Justice

Grandpappy told my pappy: "Back in my day, son,
"A man had to answer for the wicked that he done.
"Take all the rope in Texas, find a tall oak tree,
"Round up all of them bad boys, hang them high in the street,
"For all the people to see that:


"Justice is the one thing you should always find.
"You got to saddle up your boys,
"You got to draw a hard line.
"When the gunsmoke settles, we'll sing a victory tune.
"We'll all meet back at the local saloon,
"We'll raise up our glasses against evil forces,
"Singing: 'Whiskey for my men, beer for my horses.'"

And who is this Justice brought to you by???????

A Message From The President

To the Men and Women of the United States Armed Forces:

On behalf of all Americans, Laura and I send our best holiday wishes to you and your families.

During this hopeful time of year, the hearts of Americans are filled with gratitude for the many blessings in our lives. We are especially thankful for the priceless gift of freedom that our Armed Forces help defend by serving the cause of peace and standing watch over our security. As courageous Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines, and Coast Guardsmen, you have set aside comfort and convenience to protect the rest of us, earning the respect of a grateful Nation and a proud Commander in Chief.

Many of you are confronting our adversaries abroad and observing the holidays in places far from home, but you are close to our hearts. You are serving at a time when our Nation needs you, and your fellow citizens appreciate the many sacrifices that you and your families are making every day. Over the holidays and throughout the New Year, we will continue to ask the Almighty to bestow His care on you and your loved ones.

Laura and I wish each of you a safe and joyous holiday season. May God bless and watch over you, and may God bless America.

GEORGE W. BUSH

The Idiots We've Elected

Harman to President Bush: Send More Troops to Iraq...NOT!

If President Bush had any lingering doubts about how the new Democrat-controlled Congress would react to the idea of surging thousands of additional troops into Iraq, the incoming Chair of the House Armed Services Committee, my friend Ike Skelton of Missouri, cleared those up for him this week.
On Monday, following the swearing-in of Robert Gates as the new Defense Secretary, he said:
"The recent speculation in the press regarding an increase of 20,000 to 30,000 or even 50,000 troops in Iraq has left me with many concerns. Everything I've heard and everything I know to be true lead me to believe that this increase at best won't change a thing, and at worst could exacerbate the situation even further. I am also extremely concerned about the additional burden that would be placed on the Army and Marine Corps." (what schooling in tactical warfare has this idiot had, I know he studied under his father Red Skelton in clown school) Ike's right. The White House's Iraq strategy has failed, our brave military is stretched to the breaking point, and neither Congress nor the American people will support for much longer throwing good money after bad or sending good people after good people into a hopeless war zone. (notice how this bitch puts MONEY first)
Rather than talk about additional troops, it's time to begin redeploying troops out of Iraq immediately and engaging other governments and allies in crafting a diplomatic and political solution to the nightmare. (Cut, Run and Surrendor, the Democrat Mantra) That this administration could still think an escalated military option is a credible path to stability and democracy in Iraq is alarming, and indicative of how far removed from reality this president and his inner circle are. (no sweety your the one that has no basis in reality if you think retreating from the main battlefield in the war on terror will lead to anything other than embolding the enemy)
If you've seen Sacha Baron Cohen's hysterical film about the hapless journalist Borat, a character with his own tenuous grip on reality, you probably recall the scene where he attempts to learn a dated American "Not" joke ("This suit is NOT black!" - "This suit is black...NOT!").
Well, I have a message for this President, and it's not a joke: Mr. Bush, send more troops to Iraq...NOT! (thank god this goofball or any other goofball in congress have absolutly nothing to say about how many troops get sent or not. ONLY the President has the authority to make that call... Thank God)
Democrats

The symbol of Democrat Integrity Sandy Burgler

Report Says Berger Hid Archive Documents

Dec 20, 7:56 PM (ET)
By LARRY MARGASAK

WASHINGTON (AP) - President Clinton's national security adviser removed classified documents from the National Archives, hid them under a construction trailer and later tried to find the trash collector to retrieve them, the agency's internal watchdog said Wednesday.

The report was issued more than a year after Sandy Berger pleaded guilty and received a criminal sentence for removing the documents.
Democrats

A Christmas Gift from the Mad Persian

Ahmadineajd: Iran now nuclear power

Iranian president: Our scienists have reached zenith, accessed nuclear fuel cycle

Yaakov Lappin Published:
12.20.06, 13:14

Iran is now a "nuclear power," its President, Mahmoud Ahamdinejad, delcared Wednesday, according to the Islamic Republic News Agency .
During a speech delivered in the Western Iranian province of Javanroud, Ahmadinejad said: " The Islamic Republic of Iran is now a nuclear power, thanks to the hard work of the Iranian people and authorities."
Full Story

Ahmadinejad: Israel, US will vanish

Ahmadinejad says Israel, US, Britain will vanish – 'this is a divine promise;' Iran demands UN Security Council condemn Israel's nuclear development, place Israel's facilities under inspection

News agencies Published:
12.20.06, 09:35

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad launched another attack of Israel and it's allies the United States and Britain in a speech Wednesday morning.

The Iranian news agency reported that, during his speech in western Iran, the Iranian president said that the US, Britain and Israel are doomed to disappear.

"The aggressive forces will vanish, while the Iranian people will survive – since all who chose God will survive and those who distance themselves from God vanish like Pharaoh," said Ahmadinejad in his speech.

"The US, Britain, and the Zionist regime will vanish since they have distanced themselves from God. This is a divine promise," he added.

Full Story
Iran

An Essay by my 10 year old Daughter

The Essay

Global Warming
5th Grade Grizzly Cub
12/19/06
Greenhouse gasses trap heat in our atmosphere. Here is how greenhouse gasses are broken down on Earth:

Water Vapor - 95%
CO2 - 3.618%
Methane - 0.368%
Nitrous Oxide - 0.95%
Misc. - 0.072%

NASA's Mars orbiter shows that Mars may be going through global warming. The sun has been at its strongest for the past 60 years and may be affecting global temperatures. The brightening started relatively recently, 100 to 150 years ago. The global temperature increased about 0.2 degrees C over the past 20 years. To determine the sun's role in global warming, scientists measured magnetic zones on the sun's surface. They are sunspots. They are believed to intensify the sun's energy. Going back several hundred years they found that a dearth* of sunspots meant that a cold period could last as long as 50 years, but over the past century the number increased as the Earth's climate changed. The sun's brightness increased over the past 2 decades. Cosmic rays accelerate the formation of clouds in our atmosphere. Clouds have a cooling effect on Earth. Recently the sun's magnetic field doubled, reducing the influx of cosmic rays. This resulted in a reduction of cloudiness, which would be a factor in warming the Earth.

450 million years ago, CO2 levels were over 10 times higher than they are now and the planet was experiencing the coldest period in the last 1/2 billion years. The belief of worldwide warming is contradicted by the fact that massive areas are in fact cooling, such as N. & S. Pacific, the Amazon Valley, N. coast of South America, and many other places. When considered overall, warming and cooling are almost in balance. New studies also show that living plants emit a considerable amount of Methane in the presence of air.

In 1999, Michael Mann published a graph of past temperatures in which the Medieval Warming Period was not taken into account. The MWP occured starting about 1,000 B.C. and was followed by a little ice age in the 14th century. Mann and his team chose to get rid of the MWP so that their results showed what they wanted to show. Their work was accepted without criticism even though their results were not supported by the full facts.

Professor Bob Carter of the Marine Geophysical Laboratory at James Cook University in Australia, in response to Gore's movie 'The Inconvenient Truth', said, "The man is an embarrasment to U.S. science and its many fine practitioners, alot of whom know (but feel unable to state publicly) that his propaganda crusade is mostly based on junk science." Dr. Wibjorn Karlen, Department of Physical Geography and Quaternary Geology, Stockholm University, Sweden says, "The 'mass balance' of Antarctica is positive - more snow is accumulating than melting off. As a result, there is an increase in the 'calving' of icebergs as the ice dome of Antarctica is growing and flowing to the oceans."

* Dearth - scarcity or lack. Her new favorite word. It had to be looked up, of course, but she is now (successfully) attempting to use it in everyday conversation. My mother used this word a lot.

A Follow up on the Blackmail Letter from Snowe and Rockefeller

WASHINGTON, Dec. 18 /PRNewswire/ -- Lord Monckton, Viscount of Brenchley, has sent an open letter to Senators Rockefeller (D-WV) and Snowe (R-Maine) in response to their recent open letter telling the CEO of ExxonMobil to cease funding climate-skeptic scientists. (http://ff.org/centers/csspp/pdf/20061212_monckton.pdf).

Lord Monckton, former policy adviser to Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, writes: "You defy every tenet of democracy when you invite ExxonMobil to deny itself the right to provide information to senior elected and appointed government officials who disagree with your opinion."

