axiomATTIC

MILOSEVIC DEAD

2006-03-11T10:48:00.000-05:00

Would you guys please hurry up with the Saddam trial? If you don't the world will be deprived of witnessing him hang!

ETHANOL AND OPEC

2006-03-05T16:46:00.000-05:00

I have displayed often my open enthusiasm for the possibility that bio-fuel technology will eventually replace our country's dependency on imported crude. If you will look in the archives of this blog for the month of February, there are six posts on the topic.

Actually, I believe only one thing could stand in the way of this happening: THE RETURN OF PERSISTENTLY CHEAP OIL. Altogether not a bad predicament to be in, huh?

To itemize my reasons why ethanol combined soon with methanol have the potential to eliminate our use of petroleum:

1-The technology to produce the vehicles which run on bio-fuels is already there, and drivers will not have to sacrifice power OR vehicle size. It also costs no more to buy a new vehicle so equipped.

2- Ethanol is much more environmentally friendly than gasoline. It is bio-degradable and water-soluble, and most of us have IMBIBED quite a bit of it. It's combustion emits far less greenhouse gases than that of gasoline. Environmentalists who never saw an energy they couldn't oppose will have a difficult time attacking this one. Anything they use to attack ethanol will have to simultaneously be used to attack every winery and brewery in the country.

3-The delivery infrastructure is already there. Admittedly, at this time ethanol cannot be shipped via pipeline, it would have to be trucked, shipped, or sent by rail, but it can be stored at current petroleum distribution centers, and can be dispensed from existing retailer assets by simply cleaning out the tanks.

4-At $60 per barrel of crude, ethanol is price competitive, even considering the MPG deficit of approximately 15%.

5-It feels GOOD. A Chevrolet Tahoe with the 5.3 liter V-8 engine, burning E85 ethanol (85% ethanol-15% regular gas) will go 93 miles on every gallon of GAS it burns, again even taking into account the MPG deficit. In other words, compared to the smallest Toyota or Honda hybrid, (approx 60 MPG) its owner will be helping reduce our dependency on oil by ONE-THIRD MORE. America will be able to DRIVE WHAT IT HAS ALWAYS WANTED instead of having to give up size and power.

6-The demand for ethanol will triple in three years, (there are about 3 million flex-fuel vehicles already out there) without government intervention, because Ford, GM, and Chrysler have flex-fuel vehicles not only available, but available in their most popular vehicles and engines. THE VEHICLES ARE BEING DELIVERED IN QUANTITY AS WE SPEAK. Most of the people buying them don't know they are flex-fuel capable, and don't care, they are buying them for the same reasons they always do. The reason the manufacturers are building them is because each one gains them an exemption from CAFE fuel-economy standards, and thus helps the bottom line.

7-The creation of demand for bio-fuels will spark the profit motive to ignite exponential advances in production processes and alternate feedstocks, something which has been happening in recent times even without much demand. There are 91 plants producing ethanol in this country at this time, with a whopping 31 under construction. There is money to be made.

The arguments against ethanol's viability are two:

1-It takes more energy to produce ethanol than it puts out during combustion.

2-We don't have enough land.

The first one I'll take on by asking the question "Which ENERGY to produce ethanol is NOT already priced into the tank full I purchased in Statesville, North Carolina last Saturday for $2.11 per gallon? Did the farmer DONATE the diesel to plow and harvest the corn? Did the REFINERY (Oops! That's oil, ethanol is FERMENTED), er, ah, did the PRODUCTION FACILITY DONATE the fuel used to generate heat, or simply not charge for the labor involved in producing the ethanol? Did the trucker who trucked it to Statesville not charge anyone to deliver the ethanol? Now, I'm being a bit cute for a reason because this argument has been the favorite of nay-sayers for years, it is only recently that it could be refuted.

Yes, I am aware that there is a 51 cents per gallon federal subsidy for every gallon of ethanol produced. I am also aware that there may be other subsidies to the farm industry which may tend to reduce the price at the pump, but even after adding the 51 cents and an estimate of other government help, ethanol is already COMPETITIVE with gasoline, and as I shall show momentarily, all it has to be is competitive for Americans to choose to buy it. First I ask your indulgence to examine the HIDDEN COSTS of gasoline.

The price of gasoline you see at the pump doesn't BEGIN to express the costs to GET IT TO THE PUMP in order for you to put it in your tank. How much could America LOWER ITS MILITARY BUDGET if Middle Eastern countries didn't have the market cornered? What if we didn't have to protect Middle Eastern sea-lanes against terrorists? How might our foreign policies change if we were conducting diplomacy with countries who COULD NO LONGER TURN OFF THE OIL SPIGOT? What if we could no longer be confronted with this threat?
How much could you add to the price you see for gasoline to account for the BILLIONS in foreign aid we provide to countries who get it only because they threaten to turn off that spigot, or have friends who can? And the most important question....

What if OPEC could be BUSTED by competition from another liquid fuel?

The second contention of the nay-sayers is that there isn't enough land in America to both produce ethanol AND feed ourselves. Doesn't this sound a bit like Paul Samuelson?

What those in this particular negative camp have been hanging their hat on is that ethanol will continue to be made from kernel corn, as it mostly now is. Advances in feedstock technology now enable us to make ethanol from things we can't even ingest, like corn stalks, rice stalks, and switch grass. Biological genetic engineering has just begun to take on the task, on both the feedstock and production/fermentation ends of the equation. No, we have enough land, we have enough smarts, we have enough motivation, and pretty soon we'll have enough DEMAND to set it all into motion.

I believe Americans INSTINCTIVELY know that there is a tremendous HIDDEN COST to gasoline, and when they see an alternative fuel, they will, out of concern for our country and our environment, factor it in when they make a purchase decision. We have proof of this in the fact that consumers have paid $3500 to $6000 more for a tiny hybrid car, with no hope of ever getting their investment back through gas savings. Americans WILL BUY ETHANOL when they are convinced of the stakes involved, and they will be willing to pay more for it.

Which brings us to my opening contention that bio-fuels HAVE THE POTENTIAL to completely eliminate our need for oil, and that the only thing which could stand in its way is THE RETURN OF PERSISTENTLY CHEAP OIL.

I believe that cheap oil WILL RETURN, and soon. It will prevent bio-fuels from dominating the liquid-fuels market for many years. Notice I didn't say that cheap oil would PERSIST, because it won't. Petroleum price VOLATILITY will be with us for some time because of the political considerations not related to the supply and demand of oil.

Ethanol in a few years will help bring down the cost of gasoline, but it won't eliminate its use. Bio-fuels will one day BREAK OPEC, there will be a building for sale in Vienna, but for at least a couple of generations, ethanol and gasoline from crude petroleum will probably be sold side-by-side at America's refueling stations. The flex-fuel vehicle will allow us to choose which liquid fuel we will buy; some can afford to do so and will be patriotic and pay more, and some will not have the ability to do so. When gasoline prices spike up, flex-fuelers will LIVE to go to a social gathering so they can brag about what they paid for E85. Rest assured that when ethanol becomes CHEAPER than gasoline, we will see the price of gasoline go DOWN, and down, and down, until first they sell the building, then the Arabs begin to cut expenses, invest in cost-saving capital improvements, and in general, JOIN THE WORLD OF PEACEFUL NATIONS.

Ethanol, being sold side-by-side with gasoline, made possible by the inevitable proliferation of flex-fuel vehicles, will do all these things. It will put the Middle Eastern and South American oil producers in a prison cell of their own making. It will change not only the economic dynamic of globalization in America's favor, but the political one as well. One does not have to be a genius to see the implications that bio-fuels portend for the SECURITY of our country; our national security situation will change when the day comes that those who supply our crude realize that a rubicon has been crossed, and they have to COMPETE to sell us their oil.

When Americans become informed, they will act on this information, and we can all sit back and watch the inevitable unfold, and it will be a good thing, a VERY good thing.

WHITES ARE ALL RACIST?

2006-03-01T11:10:00.000-05:00

We usually have our garbage picked up by the city, but we had so much to throw away last Saturday the stickchick and I made a run to the city landfill. We loaded the trusty Chevy pick-up and headed out about mid-morning. Saturday is apparently a good day for this type of activity, there were several ahead of us at the entrance. The facility has five huge garbage bins, which on this particular morning already had five trucks backed up to them, in various stages of unloading. We had to wait a little while, so nothing else to do but people watch.

One of the bins was blocked by two trucks, one an older Ford, and the other a newer Chevy. It became apparent after a while that the Ford had failed to start, and the owner of the Chevy was helping out with jumper cables. The Ford was owned by a middle-aged black couple, very appreciatively watching in anticipation as the young white male helped them out. The youngster was dressed in what I would call western attire, except he was wearing a baseball cap bearing the emblem of a Nascar racer. His truck had a gun-rack with no guns, and, you guessed it, a confederate flag emblazoned on the tailgate.

The stickchick and I exchanged a long, silent glance, in agreement that THIS was interesting.

The young man had obviously been raised to be cordial when interacting with others, he smiled at the black couple he was aiding, and audibly indicated it was no problem, he was happy to help. Light small talk was exchanged between the three of them, one could sense the couple was very appreciative. The Ford fired up, the young man removed the jumpers, put them back in his truck, and went back to make sure the couple would get under way without trouble. As they left the black couple thanked him profusely, and went on their way. A spot came open for us at that moment and the young fellow finished unloading his truck as we commenced unloading ours.

What we had witnessed was something I personally have seen quite often; that is, white people being cordial and nice to blacks. The reverse I have also seen, but my point here is that this young man was one of those who, on the surface, at least, is judged by his appearance and his accoutrements, in some circles, to be a bigot of the first degree. What we had just witnessed did not surprise us, we know a lot of people who happen to hunt, happen to revere the confederate flag, and also happen not to harbor racism in their hearts.

We had both watched all that we could stand of Tavis Smiley's Houston hatefest on C-Span the previous evening, complete with rants from Al Sharpton and Harry Belafonte. What we were witnessing on this crisp Saturday morning at the city landfill was refuting the necessity of such a vitriolic tone we had heard the night before. We wondered what this black couple might tell their children about WHO helped them start their truck at the landfill. We wondered how they could buy into the "whites are our problem" theme the black "leadership" persists in selling them. We both would bet quite a bit that episodes such as what we witnessed at the landfill are actually the norm in relations between blacks and whites at this point in time, instead of an exception to the rule.

The black leadership is truly harming blacks. I often wonder how difficult it would be to be a black parent attempting to raise my kid to be responsible and to be a winner, (no excuses for failure), with this racist excuse being handed to him daily by this so-called leadership.

AIDS CURE FOUND?

2006-02-28T15:27:00.000-05:00

This isn't something which simply retards the spread of the AIDS virus, it attacks it, and kills it. Check it out here.

Let me see, AIDS gets cured DURING Bush administration, and WITHOUT government grant!
This could be bad for liberals, but good for an awful lot of people.

Check out Ceragenix stock here.

SOROS BAILS OUT AIR AMERICA

2006-02-27T10:53:00.000-05:00

It seems that the listener-deprived, and therefore financially troubled Air America is going to get a bailout. George Soros, among others, thinks that having a liberal presence in radio is essential, at least for now as we approach the 2006 elections.

I have had XM radio for some years now, and although I abhor the liberal point of view, perhaps in the name of "opposition research", or simply from morbid curiosity, I find myself listening to Air America quite often. Listening to liberals for any length of time was very difficult at first, but soon curiosity won the day. How could they believe the things they believe? Do they really use emotion instead of logic? What are the differences between the way liberal talk radio is done and that of conservatives?

So I listened in an attempt to figure these people out.

After a few months of Janeane Garofalo, Mark Maron, Al Franken and Randi Rhoads, I had come to some conclusions which for me shed some light on the liberal mind, liberal tenets, and the liberal predicament. First, in comparison to the more serious right-wing radio talk shows, liberal talk's principal descriptive component has to be its SARCASM. For this reason, the producers apparently decided early on that HUMOR was going to be a requirement to counterweight not only the pervasive sarcasm but the dark, angry mood which seems to dominate any topic the libs attempt to discuss. It is apparent that no one felt liberal talk could be successful without comedy, which is why all the aforementioned hosts have foils, or sidekicks on the show, whose only apparent contribution is to add a more mirthful tone. The sidekick also aids in taking the listener from serious discussions to attempts at humor, such that one can become quite confused as to whether what is said is really serious or not. I suppose liberal tenets require such a muddle of intent, as emotions are their friends and logic the apparent enemy.

Secondly, over time I began to notice a certain common quality to the tone of voice I would hear on liberal radio, in the extreme epitomized by that of Robert Kennedy Jr, who appears from time to time as a guest. What came to me happened when I had just finished listening to him, and I walked into the house to hear my seven-year-old using a similar tone to plea her case to her mommy.

It occurred to me at that moment.....it's the whine.

The liberal whine is a sarcastic whine, but also one in which one can detect a pervasive lachrymose quality; a tinge of anger, a modicum of spite, but more saliently their voices emit a plaintive plea to be picked up and loved by a symbolic mommy in the audience of listeners. This could be why parents raising young children have more difficulty than most listening to liberals, especially on the radio. Even if one is of the liberal persuasion, listening to someone whining can remind of you of something you abhor in your children, and probably, that which you simply won't tolerate. It being no mystery to anyone why conservatives will not listen to liberal talk radio, this one episode helped clear up for me why many liberals apparently cannot bring themselves to listen either.

Liberal talk radio is a roller-coaster of emotions. Whenever it appears a Republican has stumbled, the event gets built way out of proportion. The glee and derision reach a fever pitch in anticipation that EVERYONE will see it the way they see it. Then the event itself will be found to rest on overwrought or faulty information, the public will yawn, and the liberal mood will become morose and angry. This is a cycle which is repeated on a weekly basis, and can be quite predictable.

Another difference between liberal and conservative talk radio lies in the use of profanity. Conservatives simply refuse to use it. Conservatives have thus learned to communicate without it. Air America has been obviously told not to use profanity, but the hosts aren't prepared to communicate without it, and it is simply hilarious to listen to them when they get angry and can't use profanity. Sometimes they succumb, of course, because it's not illegal on XM, but it is funny to hear them struggle so.

Since liberal tenets are being refuted by events on a daily basis, I suppose liberal talk radio serves the purpose of propping up these tenets through pretzel logic, revisionist history and outright lies. Their listeners need what they have to serve up for ideological survival, but have to put up with a negative and derisive tone which no one can withstand for very long. They have to have it, but it brings them down. This is the predicament liberal talk finds itself in, from the standpoints of both those behind the mike and their listeners. Not a formula for financial success, I would bet, thus the need for infusions of cash will no doubt continue.

THIS BUSHO NOT RELATED TO DUBYA

2006-02-26T12:12:00.000-05:00

Mohacs is a little town on the Danube in southern Hungary. Their citizens provide us annually with an example of how NOT to deal with the problem of Islamic expansionism. The Busho Festival there each year celebrates the end of winter and the temporary ousting of Ottoman Turks from the region. History tells us however, that the Turks came back to seize not only Hungary, but were threatening all of Europe until they were routed at the gates of Vienna by a combination of Austrians and Poles led by Jan Sobieski. From the Busho Festival website:

"The legend about the borne (birth) of the event takes us back to the time of Turkish domination. It is said that the young men of Mohács, being tired of hiding in fear in the swampy islands of the Danube, close to the city, decided to take back their homes occupied by Turkish soldiers. They dressed in scary furs, put on masks and crossed the river on their boats on a stormy night. Scared by the devil looking like monsters and the terrible noise they made with their self-prepared tools, the enemy ran away. And the land was free again."

There is a strange symmetry, is there not, about how the citizens of Mohacs attempted to fight off the invaders, and how the Democratic Party wishes us to battle their progeny today? The Democrats seem to think they can scare them away, and this time the West won't even get a temporary reprieve, because the Islamists learned their lesson once before.

BOMBINGS POINT TO IRAN

2006-02-24T14:29:00.000-05:00

So, first we have the bombing of a Shia mosque in Sammara on Wednesday, then the unsuccessful attempt to car bomb Saudi Arabia's largest oil extraction facility.

Almost everyone is blaming the Samarra mosque destruction on Zarqawi, it seems so obvious....but is it? For me, it is pretty obvious that Zarqawi's optimum time to pull something like this was just prior to each of the last two votes, when the Iraqi insurgency still had some potential. No, the timing of this would tend to point to someone like Iran. The Iranians probably now see that an attack on their nukes by the American military is inevitable, and the hit on the symbolic shia shrine is to send a message that they too can play the preemption game.

The attempt on the oil field in Saudi Arabia also points to Iran because either the planners were utterly delusional to think they could get through three security fences with bomb-laden cars, or.....someone simply wanted to send a message.

The two events point to Iran, not al-Qaida. Iran is facing security council votes soon, and has heard clearly the sabre rattling from the US, Israel, even France and Germany.

The message is "if you attack us, we will kill your little democratic baby in Iraq, AND we will disrupt the world's oil supply.

Merkel's Message to Hamas - Behave or we cancel our support

2006-02-23T13:08:00.000-05:00

Thanks to all of you, people of Germany.

Angela Merkel has laid down the gauntlet to Hamas, recognize Israel or we will cut you off. From der Speigel:

On Sunday, Merkel made clear that unless the Islamists back down from their hard-liner positions, it was "unimaginable" that the Palestinian Authority would continue to be directly funded with EU money. "We'll have to see what the reaction is," she said after meeting interim Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert. "It's important that Hamas understands that we have clear principles."

