Odds and Ends

Will be working on a post about the Tea Party in Winona last week and about the Republican Congressional District 1 endorsement convention this past Saturday to put up this week.

In the meantime, a few items that caught my eye the last two weeks:

A follow up on the couple beaten in New Orleans last week by leftwing protesters.  The Palin pin part of it has been debunked, but it is very clear this was a politically motivated attack. The mainstream media shows that they are well beyond simple bias by ignoring this one.  If conservative protesters had done this to a pair of Democrats it would be the overkill story for weeks.

Dr. Helen aka the Instawife has an interesting piece up about how psychologists are moving to social activism in their therapy.  This is damning stuff and worth checking out. The desire to control other’s lives is getting to be the hallmark of the left.

Speaking of controlling people, the FDA is going to start regulating salt in prepared foods.  This serves two goals:  controlling the population even in the most miniscule way and to inflate the number of government employees (they’ll need to hire more to administrate this, of course). Idiocy. Look for more of this under the guise of lowering the government’s cost of providing healthcare.

There is no way ObamaCare can be funded, it is simply impossible.  But the Democrats will keep trying and one way they want to raise taxes is by adding a VAT (Value Added Tax). That hasn’t worked out so well for the Europeans and is yet another way to retard the growth of an economy.  In our case, it would kill it dead. Best quote:

In 2008, the average resident of West Virginia, one of the poorest American states, had an income $2,000 a year higher than the average resident of the European Union, according to economist Mark Perry of the University of Michigan, Flint.

Oh yeah, we really need to emulate those Europeans.

Denial of reality seems to be a big part of leftwing big government.  Over in California they are doing their best to be like Europe and ignore the financial catastrophe they are in.  Entertainment comes first but the piper will have to be paid eventually.

Meanwhile, that unpronounceable volcano in Iceland is still hampering flying and a bigger eruption is possible.  But just how unsafe was it to fly?  Turns out that the grounding was based exclusively on computer models and nary a single weather balloon was sent up to get real data. The religion of computer models has already given us the fraud of man made global warming and now this is going on. Once again reality is being ignored in favor of theory.  I’m afraid science is dead.

The relationship between Israel and the United States is on life support as well.  The hostility of Obama and his cronies toward the Israelis  has been palpable of late and has generated a great deal of concern. I’ve been warning people he is slowly building a case for armed conflict with Israel and been greeted with dismissal.  Better look again, as this refusal by the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff to rule out shooting down Israeli planes crossing Iraqi airspace to hit Iran. The ghost of Jeremiah Wright is alive and well in the Obama administration.

A Moment of Beauty and Brotherhood in Iraq

With Thanksgiving nearly upon us, it is an appropriate time to reflect on the good things in life and the good people who are doing their best to make this world a better place. So when I read Michael Yon's latest dispatch about Muslims wanting their Christian neighbors to return in a neighborhood in Baghdad, I knew I'd found one of those beautiful moments where people can be seen treating their brothers and sisters with love. I am continually amazed at how our media insists on dwelling on the negative on any topic possible and wonder if they are all on anti-depressants as their outlook on life seems terminally hopeless. Thankfully, we have good people out there telling the truth, whether it be good, bad, or ugly.

Looking at the pictures of St. John's in Baghdad and reading the account made my day. I find it fascinating that before al Qaeda came to the area, Christians and Muslims were living in peace and brotherhood. With the Muslims of that neighborhood helping clean and repair the Catholic church, then actually attending a mass to show their love for those driven away, I see a bright ray of hope for greater Iraq. The possibility of the country becoming more like the Lebanon of the 1950s is looking more plausible.

So heading into the holidays, I am grateful for people cross religious or cultural lines and love their neighbors.

UPDATED:

Yet another story, this one involving a USMC Lt. and an Iraqi police officer who were once on opposite sides in Ramadi. Some amazing things are happening over there and if this isn't a terrific example of the power of forgiveness, I don't know what is.

