Crossposted from Flopping Aces

Why Rev. Wright did what he did!

REV-ENGE IS SWEET FOR ‘BETRAYED’ PASTOR
By FREDRIC U. DICKER
New York Post
April 30, 2008

ALBANY – The Rev. Jeremiah Wright would be happy to see Barack Obama’s presidential campaign derailed because the pastor is fuming that his former congregant has “betrayed” their 20-year relationship,

The Post has learned. “After 20 years of loving Barack like he was a member of his own family, for Jeremiah to see Barack saying over and over that he didn’t know about Jeremiah’s views during those years, that he wasn’t familiar with what Jeremiah had said, that he may have missed church on this day or that and didn’t hear what Jeremiah said, this is seen by Jeremiah as nonsense and betrayal,” said the source, who has deep roots in Wright’s Chicago community and is familiar with his thinking on the matter.

“Jeremiah is trying to defend his congregation and the work of his ministry by saying what he is saying now,” the source added.

“Jeremiah doesn’t care if he derails Obama’s candidacy or not . . . He knows what he’s doing. Obviously, he’s not a dumb man. He knows he’s not helping.”

The source spoke yesterday about Wright’s motivation for thrusting himself back into the news, the day after the pastor appeared at the National Press Club on Monday and embarrassed Obama by accusing the United States of terrorism.

Wright has said the reason he has begun granting interviews and making public appearances now is that he wants to defend black churches.

But the source said the preacher’s motivation is much more personal.

The source noted that the roots of Wright’s disillusionment with Obama began last year after the Illinois senator unexpectedly yanked him from participating in the public announcement of his presidential campaign.

“That’s why Jeremiah revealed . . . that he had actually been at the [announcement] hotel and prayed privately with the Obama family before the official declaration,” the source told The Post.

“Rev. Wright, as well as other senior members of his church, believe that Obama has betrayed over 20 years of their supposed friendship.”

Obama further angered Wright by trying to distance himself from the pastor ever since videos were made public earlier this year of the preacher alleging that America brought 9/11 upon itself and that people should say “God damn America,” not “God bless America.”

The source added, “After 20 years of loving Barack like he is one of their own, after he was embraced by this congregation as a brother in Christ, after his pastor was a father figure to him and gave him credibility in a city he had not grown up in and in a black community that was suspect of someone from Hawaii and Harvard, he thanks him by not allowing him to speak publicly at his announcement last year?

“A lot of people in the church believe they were there for this man when no one else was, and a lot of people don’t believe it any more when Obama claims he loves the man who did so much for him,” the source added.

Meanwhile, political pro Dick Morris penned a new column yesterday exclaiming that Obama’s latest denouncement of Wright was a good move politically. Morris said: “Obama moved decisively and well to seize the opportunity that the Rev. Wright’s wrongs pose.”

But in doing so, Obama reinforced the image which has taken hold in the flap over Rev. Wright that Obama is just another politician. And one that will disown anyone who stands in his way.

Again, I’m reminded of the words Obama spoke in that much lauded speech in Philadelphia when he first attempted to put the Wright controversy behind him: “I can no more disown him [Rev. Wright] than I can disown the black community.”

Has Obama now disowned the black community?

also:

The Democrat Anti-McCain Ads

FactCheck does a good job dissecting the two new DNC ads that target John McCain. The first one:

FactCheck notes that this whole ad clearly implies that if McCain is elected we will be at war in Iraq for decades to come. Of course they cut off the most relevant part of what McCain said:

Maybe a hundred. … We’ve been in Japan for 60 years. We’ve been in South Korea for 50 years or so. That would be fine with me, as long as Americans, as long as Americans are not being injured or harmed or wounded or killed. It’s fine with me and I hope it would be fine with you if we maintain a presence in a very volatile part of the world.

“As long as Americans are not being injured or harmed or wounded or killed.” Peace time. And no mention in the ad of this context. Shocked?
(more…)

Crossposted from Red Maryland

Attorney General Doug Gansler took a break from carrying O’Guvnah’s water to leave the capital and travel around the state discussing the recommendations of a task force on ways to improve voting in the state of Maryland. Of course, none of the recommendations included “require photo ID for anyone attempting to vote”.

Instead, Doug Gansler decided to play the race card.

According to the Calvert Street Communist Pary Newsletter:

“This is America in the 21st century, yet it took three hours to exercise their franchise,” Gansler said. “It reminded me of the days of literacy tests and poll taxes — obstacles to voting — to just merely exercise one of the most fundamental rights that we have in our democracy.”

Literacy tests and poll taxes? Are you frakking kidding me? Who is this frakking ass clown?

The election in 2006 saw some of the largest turnout in the state in over four decades. The local boards of election – which answer not to the Attorney General, but fellow water-carrier for the Democrat Party Linda Lamone — dramatically underestimated the demand that would be placed on the system. On top of that, Linda “Peter Principle” Lamone has done a miserable job choosing the right voting equipment for the state, too. So in 2006, after decades of crappy ass turnout, the system was overloaded.

It wasn’t discrimination. It wasn’t Jim Crow. It wasn’t Bull Connor. It was an incompetent state bureaucrat who inadquately prepared her agency and its subordinates. Trying to turn this into a racial thing is such a fundamentally cheap shot. It’s bush league. The State of Maryland deserves better from its Attorney General.

I think several big questions need to be asked about our election process:

Why can’t voting machines work like ATMs? Billions of dollars flow through ATMs every day, with an error rate well under 1%. The same companies that make ATMs also making voting machines (like, say, Diebold). So why can’t we have voting machines that work like ATMs?

Why can’t we require a state-issued ID in order to vote? Image a state-issued ID with a pin number that could be inserted into an ATM-like voting machine. You walk up, use the machine, vote, and walk away. Votes can be recorded and stored real-time. Heck, votes could even be transmitted to a central counting office real-time. You could cut down on the nonsense at the voting locations where records are out of date, lines, etc.