In what The Charleston (WV) Daily Mail has called "an intemperate attempt to squelch debate with a hint of political consequences," Senators Rockefeller and Snowe released an open letter dated October 30 to ExxonMobil CEO, Rex Tillerson, insisting he end Exxons funding of a "climate change denial campaign." The Senators labeled scientists with whom they disagree as "deniers," a term usually directed at "Holocaust deniers." Some voices on the political left have called for the arrest and prosecution of skeptical scientists. The British Foreign Secretary has said skeptics should be treated like advocates of Islamic terror and must be denied access to the media.

Responds Lord Monckton, "Sceptics and those who have the courage to support them are actually helpful in getting the science right. They do not, as you improperly suggest, obfuscate the issue: they assist in clarifying it by challenging weaknesses in the consensus argument and they compel necessary corrections ... "

Lord Moncktons Churchillian reproof continues, "You acknowledge the effectiveness of the climate sceptics. In so doing, you pay a compliment to the courage of those free-thinking scientists who continue to research climate change independently despite the likelihood of refusal of publication in journals that have taken preconceived positions; the hate mail and vilification from ignorant environmentalists; and the threat of loss of tenure in institutions of learning which no longer make any pretence to uphold or cherish academic freedom."

Of Britains Royal Society, a State-funded scientific body which, like the Senators, has publicly leaned on ExxonMobil, Lord Monckton said, "The Societys long-standing funding by taxpayers does not ensure any greater purity of motive or rigour of thought than industrial funding of scientists who dare to question whether climate change will do any harm."

To the Senators comparison of ExxonMobils funding of climate sceptics with tobacco-industry funding of research denying the link between smoking and lung cancer, Lord Monckton counters, "Your comparison of Exxons funding of sceptical scientists and groups with the former antics of the tobacco industry is unjustifiable and unworthy of any credible elected representatives. Either withdraw that monstrous comparison forthwith, or resign so as not to pollute the office you hold."

Concludes Lord Monckton, "I challenge you to withdraw or resign because your letter is the latest in what appears to be an internationally-coordinated series of maladroit and malevolent attempts to silence the voices of scientists and others who have sound grounds, rooted firmly in the peer- reviewed scientific literature, to question what you would have us believe is the unanimous agreement of scientists worldwide that global warming will lead to what you excitedly but unjustifiably call disastrous and calamitous consequences."

SOURCE Center for Science and Public Policy


Thanks Mikes America
Democrats

The Crack Smokin former Mayor of D.C.

This crackhead criminal that the stupid people that live in DC keep voting for to serve in one position or another is the poster child for black achievment under the Democrat model of society....

Barry Arrested, Claims He Was Targeted
Barry Considers Suit Against D.C., Park Police

WASHINGTON -- Marion Barry said that he is talking to his lawyers and thinking about suing the D.C. government and the U.S. Park Police after he was stopped, arrested and then released this past Saturday.

Barry said that he was driving to a holiday party around 4:30 p.m. Saturday when U.S. Park Police officers, who said that he was driving too slowly, stopped him.

Barry said the officers asked him for his license and registration and then said that his license was suspended.

Barry told NBC4 the suspension was a clerical mistake, and he accused the U.S. Park police of racial profiling.

Park Police said Barry's license was in fact suspended, and that's why he was arrested.

Barry was cuffed and taken to a park police station for processing.

Barry said the incident took several hours to work out and he was humiliated and severely inconvenienced. He said he wasn't able to drive all weekend due to a mistake by the D.C. government.

So far there's been no response from the D.C. Department of Motor Vehicles.

Merry Christmass

A Letter to Newt

Mr Gingrich

I heard the other day that you are feeling that you may not run. Well thats a disgrace! Our party has fallen apart because it lacks both leadership and a backbone. You could provide both. Guilianni would provide leadership but but is a mogerate liberal NOT a conservative. McCain is part of the internal enemy and doesn't even know it. His stance AGAINST FREE SPEECH, and the first ammendment can NOT be allowed to hold the reigns of power especialy during war time. Romney is also a moderate liberal but no where as bad as McCain.
In a time of WAR we need the voices of men who understand the repeat of history that is playing before our eyes. The Main Stream Media and the Democrats have already ceeded our defeat and want us to sit down with the mad Persian and his Syrian lap dog to discuss our terms of surrendor.
Are you going to sit idly by while fools steer our nation down a path that will lead to the deaths of Millions?
People keep saying that it's 1938 and we are experiencing a Chamberlain moment. I say it's September 1941 and a Nuclear December 7th is around the corner.
And your going to hesitate on whether or not your needed? This last election was NOT won by the Democrats it was lost by the Republican Leadership or lack there of. No one came out to support our team because they gave us nothing to support.
Renew your Contract with the people. We are begging for someone that will speak the cold hard reality of what we are now facing as a nation and a world. If you won't do it NO ONE will. The Republican Party leadership has PROVEN that they do not have the stomach to stand against the slings and arrows of the Dems and the MSM.
I thought you of all people would see what is needed and have the sense of history to understand that that light at the end of the Tunnel is the Train of war that is about to crush us...
Newt

Hillary starts building her manure pile one scoop at a time

Hillary Clinton Says She Wouldn't Have Voted For Iraq War

December 18, 2006 4:02 PMDavid Chalian
ABC News' David Chalian Reports: As Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton continues to assess a possible presidential candidacy and the contours of a Democratic nomination fight, she has taken another step away from her 2002 vote authorizing President Bush to attack Iraq by saying that she "wouldn't have voted that way" if she knew everything she knows now.

So I guess thats an I vote against after I voted for it unless of course the polls say otherwise
Democrats
Clinton

Do you feel like I do?

Is it just me or has the whole country gone nutz?....

I just spent the whole week stuck in NY with a pack of wack job liberals, and listening to nothing but lunatics on the Radio. The trip to NY was necessitated by the recurring Nightmare of an ongoing training that culminated in a 31/2 hour test. To add to this joy the other 3 people taking the test and the guy that gave the class were screaming liberals. Here I was in NY with a guy teaching a class that has to take 20 min a day to give us his opinion about Bush and the deficit. While being trapped with in a limo van with another guy from LA that could only talk about Global Warming, and the Dallas Cowboys both subjects that cause me to want to stick pencils in my eyes or at least the person who's talkings eyes...LOL The final straw was the afternoon trip in the van when the driver went an a half hour dissertation as to how the guvment blew up them towers and a cruise missile hit the Pentagon....

In the meantime the press and 3/4 of congress have decided not only should we pull out and admit a defeat that has yet been given to us but we must also sit down with the mad little Persian and has Syrian pet to negotiate the terms of our surrender.... Are these people all out of there fucking minds or has Rod Serling snatched me from beyond the grave. This has got to be the Twighlite Zone.

Ahh the Christmass Season you just got to love it......

Voodoo Science From the ALL Knowing an ALL Powerfull

This story ran a couple of days ago and got some mention but not what I feel is the amount of attention that it should get. What we have here are two examples of everything that is bad and dangerous in the US Senate. These two halfwits are threatining a major corporation in OUR name, and with the weight of the Federal Government. Global Warming has NOT been proven. The majority of the studies that do support it are based on faulty data by a Wacko named Mann. Who to make the data fit his BELIEF system deleted a period of history known as the Middle ages warming period. His corupt data has been used to foist this phony belief system down everybody's throats. Trying to make it seem that the temperature change is NOT a normal cyclic phenominom. What is even more freightening is Congresses tendancy to take voodoo science like this and base LAW on it. They have also done this with the MYTH of second hand smoke. Another theory that has NO proof to back it up. Also the second hand smoke myth is the model Congress (well at least these two idiots) wants to now use to extort money out of oil companies the way they did big tobacco.


Global Warming Gag Order
Senators to Exxon: Shut up, and pay up.

Monday, December 4, 2006 12:01 a.m. EST

Washington has no shortage of bullies, but even we can't quite believe an October 27 letter that Senators Jay Rockefeller and Olympia Snowe sent to ExxonMobil CEO Rex Tillerson. Its message: Start toeing the Senators' line on climate change, or else.

We reprint the full text of the letter here, so readers can see for themselves. But its essential point is that the two Senators believe global warming is a fact, and therefore all debate about the issue must stop and ExxonMobil should "end its dangerous support of the [global warming] 'deniers.' " Not only that, the company "should repudiate its climate change denial campaign and make public its funding history." And in extra penance for being "one of the world's largest carbon emitters," Exxon should spend that money on "global remediation efforts."

The Senators aren't dumb enough to risk an ethics inquiry by threatening specific consequences if Mr. Tillerson declines this offer he can't refuse. But in case the CEO doesn't understand his company's jeopardy, they add that "ExxonMobil and its partners in denial have manufactured controversy, sown doubt, and impeded progress with strategies all-too reminiscent of those used by the tobacco industry for so many years." (Our emphasis.) The Senators also graciously copied the Exxon board on their missive.

