for it. It can only be hoped that, as he conducts the promised review of LOST, he will make clear he does not want it ratified, now or ever.

Better yet, President Bush should assign his trusted undersecretary of Arms Control and International Security, John Bolton, the job of arranging for LOST to be "unsigned" — just as he did with respect to the fatally flawed treaty that created the International Criminal Court. Secretary Bolton would be particularly appropriate for this job, since he was also the prime architect of the Proliferation Security Initiative that the Law of the Sea Treaty would eviscerate.

While such developments are generally welcome, one thing curiously has not happened. The alarm about the defective Law of the Sea Treaty has still not been sounded by the likes of Rush Limbaugh and Fox News. It can only be hoped that, as the Senate hearings on LOST start next week, this oversight will be corrected, ensuring that the treaty is deep-sixed, once and for all.

Finding the political center. Can that be John Mccain

0.Communist (far left), 2.Socialist, 3. Move on, 4.Mother Jones, 6.Nation, 8.Fairness & Accuracy in Media 10.Paul Begala, 12.Carol Simpson(see Cspan Newseum Panel on Second Bush Administration 11/8/2004), 14.Molly Ivins, 16.Maxine Waters, 18.Howard Dean    1.0 - Communist Party USA, Socialist Workers Party, Cord from Boulder.

   1.5 - Mother Jones, Maxine Waters, Noam Chomsky, Howard Zinn, Earth First!

 20.Michael Moore, 22.Barney Franks, 24.Ralph Nader, 26.New York Times, 28.Newsweek 

2.0 - Democratic Socialists of America, The Nation, The Progressive, Molly Ivins, Michael Moore, Bernie Sanders, Ralph Nader, PETA.

   2.5 - Los Angeles Times, James Carville, Elinor Clift, National Education Association, Children's Defense Fund, People for the American Way, Environmental Defense Fund, Ted Kennedy, Hillary Clinton, Alan Colmes, Diana DeGette, Ellen Goodman, Dianne Carmen, Mike Littwin.

     30.Time Magazine,32.N.E.A., 34.Diane Degett, 36.NPR, 38.Bill Moyers     3.0 - NPR, E.J. Dione, Maureen Dowd, Bill Moyers, Sierra Club, The Washington Post, The New York Times, Dick Gephardt, Tom Daschle, Wellington Webb.

   3.5 - PBS, The Denver Post (editorials), Brookings Institution, Time, Newsweek, Mark Udall, Dick Lamm (old), Bill Clinton*.

40.ABC, 41.NBC, 42.CBS, 44.PBS, 46.Fredom Forum, 48.Jim Leher, 49.Jeff Greenfield   4.5 - Rocky Mountain News (news pages), U.S. News & World Report, USA Today, Wall Street Journal (news pages), Chris Matthews, Tim Russert, Bill Clinton*.

50.John McCain ( Center), 53.Dick Lamb, 56.Ben Nighthorse Campbell, 59.Rudy Giuliani              5.0 - Brian Lamb, Tim Russert, Jeff Greenfield, John McCain, John Breaux, William Cohen, Olympia Snowe, Elizabeth Dole, Jesse Ventura, Chuck Green, Dick Lamm (new), Bill Clinton*.

   5.5 - Ben Wattenberg, Zell Miller, Ben Nighthorse Campbell, Bill O'Reilly, Rudy Giuliani, Bill Clinton*.

62.Fox News, 65.Britt Hume, 68.Media Reseach Center    6.0 - George W. Bush, Brit Hume, Fox News Channel, Scott McInnis, Jack Kemp, George Will.

   6.25 - Mike Rosen.

   6.5 - Ronald Reagan, Wall Street Journal (editorials), Weekly Standard, Peggy Noonan, Rocky Mountain News (editorials), Vincent Carroll, Bill Owens, Wayne Allard.

71.George Will, 74.William F. Buckley Jr., 77.Wall Street Journal (editorial)    7.0 - William F. Buckley Jr., National Review, Heritage Foundation, Rush Limbuagh, Sean Hannity, Mona Charen, Linda Chavez.

   7.5 - Joel Hefley, Tom Tancredo, Bob Schaffer, National Rifle Association.

80.National Review, 83.Ronald Reagan, 86.Pat Buchanan, 89.John Birch Society    8.0 - Pat Buchanan, Pat Robertson, John Birch Society.

