Friend of Western Civ: Jeff Foxworthy

I'm not a big fan of country music myself, but these comments by Jeff Foxworthy explain why there are so many good people who do:

"I started thinking about why I like country music and doing this show so much, and here's what I came up with, y'all.

"I like country music because it's about the things in life that really matter. It ain't about braggin' about how you're gonna mess somebody up, or how somebody ain't respectin' ya. It's about love, family, friends -- with a few beers, a cheap woman and a two-timin' man thrown in for spice. It doesn't take political sides, even with things as ugly as war. Instead, it celebrates the brave men and women who go to fight 'em, the price they pay to do it and the longin' we have for them to return home to the ones that they love.

"It's about kids and how there ain't nothin' like 'em. I get tired of hearin' about how bad kids are today, because there are a lot of great kids out there that just need somebody to love 'em and believe in 'em. Country folks love their kids and they will jack you up if you try to mess with 'em!

SOURCE: Jack Myers Media Village: 19 APRIL 2007: Jeff Foxworthy's Passionate, Show-Stopping Speech at the CMT Awards

The US Supreme Court is trying to get back in my good graces...

The Supreme Court is trying to get back on my good side, by upholding a ban on partial-birth abortions. For reasons that anyone familir with the birthing process know full well, a BREACH BIRTH, where a babie's legs come out first rather than the head, is a bad, dangerous thing! And yet, a breach birth is artifiically induced ON PURPOSE as 'Step 1' of a partial-birth abortion. Realize that before the "surgeon" sticks a scaple in the back of the babies' head to kill it, 80% of the kid is already OUTSIDE of the woman's body...the remaining part is only the head, and the ONLY REASON it's left in the birth canal is for the fig leaf of ethical dignity in that the baby was killed "in the womb"--not outside of it--even though 80% of the little guy is already outside of the mother's body...

The pretense that we need this procedure because it's SAFE is an outright lie, there's nothing safe about it, especially if you are the little dude getting the knife in the back of your neck. It's done for the pure sake of convenience, as it's easier to yank the little guy out and stab him in the neck than it is to use the other method: dismemberment of the child while it's INSIDE of the mother's womb.

You see folks, if you chop a baby up while it's INSIDE of a mother's womb, that is a CONSTITUTIONALLY PROTECTED RIGHT -- never mind the fact that I have yet to find ANY copy of the Constitution that mentions the word "abortion" or anything related to it. It must be in the index or something...

But if you were to take a baby and slice it up AFTER it comes out of the mother's womb, why that's MURDER. In the womb, a RIGHT, out of the womb, MURDER. It's an amazing thing the fine line between legality and prison, isn't it? Any questions?

Well that's your lesson in the logic and rational of liberal left-wing thinking for today. Thank you very much.

An excerpt from the Trib:

The U.S. Supreme Court handed conservatives a long-sought victory Wednesday, upholding a nationwide ban on a medical procedure that opponents call "partial-birth abortion" and giving lawmakers more leeway to restrict the practice of abortion in general.

Experts on both sides of the abortion divide predicted the ruling would encourage state and federal governments to impose tighter regulations on abortion, but said there was no indication the high court was any closer to reversing Roe vs. Wade, the 1973 decision that guaranteed women the right to terminate a pregnancy.

The 5-4 ruling, written by Justice Anthony Kennedy, said the federal abortion ban signed into law by President Bush in 2003 does not violate that constitutional right. Opponents of the ban "have not demonstrated that the act would be unconstitutional in a large fraction of relevant cases," Kennedy said.

The majority opinion was joined by Bush's two Supreme Court appointees, Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito, as well as by Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas.

In a dissenting opinion, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg called the ruling "alarming" because it failed to respect the court's abortion precedents, including that the woman's health should be the doctor's paramount consideration. Wednesday's decision "deprives women of the right to make an autonomous choice, even at the expense of their safety," she said.

She called the majority's justifications "flimsy and transparent" and said they did not bother to conceal their hostility to abortion rights: "Throughout, the opinion refers to obstetrician-gynecologists and surgeons who perform abortions not by the titles of their medical specialties, but by the pejorative label 'abortion doctor.' "

Ginsburg's dissent was joined by Justices Stephen Breyer, David Souter and John Paul Stevens.

