I can't wait to see this...

There are reports today that Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has written an open letter to American citizens, which will be released later today. Unfortunately, duty calls so I'll have to read it later.

Prediction: The letter will at least in part be a da'wah, an invitation to Islam, as was the letter he sent to Bush earlier this year.

The First Post's slide into cheap tabloidism

I really used to like reading The First Post, a UK-based news and entertainment site. Sure, they publish more than their fair share of moonbat screeds, but almost as often there's some good news and opinion to be found there.

With this article, though, their inexorable slide into trashy tabloid journalism is just about complete. In the headline, author Carl Senna asks "Is Bush back on the sauce?", and then offers up evidence worthy only of The National Enquirer or Weekly World News:

• The scandal sheets claim he has fallen completely off the wagon and that the first couple's marriage is at stake.

• ...there has long been puzzlement over the President's physical awkwardness, jumbled speech and memory loss. [Yeah...among the looney left. --ed.]
  

• Nicholas Lemann, New Yorker political correspondent, says he has never seen the President take a drink but adds: "Does Bush have a drinking man's personality? Yes." [Does Lemann know Bush well enough to know his personality? And what makes him an expert on "drinking men's personalities"? --ed.]
  

• Andrew Stephen, in the New Statesman, wrote this month: "I have now heard the rumour repeated at a sufficiently high level that I believe we must face the possibility that it might be true."

This isn't journalism. This is nothing more than rumor and innuendo without a single authoritative source cited. What complete drivel.

Who is Capt. Jamil Hussein?

Curt at Flopping Aces has been all over the story of AP's reportage from Iraq. He should get free beer in perpetuity for his work.

Briefly, here's the chronology in case you've missed it:

• Associated Press has been distributing news fast and furious for the past few months depicting Iraq's descent into complete chaos/anarchy/civil war (depending on which of their outlets you read).
• Last week, AP issued reports of some particularly heinous acts in the Baghdad Shia neighborhood of Hurriyah. Four mosques had been burned or blown up, and worst of all, six Sunni civilians had been dragged from Friday prayers, dowsed with kerosene and burned alive. AP's source for much of their reporting was one Iraqi police Captain Jamil Hussein.
• Later patrols of the Hurriyah neighborhood revealed one burned mosque, and no evidence could be found of the burned Sunnis.
• Suspicious, Curt starts dredging the Internet for stories citing Capt. Jamil Hussein as a source. It seems whenever there's a horrifying story coming from Iraq involving Sunni victims, the sole source of that story is Capt. Jamil Hussein.
• Curt requests info from CENTCOM on Capt. Jamil Hussein. His contact there replies they're trying to verify Hussein, and informs him that nobody below the level of Chief in the Iraqi police is supposed to be talking to the media.
• CENTCOM confirms that Capt. Jamil Hussein is neither a police officer nor an employee of the Iraqi Ministry of Interior. In fact, nobody seems to know who he really is.

So, the gist of it is this: Associated Press, whose news product is likely the most widely distributed worldwide, has been sourcing their news from someone who's at best questionable, and more likely a member of the insurgency in Iraq. They've been distributing news from a single, highly suspect source without any verification, and the antique media like NYT, WaPo, etc. have been running with it to spread the hysteria.

I'm not naive enough to believe that things are peachy in Iraq. But I'll bet you a beer things are nowhere near as bad as you think.

Muslim scholars: Female genital mutilation un-Islamic

Some rare good news from the Muslim world...

A conference of Islamic scholars in Egypt has declared female genital mutilation (FGM) to be un-Islamic, and that those who practice it should be punished.

According to the article, their ruling is considered binding, but if I read this correctly, they're relying on a fatwa to be issued by individual clerics to actually implement their ruling:

"The conference calls on judicial institutions to issue laws that prohibit and criminalise this habit ... which appeared in several societies and was adopted by some Muslims although it is not sanctioned by the Quran or the Sunna," the scholars said, referring to Islam's holy book and the sayings and deeds of Prophet Muhammad.

The conference was sponsored by TARGET Human Rights group, an organization based in Germany. Here's a description of the harshest form of FGM from their web site:

Fatima has to endure the hardest form. She is eight years old, a Muslim, and lives in the Danakil desert, Ethiopia. She will have to undergo Pharaonic mutilation. Like her friends. Laila, for example, who has not spoken since. Who has been mute for eleven weeks. According to an estimation of the UN, one third of the girls will never speak again. Death due to loss of blood.