If you really want to increase turnout, why don’t we require citizens to vote in order get their tax refunds? Or to claim a tax benefit? Or to receive government benefits? The one thing we would need to do: make sure all ballots include a “none of the above” option.

If we are worried that ballot measures (like the slots referendum) aren’t clear to voters, why don’t we make sure that the politicians do a better job of meeting with constituents to explain them. I’ve lived in Northern Baltimore County for 14 years now. I’ve met my county councilman once. I know my delegate, because he was my seventh grade math teacher. But I cannot remember the last time State Senator Larry Haines was spotted in the Hereford Zone. It seems to me our elected leaders aren’t fulfilling their leadership options here.

But playing the race card to issue a bunch of meaningless “measures” to help speed up the election process is despicable.
(more…)

by Haider Ajina

The following are two article showing progress in Iraq,

Iraqis Displaced from Homes Now Returning in Droves

BAGHDAD — With security improving, local economies flourishing and community reconstruction underway, Iraqis who once fled their South Baghdad homes in fear are now returning to the villages they deserted.

This is a good sign, said Maj. Mark Bailey, the officer in charge of the Multi-National Division – Center governance cell.

“Once people are convinced that security is good in their area, they come back,” said Bailey, who is with 401st Civil Affairs Battalion, attached to 3rd Infantry Division. “If they own a business, they re-open their business, which helps the economy.”

Out of the approximate 18,700 Iraqis who left their homes, it is estimated that 10,450 have returned, according to MND-C records.

Humanitarian aid provided by MND-C, the United Nations and the Iraqi government has been one method of reintegrating the newly returned citizens, Bailey said.

“The CA Battalion (supply section) provides humanitarian assistance packages to the (MND-C) brigade combat teams, and they hand those out where they’re needed,” he said. “It’s also a good way to gain people’s trust.”

Units in 4th Brigade Combat Team, 3rd Infantry Division have seen a steady influx of returning Iraqis, and have conducted operations to ensure the area is safe for their return.

Operation Varsity II, one such effort, resulted in the removal of dozens of al-Qaeda in Iraq from an area containing 19 previously deserted homes. (more…)

Crossposted from Conservative Thoughts.

JPost – Jewish leaders concocted the mass murder of handicapped Jews in order to keep from having to support them, and this murder is what the Jews term “the Holocaust,” according to a documentary special that aired on April 18 on Hamas’s Al Aqsa television station. According to the documentary’s narrator, Israel’s first prime minister David Ben Gurion decided that Jewish “disabled and handicapped are a burden to the state,” after which “the Satanic Jews” – the film cuts to a picture of a hassidic Jew – “thought up an evil plot to be rid of the burden of disabled and handicapped” – the film then cuts to piles of emaciated corpses – “in twisted criminal ways.”

The program dealt primarily with the Holocaust, but included comparisons to the Palestinian situation, calling the massacres in the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps a “holocaust” and blaming Israel for a “Palestinian holocaust.” “They [the Jews] were the first to invent the methods of evil and oppression,” explains the documentary’s narrator, cutting to scenes of Golda Meir, Moshe Dayan and Ben Gurion. The film claimed Jewish leaders blamed the Nazis for their own massacre of Jews “so the Jews would seem persecuted and try to benefit from international sympathy.”

(more…)

From Jerry Breen

Crossposted from Flopping Aces

So, is the good Senator from Illinois taking the ranting Reverend from ill and annoy, out of context? Or is he merely speaking out, as a politician?

This looks to be the beginning of the end of an ugly 20 year relationship:

Obama Attempts to Spin Away Wright Controversy
By Amanda Carpenter
Tuesday, April 29, 2008

Democratic presidential contender Barack Obama sought to temper news headlines in the aftermath of his longtime friend and former pastor Rev. Jeremiah Wright’s controversial media tour by denouncing Wright’s recent remarks.

In a hastily-organized news conference in North Carolina Obama called Wright’s conspiracy theories about the U.S. government and praise of Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan “ridiculous” and “offensive.”

“When he states and then amplifies such ridiculous propositions as the U.S. government somehow being involved in AIDS; when he suggests that Minister Farrakhan somehow represents one of the greatest voices of the 20th and 21st century; when he equates the U.S. wartime efforts with terrorism, then there are no excuses. They offend me. They rightly offend all Americans. And they should be denounced, and that’s what I’m doing very clearly and unequivocally here today.”

“They offend me,” Obama said.

In recent days Wright engaged in several high-profile media appearances to refute the negative news coverage of his church. Many political analysts agreed Wright only called more attention to himself and gave reporters more reason to question his relationship with Obama.

Wright had stayed relatively quiet until last week when he spoke to the New York Times, participated in a television interview on PBS and made speeches before the NAACP and the National Press Club that were carried by major television networks.

In those appearances Wright repeated many aspects of his most offensive remarks, including the U.S. government?s responsibility for creating and spreading the AIDS virus.

“Based on this Tuskegee experiment and based on what has happened to Africans in this country, I believe our government is capable of doing anything,” Wright said.

Wright was aggressive with reporters, refused to criticize Farrakhan, theorized black and white children have genetically different learning styles and said any attacks that have been made on him were also an attack on the black church.

The consequent media coverage was almost entirely harsh.

Obama’s history with Wright began when Obama started attending Wright’s church in Chicago’s more than 20 years ago. Wright married Obama and his wife and baptized his two children. Obama was so enamored with Wright he titled his autobiography “Audacity of Hope” after one of the pastor’s sermons. Wright was also once considered Obama’s “spiritual adviser.” But as reporters began to examine Wright’s church, which preaches “black liberation theology,” boasts an “unashamedly black and unapologetically Christian” motto and encourages members to adopt their “Black Value System,” people began to question Obama’s worldview.

