SOME MISSILE NEWS

Unhappy Iranians: "Information coming out of Iran indicates that the military there is very dismayed at how ineffective new Russian anti-aircraft systems were during the Israeli September 6th air strike on a Syrian weapons development facility near the Iraqi border. Syria and Iran have both bought billions of dollars worth of the latest Russian anti-aircraft missile systems. Apparently the Israelis were able to blind these systems electronically. Syria isn't saying anything, nor are the Israelis, but Iranian officers are complaining openly that they have been had by the Russians. The Iranians bought Russian equipment based on assurances that the gear would detect and shoot down Israeli warplanes.... The Iranians fear an Israeli air strike against their nuclear weapons development facilities. It was thought the new Russian missiles and radars would persuade the Israelis to stay away. But now the raid on Syria looks like a dress rehearsal for one a little further east. Since Iranian leaders have openly called for the destruction of Israel, one can't deny the Israelis a little self-defense. Thus the cries and whispers in Iranian military headquarters. A lot of this is leaking on to Farsi language email and message boards. There is much angst and unhappiness."

Missile defense test successful against dummy Nork type missile: "A U.S. interceptor missile on Friday shot down a dummy warhead replicating an incoming North Korean missile in the seventh successful test of Boeing Co's long-range missile shield, the Pentagon said. The Missile Defense Agency said in a statement it completed a test "involving a successful intercept by a ground-based interceptor missile designed to protect the United States against a limited long-range ballistic missile attack." The interceptor missile was launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base on California's central coast, and its target was fired from Alaska's Kodiak Island."

Taiwan plans its own missiles to hit China: "Faced with a threatening military buildup by China, an increasingly outgunned Taiwan is quietly pushing ahead with plans to develop missiles that could strike the mainland, defense and security experts say. Taiwan successfully tested its first cruise missile with that kind of range this year, one that could send a nearly 900-pound warhead more than 600 miles, to targets as distant as Shanghai, military analysts said. Some Taiwanese military specialists have argued for decades that Taiwan should develop offensive weapons, including missiles, as a deterrent to the mainland, which has threatened to attack the self-governing island if it moves toward formal independence. The Pentagon estimates that China has deployed 900 missiles across from Taiwan".

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On 28th. I reproduced here a report which said that Deputy Chief global warming alarmist, James Hansen (Al Gore is of course Chief Alarmist) received $720,000 from a George Soros foundation. The report was based on Soros foundation documents but Hansen has since denied that he received any Soros money. Newsbusters points out how evasive the denial is. It would appear that the money went to Hansen's benefit via a third party.

Don Surber's Week that was is good again. Very sarcastic about the Green/Left.

Senator Vitter exposes LOST dangers: "The senator demonstrated on Thursday, during a hearing into the U.N.'s Law of the Sea Treaty, that he is going to continue to do the job he was elected to do. Vitter's performance was so effective that he left State and Defense Department officials either speechless or caught up in embarrassing contradictions about the impact of this international agreement on America's security and sovereignty. It should now be perfectly obvious that Bush Administration officials, in collusion with liberal Senators, are trying to bamboozle the Senate into quickly ratifying a very dangerous pact."

GOP Albatross Is Dems' Tar Baby: "Judging by the answers given by Democratic presidential candidates on Wednesday night to the question of whether there will still be troops in Iraq in 2013 following the first term, it seems certain that the mission will continue in one form or another Bush or no Bush. The enormity of the military conflict in Iraq was spelled out in the simplest of all admissions tonight: Among all of the leading Democratic candidates for president, none was willing to commit to a promise in a campaign debate that all of the U.S. combat forces deployed in Iraq will be gone by 2013, the end of the next president's term in office. When pressed to the wall, the Democratic candidates demonstrated that despite all the tough talk about withdrawing from Iraq, they are as much a hostage to events there as the President. Like the Republicans, they are well and truly stuck with Bush's policies, the Maliki government, al-Sadr's plotting, and the rest of the crummy situation that will continue to exist for the foreseeable future in Iraq. There is no going back or getting out quickly. And the Democratic candidates, at the risk of riling up their rabid, anti-war base (and recognizing the facts of life on Iraq all along despite rhetoric to the contrary) are responsible enough and practical enough to see that there is no briar patch nearby where this tar baby can be shed." [Note the term "tar baby". It makes Leftists froth over its imagined "racism"]

Murtha ordered to testify in Haditha defamation case: "A federal judge refused Friday to dismiss a defamation case against Rep. John P. Murtha and ordered the Pennsylvania Democrat to give a sworn deposition about his comments alleging "cold-blooded murder and war crimes" by unnamed soldiers in connection with Iraqi civilian deaths. A Marine Corps sergeant is suing the 18-term congressman for making the charge, which the soldier claims is false. Murtha, who opposes the Iraq war, made the comment during a May, 2006 Capitol Hill news conference in which he predicted that a Pentagon war crimes investigation will show Marines killed dozens of innocent Iraqi civilians in Haditha in 2005."

The UAW's Awakening : "This week's deal between General Motors and the United Auto Workers is being hailed as a new era for Detroit, and for once that advertising may be justified. The UAW in particular made historic concessions that show a new awareness of global competition. What's less encouraging is how much this reality-based compromise still contrasts with the policies that unions and their political friends are promoting in the unreal world of Washington, D.C.... Under the deal, wages are frozen, save for bonuses and some lump-sum payments. GM in turn promises to invest in American plants with UAW workers, though of course it will also keep investing abroad. In what seems to be the most creative stroke, GM will pay some $35 billion toward a new health-care trust fund to be administered by the union. That's a big initial cash flow, but it means the company can divest itself of some $50 billion in long-term liabilities, which would only have grown as health-care costs rose and retirees lived longer. Investors loved it, driving up GM stock by around 7% for the week."

Black Group Welcomes Supreme Court Decision to Hear Voter ID Case: "Calling voting "one of the most fundamental rights we have," members of the Project 21 black leadership network are calling on the U.S. Supreme Court to provide a clear and unmistakable ruling on the constitutionality of states requiring voters to show photo identification at polls before the 2008 general elections. Proponents of voter ID requirements say they want to lessen the likelihood of voter fraud. Opponents, such as Democratic strategist Donna Brazile, say that asking for a driver's license or passport at a polling station is the equivalent of a "modern-day poll tax." "While I am appalled that the Supreme Court feels compelled to have to take up such a case in the first place, it is important we get this issue behind us before the next election," said Project 21's Kevin Martin. "Voting is one of the most fundamental rights we have as Americans, and we have a right to a process that is free of fraud and corruption." Six states currently require some sort of photo ID be presented before ballots are issued to voters. Photo ID laws were challenged and upheld by the courts in Indiana, Georgia and Arizona. In Missouri, a photo ID law was struck down last year".

For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, IMMIGRATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL and EYE ON BRITAIN.

List of backup or "mirror" sites here or here -- for readers in China or for everyone when blogspot is "down" or failing to update. Email me here (Hotmail address). My Home Pages are here or here or here

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"Why should the German be interested in the liberation of the Jew, if the Jew is not interested in the liberation of the German?... We recognize in Judaism, therefore, a general anti-social element of the present time... In the final analysis, the emancipation of the Jews is the emancipation of mankind from Judaism.... Indeed, in North America, the practical domination of Judaism over the Christian world has achieved as its unambiguous and normal expression that the preaching of the Gospel itself and the Christian ministry have become articles of trade... Money is the jealous god of Israel, in face of which no other god may exist". Who said that? Hitler? No. It was Karl Marx. See also here and here and here.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist" (Nationalsozialistisch) and the full name of Hitler's political party (translated) was "The National Socialist German Workers' Party".