Four adults are trying to hold Fatima, who is struggling for her life, in place. The razor blade takes away the clitoris, the labia, everything. Even her soul and trust in life, including her trust in the adults whose hands are smothering her screams. Then she faints. Her vagina is closed with acacia thorns - just like a zipper. Without mercy. Her thighs are bound together with bandages. Like a pot roast.

After four weeks the skin has grown together. What is left is an opening the size of a grain of rice. From now on urinating will take half an hour, menstruation two weeks. In her wedding night she will be opened - either with a knife or her husband's penis. When she gives birth, the opening will have to be widened. Again, with a knife. Afterwards everything will be stitched together again. This cycle will repeat itself.

Lifelong torture.

"We are in a war to the death..."

The Telegraph has a spot-on editorial by Janet Daley. Ms. Daley gets right to the point in her discussion of the conflict between Islamism and the West (all emphasis mine):

The first assumption that will have to go is the premise that Islamist terrorism can be understood in pragmatic, politically rational terms: in other words, that it can be addressed with the usual mechanisms of negotiation, concession and amended policy.

The most readily accepted version of this is that a change to our policy in the Middle East will remove the grievances that "fuel" Muslim terrorism. The Cabinet has apparently been advised that all foreign policy decisions over the next decade should have the goal of thwarting terrorism in Britain and that this should involve "a significant reduction in the number and intensity of the regional conflicts that fuel terror activity". So Britain is contemplating constructing a foreign policy, specifically in the Middle East, that is designed to give in to terrorist blackmail.

Never mind that the hereditary grievance of almost all British-born Muslim terrorists is the Kashmir question, to which the almost entirely irrelevant Palestine issue has been tacked on by political manipulators with larger ambitions. (The easiest way to make a connection between the Palestine-Israel conflict and the problem of Kashmir is to construct a global theory of persecution in which British-born Muslims may see themselves as born into a victimhood perpetrated by all non-Muslim nations upon Islam.

That, as it happens, chimes perfectly with the true goal of Islamism, which is global supremacy.) So this ignominious posture – what you might call the "save our own skin; who cares what happens in the rest of the world?" view – is based on a false premise. It is not adjustments to our stance on Israel-Palestine that the international Islamist terror movement wants.

That demand was just a bin Laden afterthought that went down a treat with the old reliable anti-Semitic interest in Europe. What Islamic fundamentalism plans to achieve (and it has made no secret of it) is a righting of the great wrong of 1492, when the Muslims were expelled from Spain: a return of the Caliphate, the destruction of corrupt Western values, and the establishment of Sharia law in all countries where Muslims reside. That is what we are up against.

As they say, read the whole thing.

A very brief cease fire

Dani Gig, of Sderot, Israel, sits in the living room of
his home which was hit by a Palestinian rocket just
before the latest cease fire. Or it could have been
after...what's the difference?

Well, that didn't take long. Just after a cease fire between Israel and Palestinian militants terrorists began, it was broken by other Palestinian militants terrorists firing rockets into Israel.

So far, Israel has chosen to exercise restraint and isn't responding to the latest round of rocket attacks.

Microsoft hosts terrorist web site

The Hizballah chapter of Argentina's web page is being hosted on MSN Groups. It's hard to say just how active this group is, but I certainly don't like their proximity to the US. And no American should sit still while an American company hosts a forum for an organization of thugs, even if they're just wannabes.

Plenty of material on Hizballah in Latin America at Western Hemisphere Policy Watch and Internet Haganah.

In all likelihood, they're just a fringe radical organization who've latched onto Hizballah as a possible source of funding and legitimacy.

"No man, no problem."

Josef Stalin was reported to have said, "Death solves all problems. No man, no problem." The record shows that this philosophy worked very well for him. At least for a while.

It would appear that Vladimir Putin has taken a page from the Joe Stalin playbook with the sudden, convenient deaths of his various critics, most recently, Alexander Litvinenko by radiation poisoning.

When this story first hit the news, my initial reaction was probably just what Putin expected the world to think: This crap just doesn't happen any more. I now suspect otherwise.