Attention increased on Obama’s roots to the church when ABC News obtained tapes of Wright giving anti-American and racist sermons. These clips dominated news coverage and ultimately led Obama to deliver a major speech on race relations in the United States.

Obama repeatedly defended Wright until today.

“Whatever relationship I had with Reverend Wright has changed as a consequence of this,” Obama said.

What took you so long, Senator Obama?

Maybe….just maybe, Senator Obama can finally go back to eating his waffle in peace.

Obama responsed with intensely visible irritation, declaring: “Why is it that like I can’t just eat my waffle?” and then following up this witticism with an even more notable turn of phrase, “Can’t I just eat my waffle?”

For his admirers, the Future President and Current Messiah has now authored a phrase for the ages, that will forever attach itself to his name.

For Abe Lincoln, it was: “Government of the People, by the People, for the People”

For Teddy Roosevelt, it was “Speak Softly, But Carry a Big Stick.”

For FDR: “The Only Thing We Have to Fear is Fear Itself”

For Truman: “The Buck Stops Here.”

For JFK: “Ask Not What Your Country Can Do for You…..”

For Reagan: “Government Isn’t the Solution; Government
is the Problem”

For Bill Clinton: “It Depends on What the Meaning of ‘Is’, is.”

and now, for Barack Obama, the most inspiring and original words of them all: “Why Can’t I Just Eat My Waffle?”

Waffles have been at the very heart of the Obama campaign

also:

News From Around the World: Our Own Backyard…

This research and investigation comes from very frustrated, but dedicated people monitoring the rise of militant Islam (though history shows no other form) in the West. They are well researched, informed, and as expected, the West is ignoring them. In essence, these Islamists are well funded, entrenched, and now politically coddled groups within the United States and Canada. They are also deadly with a long history of attacks against “infidels” of all stripes.

From the New English Review

Jamaat ul-Fuqra
“The best positioned group to help al-Qaeda launch an attack in the US.”
by Jerry Gordon

Wall Street Journalist Danny Pearl was on his way to a meeting with Jamaat ul-Fuqra (JF) founder, Sheik Mubarak Ali Gilani in Lahore, Pakistan on January 22, 2002. He was on the hunt for al Qaeda connections when he was abducted and slaughtered by Islamic Extremist and British citizen, Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh.

Were there any connections between the shadowy Sheik Gilani and the murder of Pearl? Pakistani authorities had Gilani jailed and later put under house arrest. Given the turmoil in that country, we may never know the extent of his involvement.

What we do know is that since the founding of JF, or the “community of the impoverished,” by Gilani in 1980, a network of 45 paramilitary training camps in the US and Canada have been created. The group here in the US has committed attacks and robberies, acquired contraband arms, engaged in counterfeit activities, and proselytized effectively among Afro-American prison inmates. JF members participated in the 1993 terror bombing of the World Trade Center.

JF seeks to “purify Islam” through violence.

What is of great concern is that federal and state law enforcement authorities have investigated and monitored JF and its front group Muslims of the Americas (MoA) and delisted the group as a terrorist organization. Nor has the IRS taken away MoA’s charitable tax exempt status.

(more…)

Crossposted from Red Maryland

What about it? You see, William Gray (as I have noted before) is the world renowned meteorologist from Colorado State University, famous for his hurricane season predictions. He’s also a global warming skeptic. And one for whom the university tried to curtail funding for recently:

By pioneering the science of seasonal hurricane forecasting, William Gray turned a university far from the stormy seas into a hurricane research mecca.

But last year, the long-term relationship between Gray and Colorado State University, where he has worked for nearly half a century, nearly unraveled in an episode that highlights the politically charged atmosphere that surrounds the global warming debate.

University officials told Gray that handling media inquiries related to his forecasting required too much time and detracted from efforts to promote other professors’ work.

Gray, who has emerged as a leading voice of skepticism about global warming, reacted hotly, firing off a memo to Dick Johnson, head of CSU’s Department of Atmospheric Sciences, and others. He didn’t buy the too-much-media reasoning.

“This is obviously a flimsy excuse and seems to me to be a cover for the Department’s capitulation to the desires of some (in their own interest) who want to reign (sic) in my global warming and global warming-hurricane criticisms,” Gray wrote in the memo obtained by the Chronicle.
(more…)

From Dick Morris

At the start of his campaign, Obama ran in counterpoint to the previous candidacies of Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton. Here was a black man running for president on issues that had nothing to do with race as he rose above the victimization rhetoric that characterizes so many speeches of African-American political figures.

Now, in attacking the Rev. Wright as he did Tuesday, Obama can further define himself in contrast to Wright, just as he did earlier vis-à-vis Jackson and Sharpton.

So if, as the Chinese ideogram suggests, crisis is a synthesis of danger and opportunity, the controversy surrounding the Rev. Jeremiah Wright presents plenty of both for Obama.

In his statement Tuesday, Obama moved decisively and well to seize the opportunity that the Rev. Wright’s wrongs pose.

The danger Wright presents is obvious enough. Wright has come to epitomize everything white Americans fear in an African-American public figure, secular or clerical. He is anti-white, anti-American, and avidly embraces and propagates all manner of bizarre conspiracy theories. If he is to be believed, which is a very bad idea, the United States caused the AIDS virus in order to destroy the African-American population. The reality is the opposite: America took the lead in developing treatments for the disease, with the result being that a diagnosis of AIDS is no longer tantamount to a death sentence. Wright says that we give drugs to our children. Again, he is 180 degrees wide of the mark. We do more than any other nation to battle drugs and risk the lives of tens of thousands of noble and able DEA agents to keep them away from our children.
(more…)

Crossposted from Flopping Aces

Well, this should clarify what Wright said earlier about Obama only saying what a politician has to say to get elected….he meant what he said:

MODERATOR: What is your motivation for characterizing Senator Obama’s response to you as, quote, “what a politician had to say”? What do you mean by that?

