January 31, 2004

Muslim Faithful Hear Wrathful Prayer

The cleric who delivered the sermon Friday at the annual hajj pilgrimage had a simple request:God Allah [This had to be corrected.--Jen] grant victory to Muslims fighting around the world.

The prayer by Sheik Saleh al-Taleb to 500,000 people in Mecca's Grand Mosque and nearby streets came as the hajj neared its climax.

"Oh God Allah, give victory to the mujahedeen [holy warriors] everywhere,'' al-Taleb said. "Give them victory in Palestine. Oh God, make the Muslims triumphant and destroy their enemies, and make this country and other Muslim countries safe.

"Oh God Allah, inflict your wrath on the criminal Zionists.''
[I think that means denizens of the Great Satan, like us, Jews and Israelis and sometimes even Shi'ite Muslims.--J.T.]
[...]
Rajab al-Arabi, a Belgian pilgrim of Tunisian origin, said that hearing a Grand Mosque sermon is "something one wishes all one's life. It's a dream come true.''

But he added that he had expected a stronger message.

"In Belgium, we have Egyptian and Moroccan clerics who freely criticize the hardships of Muslims, which includes the injustice that has befallen Iraq and the occupation it is under,'' he said.

Wonderful news. Thud.
This shocks me and then again, it doesn't.
I'm sure that the Mecca clerics pray similar prayers to this one every year.
(BTW, anyone out there know the difference between a fervent jihadi prayer delivered by the cleric at the Grand Mosque and a fatwa? Or is there a difference?)
What's interesting is that the Wahhab jihadis have brought the jihad home to Saudi Arabia, in addition to exporting it every place else on the planet, except for Antarctica, Iceland and Lappland.

January 30, 2004

What's Happening To Rush Should Worry Us All: From The Tampa Tribune

[...]
That they would so willingly release sensitive documents in this case gives credence to the notion that Limbaugh is being singled out for harsher treatment because of his politics and celebrity.

Even if I didn't love Rush, which I most certainly do, I would be upset!
There was the invasion of his private medical records, now the Dimocrat SAO is playing fast and loose with his Constitutional right to due process of the law, what fresh hell awaits him?!
He is being victimized, almost terrorized, really, by nothing more than a political witch hunt funded by somebody on the Left who is trying to destroy him personally and professionally.
Unjust.
Un-American.
I wish it were unreal, but it's not.
This Stalinist-purge tactic against him has been going on since November:
Stop the Insanity!

White House Seeks Raise For the Arts

After years of being noisily vilified and then quietly rebuilt, the National Endowment for the Arts is poised to get a 15 percent raise, its largest in 20 years. Laura Bush delivered the news yesterday.

At a news conference at the NEA headquarters on Pennsylvania Avenue NW, the first lady announced that the White House would recommend to Congress next week that the NEA receive an additional $18 million each year for the next three years to underwrite an initiative called "American Masterpieces: Three Centuries of Artistic Genius." Among other things, the money will give a boost to the beleaguered Martha Graham Dance Company.

" 'American Masterpieces' will introduce Americans to the best of their cultural and artistic heritage," Mrs. Bush said. "American arts are a reflection of our history and of the creativity of the human spirit. An appreciation and an understanding of the arts is vitally important for every American, especially for children, who will be the painters and the musicians and the actors of tomorrow."

Laura Bush, a former teacher and librarian, emphasized the benefits of art exposure for children, but the new NEA program is designed for "every level of learning." NEA Chairman Dana Gioia said the program would highlight the country's achievements in all arts forms, "from painting to modern dance, theater to jazz, classical music to literature."

The work will be available through touring shows, local presentations and arts education. The first year would feature dance, visual arts and music. The visual programs could include exhibitions on the paintings of the Hudson River School, pop art, southwestern Latino art or American photography, Gioia said. Partners for those tours could include Philadelphia's Barnes Foundation, the National Portrait Gallery and the U.S. Mint. He said the musical emphasis the first year would be on American choral masterpieces, which would likely include productions by singing groups VocalEssence of Minnesota and Chanticleer of San Francisco.