This is amazing stuff. On the one hand, the Senators say that everyone agrees on the facts and consequences of climate change. But at the same time they are so afraid of debate that they want Exxon to stop financing a doughty band of dissenters who can barely get their name in the paper. We respect the folks at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, but we didn't know until reading the Rockefeller-Snowe letter that they ran U.S. climate policy and led the mainstream media around by the nose, too. Congratulations.


Let's compare the balance of forces: on one side, CEI; on the other, the Pew Charitable Trusts, the Sierra Club, Environmental Defense, the U.N. and EU, Hollywood, Al Gore, and every politically correct journalist in the country. We'll grant that's a fair intellectual fight. But if the Senators are so afraid that a handful of policy wonks at a single small think-tank are in danger of winning this debate, they must not have much confidence in the merits of their own case.
The letter is so over-the-top that we also wonder if Mr. Rockefeller in particular has even read it. (He and Ms. Snowe didn't return our call.) The Senator hails from coal-producing West Virginia, where people know something about carbon emissions. Come to think of it, Mr. Rockefeller owes his own vast wealth to something other than non-carbon energy. But perhaps it's easier to be carbon free when your fortune comes from a trust fund.

The letter is of a piece with what has become a campaign of intimidation against any global warming dissent. Not only is everyone supposed to concede that the planet has been warming--as it has--but we are all supposed to salute and agree that human beings are the definitive cause, that the magnitude of the warming will be disastrous and its effects catastrophic, that such problems as AIDS and poverty are less urgent, and that economic planners must therefore impose vast new regulatory burdens on everyone around the world. Exxon is being targeted in this letter and other ways because it is one of the few companies that still thinks some debate on these questions is valuable.


Every dogma has its day, and we've lived long enough to see more than one "consensus" blown apart within a few years of "everyone knowing" it was true. In recent decades environmentalists have been wrong about almost every other apocalyptic claim they've made: global famine, overpopulation, natural resource exhaustion, the evils of pesticides, global cooling, and so on. Perhaps it's useful to have a few folks outside the "consensus" asking questions before we commit several trillion dollars to any problem.
Imagine if this letter had been sent by someone in the Bush Administration trying to enforce the opposite conclusion? The left would be howling about "censorship." That's exactly what did happen earlier this year after James Hansen, the NASA scientist and global warming evangelist, complained that a lowly 24-year-old press aide had tried to limit his media access. The entire episode was preposterous because Mr. Hansen is one of the most publicized scientists in the world, but the press aide was nonetheless sacked.

The Senators' letter is far more serious because they have enormous power to punish Exxon if it doesn't kowtow to them. A windfall profits tax is in the air, and we've seen what happens to other companies that dare to resist Congressional intimidation. It's to Exxon's credit that, in its response to the Senators, the company said that it will continue to fund free market research groups because "there is value in the debate" that helps promote "optimal public policy decisions." Too bad that's not what the Senators care about.

The Letter

FOR THE RECORD

The 'Obfuscation Agenda'
The letter to ExxonMobil.

BY JOHN D. ROCKEFELLER IV AND OLYMPIA SNOWE
Monday, December 4, 2006 12:01 a.m. EST

Editor's note: This is the text of a letter Sens. Rockefeller (D., W.Va.) and Snowe (R., Maine) sent to ExxonMobil's CEO. A related editorial appears here.





October 27, 2006
Mr. Rex W. Tillerson
Chairman and Chief Executive Officer
ExxonMobil Corporation
5959 Las Colinas Boulevard
Irving, TX 75039

Dear Mr. Tillerson:

Allow us to take this opportunity to congratulate you on your first year as Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the ExxonMobil Corporation. You will become the public face of an undisputed leader in the world energy industry, and a company that plays a vital role in our national economy. As that public face, you will have the ability and responsibility to lead ExxonMobil toward its rightful place as a good corporate and global citizen.

We are writing to appeal to your sense of stewardship of that corporate citizenship as U.S. Senators concerned about the credibility of the United States in the international community, and as Americans concerned that one of our most prestigious corporations has done much in the past to adversely affect that credibility. We are convinced that ExxonMobil's longstanding support of a small cadre of global climate change skeptics, and those skeptics access to and influence on government policymakers, have made it increasingly difficult for the United States to demonstrate the moral clarity it needs across all facets of its diplomacy.

Obviously, other factors complicate our foreign policy. However, we are persuaded that the climate change denial strategy carried out by and for ExxonMobil has helped foster the perception that the United States is insensitive to a matter of great urgency for all of mankind, and has thus damaged the stature of our nation internationally. It is our hope that under your leadership, ExxonMobil would end its dangerous support of the "deniers." Likewise, we look to you to guide ExxonMobil to capitalize on its significant resources and prominent industry position to assist this country in taking its appropriate leadership role in promoting the technological innovation necessary to address climate change and in fashioning a truly global solution to what is undeniably a global problem.

While ExxonMobil's activity in this area is well-documented, we are somewhat encouraged by developments that have come to light during your brief tenure. We fervently hope that reports that ExxonMobil intends to end its funding of the climate change denial campaign of the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) are true. Similarly, we have seen press reports that your British subsidiary has told the Royal Society, Great Britain's foremost scientific academy, that ExxonMobil will stop funding other organizations with similar purposes. However, a casual review of available literature, as performed by personnel for the Royal Society reveals that ExxonMobil is or has been the primary funding source for the "skepticism" of not only CEI, but for dozens of other overlapping and interlocking front groups sharing the same obfuscation agenda. For this reason, we share the goal of the Royal Society that ExxonMobil "come clean" about its past denial activities, and that the corporation take positive steps by a date certain toward a new and more responsible corporate citizenship.

ExxonMobil is not alone in jeopardizing the credibility and stature of the United States. Large corporations in related industries have joined ExxonMobil to provide significant and consistent financial support of this pseudo-scientific, non-peer reviewed echo chamber. The goal has not been to prevail in the scientific debate, but to obscure it. This climate change denial confederacy has exerted an influence out of all proportion to its size or relative scientific credibility. Through relentless pressure on the media to present the issue "objectively," and by challenging the consensus on climate change science by misstating both the nature of what "consensus" means and what this particular consensus is, ExxonMobil and its allies have confused the public and given cover to a few senior elected and appointed government officials whose positions and opinions enable them to damage U.S. credibility abroad.

Climate change denial has been so effective because the "denial community" has mischaracterized the necessarily guarded language of serious scientific dialogue as vagueness and uncertainty. Mainstream media outlets, attacked for being biased, help lend credence to skeptics' views, regardless of their scientific integrity, by giving them relatively equal standing with legitimate scientists. ExxonMobil is responsible for much of this bogus scientific "debate" and the demand for what the deniers cynically refer to as "sound science."

A study to be released in November by an American scientific group will expose ExxonMobil as the primary funder of no fewer than 29 climate change denial front groups in 2004 alone. Besides a shared goal, these groups often featured common staffs and board members. The study will estimate that ExxonMobil has spent more than $19 million since the late 1990s on a strategy of "information laundering," or enabling a small number of professional skeptics working through scientific-sounding organizations to funnel their viewpoints through non-peer-reviewed websites such as Tech Central Station. The Internet has provided ExxonMobil the means to wreak its havoc on U.S. credibility, while avoiding the rigors of refereed journals. While deniers can easily post something calling into question the scientific consensus on climate change, not a single refereed article in more than a decade has sought to refute it.

Indeed, while the group of outliers funded by ExxonMobil has had some success in the court of public opinion, it has failed miserably in confusing, much less convincing, the legitimate scientific community. Rather, what has emerged and continues to withstand the carefully crafted denial strategy is an insurmountable scientific consensus on both the problem and causation of climate change. Instead of the narrow and inward-looking universe of the deniers, the legitimate scientific community has developed its views on climate change through rigorous peer-reviewed research and writing across all climate-related disciplines and in virtually every country on the globe.

Where most scientists dispassionate review of the facts has moved past acknowledgement to mitigation strategies, ExxonMobil's contribution the overall politicization of science has merely bolstered the views of U.S. government officials satisfied to do nothing. Rather than investing in the development of technologies that might see us through this crisis--and which may rival the computer as a wellspring of near-term economic growth around the world--ExxonMobil and its partners in denial have manufactured controversy, sown doubt, and impeded progress with strategies all-too reminiscent of those used by the tobacco industry for so many years. The net result of this unfortunate campaign has been a diminution of this nation's ability to act internationally, and not only in environmental matters.

In light of the adverse impacts still resulting from your corporations activities, we must request that ExxonMobil end any further financial assistance or other support to groups or individuals whose public advocacy has contributed to the small, but unfortunately effective, climate change denial myth. Further, we believe ExxonMobil should take additional steps to improve the public debate, and consequently the reputation of the United States. We would recommend that ExxonMobil publicly acknowledge both the reality of climate change and the role of humans in causing or exacerbating it. Second, ExxonMobil should repudiate its climate change denial campaign and make public its funding history. Finally, we believe that there would be a benefit to the United States if one of the world's largest carbon emitters headquartered here devoted at least some of the money it has invested in climate change denial pseudo-science to global remediation efforts. We believe this would be especially important in the developing world, where the disastrous effects of global climate change are likely to have their most immediate and calamitous impacts.