Litvinenko was in London investigating the assassination of Anna Politkovskaya, murdered last month in her apartment building in central Moscow. Politkovskaya was a Russian journalist critical of Putin and the Kremlin who was about to file a news story on the brutality of Chechen authorities who are loyal to Putin and the Kremlin. Her computer's hard drive and other material for the story were taken by Russian police. The story will probably never be published.

Litvinenko himself was writing a book about the practices of the FSB (a KGB successor organization) in the state of Chechnya, including alleged concentration camps.

There's also the case of Viktor Yushchenko, the Ukrainian presidential candidate who was poisoned with dioxin in September, 2004. Yushchenko survived the the poisoning, and ultimately won the election. Yushchenko was opposed by the Kremlin due to his pro-west leanings.

I was still on active duty when the Soviet Union imploded, and everyone was talking about the "peace dividend" and singing Kumbaya. A crusty old NCO said to me (and I'm paraphrasing here), "Whatever replaces the commies will be just as bad as the commies. Don't ever trust 'em." Crusty old NCOs can be pretty smart.

Dar ul-Islam* codified in France

I saw this post over at Atlas Shrugs. We've all heard about the "no-go" zones in France dominated by Muslims and basically unsafe for non-Muslims, including law enforcement. In my naivety, I'd assumed these were a handful of urban areas. Turns out there are around 750 of them. So many of them, in fact, that the French government has a web page listing each one, with links to maps in PDF form to display the boundaries.

The French call them Zones Urbaines Sensibles, or ZUS for short. This apparently translates to "sensitive urban zones".

* Dar ul-Islam: Literally, house of Islam, or land ruled by Islam. Opposite is Dar ul-Harb, or house of war. That'd be us.

Bizarre news item of the day

Shamsu Miah declared a personal
jihad on infidel swans

Hey! Here's an alternative for those of you tired of the same old turkey on this Thanksgiving day. A Muslim man of Bangladeshi descent in Britain has been convicted of killing and attempting to eat a wild swan during the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan. It seems the man was a tad hungry.

Shamshu Miah stabbed the bird and bit its neck at a boating lake in a popular tourist resort.

Police found the 52-year-old with blood on his clothes and feathers in his beard when they were called to the West Shore boating pool in the seaside town of Llandudno, North Wales.

They confronted Bangladeshi-born Miah, who told the police: "I am a Muslim, I am fasting, I had to eat.

"I was hungry, I had to eat the swan. I killed it, I stabbed it.

"I did nothing wrong, it was just a bird, I needed to eat."

It is forbidden for Muslims to eat during daylight hours over the Islamic month of Ramadan.

One of the officers told Miah it was illegal to kill a swan because it was the property of the Queen, to which Miah replied: "I hate the Queen, I hate this country."

Happy Thanksgiving!

The survey says: America unfriendly, suspicious

A recent travel industry study finds that tourists entering the US find America unfriendly, suspicious, arrogant... unfortunately, I can see how they might arrive at that conclusion.

Having traveled internationally quite a bit over the past 10 years or so, the impression one gets when arriving in the country, especially in Atlanta, is not a good one. Here's the routine in Atlanta:

Upon arriving at the gate, you make your way off the plane and head for passport control. There's always someone there directing people to the appropriate (US citizen/non-US citizen) line. This person is not congenial. He or she is bellowing, over and over, "US citizens over here, non-US citizens over there!". Even to an English-speaking American, they're barely understandable. The passport check itself, for an American citizen, is pretty painless.

Next is baggage claim. You have to claim your checked bags before going through customs. The wait there can be lengthy, but certainly not (much) worse than, say, Frankfurt or Gatwick.

You then take your bags through customs, where you hand your customs declaration card to an unsmiling customs agent. A side note here. If you've purchased antique firearms abroad and are bringing them through customs, you will have a bit of a delay at this point.

If your trip ends in Atlanta, you're good to go. But if, like most people, you're connecting to another destination from Atlanta, the gauntlet continues with baggage re-check. Again you'll be faced with barely intelligible people bellowing instructions on what to do.

Now that you've re-checked your bag, you've got to clear security...again. Since so far you haven't left a security-sterile area, I can only assume this is because you may have taken something from your checked baggage that's not permitted in your carry-on baggage. Once more, you'll be subjected to high-volume abuse exhorting you to remove laptops and camcorders from your carry-on bags, remove your shoes and jackets, etc.

If such was my first impression of America, I'd probably head right for the ticket counter and arrange for a flight back home.