The Truth about Iraq

Michael Yon Online

Michael Totten's Middle East Journal

Most of what you read, see, and hear in the media about Iraq is distorted or false. Only a very few reporters have been seeking the truth on the ground and these are the two best out there. Take a look around their reports and you will soon get a clearer picture of things. Sometime in the past months, a tipping point was reached and things changed in Iraq for the better. But you won't see that in the media because it interferes with "shaping the narrative", whether it be anti-Conservative/BDS on the left or isolationist on the far right of the political spectrum. The truth, like all things of God, respects no man.

The truth is out there and it is complicated, messy, and requires real thought to see and comprehend. We can rail against politicians, the media, and perceived conspiracies all we want, but the main blame for this ignorance has to rest on the shoulders of the masses. The American people don't want to put effort into finding out what is going on in the world or even their local area. They wish to be spoon fed, want somebody else to deal with the problems while they go about their busy and utterly inward focused lives.

This is the challenge of our time, bringing truth to those who don't have it and more frightening to me, those who don't want it. So please take the time to read the reports by these two gentlemen. You may read things you don't want to believe, may read things that reinforce your already held views, but you will be reading honest journalism, a rarity in this day.

End Game Near?

The idea that Iran's influence in Iraqi politics has been growing along with the amount of arms they have smuggled in is getting harder to ignore, despite the desperate desire of both the Executive and Legislative branches of our government to avoid dealing with it. The latest sign that we may have lost the political war is posted about at Heading Right. If this petition holds up, support for the ground war will evaporate completely in the United States in short order. There is no doubt in my mind that Iranian money and arms are heavily influencing this, as our Congress has given our enemies proof that we are a weak willed and cowardly society. This has encouraged the Iranians and foreign jihadists no end, despite the astounding losses they are suffering. The sad thing is that the political left and quite a few moderates have forgotten the lessons of childhood playgrounds. The psychology of a bully scales up and now that we've shown our weakness, the bully will never leave us alone. That scaled up bully is Islamic terrorism and he's going to be wanting our lunch money on a regular basis after we abandon Iraq. Expect a "fortress America" mentality setting in and then being rather loudly blown up, as we can't even secure our borders. We may see a future like Israel's current situation, with suicide bombings and attacks becoming common.

We as a society are telegraphing our weakness very loudly at the moment, with the behavior of the Democrats in Congress, and the constant anti-war beat of our mass media. The drift to the Left over the war is also making the socialist fringe feel like they have a mandate here, while socialism is starting to lose its luster in Europe due to its colossal economic failures. Amazing, given that even the French have realized that it doesn't work well. All of this points to very bad times for our country in the near future as political strife undercuts our achieving anything constructive at home or abroad. The Democrats have sold their soul and are now selling out their country for political power. Nothing good can come of it and I wonder how long it will take the American people to wake up and realize what they did this last November.

A Mitigated Disaster?

Well that was brutal. The American people voted their emotions and the Iraq war, with a smattering of "culture of corruption/throw the bums out" populism being the cause. This certainly wasn't an election of "all politics are local" nature. Only one candidate I predicted as winning actually won, as the center swung over to vote for the Democrats. We lost the US House, probably the US Senate, the Minnesota House, and the bulk of the governor's races. Even sheriff's races over in Wisconsin saw almost all the Republican candidates defeated. This was a total rejection of the GOP and punishment for not having a swift victory in Iraq.

So why aren't I calling it an unmitigated disaster? Look at how the referendums on marriage went. All seven states passed amendments defining marriage as between a man and a woman. This indicates the growing conservatism of the country as a whole, not a tilt to the left. What we are seeing is a punishment of the GOP from the voters, the equivalent of taking the belt to the child that erred. This debacle means the Republican leadership will have to listen to their base and grassroots, instead of taking them for granted. Fiscal responsibility being a huge issue there.

It was a perfect storm of war fatigue, growing isolationism, the six year itch, and a masterful propaganda campaign by the media against the Right. The growing influence of the Blogosphere was not enough to counter the last and nothing could counter the others. There is going to be a lot of second guessing, but I'm of the opinion nothing could have prevented what just happened. The campaigns were run well for the most part and we simply lost. That's politics!