The law bans a rare and controversial surgical procedure performed after the first trimester of pregnancy.

In a reaction typical of abortion-rights activists, Eleanor Smeal, president of the Feminist Majority, said the two new justices "did what they were put on the court to do: strike a blow against women's fundamental right to choose abortion."

Meanwhile, the National Right to Life Committee, which was instrumental in passing the federal Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003 and similar state laws, applauded the decision, as did other anti-abortion groups.

SOURCE: Chicago Tribune: 18 APRIL 2007: Court backs ban on abortion procedure

GLOBAL WARMING: A convenient lie

Are you a dyed-in-the-wool Global Warming Jihadist? Then you need to watch this video, (and take a cold shower). For those who are wondering, the narrator is NOT a former vice-president of the United States, he's just a mere scientist...



How inconvenient.

Meanwhile...there is still a war going on....

An amazing post found on the Black Five blog:

General McCaffrey April 2007 Iraq Report

1. THE PROBLEM:

These are the facts.

Iraq is ripped by a low grade civil war which has worsened to catastrophic levels with as many as 3000 citizens murdered per month. The population is in despair. Life in many of the urban areas is now desperate. A handful of foreign fighters (500+) --- and a couple of thousand Al Qaeda operatives incite open factional struggle through suicide bombings which target Shia holy places and innocent civilians. Thousands of attacks target US Military Forces (2900 IED’s) a month---primarily stand off attacks with IED’s, rockets, mortars, snipers, and mines from both Shia (EFP attacks are a primary casualty producer) ---and Sunni (85% of all attacks---80% of US deaths16% of Iraqi population.)

Three million Iraqis are internally displaced or have fled the country to Syria and Jordan. The technical and educated elites are going into self-imposed exile---a huge brain drain that imperils the ability to govern. The Maliki government has little credibility among the Shia populations from which it emerged. It is despised by the Sunni as a Persian surrogate. It is believed untrustworthy and incompetent by the Kurds.

There is no function of government that operates effectively across the nation--- not health care, not justice, not education, not transportation, not labor and commerce, not electricity, not oil production. There is no province in the country in which the government has dominance. The government cannot spend its own money effectively. ($7.1 billion sits in New York banks.) No Iraqi government official, coalition soldier, diplomat, reporter, foreign NGO, nor contractor can walk the streets of Baghdad, nor Mosul, nor Kirkuk, nor Basra, nor Tikrit, nor Najaf, nor Ramadi---without heavily armed protection.

The police force is feared as a Shia militia in uniform which is responsible for thousands of extra-judicial killings. There is no effective nation-wide court system. There are in general almost no acceptable Iraqi penal institutions. The population is terrorized by rampant criminal gangs involved in kidnapping, extortion, robbery, rape, massive stealing of public property ---such as electrical lines, oil production material, government transportation, etc. (Saddam released 80,000 criminal prisoners.)

The Iraqi Army is too small, very badly equipped (inadequate light armor, junk Soviet small arms, no artillery, no helicopters to speak of, currently no actual or planned ground attack aircraft of significance, no significant air transport assets (only three C-130’s), no national military logistics system, no national military medical system, etc. The Iraqi Army is also unduly dominated by the Shia, and in many battalions lacks discipline. There is no legal authority to punish Iraqi soldiers or police who desert their comrades. (The desertion/AWOL numbers frequently leave Iraqi Army battalions at 50% strength or less.)

In total, enemy insurgents or armed sectarian militias (SCIRI, JAM, Pesh Merga, AQI, 1920’s Brigade, et. al.) probably exceed 100,000 armed fighters. These non-government armed bands are in some ways more capable of independent operations than the regularly constituted ISF. They do not depend fundamentally on foreign support for their operations. Most of their money, explosives, and leadership are generated inside Iraq. The majority of the Iraqi population (Sunni and Shia) support armed attacks on American forces. Although we have arrested 120,000 insurgents (hold 27,000) and killed some huge number of enemy combatants (perhaps 20,000+) --- the armed insurgents, militias, and Al Qaeda in Iraq without fail apparently re-generate both leadership cadres and foot soldiers. Their sophistication, numbers, and lethality go up--- not down--- as they incur these staggering battle losses.