Appeals court: Norway can expel Krekar

An appeals court in Norway has ruled that the Norwegian government can expel Mullah Krekar. Krekar has been in Norway since January, 2003 after being booted by Denmark for heroin smuggling. Krekar was the leader of Ansar al-Islam in Kurdish Iraq.

Charles at Little Green Footballs has loads on Krekar:

01/14/03 09:34 AM: Norway: Refuge for Islamozoids
01/02/04 11:03 AM: Krekar Arrested in Norway
02/02/06 07:55 PM: Ansar Al-Islam Leader: "The War Is On"
03/13/06 02:26 PM: "We're the Ones Who Will Change You"

Imam's call for boycott may put jihadis in a quandary

Exclusive to the Jihadi Journal

According to USAToday, Imam Omar Shahin, one of the Muslims pulled from a US Airways flight in Minneapolis, is calling for a boycott of the airline. A boycott of the airline, though, may put some aspiring jihadis in a tough position.

Imam Awana Qil'ya, head of the al-Bundhi Islamic Center in Charlotte, NC, said "Charlotte is a US Airways hub airport. If one of our brothers wants to commit himself to jihad in the tradition of the 9/11 martyrs, inshallah, he doesn't have many choices."

Such a boycott would place an undue burden on the mosque's fatwa department, Qil'ya said. "They already have to come to me for a fatwa (Islamic religious ruling) to approve their mission. Now, they'll have to request an additional fatwa to break the boycott", Qil'ya said.

Using another airline out of Charlotte isn't a good option, Qil'ya said. Most Delta flights, for example, are regional jets to Atlanta. "What are they gonna hit with one of those? A Starbucks shop?", Qil'ya wondered. In addition, flights on other airlines tend to be more costly because Charlotte isn't a hub city for them. "We only get so much money from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, y'know.", Qil'ya said.

"This whole thing is just a huge assache for me.", Qil'ya said with a sigh.

Anti-Syria cabinet member assassinated in Lebanon

Lebanese Industry Minister Pierre Gemayel has been assassinated in Lebanon. Gemayel was a Christian member of the cabinet, and opposed Hizballah and Syrian involvement in Lebanon.

And so it begins.

Palestinian rockets turn Sderot into ghost town

The market in Sderot has few vendors and even fewer
shoppers these days

While the antique media wails on about Israeli defensive incursions into Gaza, they consistently ignore the reason for the IDF action there: Barrages continue: Sderot turns into ghost town

Yoram Vaaknin, 44, who has been working at the market for 30 years no, told Ynet about the situation: "On a normal day I work nonstop, but recently buyers stopped coming here. I am a father of six, so I have to continue working here. I have no other choice. Many of my clients have left the city. Not only them, many stand owners have also left the market.

"Since the Palestinians began firing improved rockets at us, which also hurt and kill, the situation is much worse. People are extremely terrified."

Eti Almog, who has also owned a stand in the market for the past eight years, asked that the place be closed down.

"They have to close it. The market is unfortified. A disaster could happen if, God forbid, a Qassam lands here. We have nowhere to run. What shall we do? We don’t even have minimal protection.

More on the situation in Sderot.

British Home Secretary: UK policy radicalising young Muslims

In an attempt to distance himself politically from Tony Blair, Home Secretary John Reid is now parroting the Islamofascists' talking point that British foreign policy is radicalising young Muslims.

Now, in all fairness, this is probably true. But that doesn't make the policies wrong. This is akin to saying that immodestly-dressed women are to blame for their rapists' behavior. You know, like uncovered meat.

The real danger of this position is that it argues that a sovereign government should change its foreign policy because it's pissing off the bad guys.

Put another way...picture a 1942 newspaper headline reading "Japanese military build-up blamed on US response to Pearl Harbor".

Kissinger: Still an idiot

According to the latest from Henry Kissinger, a US military victory is no longer possible in Iraq. Someone needs to clue him in: we've already won. We went in there along with the Brits in March 2003, and by May it was all over. Iraqi army defeated in detail, barbaric government removed. By any historical measure, mission accomplished.

There is no war in Iraq; that war ended with an overwhelming coalition victory in 2003. What's left now are spastic efforts to prop up a democratic government on behalf of a culture that wouldn't know democracy if it clubbed it on the head. Unfortunately, with the Democrats taking control of Congress, the Iraqis probably won't ever get a chance to learn.