Wow. George, you don't have to go it alone anymore, Angela's got your back.

All this because the German people sensed that what their media and the Shroeder regime was trying to sell them just didn't smell right.

THE PORT CONTROVERSY

2006-02-23T09:18:00.000-05:00

The Detroit Patriotette, over on Conservababes, has some questions on the UAE ports controversy:

Why are the Democrats so opposed to this deal? These are the same Democrats that want to protect terrorists in our country from being discovered by screaming about "illegal wiretapping", call Gitmo a concentration camp, don't want us "racially profiling" at airports, have consistently taken the side of terrorists...on and on. So why, all of a sudden, are THEY "profiling" by coming out against an Arab company running ports in our country?

To add to the confusion, why is Jimmy Carter in FAVOR of it, siding with Bush? Isn't the hard and fast rule that if Jimmy Carter is in favor of a matter regarding foreign relations - it's wrong?

I think the answers to these questions are simple. Democrats are against the UAE taking over the port administration because GEORGE BUSH IS FOR IT. Let's face it, from tax cuts to security, Bush has bludgeoned them at every turn. The OUTCOMES of his policies are what have made them look bad, what with a roaring economy and NO ATTACK ON OUR SOIL since 9-11. They have to in knee-jerk fashion oppose him, get the media to snipe at him BEFORE outcomes of his policies arrive, because it's the only way they have to cast a pall over his administration.

As to Jimmy Carter, his very constitution won't allow him to oppose "giving" something to any non-American entity. His mindset is appease, appease, appease; his idea of defense has always involved using "good intentions" to shield our country from harm. It would shock me if Jimmy Carter WASN'T for this, he handed over the Panama Canal, what's a few American ports?

The United Arab Emirates and Iran have been fighting over a few islands in the straight for years now, there is no love lost between them. The UAE has every reason to share the US fear of Iran's acquisition of nukes. Let's sit back and relax a little bit, quite possibly the UAE has offered up something that will help us vis-vis Iran?

HOW WILL GREENS ATTACK ETHANOL?

2006-02-23T07:41:00.000-05:00

President Bush is already being criticized by environmentalists for "not going far enough" in measures he proposes, to do away with our dependency on foreign oil. Is there ANY energy the greens have embraced as not harmful to the environment?

It looks to me as if their agenda is anti-energy instead of pro-environment. Coal-too dirty. Wind power-kills birds. Nuclear-too dangerous (and efficient).

What they want of course, is a return to pinching the manufacturers through CAFE (see my take on THAT here). No, what they are really after is the eradication of capitalism through the starving of the economy.

Ethanol? I wonder how they intend to attack ethanol. It is bio-degradable and water soluble, so the transport of ethanol would pose no risk. It can be imbibed, for Pete's sake, so its not toxic to humans. It's production will absorb as much CO2 as its combustion emits, so, greenhouse gas is zero-sum with ethanol. My guess is they will use junk science to tie its vapors to the ozone somehow.

One thing for sure, socialists cloaked in the environmental movement will HAVE to fight ethanol, because it represents the equivalent of FUEL INJECTION to the engine of our economy. It has the potential to eliminate our need for petroleum, enable us to continue to drive our evil SUV's, and make red staters rich. It will be fought tooth and nail. It'll be interesting to see the junk science they come up with.

SMOKING GUN: SADDAM'S OWN WORDS JUSTIFY IRAQ WAR

2006-02-17T14:26:00.000-05:00

An article over at Newsmax.com reveals that ABC apparently fudged their interpretation of what was said on the now infamous tape of Saddam Hussein and others discussing an attack on America. Here's the scoop:

The FBI translator who supplied the 12 hours of Saddam Hussein audiotapes excerpted by ABC's "Nightline" Wednesday night now says the network discarded his translations and went with a less threatening version of the Iraqi dictator's comments.

"What you heard on ABC News was their translation," former U.N. weapons inspector Bill Tierney told ABC Radio's Sean Hannity on Thursday.

"They came up with something different on a key element regarding terrorism in the United States," Tierney insisted.

In the "Nightline" version of the 1996 recording, Saddam predicts that Washington, D.C., would be hit by terrorists. But he adds that Iraq would have nothing to do with the attack.

Here comes the BLOCKBUSTER REVELATION:

Tierney says, however, that what Saddam actually said was much more sinister. "He was discussing his intent to use chemical weapons against the United States and use proxies so it could not be traced back to Iraq," he told Hannity.

This means that Saddam was already aware, prior to 9-11, that he could lash out at the Great Satan, who had humiliated him in 1991, through proxies, and therefore with impunity.

This fact justifies taking the America hating billionaire dictator down, even though there could have been no concrete proof that he would attempt to do us harm through surrogates, just the probability given all the circumstancial evidence we all had.

Thank God for George W. Bush. Had we simply done what we did in Afghanistan, and left Saddam in power, he could have killed millions without us knowing WHO had actually sponsored the attack. The following words attributed to Saddam on the tape indicate to me he had just such a strategy:

In a passage not used by "Nightline," Tierney says Saddam declares: "Terrorism is coming. ... In the future there will be terrorism with weapons of mass destruction. What if we consider this technique, with smuggling?"

How can ANYONE read these words and not find them chilling. How can anyone now say that we'd be SAFER with Saddam still in power?

ABC is bound to know that had they put Tierney's tranlsation on TV Wednesday night, then they would have effectively de-legitimized every argument the left has had against the Iraq war. Thus, the alternative translation has been offered up to preempt and minimize the damage to the leftist anti-war cause, which the networks have been cheerleaders for all along.

Hopefully others will pick up on this very important story and in the end, the truth will win out.

MARTIN LUTHER AND CORETTA KING

2006-02-16T07:17:00.000-05:00

Mary Mostert, yet another Democrat to Republican convert, pens an absolutely fabulous article on black leadership, and victimhood. Read it all!

MEDIA HYPOCRACY

2006-02-15T09:55:00.000-05:00

Remember "The People Vs Larry Flynt"? The movie garnered all sorts of accolades from the main-stream press, and no doubt warmed the hearts of liberals everywhere. For those who don't remember, Flynt had put some pretty nasty cartoons and suggestions in his magazine lampooning Jerry Falwell. Falwell sued, and lost. The movie is the saga of Larry Flynt's heroic defense of free speech.

So, when the target of ridicule is a Christian, free speech is worth defending, and when the target is Islam, then free speech should be "moderated". I know of nothing which illustrates the crux of the matter better than the comparison of the media's reaction to these related events.

BUTANOL?

2006-02-14T15:12:00.000-05:00

Check out this very interesting site. This company has a patent which they are pretty vague about, but anyway, they claim they can bring butanol to the market cheaper than ethanol. Wow. Butanol is a four carbon molecule, as opposed to ethanol's two carbon version, and thus would deliver a bit more energy.

"EEI has developed and patented a process which makes fermentation derived butanol more economically viable and competitive with current petrochemical processes and the production of ethanol. This economic improvement was developed under a federal DOE/STTR grant from the Department of Energy through the Small Business program - (DE-F-G02-00ER86106), in association with Dr. S.T. Yang of the Ohio State University applying Dr. Yang's Fibrous Bed BioReactor patent (FBB) to our process patent. The final report is available in PDF format (Final DOE Report). A tremendous amount of work has been published by Dr. Yang over the past 15 years on the efficacy of the FBB reactor model and can be found at his site.

Butanol is presently manufactured from petroleum. Historically (early 1900s – 1950s) it was manufactured from corn and molasses in a fermentation process that also produced acetone and ethanol and was know as an ABE (acetone, butanol, ethanol) fermentation. However, as demand for butanol increased, production by fermentation declined mainly because the price of petroleum dropped below that of sugar when the USA lost its low-cost supply from Cuba around 1954. EEI has developed and patented a process which makes fermentation derived butanol more economically viable and competitive with current petrochemical processes. "

Hmm....there's more...

" Butanol is also a replacement for gasoline as a fuel, to an even greater degree than ethanol, due to more favorable physical properties, economics, safety and the fact that it works without having to modify the engine of your personal car."

WITHOUT MODIFICATIONS TO YOUR CAR? This would mean that no one has to incentivize the purchase of flex-fuel vehicles, the DEMAND side of the equation would be already achieved. Wow.

" * Higher energy content (110,000 Btu’s per gallon for butanol vs. 84,000 Btu per gallon for ethanol). Gasoline contains about 115,000 Btu’s per gallon.
* Butanol is six times less “evaporative” than ethanol and 13.5 times less evaporative than gasoline, making it safer to use as an oxygenate in Arizona, California and other states, thereby eliminating the need for very special blends during the summer and winter months.
* Butanol can be shipped through existing fuel pipelines where ethanol must be transported via rail, barge or truck
* Butanol can be used as a replacement for gasoline gallon for gallon e.g. 100%, or any other percentage. Ethanol can only be used as an additive to gasoline up to about 85% and then only after significant modifications to the engine. Worldwide 10% ethanol blends predominate. "

Why has there been little or no effort to promote buanol as an alternative fuel? My guess would have to do with government intervention and the fact that whatever breakthrough these guys are alluding to, has made its production a bit cheaper, and thus the betting simply wasn't on Butanol.

"Prior to the success of EEI’s work, production of butanol from corn and other biomass has been stymied by the lack of technology to make it economically viable. The problem has been historically low yields and low concentrations of butanol compared to those of ethanol.

The historical ABE fermentation technology produces a variety of fermentation products. The ABE process uses bacteria to produce Acetone Butanol and Ethanol. This fermentation process yielded a 6:3:1 ratio of Butanol, Acetone and Ethanol.

That is, for each bushel of corn you would garner (1.3) gallons of butanol (0.7) gallons of acetone and (0.13) gallons of ethanol with concentrations of 1-2%.

If you compared ABE yield to that of the yeast ethanol fermentation process, the yeast process yields 2.5 gallons of ethanol from a bushel of corn, with concentrations of 10-15% it becomes very clear why ethanol was chosen as an alternative fuel source over butanol in the 1970's and 80's."

So how does butanol stack up from an economic standpoint?

"This will not be known in detail until we complete testing on the B-100 Mobile Demonstration model and the B-1,000 pilot plant. However, we can share the results of estimates we developed to established the merits of proceeding with these phases of the work.

Our preliminary cost estimates suggest that we can produce butanol from corn for about $1.20 per gallon, not including a credit for the hydrogen produced. This compares with ethanol production costs of about $1.28 per gallon. Taking into account the higher Btu content of butanol, this translates to 105,000 Btu per dollar for butanol and 84,000 Btu per dollar for ethanol with corn at $2.50 per bushel. As a further point of reference, butanol produced from petroleum costs about $1.35 per gallon to manufacture.

The economics of the EEI process will be even more attractive when waste material is used as feedstock instead of corn and the price to produce a gallon is $0.85 . In such cases the need and cost to grow and prepare the corn for fermentation, by far among the major cost items, are eliminated."

Well, we'll just have to keep an eye on butanol, and EEI. If butanol becomes economically viable, then the sheiks had better begin to shake, don't you think?

KERRY STILL THINKS HE'LL GET THE NOMINATION

2006-02-14T10:56:00.000-05:00

Yep, John Kerry's camp thinks they're in the right position to gain the Democratic nomination for President in 2008. Here's a sampling from Newsmax.

Here's the scenario the aide outlined for NewsMax:

Hillary Clinton is the front-runner and she has the money and the organization to capture the nomination.

Other potential candidates, including Joe Biden, Evan Bayh and Mark Warner, don't have the money and will run out of cash before the race is over.

I beg to differ. Remember the pivotal issue which governed the Democratic nomination process in 2004, and it was ELECTABILITY.

Neither Hillary nor Kerry, nor Gore will fit this description. No, the Democratic party wants to WIN. This one is about SURVIVAL, and they will realize that if they want POWER then they will have to suck it up when it comes to the ideology of the candidate they choose.

Mark Warner will be their choice, precisely because ELECTABILITY is what in the end, will win out as the primary criterion.

Warner is not the chameleon that Clinton was, but saying one thing and doing another is the trait he most shares with the last Democrat to get elected president.

I have been a Republican donor for years here in Virginia. Just before the Virginia gubernatorial race which ended up electing Warner began a few years ago, I was approached by local Republican operatives about donating to Warner. These were Republicans who had been contacted well before the campaign began, and had been won over by a Democrat. I found this astounding. I never ended up giving Warner money, but I noticed that these Republicans were later rewarded for their efforts with positions within Warner's administration. This guy knows how to talk to "the middle", ideologically speaking. He campaigned on being "fiscally conservative and pro-business" and once elected, promptly increased state taxes. Just know that Mark Warner got a LOT of Republican votes, and got elected in an extremely red state, as a Democrat. ELECTABILITY IS WHAT MARK WARNER BRINGS TO THE TABLE.

There were some fiscally sane policies implemented by his administration, mostly in the areas of trimming fat within state agencies. His turned out to be a popular administration, proof being that his coattails elected ANOTHER DEMOCRAT to the governor's mansion.

Mark Warner will position himself as a fiscal conservative (it's the economy stupid) to placate the middle, and will adopt liberal social tenets. As to the war, he will use weasel words, non-answers to questions, and the press will let him get away with it. We will not have a clue where Mark Warner stands on the war on terror, until after the election.

I think Mark Warner will be a formidable candidate, especially if Republicans don't choose wisely.

AL GORE BASHES AMERICA...... AGAIN

2006-02-13T15:58:00.000-05:00

Is anybody else as insensed as I am about what Al Gore said to a largely Saudi audience in Jeddah? A sampling:

Former Vice President
Al Gore told a mainly Saudi audience on Sunday that the U.S. government committed "terrible abuses" against Arabs after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, and that most Americans did not support such treatment.

Gore said Arabs had been "indiscriminately rounded up" and held in "unforgivable" conditions.

I'm sorry, my girlfriend is a blonde Austrian, and each time we travel it seems SHE is singled out for frisking, sometimes me, but never the Arab-looking swarthy male in the same line. INDISCRIMINATELY?

Al Gore, I would have you know that we are so afraid of being DISCRIMINATE that we insanely ENDANGER OURSELVES to keep from discriminating. The next time someone from America gets the chance to talk to a "largely Saudi audience" I want them to DEMAND AN APOLOGY, I want to know the answer as to why 14 out of the 17 murderers on 9-11 were "LARGELY SAUDI". I want them to know if they come to my country, their words and their deeds have caused me to fear them, and I will not shoulder the blame for this reality, if they want it changed then they can begin with an apology.

Powerline has a similar take.

Sheesh!

Joemama's Free Press: Thoughts on Green Fuels - the Countries

2006-02-13T15:49:00.000-05:00

Joemama's Free Press: Thoughts on Green Fuels - the Countries

Joemama gets it. A sample:

"The Middle East will probably cease to be a world-wide concern I think. Crazy fundamentalists backed by Iranian and Saudi oil money will go the way of the anarchist bomb thrower or the Communist nationalist. Something that was a concern way back when but not so much in the future. Now every nation (that has enough arable land) would be able to generate their own energy right out of the ground. Corn won't be only used to feed hungry people but to run their cars as well. The source of the worlds energy will go from being controlled by people that hate us to being available to any nation that has a lot of land."

Please read the whole thing. I think my comment on his blog adds some to what he is saying.

LOW TESTOSTERONE-GET IT CHECKED!

2006-02-13T10:08:00.000-05:00

A couple of weeks ago I went to my doctor to get a prescription for Viagra. I am 57 years old, and I had been having some trouble with both having an erection, and sustaining it. I am not ashamed at all to admit this or talk about it, many male friends have told me they use Viagra.

I actually had called one of those phone numbers advertised on radio these days, promoting Viagra without a a doctor visit, and chickened out when it sounded like I was talking to one of those prison phone order banks you read about. Anyway, I ended up going to my physician. The doctor asked me a number of questions, among them, had I been feeling listless and tired, had I gained a little weight at the waistline, and had I perceived some change in my voice, in addition to erectile disfunction. I had to answer in the affirmative to all questions. I took a blood test that day, which revealed extremely low testosterone, and also high cholesterol.

The low testosterone levels did not surprise me, I had been born with an undescended testicle, which caused some blood drainage problems from by scrotum, and this condition had to be corrected with surgery when I was 40. I also have had prostatitis from time to time, since I was in my thirties. What really alarmed me was the cholesterol being high, because that has never been the case, and I had had it checked on numerous occasions.

As it turns out, low testosterone can cause a changed metabolic rate which will lead to increased cholesterol in the blood, the two are related.

According to the doctor, millions of men are out there with low testosterone levels, and it is quite treatable without side effects. I am now using a gel which I rub onto my arms and shoulders each morning which should over the next few weeks begin to make changes in my energy level and metabolic rate. I'll keep you posted.

In case you're interested, the gel is called AndroGel, and is made by UNIMED Pharmaceuticals, Inc., Marietta Georgia.

P.S. I never had, nor do I now have, ANY DESIRE to see Brokeback Mountain.

MICROBES KEY TO MAKING ETHANOL

2006-02-12T16:15:00.000-05:00

It seems that certain one-celled microbes are beginning to show great promise in enabling the production of ethanol to become even more efficient. In Brazil, where a large number of automobiles are running on ethanol made from sugar cane, America has meanwhile been producing ethanol from the slightly lower yielding corn harvest. (Yep, I believe sugar subsidies are one obstacle here). American ethanol primarily comes from the kernel itself, which requires more land than we have to dedicate to the process.

