Saturday, July 15, 2006

Re: "Disproportionate"

French, Spanish, Russians, The Vatican, they've all used the word. Putin elaborates:

Putin, whose government has expressed concern about the region sliding into war, said he agreed that Hizbollah's actions were "absolutely unacceptable".

"This is all true, and in this context, we consider Israel's concerns to be justified," the Russian president said. But, he said, "the use of force should be balanced".
Paul at Power Line replies: "Call me naive, but I had always thought that the object in a military action was to employ disproportionate (i.e., more) force than the enemy."

I suggest you scroll around Power Line while you are there -- great stuff in the past two days regarding a number of topics including Lebanon, the Democratic Gubernatorial Primary in Maryland, and a notably slanted AP poll regarding the 2006 elections.

Friday, July 14, 2006

Oh, and one more thing

How much more fugged would this situation be if Saddam Hussein were still in power in Iraq?

Only a handful of dominoes remain

Way back in Feburary I blogged about Abqaiq, the massive Saudi petroleum processing facility through which a substantial portion of Saudi Arabia's substantial oil exports flow. See below.



Northeast of Abqaiq is the likewise massive oil terminal at Dammam. Both are roughly 300 miles from Iran's Persian Gulf coast.

Roughly 500 miles to the east is the Strait of Hormuz, "at its narrowest, 21 miles wide, having two 1 mile wide channels for marine traffic separated by a 2 mile wide buffer zone, and is the only sea passage to the open ocean for large areas of the petroleum exporting Persian Gulf States". The Strait is bounded on the north by Iran, and so I think we might all become intimate with it in the next sixty days.



See what I'm getting at?

I figure Syria and Iran have already joined in Lebanon (Hezbollah didn't build no UAV), but if they really join, well then America will join as well and that is when we all find ourselves in jeopardy as Iran could easily topple a domino across the Strait, which doesn't just mean expensive oil, it might mean, for hundreds of millions worldwide, no oil.

If the mullahs are on the losing end then they might take a stab at Abqaiq or Dammam, which would have no strategic value, but it seems clear that Radical Islam is engaged in economic warfare with the West moreso than they have engaged the West with bullets or other weaponry.

As the title states, I think only a handful of dominoes remain between where we are today and real worldwide economic strife, and maybe even catastrophe.

Melodramatic? Perhaps, but my guess is that just about every American combat aviator, in the next two weeks, will study the arena until he knows it like the back of his hand, right down to the turds of camels in the desert west of Bandar Abbas. Any move Iran makes on the Strait or the Saudis must result in an American response that is just plain wicked.

Musings on a gym workout, Part 2

OK guys, this one is for you.

If I had my way, I would remove every last floor to ceiling mirror in existance. You want to work out? Fine, get on those weights and pump some iron. But if you want to slooooooooooooooooowly pull that weight up so that you can admire your flexed biceps in the mirror, get out of the way so that some of us can finish our workout.

I know you like to socialize. I know you like to look at yourself. You show it every day. You probably have a mirror above your bed so that when your tiny little steriod-shriveled dick is being ridden by whatever floozy you convinced to come home with you, you can look up in that mirror and pretend that you're having sex with yourself, because you're just that damn SEXY!

Yeah. Right.

Listen up, meathead: Some of us people have lives. Real lives, with real people involved in them. And we'd like to go about our lives, including our workouts, but we can't, because you're monopolizing the damned curl bench with your narcissism. And while you're trying to impress Little Miss Bubblehead with your hormone-enhanced deltoids, the rest of us are waiting to use the bench you've parked out on!

Find somewhere else for your self-glorification. Let the rest of us work out so that we can get on with our day.

Linkz

Best Middle East coverage:

Pajamas Media

Blogs of War

Counterterrorism Blog

Hot Air

Wednesday, July 12, 2006

Shining Light On The Behavior Of Liars - Bumped Posts

I orginally posted this on October 28th, 2005:

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

FIRST - POOR POOR POOR POOR POOOOOOOR Li'l Plame just wants her privacy:

WRONG!