Because dance companies have such a hard time mounting tours, the NEA's support of traveling productions by the Graham company and the Paul Taylor Dance Company should be particularly welcomed by dance supporters. Graham, a genre-bending icon who reinvented the notion what dance could be, died in 1991. A legal battle over the rights to her choreography made it virtually impossible for the Graham company to stage any of her famous works, until a 2002 court decision cleared away the restrictions.

"They will be able to do what they haven't done," Gioia said. He added, that even though reintroduction of past work is key, "this is not designed to feature only the historic works of the canon."

Even though this is a new program, the grants will go through the standard NEA selection process. Gioia said the arts organizations will then decide what to perform.

If approved by Congress, the endowment's fiscal 2005 budget would stand at $139.4 million, up from the $121 million it received this year. This is still substantially lower than the record $176 million the NEA was given in 1992. Three years later a Republican-led Congress slashed the agency's appropriation to $99.4 million as an expression of anger over NEA funding for what some lawmakers perceived as obscene and objectionable art. The NEA fought for its life and slowly began to achieve a turnaround, gaining bipartisan support in the budget battles of 2000 and 2001.

The endowment's retooling came through developing a broad strategy of targeting underserved communities for artistic enrichment and funds, as well as designing programs that received specific blocks of money from Congress. "American Masterpieces" follows that pattern. Gioia said the new programs were not being launched at the expense of existing efforts. Last year the NEA approved 2,000 grants. Among other things, the theater grants supported 138 new plays. "In a democracy arts are not for the happy few, but for everyone," he said.

Days before the announcement of the president's budget message to Congress, Laura Bush has been happily leaking details of the proposal. Last week at a ceremony for recipients of national museum and library awards, she said the Institute for Museum and Library Services would also be getting more money. The museum component is slated for a $10 million increase, and the library segments $12 million.

The National Endowment for the Humanities will most likely also get an overall increase, said a Bush administration source. A source familiar with the budget says the White House will suggest a $23 million increase for the endowment's "We the People" history education initiative, which would make it the largest competitive grant program in NEH history. Last year's suggested appropriation of $25 million was cut back by Congress to $10 million.

