June 24, 2005

Clinton hits governor on White House aide's Sept. 11 comments

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton demanded Thursday that Gov. George Pataki object to a top White House advisor's comments about liberals' response to Sept. 11. In return, Pataki called Clinton a hypocrite.
[Yes, yes, yes, Pataki!
Notice Miz Hillary! didn't say one word in condemnation of Turban Durbin's outrageous remarks about Gitmo!--Jen]

Clinton, D-N.Y., joined Senate Democrats who called on Karl Rove to apologize or resign for his comments Wednesday night in Manhattan to the New York state Conservative Party.
[How convenient...they were all "united" and vocal in this outrage and not about Durtbin.
And Karl Rove serves at the pleasure of the President, not the Democrats--thank God!
Furthermore, the White House is standing behind Rove as is only right!]

The senator said Pataki was at the event and should speak out against Rove's characterization.

"I have absolutely no intention of asking him to apologize," Pataki said, adding that he didn't think Rove's remarks were divisive.

Rove, President Bush's chief political advisor, said Wednesday that liberals "saw the savagery of the 9/11 attacks and wanted to prepare indictments and offer therapy and understanding for our attackers."
Conservatives, said Rove, "saw the savagery of 9/11 and the attacks and prepared for war."
[No truer thing has been said so clearly in a long time!
Bravo, Karl!--J.T.]

Pataki was seated at the dais while Rove spoke, and he spoke after Rove. The governor's speech focused on plans for rebuilding ground zero and did not refer to Rove's comments.

Clinton said Rove's remarks don't reflect the unity among New Yorkers and Americans of all political stripes after the terror attacks of 2001.
[Anyone besides me remember the way Hillary was booed by the FDNY and NYPD at that 9/11 benefit Concert for NYC at Madison Square Garden?
That was a beautiful moment, which Viacom edited out, BTW.]

"I would call on anyone who was at that dinner who is a New Yorker who cares about the unity of not only New York City but of our country to say we may have disagreements about what the best way is to win the war against terror, but we have no disagreements about our unity and our resolve and the goals we seek," Clinton said.

In response, Pataki said Clinton hadn't voiced similar outrage over recent controversial comments from Democrats, including national chairman Howard Dean's disparaging remarks about Republicans and Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin's invocation of Nazis and Soviet gulags in a speech about the U.S. military installation at Guantanamo Bay.
[Tell it like it is, George!]

"I think it's a little hypocritical of Senator Clinton to call on me to repudiate a political figure's comments when she never asked Senator Durbin to repudiate his comments," Pataki said.
"Senator Clinton might think about her propensity to allow outrageous statements from the other side that are far beyond political dialogue _ insulting every Republican, comparing our soldiers to Nazis or Soviet gulag guards _ and never protesting when she serves with them," Pataki said.

Michael Long, chairman of the state Conservative Party, called Rove's speech "excellent" and said the Democrats' criticism only proved Rove correct.

"I was sitting there and I watched nearly 700 people who couldn't agree more with his remarks," Long said.

If anyone should apologize to the people at that dinner last night, it should be Sen. Clinton for her failure to support a flag amendment when people died for our freedom protecting the flag," Long said.
[And yet they say this woman wants to be President...For shame, Hillary! (But then she has none.)]

The arguments over Rove's remarks quickly spread to the New York City mayor's race.
Mayor Michael Bloomberg urged both sides to cool their rhetoric, saying, "We owe it to those we lost to keep partisan politics out of the discussion and keep alive the united spirit that came out of 9/11."
[Bloomberg's such a tool.
He can't figure out which way to jump to advance his own career.]

New York state Democratic chairman Herman Farrell said the Republican mayor's "utter failure to repudiate Karl Rove's ugly and divisive comments demonstrates yet again that he is willing to put his loyalty to the White House ahead of his commitment to New York."
[How about his loyalty to truth, Mr. Farrell?--Jen]

By the end of the day, Rep Peter King, R-N.Y., made the unusual move of criticizing a fellow member of the state's congressional delegation.
"Karl Rove deserves a medal," King said. "Hillary Clinton, she's the one who went to the floor of the Senate and implied President Bush knew about Sept. 11 and let it happen."