US domestic support for the war in Iraq has evaporated and will not return. The great majority of the country thinks the war was a mistake. The US Congress now has a central focus on constraining the Administration use of military power in Iraq ---and potentially Iran. The losses of US Army, Marine, and Special Operations Force casualties in Iraq now exceed 27,000 killed and wounded. (Note: The Iraqi Security Forces have suffered more than 49,000 casualties in the last 14 months.) The war costs $9 Billion per month.

Keep on reading....it does get better! (You'll have to scroll down quite a bit to keep going...)

SOURCE: Black Five: McCaffrey Report

HAT TIP: PajamasMedia

GLOBAL WARMING is now the #1 National Security Threat!!!

It's not enough that GLOBAL WARMING is going to kill all the polar bears and penguins, now it's a NATIONAL SECURITY THREAT! This is really getting to the point of complete lunacy.

A bunch of retired generals, who have nothing better to do with there lives, have released a 63 page report indicating every possible national security threat will only be made much, much worse by GLOBAL WARMING.

My goodness--the Catholic Church will have to re-write the book of Revelations, because the GLOBAL WARMING JIHAD is making Armageddon sound like a Sunday picnic in the park by comparison.

Here is an excerpt from the LA Times:

Climate change called a security threat
By Karen Kaplan and Thomas H. Maugh II, Times Staff Writer
6:50 PM PDT, April 16, 2007

Global warming poses a "serious threat to America's national security" and the military should act now to minimize the destabilizing consequences of rising temperatures, a panel of retired generals and admirals warned Monday.

Shortages of food and water could cause weak governments to collapse, increasingly severe natural disasters could draw U.S. forces into humanitarian missions in volatile areas and melting Arctic ice could spark territorial disputes over shipping routes and natural resources.

Even the effectiveness of sonar used by U.S. submarines could be at risk if parts of the oceans become less salty.

The 63-page report describes climate change as a "threat multiplier" that makes dangerous situations all the more menacing.

"We will pay for this one way or another," said retired Marine Corps Gen. Anthony C. Zinni, who commanded U.S. forces in the Middle East. "We will pay to reduce greenhouse gas emissions today ... or we'll pay the price later in military terms. And that will involve human lives."

SOURCE: LA Times: 16 April 2007: Climate change called a security threat

So global warming is a more serious threat than global Islamic Jihad? Here's a question for those of you who think it is: Compare the total number of people who have been killed in the name of Allah, to the total number of people who have been killed as a direct result of warm weather. Then tell me how evil Global Warming really is...

We truly live in a world of complete idiots.

We could use some global warming...

Another one of the evil effects of Global Warming (NOT!) being reported by the AP: huge losses in peach crops across the southeast, due to unseasonably COLD temperatures:

COLUMBIA, S.C. - Heavy crop losses have been reported throughout the Southeast after last weekend's frigid temperatures, and farmers are bracing for another expected cold snap next week.

In South Carolina, at least 90 percent of the peach crop was destroyed and officials said Wednesday they would seek federal aid.

"This is comparable to a hurricane," Agriculture Commissioner Hugh Weathers said of the damage to the state's $40 million-a-year industry. "Growers say we'll be fortunate to get 10 percent of a crop."

In Georgia, farmers and agriculture officials were still assessing the damage, but the weekend freeze may have wiped out more than half the state's peach crop.

.....

Kentucky Agriculture Commissioner Richie Farmer has asked Gov. Ernie Fletcher to seek federal disaster relief, saying in a statement that apples and peaches there were "completely devastated."

Kentucky officials said as much as 90 percent of the state's peach and apple crops may have been destroyed, but they cautioned the figures were preliminary.