In my former life before 9/11, I was an art historian and this positive step by the Bush Administration delights me! Yes!
The arts are an integral part of what makes a society great and don't doubt it for a moment!
(Ask the French. They're still coasting on Impressionism!)
Speaking of the French, I hope you're aware that the US took the artistic lead from them in painting after WWII and their liberation by us; the Abstract Expressionist movement led by Jackson Pollock in the late 1940's established the USA as an artistic superpower, along with our military superiority.
Before I got my M.A. in Art History in the early 1990's, I didn't know that there was such a thing as "American Art;" now, it's my favorite!
This article about the NEA boost mentions the Hudson River School, a group of landscape painters in upstate New York in the latter half of the 19th Century who captured the wilds of the Catskills and the Hudson River Valley for all time.
If you haven't enjoyed the works of Frederic Edwin Church, Thomas Cole, Martin Johnson Heade and Thomas Kinsett, you don't know your own country's marvelous cultural history!
This article also mentions the Barnes Foundation in Philly: the Barnes is a national, indeed a world, treasure of Impressionist and African art which is in real financial trouble!
Founded by Dr. Albert Barnes, who made his fortune on baby eye medicine, it holds the world's largest collection of Renoirs, as well as considerable Matisses and Cézannes, as well as good canvases by other masters like Van Gogh and Picasso.
It seems the private money of the foundation has run out and the state of Pennsylvania, in the person of Clintonista Liberal Lefty Governor Ed Rendell , is trying to get his hands on the collection not to save it, but to sell it!
Needless to say, these art works are worth hundreds of millions of dollars.
If the US government were able to step in and buy this collection on the behalf of all of we taxpayers, it would be wonderful!
(And this would make the proposed increased expenditure for the NEA of a mere $18 million more than pay for itself!)
Should the state of Pennsylvania get its hands on this collection, Ed Rendell and his fellow Democrat fat cats will break it up and sell it off, after raking off a nice "fee" for themselves, I'm sure! Then, they'll spend the millions in proceeds on their latest Liberal boondoggle(s), not caring that these irreplaceable works of art will go to minor potentates in Japan, Saudi Arabia and Switzerland (like financier Mark Rich!), where they'll never be seen and appreciated again.
Furthermore, Dr. Barnes appointed the trustees of the African-American college Lincoln University to be custodians of the art after his death.
They seemingly don't know what treasures they're protecting and have come close, through indecision and disinterest mostly, to just "letting" Rendell and the state of PA "take it off their hands." Mistake.
What the Barnes really needs is a new home--the art isn't displayed very well in its present location-- and that site, in Merion, is too far out of the way for many to make the trip, being particularly far from the Philadelphia Museum of Art downtown and the heart of Philly's culture.
If the NEA could help fund and find a new museum home for the Barnes and keep it together, it would be a huge cultural asset for the American people and it could be worked out that Lincoln University could be the beneficiary of museum patronage (a 2-fer!).
Some of the best pieces of the Barnes went on tour about 10 years ago (Finally! The Barnes had been virtually inaccessible to the public for decades due to Dr. Barnes's eccentric "rules.") and I was lucky enough to have seen it in Ft. Worth at the divine Kimbell Art Museum.
Let me assure that the collection is stunning.
The Musée d'Orsay in Paris has very little over the Barnes Collection.
(Read all about the Barnes and its woes in this newly released book:Art Held Hostage: The Battle over the Barnes Collection)
I am ashamed that my fellow Conservatives are carping at President Bush for adding some dollars to the NEA and NEH budgets!
Why should the arts be the sole province of the Left?
Does being conservative mean that we have to be illiterate and uncultured rubes?
The NEA was set up by LBJ as part of his "Great Society," so it should come as no surprise that it became the turf of Liberals. Perhaps for the last decade or so, they were the only ones paying attention to American arts and letters.
The Left is always seeking to infiltrate new areas of life and new venues for their shoddy way of thinking, not to mention new places they can park "pork" funds from taxpayers like you and me!
The NEA gave them a perfect outlet to do both, while advancing their Liberal political goals at the same time.
Is it any wonder that our hard-earned money has been channeled in the past to Mapplethorpe's photos of sadomasochistic gay sex or Serano's crucifix in urine?
By increasing the budget, President Bush is making a positive step in reclaiming the fine arts for America, to whom it belongs and which speak of the greatness of the American spirit!
I just read up on Dana Gioia, a learned Californian of Italian and Mexican descent who was the first member of his family to go to college...all the way to Harvard!, but I knew of Bruce Cole, whom Bush put in charge of the NEH, as a fine art historian and Italian Renaissance art scholar from my own post-graduate studies.
Apparently, he is going to launch this "We the People" American history initiative and while I wasn't blessed with children, I can tell from my online reading that America's school kids need plenty of help in that department!
I have found as a middle-aged adult, though, that much of my learning has taken place after my formal education was over, so I think that many of we grown-ups are going to benefit from better supported arts and humanities programs!
Remember, too, that Art is one of the finer human achievements that we're fighting this war for.
The Taliban, led by OBL, was adamant about blowing up those Buddhas in Afghanistan several months before 9/11.
Islamic societies who practice the more severe forms of shar'ia like the Taliban and the mullahs in Iran make it a point to ban music, art ("images of man"),and dance (where women are scantily clad).
I'll bet that Theatre and Film aren't even mentioned they're so taboo--I haven't forgotten how the Afghans unburied their TVs after we routed the Taliban and then rushed out to watch previously banned Bollywood films!
I don't have to tell you that America has a rich heritage of culture, but you should look into it if you're not sure or are "hopping mad" about President Bush spending your tax money on something that you think is "useless."
Great countries with great leaders are known to produce great art: when Queen Elizabeth I led Great Britain, there was the Elizabethan Age from which we have Shakespeare.
In the 15th Century, the city-state of Florence ruled by the De Medicis helped produce the Renaissance.
Contemporary "art" of the 1990's like Mapplethorpe's and Serano's, to cite the 2 most egregious examples, reflect the decadence, vapidity and meaninglessness that dominated our society at the end of the last century, sad to say.
Our "holiday from history" was captured in what was thought of as "art" as well as in our films, lifestyle choices and Oval Office adultery.
On 9/11/01, we came to our national senses and rediscovered what was great about ourselves and our history as well as the greatness of what we could become in the future.
What's to say that America in the 21st Century might not very well produce a "Bush Age" or Neo-Renaissance in the arts, culture and literature?
By upping the funding for our national arts program, a production of "good" art work that portrays American Beauty is much more likely than to leave it to its old Liberal "masters" at the NEA who funded projects with their Leftist PC political agenda and not an aesthetic one at the forefront of their minds.
From John Singleton Copley's portrait of Paul Revere to Helen Frankenthaler's latest "color field" abstractions, Americans are second to none (including the French!) in art, as in military might and economic vibrancy!
Check it all out and give President Bush and Lady Laura a break!
This is going to be good!
And if I haven't interested you non-"arty" citizens about the wonderful world of American Art, I'm certain that Sister Wendy can do a much better job!