And she's been trash-talking the President, his administration, the values of this country and our military ever since, too!
Peter King is right: Karl Rove does deserve a medal for saying what needed to be said at a crucial point in the war.
I'm also pleasantly surprised by Pataki's bold defense of Rove (he didn't strike me as being brave enough to publicly stand up to Hillary), but indeed he is and was.
All in all, a good day for America.
Even though this detracted some from our righteous anger about Durbin and the need for him to resign and/or be censured, it also highlighted the Dims' silence on the Durbin and Dean insults while putting the spotlight on their moves to obstruct the prosecution of the WOT almost from the beginning.

I keep thinking about President Bush's speech to the country on Sept. 22, 2001 when he told us that this war would be long, perhaps stretching over decades: the Dems (as well as the GOP) in both houses of Congress agreed that that was "OK" then, but only 3 and 1/2 years later, the Donkies are ready to give up, pull our troops out and let the POWs go.
The Dems like Clinton, Kerry, Biden and Kennedy have complained that the Iraq part of the war isn't "going well," or it's a "quagmire" or a "Vietnam."
Yet, in his first debate with Kerry, President Bush told the American people that winning the war in Iraq was hard work, and for this, they made fun of him.
SecDef Rumsfeld also informed us that the Iraq war would be a "long, hard slog" a long time ago--yet the Dims insist that we all "move on."
For what, to what?
To a game of "let's pretend 9/11 never happened?"
Battle has been joined by Al Queda against our Coalition in Iraq and we will must and will win.
In fact, the only way we can lose is if the Dims and their minions in the MSM win the propaganda war they are waging on CSPAN and in Old Media.
This refusal to apologize by Pataki and the White House on behalf of Rove's awesome speech which isolates the Dims as obstructions and appeasers is cause for hope that we may someday win the propaganda war, too.
(For the record, Dick Durbin didn't really give much of an apology.
This a far cry from taking back his awful lies about how our military treat POWs at Gitmo.)
But we must press onward to victory: there are still Islamist killers at large and soft-headed ill-liberal "liberals" at home who must be crushed!
Also notice how the Libs will call remarks like Durbin's and Dean's part of the "political discourse" but condemn Rove's speech and demand that it be retracted as "divisive."
Pataki nailed it--they are complete hypocrites.

Blair tells EU to change or fail

The European Union faces a "crisis in political leadership" and must change to win back public support, Prime Minister Tony Blair has told Euro MPs.

Mr Blair, outlining plans for the UK's six-month EU presidency, argued the EU would fail "on a grand scale" if it did not face up to globalisation.

"Only by change will Europe recover its strength, its relevance, its idealism" and therefore public support, he said.

EC president Jose Manuel Barroso said consensus was vital to avoid paralysis.
[Don't look now, Barroso, but I can see those "limbs" stiffening as you speak!--Jen]

Pointing to last week's turbulent talks over the EU budget, Mr Barroso said the union faced a "decisive moment".

The EU presidency would be a test of the UK's historic pragmatism during its presidency, he added.
[I think he must be thinking about Scotland and their way to pinch a penny 'til it screams!--Jen]

Last week's summit saw clashes over the UK refusal to give up its £3bn annual refund from the EU budget unless there were reforms to farm subsidies.

Mr Blair said he did not think Europe quite realised the competitive challenge it faced from countries like China and India.

He was met with both heckles and applause when he said he had always been a "passionate pro-European". He insisted he wanted to reinvigorate the EU, not wreck it.

He argued the French and Dutch voters' rejection of the draft European constitution reflected a wide discontent with the EU.
[So why keep pressing it on them, old boy?]

"This is not a time to accuse those who want Europe to change of betraying Europe," he argued.

"Ideals survive through change, they die through inertia in the face of challenge."