   8.5 - David Duke, Michigan Militia.

93.David Duke, 97.Militias, 100.Klan (far right).    9.0 - KKK, Aryan Nation, Timothy McVeigh.

   * Bill Clinton's position subject to change based on daily polling data.

How's the war going? - India

After More Bomb Blasts, India Pledges to Fight Terror
By Patrick Goodenough
CNSNews.com International Editor
August 27, 2007

(CNSNews.com) - Reeling from yet another bombing, the Indian government has vowed -- again -- to eliminate terrorism, which some officials believe emanates from neighboring Pakistan or Bangladesh.

But Home Minister Shivraj Patil conceded the magnitude of the job facing the government in the world's second-most populous nation: "Our country is so big that even if we have the information that something is planned, we do not know where or when," said Patil, whose portfolio includes national security.

At least 42 people were killed and 50 more injured in two explosions in Hyderabad on Saturday, one in a park and the other at a popular restaurant. Police found and defused an unconfirmed number of unexploded devices elsewhere in the city, according to Indian media reports.

The bombings in the city, an important information technology hub in southeast India's Andhra Pradesh state with a 40 percent Muslim population, were the latest in a series of deadly attacks in India, most recently the bombing of a mosque in Hyderabad last May. Government officials also blamed that attack on foreign elements.

Citing U.S. National Counter-Terrorism Center figures, the Times of India reported Monday that 3,674 people were killed in terror attacks in India between January 2004 and March of this year -- considerably more than in any other country apart from Iraq.

The chief minister of Andhra Pradesh state, Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy, told a press conference that Saturday's attack could be the work of terrorists from Pakistan or Bangladesh. As of Monday, however, police had yet to report any clear leads in their investigation. The governments of Pakistan and Bangladesh both denied the charge.

Hindu-majority India and mostly Muslim Pakistan are historic foes but have been enjoying improved ties over the past few years, although a long running dispute over Kashmir -- divided between them and claimed by both -- remains unresolved. The infiltration of Islamic radicals across their common border into Indian territory remains an irritant in relations.

The government of Pakistan has itself been grappling with stepped-up violence in its tribal areas near the border with Afghanistan.

"Many in India's strategic community ... have little doubt that General [Pervez] Musharraf's domestic travails have strengthened pro-jihad hawks in Pakistan -- a trend reflected in the unusually high level of infiltration across the Line of Control [in Kashmir] this summer," said The Hindu newspaper.

In Washington, State Department spokesman Tom Casey condemned the attacks, and said "India has shown great resolve and courage in the face of extremist threats."

People from all over the world come to U.S. for health care.

           

                      Why the U.S. Ranks Low on WHO's Health-Care Study
By John Stossel
Wednesday, August 22, 2007

The New York Times recently declared "the disturbing truth ... that ... the United States is a laggard not a leader in providing good medical care."

As usual, the Times editors get it wrong.

   

       
                    
        Dr. Jaime Davis, surgeon and member of the foreign affairs department of Cuba's health ministry, speaks during an interview with Reuters in Havana July 16, 2007. Davis said that Michael Moore's controversial documentary "SiCKO" has given Cuba's free health system the best publicity since its 1959 revolution. REUTERS/Enrique De La Osa (CUBA)

   

 

       

They find evidence in a 2000 World Health Organization (WHO) rating of 191 nations and a Commonwealth Fund study of wealthy nations published last May.

In the WHO rankings, the United States finished 37th, behind nations like Morocco, Cyprus and Costa Rica. Finishing first and second were France and Italy. Michael Moore makes much of this in his movie "Sicko."

The Commonwealth Fund looked at Australia, Canada, Germany, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and the United States -- and ranked the U.S. last or next to last on all but one criterion.

So the verdict is in. The vaunted U.S. medical system is one of the worst.

But there's less to these studies than meets the eye. They measure something other than quality of medical care. So saying that the U.S. finished behind those other countries is misleading.

First let's acknowledge that the U.S. medical system has serious problems. But the problems stem from departures from free-market principles. The system is riddled with tax manipulation, costly insurance mandates and bureaucratic interference. Most important, six out of seven health-care dollars are spent by third parties, which means that most consumers exercise no cost-consciousness. As Milton Friedman always pointed out, no one spends other people's money as carefully as he spends his own.