Oddly enough, this has led me to re-evaluate the leadership who didn't prevent WWII. Neville Chamberlain now appears less the fool than an elected official truly representing the will of his people. We are in a time that has certain analogues to the world situation of the 1930's (maybe even the 1830's domestically) and I now know that the unavoidable is unpreventable as well. We think our governments and officials have the power to do just about anything, but they are as subject to the movements of history as the rest of us. So, Neville, I forgive you for "peace in our time" as you were doing what the British populace wanted.

I still like Winston Churchill better, but he was constantly getting thrown out of office. Heh, usually for speaking truth to power.

Well, I was going to post why Brenda Johnson won, but that turned into a rout and not in our favor. We ran a tight, focused campaign that did everything right and with an exceptional candidate. The other candidates made terrible tactical and strategic decisions, allowing us to control the overall campaign. It just turned out this was never our race to win, the DFL won everywhere in the area except for Steve Swiggum's district. Even the environmentalist independent candidate, Kevin Kelleher, didn't have a prayer in the face of what was happening. I really expected him to do better than he did in certain areas, but the DFL got the angry vote.

The same anger at those in power tilted the local sheriff's race toward the outsider who ran simply as an outsider. My favored candidate had concrete ideas and plans, but is considered part of the establishment so he didn't have a real chance either.

This really was an angry populist election and things usually go bad after one. Our foreign policy will be hamstrung now and I fear whatever chances we had at success in Iraq will be erased. Iran and Islamic extremists will correctly view this election as proof of American weakness, which will entice them to get even bolder. Very dark times are ahead for us and I can safely say most of the American people don't understand just how bad it will be. Weakness is always rewarded with pain and going isolationist means a world of pain will come knocking on our doors.

My consolation is that the Democrats ran a lot of conservative candidates who will be shut out of power by the far left leadership. We'll see some schisms in the next two years and the infighting will be brutal. Hopefully, a purging of the free spenders in the Republican ranks will occur as well. Adversity breeds character and we need some character building in the GOP. Another thing is that the voters may be opting for gridlock, as I don't see a mandate on left wing social issues. For instance, here in Minnesota Governor Pawlenty narrowly won re-election while the House was given to the DFL and their majority increased in the Senate. That means that a Republican president is a likely outcome in 2008.

Why We Fight in Iraq

After being exposed to a great deal of anger driven rants about the war in Iraq over the past few days, it was nice to run into a post at Captain's Quarters that contains this little nugget:

"Free societies cannot possibly apply the kinds of security procedures that would make mass transit completely safe, not if they want to remain free societies. We can adopt better technology and hopefully screen airline passengers more effectively, but in truth that approach alone always puts us behind the terrorist curve. They only have to be successful once; we have to be successful every single time, and still protect the civil liberties of the travelers in our nations. The only way to effectively fight terrorism is to fight it somewhere else."

This is why we must take the fight elsewhere, in my opinion, we can't fight here and win without sacrificing our personal freedoms in a dangerous way. Once gone, freedoms are hard to get back. Stop taking the fight to the Islamic terrorists in the Middle East and you will soon see the fight back on our shores. My greatest fear after 9/11 wasn't another attack, it was that the American public would suffer from a short attention span and forget that day as the years went by. This is a generational war, something not seen in modern warfare. Even WWI and WWII were short wars compared to some in the past, so this is new territory for this age. It will be long, agonizing, and will result in one of three outcomes: Islam dominates all of humanity, the fundamentalists are crushed, or democracy and Western ways spread virally through the autocratic Islamic states. Right now we are attempting a noble experiment in trying to bring about the last option. The other two will be horrific and there is a good chance of that happening as isolationism is impossible today, mainly because of modern technology shrinking the planet. I don't know about you, but I'd rather try to bring freedom to those oppressed and misguided people in the Middle East than nuke them.

The rest of Ed Morrisey's post is well worth reading.