WRIGHT: What I mean is what several of my white friends and several of my white, Jewish friends have written me and said to me. They’ve said, “You’re a Christian. You understand forgiveness. We both know that, if Senator Obama did not say what he said, he would never get elected.”

Politicians say what they say and do what they do based on electability, based on sound bites, based on polls, Huffington, whoever’s doing the polls. Preachers say what they say because they’re pastors. They have a different person to whom they’re accountable.

As I said, whether he gets elected or not, I’m still going to have to be answerable to God November 5th and January 21st. That’s what I mean. I do what pastors do. He does what politicians do.

I am not running for office. I am hoping to be vice president.

(LAUGHTER)

The press was all giggles at this event it seems…so enthralled at being in the presence of such a powerful racist they just couldn’t help themselves.

That wasn’t the end of it either. He went on to analyze the difference between white and black brains and accused those who attacked him as actually attacking the black church. This is the man that Obama holds up as his mentor.

This is the man that proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that Obama has no good judgement whatsoever to be the President of the United States.

also:

20/20 & The Silly Woman

Classic interview by John Stossel of Arianna Huffington which shows just how out of touch those on the left really are….and what hypocrites. You can skip the first 5 minutes, just some background on the lady. The good stuff starts after 5 minutes on:

I love it. She complains about welfare reform but John shows her what welfare reform really did. Eight million left the rolls and the income of low-income families are higher while unemployment is down. Yup, how terrible. (more…)

by Regina Sztajer

There is overwhelming evidence that Iran is influencing the violence in Iraq and Iran is supporting rebel militia in Iraq in the form of weapons and money. We doubt if Iraq will stand up to Iran if U.S. troops leave. Is Iran a worry, you bet!! President George W. Bush is almost out of options responding to Iran’s nuclear program. His successor will inherit an Iran on the verge of going nuclear. What will be the result? The Middle East will be deeply destabilized, moderate Arabs will be threatened with Iranian hegemony and Israel will be left on hair-trigger alert.

Will an option be deterrence to prevent the Mullahs in power from acting using nuclear weapons? During the Cold War deterrence was used to prevent a Soviet nuclear attack on the United States and our allies in Western Europe. Both the Soviets and American’s thought twice about attacking each other with nuclear weapons because we wanted to avoid MAD ( Mutual Assured Destruction) of each other. A nuclear first strike would result in a possible 2nd strike and eventual oblivion.

Iran on the other hand will have a tiny arsenal compared to the Soviet Union which will be at first incapable of reaching the U.S. but Israel might face their wrath first. Deterrence might spare Israel’s destruction and possibly Iran’s as well. It may behoove Bush to issue a declaration to Iran such as, ” It shall be the policy of this nation to regard any nuclear attack upon Israel by Iran, or originating in Iran, as an attack by Iran on the United States, requiring a full retaliatory response upon Iran. As a beacon of tolerance and a leader of the free world, the United States will not permit a second Holocaust to be perpetrated upon the Jewish people.” (www.washingtonpost.com 4/1/08, Charles Krauthammere, The Holocaust Declaration.

A formal treaty to resolve the Middle East conflict between the Arabs and Israel may be a deterrence but it may also hinder Israel’s freedom of action and have other costs. The Iranians will not rush to attack Israel because they understand the significance of such an action. Such an attack would lead to a harsh response by Israel that would cause the possible destruction of Iran. Also, Israel would rethink its nuclear capabilities from land based to submarine force, dispersal of aircraft and ballistic missiles if the Iranians pose a threat to them.
A worry is the apocalyptic minded Arab Mullah’s who may consider MAD as a variation of Islamic martyrdom. Since nuclear Iran is not unthinkable the U.S. and the world community must rethink consequences of such a possibility and before it is to late. It is best to act than react!. Israel on its 60th anniversary of its independence is threatened more than ever before. Hizbullah has rearmed with weapons flowing into Gaza which is a grave concern, Syria is within missile range of Israel and Iranian President Mahoud Ahnidinejad is a Holocaust denier who is aiding Hizbullah and the Gaza Islamic radicals.
(more…)

Crossposted from Red Maryland

Justin Ready has been tapped to be the New Executive Director of the Maryland Republican Party. And if you are expecting to come here waiting to read me blasting the choice….then you’ll be disappointed.

The selection of Justin is an inspired choice. Justin actually brings together a lot of the practical perspectives that one needs in order to be a successful Director in the modern age. He has strategic, grassroots, legislative and organization experience. Most importantly, and this is something that I have been harping on for a while, he is a blogger who has some understanding of the importance of the new medium.

Jim Pelura went out on a limb in naming Justin and interviewing a lot of nontraditional candidates. I thank him for that, as well as giving me the opportunity as well. And I am glad that he went against the grain. Rumors swirled all weekend that the choice was going to be Harris Campaign Manager Chris Meekins, and had Meekins been selected we would have looked back at the age of John Flynn as the halcyon days of good management, and we all know how poor of a job Flynn did during his tenure.
(more…)

Part 1
In just one year .. Remember the election in 2006? Thought you might like to read the following:

A little over one year ago:
1) Consumer confidence stood at a 2 1/2 year high;
2) Regular gasoline sold for $2.19 a gallon;
3) The unemployment rate was 4.5%.

Since voting in a Democratically controlled Congress in 2006 we have seen:
1) Consumer confidence plummet;
2) The cost of regular gasoline soar to over $3.50 a gallon;
3) Unemployment is up to 5% (a 10% increase);
4) American households have seen $2.3 trillion in equity value evaporate (stock and mutual fund losses);
5) Americans have seen their home equity drop by $1.2 trillion dollars;
6) 1% of American homes are in foreclosure.