SOURCE: Associated Press: 12 APRIL 2007: Heavy crop losses reported in Southeast

HAT TIP: Drudge Report

Friend of Western Civ: Freeman Dyson

Freeman Dyson is a renowned scientist, and a Global Warming Denier! (God Bless Him.) Here is his personal, professional, scientific reason for doubting the Global Warming Jihad, given in an interview with Benny Peiser:

Benny Peiser: In a Winter Commencement Address at the University of Michigan two years ago you called yourself a heretic on global warming, the most notorious dogma of modern science. You have described global warming anxiety as grossly exaggerated and have openly voiced your doubts about the reliability of climate models. These models, you argue, "do a very poor job of describing the clouds, the dust, the chemistry and the biology of fields, farms and forests. They do not begin to describe the real world that we live in." There seems to be an almost complete endorsement of the world's scientific organisations and elites of these models together with claims that they reliably epitomize reality and can consistently predict future climate change. How do you feel belonging to a tiny minority of scientists who dare to voice their doubts openly?

Freeman Dyson: I am always happy to be in the minority. Concerning the climate models, I know enough of the details to be sure that they are unreliable. They are full of fudge factors that are fitted to the existing climate, so the models more or less agree with the observed data. But there is no reason to believe that the same fudge factors would give the right behavior in a world with different chemistry, for example in a world with increased CO2 in the atmosphere.

SOURCE: TCS Daily: 10 April 2007: Rebel with a Cause: The Optimistic Scientist

HAT TIP: PajamasMedia

The Decline and Fall of New York City

New York's long, slow decline in the world of culture and finance is no lie, more and more people are coming to the realization that New York is losing out to Europe, Asia and even the Middle-East on various fronts. It is not the dominant city it once was, and the events of 9/11, while not directly responsible, due play a role.

Here is an interesting excerpt from an article in the New York Observer about New York's loss of significance in the world of finance:

The big-money people, whose only interest in the arts is how fast their paintings are appreciating, are beginning to worry that New York will be counted out on another score: They are worried that Wall Street is starting to lose out to London. Mayor Bloomberg and Charles Schumer, Wall Street’s personal Senator, issued a joint statement saying: “Unless we improve our corporate climate, we risk allowing New York to lose its pre-eminence in the global financial-services sector.”

The high cost of doing business in New York is drawing the big money away from here, if the Bloomberg-Schumer analysis is correct. For instance, they argue, “there are more than 10 federal, state and industry regulatory bodies in the U.S. The British have only one such body. Industry experts estimate that the gross financial regulatory costs to U.S. companies are 15 times higher than in Britain. Beyond cost savings, the British enjoy another advantage: While our regulatory bodies are often competing to be the toughest cop on the street, the British regulatory body seems to be more collaborative and solutions-oriented.”

SOUCRE: New York Observer: 16 APRIL 2007: Start Spreading the (Bad) News
[They must have figured out how to time travel at the Observer...today is only April 11th, 2007...]

HAT TIP: PajamasMedia

The dangers of GLOBAL WARMING: Too much ice???

The Global Warming Jihadists love to tell us how all those cute, cuddly little Arctic animals are all going to DIE because the earth is warming up like a cat on a hot tin roof. Well, perhaps some of those animals might prefer if things were a bit warmer; here is an excerpt from an article found in the Seattle Times:

Ice forces sea otters to tundra's dangers

By The Associated Press

ANCHORAGE — An unbudging sheath of sea ice has blocked off the waters where the Alaska Peninsula's sea otters forage, forcing the starving animals inland on a search for food and making them easy prey for wolves and humans.

Some otters have waddled or slid on their bellies for several miles onto the tundra near Port Heiden, where they have been attacked by dogs, killed for their pelts or have died of malnourishment.

No one knows how many have come ashore, said village Fire Chief Mark Kosbruk. Local Natives have skinned at least 17 to make hats, gloves and blankets from the luxurious hides, he said.

Once forced onto land, the sea otters' chances of survival fall sharply. They travel awkwardly and slowly, pulling with front paws while dragging flipperlike hind feet.

Their range stretches from the Aleutian Islands to Cook Inlet. They are listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act, with numbers dropping more than 50 percent in the past 20 years to about 48,000 animals, according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service estimates.

SOURCE: The Seattle Times: 9 APRIL 2007: Ice forces sea otters to tundra's dangers

"The Mozambique Miracle"

I'm posting this editorial from the Wall Street Journal as an object lesson demonstrating the futility of Marxism, and the beauty of a market driven economy.