It has long been known that cellulose from corn and rice STALKS can also yield what we want, but the process of turning cellulose into sugar, from which it could then ferment into the ethanol we need, has needed a boost. Cellulose is what makes plants hard, it usually is this quality which makes it inedible, and thus an ideal source for ethanol stock. Well, that breakthrough seems to be in the offing. From the article:

"Researchers are now exploring various ways to exploit microbes, the one-cell creatures that serve as the first link of life's food chain. One company uses the microbe itself to make ethanol. Others are taking the genes that make the waste-to-fuel enzymes and splicing them into common bacteria. What's more, a new breed of "synthetic biologists" are trying to produce the necessary enzymes by creating entirely new life forms through DNA.

Bush's endorsement of the waste-to-energy technology has renewed interest in actually supplanting fossil fuels as a dominant energy source -- a goal long dismissed as pipe dream.

"We have been at this for 25 years and we had hoped to be in commercial production by now," said Jeff Passmore, an executive vice president at ethanol-maker Iogen Inc. "What the president has done is -- perhaps -- put some wind in the sails."Ottawa-based Iogen is already producing ethanol by exploiting the destructive nature of the fungus Trichoderma reesei, which caused the "jungle rot" of tents and uniforms in the Pacific theater during World War II.

Through a genetic modification known as directed evolution, Iogen has souped up fungus microbes so they spew copious amounts of digestive enzymes to break down straw into sugars. From there, a simple fermentation -- which brewers have been doing for centuries -- turns sugar into alcohol. "

This is no longer a chicken or the egg dilemma, the automakers CAN deliver flex-fuel vehicles which will run on ethanol or gasoline, and they can do so now without any availability of ethanol, because the technology is not expensive. In Brazil they simply passed a law mandating that new automobiles had to be flex-fuel equipped. Volkswagen, Ford, GM, and Renault all delivered, and have been selling these vehicles there since 1998. GM is selling some now in the US, as is Ford. The technology consists of a sensor which tells the engine computer the composition of the fuel, and the computer simply changes the spark advance to accomodate the altered explosion whithin the combustion chamber. These vehicles can run on any combination of ethanol or gas mixture, but studies have found the optimum mix is 85% ethanol and 15% gasoline.

We are already seeing that people are buying these vehicles even though they cannot get ethanol in this area just yet. Imagine if the automakers are able to deliver oh, 25% flex-fuel capable within two years, enough demand will be created to cause the ethanol to proliferate. There is already some incentive for the automakers to produce them, through credits toward CAFE, which in recent years hasn't been much of an incentive. My understanding is that talks are under way to provide some government aid for legacy costs in exchange for building more flex-fuel vehicles.

Once they're on the road, I believe you will see very rapid advances made in the ethanol production industry, and America will be on its way to reducing significantly its dependence on foreign petroleum.

JOHN O'NEILL'S WIFE DEAD

2006-02-11T17:38:00.000-05:00

I just saw on Free Republic that John O'Neill's wife Anne, has passed away.

John of course was the force behind and face of the Swift Boat Vets, without whom we would have had John Kerry at the helm on September 11, 2001. I know that John's wife had been getting chemotherapy treatments recently. My heart goes out to a great American.

MUSHARRAF CONFIRMS TERRORISTS WERE THERE

2006-02-11T17:16:00.000-05:00

Pakistani President Musharraf has confirmed that the American predator strike two weeks ago, which targeted second in command Ayman al-Zawahiri, did indeed kill at least five al-Qaida terrorists.

"Pakistan’s President Pervez Musharraf said on Saturday he was almost certain a U.S. airstrike which killed 18 Pakistani villagers near the Afghan border last month also killed five al-Qaida militants."

It gets sweeter. Remember when al-Zawahiri, may he be in pieces, surfaced shortly thereafter to show the world he was still alive, and everyone was remarking how different the video seemed to be, with the black background and all? Here's why.

Pakistani and U.S. intelligence officials believe, however, that Midhat Mursi al-Sayid ‘Umar, an expert in explosives and poisons, was killed in the airstrike.

The U.S. government has posted a $5 million reward for him. The FBI says ‘Umar had run a training camp in Afghanistan and since 1999 had proliferated training manuals containing crude recipes for chemical and biological weapons.

Also among those possibly killed, according to Pakistani officials, was Zawahri’s son-in-law, Abdul Rehman Al-Misri al Maghribi, who was responsible for al Qaida's media department. "

It is pretty apparent to me that the other 13 who were killed are dead because they were aiding and abetting. This was no mistake by the military, these people had to die. This is how we have to fight this war, we have been trying too hard to paint our actions in defensive and altruistic terms, when the most good can come from not shying away from being punitive. They need to know we are angry, and we are serious.

"WISHFUL" JOURNALISM

2006-02-11T16:48:00.000-05:00

Carol Platt Liebeau has a great find over on her blog, a New York Times article touting the "disarray" and "lack of unity" within the Republican camp. She astutely observes....

"But there's something amusingly short-sighted about the NY Times focusing on supposed conservative disunity when the competition is a party that can't reach either substantive consensus on the most important issue of the day -- the war -- or procedural consensus, as was demonstrated during the recent Alito "flopibuster".

This kind of MSM coverage explains a lot about why Democrats awaken so disappointed after every Election Day. They've been relying on stories like this one, believing that the Republicans are midway to meltdown, and that victory is nigh. Because the MSM does such a poor job of understanding, much less convering, mainstream red state America, they've never a clue of what's really going on."

My comment to her.....

I think there are two reasons we see this kind of "wishful thinking" journalism on a consistent basis.

First, liberalism's ideological underpinning consists of beliefs which are constantly assaulted by daily events. Example: "tax cuts will harm the economy". In order to sustain these beliefs, constant "wishful thinking" journalistic reassurances are required, not to mention a great degree of revisionist history once said tenet is completely disproved by events.

Secondly, liberalism's warped world-view has been promoted and sustained by the main-stream media for years. The notion that the media no longer has the power to do so is just one more obstacle the left believes can be overcome by..... journalism's power to persuade.

What we are witnessing is so ugly, and so surreal, because their golden goose is still laying eggs, and it has become obvious to everyone but liberals that all the eggs are stillborn.

LET'S GET ADDICTED TO........ALCOHOL

2006-02-10T07:09:00.000-05:00

American Enterprise has an excellent article by Robert Zubrin on the coming nightmares for Middle Eastern oil barons, ethanol and methanol. You can also see my previous posts on the subject here, here, and here. Zubrin begins:

To liberate ourselves from the threat of foreign economic domination, undercut the financiers of terror, and give ourselves the free hand necessary to deal with Middle Eastern extremists, we must devalue their resources and increase the value of our own. We can do this by taking the world off the petroleum standard and putting it on an alcohol standard.

I am already looking into becoming an ethanol retailer here in Lynchburg, the vehicles are on the street already, not enough to make any money selling ethanol yet, but this thing should escalate rather rapidly, as automakers ramp up production. The flex-fuel option costs only $200 to $400 extra, a far cry from the additional investment to buy a hybrid.

The article in short highlights the feasibility of actually accomplishing not only becoming energy self-sufficient, but America is well-positioned to become an exporter of ethanol and methanol. Ethanol can currently be produced for about $1.50 a gallon, and methanol for about 90 cents per gallon; this makes it competitive with petroleum at a crude price of around $42 per barrel. An entrepreneur in California is already building a plant to make ethanol from discarded rice stalks, one of the many cellulose stocks it can be made from.

Zubrin also makes the point that methanol and ethanol are both water-soluble, and bio-degradable. If the Exxon Valdese had been transporting either one on that fateful day then there would have been comparatively infinitessimal damage to the environment. Trust me, there is a radical faction within the enviro-movement which will find out a way to fight even this effort, because for some, it is not about the environment. But those who truly support valid green concerns will surely embrace this new world we have a chance to enter.

HILLARY'S SURREAL SPEECH

2006-02-09T10:32:00.000-05:00

Hillary Clinton says that Democrats don't speak up enough! They can't even shut up at a funeral for Chrissakes. From the article:

The New York Democrat, facing re-election this year and considered a potential White House candidate in 2008, said Republicans won the past two elections on the issue of national security and "they're doing it to us again."

Actually, Hillary, I think you're doing it to yourselves. Americans WANT terrorist phone calls monitored, and you guys make a public spectacle of attacking the very practice.

Clinton said at a convention of
United Auto Workers that Democrats should not be afraid to question Bush's handling of the war.

Does anybody know a Democrat (other than Joe Lieberman) who has NOT spoken out against the war? Even in conversations about totally unrelated subjects they will weave in a Bush lied, or other some such criticism of the Iraq war. Their yammering is incessant, there is fear, yes, but it has to do with FIGHTING the war, not speaking out against it.

She added, "Since when has it been part of American patriotism to keep our mouths shut?"

WHO, pray tell, on the Democratic side of the aisle has the ability to keep his/her mouth shut? They can't even shut up at the one place even the crudest neanderthal would know to be silent...at a FUNERAL!

THE RELIGION OF WHAT?

2006-02-09T10:11:00.000-05:00

This picture and this story just says it all for me. From Reuters:

A Kashmiri Shia schoolboy flagellates himself with knifes attached to chains during an Ashura procession in the earthquake devastated city of Muzaffarabad in Pakistan-administered Kashmir February 9, 2006. A suspected suicide bombing on minority Shi'ite Muslims in Pakistan killed at least 23 people, wounded dozens and triggered violence on an important holy day that killed at least four more, police said. The attack targeted a procession in the town of Hangu in North West Frontier Province to mark Ashura, the holiest day for Shi'ites. Officials reported several blasts.

KERRY'S RUNNING IN MASSACHUSETTS!

2006-02-08T15:39:00.000-05:00

Kerry Healey that is. She has announced she will run for governor of Massachusetts now that Mitt Romney has said he will not seek a second term. Healey is a Republican, and much better looking than John Kerry. I bet her policies are more pleasing also.

DEMS SHOW LACK OF LOVE FOR CORETTA

2006-02-08T13:04:00.000-05:00

My father died in 1988, I remember the funeral vividly. I remember how appreciative I was of everyone who attended. I was told by many how much they loved him, and it was a very cathartic thing for me and my family.

I have lost four very close friends in the last 18 months, all of them in their fifties. Suffice it to say I have become an expert at funerals. In each case of course, there is ceremony, protocol, and very delicate etiquette to follow. One of the things one learns is to make sure that if you go to a funeral, you go there for the right reasons. The bereaved family must be spoken to directly, and it must be obvious that they are the focus.

I have witnessed many, many friends and acquaintances who have difficulty functioning properly in ANY social gathering; you know the type, loud, self-centered, or psycho types who simply can't help but make everyone else in the room uncomfortable, when given an opportunity. I have witnessed these same disfunctionals go to funerals and not display any of the social inabilities which plague them everywhere else. It has amazed me how EVERYBODY learns to behave at a funeral.

Well, apparently not everybody.

There are rules, you know. Here are just a few:

*If you choose a funeral as an opportunity to promote your business, then you will be showing your lack of respect and love for the deceased.

*If you choose a funeral as an opportunity to call attention to yourself, then you will be showing your lack of respect and love for the deceased.

*If you choose a funeral as an opportunity to attempt to change the world, then you will be showing your lack of respect and love for the deceased.

*If you choose a funeral as an opportunity to recruit for a cause, no matter how noble, then you will be showing your lack of respect and love for the deceased.

*If you choose a funeral to score points against a political rival, then you will be showing your lack of respect and love for the deceased.

*If you choose a funeral to score points against a political rival, AND THIS PARTICULAR POLITICAL RIVAL HAPPENS TO BE IN ATTENDANCE, then you will be showing your lack of respect and love for the deceased, and revealing an unrivaled rudeness to your character.

I didn't know Coretta had so few in her life who loved and respected her. The thunderous applause at each verbal dart thrown at Bush proves this. Coretta was not loved by these people, and it is such a shame that they chose her funeral to reveal this as fact.

It has often been said of the Clintons that they use people, and when they're done with them, discard them with not a twinge of conscience. I now see that the ability to feign love for someone who provides only utility, and then to discard them so heartlessly, must be an acquired trait for liberals. We have now seen this on display in both the Wellstone and Coretta King funeral RALLIES.

I feel so sorry for Coretta Scott King.

GM ANNOUNCES HYBRID SUV'S

2006-02-07T17:19:00.000-05:00

General Motors has announced that it will soon be selling hybrids, in a version of the small Saturn Vue SUV, and also in about a year and a half, the Chevrolet Tahoe.

Although I'm a GM fan, I'm skeptical that this me-too move will do them much good, even from a PR or a fiscal standpoint.

To begin with, SUV's are hated by the left because they are BIG and a constant annoying reminder that capitalism bears handsome fruits. Mark my words they will skewer these new SUV's because their animosity toward them has nothing to do with the environment and everything to do with anti-capitalism. The 20% improvement in miles per gallon will be poo-pooed because it simply won't be enough to satiate the insatiable socialist/green cabal. Consumers still won't be "doing their fair share" for the environment when they buy one of these things.

This year's Tahoe (the 2007 which is out now) will get 21 mpg highway, using displacement on demand technology. It goes from eight to four cylinders seamlessly at light throttle to achieve this monumental number, considering it is a 5700 pound vehicle. For me the exciting news is that this particular Tahoe is an Alternative Fuel Vehicle, meaning it will run on E85, a mixture of 85% ethanol and 15% gasoline.

It is said that E85 will achieve about 70% of the mpg of regular gasoline. By my calculation this means that by filling up with E85, the owner of this AFV can get roughly 14 mpg out of each gallon of fuel (70% of 21 mpg); but each gallon of E85 contains only 15% gasoline, (that which comes from the Middle East that we are addicted to), so its owner will be getting 93 miles per gallon of GAS!(14 divided by .15)

Now THAT's something I'd want to bounce off my do-gooder enviro-conscious neighbor when he inevitably button-holes me about his Toyota hybrid!

The Alternative Fuel Vehicle (or Flex Fuel some call it) is the one which has the potential to REDUCE OUR DEPENDENCE ON FOREIGN OIL much more rapidly than the hybrid, and it has the added benefit of costing about $200 more than its gas-only alternative.

ABU-HAMZA GUILTY!

2006-02-07T14:00:00.000-05:00

From the Las Vegas Sun article:

"A British jury has convicted firebrand Muslim cleric Abu Hamza al-Masri of inciting followers to kill non-Muslims in speeches at his London mosque, which has been linked to Sept. 11 plotter Zacarias Moussaoui and "shoe bomber" Richard Reid.

The jury found the one-eyed, hook-handed cleric guilty on 11 of 15 charges against him, including counts of soliciting murder, stirring racial hatred, possessing a terrorist document and possessing threatening or abusive recordings."

This is good news, very good news indeed, as it has an impact on our enemies' lethal (to us) presumption that we are too weakened by our own multi-cultural sensibilities to fight them through our legal system. I don't know about you, but given the shocking court-room travesties I have witnessed over the years, I would have wagered not a nickel that this fellow would have been convicted, notwithstanding what seemed to be overwhelming evidence that he was guilty. There may have been a British Johnnie Cochrane, and the "Muslim card" may have been played, but this time it didn't work.

CONTRACT WITH AL-QAIDA

2006-02-07T11:28:00.000-05:00

A J Strata has penned the DEMOCRATIC PARTY'S CONTRACT WITH AL-QAIDA. You must read it all.

AP FINDS A GAY COWBOY

2006-02-06T13:55:00.000-05:00

Well, the AP's been searching...and they found one by golly........yep, a GAY COWBOY!

Here's what the AP chooses to tell us about him:

"Jim Gilbert sits atop his quarterhorse, April, as snow falls Saturday, Feb. 4, 2006, in Battlecreek, Mich. Gilbert, 61, who is gay, considers himself a lifelong cowboy as he still competes in rodeos. He feels that the Oscar-nominated film 'Brokeback Mountain' tells the story of homosexual love in a way that will resonate with straight people everywhere. (AP Photo/Scott Erskine)"

And you know, that's all fine and dandy, but it's not gay people who make me uncomfortable, it's this full-court press to put every aspect of gayness, some of which I have no curiosity about at all, front and center at all times, with clear messages that non-gays are by default, LACKING IN UNDERSTANDING, OR EVIL TO THEM.

ENOUGH ALREADY.

HILLARY FINDS USE FOR MILITARY

2006-02-06T08:11:00.000-05:00

A great find from Tammy Bruce. It seems that military survival training includes contingencies to signal to intelligence that one is being COERCED, no doubt to counter our enemy's propensity to use our captives as propaganda. Note the crossed fingers in this pic! This soldier was sending us a signal. Hilarious.

DENMARK'S QUEEN ISSUED WARNING IN 2005

2006-02-05T16:52:00.000-05:00

Copenhagen -– Denmark’s Queen Margrethe II claimed that Islam poses a global threat and urged government to show no tolerance toward the Muslim minority in the north European country, reported the Telegraph on Friday, April 15. (2005).

“We have to show our opposition to Islam and we have to, at times, run the risk of having unflattering labels placed on us because there are some things for which we should display no tolerance,” the queen said in an official biography published on Thursday, April 14.

The queen told her biographer Annelise Bistrup that Islam is posing a major challenge to the whole world which requires taking serious measures to face it.

“We are being challenged by Islam these years - globally as well as locally.

“It is a challenge we have to take seriously. We have let this issue float about for too long because we are tolerant and lazy.”