Mr Blair denied he had been unwilling to discuss the UK rebate or that he had demanded the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) be renegotiated overnight.

But it would be too late to wait until 2014 to begin to change the fact that 40% of the EU budget was currently spent on agriculture, for example, he said.

Mr Blair hit out at the caricature of an "Anglo-Saxon market philosophy that tramples on the poor and disadvantaged".
[This is the nuanced way the Froggies critique Blair's policies.--Jen]

He argued he did not want to ditch Europe's social model but asked how it could allow 20m to be unemployed and fall behind in research and development.
[What's killing them economically are all the social welfare programs!
Companies can't make enough money with all the EU restrictions and then the high taxes everyone's forced to pay for those welfare programs to either plow back any earnings they make into R&D or to be able to afford to higher more workers.--Jen]

French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy later delivered a rebuff to calls for a shake-up of the EU budget, making clear that France was not willing to renegotiate the 2002 deal on farm subsidies.

There you have the current quagmire Tony faces:
He will insist that Britain get her $3 bn. refund and Jacques ChIRAQ will insist that France have her farm subsidies and never the twain shall meet!
I love it! Schadenfreude lives!

[...]
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, also attending the G8 talks, said Washington wanted to see a "strong and united" Europe, but she declined to get involved in the current row over its future direction.
[Most wise!--J.T.]

Dr Rice said the US hoped the EU would not turn its back on further enlargement but would continue to hold out the prospect of membership to countries such as Turkey.

Old Europe's current predicament was summed up pretty well by the fabulous Mark Steyn a few days ago in his op ed "An everyday fantasy of farming folk" just so:

[...]
Nevertheless, something has changed. "Europe is faced with a fundamental choice," says Peter Mandelson. "One way, we sink into economic decline, losing the means to pay for our preferred way of life. The other way, we press ahead with painful economic reforms that can make us competitive once again in world markets." The big concession was so slyly done you may have missed it: the European Trade Commissioner is acknowledging that the one thing even Eurosceptics were in favour of - a "common market" - has been a failure.

Read the whole Steyn piece, of course--it's another MS gem!
Ooh, glad I'm an American for so many reasons...the EUropeans have gotten themselves into a hell of a mess...again.
Tony Blair does talk a lot shite, as they say in the UK;
I listened to him utter some of these same platitudes about being "for a social Europe" and being a "passionate pro-European" to his own Parliament and I couldn't for the life of me figure out what in the Sam Hill he was talking about!
To tell you the truth, I'm not really sure Tony knows himself.
I'm also glad he's not my Prime Minister--Blair pushed "Europe" a lot and the welfare of Britain and her citizens very little.
Why do the Brits put up with it?
Just make popcorn: this is going to be a long, hot summer, but it probably won't be boring.
It promises to be rather contentious, though and rather fun!
(It will be crying time for somebody and I strongly suspect that somebody will be our pal Jacques!)

Taliban fighters surrounded by US forces

A large Taliban force including a number of the movement's leaders was reported to have been surrounded by US and Afghan National Army forces in southern Afghanistan yesterday, in the most intense fighting in the country since 2002.

An Afghan government spokesman said that 132 Taliban fighters had died during three days of fighting. Three Afghan National Army soldiers were reported to have been killed, and six US soldiers wounded. Two US helicopters were hit and one made a forced landing.

Lutfullah Mishal, spokesman for the interior ministry, said that some 150 Taliban fighters remained under attack and surrounded in the Deh Shapan district of Zabul province.

Prisoners reported that two of the Taliban's 10-man governing council, Mullah Dadullah and Mullah Brother,
[Who knew they were still in existence? Stubborn b*stards!--Jen]
had been with the trapped force at least until Tuesday.

Most of the Taliban dead were the result of what US army spokesman Colonel Jerry O'Hara said were "devastating" air attacks by coalition aircraft, including British Harrier jets based in Kandahar.