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Columbia University's Past: Nazi Ambassador Invited to Speak in 1933

According to the David Wyman Institute of Holocaust Studies, Columbia University's invitation to Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is not the first granted by that prestigious institution to the representative of a despotism committed to anti-semitism.

The invitation to Iran's leader may seem less surprising, but no less disturbing, when one recalls that in 1933, Columbia president Nicholas Murray Butler invited Nazi Germany's ambassador to the United States, Hans Luther, to speak on campus, and also hosted a reception for him. Luther represented "the government of a friendly people," Butler insisted. He was "entitled to be received ... with the greatest courtesy and respect." Ambassador Luther's speech focused on what he characterized as Hitler's peaceful intentions. Students who criticized the Luther invitation were derided as "ill-mannered children" by the director of Columbia's Institute of Arts and Sciences.

And this was not all. Three years later Columbia would send a delegation to celebrate the 550th annniversary of the University of Heidelberg, even though it had already been purged of Jewish faculty members, instituted a Nazi curriculum and burned books by Jewish authors. Could this be the effect of the importation of German scholarship in the previous century? Or just that every generation supplies its share of useful idiots?

Source

What it shows is that Leftists have a compulsion to portray themselves as in possession of superior wisdom -- even if to do so they have to deny the obvious

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Cao is keeping up awareness of the traitorous plan to turn the flight 93 memorial (See the plan above of the proposed memorial -- a crescent oriented towards Mecca) into something that honours Islam rather than honouring the American victims of Islamic fanatics on 9/11. G M Roper has more.

Something the MSM have ignored: A former President of Italy, Francesco Cossiga, has furiously returned the honorary doctorate given to him by Columbia University because of the university's hosting of the antisemitic President Ahmadinejad of Iran.

Hillary outsmarts her dovish competition: "Kudos to Hillary Clinton--yes, you read that right--for her Senate vote this week urging the U.S. to designate Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps as a foreign terrorist organization. That's more than can be said for her primary competition of Barack Obama, Chris Dodd, Bill Richardson and John Edwards, who assailed her on this score at Wednesday's Democratic Presidential candidates debate at Dartmouth. These are men who seem to fear the Netroots more than the mullahs. Mrs. Clinton's vote was on a symbolic amendment offered by Connecticut maverick Joe Lieberman and Republicans Jon Kyl and Norm Coleman."

Hillary good for GOP: "A leaked Democratic poll has suggested that Hillary Clinton, the front runner in the race for the party's presidential nomination, could lose the 2008 election because of her "very polarised image". The survey by the Democratic pollsters Lake Research indicated that both Mrs Clinton and Barack Obama, second in the Democratic race, trailed Rudy Giuliani, the Republican front runner, in 31 swing congressional districts. All party preference polls show that Democrats are much more popular than Republicans. But when the names of individual candidates are used, the gap narrows considerably. "The images of the two early [Democratic] favorites are part of the problem," the memo said. The leaked poll found that Mr Giuliani, a centrist Republican with liberal stances on issues such as abortion and gay rights, leads Mrs Clinton by 49 per cent to 39 per cent in the swing districts."

Some in the Netherlands get it: "Critic of Islam, Ehsan Jami, and Freedom Party leader, Geert Wilders, compared the Prophet Mohammed to Adolf Hitler in a co-written article published in the Dutch daily Volkskrant Thursday. In their article, Wilders and Jami say strong criticism of Islam is absolutely necessary. "If we do not act now against the far-reaching Islamisation of the Netherlands, then the 1930s will be revived. The only difference is that back then the danger came from Adolf Hitler, while today it comes from Mohammed." The article is a response to an interview with Tjibbe Joustra, chief of the Dutch counter-terrorism body NCTB. In the interview, published in the daily newspaper Algemeen Dagblad on September 24, Joustra said making bold statements about Islam and Muslim immigrants might push fundamentalists over the edge."

A Quiet Triumph May be Brewing: "There are signs that the global Islamic jihad movement is splitting apart, in what would be a tremendous achievement for American strategy. The center of the action is in Pakistan and Afghanistan, the very territory which is thought to harbor Usama, and from which Al Qaeda was able to launch 9/11. Capitalizing on existing splits, a trap was set and closed, and the benefist have only begun to be evident."

Spitzer meeting resistance over illegals: "Last week NY Governor Eliot Spitzer(D) announced that the state would no long require proof of citizenship or legal residence to get a drivers license. This week, county clerks who issue the licenses in NY voiced concern as did NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg. "Many of us think the whole idea is crazy and ill-fated," said Rensselaer County Clerk Frank Merola. "I myself will not process any driver's license renewal or driver's license verification for someone who cannot prove legal status." The Democratic governor's decision comes as the Department of Homeland Security is pushing all 50 states to tighten their identification standards. Merola said Spitzer's approach "is going just the opposite way" as the federal government. . Bloomberg said Wednesday that the city's lawyer "does believe that in fact this would make New York's state driver's licenses ineligible to be used to get on an airplane. People would need other form of identification, generally a passport, and that would be a very big problem."

Virginia Democrats appoint Jihadi to immigration job (until it gets known): "A member of the state's Commission of Immigration resigned Thursday, a few hours after Gov. Timothy M. Kaine was told about online videos showing the appointee condemning Israel and advocating "the jihad way." Kaine issued a statement saying he had accepted the resignation of Dr. Esam S. Omeish. He said Omeish offered to resign because he didn't want anything to distract the work of the commission."

For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, IMMIGRATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL and EYE ON BRITAIN.

List of backup or "mirror" sites here or here -- for readers in China or for everyone when blogspot is "down" or failing to update. Email me here (Hotmail address). My Home Pages are here or here or here

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"Why should the German be interested in the liberation of the Jew, if the Jew is not interested in the liberation of the German?... We recognize in Judaism, therefore, a general anti-social element of the present time... In the final analysis, the emancipation of the Jews is the emancipation of mankind from Judaism.... Indeed, in North America, the practical domination of Judaism over the Christian world has achieved as its unambiguous and normal expression that the preaching of the Gospel itself and the Christian ministry have become articles of trade... Money is the jealous god of Israel, in face of which no other god may exist". Who said that? Hitler? No. It was Karl Marx. See also here and here and here.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist" (Nationalsozialistisch) and the full name of Hitler's political party (translated) was "The National Socialist German Workers' Party".

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LOST should get lost

"Time was, Ronald Reagan's 600-ship Navy gave us freedom of the seas. But if Joe Biden and the Senate have their way, we'll need the permission of 21 judges in Hamburg. On Thursday, presidential wannabe Biden will chair hearings intended to lead to the ratification of the quarter-century-old Law of the Sea treaty (LOST), a document that would severely restrict our ability to use oceans to defend ourselves and would turn over control of 70% of the world's surface to a U.N. bureaucracy.

Supporters say we must be a signatory to guarantee our share of the resources to be found under the world's oceans and to avoid situations like the race to claim the sea bed under the Arctic between Russia, Canada and other states. But experience suggests a Law of the Sea tribunal won't protect interests we should be protecting ourselves. LOST would create an International Seabed Authority (ISA) with the power to regulate and tax things like seabed mining, fishing rights and deep-sea oil exploration. The ISA would decide who gets access to the sea's resources, and the companies granted these rights would pay a royalty to the ISA.

When he refused to sign ISA in 1982, President Reagan rightly decided the U.S. shouldn't be a part of this global resource grab and redistribution of wealth. It's in the area of national security that LOST is most dangerous. The [Bush] administration cites military support for the treaty because of its uniform limit on territorial waters and its establishment of `rules of the road' for littoral waters. But current international law already protects nonaggressive passage of military ships. When Reagan vetoed the treaty, the U.S. Navy had 594 warships. We could protect our own right of passage. Today the fleet has withered to 276 vessels. Is that why we need the treaty? The answer is to build more warships. Our access to the seas should be guaranteed by the Navy and not a U.N. bureaucracy."

