April 08, 2005

Katsav meets Khatami at pope's funeral

President Moshe Katsav shook hands and chatted briefly Friday with the leaders of >Israel's arch-enemies, Syria and Iran, during the funeral of Pope John Paul II, the president's office said.

Katsav's spokeswoman, Hagit Cohen, said it was too early to say whether the handshakes would yield diplomatic fruits, but called the exchanges historic. "There is no doubt that this is a precedent, it was a historic moment and unique opportunity," Cohen said.

[Pope JPII channels the spirit of God to work another miracle!
His funeral has already sparked a spiritual awakening and re-awakening all over the world.
No wonder the pilgrims were saying "Santo Subito!"--Jen]
[...]
Katsav told Israeli media that he shook hands twice with Syrian President Bashar Assad, who sat one row behind him during the service. Dignitaries were seated in alphabetical order, according to their countries.

Katsav said the first handshake occurred when he turned to shake hands with the nearby Swiss leader. "The Syrian president also stood there. We exchanged smiles and shook hands," Katsav told the Web site of the Maariv daily.

"During the prayers, according to the Christian tradition we exchanged handshakes ... During this, it was the Syrian president who extended his hand to me and we again shook hands," he said.

The Iranian-born Katsav also spoke briefly with Iranian President Mohammed Khatami in Farsi.

Katsav said that as he was leaving, "the Iranian president held his hand out to me. I shook his hand and greeted him in Farsi."

Cohen said the men conversed about Yazd, the city in central Iran where both men were born.

Isn't that a strange "coincidence?" Both men are from the same Iranian town! What are the chances?
A journey begins with a single step, so maybe this is the first step on the road to a real peace in the Middle East--I know the Pope would have blessed and appreciated this moment and it only served to echo all similar meetings he'd held with world leaders for reconciliation and peace with powers previously thought to be enemies of the Church .

Here's a very fine piece (in the LATimes, no less! Mirabile dictu!) on President Bush's thoughts on the Pope's funeral service as he rode Air Force One back home:
Bush: 'I Didn't Realize How Moved I Would Be By The Service'
I didn't realize how moved I would be myself.
I'm still physically drained from staying up all night to watch the funeral live, but it was worth it.
Despite the fact that I was joined watching it on TV with millions (maybe billions) of people around the world, the mass felt very intimate, almost as if I were on the front row...
It was a very beautiful and moving religious service, it was a great moment of world history and it was the "funeral of all funerals" for a great man of God and a loving shepherd of His Children whom many, many of us will sorely miss whether we be Catholic, Protestant, Orthodox, Jewish, Muslim or Buddhist.

April 07, 2005

DELAYED

  
Seems to me that this morning's front-page attack on Tom DeLay by the Washington Post isn't a story about Tom DeLay at all. The story makes clear that DeLay did nothing wrong. In 1997, he took a trip to Russia paid for (as far as he had any reason to be aware) by the National Center for Public Policy Research in Washington D.C. The Center's president, Amy Ridenour, even came along for the trip.

Note that the NYSlimes also ran a front-page "exposé" today on DeLay's supposed "shady" dealings involving sweet deals for his family.
Of that story, David Frum had this to say:

But while we're on the topic of doubtful practices, can we notice this, please? The Times story is sourced to - and is packed full of quotations from - a series of groups whistled up by George Soros for almost the exclusive purpose of attacking DeLay. (You can read some of the details here.) Maybe the Times should be alerting its readers to the true identity of those sources of these shocked-and-appalled quotations? Or even balancing this bought-and-paid-for expertise with comments from some genuinely disinterested and impartial observers?

These "reports" are nothing but rumor, innuendo and gratuitous sliming.
Rep. Delay summed up the situation best himself recently:

DeLay on March 18 portrayed criticism of his trips and close ties to lobbyists as the product of a conspiracy to "destroy the conservative movement" by attacking its leaders, such as himself. "This is a huge, nationwide, concerted effort to destroy everything we believe in," DeLay told supporters at the Family Research Council, a conservative Christian group.

This was probably on Howard Dean's schedule anyway, but especially after DeLay made his strong comments in regards to the Terri Schiavo forced dehydration/starvation, the proactive effort of the Congress to save her and America's increasing outrage with our runaway judiciary, "getting" DeLay out has become the Libs' job one.
They're hoping to tar him with enough ethics violations to get him to resign as they successfully did Newt Gingrich in 1995.
Tom DeLay isn't Newt; he's much better, stronger and more widely supported by the GOP.
And it's not 1994 with a Clinton in the White House, a Dimocrat majority in the Senate and an America that had yet to be awakened to its RedState, Jacksonian identity by the 9/11 attacks .
Unless and until the MSM can come up with more convincing, verifiable proof of DeLay's corruption, it's gonna be "Hammer Time" in the Beltway!

April 06, 2005

France "should be charged" for Rwanda genocide

Rwandan government officials claim that new proof of France's role in the 1994 Rwanda genocide has emerged during the UN's Rwanda court hearings. Not only was France training the genocidal militias prior to the genocide, the French government was even today providing perpetrators of the genocide a refuge. France has earlier been criticised by a European court for not trying genocide suspects.

Horrible!
How did Jacques and the cheese-eating surrender monkeys manage to keep this a secret for so long and let the United States take the blame?
Of course, the Leftist MSM carried all their water, with help from their good friends in Hollywood.
I hear the current "hit" movie "Hotel Rwanda" manages to heap plenty of blame on Uncle Sam for the massacre.
I suppose we could have sent troops in to stop it the killing, but our first "black President" Clinton chose not to...maybe because he didn't want to declare war on those fierce French warlords.
Here's the BBC's version of the story:
France 'shelters guilty Rwandans'

A Rwandan official has called for legal action against France over its alleged role in the 1994 genocide in Rwanda.

Aloys Mutabingwa, a representative at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, said the court had heard enough evidence of France's involvement.

He said some 100 Rwandans wanted by the court or by Rwandan prosecutors were "comfortably living in France".

At least 800,000 people,mostly minority Tutsis, died in the massacres between April and July 2004.

French were individually and collectively responsible for allowing the massacre to unfold, he said.

I don't think any kind of a legal case, even with huge reparations, will give aggrieved Rwandans the satisfaction they want, nor will it bring back the almost one million victims of the genocide, but France needs to stop sheltering the Rwandan thugocracy that made it possible and France should be humbled and publicly exorciated for their role in this.
What really makes me burn is when I recall Jacques Chirac's and Dominique de VILEpin's sanctimonious hectoring of President Bush and his awful, "warmongering" ways while their hands are running red with blood that is over a decade old!
France regards the continent of Africa as their "backyard" and it's time for that to stop if the only fruit it bears are thousands of corpses!