Booty call for world peace

OK, so maybe the anti-war movement comes up with a good idea once in a while. This time, they want you to have an orgasm for world peace. Global Orgasm wants you to find a partner this December 22nd for a synchronized, world-wide orgasm. According to their web site:

The intent is that the participants concentrate any thoughts during and after orgasm on peace. The combination of high- energy orgasmic energy combined with mindful intention may have a much greater effect than previous mass meditations and prayers.

The goal is to add so much concentrated and high-energy positive input into the energy field of the Earth that it will reduce the current dangerous levels of aggression and violence throughout the world.

Global Orgasm is an experiment open to everyone in the world.

The results will be measured on the worldwide monitor system of the Global Consciousness Project.

This is the First Annual Solstice Synchronized Global Orgasm for Peace, leading up to the December Solstice of 2012, when the Mayan Calendar ends with a new beginning.

I'm not sure what the Mayans have to do with this, but all in all, I'd have to say that this idea beats those creepy papier-mache heads pants down.

Rangel calls for reinstatement of draft...again

Rep. Charlie Rangel (D-NY) is repeating his call for reinstatement of the draft. He did the same a couple years back. As is typical among Democrats, Ol' Charlie speaks out of both sides of his mouth...

We need a draft because:

"If we're going to challenge Iran and challenge North Korea and then, as some people have asked, to send more troops to Iraq, we can't do that without a draft," Rangel said.

No, wait...we need a draft because:

"There's no question in my mind that this president and this administration would never have invaded Iraq, especially on the flimsy evidence that was presented to the Congress, if indeed we had a draft and members of Congress and the administration thought that their kids from their communities would be placed in harm's way," Rangel said.

It's that second statement that bothers me the most. Mr. Rangel knows full well that "this president and this administration" did not invade Iraq without the the consent of Congress. He reveals his low opinion of his colleagues in Congress by implying that the presence or absence of the draft would dictate how his colleagues would vote on such a grave issue.

Let's hope the Dems keep up this idiocy so they're bounced back out in '08.

Update: Just for the record...I've thought for many years that a limited application of the draft in which each service gets some small percentage of their annual quota from the draft would be a good idea. But I'm strongly opposed to a draft imposed for political reasons.

A hardliner to terrify hardliners

As if Iran isn't giving the West enough to worry about, Ayatollah Mohammad Mesbah-Yazdi, the spiritual adviser of Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, is making a move to replace Ayatollah Ali Khamenei as supreme leader of Iran.

Described a year ago by The Telegraph as "a hardliner to terrify hardliners", this is the same Ayatollah who issued a fatwa endorsing Ahmadinejad for president of Iran. Unlike Khamenei, he doesn't even try to disguise his rabid fundamentalism.

According to Wikipedia's entry on Mesbah-Yazdi, he "believes that slavery and aggression are justifiable" and a student of his has stated that the use of nuclear weapons has "religious legitimacy".

EDA: Democrats denied landslide

In the weeks just before this last election, the Dems were hedging their bets against possible losses by priming the media pump about election rigging in the Republicans' favor. Now that the Democrats have won a majority in both the House and Senate, they're leveraging that effort with this from the "Election Defense Alliance":

Major Miscount of Vote in 2006 Election: Reported Results Skewed Toward Republicans by 4 percent, 3 million votes

Apparently, winning isn't enough...the Dems wanted a landslide.

So, just who or what is EDA? Excuse me while I jump to conclusions, but if a group is whining about an election not being a convincing enough victory for a particular party, it's hard not to. Further, in this post-election EDA article, Mary Howe Kiraly writes in a post entitled 2006: A Year To Write Ballads About:

Here's to Election Integrity Activists. We didn't know it then, but in the bitter aftermath of the 2004 election, a miracle happened. People all across the United States planted their feet in their communities and said, "You may roll over me this time; but you are not taking this democracy down."

We knew what had happened in Ohio 2004, and we didn't stop talking about it.

Not exactly an unbiased, objective organization. But here's the genius of their little scheme. If they lose, it was due to Republican shenanigans. If they win, it would have been by a larger margin were it not for Republican shenanigans.

Hat tip: Pajamas Media

Of moonbats and kaffiyehs

Is the guy in the foreground cold, or does he just hate Jews?