Each of us is committed to seeing the United States officially reengage and demonstrate leadership on the issue of global climate change. We are ready to work with you and any other past corporate sponsor of the denial campaign on proactive strategies to promote energy efficiency, to expand the use of clean, alternative, and renewable fuels, to accelerate innovation to responsibly extend the useful life of our fossil fuel reserves, and to foster greater understanding of the necessity of action on a truly global scale before it is too late.


Sincerely,
John D. Rockefeller IV Olympia Snowe


Cc:
J. Stephen Simon
Walter V. Shipley
Samuel J. Palmisano
Marilyn Carlson Nelson
Henry A. McKinnell, Jr.
Philip E. Lippincott
Reatha Clark King
William R. Howell
James R. Houghton
William W. George
Michael J. Boskin

A DIFFERENT CHRISTMAS POEM

A Different Christmas Poem

The embers glowed softly, and in their dim light,
I gazed round the room and I cherished the sight.
My wife was asleep, her head on my chest,
My daughter beside me, angelic in rest.
Outside the snow fell, a blanket of white,
Transforming the yard to a winter delight.
The sparkling lights in the tree I believe,
Completed the magic that was Christmas Eve.
My eyelids were heavy, my breathing was deep,
Secure and surrounded by love I would sleep.
In perfect contentment, or so it would seem,
So I slumbered, perhaps I started to dream.

The sound wasn't loud, and it wasn't too near,
But I opened my eyes when it tickled my ear.
Perhaps just a cough, I didn't quite know, Then the
sure sound of footsteps outside in the snow.
My soul gave a tremble, I struggled to hear,
And I crept to the door just to see who was near.
Standing out in the cold and the da rk of the night,
A lone figure stood, his face weary and tight.

A soldier, I puzzled, some twenty years old,
Perhaps a Marine, huddled here in the cold.
Alone in the dark, he looked up and smiled,
Standing watch over me, and my wife and my child.
"What are you doing?" I asked without fear,
"Come in this moment, it's freezing out here!
Put down your pack, brush the snow from your sleeve,
You should be at home on a cold Christmas Eve!"

For barely a moment I saw his eyes shift,
Away from the cold and the snow blown in drifts..
To the window that danced with a warm fire's light
Then he sighed and he said "Its really all right,
I'm out here by choice. I'm here every night." "It's my duty to stand at the front of the line,
That separates you from the darkest of times.
No one had to ask or beg or implore me,
I'm proud to stand here like my fathers before me.
My Gram p s died at 'Pearl on a day in December , "
Then he sighed, "That's a Christmas 'Gram always remembers."
My dad stood his watch in the jungles of 'Nam',
And now it is my turn and so, here I am.
I've not seen my own son in more than a while,
But my wife sends me pictures, he's sure got her smile.

The red, white, and blue... an American flag.
I can live through the cold and the being alone,
Away from my family, my house and my home.
I can stand at my post through the rain and the sleet,
I can sleep in a foxhole with little to eat.
I can carry the weight of killing another,
Or lay down my life with my sister and brother..
Who stand at the front against any and all,
To ensure for all time that this flag will not fall."

"So go back inside," he said, "harbor no fright,
Your family is waiting and I'll be all right."
"But isn't there something I can do, at the least,
"Give you mo ney," I asked , "or prepare you a feast?
It seems all too little for all that you've done,
For being away from your wife and your son."
Then his eye welled a tear that held no regret,
"Just tell us you love us, and never forget.
To fight for our rights back at home while we're gone,
To stand your own watch, no matter how long.
For when we come home, either standing or dead,
To know you remember we fought and we bled.
Is payment enough, and with that we will trust,
That we mattered to you as you mattered to us."

We all Know the French are on the same side as Iran

Why would anyone believe that the French would even report the arms smuggling activities of thier allies the Iranians and the Syrians????

France deploys UAVs to stop IAF flights
By YAAKOV KATZ

In an effort to put a stop to Israeli overflights in Lebanon, the French Armed Forces has deployed an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) squadron in southern Lebanon to conduct intelligence-gathering missions in place of the IDF.

France, a member of UNIFIL, has expressed adamant opposition to IAF overflights in Lebanon. Last month, OC Planning Division Maj.-Gen. Ido Nehushtan traveled to Paris for meetings with senior military officials during which he tried to explain Israel's operational needs. The flights, the IDF claims, are necessary for gathering intelligence and keeping an eye on the Lebanese-Syrian border through which weapons are smuggled to the Hizbullah.

Angered however from an incident in October during which French soldiers almost opened fire at an IAF fighter jet, military sources in Paris told The Jerusalem Post following Nehushtan's visit that they were still opposed to the overflights and that French soldiers stationed in Lebanon were given the authority to open fire at Israeli jets if they felt threatened by the flights.

According to Israeli defense sources, the French initiative is also meant to prove the operational capabilities of its UAVs so they can compete against Israeli defense industries on the global UAV market.

While welcoming the use of UAVs as part of UNIFIL operations in Lebanon, a high-ranking officer said Sunday that the IDF would not stop flying over Lebanon.

"We need to allow UNIFIL all of the means it finds essential to perform its missions," the officer said. "But at the same time, until Hizbullah fulfills its part of UN resolution 1701 and returns the kidnapped soldiers [Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser Y.K.] there is no reason for us to completely fulfill our part of the agreement and stop the overflights."

Another MileStone Going Un-Noticed

Iraqis Near Deal on Distribution of Oil Revenues

BAGHDAD, Dec. 8 — Iraqi officials are near agreement on a national oil law that would give the central government the power to distribute current and future oil revenues to the provinces or regions, based on their population, Iraqi and American officials say.

If enacted, the measure, drafted by a committee of politicians and ministers, could help resolve a highly divisive issue that has consistently blocked efforts to reconcile the country’s feuding ethnic and sectarian factions. Sunni Arabs, who lead the insurgency, have opposed the idea of regional autonomy for fear that they would be deprived of a fair share of the country’s oil wealth, which is concentrated in the Shiite south and Kurdish north.

The Iraq Study Group report stressed that an oil law guaranteeing an equitable distribution of revenues was crucial to the process of national reconciliation, and thus to ending the war.

25 Years Ago Scumbag Mumia Abu Jamal MURDERED a good Cop Danny Faulkner

Mumia Should be 6 foot under Rather than in a 6X6 Cell....

Today marks the 25th Anniversary of the Murder of a good cop by a scumbag. A benefit was held at GENO’S STEAKS in Philly wear all money raised goes to the JUSTICE FOR DANIEL FAULKNER SCHOLRSHIP FUND please give your support.

WHO IS MUMIA ABU JAMAL?

Mumia Abu-Jamal has stated that he spent his youth as an "apprentice in revolutionary journalism" for the Black Panthers. The Panthers were a radical group that, along with their legitimate "social work," advocated violence, kidnapping, drug dealing and murder, as appropriate methods of response to perceived government and police oppression. Jamal, who had no prior criminal record prior to the Faulkner shooting, eventually rose to the rank of "Lieutenant Minister of Information" for the Panther's Philadelphia Chapter. He left the Panthers in the early 1970s and began working for a string of local Philadelphia radio stations. In March of 1981, Jamal was fired from his part-time job as a reporter for Philadelphia's NPR (National Public Radio) affiliate station, WUHY-FM, (now WHYY) in Philadelphia.

NOTE: Along with millions of others, it appears that the Mumia propaganda machine duped us too. When we first went on line, based on the information we collected while researching this issue -- which included articles written by Jamal's supporters -- we stated, "Mumia Abu-Jamal was a longstanding critic of the Philadelphia Police Department." However, since our initial posting of this site we have been contacted by several credible sources, including Pulitzer Prize winning author Buzz Bissinger and various other reporters who worked for local Philadelphia newspapers in 1981. These individuals informed us that, while Mumia Abu-Jamal known in Philadelphia's inner city for his reports on social issues, he was not known as a critic of, or even a commentator on, the Philadelphia Police Department. In his Vanity Fair article "The Guilty and the Dead" (Which is posted at danielfaulkner.com) Buzz Bissinger states that William Marimow (who shared in a Pulitzer Prize for Public Service in 1978 for reporting on police abuses in Philadelphia, and who is now the managing editor of the Baltimore Sun) told him, "I was very attuned to everyone who wrote about Philadelphia police violence. This guy [Jamal] didn't register a blip on my radar screen." Several other prominent Philadelphia journalists who specialized in writing about police abuse echo Mr. Marimow's sentiments.