Here we see a picture of the very very very shy valerie in the July Issue of Vanity Fair!



The photo was taken at the magazine's annual dinner for the Tribeca Film Festival, and Plame's and Wilson's fellow guests included Robert deNiro, Nicole Kidman, Barry Diller, Willem Dafoe, John McEnroe, and many others. A "low key social life" indeed! Poor poor poor pooor poooooooooor li'l Plame!

SECOND - Pooor Poooooooor Poooooor li'l Plame was not "Outed"

Since "Straight Shootin'" Fitzgerald won't touch the issue, let's ask our friends in the Main Stream Media whether Plame was a secret agent at the time Robert Novak "outed" her:

"The nation's largest news organizations and journalism groups" filed a brief in federal court Wednesday arguing that "a federal court should first determine whether a crime has been committed in the disclosure of an undercover CIA operative's name before prosecutors are allowed to continue seeking testimony from journalists about their confidential sources," the Washington Post reports:

The 40-page brief, filed in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, argues that there is "ample evidence . . . to doubt that a crime has been committed" in the case, which centers on the question of whether Bush administration officials knowingly revealed the identity of undercover CIA operative Valerie Plame in the summer of 2003.


But don't take their word alone. Authors of the Law Say No Law Broken – Plame Doesn’t qualify



THIRD - Bush's 16 words were WELL FOUNDED:

The British government yesterday bolstered President Bush's assertion that Iraq sought uranium from Niger, casting further doubt on former Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV's claims to the contrary.
The conclusion was reached by Robin Butler, who once was Britain's top civil servant, in a major report on prewar intelligence that came five days after the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence reached a similar conclusion in its report.
Taken together, the British and U.S. reports appear to undermine Mr. Wilson's criticism of Mr. Bush, which led to a criminal investigation of the White House and made the retired diplomat a media darling.
"It is accepted by all parties that Iraqi officials visited Niger in 1999," the British report said. "The British government had intelligence from several different sources indicating that this visit was for the purpose of acquiring uranium.
"Since uranium constitutes almost three-quarters of Niger's exports, the intelligence was credible," the report added.
That buttressed an assertion by Mr. Bush in his 2003 State of the Union speech: "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa."
Yesterday, the British report called that assertion "well founded." The report was cited by British Prime Minister Tony Blair, who told Parliament: "It expressly supports the intelligence on Iraq's attempts to procure uranium from Niger in respect of Iraq's nuclear ambitions."
The State of the Union assertion rankled Mr. Wilson, who said he found no evidence of such an attempted purchase during a CIA-sponsored trip to Niger. Mr. Wilson arrived in the African nation in late February 2002.
"I spent the next eight days drinking sweet mint tea and meeting with dozens of people," he wrote in the New York Times 18 months later. "Niger formally denied the charges."


FOURTH- Why are we even having this debate? Because Joe Wilson, attempting to bolster his credibility, claimed that Cheney was responsible for sending him to Niger. That's a lie. It was his wife:

Wilson was on CNN's "American Morning" the day after his column ran, spinning his straw into golden fabrications:

HEMMER: It's a wonderful day for us here at American Morning! You went to Niger several years ago. You concluded essentially that Iraq could not buy this uranium from that country. Why not?

WILSON: Well, I went in, actually in February of 2002 was my most recent trip there — at the request, I was told, of the office of the vice president, which had seen a report in intelligence channels about this purported memorandum of agreement on uranium sales from Niger to Iraq.

The Senate Intelligence Committee also found that Wilson lied about the role played by his wife, Valerie Plame, in his trip to Niger. Wilson wrote in his book, ironically titled The Politics of Truth, "Valerie had nothing to do with the matter. She definitely had not proposed that I make the trip." In fact, however, the Committee reported at p. 4:
[D]ocuments provided to the committee indicate that [Wilson's] wife, a CPD employee, suggested his name for the trip. The CPD reports officer told Committee staff that the former ambassador's wife "offered up his name" and a memorandum to the Deputy Chief of the CPD on February 12, 2002 from the former ambassador's wife says, "my husband has good relations with both the PM [prime minister] and the former Minister of Mines (not to mention lots of French contacts), both of whom could possibly shed light on this sort of activity."
The former ambassador was selected for the 1999 trip after his wife mentioned to her supervisors that her husband was planning a business trip to Niger in the near future and might be willing to use his contacts in the region.