America voted for “change” in 2006, and we got it!

Remember it’s Congress that makes the law, not the President. He has to work with what’s handed to him.

Quote of the Day……..”My friends, we live in the greatest nation in the history of the world. I hope you’ll join with me as we try to change it.” — Barack Obama

Part 2:
Taxes…Whether Democrat or a Republican you will find these statistics enlightening and amazing.
www.taxfoundation.org/publ ications/show/151.html< /A>
Taxes under Clinton 1999 Taxes under Bush 2008
Single making 30K – tax $8,400 Single making 30K – tax $4,500
Single making 50K – tax $14,000 Single making 50K – tax $12,500
Single making 75K – tax $23,250 Single making 75K – tax $18,750
Married making 60K – tax $16,800 Married making 60K- tax $9,000
Married making 75K – tax $21,000 Married making 75K – tax $18,750
Married making 125K – tax $38,750 Married making 125K – tax $31,250

Both democratic candidates will return to the higher tax rates

It is amazing how many people who fall into the categories above think Bush is screwing them and Bill Clinton was the greatest President ever. If Obama or Hillary are elected, they both say they will repeal the Bush tax cuts and a good portion of the people who fall into the categories above can’t wait for it to happen. This is like the movie The Sting with Paul Newman; you scam somebody out of some money and they don’t even know what happened.

PART 3:
If you think the war in Iraq is costing us too much, read this:
(more…)

Crossposted from Flopping Aces

“Clearly, a civilization that feels guilty for everything it is and does will lack the energy and conviction to defend itself.”
- Jean-Francois Revel

When I began immersing myself into politics and shedding the liberal indoctrination of my college years, one of the books I read that shaped some of my current perception, early on, was Anti-Americanism by Jean-Francois Revel. I first heard about him on the Dennis Prager Show, as he gave an interview, from France.

While researching for a post to cover this and this, I discovered that I had completely missed the news that the French intellectual had passed away almost 2 years to the date, on April 30, 2006:

[He] was almost unique among French philosophers in being a champion of economic liberalism and an outspoken critic of the anti-Americanism of European intellectuals – particularly French ones.

~~~

On his visit to the States, Revel had been “astonished by evidence that everything Europeans were saying about the US was false”; and most of his book consisted of a heavily sarcastic point-by-point rebuttal of the knee-jerk, anti-American prejudices of the day. Europe’s loss of leadership during the post-war era, in his opinion, had led to an irrational envy and resentment.
A definitive proof of the irrational origins of anti-American sentiment, he suggested, was to be found in the way in which critics often reproached the United States for some shortcoming, and then for its opposite.

During the Vietnam conflict of the 1960s, for example, French commentators developed a sudden amnesia about their country’s involvement in Indo-China, and the fact that France, while embroiled in its ugly colonial war with the Viet Minh, “frequently pleaded for and sometimes obtained American help”.

Without Marx or Jesus became a best-seller in France and in the United States, but won almost universally hostile reviews from European critics. Revel’s Swedish publisher was unable to get a single television interview for him, despite impressive sales; in Finland he was confronted on television by two “intellectuals” – one from Romania, the other from Poland; his Greek publisher composed a preface in which he begged his compatriots’ pardon for having published the book.

Refusing to be daunted, Revel returned to the charge in L’Obsession anti-americaine. Son fonctionnement, ses causes, ses inconsequences (2003), in which he directed his heavy sarcasm at European intellectuals who claimed that America had brought the 9/11 terrorist attacks on itself and blamed her for impoverishing the developing world through globalisation. Slogans such as “No to terrorism. No to war”, Revel wrote, were “about as intelligent as ‘No to illness. No to medicine’.”

Rather than point fingers at America, he suggested, European politicians should look in the mirror and acknowledge their own shortcomings. America, he argued, had been forced to act almost alone to combat global terrorism because Europe had failed to act in the cause of collective security. As for “globalisation”, developing countries wanted more, not less, access to rich markets.

Revel also detected a tendency of other countries to ascribe their own worst faults to the Americans in a curious “reversal of culpability”. Thus, the Japanese and Germans excoriate America for “militarism”; the Mexicans attack it for “electoral corruption”; the British accuse it of “imperialism”; the Chinese accuse it of “hegemonism”; and Arab writers, post 9/11, for “abridging press freedom”.

But much of Revel’s anger was directed at his fellow countrymen: “We French have had little to say against Saddam Hussein, Muammar Qaddafi, Kim Jong Il, Fidel Castro, Robert Mugabe, the imams of the Islamic Republic of Iran, or the bosses of China and Vietnam. We reserve our admonitions and our contempt and our attacks for Ronald Reagan and George W Bush.”

Revel argued that the same French intellectuals who found great difficulties in criticizing Stalin appear to be the same brain-dead intellectual elitists who fail to perceive the dangers of radical Islamic terror.

from the Brussels Journal:

Early on Sunday morning, the French intellectual Jean-François Revel died aged 82. He was a member of the French Academy and, with philosopher Bernard-Henri Lévy, economist Guy Sorman, and writer Pascal Bruckner, one of the few truly pro-American French writers.

In his 2002 book “L’obsession anti-américaine” (English version: Anti-Americanism) he analyses anti-Americanism throughout the world. Exposing its paradoxes, its contradictions and its lies, he shows that it is instigated by cultural and political elites, rather than supported by the population at large. Already in 1970, Revel was “astonished by the evidence that almost everything Europeans are saying about the US is false”. Since then, nothing has changed. From the book, an example of French anti-American bias in the press and by politicians:

According to our commentators the fact that the US unemployment rate had dropped below 5 percent since 1984 whereas our own had skyrocketed to around 12 percent, meant nothing good for the US, given that these jobs were mostly “menial jobs.” Ah! Here we have the myth of the menial jobs. How it has comforted us! During the economic slowdown of the first half of 2001 the American unemployment rate rose from 4.4 percent of the working population to 5.5 percent. On 7 May 2001 the French economic daily La Tribune immediately printed a full first page headline “Full Employment Ends in the United States.” This is but one example.

Yet, at precisely the same time the French government applauded itself frenetically for having reduced our own unemployment rate to 8.7 percent, i.e. almost twice the American rate (without taking into account the tens of thousands of actual unemployed that France artificially excludes from its statistics).

By September 2001 the unemployment rate in France already exceeded 9 percent. On 15 February 2001 Le Monde published an article entitled “The End of the American Economic Dream.” In other words, a practically uninterrupted growth of 17 years (1983-2000), an unprecedented technological revolution since the 19th century, the creation of tens of millions of new jobs, an unemployment rate of only 4 percent as well as an enormous and unexpected demographic increase from 248 million to 281 million between 1990 and 2000-all this was but a “dream.” What a pity that France did not realize this dream!

Granted, the author of the article readily straddles the hobbyhorse of the “menial jobs” and deplores that France Americanized itself to the point of “copying the sad example of the working poor.” As if this were the only example given by the American economy from which no lesson can be learned. Undoubtedly, France was better off remaining faithful to its own model of the not working poor.

I do not know if his writings had any influence on them, but with the rise into office by pro-Bush, pro-American Europeans like Sarkozy and Berlusconi, I hold out hope that they are part of the legacy that Jean-Francois Revel leaves behind in this world.

Instead of Howard Zinn and Noam Chomsky self-loathing view of America taught in our public schools, perhaps we should be investing in Jean-Francois Revel’s work?

Perhaps Reverend Wright and Senator Obama could also be sent a copy of Revel’s book, Anti-Americanism.

From Winds of Change:

Liberty. Humanity. Clarity. And an intelligence that enlightened, revealed, and challenged you every step of the way. Others will step up, and join the love story that he was a part of, and aim at the same things. They will take their place in our civilization’s long chain – but those who rise to Revel’s level are never really replaced. Was de Tocqueville ever replaced? Baron Montesquieu? It is enough that we had them for a short while, borrowed treasures that left something of themselves behind.

He has fought the good fight, and laid down a pen mightier than a brigade of swords. If there is a Heaven, he goes now to its Elysian Fields.

Au revoir notre pere, notre ami (1924-2006). May we prove worthy of your legacy.

also:

Would an Obama/Wright supporter please explain to me the following:

How are these soundbytes cherry-picked out of context? If I’m hearing them wrong, please translate and contextualize them for me.

I listened to the post-9/11 sermon- the entire sermon- and the sensationalized “faith footnote” is representative of an over-riding afro-ZINNtric worldview that is laced throughout his sermon. (more…)

Crossposted from Red Maryland

(MDPT) -In this week’s edition of the Laurel Leader, Prince George’s Senator Jim Rosapepe (D-Dist. 21) continues to blame Enron for urging the passage of utility deregulation in Maryland, while advocating for re-regulation. The spin machine is cranked up.

In the letter to the editor, Rosapepe called the 1999 rate deregulation as disaster for working families and a boon for Constellation Energy. He also said that Gov. Martin O’Malley (D) “stood up” to the parent company of BGE and “forced them” to roll back $2 billion in overcharges.