Jamal's supporters have always insisted that he was "targeted by police" because he was a constant nuisance to them and had "exposed" much of their alleged wrongdoing. But the reality seems to be that Jamal's supposed commentary on police issues in 1981 has nothing to do with his case, because he simply never made any such commentary. As confirmed by the statement made by one of Jamal's own attorneys - who admitted that the arresting officers likely had "no idea" who Jamal was on the morning of the killing -- this notion appears to be just another article of misinformation on the part of Jamal's adherents.

THE MOVE FACTOR
There is undoubtedly a link between Mumia Abu-Jamal and the violent anti-government, anti-police group known as MOVE. Headed by a man named John Africa, MOVE was headquartered in Philadelphia's Center City. Most of MOVE's members lived together in a single row home in Philadelphia's inner city area. For several years preceding the murder of Officer Faulkner, MOVE's members had been in constant conflict with their neighbors, as well as various Philadelphia City officials. According to comments made to local media by residents who lived adjacent to the MOVE home in 1978, Move's members were armed to the teeth and they would threaten any person who violated the rules MOVE had established to govern the neighborhood. MOVE allowed mountains of trash to pile up in front of their home attracting vermin to the neighborhood and throw buckets of human waste from their windows. Additionally, MOVE's members used a loudspeaker system to blast the militant rhetoric of John Africa from their windows around the clock.

In the spring of 1978, MOVE staged a lengthy hunger strike. Local activists visited the MOVE headquarters in their Powelton Village home and determined that the MOVE members participating in the hunger strike were also starving their children. Arrangements were made to have food delivered to the home for these children. MOVE's leaders first accepted this food, and then threw it back over the fence that surrounded their home. On August 10, 1978, the police were asked to extract the children from the MOVE home. As they attempted to do so, MOVE members began firing at them. When the shooting stopped, Police Officer James Ramp had been killed. Nine MOVE members were tried for Officer Ramp's murder. All were convicted and sentenced to lengthy prison terms.

According to Jamal's friends and co-workers, he openly began to espouse the teachings of MOVE founder John Africa while at work. The trial and the sentences handed down for Officer Ramp's murder enraged Jamal. According to the station's general manager, Jamal lost all semblance of objectivity as a reporter. Due to his outspoken and inflammatory rhetoric at the station, coupled with several work related violations, Jamal was fired from his part time radio job at WUHY-FM. He failed to find new employment in local media. As stated by many of his colleagues, by 1981 he had become a local media pariah whose professional and personal life had begun to unravel.

Mumia Abu-Jamal had not worked as a reporter for nearly a year, and had taken to working as a cab driver to make ends meet, on the night he murdered Officer Daniel Faulkner.

THE CASE AGAINST MUMIA ABU-JAMAL

By any standard, the evidence against Mumia Abu-Jamal was overwhelming. The prosecution case included:

Four eyewitnesses to the crime who stated that Jamal was the killer.
Considerable forensic and ballistic evidence that pointed to Jamal's guilt.
Three witnesses saw and heard Jamal, when just outside the hospital emergency room, triumphantly shout that he had killed the officer.
Jamal himself. Jamal proved to be his own worst enemy at his trial. According to members of the jury, his own conduct in the courtroom convinced them that he was quite capable of committing murder.

THE EVIDENCE

The trail evidence established that the following occurred on December 9, 1981.

At the 1982 trial four (4) eyewitnesses -- none of who knew each other prior to the shooting and each of who was deemed to have testified credibly by the court -- stated that they witnessed the following sequence of events:

At 3:51:08 AM on December 9th, 1981, Officer Faulkner pulled a Volkswagen over for driving the wrong way down a one way street with it's lights off.

William Cook, Mumia Abu Jamal's brother, was driving the vehicle. He exited the car and shortly thereafter several witnesses saw him attack Officer Faulkner, punching Faulkner in the face.

Several of the eyewitnesses saw Mumia Abu-Jamal running across the street towards the scene with his arm raised. Prior to the police stop of his brother, Jamal was coincidentally sitting in his cab across the street in a parking lot.

From less than two feet away, Jamal fired a shot, which hit Officer Faulkner in the back.

Faulkner was able to remove his revolver, turn and fire one shot at his attacker. The bullet found its mark in Mumia Abu Jamal's chest.

The wounded Faulkner then fell to the ground.

Jamal stood over the unarmed officer and fired several additional shots at Faulkner's upper body.

Jamal then took the time to bend down, put the barrel of his gun inches away from Officer Faulkner's face and fire the final and fatal shot, killing him instantly.

Jamal then staggered several steps and collapsed on the curb.

Just 90 seconds later, police apprehended Jamal, his gun at his side, only a few feet from Officer Faulkner's body. They then placed him in the back of a police van.


Jamal's Bragging Confession to the Murder

In their testimony, several witnesses stated that Mr. Jamal was violently resisting police when he was brought into Thomas Jefferson Hospital. Three people, including two police officers and a black hospital security guard twice heard Jamal shout out, "I shot the Mother Fucker, and I hope the Mother Fucker dies." Two of these individuals, police officers Gary Bell and Gary Wakschul, each reported what they had heard two months after the incident. The third, security guard Priscilla Durham, reported hearing the same outburst to her supervisor the day after the shooting.

Myths Section

Myth #1
The bullet that killed Officer Faulkner was a .44 caliber bullet, while Jamal's gun was a .38 caliber.
Myth #2
Several "eyewitnesses" saw someone else shoot Officer Faulkner and then escape up an alley.
Myth #3
The jury that convicted Mumia Abu-Jamal was racially stacked against him by the prosecutor, who used eleven of his peremptory challenges to exclude qualified black jurors, solely because they were black.
Myth #4
Mumia Abu-Jamal is a political prisoner who was convicted and sentenced to death because of his political beliefs and his past membership in the Black Panthers.
Myth #5
The court allocated just $150 for Mumia Abu-Jamal and his attorney to mount their entire defense.
Myth #6
The Philadelphia Police Department lost evidence, withheld evidence, coerced witnesses and conspired against Mr. Jamal to obtain a conviction.
Myth #7
In an effort to frame Mumia Abu-Jamal and secure a conviction, the Philadelphia Police fabricated a story about Mumia Abu-Jamal's Emergency Room confession.
Myth #8
Mr. Jamal was coming to the aid of his brother who was being brutally beaten by Officer Faulkner.
Myth #9
Mumia Abu-Jamal was denied his right to self representation, in violation of his Constitutional Rights.
Myth #10
Mumia Abu-Jamal's court appointed attorney was admittedly incompetent and incapable of mounting a defense on Jamal's behalf.
Myth #11
Judge Albert Sabo has sentenced more black people to death than any other Judge in the U.S. Therefore, he had a bias against Mumia Abu-Jamal.
Myth #12
The ballistics evidence used to convict Mumia Abu-Jamal was flawed. The police failed to test Jamal's hands to see if he had recently fired a gun and they never "sniffed" Jamal's gun to see if it had been fired.
Myth #13
Only one prosecution witness saw Mr. Jamal with a gun.
Myth #14
Mumia Abu-Jamal is an "award winning journalist" who was targeted by police and Mayor Frank Rizzo because he had repeatedly exposed police corruption in Philadelphia.
Myth #15
Some of Jamal's supporters suggest that the "real killer's" driver's license was found in Officer Faulkner's pocket the morning he was murdered.
Myth #16
The downward angle of Jamal's wound makes the prosecution's explanation of the shooting impossible.
Myth #17
Justice for Daniel Faulkner response to the Arnold Beverly Story

If you require more information why this scumbag should have been exicuted Go To the Faulkner Home Page For as much information as you need


Cop Killer Caucus
The House yesterday passed a resolution "condemning the decision of St. Denis, France, to name a street in honor of Mumia Abu-Jamal, the convicted murder [sic] of Philadelphia Police Office Danny Faulkner." The vote was 368-31, with 8 members voting "present." Here's a list of what one might call the Cop-Killer's Caucus, the congressmen who voted against the resolution, all Democrats:

Neil Abercrombie (Hawaii) Carolyn Kilpatrick (Mich.) Robert Scott (Va.)
William Clay (Mo.) Barbara Lee (Calif.) Jose Serrano (N.Y.)
Emanuel Cleaver (Mo.) Cynthia McKinney (Ga.) Fortney Hillman Stark Jr.(Calif.)
John Conyers (Mich.) Gregory Meeks (N.Y.) Edolphus Towns (N.Y.)
Jim Cooper (Tenn.) Jerrold Nadler (N.Y.) Tom Udall (N.M.)
Danny Davis (Ill.) James Oberstar (Minn.) Nydia Velazquez (N.Y.)
Raul Grijalva (Ariz.) Major Owens (N.Y.) Maxine Waters (Calif.)
Maurice Hinchey (N.Y.) Ed Pastor (Ariz.) Anthony Weiner (N.Y.)
Mike Honda (Calif.) Donald Payne (N.J.) Lynn Woolsey (Calif.)
Jesse Jackson Jr. (Ill.) Charles Rangel (N.Y.)
Eddie Bernice Johnson (Texas) Bobby Rush (Ill.)