FIFTH - More Lies from Joe Liar Wilson (note: there are more than this even):

The Senate Intelligence Committee's report says about Wilson's trip to Niger - The following, at p. 8 of the report's "Niger" section:
The intelligence report based on the former ambassador's [Wilson's] trip was disseminated on March 8, 2002 ... The intelligence report indicated that former Nigerian Prime Minister Ibrahim Mayaki...said that in June 1999, [redacted] businessman, approached him and insisted that Mayaki meet with an Iraqi delegation to discuss "expanding commercial relations" between Niger and Iraq. The intelligence report said that Mayaki interpreted "expanding commercial relations" to mean that the delegation wanted to discuss uranium yellowcake sales.
When Wilson talked to the Committee's staff, he related a version of events that was different from the official CIA report that summarized his oral debriefing, and it also contradicted the recollections of the relevant CIA employees. The committee wrote, at p. 9 of its report:
When the former ambassador spoke to Committee staff, his description of his findings differed from the DO intelligence report and his account of information provided to him by the CIA differed from the CIA officials' accounts in some respects. First, the former ambassador described his findings to Committee staff as more directly related to Iraq and specifically, as refuting the possibility that Niger could have sold uranium to Iraq and that Iraq approached Niger to purchase uranium. The intelligence report...did not refute the possibility that Iraq had approached Niger to purchase uranium.
See also p. 38 of the report, where the Committee notes that most analysts understood Wilson's report from Niger as supporting the original CIA concerns about a possible uranium deal between Niger and Iraq.

And that's not all. The Senate committee also found that Wilson falsely leaked to the Washington Post the claim that certain documents purporting to show uranium sales between Niger and Iraq were forgeries because "the names were wrong and the dates were wrong," when in fact, he had never seen the documents and was not familiar with their contents. See p. 10 of the Committee's report:
Committee staff asked how the former ambassador could have come to the conclusion that the "dates were wrong and the names were wrong" when he had never seen the CIA reports and had no knowledge of what names and dates were in the reports. The former ambassador said that he may have "misspoken" to the reporter when he said he concluded the documents were "forged." He said he may have become confused about his own recollection....

To Sum up:

The Senate Intelligence Committee's report shows that:
1) Wilson lied in the New York Times about what he told the CIA after he returned from Niger. In fact, far from debunking the concern that Iraq may have tried to buy uranium from Niger, Wilson reported that Niger's former Prime Minister told him that Iraq had made just such an overture in 1999.
2) Wilson lied when he leaked a report to the Washington Post about documents he had not even seen.
3) Wilson lied when he said that his wife Valerie "had nothing to do with" his being chosen to go to Niger.


More to come....

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

And I orginally posted this on November 3rd, 2005:

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Joe Wilson October 2003 on "Meet the Press":

"My wife has made it very clear that -- she has authorized me to say this -- she would rather chop off her right arm than say anything to the press and she will not allow herself to be photographed.".

The reason, said Wilson, is that "she's still employed" by the CIA "and has obligations to her employer."


Then in December of 2003.....2 MONTHS LATER:


October 2005:
BLITZER: Even though some of your supporters... they say your decision and your wife's decision to let her be photographed represented a major mistake because if there were people out there who may have been endangered by her name certainly when people might have seen her picture, they would have been further endangered.

WILSON: Her contacts and her network was endangered the minute Bob Novak wrote the article. The photograph of her did not identify her in any way anybody could identify.
To give you an indication of how effortlessly this guy lies, CNN was at that moment displaying the Vanity Fair photo of Wilson and Plame on a huge screen right behind him. So Wilson was asserting that no foreign intelligence service would be clever enough to see through the sunglasses-and-scarf "disguise" Plame is wearing in the photo.

