This comes via Consul-At-Arms: US AIRWAYS which came via Curmudgeonly & Skeptical which reports a very sad attack on Christian girls (very graphic link to a beheading...):


"THREE Christian high school girls were beheaded as a Ramadan "trophy" by Indonesian militants who conceived the idea after a visit to Philippines jihadists, a court heard yesterday.

The girls' severed heads were dumped in plastic bags in their village in Indonesia's strife-torn Central Sulawesi province, along with a handwritten note threatening more such attacks.

The note read: "Wanted: 100 more Christian heads, teenaged or adult, male or female; blood shall be answered with blood, soul with soul, head with head." [Beheaded girls were Ramadan 'trophies'] "

Will talking with those who want nothing more than to kill the infidel bring greater safety and security or more death and destruction?  Will pulling out of Iraq be a victory or a significant defeat?  Do we want to defeat or enemies or placate them and give them a chance to regroup and rebuild to become more deadly?

The very fact that we want to have direct talks with Syria and Iran is utter folly!

Captain Ed posts on an article from Lebanon on the plans of Syria to destroy democracy:

The Lebanese newspaper Al-Mustaqbal reports today that Lebanon has uncovered a network of assassins in their nation, trained and funded by Syria, that targeted three dozen Lebanese lawmakers. To no one's great surprise, the network exploited Palestinian refugee camps as training centers and had connections to a Fatah splinter group (via It Shines For All):

The Lebanese security forces exposed a network which planned to assassinate 36 senior anti-Syrian Lebanese officials, the Lebanese newspaper al-Mustaqbal reported Wednesday morning. ...

According to the report, the investigation revealed that the network trained in Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon and planned to execute a plot initiated by the Syrian government to assassinate 36 senior Lebanese officials.

According to the newspaper, the Syrian intelligence appointed a group belonging to the Fatah-Intifada organization to implement the plan. ...

The detainees, a Syrian and a Saudi, noted that they were part of a 200-member network which planned to execute the plan. The two were arrested by Lebanese security forces after they were suspected of a criminally-motivated murder at the al-Badawi refugee camp. According to the report, the investigation revealed that the Syrian government, through this plan, carried out the most blatant violation of United Nations Resolutions 1559 and 1701 and interfered in internal Lebanese issues.
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So, I ask you, does it really make sense to have diplomatic talks with the Syrian government that wants to destroy the democratic process in Lebanon, and replace it with Hezbollah, it's proxy to attack Israel.  Diplomacy is nothing more than giving in to our enemy...giving them what they want, because there is nothing they can give us that we can't take.  We should merely tell them to get out of Iraq and Lebanon or face the US military option ie: the Saddam option...
Update: Michael Totten has more
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In addition, our enemy in Iran, Ahmadandawhackjob, has reached out to the American people in a 5 page letter.  Again, the "Realists" and Dimocrats want us to reach out to the mad mullahs in Iran and have direct talks over Iraq.  Here again, I ask you, why?  here is a country that continues to lie and obfuscate about it's nuclear program.  a country that subsidizes gasoline to the tune that a gallon costs 30 cents!  needs nuclear power, yeah right.  And, weekly, if not daily, Ahmadandawhackjob continues to call for the utter destruction of israel and the great Satan, the very same America that he writes:

"We, like you, are aggrieved by the ever-worsening pain and misery of the Palestinian people.

Persistent aggressions by the Zionists are making life more and more difficult for the rightful owners of the land of Palestine..."

Here's classic Dimocratic words, they could have been uttered by Jack Murtha or John Kerry;

"Even the privacy of individuals is fast losing its meaning. Judicial due process and fundamental rights are trampled upon. Private phones are tapped, suspects are arbitrarily arrested, sometimes beaten in the streets, or even shot to death... "

He even says that he and we all are against terrorism, while on his desk are orders that go out to Hezbollah to destroy iSrael via Lebanon...

Diplomatic channels should always be open, perhaps back channels through Jordan and Saudi Arabia, but direct talks in which we are asked to come to the table to give up anything is sheer folly. Ad could very well lead to the deaths of more Americans, not less.  This would not make us any safer...