Even with all that, it strains credulity to hear that the U.S. ranks far from the top. Sick people come to the United States for treatment. When was the last time you heard of someone leaving this country to get medical care? The last famous case I can remember is Rock Hudson, who went to France in the 1980s to seek treatment for AIDS.

So what's wrong with the WHO and Commonwealth Fund studies? Let me count the ways.

The WHO judged a country's quality of health on life expectancy. But that's a lousy measure of a health-care system. Many things that cause premature death have nothing do with medical care. We have far more fatal transportation accidents than other countries. That's not a health-care problem.

Similarly, our homicide rate is 10 times higher than in the U.K., eight times higher than in France, and five times greater than in Canada.

When you adjust for these "fatal injury" rates, U.S. life expectancy is actually higher than in nearly every other industrialized nation.

Diet and lack of exercise also bring down average life expectancy.

Another reason the U.S. didn't score high in the WHO rankings is that we are less socialistic than other nations. What has that got to do with the quality of health care? For the authors of the study, it's crucial. The WHO judged countries not on the absolute quality of health care, but on how "fairly" health care of any quality is "distributed." The problem here is obvious. By that criterion, a country with high-quality care overall but "unequal distribution" would rank below a country with lower quality care but equal distribution.

It's when this so-called "fairness," a highly subjective standard, is factored in that the U.S. scores go south.

The U.S. ranking is influenced heavily by the number of people -- 45 million -- without medical insurance. As I reported in previous columns, our government aggravates that problem by making insurance artificially expensive with, for example, mandates for coverage that many people would not choose and forbidding us to buy policies from companies in another state.

Even with these interventions, the 45 million figure is misleading. Thirty-seven percent of that group live in households making more than $50,000 a year, says the U.S. Census Bureau. Nineteen percent are in households making more than $75,000 a year; 20 percent are not citizens, and 33 percent are eligible for existing government programs but are not enrolled.

For all its problems, the U.S. ranks at the top for quality of care and innovation, including development of life-saving drugs. It "falters" only when the criterion is proximity to socialized medicine.

Alberto Gonzales is gone who's next?

This pretty much sums up the Alberto Gonzales affair.  The Dem's win again.  What else is new and who will be next?

           

                      The Mob Wins
By Rich Lowry
Monday, August 27, 2007

Alberto Gonzales became intimately familiar with what departing White House adviser Karl Rove calls "the mob" -- the howling mass of Democratic members of Congress, bloggers and media commentators who despise all things Bush. His tenure as attorney general, and now his departure, represent a triumph for the mob.

The mob doesn't win only when it chases a target from office. It also scores a subtle victory when it forces the administration to keep in office an ineffectual or politically wounded official to demonstrate that it won't get pushed around by its frenzied detractors. Thus, Gonzales remained attorney general long after everyone but President Bush had decided that he was ill-suited for the job. The administration suffered months of unnecessary embarrassment as it stuck by Gonzales on the theory that giving in to the mob would be worse -- only to see Gonzales resign anyway.

The timing of Gonzales' departure is reminiscent of Don Rumsfeld's. The secretary of defense's mishandling of the Iraq War extracted the maximum possible political damage prior to the 2006 elections, and he left the day after. The mob targeted Rumsfeld, and so did retired generals whose criticisms made Bush think that keeping Rumsfeld made an important statement about civilian control of the Pentagon. Bush defied Rummy's detractors, but only at a grave cost to himself; if he had forced him out earlier, Republicans might have held the Senate.

Gonzales never should have been selected as attorney general in the first place. His appointment speaks to a sentimentality on Bush's part. He loved Gonzales' story of growing up with parents who were migrant workers who never finished elementary school, then his going on to graduate from Harvard Law School. Bush trusted and liked him, and that -- as happened with other members of his Texas inner circle -- blinded him to his friend's limitations.

Little did Bush realize the disservice he had done Gonzales. When the controversy broke over the entirely defensible firings of eight U.S. attorneys, Gonzales couldn't defend them, repeatedly victimized by his own carelessness with language and facts. His explanation of how an internal administration fight went down concerning the legality of a National Security Agency surveillance program was better, but still fuzzy enough for congressional Democrats to smear him as a perjurer.