Source

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Soros supports checkbook science and astroturf immigration rallies

How many people, for instance, know that James Hansen, a man billed as a lonely "NASA whistleblower" standing up to the mighty U.S. government, was really funded by Soros' Open Society Institute , which gave him "legal and media advice"? That's right, Hansen was packaged for the media by Soros' flagship "philanthropy," by as much as $720,000, most likely under the OSI's "politicization of science" program. That may have meant that Hansen had media flacks help him get on the evening news to push his agenda and lawyers pressuring officials to let him spout his supposedly "censored" spiel for weeks in the name of advancing the global warming agenda. Hansen even succeeded, with public pressure from his nightly news performances, in forcing NASA to change its media policies to his advantage. Had Hansen's OSI-funding been known, the public might have viewed the whole production differently. The outcome could have been different.

That's not the only case. Didn't the mainstream media report that 2006's vast immigration rallies across the country began as a spontaneous uprising of 2 million angry Mexican-flag waving illegal immigrants demanding U.S. citizenship in Los Angeles, egged on only by a local Spanish-language radio announcer Turns out that wasn't what happened, either. Soros' OSI had money-muscle there, too, through its $17 million Justice Fund. The fund lists 19 projects in 2006. One was vaguely described involvement in the immigration rallies. Another project funded illegal immigrant activist groups for subsequent court cases. So what looked like a wildfire grassroots movement really was a manipulation from OSI's glassy Manhattan offices. The public had no way of knowing until the release of OSI's 2006 annual report.

Meanwhile, OSI cash backed terrorist-friendly court rulings, too. Do people know last year's Supreme Court ruling abolishing special military commissions for terrorists at Guantanamo was a Soros project? OSI gave support to Georgetown lawyers in 2006 to win Hamdan v. Rumsfeld - for the terrorists. OSI also gave cash to other radicals who pressured the Transportation Security Administration to scrap a program called "Secure Flight," which matched flight passenger lists with terrorist names. It gave more cash to other left-wing lawyers who persuaded a Texas judge to block cell phone tracking of terrorists.

How did the NY Times and Washington Post miss this blockbuster report on a rich guy who is underwriting attacks on the government? Weren't they all in favor of getting money out of politics and not allowing the rich to dominate the political process?

Source

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Swedish Tax Cuts?: "Sweden's centre-right government pledged to continue its tax reform plans earlier this week, announcing cuts in personal income tax worth about US$1.6 billion (around SKr11 billion). ...Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt told lawmakers that the latest round of tax reforms was aimed at creating more incentives to work, thereby cutting Sweden's rate of unemployment. ...In other actions that will chip away at Sweden's huge welfare state, the government will reduce sick pay in the first year by 5% to a maximum of 75% of salary... The government has also promised to eliminate Sweden's wealth tax, charged at 1.5% on savings of over SKR1.5 million (US$214,000) for single people, and at the same rate on savings of more than SKR3 million for couples.

Confrontation for Sarkozy and Unions: "President Nicolas Sarkozy will face his first strike on Oct. 18 after five of France's eight railway unions called for a day of protests, vowing to defend their right to retire at 50. The strikes will be a test of labor's strength against Sarkozy's resolve to overhaul pension privileges enjoyed by 500,000 public sector employees. ...The unions seem to have been shaken by Sarkozy's determination. Unlike in 1995 and 2003, public opinion is firmly opposed to public sector pension privileges.

Feminism has failed: "Two new research papers, using very different methods, have both come to this conclusion. Betsey Stevenson and Justin Wolfers, economists at the University of Pennsylvania (and a couple), have looked at the traditional happiness data, in which people are simply asked how satisfied they are with their overall lives. In the early 1970s, women reported being slightly happier than men. Today, the two have switched places." (H/T Keith B-J)

Backlash Against Bollinger Hits Columbia: "A backlash against the president of Columbia University, Lee Bollinger, who on Monday delivered a harsh rebuke to President Ahmadinejad, is coming from faculty members and students who said he struck an "insulting tone" and that his remarks amounted to "schoolyard taunts." The fierceness of Mr. Bollinger's critique bought the Iranian some sympathy on campus that he didn't deserve, the critics said, and amounted to a squandered opportunity to provide a lesson in diplomacy."

For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, IMMIGRATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL and EYE ON BRITAIN.

List of backup or "mirror" sites here or here -- for readers in China or for everyone when blogspot is "down" or failing to update. Email me here (Hotmail address). My Home Pages are here or here or here

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"Why should the German be interested in the liberation of the Jew, if the Jew is not interested in the liberation of the German?... We recognize in Judaism, therefore, a general anti-social element of the present time... In the final analysis, the emancipation of the Jews is the emancipation of mankind from Judaism.... Indeed, in North America, the practical domination of Judaism over the Christian world has achieved as its unambiguous and normal expression that the preaching of the Gospel itself and the Christian ministry have become articles of trade... Money is the jealous god of Israel, in face of which no other god may exist". Who said that? Hitler? No. It was Karl Marx. See also here and here and here.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist" (Nationalsozialistisch) and the full name of Hitler's political party (translated) was "The National Socialist German Workers' Party".

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Brookes News Update

How the Laffer curve really works: The basis of the Laffer curve is the intuitive knowledge that if you want more of something then reduce the cost of producing it. Nevertheless, no one has shown how the Laffer curve works This article attempts to do just that with the use of a couple of simple diagrams
Defending tax cuts against leftist journalists: Lefty journalists cannot help themselves. Once again revealing their total ignorance of economics, economic history and the history of economic thought they engaged in scaremongering by making false statements about the dire consequences of tax cuts
China's economy is heading into very stormy weather: Credit-led boom is piling up ever increasing amounts of malinvestments. Calculations done by Morgan Stanley estimated that whereas 13 per cent of reported profits were of the non-operating variety last year, this has now soared to over 30 per cent
Hillary Clinton's middle class tax hike: Hillary Clinton is planning a range of tax hikes that will sock it hard to the middle class, which is odd considering that politicians like Hillary constantly talk about how much they want to help the middle class
Fidel Castro: Reagan's savior?: The evidence that Castro personally ordered the murder of President Kennedy is steadily mounting. Nevertheless, the media still refuses to report anything that might possibly implicate Castro in Kennedy's assassination. So much for media honesty
Clinton Doctrine versus Bush Doctrine : The Clinton doctrine is carried forth today by Democrats who blame America for the terrorists who seek to overturn the will of millions of Iraqis who voted in the first free election held in the region in history
Moonbats jump the shark: All the Democrats have to sell are defeat, fear, and bad news - plus their traditional solutions for any perceived problem: higher taxes and more government control over your life. Thus any good news for America and the world is bad news for them
The Gray Lady's shame: Never has the New York Times behaved more shamefully on September 10, 2007. On that day it ran a full-page ad accusing General David Petraeus of being a traitor for doing his job fighting the War of Terror
Productivity vs. jobs: another economic fallacy: Like all enemies of the market Mike Steketee cannot bring himself to accept certain fundamental economic laws, one of which is that overpricing goods or services will create a surplus. According to this genius increasing productivity destroy jobs and creates poverty. So does Rupert Murdoch's Australian publish Steketee's rubbish?