The Queen, who assumed the throne at the death of her father in 1972, went on to say....

“There is also something frightening about such a totality which is also a part of Islam.”

Dymphna at Gates of Vienna has more.

HILLARY AND WAL-MART

2006-02-05T12:53:00.000-05:00

Hillary Clinton has returned a donation of $5000 given to her campaign by Wal-Mart. The attack on Wal-Mart is clearly an attack on capitalism. Feel-good liberals for years have sensed that Wal-Mart was doing more for poor people than all their government programs combined; and the competition was apparently not welcome.

Is it any surprise then, that America's leading closet socialist joins the fray?

The reason?......"because of serious differences with current company practices." The allegation is that these "practices" somehow harm employees, employees who are perfectly willing to not only enter into contractual employment, but remain with Wal-Mart. These employees no doubt, are mystified. The leftist economic reasoning always excludes the benefits to CONSUMERS; since the BENEFIT doesn't come to them in the form of a government check, it is not a benefit at all.

CATHOLIC PRIEST MURDERED IN TURKEY

2006-02-05T11:26:00.000-05:00

Could this be as a result of the cartoons? From AP/Reuters:

"Turkish police officers stand outside Santa Maria church after an Italian catholic priest was shot dead in the Turkish Black Sea city of Trabzon February 5, 2006. 60-year-old Italian Roman Catholic priest named Andrea Santore was shot dead in his church in the Turkish Black Sea city of Trabzon on Sunday, police said. They gave no more details, but CNN Turk television said police were looking for a young man aged about 17 years old seen fleeing the scene. It was not immediately clear what the gunman's motive was for shooting the priest. Turkey is overwhelmingly Muslim and has only a tiny Christian population." REUTERS

WHY CARTOONS REQUIRE DEATH SENTENCE

2006-02-04T10:19:00.000-05:00

Some of the questions posed by the cartoon fracas:

Why?

Why now?

What does it say about THEM?

What does it say about US?

Will it wake up Europe?

Will it wake up the American left?

Where is this all going?

Here is what we know. In SEPTEMBER a Danish newspaper printed TWELVE cartoons depicting Muhammed, the prophet of Islam. In JANUARY Muslims are insulted, and begin to riot. Three additional cartoons appear, much more inflammatory ones, and are circulated as if they were among the original twelve. In other words, it appears someone on the Muslim side of the divide is trying to incite the Muslim populace.

It is this last bit of information which has caused many to ponder the why now question. Aussiegirl has posited her theory that the guiding hand is that of Iran......

"It all comes together. In some way I can't help but think that this is a coordinated strategy to distract the world's attention from the current crisis with the imminence of a nuclear Iran.

Just now, a man calling the Michael Savage show described a conversation he had yesterday with a relative in Iran. The man said that the reason for all the Muslim rage and the controversy is that Ahmadinejad was very upset that the world reacted so negatively to his statements about the holocaust and also his declarations about a nuclear Iran. According to this relative Ahmadinejad called Al-Jazeera and told them to start publicizing these cartoons as a way of ginning up Muslim rage in order to throw up some flack and cause a distraction."

Could be. I am not sure it matters whether someone is attempting to manipulate the Muslim masses or not, certainly Ahmadinejad is not succeeding in gaining any substantive reprieve from the world's attention now spotlighting his country.

For me the money questions are why are they so angry over CARTOONS, and why are they so angry now, instead of oh, when we SUMMARILY WHIPPED their beloved Taliban, or, when we EXTRACTED SADDAM from that spider hole? Why do the cartoons MAKE THEM SO ANGRY?

Could it be that they finally feel exposed? Isn't it the same anger at oneself after being caught red-handed doing something you never thought you'd be caught at? Isn't it the childish anger of being deprived of some toy another child has? What they see when they look at the cartoons is......themselves. And it makes them angry.

It makes them angry because it reveals to them how free we are, and by comparison, they're not, imprisoned as they are by the stringencies of Islam. It makes them angry because the cartoons reveal to them that WE NOW KNOW WHO THEY ARE, and our willingness to print the cartoons rubs our FREEDOM in THEIR FACES. The printing of the cartoons in a European newspaper signals to them that the days when the dhimmis cowered from them, coddled them, and appeased them....may soon be over. The infidel has obviously awakened from his slumber...and what that portends angers them no end.

The collective cultural frontal lobotomy which Muslims have experienced by virtue of their embrace of all of humanity's dark urges has not diminished their sense of self, it remains staunch, as we can clearly see. Their depravity has however, caused them to lose the ability to accept defeat, or accept responsibility for their own actions. This pathos causes them to see things differently than we do. The Iraq war is a case in point. While the American media has caused us to view the Iraq war outcome as still in doubt, Muslims see Iraq as yet another historical defeat, and it is part of the anger which is surfacing now. Though we have attempted to paint our actions in defensive and altruistic terms, the Muslim world has seen them as PUNITIVE AND RETALIATORY. This is also how they view the cartoons.

Any culture which has lost the ability to self-evaluate will view criticism as not only hatred, but as a stated threat to annihilate them. Thus the death sentence was proposed on Salman Rushdie, and death is what we get for drawing Mohammed with a bomb on his head.

The cartoons say to them "Now we know you"...and since their culture has endowed them with so much self-loathing, they say to themselves "Then you must hate me, and want to kill me".

The cartoons are bringing this collective psychosis to the surface. This can possibly be a very good thing. The left within America and most of Europe has been oblivious to the fact that we have been at war for sometime with a depraved entity. Maybe the absurd reaction to the cartoons will awaken them to the urgency of this threat. One can hope.

MORE ON ETHANOL

2006-02-03T15:50:00.000-05:00

Here's yet another optimistic forcast for ethanol becoming a viable player in the liquid energy markets, this one from Forbes Magazine's current issue.

FLEX-FUEL VEHICLES ARE HERE NOW

2006-02-03T10:15:00.000-05:00

As an update to my previous post.

Please note that the 2007 Chevrolet Tahoe, which is now in dealers' inventories, is an FFV (Flex-fuel vehicle). Its 5.3 litre V-8 will run on E-85 ethanol, a mixture of 85% ethanol and 15% gasoline, as well as gasoline. It's computer will sense the fuel mix being burned, and adjust accordingly. These vehicles are available RIGHT NOW. I understand Ford either has or soon will have some FFV's available.

There are no ethanol stations within a 100 mile radius of Lynchburg, only a few in Washington DC, and a couple in Virgina Beach, but these vehicles will run on gasoline just fine until stations begin to proliferate. My understanding is that the stations will require very little retro-fitting in order for them to pump ethanol.

This is big news folks. The Middle-Eastern oil barons have to be contemplating these developments RIGHT NOW, because this whole thing could happen within a very few years. There is no impediment to the production of E-85, the technology is already there with the auto-manufacturers, heck, I'm looking at a beautiful FFV as I type.

The other entity which had better SHAKE IN ITS SHOES are the Japanese auto manufacturers who have staked billions on hybrid technology the need for which will be completely eliminated by a massive switch to ethanol. The Americans, of course, will have wasted a few bucks on hybrids also, but BIG CARS AND SUV's stand to gain if this all goes where it seems to be heading.

This whole thing has the potential to RESHAPE THE WORLD for the better, and it will have come from good old AMERICAN technology and ingenuity.

You can check out Flex-Fuel Vehicles from GM HERE.

BUSH'S ENERGY POLICY ON TARGET

2006-02-02T14:07:00.000-05:00

Having worked in the automotive industry for 25 years, I was interested as to what President Bush would propose during the State of the Union speech on Tuesday, when he got around to his energy proposals.

After the speech, I was a bit relieved about what he DIDN'T propose (see my blog post here), but I was honestly a bit perturbed that what he did propose smacked of yet another big-government solution. If you'll remember, Bush proposed a government-fostered thrust to bring about the widespread production of ethanol and methanol, and couple this with an incentive to get auto manufacturers to make vehicles which could run on these alcohol-based fuels.

I have been pondering this for a couple of days, and the more I think about it the more I like it. Courtesy of Instapundit, I found this article by an aerospace engineer who has convinced me that we could not only pull this off, but do so with a minimum of disruption to my industry, along with a stupendous increase in our nation's security by virtue of eliminating our addiction to foreign petroleum.

I cannot emphasize enough how important it is to read this article. The answer to an awful lot of the world's problems lies in its assertions. Here's a sample:

To liberate ourselves from the threat of foreign economic domination, undercut the financiers of terror, and give ourselves the free hand necessary to deal with Middle Eastern extremists, we must devalue their resources and increase the value of our own. We can do this by taking the world off the petroleum standard and putting it on an alcohol standard.

This may sound like a huge and impossible task, but with gasoline prices well over $2 per gallon, the means to accomplish it are now at hand. Congress could make an enormous step toward American energy independence within a decade or so if it would simply pass a law stating that all new cars sold in the U.S.A. must be flexible-fuel vehicles capable of burning any combination of gasoline and alcohol. The alcohols so employed could be either methanol or ethanol.

The largest producers of both ethanol and methanol are all in the western hemisphere, with the United States having by far the greatest production potential for both. Ethanol is made from agricultural products. Methanol can also be made from biomass, as well as from natural gas or coal. American coal reserves alone are sufficient to power every car in the country on methanol for more than 500 years.

Ethanol can currently be produced for about $1.50 per gallon, and methanol is selling for $0.90 per gallon. With gasoline having roughly doubled in price recently, and with little likelihood of a substantial price retreat in the future, high alcohol-to-gasoline fuel mixtures are suddenly practical. Cars capable of burning such fuel are no futuristic dream. This year, Detroit will offer some two dozen models of standard cars with a flex-fuel option available for purchase. The engineering difference is in one sensor and a computer chip that controls the fuel-air mixture, and the employment of a corrosion-resistant fuel system. The difference in price from standard units ranges from $100 to $800.

Flexible-fuel vehicles (FFVs) offer consumers little advantage right now, because the high-alcohol fuels which they could employ are not generally available for purchase. This is because there are so few such vehicles that it doesn’t pay gas station owners to dedicate a pump to cater to them. Were FFVs made the standard, however, the fuel they need would quickly be made available everywhere.

If all cars sold in the U.S. had to be flexible-fueled, foreign manufacturers would also mass-produce such units, creating a large market in Europe and Asia as well as the U.S. for methanol and ethanol—much of which would be produced in America. Instead of being the world’s largest fuel importer, the United

States could become the world’s largest fuel exporter. A large portion of the money now going to Arabs and Iranians would instead go to the U.S.A. and Canada, with much of the rest going to Brazil and other tropical agricultural nations. This would reverse our trade deficit, improve conditions in the Third World, and cause a global shift in world economic power in favor of the West.

By promoting agriculture, FFVs also act as global cooling agents. Plants draw CO2 out of the atmosphere. They increase water evaporation, and the water vapor thus produced transports heat from the Earth’s surface to the upper atmosphere, where most of it is released to space.

The use of alcohol also reduces air pollution. In fact, environmental advantages were the motivation for the initial development of the first FFVs in California in the 1980s. During the era of $1.50 per gallon gasoline, gasohol pleased ecological activists, but it was economically disadvantageous. Recently, however, the comparative economics of alcohol fuels and gasoline have changed radically.

Methanol can also be used as the raw material to produce dimethyl ether, a completely clean-burning diesel fuel which could be used by trucks, locomotives, and ships. Many cars could also eventually use diesel. Diesel engines are substantially more efficient than traditional internal combustion engines, and equal to anything realistically possible from far more expensive, and as yet impractical, fuel cells.

THE ECONOMICS AND TECHNOLOGY HAVE ARRIVED—NOW FOR THE POLITICS

Two developments make a rapid transfer to high-alcohol fuels possible. One is the recent rise of gasoline prices, making methanol and ethanol economically attractive. The other is a technological innovation: the development by the Netherlands

Research Institute for Road Vehicles of a sensor capable of continuously measuring the alcohol content in mixed alcohol/gasoline fuel, and using this information to regulate the engine.

With this breakthrough, some 4.1 million vehicles were produced between 1998 and 2004 capable of handling various alcohol/ gasoline combinations. That is already five times the number of gasoline/electric hybrids on the road, and vastly increased use of such vehicles could happen overnight, for just a few hundred dollars extra per vehicle (compared to many thousands more for hybrids).

The only sticking point is the non-availability of high alcohol fuel mixes at the pump. Filling stations don’t want to dedicate space to a fuel mix used only by 1 percent of all cars. And consumers are not interested in buying vehicles for which the preferred fuel mix is unavailable.

This chicken-and-egg problem can be readily resolved by legislation. One major country has already done so. In 2003, Brazilian lawmakers mandated a transition to FFVs, with some tax incentives included to move things along. As a result, the Brazilian divisions of Fiat, Volkswagen, Ford, Renault, and GM all came out with ethanol FFV models in 2004, which took 60 percent of the country’s new vehicle sales that year. By 2007, 80 percent of all new vehicles sold in Brazil are expected to be FFVs, producing significant fuel savings to consumers, a boost to local agriculture, and a massive benefit to the country’s foreign trade balance.

I know for a fact the technology is feasible, and it would be a solution which would not take very long to implement, as the delivery infrastructure for the fuel is already in place. This is exciting. Please read it all.

IRAQ WAR COST COMPARISON

2006-02-02T09:19:00.000-05:00

Gandalf over at Depleted Uranium has an outstanding piece on myths about the Iraq war, and the Middle East. One myth in particular he obliterates with this chart:If Iraqi oil extraction tech ever gets upgraded, and the insurgents are defeated so that the oil can flow freely, then this will prove to be a very, very inexpensive war in financial terms.

Cindy Should Have Been Allowed To Stay

2006-02-02T07:31:00.000-05:00

Cindy Sheehan should have been allowed to not only wear her t-shirt, but display it proudly. People should be free to embarass themselves, free to make stupid, self-serving speech, and free to set their own causes back through their actions.

Here is what the t-shirt said:

2,245 dead. How many more?

This is a cheap, dirty, low-down stab at the War on Terror, and has proven to be inefective. Of course there are dead soldiers, IT'S A WAR. The statement would conjure up another number, of course, and that number is 3000, the approximate number of innocents murdered on 9-11.

In my view it would have been far better if Cindi had been allowed to stay, to once again point out that Democrats freely align themselves with moonbats. The more the cameras panned her bleeding-heart mug, the better it would have been for Republicans. It may even have backfired on war protesters, as it would become obvious how unfair they are to Bush, they can't be civil enough to grant him a reprieve for ONE NIGHT. Let's not forget we won an election largely because Americans saw the image of fat, slovenly Michael Moore sitting on the same stage with John Kerry. Cindy, and by association, THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY would have been seen once again as the rude rubes that they are.

We squandered an opportunity by removing her from the gallery, in my opinion.

2006-02-01T11:17:00.000-05:00

Westhawk has an absolutely marvelous and informative essay which sheds more light on WHY the Russians and Chinese have agreed to help put pressure on the Iranians through the UN security council. (See my post directly below).

WHY IRAN AND RUSSIA FOLDED ON IRAN

2006-01-31T15:16:00.000-05:00

McQ over at Q and O Online Blog has some excellent commentary on Russia and China voting to report Iran to the UN Security Council.

Everybody is hoping that this is the first step toward moving Iran into the realm of peaceful nations, but I have what I believe to be an even more important question: what caused RUSSIA and CHINA to join the west in this issue when they have been decidedly on the side of Iran in past dealings?

Most are attributing this surprising turn of events on some masterful persuasion on the part of Condoleeza Rice, and I have no doubt it may have played a role, but surely SOMETHING ELSE MUST BE ON THEIR MIND.

Does anyone really think that either one gives a hoot whether or not Iran has the bomb? The west's interests would be much more threatened than theirs, and they have both demonstrated their awareness of this fact in the past. Do they feel the need to improve relations with the US? I don't think so, both benefit from the benign tension which has existed since the fall of the Soviet Union and Taiwan's re-merger with China.

No, I think Condi made them aware of the fact that George W. Bush WOULD GO IT ALONE AGAIN IF HE HAD TO. I think that, having seen what the Americans have done in Iraq, they both made the cold political calculation that in the end, Iran would be toppled, the Mullahs would be deposed, and in time Iran would revert to Western ways harking back to the days of the Shah; AND THEY BOTH SEE THAT EVENTUALITY AS WORSE THAN THE ALTERNATIVE of helping the west to disarm them.

The Russians and the Chinese DO NOT SEE THE IRAQ WAR THE SAME AS OUR MEDIA HAS CAUSED US TO SEE IT. The Iraq war will be the gift that keeps on giving, as America moves forward.

Manbags

2006-01-31T14:43:00.000-05:00

Check out this post over at Drinking From Home: Manbags

Show me a man carrying a handbag and I'll show you a metrosexual?...liberal?...Kerry supporter?

Does my refusal to purchase one make me a purseaphobe?...metrosexaphobe?....conservative?

HAMAS' VICTORY-ANOTHER FALSE ALARM FOR THE LEFT

2006-01-31T14:17:00.000-05:00

What does the Hamas victory in the Palestinian election mean?

The left was quick to portray this as somehow a defeat for Bush's war on terrorism in general, and his faith in Middle Eastern democracy in particular. When I ask myself what will happen from here, I see the Hamas victory as changing the Middle Eastern dynamic DECIDEDLY in favor of western interests.

The Palestinian people have spoken. Arafat's ability to capitalize on the ambiguity the convoluted political situation within Palestine presented did not die with him, but with this election.