The "present" votes came from Sam Farr (Calif.), Al Green (Texas), Luis Gutierrez (Ill.), Sheila Jackson-Lee (Texas), John Lewis (Ga.), George Miller (Calif.), Janice Schakowsky (Ill.) and Melvin Watt (N.C.). Tellingly, every member of the Pennsylvania delegation who was present voted "yes."

The most disturbing name on the "no" list is that of John Conyers. Granted, this is only a symbolic vote, but is it really a good idea to entrust the chairmanship of the Judiciary Committee to a man who casts a symbolic vote for a cop-killer and against his victim?


Mumia
Democrats

Death of an ICON

I loved Ms. Kirkpatrick, she is a woman I would have gladly voted for to be President. The country has lost a National Treasure with her passing.

Jeane Kirkpatrick, Ex-Ambassador, Dies
Dec 8, 10:26 AM (ET)
By MERRILL HARTSON

WASHINGTON (AP) - Jeane J. Kirkpatrick, an unabashed apostle of Reagan era conservatism and the first woman U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, has died.

The death of the 80-year-old Kirkpatrick, who began her public life as a Hubert Humphrey Democrat, was announced Friday at the senior staff meeting of the U.S. mission to the United Nations.

Spokesman Richard Grenell said that Ambassador John Bolton asked for a moment of silence. An announcement of her death also was posted on the Web site of the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative-oriented think tank here where she was a senior fellow.

Kirkpatrick's assistant, Andrea Harrington, said that she died in her sleep at home in Bethesda, Md. late Thursday. The cause of death was not immediately known.

Kirkpatrick's health had been in decline recently, Harrington said, adding that she was "basically confined to her house," going to work about once a week "and then less and less."

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., said that Kirkpatrick, who had a reputation as a blunt and acerbic advocate, "stood up for the interests of America while at the U.N., lent a powerful moral voice to the Reagan foreign policy and has been a source of wise counsel to our nation since leaving the government two decades ago. She will be greatly missed."

Karlyn H. Bowman, a colleague of Kirkpatrick's at AEI, called her "always insightful. Always interesting. Very thoughtful about modern American politics and foreign policy. A wonderful colleague."

Bowman also said that Kirkpatrick, who had been elevated to the U.N. post by President Reagan in 1981, had "served with great distinction" at the U.N. "She was a great patriot, a champion of freedom and we will certainly miss her at AEI and the country."

Kirkpatrick was known as a blunt and sometimes acerbic advocate for her causes. She remained involved in public issues even though she'd left government service two decades ago. She joined seven other former U.N. ambassadors in 2005 in writing a letter to Congress telling lawmakers that their plan to withhold dues to force reform at the world body was misguided and would "create resentment, build animosity and actually strengthen opponents of reform."

Bill Bennett, a former secretary of education under Reagan, the nation's drug czar under the first President Bush and a leading conservative opinion-maker, called her "very forceful, very strong, a daughter of Oklahoma, great sense of humor. She held her own."

Bennett said the Iraq Study Group so prominently in the news "would have been better with Jeane Kirkpatrick on it ... She had no patience with tyrannies, said they had to be confronted, you couldn't deal with tyrannies, that there were some people you could work with - these people you couldn't."

Update from FDD

A tribute to Jeane Kirkpatrick (AV)

I was awakened this morning by a call from a friend informing me that Jeane Kirkpatrick had died. Ambassador Kirkpatrick, until fairly recently, was a scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, where I interned last year, and her office was only a few steps away from my bay on the 11th floor. She later went on to help found the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies.
Jeane would make a point of stopping for a chat every time she passed my bay at AEI, and we had many fascinating conversations about foreign policy, and I was constantly struck by her powerful mind, on which, mercifully, age was not taking its toll.
Being a somewhat bumptious sort, I would try to tease out her views on the issues facing us today—at the time, it was the floundering Iraq mission—and it was clear that her contributions deserved a more public airing. Fortunately, prior to her death, Jeane had finished writing a new book on foreign policy. Though I have not yet had the pleasure to read it (it will be published shortly), I am told by those whose judgment I trust that it is excellent.
I remember one particular conversation with Jeane during which, and this was the Tory in me speaking, I quizzed her about her role in the Falklands crisis, which had received unfavorable reviews in Margaret Thatcher's memoirs Downing Street Years. Jeane displayed her characteristic graciousness, explaining the basis for her skepticism at being too supportive of Britain's pursuit of its territorial claim, while conceding that hindsight showed her fears were too severe.
Jeane explained that she was worried that an embarrassment of the Argentinean government over the Falklands might lead to its replacement by a communist one. Jeane's thinking flowed from the powerful, and powerfully American traditions of the Monroe Doctrine, as well as her own thesis in Dictatorships and Double Standards, which foreign policy thinkers today, especially those specializing in the Middle East, are I think admonished to read. (A link to the original essay is here, and its book form here).
In vivid detail, Jeane explained that hindsight had vindicated Lady Thatcher's decision, not her own. Yet, in this concession, Jeane's graciousness and honor came through, and I came to see that any sensible policymaker in her place would have had the same fears as her, and would probably have come to the same decision: I, with all my sympathies for the Anglosphere and the old order, certainly would have.
Jeane then spoke to me about the profound ambiguity of foreign policy idealism that animated her Dictatorships and Double Standards thesis, subtly calling attention to a particular weakness in my own foreign policy thinking. I would say that if there is one essay that those who are called neoconservatives should read, it is Dictatorships and Double Standards.
Ultimately, difficult policy decisions cannot be entirely based on ex ante normative ideals, but prudential concerns, animated by history. Fortunately, this underscores the need for powerfully smart, and idealistic, statesmen, of which Jeane Kirkpatrick surely was one. Withal, Jeane's contribution to U.S. foreign policy was very significant, and her death is serious and in many ways sad, but she leaves behind many friends, a goodly number of acolytes, and a very, very significant legacy. May she rest in peace.

Posted by Alykhan Velshi at 09:58 AM

Stop screaming Racists at Cops just because the CRIMINAL is BLACK

Heather Mac Donald
No, the Cops Didn’t Murder Sean Bell
And here’s what decent black advocates would say.
4 December 2006

New York’s anti-cop forces have roared back to life, thanks to a fatal police shooting of an unarmed man a week ago. The press is once again fawning over Al Sharpton, Herbert Daughtry, Charles Barron, and sundry other hate-mongers in and out of city government as they accuse the police of widespread mistreatment of blacks and issue barely veiled threats of riots if they do not get “justice.”

The allegation that last weekend’s shooting was racially motivated is preposterous. A group of undercover officers working in a gun- and drug-plagued strip joint in Queens had good reason to believe that a party leaving the club was armed and about to shoot an adversary. When one of the undercovers identified himself as an officer, the car holding the party twice tried to run him down. The officer started firing while yelling to the car’s occupants: “Let me see your hands.” His colleagues, believing they were under attack, fired as well, eventually shooting off 50 rounds and killing the driver, Sean Bell. No gun was found in the car, but witnesses and video footage confirm that a fourth man in the party fled the scene once the altercation began. Bell and the other men with him all had been arrested for illegal possession of guns in the past; one of Bell’s companions that night, Joseph Guzman, had spent considerable time in prison, including for an armed robbery in which he shot at his victim.

Nothing in these facts suggests that racial animus lay behind the incident. (Though this detail should be irrelevant, the undercover team was racially mixed, and the officer who fired the first shot was black.) But even more preposterous than the assertion of such animus is the claim by New York’s self-appointed minority advocates that the well-being of the minority community is what motivates them. If it were, here are seven things that you would have heard them say years ago:

Ahmadinejad's letter to Americans

Editor's note: This is the full text of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's open letter to "the American People," as supplied to CNN.]
(CNN) --
Commentary in RED added by The City Troll

In the name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful

O, Almighty God, bestow upon humanity the perfect human being promised to all by You, and make us among his followers.

Noble Americans,

Were we not faced with the activities of the US administration in this part of the world and the negative ramifications of those activities on the daily lives of our peoples, coupled with the many wars and calamities caused by the US administration as well as the tragic consequences of US interference in other countries; In other words the US is responsible for all the worlds trouble, this coming from the country that has been training, paying, and supplying terrorists since 1979, and is right now supplying Hezbooha and Hamass in their efforts to destroy Israel and topple the lebanese government.

Were the American people not God-fearing, truth-loving, and justice-seeking, while the US administration actively conceals the truth and impedes any objective portrayal of current realities; Yes, Yes our leaders are the great Satan who only want to suck the lifes blood Oil from the ground and steal it from the peace loving god fearing Persions and Arabs.