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Union Fund Embezzlements 'Epidemic,' Analyst Says: "Eleven union officials were indicted and eight were convicted in August on charges of embezzling union pension funds, following probes launched by federal auditors and investigators at the U.S. Department of Labor. According to a report released Monday by the department's Office of Labor-Management Standards (OLMS), 84 indictments for corruption have been issued thus far in 2007, leading to the conviction of 108 union officials. All told, nearly 800 convictions have been obtained since 2001, with court-ordered restitution exceeding $101 million, said Deputy Assistant Labor Secretary Don Todd, who announced the report's release. In the largest enforcement effort, Jorge Aponte-Figueroa, the former president of the International Longshoreman's Association Local 1740 in San Juan, Puerto Rico, was sentenced to five years in prison and three years of supervised release for embezzling $1.9 million in union funds. He also was found guilty of falsifying records and money laundering".

Kicking them when they're down: "Politicians and bureaucrats have power and are often careless about how they use it. Respect for the rights of innocent people? Not always a priority. Not even in New Orleans, where so many are struggling to pick themselves back up after one of the toughest gut punches anybody can suffer. So you live through Hurricane Katrina, return to the city, spend thousands to fix your home. Double-check to make sure it isn't targeted for demolition. Then what? Well, if you're IdaBelle Joshua, two days after City Hall says your home is safe ... it's smashed! Gone. No prior notice except tiny type in a newspaper somewhere."

Wheel rediscovered: "For centuries men believed themselves to be smarter than the fairer sex, who they felt were only equipped for wifely duties. Now a study has revealed that the male of the species is actually more intelligent. But there's a catch - he's also more stupid. When scientists measured the intelligence of more than 2500 brothers and sisters, they found a disproportionate number of men in both the top 2 per cent and the bottom 2 per cent. There were twice as many men as women in the smartest group. But there were also twice as many men among the dunces. The subjects were tested on science, maths, English and mechanical abilities. The average scores of the men were virtually identical to that of the women. Professor Bates, of Scotland's Edinburgh University, said: "The female developmental program may be tilted more towards ensuring survival and the safety of the middle ground."

Same old drivel: "Listening to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad address the UN, I was struck by how mainstream American left he is. From his anti-Semitism to blaming the United States for all the woes of the world to blaming poverty on capitalism - even to his views on global warming - Ahmadinejad hit all the lefty talking points except for gay marriage. Well, Bill Clinton codified don't-ask, don't-tell and signed DOMA into law. Nobody's perfect. But Americans have heard it all before. In the 1960s, it was Nikita Khrushchev and Fidel Castro. In the 1970s, Yasser Arafat. In the 1980s, Mikhail Gorbachev. Last year, Hugo Chavez. This year, this guy. What they share in common besides their iron-fisted rule at home (Arafat within the PLO) is a streak of anti-Americanism, anti-capitalism and anti-Semitism."

Tax the internet? "Legislation in Congress to make the Internet tax ban permanent has strong bipartisan support, but that doesn't mean it should be taken for granted. In fact, it recently hit a snag over the unrelated issue of how satellite TV is taxed, while there continue to be disputes over when grandfather clauses that allow some states to tax the Internet should finally be closed. Given the tight timeframe - the current moratorium is due to expire on November 1 - it's possible that a slew of new Internet taxes could in fact arrive this fall.... A federal moratorium first put in place in 1998, and subsequently extended, has protected the Internet from access taxes and discriminatory or multiple taxation... If the moratorium is allowed to expire, states will likely impose new taxes on Internet access fees, bit-taxes on downloads, and perhaps even e-mail taxes."

Major Insurance Company Planning to Escape Germany's High Taxes: "Hannover Re, one of the world's largest reinsurance companies, is considering switching its operations to Ireland or another low tax jurisdiction, the company's chief executive told a conference recently. According to Bermuda's Royal Gazette, Wilhelm Zeller, CEO of Hannover Re, told a press conference at the annual reinsurance gathering, Le Rendez-Vous in Monte Carlo, that the $5.5 billion firm is considering moving from its present base in Germany... "For us, the ideal location, from a fiscal point of view, would be Ireland," Zeller stated, although he added that setting up headquarters in Dublin could be costly." [H/T Market Center blog]

For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, IMMIGRATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL and EYE ON BRITAIN.

List of backup or "mirror" sites here or here -- for readers in China or for everyone when blogspot is "down" or failing to update. Email me here (Hotmail address). My Home Pages are here or here or here

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"Why should the German be interested in the liberation of the Jew, if the Jew is not interested in the liberation of the German?... We recognize in Judaism, therefore, a general anti-social element of the present time... In the final analysis, the emancipation of the Jews is the emancipation of mankind from Judaism.... Indeed, in North America, the practical domination of Judaism over the Christian world has achieved as its unambiguous and normal expression that the preaching of the Gospel itself and the Christian ministry have become articles of trade... Money is the jealous god of Israel, in face of which no other god may exist". Who said that? Hitler? No. It was Karl Marx. See also here and here and here.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist" (Nationalsozialistisch) and the full name of Hitler's political party (translated) was "The National Socialist German Workers' Party".

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Islamics and Leftists have a "logic" that serves their needs, not truth

With projection and denial prominent

In the unconscious mind, where symmetrical logic rules the night, the stronger the emotion one is feeling, the more "symmetrical deductions" are likely to occur. For example, as Bomford writes, on a deep unconscious level, "one who hates has to believe that his or her hatred is returned." Note that this is a logical operation, only based upon a different sort of logic. This logic is no doubt the source of the psychotic fear of Israel in the Islamic world. Their unconscious hatred is so profound that it simultaneously reverses the relation, so that they can't help perceiving that Israel hates them. But Israelis just want to shop, raise their families, or read the Torah. They couldn't care less about Muslims, except to the extent that bloodthirsty Muslim barbarians harbor murderous rage toward them.

It's fine to hate evil, but in the Islamic world, what is hated is transformed into evil. Something is not hated because it is evil, but evil because it is hated. One could say the same of the left, which habitually fears what it eternally hates. The left cannot be comprehended unless one appreciates the extent of their unbound hatred. Once this is grasped, what seems illogical is suddenly seen to obey the dictates of symmetrical logic. For example, the unconscious feeling that I hate America and want us to lose in Iraq is transformed to General Petraeus is a traitor, or I am a racist becomes America is racist, or I am unbearably envious becomes the wealthy are engaged in class warfare against me!

Another characteristic of the unconscious is that it is timeless, in the sense that it can reverse temporal relations. For example, in the unconscious mind, if A is the cause of B, B can also be the cause of A. Thus, "before" and "after" become meaningless. Therefore, although we were inexcusably attacked by Islamists on 9-11, within minutes, leftists were saying that the real reason for the attack was that we had done something to offend Muslims.

Likewise, throughout the Cold War, leftist scholars wrote "revisionist" histories, in which the United States was the cause of the Cold War, or at least equally responsible for it. You will notice that there are no conservative revisionists who write, for example, that blacks were the cause of their own lynching, or that Japanese Americans were the cause of their own internment. You can only think in this manner if you are pathologically under the sway of unconscious symmetrical logic.

Also in the unconscious mind, there is no distinction between the memory of something that actually occurred vs. the memory of a fantasy. Here we can understand how and why the left is so prone to mythologizing the past, as their fantasies are mingled with reality. Thus, no amount of reality and asymmetrical logic will ever convince them that FDR made the Great Depression worse, not better, or that the black family only began to disintegrate after the imposition of all the "Great Society" programs of the mid to late '60s. No amount of logic could convince a leftist that his policies harm the "little guy," since his ruling myth, in the face of all evidence to the contrary, is that he is here to rescue the hapless little guy (for whom the leftist always feels rich contempt in the unconscious mind, contempt which only seeps out everywhere).

One thing you will notice about the left is that they are passionate. Because the left is guided by feelings and intentions, they are blind to the results of their actions. If their feelings are infinitely good, then in the unconscious mind, the results must also be infinitely good.