Any attack on Israel will now become official state policy, there will be no more Palestinian spokespersons trotted out to decry an agression against Israel in English in the AM, only to reappear in the PM to praise its perpetrators in Arabic. All ambiguity is hereby removed. Any act of agression against Israel can now be deemed an act of war, and the response can be characterized as "perpetuating the cycle of violence", no more.

The wall is thus justified, and now a pre-emptive strike on Iran by the Israelis acquires much more of a defensive flavor.

The world watched as Israelis painfully uprooted their own to provide the Palis with Gaza, and the election of Hamas shows how the Palestinians respond to concessions.

For the left, I think this is under the category of "be careful what you wish for."

ANOTHER LEFTIST RAG SHRINKS

2006-01-31T09:40:00.000-05:00

Time Magazine has announced another round of layoffs. 'Anyone surprised? From the NY Post article...

"Some 66 Time Inc. staffers have been handed pink slips at the nation's largest magazine publisher. The final number could jump to 100.

So far, 40 business-side workers and about 26 editorial employees were axed or will be axed within the next day, according to a source.

An additional and substantial number of editorial jobs will also be lost as employees take up voluntary buyouts."

I used to subscribe to both Time and Newsweek, and now I take National Review and the American Spectator, but from what I can tell Time has fought the liberal fight prominently in its pages in recent years. I submit this is the main reason for their demise, but not the only one.

It is not only that the idoeological tide seems to be moving in conservatism's favor, but there is so much there, within all media, for the consumer of leftist viewpoints to choose from. It's pure supply and demand. Talk radio has flourished for conservatives because at one time it was the only place to go for a conservative viewpoint. Fox News flourishes because it is the only provider of same on the small screen. The internet, though dominated by conservatives, has nonetheless provided competition for the leftist media, and in so doing is providing yet another strain on antiquated info delivery systems such as weekly magazines.

The other problem for leftist media is that their primary mission has come to be to prop up a demonstrably failed ideology, instead of just reporting and analyzing news. Events on the ground have begun to refute the very foundation of leftism, rendering the attempt to defend this warped world-view as tedious and boring.

DEMS BACK DOWN FROM FILIBUSTER

2006-01-30T17:07:00.000-05:00

The vote for cloture has just passed the Senate, so Alito will no doubt be confirmed tomorrow.

I suppose some conclusions can be drawn. First, this will be a resounding defeat for the two distinguished (sarcasm/off) senators from Massachusetts. Defeat, however, seems not to be a political detriment for a Democrat these days.

The key moment came when Arlen Specter shut down Kennedy when he tried to take over the committee hearing. It was a very public summary whipping, and Specter may have made up somewhat for former disappointments he has delivered to Republicans.

Alito and his wife will no doubt be seated with Laura tomorrow for the State of the Union address; no wait, it's possible he could be voted on by 11 AM and sworn in in time to be seated with the supremes!

Wouldn't that be nice?

This is a HUGE victory for George W. Bush and will no doubt in the end be a gold star on his legacy notebook.

HOWARD DEAN UNDER FIRE FROM DEMS

2006-01-30T11:12:00.000-05:00

The story is from Drudge. A sampling....

Democratic leaders on Capitol Hill are privately bristling over Howard Dean’s management of the Democratic National Committee and have made those sentiments clear after new fundraising numbers showed he has spent nearly all the committee’s cash and has little left to support their efforts to gain seats this cycle, ROLL CALL reports.

I'm sorry, but the collector is not the only one to blame, said "Democratic leaders" are as much the problem as Dean.

As a matter of fact, I don't care WHO they put in charge of fund raising, the Dems are in deep doo-doo.

First, and probably most importantly, THEY ARE OUT OF POWER. And the Dems need power in order to bestow favors and, as was seen in the Clinton years, SHAKEDOWN COMPANIES. I was absolutely amazed during the Clinton years,especially in his second term, at how much money the Democratic Party received from BUSINESS. After all, from tax policy to regulation, BUSINESS has been the declared enemy of the Democratic party for some time. Why would so may corporations donate to them?

I have come to conclude there were two reasons. First, through actions and words, it became evident to business lobbyists early in Clinton's administration that THIS ADMINISTRATION WAS FOR SALE. Think GLOBAL CROSSING, NETSCAPE, INDONESIAN COAL, and THE GRAND STAIRCASE ESCALANTE PRESERVE. Think HUGHES and CHINA. In the end major corporations were ligning up to curry favor for their industry, or, as in the case of Netscape, to unleash the Clinton justice department on competitors. Which brings us to the second reason. Many business lobbies were paying into Clinton coffers to KEEP THE JUSTICE DEPARTMENT AND THE IRS off their backs.

We have to see now that the Dems are having trouble with donations, that BEING out of power harms their collection effort much more than that which the Republicans experience when they are out of power.

In addition, people like George Soros, Jim Senegal (COSTCO), and Peter Lewis (Progressive Insurance) are leftist ideologs who contributed millions to the liberal cause over the years, but recently, what have these millions gotten them? They failed to elect Gore or Kerry, and they must be questioning the prospects of further investments in Democrats to bear fruit. I think it will be interesting to see if as much money comes from these usual sources in the future.

The third reason the Dems are having trouble with donations has to do with McCain-Feingold. The bedrock of Republican fund-raising in recent years has been the individual donation, and McCain-Feingold DOUBLED the maximun an individual could donate. The part of the law which favored PAC's seemingly at first benefited the Dems but now seems to give an edge to THE PARTY IN POWER.

So, go ahead fellows, conclude that Dean is the problem AT YOUR PERIL. From my standpoint it doesn't matter who they put in the DNC chair, it will be a hot seat for some time to come.

2006-01-30T10:31:00.000-05:00

OK, Ellen Barkin is available now. I wonder if I have a chance?

2006-01-30T10:25:00.000-05:00

Apparently, the powers that be feel that there was indeed a terrorist connection to the bombing outside the Oklahoma football stadium last year. Generation Why has all the info.

IS THAT THE FAT LADY I HEAR???

2006-01-28T18:47:00.000-05:00

The reason the media all of a sudden seems to not want to talk about the Iraq war may lie in these recent developments, as reported by the great folks over at No End But Victory.Allow me to sum it up for you:

1-Sunnis in Al Anbar province (home of Fallujah) who, as recently as last March were fighting against coalition troops, today arrested 270 al-Qaida afiliated foreigners, and have turned them over to Iraqi government authorities.
2-Zarqawi has reportedly stepped aside and appointed an Iraqi head of the al-Qaida in Iraq effort. (And he sleeps wearing a bomb belt).
3-Letter from mayor of Tal-Afar thanks American troops for "liberation" from al-Qaida thugs.(reprinted below)
4-US commanders now say "four of the six Iraqi infantry companies are capable of conducting foot patrols and raids alone, relying on the Marines only for armored transport, medical care for the wounded and covering fire from observation posts." Big, this one, because it enable our boys to come home soon, and leaves al-Qaida with only Muslims and Arabs to kill...and this is checkmate to anti-warriors within US.

This war is over, boys and girls. When the media no longer has dead American soldiers with which to beat us over the head, and IRAQIS are fighting the insurgents, who really have nothing to gain but bad pub in the Arab press by having to kill fellow Muslims and Arabs to attain their goals....I think I hear the Fat Lady beginning to clear her throat.....

Here's the letter from the Mayor of the City of Tal-Afar to General George W. Casey:

“Our city was overrun by heartless terrorists, Zarqawi and his followers, who unloaded their bloodthirsty and voracious action of evil on this city for several months by indiscriminately killing men, women and children. Tall Afar was a human slaughterhouse. Simple services were not possible, causing the people to suffer, till the day you dispatched your troops, who were our lion-hearted saviors. Your troops came to rescue Tall Afar led by our heroes, whom Tall Afar will never forget. After the major operation, your wonderful soldiers started nursing the wounds of this city by rebuilding the damaged lives and buildings with great compassion and speed. These soldiers have done more than their original mission required of them. Thank you from the bottom of our hearts.”

Wow, you won't see that one in tomorrow's New York Times!

NEUTERS

2006-01-28T11:10:00.000-05:00

Gaghdad Bob over at One Cosmos has penned (keyboarded, or typed just doesn't sound right) an absolutely marvelous essay which for me at least, clarifies in clear terms the rift between conservative and liberal ideologies.

For those of you who, like me, have come to despise Julian Phillips on Fox News, and can't quite pinpoint why, this essay will clear it all up for you.

CLINTON AND FEINSTEIN FILIPOSTURING

2006-01-28T08:31:00.000-05:00

Senators Feinstein and Clinton announced yesterday that they would support a filibuster to stymie the floor vote on Judge Alito's nomination to the Supremes. Since it is clear that another 8 or 10 Democrats would have to also flip-flop in order to effect a filibuster, then what we see here is simply the two of them attempting to look tough in front of their extreme lefty constituency.

An actual filibuster would place them in dangerous political territory. The judiciary committee DID NOT succeed in convincing anyone that Alito would vote for a return to slavery, or legalize rape, so the filibuster would definitely be counterproductive for the Democrats.

My bet is that the filibuster will never happen.

Rest assured, a floor vote without a filibuster will be a tremendous defeat for the party, these two are simply trying to limit the damage to their own political futures.

HAMAS NOW HAS THE BURDEN OF GOVERNING

2006-01-27T14:46:00.000-05:00

Everyone and his brother (or sister) has commented on the election in Palestine, so I might as well too.

It should have been no surprise that the people of Palestine would want to eject Fatah. Look at the years of misery its leadership has wrought on its people.

Hamas however, now has something it never had before, and will soon conclude they really didn't want; the BURDEN of governing. Their call to the opposition to form a coalition government is instructive.

Hamas' alignment with Iran changes the dynamic for the whole region, not just that of the Israeli-Palestinian relationship. Hamas' alignment with Iran and the mutual goal of the complete annihilation of Israel removes all the former ambiguity. Any agression against Israel will be seen by the world as state policy, an act of war. The wall thus becomes legitimate, and any Israeli response to agression will be seen by the world as having a more defensive character.

What will be extremely interesting in the coming days will be to watch for Iran to disavow their connection to Hamas. If not, they somewhat justify an Israeli attack on their nuclear facilities. We will soon know for sure whether their belligerent rhetoric was for show or not. I am betting it was, and that they will signal their lack of desire to be pulled into Hamas' confrontation with Israel.

Another thing to watch will be whether or not Netanyahu will be helped by the newly clarified position of Palestine.

The Captain has some thoughts here.

Rightangle writes knowledgably on this topic also.

Aussiegirl has some good stuff too.

ALITO FAMILY, MARY JO KOPECHNE KNEW EACH OTHER

2006-01-27T13:12:00.000-05:00

According to this researcher on Freerepublic, they lived in the same town and went to the same church.

IRAQ, AL-QAIDA LINKED AGAIN

2006-01-27T11:23:00.000-05:00

Captain's Quarters has the story.

BUSH RESTORES EDEN, DEMS SILENT

2006-01-27T09:57:00.000-05:00

The Marsh Arabs lived in an area of southern Iraq, comprising roughly 7500 miles of marshlands, for FIVE THOUSAND YEARS. The area is thought by many to be the original Eden referred to in the bible. In the year 1990, apparently the inhabitants of this huge wetland managed to anger Saddam Hussein. Some say they had made the mistake of taking in a group of Shias who had been expelled from Baghdad by Saddam, others say they had run afoul of a business deal with the French. For whatever reason, Saddam dammed the river which fed the marshlands, and promptly turned the area into a dusty, dry, dead desert.

Some 250,000 lived there at the time of the damming, and this number soon dwindled to around 5000 by the time of the Iraq invasion by coalition forces.

I would like to point out to those who opposed the Iraq war that this area would be a protected wetland in America. It was a natural habitat for all sorts of species of animals which no longer had a home. In America, an attack on a wetland of this magnitude would have elicited calls for the summary execution of the perpetrator, of this there can be no doubt.

Of course, the American-led liberation of Iraq has led to the re-irrigation of the marshlands, and thus its restoration after a decade as a desert. Its people who survived Saddam's purge are beginning to return to begin their lives anew. Jay Nordlinger has an excellent account of this heartwarming story here.

The Environmentalists have consistently displayed that their feelings for animals trump their concern for human beings, and the liberation of Iraq is a potential case in point. Will George Bush get any credit for this wonderful environmental reversal among greens? Will the Democrats and the mainstream media step up and call a spade a spade in this instance? Nope. They will try to keep this story from seeing the light of day.

I'm doing my part, will you do yours?

2006-01-27T09:40:00.000-05:00

Check out a great new conservative blogger here.

MARKET PUTS KABOSH ON KELO

2006-01-26T13:06:00.000-05:00

BB&T, a North Carolina based bank, has announced it will not finance any project on property seized under eminent domain. Can you say KELO KAYO? The moneygraph.....

"The idea that a citizen's property can be taken by the government solely for private use is extremely misguided; in fact, it's just plain wrong," said John Allison, the bank's chairman and chief executive officer.

Once again, CAPITALISM shows the positive force it can be, in this case helping to thwart government overreach.

The bank is making a business decision. It's profits will no doubt increase because of this posture, as it should, and it will shock me if other banks don't follow suit.

CAFE: IT FAILED ONCE, WHY NOT TRY IT AGAIN?

2006-01-26T10:44:00.000-05:00

The following is a letter I sent to the Washington Times, after seeing a front page article by Patrice Hill in which Mr. Hill laments that the energy bill being proposed at that time had no provision to increase the Corporate Average Fuel Economy restrictions on the automobile manufacturers. The suggestion admittedly set me off a bit, so I wrote them an online letter. I subsequently got a call from the Times, someone there wanted to print the letter. I was asked if the letter had been published elsewhere, and I answered that I had posted it on Freerepublic.com. The caller then said the Times would be unable to print it. Fine.

Here it is.

Dear Sirs:

Of all places I could expect to see a “drumbeat” for raising Corporate Average Fuel Economy standards, (Drumbeat Grows Louder For Fuel Efficiency, Patrice Hill, Monday, August 22, 2005.), the last was the front page of the Washington Times. As a matter of fact, it should have been on the op-ed page, as the first paragraph of the article clearly shows:

The recently approved energy legislation excluded the biggest item that would have cut U.S. dependence on foreign oil as well as help lower record-high oil and gasoline prices: higher fuel efficiency standards for cars and sport utility vehicles.

What bothers even more is the fact that some within the Bush Administration probably agree with the thrust of that assertion.

The government solution has for some time been the exclusive, hard-earned property of the left; since when did our side begin to trespass? Not only is it well known within conservative circles that government solutions tend to have unintended consequences, generally working to exacerbate the very problem they profess to address, this particular one has a history to observe, making it even more stupefying that someone on our side of the fence would propose that we pay it another visit.

In 1972 the most fuel-efficient passenger car that General Motors could field was the Chevrolet Nova. One gallon of gas secured for its owner, being generous here, maybe 16 miles per gallon…..HIGHWAY. Ford and Chrysler (This was when Honda was the name of a motorcycle, and Toyota and Datsun were yet to enter the American lexicon) were similarly ill prepared for what was to come, abruptly and unexpectedly, in 1973. CAFE was passed and phased in by 1981. The auto engineers did indeed come through, such that by the early eighties what Detroit turned out was about twice as fuel-efficient. Problem fixed, right? Are we less dependent on foreign oil today than then? Or more?

In his book, APPLIED ECONOMICS, Thomas Sowell tells of a teacher at Harvard who, while young Thomas was still a student there, taught him a valuable lesson. Mr. Sowell had proposed some sort of government measure which he felt would deal properly with the particular problem the teacher had asked the students to attempt to address. Young Thomas put a lot of thought into dealing with the problem and made his proposal. The teacher said, “fine, Mr. Sowell, then what would happen?” So Thomas thought a little bit, and said, “well, such and such would then happen”. Teacher came back, “all right, if what you say would happen is what would then ensue, what would happen…THEN?” This went on until young Sowell realized that his original proposal was rendered inoperative by what we (conservatives, at least) now have come to recognize as UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES.

Did the doubling of fuel economy and the corresponding reduction in the cost of miles driven have zero effect on consumer behavior? Republicans lament that the CBO’s static analysis of tax policy renders a distorted prediction, isn’t this much less complicated? If the cost of something goes down, (I am talking here about the cost per mile driven-not the price of fuel) might consumers and businesses alike find reasons to use more of it? And if making a vehicle more fuel efficient removes some of the elements that consumers desired in their vehicles, is it possible that they will then be willing to sacrifice fuel efficiency to get the other attributes they deem more important? Does anyone see those SUV’s on the road?

I have seen estimates on these pages that indicate that Americans drive 30% more today than prior to the Arab oil embargo. Not only are they driving more, they are doing it increasingly in vehicles which have the attributes they want, and fuel economy simply isn’t one of them. The “company car” was unheard of before that day, and now they are ubiquitous. Suddenly, “getting close to the customer”, meant driving there instead of opening another office. Everyday decisions by travelers began more and more to exclude the option of using mass transportation. If you owned a mass transit company (and as taxpayers, lamentably, you and I both do) then you would be fighting against increasing the Corporate Average Fuel Economy targets, as it will give your competitor (the automobile) more of the same advantage it has punished you with for three decades. How can the same voices that exhort us to do something to increase the use of mass transit, simultaneously clamor for measures that make it impossible for it to compete?