WILSON: Let me just get this very clear. When one is faced with adversity, one of the ways that one acts in the face of adversity is to try and bring a certain amount of humor to the situation. It's called irony. And uh, if uh, people have no sense of humor or no sense of perspective on that, my response is it's about time to get a life. But in no way did that picture endanger anybody. What endangered people was the outing of her name, her maiden name, and subsequently the outing of the corporation she worked for...

BLITZER: So you don't have any regrets about the Vanity Fair picture?

WILSON: I think it's a great picture. I think...

BLITZER: It's a great picture, but I mean...

WILSON: I think someday it too will be in the International Spy Museum.



"HUMOR"!?! "IRONY"!?! What happened to "chopping off her right arm"?! I thought she was "still employed" by the CIA "and has obligations to her employer." "HUMOR"!?! "IRONY"?!?

July 2005:



"She's still employed" by the CIA "and has obligations to her employer." "She would rather chop off her right arm than say anything to the press and she will not allow herself to be photographed." "HUMOR" "IRONY"

Wait a tick! This poor poor poooooor woman's "cover" has been blown, her career is ruined.....right?

"She's still employed" by the CIA "and has obligations to her employer." Right?

"HUMOR"? "IRONY"?

BULLSHIT

Both are worth revisiting since we've recently learned that Rove will not be indicted, and Novak got Plame's name from the 2002 Who's Who in America. How is that for a compendium, Tim? :)

Best Links re: Israel

I have found these sources to be handy today:

Jerusalem Post

Austin Bay

Blogs of War

Israel Matzav

Of course: The Belmont Club

Pajamas Media

Hot Air



Also:
Sharon was succeeded by Ehud Olmert, a man who once said in a speech,'We are tired of fighting, we are tired of being courageous, we are tired of winning, we are tired of defeating our enemies... .' No words could more aptly demonstrate the success of Hezbollah's strategy against Israel. And the presence now in Gaza of Israeli troops, engaged in pitched battle with Palestinans, demonstrates the bankruptcy of the Gaza disengagement plan.
.
.
.
By its displays of weakness, in Lebanon and Gaza, in the cause of 'Peace Now,' Israel has convinced its deadly foes of its vulnerability and has invited attack. As a result, Israel now fights a two-front hot war."
The Hedgehog Blog

"Bring a Gun to DC Day"

Can't even walk on the Mall anymore without fear of assault. Anyone got a handy way to blame this on Bush? I want a Diary at Kos.

Well, it's finally happened.

Now we wait to see how this plays out.

BEIRUT, Lebanon — Hezbollah fighters launched a raid into Israel and captured two Israeli soldiers Wednesday, triggering an Israeli assault with warplanes, gunboats and ground troops in southern Lebanon to hunt for the captives.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert called the Hezbollah raid "an act of war" and held the Lebanese government responsible, vowing that the Israeli response "will be restrained, but very, very, very painful."


Hezbollah has been fighting a war against Israel, along with Hamas, and other countries through the terrorist organizations. It was only a matter of time before Israel was forced to retalliate.

Honestly, I hate to say it, but the best thing for Israel is to simply go to war with the countries that are supporting the terrorists. It's not nice, it's not pretty, but I think that is was is needed for Israel to be allowed to exist unmolested.

And that sucks. But Israel has been nice for too long, and it's about time that they finally reached the point where they won't take any more crap from genocidal terrorists hell-bent on destroying their country.

All Star Game

So, I have my Irish Whiskey at hand, right? Jameson's. Good stuff. I have pretzels. I have other snack foods. Weather is good, almost no rain and little wind where I am.

I settle into my favorite chair. Find the channel and watch the opening ceremonies. Star Spangled Banner was done well, without all the bullshit stylizing that people today seem to have a fetish for. I see the first pitch. And just about halfway through the top of the 1st inning....

*poof* Power goes out. For no reason. All over my section of post.

I'm sure they heard my scream all over this crappy little island.