As I have written before, this is a religious passion in the absence of religion, so it has no traditional means to structure and channel it. Just as religion partakes of symmetrical logic in an adaptive way (i.e., the meek shall inherit the earth, the Golden Rule, humans are made in the image of the Creator, etc.), leftists do so in a terribly unhealthy way. That is, because of the intensity of their feelings, these feelings reach way down into the symmetrical realm, with no way to structure or make sense of them. This is why you always see so much highly charged, "unfiltered" unconscious material coming out of the left. To borrow a metaphor from someone, reading dailykos or huffington post is like taking a ride through a sewer in a glass bottom boat.

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Ahmadinejad hears some home truths: "I can't pretend to understand Lee Bollinger. I'm not sure why he invited Mahmoud Ahmadenijad to disgrace his campus, and whether the invitation was a ruse to get the diminutive dinner jacket on the same stage so the Dean could blast the Mahdi with the Mahdi's list of horribles. Regardless of how stupid inviting Ahmadenijad to the Columbia was in the first place, let's give Bollinger credit for standing face-to-face with evil and calling it out. If you didn't see Bollinger's speech, you have no idea what I'm talking about. Suffice to say, Bollinger used the occasion to deliver a Sister Souljah moment on behalf of academia. His attack on the Mahdi was withering, something so harsh that it could have sprung from the modem of a conservative blogger. Bollinger's speech today, for what it's worth, gets an A . The Mahdi, clearly with hurt feelings, labeled the speech a "wave of insults."

EU may fund anti-Semitic radio station: "The head of the Center of Organizations of Holocaust Survivors in Israel is urging the European Union not to pour tens of millions into a Polish ultra-nationalist Catholic radio station infamous for its anti-Semitic programming. The 15.5 million euros in EU funding would be allocated towards the expansion of a journalism school for the controversial Polish radio station Radio Maryja. "The head of the radio station, and the radio station itself, is known throughout Europe as a symbol of the increasing wave of global anti-Semitism," head of the umbrella organization of Holocaust survivors in Israel, Noah Flug, wrote in a letter to the President of the European Commission Jose Manuel Barroso."

The Holy Father defends religious liberty: "Another cause highly esteemed by all of you is the defence of religious liberty, which is a fundamental, irrepressible, inalienable and inviolable right rooted in the dignity of every human being and acknowledged by various international documents, especially the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The exercise of this freedom also includes the right to change religion, which should be guaranteed not only legally, but also in daily practice. In fact, religious liberty corresponds to the human person's innate openness to God, who is the fullness of truth and the supreme good. An appreciation for religious freedom is a fundamental expression of respect for human reason and its capacity to know the truth."

Iran smuggling surface to air missiles into Iraq: "The U.S. military accused Iran on Sunday of smuggling surface-to-air missiles and other advanced weapons into Iraq for use against American troops.... Military spokesman Rear Adm. Mark Fox said U.S. troops were continuing to find Iranian-supplied weaponry including the Misagh 1, a portable surface-to-air missile that uses an infrared guidance system. Other advanced Iranian weaponry found in Iraq includes the RPG-29 rocket-propelled grenade, 240 mm rockets and armor-piercing roadside bombs known as explosively formed penetrators, or EFPs, Fox said".

For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, IMMIGRATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL and EYE ON BRITAIN.

List of backup or "mirror" sites here or here -- for readers in China or for everyone when blogspot is "down" or failing to update. Email me here (Hotmail address). My Home Pages are here or here or here

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"Why should the German be interested in the liberation of the Jew, if the Jew is not interested in the liberation of the German?... We recognize in Judaism, therefore, a general anti-social element of the present time... In the final analysis, the emancipation of the Jews is the emancipation of mankind from Judaism.... Indeed, in North America, the practical domination of Judaism over the Christian world has achieved as its unambiguous and normal expression that the preaching of the Gospel itself and the Christian ministry have become articles of trade... Money is the jealous god of Israel, in face of which no other god may exist". Who said that? Hitler? No. It was Karl Marx. See also here and here and here.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist" (Nationalsozialistisch) and the full name of Hitler's political party (translated) was "The National Socialist German Workers' Party".

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Explaining Liberal Thinking In A Single Column

By John Hawkins

Liberals love to think of themselves as intellectual and nuanced, but liberalism is incredibly simplistic. It's nothing more than "childlike emotionalism applied to adult issues." Very seldom does any issue that doesn't involve pandering to their supporters boil down at its core level to more than feeling "nice" or "mean" to liberals. This makes liberals ill equipped to deal with complex issues. Since liberals tend to support or oppose policies based on how those policies make them feel about themselves, they do very little intellectual examination of whether the policies they advocate work or not. That's because it doesn't matter to them whether the policy is effective or not; it matters whether advocating the policy makes them feel "good" or "bad," "compassionate" or "stingy," "nice" or "mean."

Because of this, liberalism has more in common with religion than it does with other political ideologies like conservatism or libertarianism. Moreover, liberal beliefs are more like religious doctrine than any sort of battle-tested policies that bear up under logic or examination. Although the interpretation of the doctrine that the Left supports may change a bit over time, just as religious doctrine does, it's essentially taken on faith, like scripture. That's why, for example, you may see ferocious debates on the right side of the blogosphere about the war, illegal immigration, or spending. But, with the netroots, the debates almost always revolve around the best strategy to get more liberals elected. The issues are not really up for debate, other than debate over how to get them enacted.

This same thinking leads to very little criticism of liberals by other liberals. Liberals will ferociously defend and even happily echo the lies of other liberals. Liberal feminists will defend Bill Clinton and Ted Kennedy. Liberals who pride themselves on being tolerant of other races will support Robert Byrd. Why? Because even if they're wrong, they're still fellow liberals -- which must mean they're nice people. What this leads to is an attitude that can be summed up like so: "The only things that a liberal can do wrong is to be insufficiently liberal, to question an important plank of the liberal agenda, or to do something politically that aids conservatives." ...

* Why are so many liberals hostile to religion? Because religion sets rules and tells people that if they break those rules, they're sinning! That keeps people from doing things that make them feel good and telling people that they're sinning makes them feel bad.

* Why are so many liberals hostile to the troops? Because the troops tend to be conservative (evil) and because they're out killing people and breaking things (which would make most liberals feel like bad people).

* Why are so many liberals unpatriotic? It makes liberals feel morally superior to rant about what's wrong with their own country. Plus, as an added bonus, people from other nations agree with them and that makes them feel good as well....

* Why are liberals so hostile to successful people who don't happen to be celebrities, trial lawyers, or big donors to the Democratic Party? Again, this is another great opportunity for them to feel morally superior. They can feel like good people because they want to give money to the poor -- granted, not their money, but rich people's money. The rich have so much and the poor have so little, so why shouldn't liberals take it from them and then pat themselves on the back for their compassion?

Once you understand the basics of how liberals think, you can understand everything that they do. Granted, there will be a few exceptions, but if the vast herd of liberals is doing something that doesn't seem to fit the template, it's either because there's money or sex involved, they're doing what they have to do to win politically, they're taking that position because they refuse to be on the same side as conservatives, or there's something going on you don't know about and it's not really an exception.

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The old gray lady has some explaining to do: "Officials at the New York Times have admitted a liberal activist group was permitted to pay half the rate it should have for a provocative ad condemning U.S. Iraq commander Gen. David Petraeus. The MoveOn ad, which cast Petraeus as "General Betray Us" and attacked his truthfulness, ran on the same day the commander made a highly anticipated appearance before Congress. But since the liberal group paid the standby rate of $64,575 for the full-page ad, it should not have been guaranteed to run on Sept. 10, the day Petraeus warned Congress against a rapid withdrawal of troops from Iraq, Times personnel said. "We made a mistake," Catherine Mathis, vice president of corporate communications for The Times, told the newspaper's public editor. Mathis said an advertising representative left the liberal group with the understanding that the ad would run that Monday even though they had been charged the standby rate. The group should have paid $142,083 to ensure placement that day".