CAFE didn’t create urban sprawl, but it accelerated it at hyper-speed. How else could people afford to drive from Warrenton, Va. to DC, to work? They moved there, BECAUSE THEY COULD.

We use more gasoline today than ever before. We tried forcing Detroit’s engineers to solve this problem for us, and they can’t do it because their purview does not encompass consumer behavior.

In which alternative universe would the hoped-for conservation of a commodity be made more likely by making its use less expensive?

Increased CAFE would only serve to enable some consumers to move further from work, choose to drive more for leisure, and use their vehicles for more tasks. For others, it will cause them to be willing to put up with less fuel-efficient vehicles in order to get more of what they want in a vehicle. Corporations will have yet another reason to add company cars, and forego opening regional offices. Who will ride the train? Who will ride the bus anymore?

I am not a liberal, so I will offer a solution: a conservative solution, which has to date no history of exacerbating the problem. I propose that we leave the market alone. There is nothing that will foster conservation, reduce driving, cause business to rethink the company car versus the regional office, and have the desired impact on consumer vehicle choice, quite like $2. 75 a gallon, Let’s give it more time before we repeat an old mistake, and an anti-conservative one at that.

2006-01-26T10:15:00.000-05:00

The second in command of Saddam's Airforce says that the Iraqi WMD now reside in Syria, and he knows when and how they got there. It's all in this article at the New York Sun.

2006-01-26T10:12:00.000-05:00

It seems that the German media has given the US military no quarter when reporting on Abu Ghraib, how will they explain this?

2006-01-26T10:01:00.000-05:00

Joemama points out that there's now at least ONE Democrat who sees that appeasing Iran might not be very prudent.

ASTHMATICS: NEWEST VICTIMS OF RADICAL ENVIRONMENTALISM

2006-01-26T09:35:00.000-05:00

Check out this great find by Aussiegirl over at Ultima Thule. It seems that the greens are about to succeed in banning Primatene Mist, an inhaler used by asthmatics to open their breathing passages. Aussie girl says....

This smells of big pharma pressure to ensure that only expensive prescription drugs will be available. To ban a life-saving and inexpensive medicine because of some theoretical and unproven risk to the ozone layer is absurd.

I agree. The environmental movement began as a well-intentioned effort to clean up our waterways and get the smog out of the air. They have since been taken over by anti-capitalists who saw the environmental movement as a useful cloak for their true agenda, to battle capitalism by crippling businesses. Now we see that other interests may be viewing the greens as a useful tool. Read her whole post, it's eye opening.

THE RETURN OF AL GORE

2006-01-25T15:12:00.000-05:00

If I were a Democrat...wait, let me rephrase that...if I were a Democrat not of the Marxist, spittle-spewing, hate-America strain, then I would NOT find great comfort in the spectre of Al Gore's return to the limelight, let alone to the front of my party's candidate list for President, as this article in the New York Sun suggests.

Hmmm....that said, I guess he's a shoe-in.

An excerpt:

Mr. Gore—no longer Bill Clinton’s straight man, no longer the wooden, cautious candidate of 2000—has been raising his profile through a series of impassioned speeches against the Bush administration. They began in September 2002, when he warned against the invasion of Iraq, which he said “has the potential to seriously damage our ability to win the war against terrorism and to weaken our ability to lead the world.”

The Democratic Party is composed of many disparate groups. They cannot all be lumped into the "victimhood" camp, and its supplicants; nor will they all fit under the anti-capitalist tent, as radical environmentalists certainly do. And though not all feminists are true Marxist disciples, they find common cause with both ethnic minorities and enviros in that all three need big government to give them the legal sanctions they require. I mention this because these are the groupings which comprise the bedrock of the Democratic Party's far-left, and for them, it must have been a rocky five or six years since Bush outlawed free speech and began sending gays to the gallows......sorry, I mean....since Bush got elected.

This Gore fellow just fits them perfectly, both emotionally and ideologically,and what with Hillary now pandering to the.....sane.....well; "Al, you just come on over here, pal, we should never have let you go".

Look fellas, Gore lost because he displayed a.....well......I'm not sure what to call it....his UNHINGED side, if you will. The guy came across as a bit volatile, snippy, downright DISTURBED in the debates; most of us saw several different Al Gores, none of them possessed of apparent mental stability.

Could any phenomenon more clearly illustrate the sheer vacuity, desperation, and, more importantly, OPERATIONAL BANKRUPTCY the Democratic Party now manifests, than the one embodied in the fact of Al Gore's return to prominence within the party?

Al-Qaida Is Losing

2006-01-24T15:57:00.000-05:00

Christopher Hitchens makes a good case that al-Qaida is indeed losing, based on a clear call for a truce contained within Osama's last recorded missive. The moneygraph.....

All one needs, in order to earn Bin Laden's mercy, is to give up Afghanistan and Iraq. But this raises a more intriguing question. Why are formerly triumphalist jihadists using the language of "truce" at all? Not very long ago, God was claimed to be on their side and victory certain.

Because the Great Satan's boys bleed, but they don't run away anymore, that's why.

Read it all.

CABO PICS

2006-01-24T14:55:00.000-05:00

The wharf at Cabo San Lucas. It was actually a bit cold there. We had to buy sweatshirts and jackets, as the mornings and evenings were a bit nippy, during the day, however, the weather was perfect.

The stickchick and I played a lot of tennis while there, and also went horseback riding on the beach. The beaches are some of the most beautiful, and clean, I have seen in the world.

So, it's back to reality now......sigh.

Check out Aussiegirl over at Ultima Thule, she has some very good posts, one in particular connecting to a Ralph Peters article very worth reading.

2006-01-24T10:02:00.000-05:00

Well, we're back from Cabo San Lucas. On the right is a photo of the "Duo Los Panchos", who serenaded us while we had lunch at Margaritavilla in Cabo San Lucas on Saturday. At the left here you see a view of the wharf from out table. We had gone to Cabo with a group of 48 out of Lynchburg, all advertisers being treated by the local ABC affiliate to a week of fun in the sun.

We stayed at the Presidente Intercontinental, an all-inclusive resort near Cabo San Jose, a smaller village south of Cabo San Lucas.

I'm trying to get reoriented, I spent a week with no internet, no TV, no current news of any kind. We just relaxed, played a lot of tennis, and read books.

I'll blog some later today. It looks like the Canadian election is a big win for conservatism. Some seem to be saying this bodes well for us here in the US in 2006, I'm not so sure.

TWO AMERICAS

2006-01-16T15:50:00.000-05:00

I visit Free Republic often. It is a great place to get news, and it is also where the collective right wing opinion can be sought out, and evaluated.

Lately we've had a lot of good economic news posted there, followed by comments from Freepers which relay deserved kudos for the Bush administration, and comments which also indicate the certainty that the good economic news WILL EVENTUALLY translate to the voting booth. There is also a lot of frustration at how the populace at large seems to poo-poo the good economic news.

We are heading for oblivion if we don't acknowledge to ourselves that the game has changed. We are living a lie in persisting in the belief that proper stewardship of the economy will gain us future Republican electoral victories.

The problem we have is not one of communication, education, or reason. The problem is systemic, structural, and growing exponentially.

I am referring to the fact that soon there will be more people employed by, or relying on, the GOVERNMENT for their livelihood, than working in the private sector. These are people for whom PROSPERITY THROUGH GDP GROWTH is something which happens to EVERYBODY BUT THEM.

Government employees, state, local and municipal, are obviously outside the private sphere. Teachers, retirees, and RECIPIENTS of government largesse comprise another exo-economic group, much larger in number than we might imagine. Employees of non-profits dependent upon government grants, and even private firms who contract for government work find themselves outside the reach of general private sphere prosperity.

These people, let's call them EXO-CONS, see the economy as a zero-sum game, and will invariably react to positive economic news much differently than those of us who directly rely on the private sector for our prosperity.

We should not therefore be surprised when terrific economic news is not only ignored, but sneered at, and the polls show that the number of citizens who still feel mired in stagnation has not changed. We should not be astounded that the tired "tax cuts for the rich" mantra still has power, as this is the phrase which sums up the divide between THESE TWO AMERICAS, as opposed to the two Americas we understood John Edwards to be talking about.

As a matter of fact, GDP growth not accompanied by fiscal sanity exacerbates the conservative dilemma. GDP growth spawns REVENUE GROWTH which enlarges the size of government inexorably, absent cuts in bureacracy. This means that no Republican administration can be considered a catalyst for enlarging the party, if it grows revenues, but doesn't cut programs and departments. What happens is just the opposite, as Democrats will be created simply by the enlargement of government.

We are definitely headed for a shock in 2008, if not 2006, because we have underestimated this dynamic; how the voter's bread is buttered puts a growing number outside the private sphere, and if we think the way we handle the economy is going to do us any good at the polls, then we are sorely mistaken.

CABO SAN LUCAS

2006-01-16T11:11:00.000-05:00

The Stickchick and I will be headed there tomorrow for a week. I get to travel a lot in my business, so I haven't taken many non-working vacations, but that's precisely what this one will be. I've never been to Cabo, but am looking forward to it.

Blogging will be limited, if at all. We are staying at an all-inclusive resort, I'll bring back pics and a review of the trip for those interested.

WHAT TO DO WITH IRAN, PART 2

2006-01-16T10:37:00.000-05:00

We have all learned at one time or another to be careful what we wish for. Sometimes we get what we want, and disaster ensues. For this to happen, all that has to happen is a slight miscaluclation.

Mahmoud Amahdinejad may have made such a miscalculation when he suggested Iran may have to resort to playing the "oil card". I suppose he is referring to a cut off of the sale of oil to countries who now propose to deal with his insane agression via the UN, or with sanctions.

It is apparent that Capitalism 101 was not taught where the Iranian leader went to school, for in reality, one nation CANNOT cut off a commodity to select purchasers, unless all purchasers co-operate. If Iran were to try to prohibit Iranian oil sold to neutral entities from arriving on US soil, it simply wouldn't be able to do so. The only way to do this would be to refuse to sell ANY oil to ANY country, and this the Mullahs simply don't want to do.

When we look at all the options we have to deal with the Iranian situation, we would have to boil them down to four.

1-Full-scale, Iraq-style attack to accomplish regime change. This one has the main drawback of having to utilize the precious assets now in Iraq and putting our nascent democracy there in jeopardy.

2-Limited attack to eliminate nuke capability only. I like this one the least because it will show we learned nothing from 9-11, or our half-measure involving Saddam Hussein in 1991. This type of action would not limit Iran's ability to promote terror, and has the drawback of legitimizing a retaliation in the eyes of its citizens. This is the choice which will make Iran more dangerous, not less.

3-A world-wide embargo on sales of goods to Iran, through the UN, and enforced by the US Navy and Air Force. The part I don't like here is that it would ALLOW the sale of oil, by Iran, to the rest of the world, and would be self-defeating. We simply cannot embargo everything BUT oil.

4-Clamp down every thing they buy OR sell, including oil. This is the one I would favor at this time. Eliminate their ability to derive billions from the sale of their oil, it would put the Mullahs in a very precarious position. Iran imports virtually everything, purchased, of course, with massive oil revenues. The mullahs buy their political power within their country with these revenues. Iran is a political tinderbox, they cannot and will not be able to remain in power very long without it.

Within weeks their economy, already weak, would be in a shambles. IRAN DOESN'T EVEN REFINE ITS OWN OIL, so their economy would be more weakened than ours.

As to Venezuela joining in, Chavez has the same situation. Venezuela cannot afford to do without oil revenues for very long, especially if the only gain is Iranian nukes.

Though this option would be quite painful to the American and world economy, it would not be the disaster which the Iranian economy would suffer. There is already great unrest in Iran, the embargo would be devastating to the mullahs politically, and it wouldn't take long for them to fold, IMHO.

WHAT TO MAKE OF IRAN

2006-01-15T17:55:00.000-05:00

Ahmadinejad has made yet another speech, characterized over at Michelle Malkin.....

Iran's president on Saturday denounced Western nations threatening to refer his country to the U.N. Security Council for possible sanctions over its nuclear program, saying the international community has no legal basis for restricting Tehran's right to research.

I watched the speech on C-Span, translated to English as he spoke.

Lately, the newly-elected leader of Iran has become ubiquitous. First he caused the world to conjure up the vision of a nuke exploding in Jerusalem. Then, he exposed himself as a holocaust denier with a belief that a godly halo accompanied him to the UN. Now a proposal for a "holocaust summit"?

What's behind all this? Is there a strategy here?

I have postured earlier that I believe there to be a strategy behind the sometimes wild talk, and that is to make the world think he is actually crazy. Playing the Israel card was designed to cower the Pentagon, if not the intended audience in Europe, and buy time to deal with internal political problems.

What I gather from today's speech is that we are now witnessing an attempt by Ahmadinejad to place Iran in the role of international victim; no doubt to galvanize what little allegiance the populace may have for its government through increasing their concern for their own security.

The Iranian people have felt threatened by their own government for some time, and this is just an attempt to replace one threat with another one.

His first speeches then, were designed to cower America and Europe, this one I believe to be directed to his own people, designed to get them to feel a common threat from outside Iran.

All this appears to me to be bluster. Iran has spent 1% that of the US on its military, they could not even have matched that of Saddam's Iraq, pre-war. They have no plans to attack anyone with a nuke they don't yet have, even after they have it, especially Israel. Israel is a small country with 150 to 250 missile mounted nuclear warheads, not all of which could be taken out by a surprise strike by Iran. Israel has several nukes on subs underneath the Mediterranean, and the Mullahs are fully aware of this. The TALK is designed to buy time, in my opinion. Unlike North Korea, the Iranians don't threaten for money, with the recent run-up in oil prices, they have plenty of that. No, what Iran is doing with all this talk and bluster is trying to buy time to shore up their power within their own country, which by all reports is growing more restless by the minute.

PAKIS SAY ZAWAHIRI NOT DEAD

2006-01-14T08:17:00.000-05:00

A Fox News story is pouring cold water on the reports that a CIA predator (or two) may have killed al-Qaida terrorists, among them their number 2, Aiman al Zawahiri.

"Their information was wrong, and our investigations conclude that they acted on a false information,"

These are supposedly senior Pakistani intelligence officials who have concluded categorically that Zawahiri was not in the house when the strike took place. It is interesting to note that Pakistani intelligence WAS NOT NOTIFIED of the strike until after it took place. They are no doubt a bit miffed.

Have the Paki officials already checked the DNA of the 17 bodies reported to have been killed? How do they know he wasn't among them? Obviously the CIA thought it had pretty good intel, how can the Pakistanis KNOW so soon that it was wrong? Do they have knowledge of his whereabouts? They would have to, wouldn't they, in order to be so sure so soon after the bombing.

This whole story is full of conflicting information, we will just have to wait and see.

ULTIMA THULE

2006-01-12T14:29:00.000-05:00

Just spent an hour "blog-hopping". I found an absolutely wonderful blog called Ultima Thule. "Aussiegirl" came to our "wonderful shores" from the Ukraine, via Australia, and has a great deal to offer as to relations with Russia and the Ukraine. I plan to check it out often.

2006-01-10T10:37:00.000-05:00

Jason over at Generation Why NAILS Hillary.

NO MIDDLE GROUND

2006-01-09T09:32:00.000-05:00

It seems that the respected Middle East scholar,Michael Ledeen has a trusted source within Iran who tells him Osama bin-Laden died there in December.

I have stated before that an attack on Iran which limits its goal to eradicating Iranian nuclear capability is a mistake. It would show that not only did we not learn the lessons of 9-11, but we will have ignored our blunder of not taking out the Hussein regime in '91.

Iranians, and many other Middle Eastern regimes, not to mention the "Arab Street", all believe that ALLOWING Israel to have nukes and denying it to others is hypocritical in the extreme. Such a limited strike would serve only to incite more terror on our soil.

The announced Bush doctrine includes those who HARBOR TERRORISTS, and with this revelation from Ledeen, if proven, we have a much better pretext for what MUST be done. Iran's REGIME must be taken out, just like Saddam's. The nuclear capability can be dealt with at the same time, but the mullahs must go.

Please, W, no half-measures. Either wait and talk, or all out war. It's the middle ground which will get us killed.

Al-Qaida, Democrats Try To Spin Defeat In Iraq

2006-01-06T16:14:00.000-05:00

So, now Zawahiri and the Democratic party are completely on message in declaring that the Americans are losing in Iraq. What a dreamworld they all live in.

The US withdrawal from Iraq is more like a basketball game in which the score has become so lop-sided the "starters" are being removed early, with full confidence that the scrubs can win the game.

IT'S GARBAGE TIME!

I wonder if Zarqawi, Zawahiri, or John Murtha can name ONE strategic success the jihad has had in Iraq.

They didn't succeed in causing a Shia-Sunni civil war....

The jihad did not intimidate Iraqis into not voting in an interim government....

The insurgency did not prevent the vote on an Iraqi constitution.....

The vote to elect a parliament went off as planned, and even Sunnis participated....

Why, even the TIMETABLE Bush had laid out was not altered in the least.....

In recent days the jihad in Iraq has succeeded in getting 200,000 JORDANIANS to march against them in Amman. Meanwhile Iraqis, including Sunnis have decided they want them out of their country....

The team and its cheerleaders who are claiming victory obviously haven't LOOKED AT THE SCOREBOARD!

And now, BY VIRTUE OF THE US DRAWDOWN, the Jihad faces the daunting task of HAVING TO KILL FELLOW ARABS AND MUSLIMS....in order to win their hearts and minds!