The manual from al Qaeda, Chapter 4, Subsection 6, merely states that when traveling on US carriers mujahideen should place themselves throughout the airplane to deny exits, and access to the flight crew:

"Passengers and flight attendants told law-enforcement officials the imams switched from their assigned seats to a pattern associated with the September 11 terrorist attacks and also found in probes of U.S. security since the attacks -- two in the front row first-class, two in the middle of the plane on the exit aisle and two in the rear of the cabin.  (WashTimes, How the imams terrorized an airliner).


Further, Chapter 10, subsection 3, states that when confronted by the authorities,use the freedoms so loved by the Infidel against himself...plead freedom, plead denial of liberty, or better: claim a violation of civil rights!  When all else fails get the media involved...

"That's like shouting 'fire' in a crowded theater. You just can't do that anymore," said Robert MacLean, a former air marshal.
    "They should have been denied boarding and been investigated," Mr. MacLean said. "It looks like they are trying to create public sympathy or maybe setting someone up for a lawsuit."
    The pilot with another airline who talked to The Washington Times on condition of anonymity, said he would have made the same call as the US Airways pilot.
    "If any group of passengers is commingling in the terminal and didn't sit in their assigned seats or with each other, I would stop everything and investigate until they could provide me with a reason they did not sit in their assigned seats."

If, indeed, the witnesses are accurate there was more to the situation than the Imams would have us believe.  They had/have a plan.  They were subject to more than racial profiling, it was behavioral profiling.  Their actions were the cause of their profiling, not their race.  They exhibited suspicious behavior from the get go.  You know, I work for a major bank, and when a guy walks in and exhibits behaviors that would likely be suspicious I will approach that individual.  If there is a suspicious jerk in the parking lot casing the joint, Id call security or the police. If they were wearing a mask (ie; motorcycle helmet) I'd ask him to remove it...if he or she were jumpy and carrying a large sack, I would ask him if I could help him before he got to the teller line...if an individual leaves a backpack in the lobby or if that individual came running across the lobby brandishing a gun, I'd dial 911 black/white/hispanic/green...it's not rocket science.

We live in a post 9/11 world, 19 Islamic Terrorists hijacked planes and used them as missiles to cause the deaths of nearly 3000 people, and caused trillions of dollars of damage to our economy.  Are we really willing to pussyfoot around suspicious behavior for the sake of being PC?

Is Jonathan Chait out of his mind or has his Bush derangement Syndrome gotten the best of him?

Jonathan Chait: Bring back Saddam Hussein

"Restoring the dictator to power may give Iraqis the jolt of authority they need. Have a better solution?

November 26, 2006

THE DEBATE about Iraq has moved past the question of whether it was a mistake (everybody knows it was) to the more depressing question of whether it is possible to avert total disaster. Every self-respecting foreign policy analyst has his own plan for Iraq. The trouble is that these tracts are inevitably unconvincing, except when they argue why all the other plans would fail. It's all terribly grim.

So allow me to propose the unthinkable: Maybe, just maybe, our best option is to restore Saddam Hussein to power."

That is just insane...bring back the murderous dictator, hey, I know what else we need to do: pay reparations to Saddam and his henchmen, too.

Sad, really...

Her first choice for the chairmanship of The House Intelligence Committee, Alcee Hastings,  has reportedly removed himself from contention for the position- according to TPM Muckraker. Really, or was it that the impeached judge was too hot too handle?  Pelosi's decision making and leadership has been very questionable, and she hasn't even assumed the Speakership, yet...

Professor Bainbridge is wondering who will then become the Chairman(person) of the Intel Committee?   "If not Harman, who?" Hattip: Instapundit...

I fear the next 2 years, I really don't belive anything will occur in the House and Senate to protect us against Islamofascists. 

Speaking of Do Nothing's Senate Majority Leader Reid is promising to get the Senate moving:

Senate leader-elect sets agenda

By NEDRA PICKLER, Associated Press Writer
Tuesday, November 28th, 2006 03:38 PM (PST)

WASHINGTON (AP) - Senate Majority Leader-elect Harry Reid said Tuesday he's doing away with the "do-nothing Congress" that Democrats campaigned against and plans to keep senators working long hours - focusing first on ethics, the minimum wage and stem cell research.