Hillary has deserted the troops: "With her refusal to denounce the far-left MoveOn.org for its smear of our top commander in Iraq, Clinton has taken another big step away from the center of American politics. On the most important issue of our times - Iraq and the fight against Islamic terrorism - the Democratic presidential front-runner has thrown her lot in with the radicals, kooks and nuts that litter the wackadoo wing. And she has turned her back on our soldiers and their leaders during wartime. This is not the first time she has gone AWOL on the military. Back in May, Clinton voted to cut off all funds for the war. That she was in a small minority then was an alarming indication of how far she was willing to go to placate the anti-war base of the party. It was not, we know now, an aberration".

Horowitz on Columbia and the 'Persian Hitler': "David Horowitz can think of a lot of reasons why Columbia University shouldn't invite Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to speak there Monday: "Not to mention he's a Nazi. Not to mention he wants to kill all the Jews -- I take that personally." The Ahmadinejad speech -- which roiled the blogosphere this week -- is also personal for Horowitz because he's an alumnus of Columbia. The university's Web site listing of "notable alumni" describes him as a "neo-conservative movement founder." It would be more accurate to describe Horowitz as a "red diaper baby" (his parents were Communist Party members)... In a telephone interview Friday, Horowitz called Ahmadinejad "the Persian Hitler." It's not hard to see why, given this video of the Iranian president leading a crowd in chanting "Death to Israel".... Columbia President Lee Bollinger has defended the Ahmadinejad speech as "robust debate ... on global issues." Horowitz isn't buying that argument."

Swing districts not swinging to Dems: "Conventional wisdom dictates that Democratic voters are thrilled with their choices for president, bursting at the seams to rally behind Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (N.Y.), Sen. Barack Obama (Ill.) or whoever gets the party's nod next year. A recent survey by Democratic pollster Celinda Lake, however, showed Clinton and Obama trailing former New York mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani (R) in the 31 Democratic-held House districts regarded as most imperiled in 2008, and even potentially serving as a drag on those lawmakers' reelection chances. The poll was conducted in August but has not been previously reported. It paints a "sobering picture" for Democrats, according to a memo by Lake and Daniel Gotoff that accompanies the poll report".

For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, IMMIGRATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL and EYE ON BRITAIN.

List of backup or "mirror" sites here or here -- for readers in China or for everyone when blogspot is "down" or failing to update. Email me here (Hotmail address). My Home Pages are here or here or here

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"Why should the German be interested in the liberation of the Jew, if the Jew is not interested in the liberation of the German?... We recognize in Judaism, therefore, a general anti-social element of the present time... In the final analysis, the emancipation of the Jews is the emancipation of mankind from Judaism.... Indeed, in North America, the practical domination of Judaism over the Christian world has achieved as its unambiguous and normal expression that the preaching of the Gospel itself and the Christian ministry have become articles of trade... Money is the jealous god of Israel, in face of which no other god may exist". Who said that? Hitler? No. It was Karl Marx. See also here and here and here.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist" (Nationalsozialistisch) and the full name of Hitler's political party (translated) was "The National Socialist German Workers' Party".

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More idiosyncratic "reasoning" from a U.S. court

The meat was predominantly exported (mainly to Europe) but the court decided that stopping the process "does not significantly interfere with interstate or foreign commerce"! Go figure

A FEDERAL appellate court panel has upheld the constitutionality of an Illinois law that prohibits the slaughter of horses for human consumption. The ruling effectively shuts down a DeKalb horse-slaughtering plant, the last facility of its kind in the country. Cavel International, Inc., a Belgium-based company that operates the plant, kills horses and ships meat overseas for human consumption.

Cavel had asked the court to invalidate a statute signed into law last May that prohibited the slaughter of horses for human consumption and the possession, import or export of horse meat for human consumption. Cavel also argued the state law discriminates against foreign commerce.

The appellate panel expressed some reluctance in reaching its decision, saying in its written opinion that "... we are not entirely happy about having to uphold the Illinois statute". But it concluded that the law does not improperly discriminate and does not significantly interfere with interstate or foreign commerce.

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Bush made the world hate America so much that McDonald's is booming: "AP reported that sales at McDonald's have been surprisingly buoyant overseas: "Anti-Americanism over the Iraq war hasn't eaten into global sales, either, despite the golden arches' close association with Uncle Sam abroad. The increase was 12.4% in its Asia/Pacific, Middle East and Africa restaurants and a noteworthy 6.1% in Europe, where the turnaround didn't take hold until recently. "Consumers' attention span is pretty short," said Lakshman Krishnamurthi, a marketing professor at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University. "As long as you have a good product that people like, people are going to go and eat it."

1200 Iraqis Line Up For Hours To Fight al-Qaeda: "Who would have predicted in October of 2001, as the fires of the WTC raged under a mountain of rubble and debris, that we would witness Iraqis lining up for hours in the heat, standing in line for their opportunity to sign up to fight and destroy al-Qaeda. No one in their wildest dreams would have given credence to that idea, yet here we are in September 2007, 6 years after that fateful day, and we have hours long lines in Iraq queuing up for a chance to fight Bloody Bin Laden's thugs"

Israel collects samples of Nork nuke material during raid: "Israeli commandos seized nuclear material of North Korean origin during a daring raid on a secret military site in Syria before Israel bombed it this month, according to informed sources in Washington and Jerusalem. The attack was launched with American approval on September 6 after Washington was shown evidence the material was nuclear related, the well-placed sources say. They confirmed that samples taken from Syria for testing had been identified as North Korean. This raised fears that Syria might have joined North Korea and Iran in seeking to acquire nuclear weapons."

Israel warns Syria: "Israeli officials vowed to wipe Syria off the map if it is attacked with chemical weapons like one that reportedly exploded in July at a secret Syrian base staffed with Iranian engineers. Politicians in Israel said yesterday they were not picking a fight with their neighbor, but pledged to forcefully retaliate if chemical warheads come screaming across its shared border. "We will not attack them first. But if they ever use these weapons against Israel, then we must be clear - it will be the end of this evil and brutal dictatorship," Yuval Steinitz, a right-wing member of the Israeli parliament, told the Daily News yesterday. Sparking shock waves across the Middle East was a report in Jane's Defence Weekly about an accidental explosion at a top secret Syrian base in July. Citing Syrian intelligence sources, the report claimed a team of Iranian and Syrian engineers were killed July 26 while trying to arm a Scud-C missile with a mustard gas warhead".



NY: Spitzer spits at the law: "Gov. Spitzer announced yesterday that illegal immigrants will get driver's licenses - but at a cost to legal citizens because they'll now be useless as airport ID. Spitzer said the state would no longer require a Social Security number or proof that a person is not eligible for such a number in order to qualify for a driver's license. That change clashes with the 2005 REAL ID law passed by Congress that states require, among other things, a Social Security number in order to get a license. States have until December 2009 to be in compliance. States that fail to meet the standards will lose their certification by the Department of Homeland Security, meaning that driver's licenses in those states will no longer be valid for air travel, entry to federal facilities and for tax purposes".

Batty Britain again: "A radical Muslim cleric banned from his local mosque was allowed to work as a hospital chaplain, according to a BBC London investigation. Usman Ali has been banned from his local mosque in Woolwich, London, after trustees won a court injunction. But the ex-member of banned group Al Muha-ji-roun led prayers for NHS staff at Woolwich's Queen Elizabeth Hospital. Hospital staff said they had suspended Mr Ali two days ago after concerns were raised by the police. The 30-year-old British born preacher was banned for life from entering his local mosque in Woolwich after trustees won a county court injunction against him in January. It was an unprecedented step and cost the mosque 30,000 pounds. BBC London has seen the judge's order on the case and found that Ali had shown a video to children in the mosque containing clips of planes flying into the world trade centre during which he chanted "God is great". Mosque trustees said they warned hospital officials about Mr Ali months ago but nothing was done".