Tuesday, July 11, 2006

I loathe the "race card", but...

...I tuned to cable news, including Fox, MSNBC, and CNN, several times tonight and there was very, VERY little coverage of Mumbai. Fox was talking Bill Keller, MSNBC was talking budget deficit, CNN (heh) was talking about Robert Novak. The bombings in Mumbai that claimed 147 lives, it appears, are going to get about 1/10th the coverage of the London bombings that killed 52 just one year ago.

What can one glean from that?

Question



"Are the people who bombed trains in India, killing over 150 people, possessive of the rights of signatories to the Geneva Conventions, Justice Ginsburg?"

Another State sees the light

And simply says, "If you're a criminal breaking into a house in Mississippi, the owner can shoot you without a hassle"

The safety valve for the "Castle doctrine" is for burglars, crackheads, carjackers, strong-arm robbers, muggers, rapists, thieves and other assorted boils on the butt of humanity to stay out of homes, cars, stores, offices and other domiciles that don't belong to them and to stop mugging, robbing, raping and stealing.

Those who utilize that course of action aren't terribly likely to be shot. Those who don't likely will be.


Ah, the simple concept that the pants-wetting gun-grabbers simply cannot comprehend. If you don't break into a person's house, you won't get shot.

In short, if you're not a criminal, you don't have to worry.

The "Castle doctrine" should serve notice on those who choose a life of crime that the consequences of that choice may prove dire indeed - and that potential victims may indeed "shoot first and ask questions later."

Again, there's a safety valve for those criminals. It's called not breaking the law in the first place.


I've got a big grin on my face right now.

Found via Kim du Toit (link on the sidebar)

Objectification Pontification

Heh. Dave's post reminds me that I owe the crowd a note re: catheterization and objectification. It also reminds me that most women who object to objectification of women are women who would barely be objectified by a blind man on mushrooms.

It also reminds me of Kos.

Random Musings from a Gym Workout

So, all us guys know that we're not supposed to objectify women, right? Right.

So please tell me this: Why is it, that after decades of women saying they don't want to be objectified, do women walk into a weight room wearing pants so tight that I can tell if she's clean shaven or not, and proceed to use the hip-flexor machine? Legs spread, legs closed, legs spread, legs closed, all while wearing a lip-biting expression that says "YES, YES, YES!"

You wonder why men in this country are so screwed up? I don't. Not anymore. It's the sexual frustration caused when women's words and actions constantly contradict themselves. Modern society is pretty damn messed up. "I AM NOT A SEXUAL OBJECT" + clothing that clearly delineates the pubic region = Messed up. "DO NOT LOOK AT MY BREASTS!" + clothing that clearly shows the size, shape, and relative color of your nipples = Messed up.

Don't get me wrong, if women want to wear tighter-than-painted-on-latex clothing while performing exercises that mimic a sexual act, that's fine and dandy with me. That may even encourage more men to go to the gym. Just don't do it and then complain about being objectified.

I expect pissed off comments tomorrow. But honestly, I don't really care at this point. I know that there are women who behave much more modestly than the women I'm currently around, so if my little rant doesn't apply to you, please don't take it as such.

And guys, don't think I'm letting the male gender off to easily. That's just a rant for another day.

New York Daily News: World War III is in progress

As John McClane would say: "Welcome to the party, pal."



New York, 1993


Saudi Arabia, 1996


Kenya, 1998


Tanzania, 1998


New York, 2001


Bali, 2002


Spain, 2004


Beslan, 2004


London, 2005



New York Daily News - News & Views Columnists - Michael Goodwin: It's WWIII, and U.S. is out of ideas

The Judge Came Back

...and there's gonna be trouble. Hey na, hey na, the judge came back!

WASHINGTON — A federal judge on Monday upheld the FBI's unprecedented raid of a congressional office, saying that barring searches of lawmakers' offices would turn Capitol Hill into "a taxpayer-subsidized sanctuary for crime."

Chief U.S. District Judge Thomas F. Hogan rejected requests from lawmakers and Rep. William Jefferson to return material seized by the FBI in a May 20-21 search of Jefferson's office.