The Nevada Democrat said he would tackle those priorities after cleaning up the "financial mess" the outgoing Republican Congress is leaving behind, a reference to nine long-overdue spending bills covering 13 Cabinet departments for the budget year that began Oct. 1.

Debra Saunders has a book review for Daveed Gartenstein-Ross and his memoir "My Year Inside Radical Islam," due out in February.  He was a convert to Islam and after 9/11 took Noam Chomsky's call to understand the reasons that the attack occurred.  Read the whole article, The dagger at their throats, but here is an excerpt:



"Gartenstein-Ross describes how he was drawn to Islam because he saw it as a religion of peace.

Over time, however, he watched himself and those around him seduced into a fanaticism that required them to loathe not only non-Muslims, but also Muslims who belonged to the wrong sect, listened to music or shaved. He had expected an open, accepting religion, only to hear sheikhs arguing that Muslims who leave the religion should be killed, that it is acceptable to kill civilians for jihad and that good Muslims should work to replace democratic governments with Shariah law.

The hate chased Gartenstein-Ross from Islam, but only after it sucked him into believing that unacceptable actions were holy. "

 

So, whenever you read the reporting from Iraq it is really time to question journalism.  Flopping Aces has done the work for us and continues to dissect the reporting...

• Getting the News From the Enemy, Part II

• Getting the News From the Enemy

It doesn't help that the Dimocrats buy the Enemy's PsyOps hook, line and sinker...NYTimes, Reuters, et al are complicit in ensuring that not only are the Dims duped, but that the world will then take Islamofascists word.

I find it interesting that the peace brokered in Gaza, and the pull back by the Israeli's should be a warning shot across our bow.  We are hearing from many Dims that we are the cause of the violence in Iraq.  If only we would pull out ar reduce our force structure, then the violence in Iraq will go away.  No sooner than the Israeli's had pulled out that there were more attacks. 

You can not trust those who are out simply to destroy our ay of life and to convert us to Islam at the barrel of gun or the wave of the IED explosion.

Appeasement didn't work in WWII (or leading up to it) and it will not work in the 21st Century.  Before the first decade has passed are we doomed to repeat the single most deadly war of the 20th Century?  I pray not.  A repeat of 9/11 tenfold will be the price we pay...

The first rule of holes: stop digging...

 

Do you think this poll will halp Jon Karry stop digging?  Or is he too smart for us po' folk?

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democratic Sen. John Kerry, mulling a second bid for the U.S. presidency, finished dead last in a poll released on Monday on the likability of 20 top American political figures.

Among those placing ahead of Kerry were about a dozen potential 2008 White House rivals, including Democratic Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York and Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona.

Hattip: Austin bay Blog: John Kerry needs HALP

Here's a laugher

 

If you can't laugh at yourself...

 

 

 

The only way to lose a war when you are a the only hyper power, is to shoot yourself in the foot.  We continue to do so everyday, an this is no exception (hattip: INDCJournal).  When you hamstring the men and women fighting the war you give the enemy the advantage.  We fight by rules of engagement, and they don't.  We adhere and worry that we are not adhering to the Geneva Convention, and human rights, while the enemy guns down children, burns people in a Mosque, and lops peoples head off without a thought.  we are losing the War on Terror because we are more worried about the enemies rights, than we are in destroying the enemy...

The NYT's CJ Chivers continues great coverage from Anbar:

In the Marine Corps, snipers have long been a culture within the culture, a group of quiet, highly competent infantrymen selected for their field skills, self-discipline and shooting expertise.

Picked from the ranks, they are trained at a 10-week school that develops their skills in hiding, stalking and long-range marksmanship. Each infantry battalion has a platoon of snipers, who typically work in small teams apart from the rifle companies. They are considered elite.

But some snipers now worry that the difficulties they face have been compounded by rules and conditions placed on them by senior military leaders.