This game is over folks, and I doubt the Jihad will be able to even field a team just to play in the CONSOLATION GAME to come.

LEFTISM IS PSYCHOSIS

2006-01-05T14:51:00.000-05:00

I mentioned in my profile that I was once a card-carrying member of the socialist, anti-war left. My trek right-ward was not due to any one cathartic moment, no single emotional event, no epiphany; just a drip-drip of realizations over time that eventually brought me into the conservative camp. Unlike Michael Medved, David Horowitz, Whittaker Chambers, Ron Radosh and others, I heard no scream, saw no murder, the left never turned on me at all. I just simply began to see the POSITIVES of capitalism and the WISDOM of tradition, along with the sordid unintended outcomes of some leftist policies I had once advocated.

But I was there, in the belly of the beast, and the following represents my assessment of what it means to be on the inside, now that I'm far enough away from it emotionally to be able to speak about it objectively........

The pre-conditions for the embrace of leftist ideology are innate. A seemingly benign sense of altruism combines with inexperience and leftist peer-group influence to bring one to the door step, and a powerful need to belong will inevitably cause many to walk through the doorway. Once inside, CAPITALISM must be questioned, examined thoroughly, and found guilty. In order to "be objective" one proceeds to the unspoken, but nonetheless factual renunciation of one's American-ness. This is the price of admission, and you indeed become a "citizen of the world". In time, your rejection of ethno-centrism, your embrace of altruism and egalitarianism begin to provide you with a tremendous sense of belonging to a SUPERIOR TRIBE.

Membership delivers tremendous emotional rewards, not unlike a drug, especially when one activates the dopamine trigger by daring to "speak truth to power".

The American version of leftism differentiates from other versions in that not all of what we see from the tribe members is born of the desire for power, but is instead motivated by the even more powerful fear of loss; specifically the fear of being cut off from the tremendous psychological rewards the tribe provides in spades.

Notice how the tribe immediately places heretics in the hated "other group", and how effective this tactic is. Power serves the left mainly in the sense of preservation of the tribe. Note that when they acquire power, they refuse to use it except to defend and promote the viability of the tribe itself, never the ideals of the country in which they reside.

Leftism is psychosis. They never heard the screams of Saddam's victims, yet they can maintain their tenuous hold onto their claim of altruism. Theirs is an existence of collective intoxication, their individuality having been pawned to the tribe; we should therefore not be surprised at irrational behavior....Pelosi, Howard Dean, Murtha?

What the left now sees in George W. Bush, the Republican party, and the Iraq war is the seizing of the hallowed high ground on which they have laid claim, and the end of the tremendous high it provides. Obviously they see their demise is imminent, and they have become almost child-like; conservatism threatens to take away not only their allowance, but their ability to stay together as a family. Thus they will scream and shout at the slightest provocation, every mole-hill will become a mountain. Trust me, they will fight, they see their very existence in the balance.

The World Votes Iraq War Approval

2006-01-04T11:21:00.000-05:00

Tammy Bruce makes a great point in today's post on her blog. It seems that the San Francisco Chronicle has reported that Jacque Chirac finds himself "irrelevant" now in France, and that voters are turning once again to a pro-American pol, Nicolas Sarkozy. Tammy says.....

It is worth noting that the French and German "world leaders" most actively opposed to American foreign policy are now gone or "written off." Those who supported us, Like Prime Minister Howard of Australia, have been re-elected and remain strong.

This is a huge point that Tammy makes here. The leftist mindset apparently so craves validation from Europe and the rest of the world that they will allow the pursuit of this validation to trump the concern for their own security.

The world in general, and Europe in particular is showing us through their votes that they believe America's takedown of Saddam was the right thing to do. We should never fail to point this out to our liberal friends, it has a powerful psychological punch, one which may bring a few of them back to our side of the fight against terrorism, in my humble opinion.

WHAT TO DO WITH IRAN?

2006-01-03T14:13:00.000-05:00

Steve Forbes has penned a very thought provoking piece over at Forbes.com. A quote from the article.....

The prospect of Iran's having a nuclear capability is especially frightening because its new president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, is lethally delusional.

Delusional? Or coldly calculating?

We need to put the recent rants by Ahmadinejad in perspective. He has just threatened a country which posseses, by most estimates, between 150 and 250 nuclear warheads, while Iran will soon have.......one. OK, maybe as many as four within six months. And maybe any one of the four won't be a tenth as potent as the state-of-the-art nukes within Israel; actually not all of the Israeli nukes are IN Israel, some are onboard Israeli subs in the Mediterranean, no doubt PRE-SET with coordinates for TEHERAN; but why quibble with details? Iran could NUKE Israel with only one, right?.......And Palestine, if they're accurate, and quite possibly Cairo or Amman if not.

Let's think for a minute how ludicrous it is, IF ONE PLANS ON FIRING A NUCLEAR WARHEAD AT AN ENEMY, why one would WARN the enemy, giving him TIME to prepare to make the RETALIATION much more lethal. Iran would be obliterated by the obligatory Israeli retaliation, reduced to a smoldering cinder, and rightly so.

So why would the Mullahs allow Ahmadinejad to bluster on? Could it be that they see the concessions and new-found "concerned neighbors" the North Koreans have derived from rattling the nuclear sabre? Could it be that internal Iranian unrest has been deemed approaching the tipping point and the bluster is all about maintaining power?

I believe it's all about the Great Satan perched next door in Iraq, this time obviously unafraid to play the role of constable. The dilemma for Iran has only recently become, HOW TO COWER THE GREAT SATAN, who has now demonstrated clearly a willingness to shed blood to defend itself. The American military is not fearful of anything Iran could do to us in the event of an Iraq-style invasion, and the mullahs know it. The vast majority of Iranians would LOVE to see their oppressive regime toppled, Saddam-style, and would probably pick up arms to help. They are not nearly as fearful of their oppressors as the Iraqis had been under Saddam's boot heel, and the leadership of Iran is aware of this also.

Their only hope, as they obviously see it, is to create an Armageddon scenario by threatening Israel, with which they hope to make the Pentagon hesitate. Ahmadinejad is being used by the Mullahs in classic good-cop bad-cop style. The reason for their staged "election" which brought him to power now comes clearly in to focus. Do you really believe they will allow this guy anywhere near their nuclear launch button?

All this is to buy time with which they hope to shore up their power within Iran. Their crazy talk, then, is not about anti-Semitism or anti-Zionism, but is about political survival within Iran, for the Islamic regime. Iran clearly fears an attack by the US, and is playing the Jew card in order to stave it off.

What to do?

We can wait, or we can attack now.

Let's say that Iran acquires nuclear missile capability, does anyone believe they would fire at someone who has 200 more to fire at them? Having seen what happened to two countries which attacked the US, can we believe the Mullahs would attempt to plant one in an American city? If an attack is appropriate, then why not Pakistan too?

Mutually assured destruction is what prevented the Russians from attacking America for over 35 years, and in the case of Iran and their comparatively minuscule nuclear program, MUTUAL ceases to be the operative adjective. They are not crazy, they are calculating.

I say wait, and do what we can to destabilize the regime through psy-ops and covert ops from Iraq. We simply cannot afford to put the nascent democracy in Iraq in jeopardy at this time. An attack on Iran with the limited goal of taking out un-proven, un-tested nuclear capability may be more dangerous for American interests than the admittedly dangerous alternative of waiting. Their bluster is however, indicative of the fact that THEY BELIEVE they are playing a weak hand, and for me is pivotal in the very difficult decision as to whether to attack now or wait. The Mullahs surely have seen what happened to Saddam and will not risk an overt act of agression, in my opinion.

All that said, there is another factor to consider; if Iran continues to meddle in Iraqi affairs, then there is a threshold whereby we should be willing to unleash the military force necessary to depose the Mullahs. A warning should be issued at this time informing them that Iranian government sanction of aid to the terrorists in Iraq will be considered as an act of war, and the response should be all out, as opposed to an action which has as its goal to only take out nuclear capability.

The Arab street obviously feels that if Israel is allowed to have nukes then Iran should be allowed them also. A mission to merely take out their nuclear facilities would be a tremendous political blunder, whereas I believe an all-out attack in response to what is clearly an act of war would see the region's people with their collective hands in their laps. There really should be no middle ground here. It has been a big blunder in my opinion for Bush to allow the EU to muck things up with their "diplomacy" vis-a-vis Iran. Only those who sent young people to die for Iraq's freedom should be allowed to deal with this particular problem, and it is time to say "butt-out, WE will proceed with the other 30 countries who DID, once again, in our customary "unilateral" fashion. The message to Iran should be "if you don't leave Iraq alone, then you won't have your nukes OR your country".

LET'S TAKE THE NYT TO COURT

2006-01-02T16:44:00.000-05:00

The New York Times has released CLASSIFIED information which will aid enemies in their attempt TO KILL US. There is no denying this fact. They deserve to be frog-walked just for their sheer hypocricy, what with their hysteria over the "outing" of a CIA desk-jockey.

Count me with Dr. Sanity, A. J. Strata, over at THE STRATA-SPHERE, and Athena at THE ANCHORESS, who have all decided that suing the paper is not only the right thing to do, but quite possible to pull off.

As Dr. Sanity pointed out, we've already cancelled our subscription, we have been put in the position of having to fight them for our lives, so what else can we do?

HEY! I GOT YOUR "COWBOY"!

2006-01-02T06:12:00.000-05:00

On New Year's eve the Stickchick and I went over to a friend's house for cocktails prior to a dinner and dance at the local tennis club. The friend's brother was in town from Colorado. A very agreeable chap, the conversation somehow got around to politics. Actually, he started it.

After his question as to who might be running in '08 for the Democrats, and a very cordial, interesting discussion, including my admonition to watch out for Mark Warner, he declared his hatred for Hillary. Just when I was feeling relief that the event was not destined for ruination, he promptly revealed that he had voted for Bush but Bush had been "too much of a cowboy, for me".

Cowboy? Hmmmm......Usually this kind of thing will push my buttons, but considering the venue, the fact that we LOVE his sister and her very conservative husband (Retired General, National Guard), I let it go without retort, but trust me, I WANTED to reply.

Since when did "cowboy" become a pejorative?

The cowboy in Bush is precisely what I like about him. It's what our country truly needed at this time in history. I suppose he is too decisive and judgmental for today's sensibilities.

From my vantage point the act of impugning Bush for being a cowboy stems from a deep psychological desire to be loved and admired by the rest of the world. This would be my friend's brother's way of expressing his shame at the fact that some didn't appreciate our "unilateral" foreign policy. This reveals a pervasive mindset which is oblivious to the threat aligned against our civilization, and a collective psychosis which craves validation from others at the expense of safety.

The "cowboy" diss openly displays an apparent liberal imperative to "put down", and thus corroborates the charge of malignant narcissism. It also indicates the chasm between what conservatives and liberals look for in a leader. When the trump psychological need is to be loved, reality is ignored, and foreign policy becomes farce, in the extreme.

I count my lucky stars we had a cowboy in the White House on that infamous day. Look for the "cowboy" dart to be thrown on a consistent basis in the future, especially at cocktail parties.

Mark Steyn's Warning to the West

2006-01-01T21:16:00.002-05:00

Mark Steyn has once again assessed the state of the world with both intoxicating prose and great insight. A master at using his columns to simultaneously entertain and enlighten, he chooses this one to issue a warning. I believe it to be one of those literary pieces which many will refer to and return to for years to come. A sample:

Most people reading this have strong stomachs, so let me lay it out as baldly as I can: Much of what we loosely call the western world will survive this century, and much of it will effectively disappear within our lifetimes, including many if not most western European countries. There’ll probably still be a geographical area on the map marked as Italy or the Netherlands— probably—just as in Istanbul there’s still a building called St. Sophia’s Cathedral. But it’s not a cathedral; it’s merely a designation for a piece of real estate. Likewise, Italy and the Netherlands will merely be designations for real estate. The challenge for those who reckon western civilization is on balance better than the alternatives is to figure out a way to save at least some parts of the west.

Most of the theme here is that Islam will soon become a major political force in many western countries. He uses demographic data, including birth rates, to predict a pretty dire future for western culture. I thought this observation was profound:

We spend a lot of time at The New Criterion attacking the elites and we’re right to do so. The commanding heights of the culture have behaved disgracefully for the last several decades. But, if it were just a problem with the elites, it wouldn’t be that serious: the mob could rise up and hang ’em from lampposts—a scenario that’s not unlikely in certain Continental countries. But the problem now goes way beyond the ruling establishment. The annexation by government of most of the key responsibilities of life—child-raising, taking care of your elderly parents—has profoundly changed the relationship between the citizen and the state. At some point—I would say socialized health care is a good marker—you cross a line, and it’s very hard then to persuade a citizenry enjoying that much government largesse to cross back. In National Review recently, I took issue with that line Gerald Ford always uses to ingratiate himself with conservative audiences: “A government big enough to give you everything you want is big enough to take away everything you have.” Actually, you run into trouble long before that point: A government big enough to give you everything you want still isn’t big enough to get you to give anything back. That’s what the French and German political classes are discovering.

He is describing of course, the situation in Europe in which the populace has become addicted to state welfare, and cannot find the will to reject it, knowing full well it will result in the state's fiscal demise. What I find to be so profound is his assertion that the adoption of government health care is a critical, pivotal line to cross; the European experience is certainly not one we should wish to emulate, and we are herein provided with a marker.

He then moves to the war on terror.....

That’s what the war’s about: our lack of civilizational confidence. As a famous Arnold Toynbee quote puts it: “Civilizations die from suicide, not murder”—as can be seen throughout much of “the western world” right now. The progressive agenda —lavish social welfare, abortion, secularism, multiculturalism—is collectively the real suicide bomb.

Please click on the title above and read the whole thing.

2005-12-29T15:34:00.000-05:00

PRODUCTIVITY: "THE ECONOMY'S GIFT TO POLITICIANS"

The above quote is from Arnold Kling, quoted in this POWERLINE article by Paul Minrengoff.

Kling reports that " the average productivity growth from 2000-2005 is 50 percent higher than it was from 1995-2000, and about twice as high as during the previous ten years. Indeed, the average productivity growth rate in the last five years is the highest over the past half century."

I have no doubt that computerization, its proliferation throughout our economy, has been the engine behind productivity growth. Our company now has paperless archiving, bar-coding, and cheap, fast, data processing. As few as five years ago, most of what we do now with computers was done by hand or with crude electronic implements.

The internet, of course, has played a huge role in increasing productivity, and it's not a stretch to predict that more advancements are on the way.

2005-12-29T15:27:00.000-05:00

MARCH MADNESS AND THE ECONOMY

Suppose the NCAA basketball tournament were run like our economy. The PLAYING FIELD would have to be "levelled", wouldn't it?

Perhaps the Las Vegas point spread would be allocated to the underdog AT THE END OF THE GAME to determine which team would move forward in the tournament?

2005-12-29T15:22:00.000-05:00

MICHAEL CHRICHTON'S TAKE ON ENVIRONMENTALISM

Complete with charts, facts and reasoning to back up his case. Check it out here.

2005-12-27T14:38:00.000-05:00

THANKSGIVING WITH LIBERAL RELATIVES

This is a post I made to Gordongekko over on FreeRepublic.com, during a discussion about arguing with liberals. Quite frankly, I had never felt comfortable arguing with my liberal brother and sister, and usually did much to avoid getting into politics. Before going home this past Thanksgiving, however, I knew what was coming, so I did a lot of preparation and I think it paid off.

To: Gordongekko909, December 4, 2005.

Great Post, Gordongekko!

My brother and sister are both extremely anti-Iraq war, and in the past have seemed to live to bombard me with their predictions of doom.

This past Thanksgiving, I waited patiently for the onslaught I knew would come. This time I had prepared. The inevitable attack came with the snide opener ..."Well, what do you think of the Iraq war NOOOWWWW"?...Huh?...Huh...?

I replied that I thought the war was already won...by our side.

Mockingly grinning from ear to ear, in unison, they pounced. "Oh really?"

"Yes, the outcome is now inevitable, you have chosen the wrong side to root for. The insurgency has now been reduced to having to send 10 year olds, the retarded, and recently in the Amman bombings we see the use of valued lieutenants sent to die for the cause. This indicates to me their recruiting is headed in the wrong direction."

"Is that all you've got?"

"No. The withdrawal you are calling for will soon happen, and it will leave the insurgency with the now-proven losing tactic of having to kill fellow Muslims and Arabs in order to succeed. Incidentally, can you name one strategic victory the jihad can claim in Iraq?"

They could not name one. I proceeded to itemize the failures of the jihad....failure to seed civil war, failure to stop the election of an interim government, failure to stop the vote on the constitution, failure to derail Bush's timetable for each election, failure to expel the infidel..."they have succeeded however, in achieving ONE of their goals....can either of you tell me what that is?

Silence.

"They have succeeded in HARDENING THE HEARTS of people like you...they have succeeded in getting you to embrace their cause of preventing the liberation of 27 million from unspeakable tyranny."

My Mother noticed the deterioration and somehow managed to change the subject, and they said no more about Iraq that day.

UPDATE: I was home again during Christmas, my sister wasn't there but my brother came up to me and said, "Aren't these people crazy to be attacking Bush for trying to monitor RADIATION for crissakes? That's what I want him to be doing!"

This was very surprising to me coming from someone who had never given Bush any quarter. I have to believe it had come from my more belligerent stance on political discussion. Who knows?