The picture above was taken from news.com.au and was shot during a moonbat convergence at a G-20 summit meeting in Melbourne, Australia. Whenever you have moonbats protesting, uh, whatever it is they protest at a G-20 summit, you'll see someone wearing a Palestinian kaffiyeh.

The Magazine of the Party for Socialism and Liberation has their take on the tradition.

So does Jim Hancot.

Call me crazy, but I'm siding with Jim on this one.

Five killed by RoP in Thailand

Islamic paramilitary death squads in Thailand's southern provinces have executed five and wounded a police officer:

A 60-year-old Buddhist cattle raiser was gunned down while walking, before suspected insurgents burned his body and left it on the roadside in Yala, one of three violence-torn southern provinces bordering Malaysia.

A 52-year-old Buddhist street ice cream seller was also shot dead on Friday by two suspected insurgents on a motorcycle in Yala where another Muslim villager, 27, was killed late on the same day while riding a motorcycle, police said.

In neighboring Pattani province on Friday, a Buddhist security guard, 35, was shot dead while riding a motorcycle after work. Another Buddhist villager, 33, was gunned down later in the day when he was shopping at a food market.

Early on Saturday, a border patrol policeman was seriously wounded in a drive-by shooting.

I'd hate to see what would happen if Islam wasn't such a peaceful, tolerant religion.

Chinese Marine Corps

Two Chinese Marine Corps members show off their
new, 100% polyester-free uniforms

British school forced to back away from halal Christmas meal

In an effort to bring "a spirit of inclusion" to their annual Christmas dinner, the Oakwood School in Rotherham decided this year's dinner would be 100% halal (kosher for Muslims). The school's population of 1,000 is 20% Muslim. Well, that's what I'm inferring, because the Telegraph's article states by way of explanation that one in five students are of "Asian origin". They could be Chinese with a hankerin' for halal food, I suppose.

Not so fast, said some parents:

But Rachel Johnson, who has two daughters at the school, said: "It has really rocked my boat because I feel my culture is being stolen away from me. I have no objection to halal meat being on the menu so long as there is a choice of traditional Christmas fare.

"Our culture and religion are being trampled on and it is not right."

You go, girl. The head of the school, Jan Charters, said:

"Having listened to the concerns of some of our parents, we have agreed to provide turkey as an alternative along with the halal chicken and a vegetarian option so that we can hopefully cater for everyone.

"Our aim, as it always was with this event, is to make sure that everyone, regardless of their faith and background, can come together at this time of year and enjoy a traditional celebratory meal in our community."

I remember when alternative meant the exception to the majority.

UK Muslims: Leave Christmas alone

Britain's Muslims are urging local governments to continue with traditional Christmas celebrations. Not because it's the right thing to do, given that more than 70% of Britons describe themselves as Christians, but because "...attempts to remove religion from the festival were fuelling Right-wing extremism." [There go those damn Christian terrorists again! --ed.]

In 1998, the city of Birmingham renamed their Christmas celebration "Winterval". In 2001, Luton started calling their Christmas lights "Luminos". Pardon me while I puke.

UK to confront Islamic radicalism on campus

The Telegraph reports today that "Britain faces a sustained threat from extremist Islamic groups recruiting in British universities". Gee, d'ya think?

Of course, while rational persons in Britain attempt to focus attention on groups that represent a true threat, others are quick to remind them of other extremists:

A spokesman [for the British Muslim Forum] said: "We would, however, strongly urge the Government to consider issuing similar guidance on tackling anti-Muslim extremism of the far right, as this would reinforce the Government's resolve to tackle all forms of extremism."

Universities UK also praised the guidance but said warnings should be "focussed on all kinds of extremism, not just on extremism in the name of Islam".

They must be referring to all those Christians, Jews and Buddhists who've been blowing up trains, planes and buses lately.

Robert Fox: On the wrong side

Robert Fox over at The First Post has done it again. In an opinion column on the launch of Al Jazeera's English news channel, he states:

Those in favour of healthy media competition should shout hooray at the launch of al-Jazeera's English language service - the more voices, the better. But it will be only two cheers from me, not the statutory three.

Having read and remarked previously on Fox's incoherent, pro-Islamist ramblings, I thought at first, "wow...does Fox actually have misgivings over JihadTV's English language launch?". Well, maybe. But for the wrong reasons:

...Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was caught by a joint CIA-Pakistan police raid outside Islamabad. He remains the highest ranked al-Qaeda member to be picked up so far. But according to the Pulitzer-winning journalist Ron Suskind, Khalid was only pulled in after the Emir of Kuwait leaned on the al-Jazeera team who had interviewed him in hiding.