Stupid "Animal Rights" ban opposed (Australia has millions of wild kangaroos): "Miro Odich, who has owned the Soccer Locker store in Fair Oaks for nearly three decades, says without hesitation that nothing is better than shoes made from kangaroo leather. "They are the best in the world," Odich said. "They're so soft and stretchy and mold to your foot, so you feel the ball. Calf leather is much thicker and rougher." Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, himself a well-known aficionado of footwear made from unusual animal skins, must decide by mid-October whether retailers such as Odich can sell soccer shoes made from the Australian marsupial."

For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, IMMIGRATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL and EYE ON BRITAIN.

List of backup or "mirror" sites here or here -- for readers in China or for everyone when blogspot is "down" or failing to update. Email me here (Hotmail address). My Home Pages are here or here or here

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"Why should the German be interested in the liberation of the Jew, if the Jew is not interested in the liberation of the German?... We recognize in Judaism, therefore, a general anti-social element of the present time... In the final analysis, the emancipation of the Jews is the emancipation of mankind from Judaism.... Indeed, in North America, the practical domination of Judaism over the Christian world has achieved as its unambiguous and normal expression that the preaching of the Gospel itself and the Christian ministry have become articles of trade... Money is the jealous god of Israel, in face of which no other god may exist". Who said that? Hitler? No. It was Karl Marx. See also here and here and here.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist" (Nationalsozialistisch) and the full name of Hitler's political party (translated) was "The National Socialist German Workers' Party".

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Both Leftism and Islamism are outlets for rage

Young people who are enraged tend to be drawn into delinquency, drug and alcohol use, and criminality, all as ways to manage and discharge their intolerable internal states. Imagine how awful it is to feel that everyone has disappointed and failed you; imagine the rage of children who feel betrayed and let down over and over again. Such young people are also drawn to ideologies which explicitly support their need to externalize:

I am enraged; it is intolerable to know that my rage stems from my own failures and the failures of those people who have formed the nidus of my internal object world [usually parents]; my failures must be caused by someone else and their behavior [Jews, Americans] justifies this rage I cannot get rid of; now I have a place to discharge and rid myself of this rage.

In reality, since the primary source of the rage is internal, such discharge only works temporarily, necessitating new situations in which to justify and discharge the renewed built-up rage.

Both Marxism and Islamism, with their emphasis on Utopian goals which promise to end disappointment and deprivation while directing condoned rage against the external world of oppressors, share this structure. They facilitate defensive externalization, allow for the free expression of primitive rage, and promise a Utopian consummation, either in an earthly paradise where all desires, material and sexual, can be achieved, or in the heavenly Paradise where the 72 virgins await. This is the attraction of Islam and Marxism to so many disaffected young people.

In college, I dabbled in radical politics. I went to many anti-war demonstrations as a teenager. I enjoyed the frisson of rebellion that the Psychedelic 60s was shrouded within, yet a single incident awoke me to the reality that I would never be a good Marxist. I had been intrigued by Trotsky, the idea of constant revolution was fascinating to someone who wished to resist falling into the predicted and predictable path I feared I was on. On campus was a well established group of young Trotskyites, the Young Socialist Alliance. They were involved in various protests, which were always enjoyable, not least for the presence of many nubile, young radical women who approved of radical young men. One fateful day I stopped by the YSA table to find out more about them. I made a joking reference to the previous weekend's demonstration and discovered that the leader of the group was a young man who was incredibly humorless. He proceeded to lecture me (hectored me, perhaps) with a diatribe on how much commitment was necessary for the revolution to succeed and how there was no room for humor in the revolution; this was deadly serious business fighting the oppressors and jokes had no place in it.

I thought he was a complete jerk; I also thought he was a very dangerous jerk. This was the kind of person who would have no trouble condemning someone for thought crimes. If that was the kind of person who was attracted to Marxism, perhaps I wasn't as much of a radical as I fancied.

Years later I can still recall him, with a Che Guevara beard, intense eyes, and a complete lack of humor or humanity. Any revolution that condemned humor was not a revolution for me.

Rage at a cruel and withholding universe (often a derivative of infantile frustration) is difficult to tolerate. Most of us, with good-enough parenting, come to temper our infantile frustrations (which have roots in our infantile grandiosity which is so painful to give up) by using our loving ties to our parents to metabolize the rage which would otherwise be so destructive. Those unfortunates who cannot do so via love are left enraged and searching for ways to offload the rage to an external victim. Ideologies that enable such offloading attract the angry and the failed and it is through this pathway that Marx (the angry, anti-Semitic hater of religion) and the Islamists (descended from Qutb, the angry, anti-Semitic hater of secularism) find their true identity.

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Wal-Mart Unveils Employee Health-Care Overhaul-But Haters Still Unsatisfied: "Wal-Mart, long criticized for its healthcare coverage, unveiled a broad plan this week that is intended to cut employee costs, expand coverage and offer workers thousands of cheap prescription drugs. Starting next year, Wal-Mart"s insurance will look a lot like that offered by many other American companies, but with some twists that even longtime critics described as innovative. Independent experts praised several features of the plan and said it could represent a turning point for the retailer, the NY Times reports. "On face value, this looks like a very significant change and improvement," said Ron Pollack, president of Families USA, a healthcare advocacy group in Washington that has been critical of Wal-Mart. But Wal-Mart Watch, a group long critical of the company, said "these plans are still unaffordable due to low wages or inaccessible due to waiting periods," according to the Times report by Michael Barbaro. The plans with the lowest premiums would still charge annual deductibles as high as $2,000-typical for American corporate health plans, but perhaps steep for Wal-Mart employees, many of whom work part time and earn less than $20,000 a year. And the company"s plans have other limitations, including waiting periods as long as a year for new employees. But industry analysts said the program represented an upgrade for the 636,000 employees who already receive health insurance through Wal-Mart. They said it could force the company"s discount-retailing competitors to offer more generous plans for their own workers".

Army wants 10,000 new armored vehicles: "The Army has decided to ask for 10,000 Mine Resistant Ambush Protected armored vehicles to counter the threat of makeshift bombs in Iraq, according to one of the program's top congressional supporters. The new request is nearly four times the 2,700 vehicles, known as MRAPs, that the Army had sought. That's still not enough, said Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del., who was briefed on the change by the Defense Department. Biden cited a request this year for 17,770 of the vehicles for the Army by Lt. Gen. Raymond Odierno, the No. 2 military commander in Iraq."

Poor don't fret about income inequality: "Many analysts think society is happier when inequalities fall and unhappier when inequalities rise. The truth is more complex. In an economic recession, profits fall much faster than wages, so equality improves. But the poor don't enjoy recessions, because they don't want to lose their jobs. They prefer an economic boom, when profits rise faster than wages, even though inequalities also increase. In India, states like Bihar and Orissa are dirt poor while Maharashtra and Goa are rich. But while economists fret about the disparity, the poor people of Bihar and Orissa don't. They know their travails are caused not by rich people in other states but by local landlords, mobsters and politicians. Poor people worry about inequality when the local dominant classes keep them down. But they have no wish to impoverish industrialists in rich states; they merely want to become rich themselves. Booming stock markets bring jobs and investment, so poor people welcome them."

For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, IMMIGRATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL and EYE ON BRITAIN.