This is not the first time my Senator has pulled this one out from nowhere. He originally came up with this one last year, when he wrote, basically the same thing in The Gazette. The current letter was also published in this weekend’s edition of The Gazette as well.

Another politician, trying to re-write history. And so it goes… (more…)

By Blair Lee: The Gazette

Last week we stressed the importance of state aid, the $7.3 billion that state lawmakers distributed annually to Maryland’s 24 local subdivisions. State aid, we said, was a nifty way of letting outsiders pay your bills.

Every state aid dollar a county receives is one less dollar that local taxpayers pay. That’s why most lawmakers fight to bring home as much state aid as possible. Counties, like Montgomery, that don’t bring home much state aid must tax their county residents to make up the difference. Likewise, every tax dollar not sent to Annapolis is another tax dollar available at home for county services.

So, why is ‘‘bringing home the bacon” (less taxes and more state aid for Montgomery) such a low priority among Montgomery’s State House lawmakers?

First, there’s no pressure from home. Montgomery’s idealistic voters don’t believe in parochialism and money-grubbing. It’s beneath them. They’re more interested in progressive social agendas. (Yes, these are the same liberals who ridicule Red State voters for failing to identify their economic self-interests.) Second, Montgomery’s voters can’t grasp the relationship between Montgomery’s well-being and what happens in Annapolis. For instance, they favor ‘‘soaking the rich,” which means exporting millions and millions of Montgomery’s dollars to Annapolis which are then recycled to other counties. Or consider the Thorton education program, the state’s $1.3 billion education increase. With 17 percent of the state’s students, Montgomery gets only 8.6 percent of the Thorton funds. Yet Montgomery’s school board, teachers union and lawmakers blindly supported Thorton because it was labeled ‘‘education.” That’s why other counties laugh at us.

Third, sticking up for Montgomery can be dangerous to a lawmaker’s Statehouse career. The Annapolis bosses understand perfectly that MoCo lawmakers can vote against MoCo’s interests with impunity. The folks back home won’t know or care and The Washington Post certainly isn’t going to wake them up. So, in the Alice-in-Wonderland world of Annapolis, because MoCo’s lawmakers can sell their county down the river and still get re-elected, they are expected to do so!
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Crossposted from Conservative Thoughts.

IOL – Special Assignment, a weekly investigative documentary show, planned to broadcast a story on the death of 25-year-old UCT [University of Cape Town, South Africa] graduate Buntu Majalaza, who went to the bush to be initiated into adulthood, but died two weeks later on January 6 from septicaemia because of a botched circumcision. The programme focuses on the dangers of informal initiation schools where some students died. The show was meant to be aired on Tuesday but was retracted two hours before the scheduled time. It is believed that the SABC [South African Broadcasting Corporation, state owned broadcaster] refused to allow the show to go on air because of its controversial nature and its potential to offend traditional leaders

. (more…)

Crossposted from Flopping Aces

Not OK to link Rev. Wright with Obama in North Carolina, but OK to link Obama with Hamas terrorists?

I’m confused!

This week GOP presidential candidate John McCain repeatedly condemned the North Carolina GOP ad which shows a short clip of one of the infamous rants of Obama’s pastor Reverend Wright and asks if North Carolina Democrat leaders should have endorsed Obama?

We all know that Senator McCain wants to take the high road this election year. But in the same week he denounced the mild ad in North Carolina, he responded to the Hamas terrorist leader who said “Actually, we like Mr. Obama. We hope he will [win] the election” by saying: “I think it is very clear who Hamas wants to be the next president of the United States … I think that the people should understand that I will be Hamas’ worst nightmare.”

Asked later if his remarks amounted to a negative attack he responded that they were simply a “statement of fact.”

But isn’t it also a statement of fact that Democrat leaders in North Carolina have endorsed Obama? Wasn’t the NC GOP right in pointing out that Obama’s beliefs are too “extreme” for North Carolina?

Some see this as just another example of McCain sticking it to conservatives. His action in this episode reinforces many of the concerns and negative impressions many conservatives still hold for McCain.

“Man Up,” Sen. McCain
By Arnold Ahlert
Political Mavens

On Wednesday, John McCain demanded that the North Carolina Republican Party remove a TV ad featuring Rev. Jeremiah Wright’s “God damn America” sermon which is being used to portray two Democratic gubernatorial candidates who support Barack Obama as “too extreme.” “There is no place for that kind of campaigning,” said the Republican nominee for president. Memo to Sen. McCain: wake up and smell the coffee.

The 20-year relationship between Barack Obama and his anti-American, black separatist “mentor” is fair game. So are his political associations with former Weather Underground terrorists William Ayers and Bernadette Dohrn and his “close friendship” with indicted real estate developer Tony Rezko.

Mr. Obama is not running for college president on some lunatic left-wing campus, Senator. He’s running for the most powerful office in the world, and the public ought to be well acquainted with the company he’s kept and keeping–loud and often.

Incredible as it seems from here, perhaps you’re still naive enough to believe the media which has treated you with kid gloves whenever you tilted left is going to give you even-handed coverage once the slug-fest between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama produces a winner. One would think the hit-piece published by the New York Times regarding your ostensible extra-marital affair–a compendium of innuendoes, shoddy reporting and outright lies–would have given you a clue as to what is coming.

Either Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama will do anything and everything to undermine your candidacy. How do I know? Take a good look at what they’re doing to EACH OTHER, Senator. Multiply by ten.

This is one American who’s damn tired of a Republican candidate for president who thinks going toe-to-toe with two irredeemable socialists is “unseemly.” Better to “disrespect” them than that part of the American electorate–hopefully a majority–which yearns to see a Republican show a little backbone. Nothing is more “hardball” than a presidential election.

“Man up,” Mr. McCain.

To those who had been thinking of sending in a donation to the McCain campaign but were offended by McC’s latest move, why not make a donation to the North Carolina GOP so they can continue to televise this ad? And let them know why you are contributing to them and not McCain.

also:

9/11 Truther Attacks Handicapped Girl at Laura Bush Book Event

Then has the nerve to claim the girl’s father attacked him with the wheelchair!

We’ve all seen these 9/11 “truthers” in action. They are the left wing equivalent of Nazi fascists. Their delusions of hate and willful self deception about the horror of the September 11th attacks has warped their minds beyond reason.

Earlier this week the NY Post reports that one of that ilk was out doing what they do best: shouting obscenities at Laura and Jenna Bush as they were promoting their book “Read All About It” which introduces children to the joys of reading.
(more…)

Crossposted from Conservative Thoughts.

IHT – In the new nonsmoking France, where café-goers and restaurateurs have made a remarkably quiet transition to the regime of not lighting up indoors, there remains an unexpected pocket of resistance: hookah bars. Hookah bars, which began springing up in France more than a decade ago, became increasingly popular across Europe, both among immigrants from Islamic countries and among the hip student crowd. Helou’s union estimates that France had 800 hookah bars before the smoking ban, half of them in Paris or its suburbs, but that perhaps one-third have closed since the ban took effect. The Hookah Professionals’ Union has been holding talks with the government of President Nicolas Sarkozy in hopes of finding a solution, so far without success. Health Minister Roselyne Bachelot has shown no inclination to negotiate since declaring in December that there would be no exceptions to the smoking ban. “It’s a matter of public health,” she said.