And if we did not share a common responsibility to promote and protect freedom and human dignity and integrity; Yes like this the public hanging of an 18 year old and a minor or this exicution of a man that spoke out politicaly

Then, there would have been little urgency to have a dialogue with you.

While Divine providence has placed Iran and the United States geographically far apart, we should be cognizant that human values and our common human spirit, which proclaim the dignity and exalted worth of all human beings, have brought our two great nations of Iran and the United States closer together. Yes this is what Iran thinks of the value of ALL human beings, but I guess a Gay man isn't human nor are these dozen protestors

Both our nations are God-fearing, truth-loving and justice-seeking, and both seek dignity, respect and perfection. Yes as long as woman keep their mouths shut and their heads veiled

Both greatly value and readily embrace the promotion of human ideals such as compassion, empathy, respect for the rights of human beings, (unless your Israel) securing justice and equity, and defending the innocent and the weak against oppressors and bullies.

We are all inclined towards the good, and towards extending a helping hand to one another, particularly to those in need.

We all deplore injustice, the trampling of peoples' rights and the intimidation and humiliation of human beings. Except protestors they all must hang

We all detest darkness, deceit, lies and distortion, and seek and admire salvation, enlightenment, sincerity and honesty.

The pure human essence of the two great nations of Iran and the United States testify to the veracity of these statements. Well that was major pile of bullshit if I ever smelt one.

Noble Americans,

Our nation has always extended its hand of friendship to all other nations of the world. Except Israel, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq oh and the US and Britain but that's irrelivant

Hundreds of thousands of my Iranian compatriots are living amongst you in friendship and peace, (sleeper cells) and are contributing positively to your society. Our people have been in contact with you over the past many years and have maintained these contacts despite the unnecessary restrictions of US authorities. Why would we ever want to restrict the loving people that seize our embassies and blow up our soldiers and plant bombs on busses to kill woman and children

As mentioned, we have common concerns, face similar challenges, and are pained by the sufferings and afflictions in the world.

We, like you, are aggrieved by the ever-worsening pain and misery of the Palestinian people. Persistent aggressions by the Zionists are making life more and more difficult for the rightful owners of the land of Palestine. (the Jews ARE the rightful owners) In broad day-light, in front of cameras and before the eyes of the world, they are bombarding innocent defenseless civilians, (That have a tendancy to self explode killing woman and children and who continue to fire dozens of rockets a day into civilian targets in Israel) bulldozing houses, firing machine guns at students in the streets and alleys, and subjecting their families to endless grief.

No day goes by without a new crime. (From a Muslim)

Palestinian mothers, just like Iranian and American mothers, love their children, and are painfully bereaved by the imprisonment, wounding and murder of their children. What mother wouldn't? (yet they are proud to strap explosives to them and send them into crowds of jewish children, they hate Jews more than they love their kids)

For 60 years, the Zionist regime has driven millions of the inhabitants of Palestine out of their homes. Many of these refugees have died in the Diaspora and in refugee camps. (because the nations that they are from like Jordan refuse to allow them to come back) Their children have spent their youth in these camps and are aging while still in the hope of returning to homeland. (that they never had in Israel)

You know well that the US administration has persistently provided blind and blanket support to the Zionist regime, has emboldened it to continue its crimes, and has prevented the UN Security Council from condemning it. (especially while the UN refuses to condemn the genocide taking place by Muslims all over the world)

Who can deny such broken promises and grave injustices towards humanity by the US administration? (LOL)

Governments are there to serve their own people. No people wants to side with or support any oppressors. But regrettably, the US administration disregards even its own public opinion and remains in the forefront of supporting the trampling of the rights of the Palestinian people. (Fuck the Palestinians, Thats the Public opinion in the US)

Let's take a look at Iraq. Since the commencement of the US military presence in Iraq, hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have been killed, maimed or displaced. Terrorism in Iraq has grown exponentially. (with your funding and supply of weapons and pupet Al Sadre) With the presence of the US military in Iraq, nothing has been done to rebuild the ruins, to restore the infrastructure or to alleviate poverty. (BULLSHIT) The US Government used the pretext of the existence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, but later it became clear that that was just a lie and a deception. (BULLSHIT, but also doesn't he sound like a Democrat Here..LOL)

Although Saddam was overthrown and people are happy about his departure, the pain and suffering of the Iraqi people has persisted and has even been aggravated. (by Iranian backed Terrorists)

In Iraq, about one hundred and fifty thousand American soldiers, separated from their families and loved ones, are operating under the command of the current US administration. A substantial number of them have been killed or wounded and their presence in Iraq has tarnished the image of the American people and government. (Ain't it amazing how 90% of those soldiers voted for Bush TWICE)

Their mothers and relatives have, on numerous occasions, displayed their discontent with the presence of their sons and daughters in a land thousands of miles away from US shores. American soldiers often wonder why they have been sent to Iraq. (yet re-enlistment rates for soldiers that have served in Iraq are the highest they have been in all our History ...go figure)

I consider it extremely unlikely that you, the American people, consent to the billions of dollars of annual expenditure from your treasury for this military misadventure. (we give consent and even would aprove of spending more)

Noble Americans,

You have heard that the US administration is kidnapping its presumed opponents from across the globe and arbitrarily holding them without trial or any international supervision in horrendous prisons that it has established in various parts of the world. God knows who these detainees actually are, and what terrible fate awaits them. (they are TERRORISTS and we can only hope our CIA and other agencies keep up the good work)

You have certainly heard the sad stories of the Guantanamo and Abu-Ghraib prisons. (and we peed ourselves we laughed so hard) The US administration attempts to justify them through its proclaimed "war on terror." But every one knows that such behavior, in fact, offends global public opinion, exacerbates resentment and thereby spreads terrorism, and tarnishes the US image and its credibility among nations. (once again the same words of Teddy Kennedy, Nancy Pelousi, John Kerry, and the Clintons)

The US administration's illegal and immoral behavior is not even confined to outside its borders. You are witnessing daily that under the pretext of "the war on terror," civil liberties in the United States are being increasingly curtailed. Even the privacy of individuals is fast losing its meaning. Judicial due process and fundamental rights are trampled upon. Private phones are tapped, suspects are arbitrarily arrested, sometimes beaten in the streets, or even shot to death. (more DEMOCRAT talking points coming out of the mouth of a man that publicly hangs protestors everyday)

I have no doubt that the American people do not approve of this behavior and indeed deplore it. (wrongo fuckhead)

The US administration does not accept accountability before any organization, institution or council. (bullshit) The US administration has undermined the credibility of international organizations, particularly the United Nations and its Security Council. (could be because the UN has NO credibility on anything) But, I do not intend to address all the challenges and calamities in this message.

The legitimacy, power and influence of a government do not emanate from its arsenals of tanks, fighter aircrafts, missiles or nuclear weapons. Legitimacy and influence reside in sound logic, quest for justice and compassion and empathy for all humanity. The global position of the United States is in all probability weakened because the administration has continued to resort to force, to conceal the truth, and to mislead the American people about its policies and practices. (no you can bank on this truth, that all those tools will be brought down on your head asshole it's only a matter of time)

Undoubtedly, the American people are not satisfied with this behavior and they showed their discontent in the recent elections. I hope that in the wake of the mid-term elections, the administration of President Bush will have heard and will heed the message of the American people. (more Democrat talking points)

My questions are the following:

Is there not a better approach to governance?

Is it not possible to put wealth and power in the service of peace, stability, prosperity and the happiness of all peoples through a commitment to justice and respect for the rights of all nations, instead of aggression and war? (you've got balls... your nation has funded every terror orginization since 1979 whats the matter getting a little nervouse that we are finally responding??)

We all condemn terrorism, because its victims are the innocent. (then why are you behind 90% of it)

But, can terrorism be contained and eradicated through war, destruction and the killing of hundreds of thousands of innocents? (YES)

If that were possible, then why has the problem not been resolved? (becouse we haven't killed enough yet)

The sad experience of invading Iraq is before us all.

What has blind support for the Zionists by the US administration brought for the American people? (peace of mind) It is regrettable that for the US administration, the interests of these occupiers supersedes the interests of the American people and of the other nations of the world. (their interest is OUR INTEREST)

What have the Zionists done for the American people that the US administration considers itself obliged to blindly support these infamous aggressors? Is it not because they have imposed themselves on a substantial portion of the banking, financial, cultural and media sectors? (more Liberal talking points)

I recommend that in a demonstration of respect for the American people and for humanity, the right of Palestinians to live in their own homeland should be recognized so that millions of Palestinian refugees can return to their homes and the future of all of Palestine and its form of government be determined in a referendum. This will benefit everyone. (LOL yeah lets have a vote)

Now that Iraq has a Constitution and an independent Assembly and Government, would it not be more beneficial to bring the US officers and soldiers home, (no) and to spend the astronomical US military expenditures in Iraq for the welfare and prosperity of the American people? As you know very well, many victims of Katrina continue to suffer, and countless Americans continue to live in poverty and homelessness. (my God this guy could capture the Democrat party and be their choice for President. He believes and stands for exactly what the same positions the Democrat party does)

I'd also like to say a word to the winners of the recent elections in the US: (ahh speaking to his party)

The United States has had many administrations; some who have left a positive legacy, and others that are neither remembered fondly by the American people nor by other nations. (like FDR)

Now that you control an important branch of the US Government, you will also be held to account by the people and by history.