 

 

January 29, 2004

Five Saudi Agents Killed in Shootout

Five Saudi security agents were killed in a shootout with terror suspects in the Saudi capital Thursday, as nearly 2 million Muslims from around the world began the annual hajj pilgrimage to Mecca amid heightened security after a year of terror attacks in the kingdom.

Bombings killed 51 people, including eight Americans, at housing compounds for foreigners in 2003; Saudi and U.S. officials have blamed the al-Qaida network of Osama bin Laden, a Saudi exile.

This could be an interesting next few days.
The Sauds' real war as (Sunni) Wahhabs is with all the other sects of Islam, particularly Shi'ites, whom they lump in with Jews and Christians and the Great Satan.
While we all may be "people of the Book," they think we're polytheists (I think they deem the Holy Trinity of Christianity to be "3 separate gods"), who should be killed or subjugated to the "pure" monotheistic faith of Wahhabist sect of Islam.
And then there's OBL and Al Queda, whom I believe also are Sunny Wahhabs but who consider the Saudi Royal Family to be decadent, apostate Muslims who should be deposed.
Sigh. Saudi Arabia--what a hellhole of a country!
Why would anyone want to go there if they didn't have to?

North Korea offers Nigeria missile deal

North Korea has offered to sell Nigeria advanced missile technology, the Nigerian government said yesterday, prompting the United States to warn its African ally that it might face sanctions if it strikes a deal with Pyongyang.
    
Nigerian officials yesterday issued vague and contradictory statements about their intentions and the missile type on offer, although they acknowledged seeking ballistic-missile technology for "peaceful" purposes.

Who knew the Nigerians would have the need to "keep the peace" in north-central Africa with ballistic missiles or that they had the spare money to do it.
God knows their country could use every spare dollar for development!
I have a feeling that the NorKs just offered these missiles, which underscores precisely what President Bush means about evil, rogue regimes who peddle WMDs to potential terrorists (and I'm not speaking of Nigeria here, but the point of the Bush Doctrine is taken).

Israel promises painful response to bus bombing
I am so happy for the Israelis!
You can bet the IDF will have a military response to this.
Who's got the whip hand now?
As recently as 2 years ago, maybe even a year ago, it was always the IslamoFascist "Palestinians" who were taunting the Israelis with their threats of blood revenge.
How long can it be before President Bush joins the Palestinian areas and its terror groups to the GWOIT [Global War on Islamist Terror] officially, because I'm sure he has in his thinking and strategery and so have most of the rest of us.
The fact that the bomber was a Paleo cop also doesn't bode well for Arafat and the PA's future as an "independent state;" the very men who are supposed to be keeping order and upholding justice simply can't also be the perpetrators of jihadi terror in a state that is required to rid itself of this very terror.
Could it be that the Palis are so desperate that they've decided to quit pretending that they're not terrorists, even the "civilized" ones in their police force?
Or are they running out of willing kamikazi killers?
(A couple of weeks ago it was the mother of small children, now it's a cop.)
Where are the fine young Arab men who would so happily commit jihad by bomber belt of yesterday? Gone to Iraq?
Let's hope some of them are finally seeing Islamist "martyrdom" homicide bombing for the fool's errand that it is.