Sarko might not be the ideal Conservative, but imagine it was that loony socialist Sego who was running the joint, you can guarantee once they get wind of this, they’d effectively have separate laws for the regular peasants and the Muslim immigrants. That is the case elsewhere, like that Muslim polygamist in Britain who got let off for speeding and the ones who can have extra benefits if they have extra wives. Lefties are happy to condemn and smear all Christians when some do crap like that, but when it comes to the religion of tolerance and peace, they’re surprisingly tolerant and happy to bend over. If it was Sego, you’d find that the government would have to be shamed into enforcing its laws and such.

Sarko’s government will do what its supposed to, enforce the law across the board, not selectively. Sorry ‘hip student crowd’, you lot are usually whining for some meddling socialist policy or other, it’s like living in your not-so-hip father’s house, if you want him to pick up the tab all the time, eventually you’ll have to do as he says, so choke on that. Perhaps you can hold out until the French get tired of working hard and paying less tax or something, they’ll vote for Sego then and she’ll usher in the nanny state and the parasites will return in the name of social justice. Then you just need to burn some more cars, scream racism, xenophobia and what not and she’ll promptly roll over and you can go ahead.

Crossposted from Red Maryland

Interesting report from WBAL

It has been two years since the General Assembly overrode a decision by the State School Board to privatize four high schools in Baltimore and have the city hire a third party to run seven low performing middle schools.

State School Board member David Tufaro tells WBAL Radio the information he has reviewed show those eleven “remain in general very low performing schools.” He says he doesn’t consider himself an expert on the information but he has looked over a number of factors. Some of the eleven will be closed this year, or in the coming years after the Baltimore City School Commissioners voted for that action recently.

Tufaro says “the question needs to be asked did then Mayor O’Malley and did our elected representatives and the General Assembly as a whole act wisely, prudently on behalf of the students of Baltimore City. And I would submit based on the information I know, no they clearly did not.”

He believes the lawmakers were acting in political interests and protecting aspects of a failed school system.

Now this is just preliminary, but Mike Miller, Martin O’Malley, and Mike Busch would never play politics with poor students (or working families) as pawns, only to drop them like a bad habit after they retake the governor’s mansion. Right???

Crossposted from Flopping Aces

The mentor of Obama who said the following:

Now says that it was unfair to air his statements:

In his first wide-ranging interview since video clips of his inflammatory sermons were aired, the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr. defended himself over the controversy, saying that his words were twisted.

Mr. Wright, Senator Barack Obama’s former pastor, gave an interview to Bill Moyers on Wednesday, to air on PBS tomorrow.

“I felt it was unfair,” Mr. Wright said, according to excerpts of the interview released Thursday. “I felt it was unjust. I felt it was untrue. I felt for those who were doing that, were doing it for some very devious reasons.”

In Mr. Wright’s sermons, he suggested that Americans bore some responsibility for the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, saying “America’s chickens are coming home to roost.” He also blamed the government for the spread of AIDS among African-Americans, characterized the United States government as corrupt and referred to the “U.S. of K.K.K. A.”

He did not apologize or back away from his remarks in the interview, instead saying that people wanted to paint him as “some sort of fanatic.”

“It’s to paint me as something — ‘Something’s wrong with me. There’s nothing wrong with this country … for its policies. We’re perfect. Our hands are free. Our hands have no blood on them,’” he said. “That’s not a failure to communicate. The message that is being communicated by the sound bites is exactly what those pushing those sound bites want to communicate.”

When asked what the people who aired the clips “wanted to communicate,” Mr. Wright said, “I think they wanted to communicate that I am unpatriotic, that I am un-American, that I am filled with hate speech, that I have a cult at Trinity United Church of Christ. And by the way, guess who goes to his church, hint, hint, hint? That’s what they wanted to communicate.”

This doesn’t shock me in the least. I never thought the man would back away from his statements because he IS a racist fanatic. What is surprising, and very welcome is this statement from him:

Mr. Wright, who has acted as Mr. Obama’s spiritual mentor and retired in February as pastor of Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago, said that he has never heard Mr. Obama repeat any of his controversial statements.

“Absolutely not,” Mr. Wright said. “I don’t talk to him about politics. And so he had a political event, he goes out as a politician and says what he has to say as a politician. I continue to be a pastor who speaks to the people of God about the things of God.”

Mr. Obama publicly denounced Mr. Wright’s remarks, a reaction Mr. Wright said “went down very simply.”

“He’s a politician, I’m a pastor,” he said. “We speak to two different audiences. And he says what he has to say as a politician. I say what I have to say as a pastor. But they’re two different worlds.”

He added, “I do what I do. He does what politicians do. So that what happened in Philadelphia where he had to respond to the sound bytes, he responded as a politician.”

I’m sure Obama appreciated THAT soundbite from his mentor huh?

I love this one also:

I continue to be a pastor who speaks to the people of God about the things of God.

The things of God include the fact that the whites created the AIDS virus to exterminate blacks, to accuse this country of being the United States of KKK, and that 9/11 was deserved?

The man is a loon

also:

The Violence of “Peace” Protesters

Last month, skye was assaulted while counterprotesting the Chester County “Peace” Movement.

Now, CJ brings attention to an ugly incident that happened to a family in Edinboro, Pennsylvania. Not only were Jason and Carrie Swartout assaulted, but so was their 14 year old son. And what is perhaps just as outrageous, perhaps more so, is the behavior of one of the officers involved:

On April 22nd several members of the Northwest Pa. Gathering of Eagles gathered in Edinboro, Pa to counter-protest an anti-war demonstration staged by some students from Edinboro University, their professors and a few unidentified and hygienically challenged others. Initially the operation was quite innocuous with a few spirited verbal exchanges between the two sides. We were positioned across the street receiving many honks and thumbs up from passersby.

Andrew, our 14-year-old son, crossed the street to videotape the “toy-soldier” displays setup by the peace crowd. These displays consisted of many small plastic soldiers glued to a child’s sled, can’t explain that one, and a footlocker with toy soldiers, middle finger pictures and a map of Iraq. Two females began harassing Andrew as they shoved signs in his face and threatened to sue him for videotaping. Carrie and I (Jason) crossed the street to ensure Andrew wasn’t hurt and to explain to the “students” that his videotaping was well within the law. The professors standing with the students goaded the entire thing on failing to explain to the students that they were wrong and out of line. It wasn’t long before one of the peace protesters grabbed the sign out of my hand and threw it into the street. As I attempted to retrieve it she got up into my face. Carrie stepped between us so that I would not have to defend myself to a female. The girl and her sister then stepped into Carrie’s face and swung at her. (more…)