"Their camps were decimated. Bodies lay everywhere. Heavy machineguns and AK-47s were scattered alongside blankets, kettles and food," said police general Salim Khan from the scene. "Some of the Taliban were also killed in caves where they were hiding and US helicopters came and pounded them."

Speaking to The Daily Telegraph from a secret location, Taliban spokesman Maulvi Abdul Latif Hakimi claimed they had killed 16 Americans, 23 Afghan National Army soldiers and shot down two US helicopters.
[The bad guys always exaggerate and lie so much.--J.T.]

The war continues apace and contrary to what Nancy Pelosi (D-Botox) thinks, it's not over in Afghanistan either, but we're working on it...
Hooah on this good action!

June 20, 2005

This bit of blogging excellence got a direct link from Drudge!
It's another wild Dem story of "fake, but accurate" "documents":
Did Lucy Ramirez Find The Downing Street Memos?

The media and the Leftists have had a field day with the Downing Street memos that they claim imply that the Bush administration lied about the intelligence on WMD in order to justify the attack on Iraq. Despite the fact that none of the memos actually say that, none of them quote any officials or any documents, and that the text of the memos show that the British government worried about the deployment of WMD by Saddam against Coalition troops, Kuwait and/or Israel, the meme continues to survive.

Until tonight, however, no one questioned the authenticity of the documents provided by the Times of London. That has now changed, as Times reporter Michael Smith admitted that the memos he used are not originals, but retyped copies...

Read all of what Captain Ed has discovered.
My favorite part is that the docs were "retyped" on an old manual typewriter and the "originals" were "destroyed." Hmmm.
Is that to correct the mistake of Dan Rather, Mary Mapes and Co. of putting their "old" documents, which were allegedly created on a manual typewriter in the 1960's, on a contemporary version of MS Word?
What remains to be seen is whether the Dems, led by John Kerry, who served in Vietnam and made "Ds" at Yale, will still try to use the Downing St. memos as the basis for a real impeachment attempt of President Bush or whether they'll be happy with their mock impeachment party, held in the Capitol basement.
You know when WashedUpPost columnist Dana Milbank takes time off from picking on President Bush to make fun of you (Democrats Play House To Rally Against the War
that Leftist Democrat Moonbatism has reached a new low (high?).

Iran's 'Democracy'
A rigged election, no reformist victory.

The most astonishing aspect of Friday's presidential vote in Iran is not that the elections will go into a second round but that Tehran managed to convince so many in the West that this is a real demonstration of democracy.

All power is held by Supreme Leader Ali Khameni, his Council of Guardians and the small clique of military officers and businessmen around him. The Council disqualified more than 1,000 candidates before the election, vetting only contestants who support the regime's ideological lines. The example of outgoing "reformist" President Mohammad Khatami, who presided over eight years of economic decline and worsening repression, has proven that the President cannot change anything against the Council's will.

The one number worth parsing in Friday's election is that of voter participation. Many Iranians had called for a boycott as the only way of showing resistance. Knowing this, the mullahs seem to have taken their usual election manipulations to another level. Intimidation by the Revolutionary Guards and the fact that proof of voting is needed for certain jobs and welfare payments have always pushed up turnout. Still, voter participation has steadily declined in the past few years to barely 50%.

But this time turnout was 62.7%, exactly the level Supreme Leader Khameni had predicted. "Something is fishy here," Patrick Clawson, who follows Iran for the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, told us. Contradicting all reports about the mood in the country ahead of the vote, hard-line candidates received unprecedented support, while the main reformist candidate, Mustafa Moin, came in fifth. Mr. Moin also suggested the elections were rigged, but since the regime allows no neutral observers
[Not even their longtime best friend, Jimmuh Cartuh!--Jen]
the real extent of fraud or Iranian discontent can't be known.

The runoff election will now have former President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani facing hard-line Tehran Mayor Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who surprised Western observers by finishing second. Neither man is a moderate in any Western sense. Mr. Rafsanjani stood by the late Ayatollah Khomeini from the first day of the Iranian revolution and was in power as Iran promoted international terror and rounded up political prisoners. He is also the father of Iran's nuclear program and openly mused in 2001 that the Islamic world would need only one nuclear bomb to destroy Israel.