EDITORIAL BOARD

The Mozambique Miracle
By MATTHEW KAMINSKI
April 7, 2007; Page A8

MAPUTO, Mozambique -- In the Hulene quarter of this former Portuguese colonial capital, private minibuses swerve around holes carved in seas of mud. Metal sheets provide shelter for thousands packed in without electricity or sanitation. Illiteracy and HIV rates are shockingly high. The stench and deprivation take the breath away.

Mozambique is one of the world's poorest countries. It's also an African success story. Here, such things are relative. To the immediate west, Zimbabwe's Robert Mugabe misrules his country toward calamity. Nigeria, Ivory Coast and others are beset by civil conflict and corruption. But Mozambique, scarred by 16 years of civil war and Soviet-style economics, turned itself in the right direction on its own. Optimism, however guarded, and Africa do sometimes go together.

For all the debates over development strategies, the secret to Mozambique's recovery is simple. "We opened our markets and dropped the centralized economy," says Miquelina Menezes, who chairs the country's association of economists and runs a fund devoted to bringing electricity to rural areas. "If you want to join the world, you have to change. We needed to rebuild the country and to rebuild confidence."

The elite never experienced an ideological conversion. The main drags in Maputo, once dedicated to Portuguese worthies, are still named after Mao, Lenin and Kim Il Sung. ("It's our history, not our present," laughs Ms. Menezes. "They won't change them again.") But hyperinflation and a stagnant economy forced leaders of the neo-Marxist liberation movement, Frelimo, to shift their approach. Starting in the early 1990s, the ruling party cut subsidies, opened to outside investment, privatized firms nationalized after independence in 1975 and got a grip on borrowing and the budget. An independent central bank brought inflation into single digits. According to the World Economic Forum's competitiveness index, Mozambique has reformed more than any sub-Saharan African country.

The payoff is the highest average growth rate, at 8% over the last decade, among the continent's non-oil exporters. GDP per capita is a still tiny $320, but that's compared with $178 in 1992. Since 1997, poverty rates decreased more in rural areas (from 71% to 55%) than in urban (62% to 52%), according to the World Bank. Child mortality has declined to 152 per 1,000 live births from 235. And primary-school enrollment has risen to 71% from 43%. Once a leading recipient of food aid, Mozambique now exports maize, with 5.6% average yearly growth in farming in the last 15 years. Banks, telecom and tourist firms, many from neighboring South Africa, have come in.

"[Economic and political] stability has been the key factor" to reviving the country, says Thiago Fonseca, who runs the Golo advertising agency here. His challenges: A lack of skilled workers and HIV/AIDS, which has claimed the lives of a couple of his employees. The nation's HIV prevalence rate is 16%, which will reduce life expectancy to age 36 by 2010, from 40 today.

Appreciating the change for the better takes some imagination. Like many of its neighbors, Mozambique went from colonialism -- under Portugal, still a developing country itself -- to a Cold War-proxy conflict that claimed a million lives (out of 20 million) and left a generation uneducated. Few of the paved roads have been worked on since the Portuguese left 32 years ago. "A lot of [the growth] is catch-up after war," says the World Bank's man in Maputo, Michael Baxter.

But neighbors in similar straits haven't put in place Mozambique's fixes. Inflation in Zimbabwe is 1,700%; nearby Malawi and Zambia, their economies distorted by subsidies on commodities, are growing haphazardly. "You need political will" to get it right, says Mr. Baxter. "Starting from a low base" or "being a former colony" -- oft-heard excuses for Africa -- has little impact on economic performance. What matters, as regional dynamo Botswana also shows, is governance.

A "donor darling," Mozambique doesn't obviously squander the more than $1 billion a year in Western aid, which accounts for half the budget. Experience here suggests that a commitment to economic opening ought to be the litmus test for aid recipients.

No country in this part of the world is assured of staying on track. Erratic "Uncle Bob," as his deferential neighbors call Zimbabwe's 83-year-old Robert Mugabe, is a useful reminder that local politicians pose the gravest threat to Africa's future. In each of the three general elections since the 1990 constitution, Frelimo has won by wider margins amid accusations of fraud. Absent any peaceful turnover of power in Mozambique, Frelimo and the state are increasingly becoming one; nearly all jobs are reserved for party members.