Besides its impulse not to validate critics, the administration held on to Gonzales for fear of the difficulty of getting a replacement confirmed. Congressional Democrats reacted to his departure as if it were part of a cover-up of whatever vague crime they believe was committed at the Department of Justice. They will seek to exert the maximum possible concessions from the White House for the release of documents related to the firings and the NSA program in return for confirming a new attorney general.

The administration should do what it should have done all along -- nominate the most capable lawyer it can find and trust that the strength of its case will eventually win out, both on the merits of the controversies left over from Gonzales and the document fights. Hiring and firing U.S. attorneys is a core executive function over which Congress has no say and limited legitimate oversight function. As for the NSA program, Congress has validated the heart of it in a temporary law passed this past month, and the administration is on strong political grounds defending it.

Perhaps Congress won't relent, but if the nominee is obviously qualified and can joust effectively with his tormentors, perhaps the mob will be embarrassed for once instead of the administration. In any case, there could be worse things than keeping Solicitor General Paul Clement in the top job; he is slated to become acting attorney general and is widely considered one of the smartest people in government.

The Gonzales case is sad all around: for what happened to the reputation of a decent man over-matched by his responsibilities; for the distraction at a crucial department of government; and for the blood-lust that masquerades as political opposition in Washington. But it's never very edifying when the mob wins.

Christiane Amanpour "God's Warriors"

On Monday's MSNBC Live with Dan Abrams, host and MSNBC General 
Manager Abrams attacked CNN's God's Warriors series for "a defense of 
Islamic fundamentalism and the worst type of moral relativism," and as 
"shameful advocacy masked as journalism," quipping that series host 
Christiane Amanpour "avoided getting bogged down in objectivity." Abrams 
further took exception with Amanpour for comparing those who support 
Israel's defense strategy to Muslim terrorists: "Christians and Jews, for 
example, who support Israel's strategy for self-defense are just as much 
God's warriors, according to Amanpour, as the Islamic radicals who blow 
themselves and others up in an effort to destroy the world as we know it." 

    After contending that Amanpour attempted to "understand" violent 
Muslim fundamentalists without trying to "understand" evangelical 
Christians and Israelis, Abrams played a clip of Amanpour in which she 
"blames the warrior Jews" for the anger of radical Muslims. Amanpour: 
"Muslims, like people everywhere, abhor terrorism. The small minority who 
resorts to violence is symptomatic of something many of us have failed to 
understand: the impact of God's Jewish warriors goes far beyond these 
rocky hills. The Jewish settlements have inflamed much of the Muslim world."

    [This item, by Brad Wilmouth, was posted Tuesday morning on the MRC's 
blog, NewsBusters.org: http://newsbusters.org/blogs/brad-
wilmouth/2007/08/28/msnbcs-abrams-hits-cnns-amanpour-defending-islamic-
fundamentalism ]

    Abrams soon brought aboard Muslim author Asma Hasan, Air America host 
Reverend Wilton Gaddy, and terrorism analyst Steve Emerson for a 
discussion of the topic, during which Emerson labeled the CNN series as 
"the most unfair series" and "the most dishonest series on television that 
I've seen in my 20 years of reporting or covering terrorism." Emerson 
further criticized Amanpour for not showing examples of violent Muslim 
extremists in Europe such as the Madrid and London bombings, and for 
portraying Jews and Christians as "demons." Emerson: "I thought that, in 
part, the actual dogma of this series actually focused mainly on Jews and 
Christians as being the demons, and in fact, one could accuse her of 
actually engaging in anti-Christian and anti-Semitic behavior by the 
selection of facts she chose to choose."

    Abrams showed a clip of Amanpour speaking to Christian youth leader 
Ron Luce of Teen Mania Ministries during which she contended that campus 
rules prohibiting female students from wearing short skirts and 
prohibiting male students from using the Internet without supervision 
reminded her of "totalitarian regimes," and compared the female dress code 
to what the Taliban did. Amanpour: "But that's what the Taliban said. They 
kept women in their house because men couldn't be trusted around them."