Marine snipers have customarily trained to work in two-man teams who hide and stalk for days, seeking targets a half-mile or more away. Often an area might be saturated with snipers, so they can support and protect one another while confusing an enemy force with different angles of fire.

This way, according to their thinking, they can kill more enemy combatants, and sow more fear.

Those two-man teams are not allowed in Iraq, in part because of the killings of two groups of snipers earlier in the war.

I found this quote notable:

He said snipers were willing to assume the risk of traveling in pairs. "It's a war," he said. "People are going to die, and the American public needs to get over that. They need to get over that and let us do our job."

My question: what will it take for the United States to fully engage the enemy and destroy it?  9/11 times 2, 10, 30, 60?  When the Dimocrats are more interested in getting Bush Co., than it is in defeating the enemy, we are in trouble.

Read the Investors' Business daily from today's opinion page, and the Dimocrats Secret Weapons:

•  Intelligence: Senate Democrats are focusing their new powers on one thing above all else: wrenching as many national security secrets as possible from this White House and using them for political assassination.

  Patrick Leahy of Vermont, soon to be chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, has made more than 65 requests for classified documents from the Bush administration. Among other secrets, he wants "all directives, memoranda and/or orders including any and all attachments to such documents regarding CIA interrogation methods or policies for the treatment of detainees."

 

Heh...

God has truly blessed me.  Things I am thankful for:

• I am thankful for Christ, and his undying love for me and for dying on the cross, His blood cleansing me of sin and rising from the dead to give us all the opportunity for an eternal life. 
• I am thankful for family
• My wife- the beautiful woman that she is, her kindness, brilliance and her dedication to her career and family
• My children- two wonderful kids, loving and kind, precocious and smart
• Parents- my Dad is suffering from cancer, a stroke and a heart attack, but we have gotten closer than ever, and for my Mom who is infinitely patient and enduring strength
• My health- for what it is worth, I am still able to get up and about, after 6 surgeries (neck, back and shoulder) I am grateful that I can still run around with the kids, play golf, ride bikes, etc.  As Paul had his thorn in his side, I am reminded of God's love everyday.  I haven't figured out why He has inflicted me with my ailments, and I know He has a plan.
• My Job- self evident, I am blessed to have one that provides me the many opportunities to do the things i am now doing. Providing a home, school for my children, and helping in our small way in contributing to the spread of God's word
• My church, North Coast Church is a fantastic evangelical church that is more than a building, it is a community, and my Growth Group for the fellowship and accountability so lacking in life
• My Country-  Thank God I live in the freest country on God's green earth
• And with that I am thankful for President Bush and his leadership
• For the soldiers who lie awake at night and put their lives on the line everyday
• For a government that is made up of Dimocrats and Republicans and every other party out there, without them we would not have a great country.  I may disagree, but at least we are able to present our arguments without fear of a bullet to the temple
• To the men and women of law enforcement and fire departments that do their job of protecting us as well
• Thank you to the educators that are teaching my son and daughter
• Surely there is much I have left out, but know that my heart is very grateful and content in this life

My prayer for the remainder of the year is for my father, he is in his sunset year(s) and I pray that he gets to know the Lord, and that I may have at least a small part in that.  I pray for peace and for freedom's march.  I pray that we root out evil in the form of Islamofascism, and that we see a true change in the hearts of those who love peace, and not conversion at gunpoint, or with suicide bombs.  I pray for the peace and protection of Israel.  I pray that weapons of mass destruction do not fall into the hands of madmen, either in Iran or North Korea, and I pray that we answer the threat before there is a nuclear explosion in NY or San Francisco.

I pray that 2007 will be a year of change for me and my family.  That my health will stabilize enough for me to make a change in careers, away from selling widgets and into planning for people's future through Financial Planning (college and retirement especially).  I pray that my wife will have continued success at her career, and that would add my ability to step out of my comfort zone.  I pray that my children will continue to grow and succeed.

I, too, pray for my fellow bloggers, especially those who regularly read my stuff.  mgraves (Coming Up Crows), Jimmy Carter, Mike Deschamps, Sheila (One Eighty), and others. Mostly, I pray for Dimocrats...