What if it lost elections? "We'd have a serious revolution," says Fernando Lima, publisher of Mediacoop, the largest independent press group. While the government is publicly committed to free speech and democracy -- to keep donors happy, at least -- Mozambique's civil society is hampered by state domination of media, low penetration of radio and television, and weak institutions such as the courts. "Every country in Africa says it's a multi-party democracy," says Leon Louw, director of the Law Review Project in Johannesburg. "It doesn't mean it's so; it only means it's better than it could be."

In the meantime, having done the so-called first generation of market reforms, the government is dragging its feet on legalizing land ownership, fighting corruption and loosening a restrictive labor code to bring in more investment. "Now they're stuck," says Mr. Lima. "There is a strong socialist background here. If we want to perform, we need to be different."

The road ahead for a place like Mozambique is staggeringly long. About 93% of its people lack access to electricity. Half can't read; half are undernourished. But Africa needs to start somewhere, and Mozambique shows how.

SOURCE: Wall Street Journal: 7 APRIL 2007: The Mozambique Miracle

Those non-voilent pacificist Buddhists of Tibbet -- don't exist...

There are those here in the West who think the Dailia Lama and those nice, peaceful shepherds of Tibet are just some of the most genteel and peaceful people who've ever walked the earth. While there is a mountian of evidence available that could destroy this distorted viewpoint in a heartbeat, let me just point out this article that appeared on Nation Reivew Online:

The Dalai Lama’s Army
A right to self-defense is recognized by the Dalai Lama -- indeed, his predecessor tried to recruit an army.

By Dave Kopel

An al Qaeda organization is attempting to assassinate the Dalai Lama. Lashkar-e-Toiba, al Qaeda’s South Asian affiliate, is acting consistently with Osama bin Laden’s April 2006 denunciation of “pagan Buddhists.”

This raises an interesting question: Can an ethical follower of Tibetan Buddhism kill someone in order to save the Dalai Lama? Or in order to fight religious totalitarianism in general?

Absolutely yes. Although some Westerners imagine that the Dalai Lama is an absolute pacifist, the teachings of the present Dalai Lama and of his predecessor, as well as the traditions of Tibetan Buddhism, all legitimize the use of deadly force against killers and would-be tyrants.

This may come as news to certain anti-American pacifists in the United States and Europe who are guilty of “Shangri-La-ism” — of what Jane Ardley (in her book The Tibetan Independence Movement) describes as the “idealized, romantic vision of Tibet as a land of enlightened, non-violent, happy and exotic people.” She observes, “For those in the West who look to Tibetan Buddhism for all the answers to their insecurities, the image of ‘violent’ Buddhists is uncomfortable particularly where Buddhism itself can be offered as a justification for their actions.”

SOURCE: National Review Online: 5 APRIL 2007: The Dalai Lama's Army

Charlie Brown converts to ISLAM...

Charlie Brown's Jihad Christmas:



HAT TIP: Pierre Legrand

Rosie O'Donnell 9/11 Conspiracy Comments: Popular Mechanics Responds

Rosie O'Donnel made a complete ass of herself on the television program "The View" espousing ignorant, hateful conspiracy theory garbage that has to be heard to be believed.

If you are wondering about her bizarre comments concerning World Trade Center Building 7, it seems as the left-wing lunatics believe THE UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT blew it up, (as well as being behind the planes that flew into the twin towers!!!) All of this, of course, is based on absolutely NO EVIDENCE. It's pure left-wing stupidity and irrational hatred on parade for all the world to see.

Well, at least one organization, Popular Mechanics, has taken the time to debunk Rosie, and the goof balls who are on her side. For added fun, you just HAVE TO read the comments section on the Popular Mechanics web site, and see how many people are so willing to put their ignorance on public display...it simply defies any rational explanation.

SOURCE: Popular Mechanics: 30 MARCH 2007: Rosie O'Donnell 9/11 Conspiracy Comments: Popular Mechanics Responds

HAT TIP: Michelle Malkin

Left-wing tolerance, love and non-violence -- NOT!!!