This poses the profoundest dilemma. The circumstances may have been exceptional - but do it once and the taint of collusion with the dark works of the intelligence community is hard to remove.

Fox may as well just sign on with al Qaeda's media relations department. Come to think of it, maybe he already has.

Just in time for Christmas!

Hey, kids! Get your very own Shiite Pet!

British Archbishop: BBC afraid to criticize Islam

Here's a news flash. The Archbishop of York, Dr. John Sentamu, claims that the BBC is biased against Christianity in favor of Islam. The reason according to Dr. Sentamu:

"They can do to us what they dare not do to the Muslims," he said. "We are fair game because they can get away with it. We don't go down there and say, 'We are going to bomb your place.' That is not in our nature."

I'm shocked. Shocked, I tell you!

Iran grooming new al Qaeda leadership

Just a day after it was reported that Tony Blair wants to cultivate a "new partnership" with Iran, The Telegraph reports that Iran is grooming new Jihadi masterminds for al Qaeda:

The Iranians want Saif al-Adel, a 46-year-old former colonel in Egypt's special forces, to be the organisation's number three.

Al-Adel was formerly bin Laden's head of security, and was named on the FBI's 22 most wanted list after September 11 for his alleged involvement in terror attacks against US targets in Somalia and Africa in the 1990s. He has been living in a Revolutionary Guard guest house in Teheran since fleeing from Afghanistan in late 2001.

In a related story, The Telegraph reports that Iran is attempting to completely take over control of al Qaeda:

Iran is seeking to take control of Osama bin Laden's al-Qa'eda terror network by encouraging it to promote officials known to be friendly to Teheran, The Daily Telegraph can reveal.

According to recent reports received by Western intelligence agencies, the Iranians are training senior al-Qa'eda operatives in Teheran to take over the organisation when bin Laden is no longer leader.

Now is there reason enough to forcibly stop Iran from becoming a nuclear power?

Bizarre news item of the day

These pretty North Korean girls are hoping
their next forced assembly will be for Eric Clapton

According to The First Post, North Korea's Kim Jong Il wants to host a rock festival a la Woodstock next year. While he hopes to attract headline acts like Eric Clapton, U2 and Lynard Skynard, he sets a few, um, restrictions on what performers can play:

...anyone who accepts the invitation will have to refrain from mentioning war, sex, violence, drugs, imperialism or "anti-socialism".

I guess Eminem won't be invited.

Billed as "Rock for Peace", the program is an effort to show the world that the mad, isolated country is just like other nations on earth:

"We are not a mad, isolated country. We are part of an ordinary world, just like yourselves," organisers told The First Post.

Mid-term elections a victory for America's enemies

When I first saw the results of last week's mid-term elections, I was just disappointed, and only a little concerned. Being in Europe the week of the elections didn't do much to allay my worries. Everybody there, it seemed, was positively giddy over the election results, and while European nations aren't overt enemies of the US, they certainly don't favor a strong America. Anything in their eyes that bodes well for a kinder, gentler (read weaker) America is just dandy with them. But as reports from elsewhere in the world started filtering in, my worries became more profound.

Some examples...
Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei:
"Since Washington's hostile and hawkish policies have always been against the Iranian nation, this defeat is actually an obvious victory for the Iranian nation."

Venezuelan Thug-in-Chief Hugo Chavez:
"Heads are beginning to roll," Chavez said of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld during a press conference. "It was about time he resigned. The president should resign now."

Even Abu Musab Al Zarqawi's replacement as head of al Qaeda in Iraq, Abu Ayyub al-Masri, got in on the act, gloating over the Republican losses and Rumsfeld's resignation.

So, thanks, America. Just like Spain in the wake of the Madrid train bombings, you've given the bad guys exactly what they wanted.

Say it ain't so

Well, the Democrats Socialists have pulled off the unexpected and captured both the House and the Senate. This does not bode well for the coming years.