2005-12-27T10:10:00.001-05:00

WHY THE NEW YORK TIMES WON'T GO AWAY

Check out this article over at the New York Post, THE GRAY LADY TOYS WITH TREASON.

Attacking America and what it stands for cannot possibly be a successful business model, can it? They'll go under if they keep this up won't they? Yes.....and no.

It's niche marketing folks, and though their circulation has gone down in recent times, the NYT is in no more financial trouble than any other newspaper of note. The New York Times probably got to where they are BY PAYING ATTENTION. They noticed over time that liberalism sells. They have had some circulation setbacks, but no more than all fishwraps worldwide seem to be suffering, no doubt because the internet has provided another place to go for news.

It is obvious that the NYT has chosen the ideological Left as the NICHE they wish to carve out for themselves...no, to DOMINATE WORLD WIDE. While those of us on the right have been thoroughly mystified as to how anyone could continue to rely on a news source which has proven to be so unreliable, so untruthful, and so unabashedly partisan, the NYT has risen to biblical status within its target audience.

Is there a reason its readers are so loyal?

Maybe......Leftist beliefs are constantly endangered by facts on the ground, events, and exposure of the results of those beliefs. This is why revisionist history, spin, and news manipulation are essential to the psychological well-being of the liberal news consumer.

Liberals then, require constant affirmation for their warped worldview, and the New York Times gives it to them in spades. In other words, the readers, the TARGET MARKET of the NYT are people who will not simply want, but CRAVE what the Times has to sell. The paper's non-ideological content is also world-class, another problem for those of us who wish its demise.

I was once absolutely convinced that the marketplace would eventually force the Times to change, but now realize this was the triumph of hope over reason. They have a very viable business model, unfortunately for America. We've already seen the first sign that the Times' strategy is a winning one, as a major competitor, the Washington Post has had to straddle the ideological line between the New York Times, and their hometown competitor, The Washington Times, leaving the NYT a huge advantage toward remaining dominant within its target market of ideological leftward-leaners. The Post is between the proverbial rock and the hard place.

While the US is becoming more conservative, the rest of the world represents huge potential for growth, for the "paper of record".

There is hardly a place in the world today where you cannot get The New York Times. They have realized their scope is global, and they understand what they are selling; we can hope for their demise, and organize boycotts all we want, but the Gray Bitch is going to be around for a long time.

2005-12-27T09:45:00.000-05:00

TODAY SHOW GETS DAILY SPANKING

Check out Mark Finkelstein's daily review of the today show. Mark consistently exposes the leftist lean of both Matt Lauer and Katie Couric. His column is a blow by blow account of pertinent segments of each show, replete with evidence of the show's constant campaigning for the Democratic party.

Today's column highlights Ann Coulter's visit, and it looks like she fared very well. Lauer has learned (the hard way) to be nice to her, and apparently Katie is avoiding her.

I simply cannot watch it, and it is nice to have a heads up each day on what the left's talking points may be. Check out Mark's site here.

2005-12-26T15:10:00.000-05:00

Up until Gary Rea commented on my blog, and I checked his site out here,
I was unaware of WHY I wasn't drawn to libertarianism. I share many beliefs with libertarians, but I guess my experiences with the ideological left made me just as fearful of heading too far to the right. It could be that I haven't become a libertarian simply because it is not practical at this time, they could only field a candidate which might harm our ability to defeat a Democrat. Perhaps there are different degrees of libertarians, conservatives, and liberals, and the extreme libertarian conciously or unconciously embraces anarchy. Gary sums it up well....

What I couldn’t see, despite detractors’ warnings, was that this viewpoint was not only as much a fantasy as the socialist’s view that the existing order must be swept away to make way for a socialist society, but that, in fact, my vision was exactly the same thing as the socialist’s view, with the exception of what I proposed to replace the old order with.

I have always been fascinated with those who "left" the left, and their stories. David Horowitz' NATIVE SON depicts one such trek. Ron Radosh and Michael Medved have written stories of their own conversion to conservatism from the liberal camp.

Gary Rea apparently came from a place most of us probably never feared going, but we would be smart to heed his warning. Without a doubt, we have to have government, the question of course, is to what degree.

2005-12-23T14:49:00.000-05:00

ANOTHER EX-DEM

Check out David Horowitz' blog, he has a friend named 'Anon' who just had a an EPIPHANY, and it's what caused me to write the post below.

2005-12-23T13:51:00.000-05:00

WHY THE DEMOCRATS HAVE GONE NUTS OVER "EAVESDROPPING"

The price of admission into the liberal camp is the renunciation of one's AMERICAN-NESS. Membership will eventually require the repudiation of capitalism and ultimately arrives at the embrace of America's enemies. A powerful egalitarianism provides liberals their psychological underpinning, and the tribal sense of belonging to a wonderful, revolutionary, and powerful force for good triggers a dopamine rush not unlike that of a drug addict.

I know, I was there.

Liberals have to live a lot of lies. The basic tenets of liberalism are continually assaulted by the outcomes of their policies and by daily events. Thus, revisionist history and the "spin" of news is not just a political tactic, it is a survival mechanism.

Now, if liberals ever owned up to what they REALLY believe, and WHO they REALLY are, then they would lose ALL political power they have worked for all these years, wouldn't they?
They HAVE to exist in a protective cocoon formed of pretzel logic, verbal sleight-of-hand, and cloaked agendas.

For liberals, the wagons are ALWAYS circled, they cannot afford to let their guard down, lest they be exposed for who they really are. This is why debates with liberals so many times end up in emotional attacks from them, as to reason would expose some things they just don't want to be known.

Thus, EAVESDROPPING frightens them beyond our imagination. Someone with the ability to listen in on their private conversations will be reacted to VISCERALLY,and, AS A MATTER OF SURVIVAL must be feared, hated, and ultimately eliminated.

2005-12-23T09:28:00.000-05:00

Don't think there are two Americas? See this article over at THE NEW YORK POST .

The rift is between those who derive their livlihood and HOPE from the government, and those who rely on the private sector.

THE EXO-CON DILEMMA

2005-12-21T11:08:00.000-05:00

These people, let's call them EXO-CONS, see the economy as a zero-sum game, and will invariably react to positive economic news much differently than those of us who directly rely on the private sector for our prosperity.

We should not therefore be surprised when terrific economic news is not only ignored, but sneered at, and the polls show that the number of citizens who still feel mired in stagnation has not changed. We should not be astounded that the tired "tax cuts for the rich" mantra still has power, as this is the phrase which sums up the divide between THESE TWO AMERICAS, as opposed to the two Americas we understood John Edwards to be talking about.

As a matter of fact, GDP growth not accompanied by fiscal sanity exacerbates the conservative dilemma. GDP growth spawns REVENUE GROWTH which enlarges the size of government inexorably, absent cuts in bureacracy. This means that no Republican administration can be considered a catalyst for enlarging the party, if it grows revenues, but doesn't cut programs and departments. What happens is just the opposite, as Democrats will be created simply by the enlargement of government.

We are definitely headed for a shock in 2008, if not 2006, because we have underestimated this dynamic; how the voter's bread is buttered puts a growing number outside the private sphere, and if we think the way we handle the economy is going to do us any good at the polls, then we are sorely mistaken.

2005-12-18T09:45:00.000-05:00

WITHDRAWAL.....WHY?

Once Americans are no longer dying in Iraq, the fifth-column within will lose its only implement with which to beat Bush over the head.

IRAN is the reason we shouldn't withdraw. I am not saying that we need 153,000 GROUND TROOPS in Iraq, but a ready strike force including principally our air assets should remain, to present a menacing military face to the mullahs in Teheran. The Democrats, of course, don't want us to deal with threats to America, this has become glaringly apparent, and as long as their supplicant media disproportionately reported the death of American soldiers, they had some sway with the American populace.

Bush can take advantage of the coming apathy on Iraq, and do what is necessary to face Iran militarily from our Iraqi position, unless of course, we give it up through withdrawal.

Not only should we stay, but we should ANNOUNCE we're going to stay, and the REASON should be the "belligerent rhetoric emanating from Teheran."

2005-12-17T08:14:00.000-05:00

CAPITULATION BY OUR FIFTH-COLUMN WITHIN: WHAT FORM WILL IT TAKE?

Chris Matthews is quoted over on YargB..... "If he [Bush] gambled on creating a democracy in the Arab Middle East and he does it, he belongs on Mt Rushmore."

The left has chosen the wrong side to root for in the Iraq war. A concession like this one coming from Matthews may be the first crack in the dam. Though journalists have aided and abetted the Democratic party, I don't believe they want to go down with the ship. Journalists are the canary in the coal mine for the left, they will man the lifeboats first. They have to, as ELECTIONS are carried out daily in their quest for a constituency.

The politicos always have time to spin, reposition, and revise their political stances, as time between their elections allows them to do so.

Matthews' words are shocking and revealing, coming from whence they come, and they will alert the anti-war faction within the Democratic party that the day is near when they too will have to eat a little crow.

2005-12-15T16:43:00.000-05:00

WHY HAVE THEY NOT ATTACKED AMERICA AGAIN?

That's an important question to answer.

Does anyone believe that we have somehow eradicated the jihad's ABILITY to strike us again, on our own soil? I don't. We have seen with the bombings in London, Madrid, Bali, Amman, and Iraq that our enemy still has the capability to strike.

Is it possible that something we have done has caused them to lose their will to hit the Great Satan again? If so, what could be more important than to find out what it is that we have done?

As we have said before, wars are fought on both tactical and psychological fields of battle. If it is true that we have stunted the will of our enemy, then we must enter the psychological arena; more specifically, we must enter the mind of our enemy.

What were they thinking when they struck us on September 11, 2001?

It is apparent from this point in time that the attack occurred not from an abundance of hate, but from a profound lack of respect. Let's call it the "Mogadishu model". Beginning with our exit from Beirut during Reagan's tenure, and continuing through all administrations throughout the years, bin-Laden had no reason to suspect that the then recently-elected George W. Bush would be any different than any of his predecessors. The attack was a deliberate attempt to draw us into Afghanistan, where the Mujahideen would defeat us as they had the Russians. We were supposed to go there, bleed, and leave.

Al-Qaida, of course, was the spawn of the Afghani mujahideen, and it is important to understand that the victory over the Russians ended a centuries-long string of humiliating defeats for Islamists. This victory was a seminal emotional and psychological event for the entire Arab world. The truth of the matter is that the mujahideen would never have been able to expel the Russians without the help of millions from the Saudis and the Americans, and some clandestine military and logistics support from the American CIA. (See Charlie Wilson's War by George Crile).

The Arab mind, afflicted by years of failure in all things political, economic, and cultural, and centuries of being pummeled by western armies, HAD to give itself total credit for defeating the Russians. It was not a matter of pride, it had become a psychological imperative that the victory be rationalized as theirs and theirs alone. This type of mental activity renders a collective psychosis which, as we shall discuss momentarily, has other pitfalls.

Suffice it to say that America was FORTUNATE that she had been attacked on that infamous day by those possessed of extreme overconfidence and arrogance. To win a war on the psychological field of battle, it helps if the enemy cannot conceive of his defeat. Humiliation, a necessary pre-condition to capitulation in all wars, is thus made infinitely more achievable.

There's another feature of the Arab mind which though largely cultural, is exacerbated by the same conditions which created the craving for validation displayed in their warped estimation of their own power.

Arabs are the world's foremost exhibitors of the PERSECUTION COMPLEX. And this is a good thing too. Wars which are won quickly and decisively usually have a victor who, during the war, displayed a viciousness, a ferocity, and a singular willingness to both VANQUISH AND PUNISH its enemy. The good news is that, though we have attempted to frame our actions in the war on terror as having an altruistic and defensive character, our enemy has seen our actions as PUNITIVE AND RETALIATORY.

There is abundant evidence to come to this conclusion in the many conspiracy theories flowing through conversation in the Arab Street, from their media, and in missives from bin-Laden and Zawahiri. They see our actions as an attempt to embarrass them. They see the willingness of our soldiers to stand and die in Iraq as an attempt to conquer, instead of an attempt to eradicate the conditions which led to their collective psychosis.

It is ironic that the jihad's most powerful and effective defeats on this very important psychological battlefield have come in inadvertent fashion. Let's get back to the tactical battlefield for a moment, while keeping in mind the pivotal psychological character of the enemy mindset.

First, the American rout of the Taliban in such summary fashion had to be a bitter pill. The jihad would not have attacked us with the intention of drawing us into Afghanistan if they had not expected to defeat us there. Remember, the Russians were NOT deemed to be paper tigers when they invaded, and in the mind of the mujahideen the Russians not only had been dispatched militarily, but also defeated politically. When the Soviet Union collapsed, guess who patted themselves on the back?

We have grossly underestimated the humiliation the Arab world felt at their clear defeat in Afghanistan. Had the war stopped there, I believe the delusional Arab mind would soon have rationalized the defeat, dusted itself off, and continued its agression, to include more attacks on American soil. But to their amazement and their consternation, it didn't end there.

The fact that Saddam Hussein had survived the Gulf War was all the warped Arab mind needed to conclude that he was the clear winner. Saddam's image in the Middle East had been enhanced by his blatant and open belligerence toward the West in general, and the Great Satan in particular. He thus became the symbol of Arab power. I know, this seems difficult for sane minds to grasp, but here again reason yields to the depths of collective psychosis.

Though now we Americans see the defeat of Saddam Hussein as inevitable, there were those even in the West who were astounded at the ease at which his military was dispatched. The Arab world was absolutely dumbfounded. Saddam's extraction, ALIVE, from that spider-hole was the most humiliating moment in an Arab history fraught with many such moments. The vaunted "Arab Street" had traversed emotionally from the euphoria at the vision of the infidel jumping from burning buildings, to the depths of abject despair at the display of Saddam Hussein's capture.

Though our media has managed to make most of us think that what followed in Iraq was somehow indicative of an implacable enemy, what we have witnessed is the enemy being brought to heel in slow, inexorable fashion. The jihad in Iraq can claim not one tactical victory. There was no civil war, the vote to elect an interim government was not stopped, the vote on the constitution was carried out with less violence, and as I sit here on December 15, eleven million purple fingers taunt the jihadis with great glee. The jihad did not even succeed in changing the timetable for these tactical, game-changing events. It's as if George W. Bush took his bat, pointed it to center field, then hit the ball out of the park.

Al-Qaida will soon regret their decision to make Iraq their central front for their war against the West. Quite possibly, they had no choice. Their defeat is symbolized in their mid-war abandonment of the "Mogadishu model" and embrace of the "Vietnam model", with an assist from our fifth-column within the US. Each tactical victory for the US in Iraq, today's vote being paramount, is also a defeat for the anti-war movement within the US, al-Qaida's last hope.

We have not been attacked on our soil because the psychological consequences to the enemy have cowered them. Humiliation has a way of fostering hesitation, disarray, and a stunting of the will to die for a losing cause. The jihad will lower its sights as to what it believes it can accomplish, and will die from indifference and apathy from precisely those it had once hoped to rally to the cause.

2005-12-13T12:48:00.000-05:00

Well, Tookie's dead.

I heard on Fox News that in the end, he was still defiant. It is said that while being prepped for his injection, that he glared at the victims' families. That shouldn't surprise anyone. What is surprising, and interesting, is that he also took time to turn his head to glare directly at the media, who apparently were grouped on the opposite side of the room from the victims' families.

The media of course, had been shilling for his release, touting his moral conversion, and talking about him as if he were Rosa Parks. They had been ON HIS SIDE every step of the way.

So in the end, those consumed with hatred will turn on both friend and foe.

My mind uncontrollably made a parallel between Tookie's last gasp and the jihad in Iraq.

They are definitely filled with hatred, and are acting out their hatred through murder. They are actually a bit more consumed than Tookie, as many of them apparently hate themselves enough to commit suicide in order to kill others.

Many have correctly observed that, in our war against terror, there will be no formal surrender, no white flag, no signing ceremony. All wars are fought on both tactical and psychological battlefields. I believe that our war on terror can be won, and the victory will come through what consequences occur within the minds of our enemies. Capitulation on the part of our enemy will not come with an abrupt cease-fire. It will be recognized for what it was only in hindsight.

This war is different from other wars in that the signals of defeat may not follow the usual sequence. For me, the first sign that we were winning on the psychological front came with the recent indications that the jihad has apparently been forced to use 10 year olds, the retarded, and more recently, VALUED LIEUTENANTS as martyrs. Doesn't this mean that the usual volunteers have decided they are not willing to die for a losing cause? I have also heard that there was some evidence that some of the car bombers had been detonated remotely, at least one had been chained to the steering wheel.

Just as Tookie in the end glared at his comrades in the media, our best indication that our enemy's defeat is near will be when they begin to lash out at their no-longer needed allies. We may have already seen this in the Amman, Jordan bombings.

Although it gives me great pleasure to attribute the French riots to their welfare-state economic policies, the phenomenon seemed to be limited to Islamists. Islamists are unhappy everywhere they reside, why France? There is no Islamist who isn't following the Iraq war intensely. It is the central front of their war on the West. To think that they don't feel a bit of frustration about what is going on there ignores a very important psychological dynamic. France had been Saddam's enabler and had fought tooth and nail to keep the US from going into Iraq. Had not France been the jihad's best friend in the West? So why France and why now?

Quite possibly it is born of the frustration of having to witness sure defeat in Iraq, and since Iraq is apparently now deemed to be lost, the lashing out at former allies has begun.