    (For more on the six-hour series aired last week and again over the 
weekend, see the August 27 CyberAlert item, "CNN's 'God's Warriors' 
Reflects MSM's Bias Against 'Big 3' Faiths," online at: 
http://www.mrc.org/cyberalerts/2007/cyb20070827.asp#5 )

    Below is a transcript of relevant portions of the Monday, August 27 
MSNBC Live with Dan Abrams:

    DAN ABRAMS: For the past week, CNN has been proudly promoting and then 
celebrating its series called God's Warriors, presumably a look at 
radicals of different religions willing to fight for their cause. My take: 
I think it's fair to say it was not what it claimed or promised to be.
    CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, ON CNN: So we're not here lobbying for or 
advocating for or drawing conclusions, either political, religious or 
ideological-
    ABRAMS: Oh, yes they did. CNN should have called it what it was: a 
defense of Islamic fundamentalism and the worst type of moral relativism. 
For each of three nights, CNN devoted two hours to the, quote, "warriors" 
of each religion: Jewish, Christian and Muslim. But rather than 
distinguish between Islamic terrorists who utilize fierce violence to 
achieve warped goals, and the merely fiercely religious or even just those 
who fiercely believe in the state of Israel, Christiane Amanpour avoided 
getting bogged down in objectivity. Christians and Jews, for example, who 
support Israel's strategy for self-defense are just as much God's 
warriors, according to Amanpour, as the Islamic radicals who blow 
themselves and others up in an effort to destroy the world as we know it. 
A handful of the most radical of the Jews and Christians who can almost 
all be identified by name are highlighted. The violent Islamic 
fundamentalists are, quote, "understood," with no comparable effort to 
"understand" the evangelical Christians or Israelis. Amanpour even offers 
an explanation for the angry radical Islamists. She blames the warrior Jews.
    AMANPOUR, ON CNN: Muslims, like people everywhere, abhor terrorism. 
The small minority who resorts to violence is symptomatic of something 
many of us have failed to understand: the impact of God's Jewish warriors 
goes far beyond these rocky hills. The Jewish settlements have inflamed 
much of the Muslim world.
    ABRAMS: She takes Jewish and Christian political movements, even 
Jewish lobbyists in Congress, and lumps them in with God's warriors, 
thereby equating them with the radical Muslim warriors, the quote, "much 
feared and little understood." Maybe most troubling, much of the warrior 
Muslim program highlights not the warriors themselves, but claims of 
discrimination against Muslims.
    AMANPOUR, ON CNN: Geneive Abdo is the author of Mecca and Main Street. 
She says that since 9/11, the majority of American Muslims feel they're 
singled out for suspicion and surveillance by the government and by 
ordinary people. Imam Fawaz Jneid, leader of a mosque in the Hague, 
believes Muslims are under attack, victims of religious discrimination.
    ABRAMS: What does that have to do with the warriors? She portrays 
Muslims as victims, while accusing evangelical Christians of playing the victim.
    AMANPOUR, ON CNN: The religious right would have you believe that 
there's no mention of God anywhere in our public sphere. It's on the currency.
    JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN Legal Analyst: It's on the currency, and they say 
because it's on the currency, there's nothing wrong with it being in the 
schools, or in the courthouses, or in the Capitol.
    AMANPOUR: But they also play the victim somewhat.
    ABRAMS: This series was well-produced and successful, but also 
shameful advocacy masked as journalism. We have opinionated hosts here on 
MSNBC who offer opinions on a wide range of topics, including me, but I 
admit it when I'm advocating. In the end, this was exactly what she said 
it wasn't: lobbying, advocacy, and an effort, intentional or not, to have 
people draw particular conclusions.

    ...

    Before we talk about some of this other stuff, Asma, what do you think 
about the comments that I just made?
    [ASMA HASAN, Author of Why I Am a Muslim]
    ABRAMS: A little history lesson for you. I covered the Oklahoma City 
bombing trial, and you talk to any of the prosecutors who prosecuted the 
case. In the end, they don't believe that it was part of some militia 
effort. So that's just fiction, and that's the problem here. The facts are 
so important.
    HASAN: But didn't Timothy McVeigh say in writings from prison that he 
didn't like how the government was treating Christians, how they were 
restricting Christians?
    ABRAMS: Yeah, he didn't. He didn't. That's right. That's right. That's 
the beauty of this. Steve Emerson, the beauty of this is they highlight 
throughout the CNN piece, they highlight identifiable people, Christians 
and Jews, who've been arrested and convicted of various crimes. And they 
lump it in, and they claim this is all one big religious fundamentalism.
    STEVE EMERSON, Terrorism Analyst: Right. It's so contrived, I thought 
that I was watching Al-Jazeera. The treatment of radical Islamic 
fundamentalists were given kid-glove treatment. They explain the Muslim 
Brotherhood as a peaceful movement. They explain jihad as a peaceful 
internal struggle. I mean, this was inverting reality on its head. And 
when they described terrorism, they could only explain it in terms of 
Muslims being the victims, not being the perpetrators. I felt that, I was 
really, I felt that the viewer here was really dishonestly treated here. 
And as far as the treatment of Jews and Christians, when Christian lawyers 
went to law school, they were called, demonized as "God's warriors." And 
when Jewish supporters of Israel lobbied for Israel, they were demonized 
as somehow causing riots throughout the Middle East. This was the most 
unfair series and, I think, the most dishonest series on television that 
I've seen in my 20 years of reporting or covering terrorism.