Jerusalem Bomb Kills 10, Prisoner Swap Goes Ahead

A suicide bomber blew up an Israeli bus in Jerusalem Thursday, killing at least 10 people, as a complicated prisoner exchange between Israel and the Lebanese guerrilla group Hizbollah got underway.
[This was organized by Axis of Weasel member Germany--wonder why? Atonement for the Holocaust? Regret over the way they mishandled Black September in 1972? Persistent need to tell Jews (and everybody else) what to do? or All 3?--J.T.]

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the blast that peeled back part of the bus's roof, shattered windows and scattered body parts up to 50 feet away on Gaza Street near Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's official residence.

Sharon was at his ranch in southern Israel at the time. Police said the bomber died in the explosion. Dozens of wounded were rushed to hospital.
[...]
It was not clear whether the bombing in Jewish west Jerusalem was linked to the prisoner exchange, three years in the making.

Hours after the blast, Israel released some 400 Palestinian prisoners into the West Bank and Gaza and returned over its border with Lebanon the bodies of 59 Lebanese and Arab fighters killed during a 22-year occupation[Good old Rooters! They can't resist getting in a dig at Israel, especially now that their partner in crime--the BBC--has been so busted of late.--Jen] of southern Lebanon.
[...]
Earlier, some 30 Arab prisoners were flown to Germany as German mediators flew an Israeli businessman and the remains of three soldiers, abducted on a border patrol in 2000, from Beirut to Cologne for the swap.

Israeli forensic experts sent to Cologne identified the bodies of the Israeli soldiers, clearing the way for the exchange to proceed.

Most of the Arab prisoners flown from Israel were Lebanese expected to return home later in the day. A German convert to Islam jailed in 1997 as a Hizbollah agent was also freed.
[...]
The bombing came in the midst of a visit by U.S. envoy John Wolf, who has met this week with Israel and Palestinian officials to try to revive a U.S.-backed peace "road map" stalled by violence.

Palestinian militant groups had vowed revenge [Word on the street was that it was Islamic Jihad to be more specific.--Jen] for an Israeli army raid in the Gaza Strip Wednesday in which troops killed eight Palestinians, including five fighters.

Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qurie condemned the Jerusalem bombing[Is it okay to yawn now?--Jen] -- the latest in dozens that have killed hundreds of Israelis since a Palestinian uprising began in September 2000 -- and called for peace talks to resume.

Bastards.
I am so sick of these "Palestinian" killers.
They love to do these bombings when they think they're close to getting what they want, be it more of their pals being released from jail or more ambiguous road map terms with no requirement that they eschew terror killings.
Thank God they're not very bright, because all it will do will convince President Bush and right-minded Americans and Israelis that these jihadi Islamists can never give up terror and murder. Never.
For his part, PM Ariel Sharon is keeping to Israel's part of the "road map:" he's dismantling the settlements and releasing these Arab bad guys from Israeli custody, even though he knows that they should have been locked up and stayed in prison and even though taking down the settlements is probably one of the hardest things he's ever had to do.
Sharon is not going to give the Islamists or the West one single reason to complain that Israel hasn't kept to its part of the road map for peace.
While Arafat and his IslamoNazi friends will have given every reason to show that terrorist murder is their one and only tool and weapon and that for them, there can be no peace while Israel exists and Jews (and Christians) live happily on God's earth.
Keep building the fence, Israel, and God bless Ariel Sharon as he leads his nation down the road to real peace.
There will probably have to be another fight-to-the-death battle between the Paleostinians and the Israels to truly end this someday very soon, because there can't be peace until you have a war with a victor and a loser.
The smart money, including mine, is on the IDF.