The temptation will be strong, especially in Europe, to consider Mr. Rafsanjani to be the regime's "pragmatist" and someone who can be trusted to agree to end Iran's uranium enrichment program in return for the right "economic incentives." But it's more accurate to read these election results as the regime's attempt to tighten its control and to present a united, hard-line front as it sprints to develop the bomb under cover of the talks.

Writing in The Wall Street Journal last week, Shirin Ebadi, the Iranian Nobel Peace laureate, warned the West against offering any concessions to the regime, urging Europe and the U.S. instead to help Iran's democracy movement by highlighting Iran's human rights violations. One day before the vote, President Bush finally reached out to the Iranian people:

"Today, Iran is ruled by men who suppress liberty at home and spread terror across the world. Power is in the hands of an unelected few who have retained power through an electoral process that ignores the basic requirements of democracy. . . . And to the Iranian people, I say: As you stand for your own liberty, the people of America stand with you." Unfortunately, Iranians are still waiting to hear from Europe.

Sadly, most of Old Europe also needs a popular revolution by the people for government with the consent of the governed, but that's another story...
This "election" is basically "business as usual" in Iran--sham election results, sham "reformers".
They've even staged a run-off to make it legitimate.
If I didn't know better, I'd think that the entire election was staged for President Bush's benefit as if to say "Please don't régime change us!"
Let's hope that the Iranian people can find the courage and strength to overthrow the mad mullahs themselves; our troops are still kinda busy right now in Iraq (and our enemy includes Hezbollah fighters coming out of Syria, but funded by Iran) while the MSM erodes our national confidence and our faith in victory in this war on a daily basis here at home.
Pray daily that the mullahs aren't close to having nuclear weapons, but I'd bet the farm that they are.
As Michael Ledeen says often about Iranian liberation, "Faster, please."
(Bookmark and check frequently with Régime Change Iran for the latest news from Persia.)
Meanwhile, the news from Lebanon is a lot better:
Opposition Wins Majority in Lebanon Vote
A legit election for true reformers and a genuine demonstration of newfound democracy and freedom from Baathist Syrian rule!

Clinton adds voice to criticism of Guantánamo
It's clear that when Slick Willy jumps ugly on Camp Gitmo, he's taking the baton from Durbin and that this "Close Gitmo" thing is a concerted campaign on the part of the Leftist Democrats.
(I knew Turban Durbin wasn't smart enough to think this stuff up on his own!)
Obviously, the Dems, including both Clintoons, want power back so badly that they will attack the President, the military and the security of this country to make that happen.
That a former POTUS would join this chorus of treason is unbelievably appalling, but then that's Billy Jeff Clinton for ya.
America, do us all a huge favor and don't elect a scumbag like this to the Oval Office again. Ever.
Notice that Hillary refuses to go on the record on the subject and lets her HINO (husband in name only) do the talking for the both of them--too bad it's trash-talking this country to the benefit of our enemies in wartime.
Yesterday, Mark Steyn wrote a serious, angry and excellent piece about the Durtbin mess; here's the closing paragraph:

[...]
This isn't a Republican vs Democrat thing; it's about senior Democrats who are so over-invested in their hatred of a passing administration that they've signed on to the nuttiest slurs of the lunatic fringe. It would be heartening to think that Durbin will himself now be subjected to some serious torture. Not real torture, of course; I don't mean using Pol Pot techniques and playing the Celine Dion Christmas album really loud to him. But he should at least be made a little uncomfortable over what he's done -- in a time of war, make an inflammatory libel against his country's military that has no value whatsoever except to America's enemies. Shame on him, and shame on those fellow senators and Democrats who by their refusal to condemn him endorse his slander.

How pathetic and sad to see a former President join this treasonous crew.
We do indeed live in strange and often terrible times.