    ...

    ABRAMS: Reverend Gaddy, let me ask you this. Let me play this piece of 
sound for you where, again, Christiane Amanpour compares some of the 
fundamentalist Christians to the Taliban. And I want to ask you if you 
think this is a fair comparison.
    AMANPOUR: On campus, students must follow a strict set of rules. When 
I, you know, read that women have to wear skirts of a certain length and 
guys aren't allowed to, you know, go on the Internet unsupervised, I mean, 
I think, you know, totalitarian regimes.
    RON LUCE, Christian youth leader: No, it's about learning to have 
disciplines that communicate purity, you know. The skirts' length are to 
keep guys from, you know, any man on the planet could be distracted, and 
we don't want to unintentionally create distraction.
    AMANPOUR: But, Ron, that's what the Taliban said. They kept women in 
their house because men couldn't be trusted around them.
    ABRAMS: Fair comparison, Reverend Gaddy, between a dress code and the 
Taliban?
    [Reverend WILTON GADDY, The Interfaith Counsel]
    ABRAMS: And they back it up, again, we're not just talking about 
individuals who we can name, but there is a large and significant movement 
of fundamentalist Islam, which I think ends up being minimized by equating 
this all. I'm sorry, Asma, I interrupted you before.
    [HASAN talks about international criticism of Jewish settlement expansion]
    ABRAMS: Okay, but that's fine. That's fine. But that doesn't address, 
look, I'm not going to have debates about the settlements here. I'm 
debating the bias, the overt bias of this CNN series.

    ...

    ABRAMS: Steve Emerson, I want to play you this piece of sound. It's a 
final one. ... And this is again suggesting, let's listen, and then we'll 
talk about it.
    AMANPOUR: Across Europe, Islam is the fastest growing religion, the 
number of Muslims tripling in the last 30 years. This increased Muslim 
presence and violence like the Van Gogh murder play into the hands of 
right-wing politicians, like Geert Wilders, a member of the Dutch parliament.
    ABRAMS: All right, Steve Emerson, again, "play into the hands," the 
Muslims as the victims, again, throughout this whole piece.
    EMERSON: Exactly. She didn't mention the Madrid bombings, she didn't 
mention the two London series of bombings, she didn't mention the number 
of attacks in Europe, throughout Europe. She didn't mention the vast 
amount of Wahabist radical Islamic influence and supporters in the United 
States. She omitted all of that in an attempt to bring the perpetrators 
who she claimed were right-wingers or Christians or Jews. I thought that, 
in part, the actual dogma of this series actually focused mainly on Jews 
and Christians as being the demons, and in fact, one could accuse her of 
actually engaging in anti-Christian and anti-Semitic behavior by the 
selection of facts she chose to choose.
    ABRAMS: Reverend Gaddy, go ahead.
    [GADDY]
    ABRAMS: Well, I can tell you this, CNN is listening to this segment, 
so maybe they will hear you loud and clear on that and make up for what I 
think was really well done but ultimately shoddy journalism.

Do what you can to help Robert Spencer.

              

       

An Urgent         Message
From the Desk of David         Horowitz

       

I need your help. The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) -         whose very founders have been arrested in connection with terrorist         activities - has decided to silence once and for all its harshest and         bravest critic: the Freedom Center's Robert Spencer.

       

CAIR is using legal threats to extort groups who ask Robert to         speak at their gatherings and tell the truth about Islamic Jihad.        