List of backup or "mirror" sites here or here -- for readers in China or for everyone when blogspot is "down" or failing to update. Email me here (Hotmail address). My Home Pages are here or here or here

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"Why should the German be interested in the liberation of the Jew, if the Jew is not interested in the liberation of the German?... We recognize in Judaism, therefore, a general anti-social element of the present time... In the final analysis, the emancipation of the Jews is the emancipation of mankind from Judaism.... Indeed, in North America, the practical domination of Judaism over the Christian world has achieved as its unambiguous and normal expression that the preaching of the Gospel itself and the Christian ministry have become articles of trade... Money is the jealous god of Israel, in face of which no other god may exist". Who said that? Hitler? No. It was Karl Marx. See also here and here and here.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist" (Nationalsozialistisch) and the full name of Hitler's political party (translated) was "The National Socialist German Workers' Party".

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The Leftist false gospel of self-esteem

"Blessed are the meek" certainly does not get a mention

One of the big pieces of the psychobabble industry is the promotion of "self esteem" at the expense of self control and personal responsibility. But, contrary to popular myth, self esteem is not the holy grail of psychological health. In fact, it is not necessarily even good for you, and most bullies, tyrants and other dysfunctional people fairly ooze self esteem.

Most people confuse "self-esteem" with a "sense of self". It is the latter--not the former, that is so often screwed up in the angry, violent, grandiose, and generally narcissistic people in the world. If you have a healthy "sense of self", you are likely to have a healthy self-esteem; and a healthy self-esteem is not the same at all as a high self-esteem.

The psychological defect that leads to so many problems for people in their lives is a defective or distorted sense of one's SELF. The excessive self-esteem you see in a bully comes from a distortion of reality that person develops with regard to their self. It used to be widely believed that low self-esteem was a cause of violence, but in reality, violent individuals, groups and nations happen to think very well of themselves. Do you really suppose that individuals like Ahmadinejad or the Iranian mullahs suffer from poor self-esteem? Do you think bullies like Saddam or thugs like Zawahiri had "fragile" egos as they made their way through life? And that they were simply misunderstood or had unhappy childhoods and that is what made them so bad? If only social conditions be improved and poverty eliminated then the world would not see the development of such people--or so goes the thinking, anyway.

I'm afraid not. The reality is that human nature is what it is whether you are rich or poor; or what color your skin happens to be; and without regard for the particular political structure you live in. Exaggerated self-esteem that is not based on personal achievement or responsibility is one of the hallmarks of a pathological narcissist or psychopath.

The pop-psychology that promulgated the widespread belief that if you nurture kid's self-esteem neglected to mention that if the sense of self was already damaged, all the social engineers would manage to do was to create a narcissistic monster. That is why our society is filled with the pursuit of unhealthy narcissistic gratification. In this new century, that narcissism seems to be morphing into an even more malignant sociopathy that pervades society and impacts almost all our social, political, and educational institutions.

Our cultural focus on enhancing "self-esteem" has resulted in the near-worship of emotions and feelings at the expense of reason and thought; on emphasizing "root causes" and victimhood, instead of demanding that behavior be civilized and that individuals exert self-discipline and self-control--no matter what they are "feeling".

Source. See also here. The Christian teaching is here: Matthew 5:3-5; 18:4; 23:8-12.

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The paradox of moral equivalence: "I used to believe that the world essentially divided into two types of people: those who were broadly tolerant, and those who felt threatened by differences. If only the former ruled the earth, I reasoned, the world might know some measure of peace. But there was a problem with my theory, and it was never clearer than in a conversation I had with a Pakistani friend who told me that he loathed people like George Bush who insisted on dividing the world into "us" and "them". My friend did not realise that he was in fact falling straight into the camp of people he loathed. This is a political version of a famous paradox formulated by Bertrand Russell. The stronger you insist on the necessity of tolerance, the more intolerant you become toward those who disagree. The moral lesson is that there is no such thing as unqualified tolerance; ultimately, one must be able to expound intolerance of certain ideologies without surrendering the moral high ground normally linked to tolerance."

French revolution? "Unveiling his domestic reform agenda in Paris Tuesday, Nicolas Sarkozy called for "a new social contract" for France. His proposed revision of French socialist tradition going back to Jean-Jacques Rousseau is nothing short of revolutionary. His ability to deliver will make or break his presidency. True to character, Mr. Sarkozy came out swinging. The new President declared that France's generous welfare state is "unjust" and "financially untenable," "discourages work and job creation," and "fails to bring equal opportunity." The result: France's jobless rate is the euro zone's highest. The President wants "a new social contract founded on work, merit and equal opportunity." He promised to loosen restrictions on working hours and toughen up requirements for jobless benefits, to ease hiring and firing rules and reduce incentives to retire early".

The usual military equipment bungling: "After six years at war, some Army National Guard units are still struggling with less than half the equipment they need to do their jobs at home, the top Guard general said Wednesday. He said it will take an extra $13 billion over the next five years to get them 90 percent of the gear they need. Lt. Gen. H. Steven Blum, chief of the National Guard, said that while Guard units heading to Iraq and Afghanistan have all the necessary equipment, all units at home are short at least 30 percent of the equipment they need."

Senate rejects measure attempting to regulate length of combat tours in Iraq: " Democrats' efforts to challenge President Bush's Iraq policies were dealt a demoralizing blow Wednesday in the Senate after they failed to scrape together enough support to guarantee troops more time at home. The 56-44 vote - four short of reaching the 60 needed to advance - all but assured that Democrats would be unable to muster the support needed to pass tough anti-war legislation by year's end. The legislation, sponsored by Sen. Jim Webb, D-Va., was seen as the Democrats' best shot because of its pro-military premise".

Wes Clark: Petraeus told the truth: "Gen. Wes Clark was asked by Matt Stoller, a lefty blogger, about MoveOn's Betray Us ad. Clark said it was a big mistake. Clark also said Gen. Dave Petraeus told the truth. The ad was a big mistake, Clark said, "because it distracted attention from focusing on the failures of the policy and let the other side play a game of personal attack again and you know sort of outrage at that. That's a mistake. It distracted us from the dialogue we needed." Later, Clark said: "I'd say it was a mistake tactically. But I also, I know Dave Petraeus, and he's not gonna say something he thinks is incorrect, he's not gonna lie... Gen. Clark is the left's military man. Lefties might want to listen to him."

Victimhood: "In the quasi-religious cult of victimhood that is part of today's leftist dogma, "victimhood" has been identified as the key quality deserving of attention and pity. This is in part because many on the political left have an intense narcissistic need to see themselves as "champions of the oppressed", hence the constant need to find and maintain an oppressed class of people to champion. But it also dovetails nicely into the the Marxist dialectic that underlies that ideology. The world is divided up into two groups, you see: the oppressors (i.e., white, male,heterosexual, Republican, Americans or Israelis) and the oppressed (everyone else)."

For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, IMMIGRATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL and EYE ON BRITAIN.

List of backup or "mirror" sites here or here -- for readers in China or for everyone when blogspot is "down" or failing to update. Email me here (Hotmail address). My Home Pages are here or here or here

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"Why should the German be interested in the liberation of the Jew, if the Jew is not interested in the liberation of the German?... We recognize in Judaism, therefore, a general anti-social element of the present time... In the final analysis, the emancipation of the Jews is the emancipation of mankind from Judaism.... Indeed, in North America, the practical domination of Judaism over the Christian world has achieved as its unambiguous and normal expression that the preaching of the Gospel itself and the Christian ministry have become articles of trade... Money is the jealous god of Israel, in face of which no other god may exist". Who said that? Hitler? No. It was Karl Marx. See also here and here and here.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist" (Nationalsozialistisch) and the full name of Hitler's political party (translated) was "The National Socialist German Workers' Party".

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