Left-wingers just love, LOVE to endlessly diss conservatives on their hatred, racism, intolerance, and bad haircuts. But to they live up to those standards themselves, or, is it more like EVERYTHING else that the left "stands" for: another double standard is in effect? You be the judge...

There is a wonderful example left-wing tolerance, love and human dignity for all to see over at the Scripps Howard News Service. The context: "The Tennessee Center for Policy Research recently generated headlines when it announced that former Vice President Al Gore's Nashville estate "devoured nearly 221,000 kilowatt-hours" of electricity in 2006, "more than 20 times the national average.""

Seems as if the Gore worshipers got their knickers in a twist about that none-to-flattering revelation that the Goracle is a mega-hypocrite.

Just read some of the snippets from the love notes sent to the Tennessee Center from those tolerant, loving, caring members of the far Left Wing. You'll be overcome with love and compassion...might even get a warm fuzzy.

HAT TIP: Michelle Malkin

"Show us your chocolate Mohammeds. Show us your Korans dipped in urine."

If you haven't noticed, there is a blatant and obvious double standard when it comes to dissing relgions. Christians and Jews are dissed on nearly a daily basis (Just check out this Jewish tribute that was featured on the Daily Kos...) but, for some odd reason, the left-wing liberal moonbats fall as silent as a church mouse when it comes to dissing the most violent, intolerant religion on planet earth: Isalm.

Maybe it's because if you dis Islam, your friends will be watching your head being hacked off on YouTube.

Well, even the agnostics are seeing the blatant hypocrisy of this double standard, and are beginning to take a stand--for Christianity. Alan Bolt, an agnostic and a columnist for Australia's Herald Sun, writes a column that highlights the double standard that has become self-evident all over Western Civilization. Here is a giant size excerpt for your reading pleasure:

...it seems the cheap-shot sneers of intolerant atheists are fewer this year. More muted. And the squawks we still hear seem more contemptible.

It would be no wonder. I wouldn’t be alone in thinking each time an artist or commentator insults Christians: friend, if you’re so brave, say that about Islam.

Show us your chocolate Mohammeds. Show us your Korans dipped in urine.

Where is the singer who will rip up a Koran as Marilyn Manson ripped up a Bible? Or will on television tear up a picture of Islam’s most honoured preacher as Sinead O’Connor shredded one of the great Pope John Paul II?

It’s not as if Islam doesn’t threaten our artists more than does Christianity.

See only the murder of film director Theo van Gogh or the fatwa on writer Salman Rushdie or the stabbing of Rushdie’s translator. Or see those deadly riots against the Mohammed cartoons.

So when I see a Western artist mock Christ, I see an artist advertising not his courage but his cowardice – by not daring to mock what would threaten him more.

I am most certainly not saying that moderate Islam should now be treated with the childish disrespect so often shown to Christianity.

Nor am I saying most Muslims endorse violence, or that there aren’t a few Christians who might turn violent, too.

After all, the chocolate Jesus has been removed from display when Lab Gallery’s boss was bombarded with complaints and even – he claims – threats.

But I am saying that more people now know there is a double standard here illustrated perfectly by the Melbourne International Comedy Festival, which banned acts that told jokes against Muslims but promoted ones that lampooned Christians.

It’s this blatant double standard that may finally have shamed some of the usual jeerers into showing Christianity a little respect.

And perhaps – just perhaps – more of us might be wakening to a truth we too long took for granted. It’s no accident that we feel safer insulting Christians than trashing almost anyone else.

This is a religion that’s always preached tolerance, reason and non-violence, even if too many of its followers have seemed deaf.

It’s also urged us to leave the judgment of others to God (a message I ignore for professional reasons). We are the beneficiaries of that preaching, even those of us who aren’t Christians.

We live in a society, founded on Christian principles, that guards our right to speak, and even to abuse things we should praise.

We can now vilify Jesus and damn priests, and risk nothing but hard looks from a soft bishop, and a job offer from The Age.

SOURCE: Morning Herald: 6 APRIL 2007: Kinder to our Christians

HAT TIP: Michelle Malkin

Enemy of Western Civ: The Supreme Court (well, at least five of the nine justices anyway...)