       

You may recall, not long ago I asked Robert, a fearless patriot, to         come join the Freedom Center team. Spencer's powerful internet site,         Jihad Watch, was taking on radical Islam in ways no one in on the         planet was doing - daily, sometimes hourly, exposing their financial         underpinnings and digging deep to reveal the roots of Islamofascism's         evil and terror.

       

Robert is so good at what he does terrorists issued a fatwa - a legal         decree in sharia law requiring any Muslim to kill Spencer if they had         the chance. The fatwa's closing line is nothing less than bloodcurdling:        

       

"May Allah rip out his spine from his back and split his brains         in two, and then put them both back, and then do it over and         over.

       

However, rather than striking fear into Robert's heart, the death         decree has made him more forcused and dedicated to exposing the         "religion of peace" for what it truly is.

       

Recently Robert was invited to speak at a conference hosted by the         Young America's Foundation in Washington, D.C. YAF the leading         conservative organization for high school and college-aged Americans.

       

A day before Robert was to deliver a talk titled "The Truth About the         Council on American-Islamic Relations," YAF officials found an ominous         letter on their FAX machine.

       

A powerful Washington, D.C. law firm told YAF that Robert was, in         essence, a hate-filled liar and that CAIR had ordered the law firm "to         purse every available and appropriate legal remedy to redress any false         and defamatory statements that made" at the conference.

       

In other words: silence Robert Spencer or be sued. It         doesn't get much more threatening than this and still remain within the         bounds of the law.

       

To help Robert, we are creating a special Jihad Watch Defense         Fund to counter these threats. Your         contribution of $35, $50, $100, $200, $500 or more right now will         help us raise the $250,000 we need to ensure two things:

       

1. Send the message that you and other Americans are not intimidated           by the politically correct radical left and that Jihad Watch and           Robert Spencer are financially ready to combat what can only be           described as legal extortion.          
2. Keep Robert and Jihad Watch doing what they do best: exposing           groups like CAIR who mask themselves as friends of our country, when           Robert consistently reveals their lies and connections to groups and           individuals who support Islamofascism.

       

You know well how the radical left works. Anyone who dares speak out         against them becomes a target for lies, vilification, and threats.

       

Robert takes these threats in stride. But legal challenges, no matter         how scurrilous, are costly. We must be willing to do what needs to be         done to meet this challenge.

       

And one more thing you and I must consider. Recently you may have         read that the editor of the Oakland Post was murdered for doing his job         - revealing the violent nature of a local Black Muslim group.

       

The murder of this journalist demonstrates clearly the evil threat         that hangs over our friend Robert Spencer each day. You and I can take         great pride in working to help him and Jihad Watch.

       

So please, take a moment right to use one of the blue         highlighted links in this letter and make a contribution of $35,         $50, $100, $200, $500 or more if possible right now. It's courageous         work he's doing and courageous support you'll be giving.

       

As always, I truly appreciate your support. I know I speak on behalf         of our small but dedicated Center team when I say, thank you.

        Sincerely,        
David Horowitz
President & Founder        

P.S. Linked to our Jihad         Defense Fund contribution page is a copy of the thinly veiled         threat CAIR's attorney sent the Young America's Foundation. I think         you'll see they mean to scare YAF and anyone else interested in hearing         the truth about radical jihad from Robert Spencer.

       

When         you make a contribution of $50 or more today I will rush you a copy of         Robert's bestseller, "The Truth About Mohammed." This book is         typical of Robert's excellent research and dedication to getting the         facts to you and me. Thanks again!

       

---

       

 

               

Paid for and Authorized by     FrontPageMag.com.

Democrats and Republicans that's all folks.

Alan Caruba is the only journalist that has identified himself as a Republican.  I find that he is often right.  He has a good grasp of this issue I hope he is right.  We can't afford to have Hilary as our next President.

The Struggle for the Soul of the Democrat Party
By Alan Caruba
CNSNews.com Commentary from the National Anxiety Center
August 28, 2007

What happens when neither political party has a new idea about what is happening in the nation and the world? You get election results so nearly tied that a few hundred votes decide who won or lost. It is, if you think about it, fairly astounding that the voters are so equally divided between Democrats and Republicans.

You notice, I said "the voters," not the people who simply identify themselves as members or sympathetic to one party or the other. One of the Republican Party's greatest problems right now is that it has drifted so far away from what its base believes and wants, many are prepared to stay home, short of candidates that offer them a compelling reason to show up at the polls.

