We Won!



That large yellow tie is a bit dubious, though!

America, its allies and the Iraqi people have won the war against terror in Iraq. How do we know? Simple. Just follow the money. European and Asian investment companies are beating a path to Iraq, money in hand. Iraqi Airlines is flying high thanks to a colossal $5.5 billion contract with Boeing and the United Arab Emirates just canceled billions of dollars of Iraqi debt as they moved to restore a diplomatic mission in Baghdad.

When foreign countries start investing billions of dollars in a country, its a safe bet they are aware of the risks involved. And, unlike the old news media and our elected Democrat officials, they see a relatively stable country ripe for investment.

The influx of foreign investment is largely due to the improved security in Iraq, which continues to improve even after the withdrawal of nearly 25% of U.S. combat brigades. The Joint Chiefs of Staff recently acknowledged cautiously that security 'is on its way to becoming sustainable.'

American and Iraqi forces have driven Al-Qaeda in Iraq out of its last redoubt in the north of the country in the culmination of one of the most spectacular victories of the war on terror. Al-Maliki, Iraq's prime minister said that "the government has defeated terrorism in the country." Pretty unequivocal. In fact, things are going so well in Iraq that the discussion has now shifted to a timetable for more troop withdrawals.

The American media is silent on all this good news, possibly out of embarrassment for being so incredibly wrong on pretty much every single issue having to do with Iraq. They would like to forget their near universal scorn for the now successful surge. The Democrats had declared defeat and there was no way they would accept anything more. The media trumpeted their views. Lo and behold, the surge worked. Horror of horrors, Bush was right.

When evidence of the progress on the ground was too overwhelming to ignore, new talking points emerged on the left. Democrats avowed that our military victory meant nothing. (Think about that a second) What really mattered, they intoned with one voice, was the political progress, as measured by Congressionally established benchmarks. More horrors. It appears that a March 2008 report shows that the Iraqis have met 15 of the 18 benchmarks. The silence from the left, and the old media is now deafening.

More here

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Intellectual impotence

The greatest lie intellectuals tell us is that "the pen is mightier than the sword." That's what cowards claim when they want to preen as heroes. Billions of words have been hurled at Sudan's government. The misery in Darfur not only continues but deepens. While intellectuals wrestled with compound sentences, Darfur degenerated from selective oppression to savage anarchy. Legions of columnists and commentators have deplored Robert Mugabe's monstrous rule in Zimbabwe. But none of the hand-wringing by American, European or even African intellectuals restrained one fist or stopped one club in midair. Guess who "won" that election. Regiments of professors and pundits have bemoaned China's gobbling of Tibet for half a century. The result? Beijing cracked down even harder.

"Brave" columnists wrote countless columns bemoaning the suffering of the Kurds and the Shia under Saddam Hussein. Their earnest paragraphs didn't save a single life. Only when better men acted did the surviving victims of one of the world's worst dictatorships glimpse freedom - an imperfect freedom but better than a mass grave. Nothing positive is going to happen in Sudan or Zimbabwe (or Tibet) until rule-of-law states take action. As outraged activists scribble on, Beijing blithely continues supporting these and other rogue regimes...

Does anyone really believe that there's anything we can write or say that will persuade al Qaeda to make nice? It's on the strategic defensive today but only because our soldiers and Marines thumped the hell out of its cadres in Iraq and Afghanistan. The point isn't that military solutions are always the best solutions - any problem that can be resolved without bloodshed should be handled peaceably. But we've got to stop playing pretend: In this hate-plagued, often merciless world, events sometimes demand action, not just talk.

More here

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ELSEWHERE

Microsoft Admits Windows Vista Mistakes: "Microsoft is now acknowledging it screwed up with its initial launch of Windows Vista, and is ready to try again. "We broke a lot of things. We know that, and we know it caused you a lot of pain. It got customers thinking, hey, is Windows Vista a generation we want to get invested in?" So Brad Brooks, Microsoft's VP of Windows Vista consumer marketing, fessed up publicly this week."

No cracks: "The police chief is warning residents of Flint, Mich., to pull up their trousers ... or else. "Some people call it a fad," Chief David Dicks tells the Detroit Free Press. "But I believe it's a national nuisance. It is indecent and thus it is indecent exposure, which has been on the books for years." Ben Schmitt, a USA TODAY correspondent, says violators face the possibility of fines and jail time."

From bull semen to bras, Iran still buys American: "Nuclear weapons? No way. But there are plenty of items on Iran's shopping list the United States is more than happy to supply: cigarettes, brassieres, bull semen and more. U.S. exports to Iran grew more than tenfold during President Bush's years in office even as he accused it of nuclear ambitions and sponsoring terrorists. America sent more cigarettes to Iran-at least $158 million worth under Bush-than any other product. Other surprising shipments during the Bush administration: fur clothing, sculptures, perfume, musical instruments and military apparel."

Queer opera privileges in Seattle: "The Seattle Opera will host lesbian-gay-bisexual-transgender nights during designated Friday performances in the 2008-09 season, the opera house announced Monday. The LGBT nights will include $100 admission to orchestra seats, which usually cost between $94 and $140; private intermission receptions, including complimentary refreshments, and free admission to a pre-opera lecture. The program will include performances of the operas "Aida" on August 22, "The Pearl Fishers" on January 23, and "The Marriage of Figaro" on May 15."

For more postings from me, see OBAMA WATCH, 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.

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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" (Nationalsozialist) and the full name of Hitler's political party (translated) was "The National Socialist German Workers' Party" (In German: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei)

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