Some folks on the anti-Idiotarian front are predicting a vindictive, Moonbat-dominated Congress will launch a witch hunt targeting President Bush and other prominent Republicans. They may be right. I'm not one for making predictions, but I'll stick my neck out a bit here. For the next couple of years, look for:

• A sagging economy as tax cuts are taken back and an anti-business Congress gets to work on profit-inhibiting legislation
• Profligate social spending at the expense of national security and secure borders. And worst of all...
• A move to appease radical Islamist groups here and throughout the world

"Almost ashamed"

Rusty Shackleford at the Jawa Report has a follow-up item on the "gentleman" pictured here from this year's Great Cartoon Jihad. He says he's almost ashamed over the message depicted on his sign.

The Jawa Report post does a nice job comparing BBC's coverage of Mizanur Rahman's statements and what he actually said. The BBC report, headlined "Cartoons protest man apologizes", glosses over some of the more vile incitements Rahman indulged in, such as:

Oh Allah, we want to see another 9/11 in Iraq, another 9/11 in Denmark, another 9/11 in Spain, in France, all over Europe. Oh Allah, destroy all of them, Amen.

Bomb, bomb France. Bomb, bomb France. Nuke, nuke France. Nuke, nuke France.

We want to see them coming home in body bags. We want to see their blood running in the streets of Baghdad and Fallujah.

We want to see the Mujahideen shoot down their planes like the way they shoot down birds. We want to see their tanks burnt, just like we burn their flags.

We want to see their freedoms destroyed. We want to see all of them removed from Muslim land. Oh, Allah don't leave any of them alive in Iraq, don't leave any of them alive in Afghanistan, don't leave any of them standing in France.

Hang 'em high

With any luck, he'll swing for a while before he dies.

Vote early and often!

Just a reminder to go out and vote on Tuesday. I already cast my vote a couple weeks ago since I'm leaving for Germany today and won't be around next week (posting next week will be light, of course).

I don't care who you vote for, as long as it's not a Democrat!

AFP's take on Palestinian human shields

This little bit of journalistic fellatio from Agence France Presse is absolutely unbelievable. In their coverage of the Hamas-ordered human shield operation in Gaza, they fawn over the women who acted as human shields to help rescue a pack of rabid dogs, but make no mention of why they were hiding in a mosque in the first place.

These guys weren't a bunch of innocent men fleeing an act of Zionist aggression. The IDF went in to round them up after they launched rockets at Israeli civilian targets from Gaza.

Confirmed: Palestinian terrorists use human shields

Back in August, I posted this item showing a Palestinian terrorist firing on Israeli troops in the midst of several bystanders, apparently using them as human shields. Today, we have confirmation that this is Hamas policy:

The dead woman was one of several hundreds who heeded a call by Hamas militants [Redundant. Hamas is by definition "militant", i.e., terrorist. --ed.] to ring the mosque in the northern Gaza town of Beit Hanoun.

Disgusting.

Hizballah making power play in Lebanon

Terrorist leader Hassan Nasrallah is threatening the Lebanese government with massive street protests in a bid to force early elections he believes will give Hizballah "veto power" within the government.

The Bush administration suspects Syrian and Iranian puppeteering.

Indonesian tourism down 14 percent; Reuters prevaricates on cause

Given the rampant Islamist violence in Indonesia, It's no big shock that tourism there is down 14 percent from a year ago. I suppose it comes as even less of a surprise that al-Reuters would attempt to gloss over the real cause in their bland headline and opening paragraph:

Indonesia's Sept foreign tourist arrivals down 14 pct

JAKARTA, Nov 1 (Reuters) - The number of foreign tourists visiting Indonesia in September fell nearly 14 percent from a year ago, the statistics bureau said on Wednesday, as natural disasters and the threat of bird flu kept visitors away.

Readers often scan headlines and read the first paragraph or two to get the gist of a story before moving on to the next, so this suits the al-Reuters agenda quite nicely. It's not until the third paragraph that the reader gets a hint of the real problem:

Tourism in the sprawling archipelago of some 17,000 islands, has been shaken by bomb attacks, tsunamis, earthquakes and cases of bird flu.

Then finally, in paragraphs five and six, al-Reuters gives up the charade:

The predominantly Hindu island in mostly Muslim Indonesia is still struggling to recover after suicide bombers attacked three restaurants in October last year, killing 20 people.

These attacks occurred three years after Islamic militants bombed two Bali nightclubs, killing 202 people, mostly foreign holidaymakers.

The really big news here is that tourism is only down 14 percent.