The Democrats are faced with another problem. Its platform is essentially the one that won four terms for Franklin Delano Roosevelt in the 30s and 40s. Responding to the Depression, FDR tapped every bright lad he could to come up with something - anything -- that might turn the economy around. In the end, it was World War II that energized the nation and started the U.S. on its superpower trajectory. It was helpful, too, that the homeland, other than Pearl Harbor, had not suffered the destruction that occurred in Europe or Japan.

So Americans ever since have had Social Security, Medicare, and a host of other "entitlement" programs. The problem for recent administrations is that these programs are either broke or soon will be. When the GOP added a hugely costly prescription drug entitlement they were acting more like Democrats, but by then the way Congress functioned there were few members who could be clearly identified by party affiliation.

All were drunk on "earmarks" funneling millions back to their districts. The notion that local communities should run their schools is foreign to them. All seemed indifferent to protecting national sovereignty, securing the borders, or the invasion of a million aliens every year.

The only thing with which one could definitively identify Republicans was their support for the war in Iraq. It was, of course, the single issue that turned control of Congress --just barely -- to the Democrats in the 2006 elections and it is the one issue that will determine the outcome of the 2008 elections. The only issue Democrats have is their hatred of President Bush and their opposition to conservatives who have a visceral contempt for abortion, gay marriage, and thuggish foreign leaders.

In the 2008 campaign Democrats will offer national health care, but that notion has been trotted out for a very long time and most people are vaguely aware of what a disaster it has proven to be in England and Canada, to name just two places. Michael Moore's documentary, a celebration of Cuban health care, managed to overlook the many shortages of everything needed to practice medicine there.

Most books about politics are, by definition, partisan but a rare exception is Matt Bai's "The Argument: Billionaires, Bloggers, and the Battle to Remake Democratic Politics." He is such a skilled journalist, a political writer for The New York Times magazine, that he humanizes the individuals who are now locked in a struggle to control the Democrat Party.

The result is, frankly, a hilarious portrait of a party where obscenely rich people think their money can make a difference and buy them real influence, while nobodies with little more than bad attitudes and Internet sites like "The Daily Kos" have become movers and shakers to whom candidates must pay heed. Sandwiched between these groups are the party apparatchiks; those who must raise funds, the political consultants, the pollsters, and the think tank folks, all of whom are desperately trying to fashion a winning campaign.

About the only thing the members of both parties agree upon is that the members of the opposing party are just too dumb to understand the issues!

Neither party lacks for really dumb people and this includes those who have risen to the top. At one point, prior to the 2005-6 campaign, casting about for a new motto, Rep. Nancy Pelosi suggested that Democrats call themselves "the people's party." Bai notes that, "This slogan was quickly and wisely rejected, as it sounded like a communiqu/'e9 from the party headquarters in Pyongyang."

In the end, the Democrats concluded that policy ideas, leadership issues, and the usual rhetoric of campaigning weren't needed, given the collapse of support for and by Republicans. Why "offer an actual agenda and risk the possibility that some voters might not like it?"

One of the real issues is the war against the Islamofascists and, whether a Democrat or Republican is elected, they will be part of a continuum of presidents who have either tried to ignore them as did Clinton or put troops in the field to kill them as Bush did. It doesn't matter in the short run what people think about the current state of the war -- except for the way it influences elections -- because it is a war that was declared against us and which we must pursue until victory whether we want to or not.

Aside from a lack of any ideas other than those inherited from FDR and LBJ, the Democrats will continue to suffer from the general perception of cowardliness in the face of an enemy and endless bleating about the poor and disadvantaged. They tend to ignore the way America has grown famous and wealthy from people who worked hard, took risks, and moved up the economic ladder. The other factor working against them is the way the population has leaned to the right ever since the days of Reagan and Goldwater.

Bush will not be a factor in the 2008 elections except as a person on whom Democrats can fix (and waste) their hatred. But he is not running for office.

Without a compelling reason to vote for a Democrat candidate, voters may decide to stay with the party that -- flawed as it may be at this point -- still believes in lower taxes, a strong military, and the magic elixir of freedom, opportunity.

Politics of Personal Destruction at it's best

So they got Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.  Who's next?  Only the Dem's know, maybe Condi Rice.