January 27, 2004

Senator who? We're trying to bowl here!!
Dave Barry is so reliably hilarious!
He's reporting on the Dimocrat primary in N.H. (sort of) and his coverage of a John Edwards campaign event at a bowling alley--of all places!--is too funny for words!
This definitely needs a Dave Barry "I am not making this up!" although it's funny if he is.. or if he isn't!

Into this festive scene surged Sen. Edwards, whose campaign theme is that he is going to bring America together. He stood on a platform and gave a speech, surrounded by a dense crowd of media and applauding supporters. About 25 feet away, outside the crowd, the bowlers offered their rebuttal. It was a weird kind of stereo: In one ear, I'd hear Sen. Edwards explaining how he would provide economic opportunity to all Americans; in the other ear, I'd hear: "OUR WHOLE NIGHT IS RUINED! YOU DON'T GIVE A (bad word) ABOUT US!''

But Sen. Edwards soldiered on, finishing his speech on a high note, with the crowd chanting, ''Edwards! Edwards!'' while the public-address-system person, caught up in the candidate's vision for America, announced that the police had arrived and nonbowlers had to leave the building NOW. So Sen. Edwards did not attempt to bowl, which was fortunate, as he does not yet have Secret Service protection.

As the crowd dispersed, I overheard this exchange between an Edwards volunteer and a bowler:

Bowler: Go Bush. You guys suck.

Volunteer: You shouldn't generalize. We don't ALL suck.

Bowler: Yeah, you do.

That's what's so great about the primaries: people talking about issues.

Mr. Bowler, I love you and Dave, too.
Go Bush--the Democrats do suck; look at some of their antics of late:
HOWARD LASHES OUT AT CYBER 'SMEAR CAMPAIGN'
The Donk candidate who was supposedly "made" by the Internet is now seemingly undone by it in the Granite State.
And check out the pranks by "Dean campaigners:"

Dean also said the same thing is happening over the phone, with callers introducing themselves as Dean supporters and screaming into the phone.

Sounds like teenage or preteens and is it any wonder they'd do this after Hollerin' Howard's "I have a scream" speech in Iowa?
Then, there's "Mr. Gandhi" Al Franken with the Dean campaign who body-slammed a Lyndon Larouche supporter from behind supposedly in defense of "freedom of speech" and hitting the man so hard, Franken broke his glasses:
AL FRANKEN KNOCKS DOWN DEAN HECKLER
Sounds like the campaign is getting as crazy as the candidates!
Maybe this will be fun after all.

January 26, 2004

EU snubs Paris over arms for China

A French attempt to lift the European Union arms embargo against China was rejected by ministers yesterday amid concern over Beijing's human rights record and belligerent attitude to Taiwan.

President Jacques Chirac has led the drive to ease sanctions imposed after the Tiananmen Square massacre of students in 1989, hoping to benefit from China's economic growth and draw Asia's rising power into strategic "multipolar" alliance with the EU to counter American hegemony.

But EU foreign ministers meeting in Brussels agreed by 14 to 1 that China's deployment of up to 650 missiles in a war of nerves against Taiwan made it a hazardous moment to lift the arms boycott.

The decision is a blow to Beijing, which has been seeking a strategic partnership with the EU to obtain high-technology weaponry.

The hard line from Brussels came as M Chirac welcomed President Hu Jintao of China for a four-day state visit, shutting out complaints from human rights groups in preparing one of the most lavish receptions France has ever offered a foreign leader.

In Paris, where the Eiffel Tower glowed Communist red last night, 2004 has been designated the Year of China. Museums, theatres and schools are hosting Chinese performers and exhibitions.

Let's hear it for "New Europe"...or maybe even all of the EU except France!
(Axis of Weasel members Germany and Belgium must be coming around.)
Apparently, no-one's buying Jacques's plan for a "multipolar EU to counter American hegemony," because it mainly means that France being given a carte blanche shall we say? to do as they wish unilaterally anywhere in the world.
Funny and ironic, isn't it?
(When the Dhimmicrats here complain about America acting "unilaterally," they almost always mean acting without France, so it's just too funny that Chirac's use of "multi-polar" would mean France first, everyone else: sit down and shut up!)