Happy Thanksgiving to you and your families.  May God Bless you and this great nation!

Is it any surprise that the Gray Lady has taken a swipe at Christians and Christianity?  No less, in describing a man who stood athwart a brutal and ruthless Islamic movement in Lebanon.  Here, a man driving through a Christian neighborhood, presumably, on his way to work to secure a Lebanese government for the Lebanese, is ruthlessly and mercilessly gunned down in his car.

Here is a piece of the article, Anger Boils at Slain Official's Funeral in Lebanon:

Mr. Gemayel, who came from one of Lebanon’s most prominent and divisive Christian (emphasis mine)families, was ambushed and killed Tuesday as he drove his car through a Christian neighborhood on the edge of Beirut. He was 34, married, and the father of two small children. His grandfather and namesake, Pierre Gemayel, founded the Phalange party, a nationalist, religious militant organization once aligned with Israel; his father, Amin, was Lebanon’s president in the 1980’s.

So, I ask you, is it really necessary to use the adjective "divisive" before the word Christian?  Could they have left the Christian part out to describe the family?  Or, why not place the adjective "prominent" before Christian?  Does the NYTimes have such great disdain for Christianity that a man who is fighting for his country, brutally and mercilessly ambushed by a divisive Islamic group that it would rather take a swipe at latter and not the former?

You see, when you see no black and white, no good and evil, everything is gray...

There is no moral compass in the MSM.  I have practically given up on all MSM, CNN- ha, now there's a joke, MSNBC, who employs the deranged Keith Olberman, is dying.  I started getting Investors Business Daily, at least it has a more conservative outlook in it's reporting and opinion pages.  There's something to be grateful for today- FOXNews, the WSJ, IBD, talk radio...choice in media, and who is growing versus bleeding subscribers and viewers?

 he Atlantic Monthly put together their list: The Top 100 The most influential figures in American history.

Very interesting, but not overly surprising, Ronald Wilson Reagan was the 17th most influential American.

The most surprising list is the top most influential living Americans...

Don't you find it interesting the Bill Clinton is on the list, and George W. Bush is not (50 million Muslims are living in democracies now than when Bill was in office...), I am just saying...

Hattip: INDCJournal

The MSM did everything it could to ensure that the Dimocrats took over power in both houses of Congress.  Now here are at least two headlines that only ran after the election.  One has to do with electing the "cut and run" party.  The other has to do with stem cells, and the success of using adult stem cells.  Neither would have run front page of the NYTimes until after the Dims secured their majorities.  So much for "All the News That's Fit To Print," when the news meshes with the op-ed board...

 "Get out of Iraq Now? Not so Fast, Experts Say." Carl Levin wants the troops out in 4-6 months, and San Fran Nan has said her job is to get the US out of Iraq and end the War.

A cure for muscular dystrophy would get the front page if it was from embryonic stem cells.  As the op-ed page at IBD reminds us, "Clone a sheep, and you are headline news."

There are great strides being made everyday using adult stem cells.  Cells from skin, stomachs, umbilical cords, etc.  The left only recognizes the use of embryonic stem cells as it has a ancillary reason: devaluing the human embryo.  As long as it is okay to destroy a "blastocyst" and not call it life, then it is okay to abort a fetus oh say into the first trimester of it's existence. 

As long as the independent voters of this country sway between the right and the left, and the MSM is as unobjective as it is, we are going to have a divided governement.  The best thing we Republicans can do is get back to our core values.

Who best represents our core values?  We have two years, well maybe like 1 year and 6 months, to figure that out.  We need to recapture one or both houses and the presidency in 2008.

This is one blog that will continue to look at the issues we need to be rock solid on:

Free Trade
Social Security Reform
Secure Border and Legal Immigration
Tax Reductions
Strict Constructionist judges
Smart tools in fighting the war on terror
Pro Life
Securing our place as the worlds leader in technology
Health care reform, in the form of tort reform
Ethics reform
Smaller government, cutting waste and Earmarks
Strengthen our Military
Take on Islamofascists and prevent another 9/11