At this point, I say search the offices of every damn congresscritter. They're all so damn corrupt that only a complete extermination of all the parasites can turn it around in any kind of quick measure.

Hell, if it works in congress, I say it's guilty by association. I wouldn't trust a congresscritter to wipe it's own as without finding a way to steal tax dollars for some pet project (or in the case of congresscritter Jefferson, a way to turn tax dollars into bribery cash for his own pocket).

Plus, I like the thought of congresscritters looking over their shoulders while they funnel tax dollars into their pockets. Let them know that we're finally tired of this crap.

Sick. Just plain sick.

Who in God's green earth would rape an ELEVEN YEAR OLD GIRL???

Police said Monday that more arrests are likely in a rape case involving an 11-year-old girl who may have been attacked by as many as 10 men.

Two arrests have been made in the Saturday attack, and officials said they have identified eight others as persons of interest. Most or all are students at either Fresno City College or Reedley College, police said.


Now, should I ever become a parent (the wife and I are in discussion about that, and have been for the past two years) and my little girl was raped by as many as 10 men, I can guarantee you one thing - I would do my best to ensure that the people who attacked my girl would never get a chance to go to trial.

Because they'd be six feet under before the trial date.

Kee-RIST! Eleven years old! ELEVEN!

If they're found guilty, I say give them a full castration, and I mean take EVERYTHING off, and then lock them up for the rest of their lives.

Monday, July 10, 2006

Breaking News ! ! ! !

Maxine Waters Joins Ned Lamont ! ! !

Al Qaeda thumbs its nose at the Geneva Conventions ! ! !

LGF has more 9/11 science ! ! !

Hmmm

DANEgerus wonders aloud about Debbie Eph.

I have said it before....

North Korea is China's dog. And if China doesn't want to keep their dog on a short leash, then the countries threatened by that dog will take steps to deal with it themselves.

Japan on Monday was considering a pre-emptive strike against North Korea's missile bases, signaling a firm stance before a possible U.N. Security Council vote on sanctions against the communist-led country.


When Japan is looking into the possibilities of a pre-emptive strike, you know that people are sick of Kimmy Dimmy Ding Dong's bullshit. China needs to understand that we, meaning the USA and our allies, are not amused.

I still say that we tell the ChiComs this: Any more missile tests, and we will arm any and all of our allies within that missile's range with nuclear weapons.

Watch how fast China pulls their dog in.

Why is this news?

I don't know what movie it's from, (hell, it's been used in dozens of movies) but there's a line, normally spoken with a massive New York accent, that goes:

"Hey, you mess wit da bull, sometimes you get da horns, yaknow?"

Or let me put it this way: If you choose to sprint in front of a one-ton animal that can run at high speeds, possesses rather large, sharp horns and a really bad attitude, then at some point someone is going to have a few large holes appear in random order in their body.

And yet it makes the news year after year. "BULL GORES RUNNER!" "DOG BITES MAN!" "THE SKY IS BLUE!" "WATER IS WET!" "ALGORE IS AN ANIMATRONIC ROBOT!"

We already know these things. Is it just a slow news day?

I don't feel sorry for Deb at all

I've been watching Protein Wisdom when I can, and Deb Frisch has shown to me what happens when a human being discards every scrap of morals they can and dives to the bottom of the sewers of their mind.

If Frisch has suffered because of what came about, it is self-inflicted suffering.

In the meantime, Shamil Basayev, who masterminded the Beslan massacre in Russia, has kicked the bucket.

I truly hope he's burning in hell right now. I know that God's forgiveness can make anything possible, but how you can forgive the wholesale slaughter of children is beyond me.

Trust me, the world wouldn't like it if I were the Holiest of Holies, I can tell ya that much.

The thing about Deb Frisch is...

...that she has an extended history of being a malevolent numbskull.

UPDATE:



So it's BDS, then, Sullivanesque BDS. Sheesh.

That sucks.

Now I feel sorry for her.