It seems that the five left-leaning ACTIVIST Supreme Court justices have decided that CARBON DIOXIDE is a POLLUTANT that MUST be regulated by the EPA! I guess we will all need to get permits from Uncle Sam in order to exhale.

The Wall Street Journal posted a SCATHING editorial about the utter stupidity of this decision in today's paper. Excerpt:

Jolly Green Justices
April 3, 2007; Page A14

The current Supreme Court is a talented group of jurists, but until yesterday we didn't think their expertise ran to climatology. The Justices would have done better in their big global warming decision if they'd stuck more closely to the law.

They showed no such modesty. In Massachusetts v. Environmental Protection Agency, a narrow majority managed to diminish the rules of judicial standing, rewrite the definition of "pollutant" under the Clean Air Act, and dramatically curtail the decision-making authority of the executive branch. And judging from Justice John Paul Stevens's 5-4 majority decision, they did so because the five Justices are personally anxious about rising temperatures. As Justice Antonin Scalia noted in dissent, the "Court's alarm over global warming" has led it to substitute "its own desired outcome" for the EPA's judgment.

The case goes back to 1999, when activists frustrated that Congress hadn't enacted a global warming program demanded that the EPA use its Clean Air Act power to unilaterally regulate CO2 "pollutants" from cars. The EPA declined to do so in 2003, claiming it lacked authority under the Clean Air Act to regulate CO2. The greens and several states turned to that mecca for frustrated liberal policy makers -- the courts.

The five Supreme climatologists granted Al Gore's fondest wish by declaring that "the harms associated with climate change are serious and well recognized." The majority warned about a "precipitous rise in sea levels," "severe and irreversible changes to natural ecosystems" and "increases in the spread of disease."

The Court used all of this not-so-inadvertent opining to justify its conclusion that CO2 is indeed a "pollutant." The Clean Air Act requires the EPA to regulate "any air pollutant" from cars that might "endanger public health or welfare," though the majority took the widest view that the definition includes any "physical, chemical" substance that goes in the air. (Next up: oxygen.) Justice Scalia poked fun at this reasoning, noting Webster's definition of "pollute" is "to make or render impure or unclean" -- which might apply to sulfur dioxide or other dirty gases but not a product of human respiration that resides in the upper atmosphere.

In any case, isn't this something for Congress to decide? Global warming was already a hot topic in 1990, when Congress last amended the Clean Air Act. Yet it declined to enact amendments that would have forced the EPA to set CO2 emissions standards. The Members have since been engaged in periodic brawls over whether and how to regulate CO2, but, voila, the High Court has now declared that it shall be so.

The ruling means the EPA must regulate automobile CO2 emissions unless that agency can show the science of global warming, or the potential harm it may cause, are too uncertain to justify action. The Bush EPA will no doubt be sued whatever it does. Congress will also dive in with more regulation, if only to clear up the legal uncertainty.

Perhaps most distressing is the way the majority made a hash of traditional "standing" doctrine, which determines when a plaintiff has a right to sue. To justify its global warming afflatus, the Justices simply asserted that the Massachusetts coastline faces imminent threat from rising seas. Not even Mr. Gore goes that far. But the Court cites climate models to suggest future harm in order to claim the threat of immediate injury, and thus standing by the Bay State.

"Aside from a single conclusory statement, there is nothing in petitioners' 43 standing declarations and accompanying exhibits to support an inference of actual loss of Massachusetts coastal land from 20th century global sea level increases," writes Chief Justice John Roberts in his dissent. "It is pure conjecture."

And done for the purpose of pure policy invention. Standing is one of the few self-restraints on the power of the federal courts, and it is a far too frequent habit of the current Supreme Court to view its own power as unlimited. By diluting the standards for standing, the High Court creates a highway by which judges can speed past the political branches and play an ever larger role in American public life.

It is also worth noting that this is at least the third case in two years in which Justice Kennedy has provided the fifth vote for a decidedly activist liberal majority. Someone recently quipped that Justice Stevens considers it his late life's work to compete for the jump ball that is the jurisprudence of Justice Kennedy, and he seems to be winning most possessions.

SOURCE: The Wall Street Journal: 3 APRIL 2007: Jolly Green Justices
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