If the US Government meets the current domestic and external challenges with an approach based on truth and Justice, it can remedy some of the past afflictions and alleviate some of the global resentment and hatred of America. But if the approach remains the same, it would not be unexpected that the American people would similarly reject the new electoral winners, although the recent elections, rather than reflecting a victory, in reality point to the failure of the current administration's policies. These issues had been extensively dealt with in my letter to President Bush earlier this year. (sounds just like Dean don't he)

To sum up:

It is possible to govern based on an approach that is distinctly different from one of coercion, force and injustice.

It is possible to sincerely serve and promote common human values, and honesty and compassion.

It is possible to provide welfare and prosperity without tension, threats, imposition or war.

It is possible to lead the world towards the aspired perfection by adhering to unity, monotheism, morality and spirituality and drawing upon the teachings of the Divine Prophets.

Then, the American people, who are God-fearing and followers of Divine religions, will overcome every difficulty.

What I stated represents some of my anxieties and concerns.

I am confident that you, the American people, will play an instrumental role in the establishment of justice and spirituality throughout the world. The promises of the Almighty and His prophets will certainly be realized, Justice and Truth will prevail and all nations will live a true life in a climate replete with love, compassion and fraternity.

The US governing establishment, the authorities and the powerful should not choose irreversible paths. As all prophets have taught us, injustice and transgression will eventually bring about decline and demise. Today, the path of return to faith and spirituality is open and unimpeded.

We should all heed the Divine Word of the Holy Qur'an: (or die )

"But those who repent, have faith and do good may receive Salvation. Your Lord, alone, creates and chooses as He will, and others have no part in His choice; Glorified is God and Exalted above any partners they ascribe to Him." (28:67-68) (all others will be killed by rightouse jihadi)

I pray to the Almighty to bless the Iranian and American nations and indeed all nations of the world with dignity and success.

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
President of the Islamic Republic of Iran
29 November 2006

And now after this letter he has met his obligations under Sharia Law and is now free to kill each and everyone of us since we did not convert with Gods blessing Allah Ahkbar...
Iran
Democrats

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Democrats to Gut Missile Defense / Bush to Announce "Orbital Battle Station"

By Taylor Dinerman

Democratic leaders are poised to gut America’s missile defense - at the same time North Korea and Iran are testing long-range missiles that can strike the U.S. and its allies, including Israel, Japan and Britain.

Meanwhile, sources inside the missile-defense community tell Pajamas Media that the Bush administration is planning to ask Congress to begin funding development of an “orbital battle station.”

With these key developments, 2007 is set to be the biggest battle of space-based weapons since President Reagan proposed “Star Wars” in 1983.

The incoming chairman of the Senate’s Armed Services Committee is Carl Levin. Levin, a Michigan Democrat, has long been a foe of missile defense. In 1980s, he worried that President Reagan’s Strategic Defense Initiative — which aimed to develop technology to destroy Soviet missiles during all phases of flight — was “destabilizing.”

Today Sen. Levin sings the same tune in a different key. “They’ve not done the operational testing yet that is convincing,” said Senator Levin during a post-election press conference. He was referring to the Ground based Missile Defense [GMD] system being installed in Alaska and California, to defend against North Korean missiles. He added that he favors stalling purchases of interceptor missiles - vital for missile defense — until after testing is complete.

In short, Sen. Levin and other longtime opponents of missile defense plan to use “testing” - set to an unrealistically high level - to stop missile defense.

Read the Story

Good Words to Listen to

Look Who's Cutting and Running Now
James Baker is the last guy we should listen to about Iraq.
By Christopher Hitchens

According to the Associated Press, Henry Kissinger made it official Sunday morning in London, when he told a BBC interviewer that military victory was not possible in Iraq. Actually, what he said was this:

If you mean by "military victory" an Iraqi government that can be established
and whose writ runs across the whole country, that gets the civil war under
control and sectarian violence under control in a time period that the political
processes of the democracies will support, I don't believe that is possible.

There are a couple of qualifications in there, and what Kissinger is describing is really more the definition of a political victory than a military one, but say what you will about our Henry, he wasn't born yesterday. He must have known that the question would come up, what his answer would be, and what the ensuing AP headline ("Kissinger: Iraq Military Win Impossible") would look like.

Taken together with the dismissal of Donald Rumsfeld, the nomination of Robert Gates, and the holy awe with which the findings of the Iraq Study Group are now expected, this means that the Bush administration, or large parts of it, is now cutting if not actually running, and it is looking for partners in the process. (You have to admit that it was clever of the president to make it appear that Rumsfeld had been fired by the electorate rather than by him.) It seems that Kissinger has been giving his "realist" advice even to the supposedly most hawkish member of the administration, namely the vice president, and at a dinner in honor of the president-elect of Mexico a few nights ago, I saw him mixing easily with such ISG elders as former Rep. Lee Hamilton. Members of this wing or tendency were all over the New York Times on Sunday as well, imputing near-ethereal qualities of leadership to Robert Gates, so a sort of self-reinforcing feedback loop appears to be in place.

The summa of wisdom in these circles is the need for consultation with Iraq's immediate neighbors in Syria and Iran. Given that these two regimes have recently succeeded in destroying the other most hopeful democratic experiment in the region—the brief emergence of a self-determined Lebanon that was free of foreign occupation—and are busily engaged in promoting their own version of sectarian mayhem there, through the trusty medium of Hezbollah, it looks as if a distinctly unsentimental process is under way.

This will present few difficulties to Baker, who supported the Syrian near-annexation of Lebanon. In order to recruit the Baathist regime of Hafez Assad to his coalition of the cynical against Saddam in the Kuwait war, Baker and Bush senior both acquiesced in the obliteration of Lebanese sovereignty. "I believe in talking to your enemies," said Baker last month—invoking what is certainly a principle of diplomacy. In this instance, however, it will surely seem to him to be more like talking to old friends—who just happen to be supplying the sinews of war to those who kill American soldiers and Iraqi civilians. Is it likely that they will stop doing this once they become convinced that an American withdrawal is only a matter of time?

At around the same time he made this statement, Baker was quoted as saying, with great self-satisfaction, that nobody ever asks him any more about the decision to leave Saddam Hussein in power in 1991. It's interesting to know that he still feels himself invested in that grand bargain of realpolitik, which, contrary to what he may think, has not by any means been forgotten. It's also interesting in shedding light on the sort of conversations he has been having in Baghdad. For millions of Iraqis, the betrayal of their uprising against Saddam in 1991 is something that they can never forget. They tend to bring it up, too, and to fear a repetition of it. This apprehension about another sellout is especially strong among the Shiite and Kurdish elements who together make up a majority of the population, but it seems from its public reports so far that the ISG has not visited the Kurdish north of the country. If Baker thinks that the episode is a closed subject, it shows us something of what the quality of his "listening" must be like.

In 1991, for those who keep insisting on the importance of sending enough troops, there were half a million already-triumphant Allied soldiers on the scene. Iraq was stuffed with weapons of mass destruction, just waiting to be discovered by the inspectors of UNSCOM. The mass graves were fresh. The strength of sectarian militias was slight. The influence of Iran, still recovering from the devastating aggression of Saddam Hussein, was limited. Syria was—let's give Baker his due—"on side." The Iraqi Baathists were demoralized by the sheer speed and ignominy of their eviction from Kuwait and completely isolated even from their usual protectors in Moscow, Paris, and Beijing. There would never have been a better opportunity to "address the root cause" and to remove a dictator who was a permanent menace to his subjects, his neighbors, and the world beyond. Instead, he was shamefully confirmed in power and a miserable 12-year period of sanctions helped him to enrich himself and to create the immiserated, uneducated, unemployed underclass that is now one of the "root causes" of a new social breakdown in Iraq. It seems a bit much that the man principally responsible for all this should be so pleased with himself and that he should be hailed on all sides as the very model of the statesmanship we now need.

SWEARING LOYALTY ON THE KORAN

Can't say that I am surprised to read that Keith Ellison, the first member of the US Congress to be a Muslim, has made it clear he will take his oath of office on the Bible, but on the bible of Islam, the Koran. I agree with Dennis Prager that he should NOT be allowed to do so - because the very act Ellison contemplates undermines American civilization.

Consider this. What Ellison and his Muslim and leftist supporters are saying is that it is of no consequence what America holds as its holiest book; all that matters is what any individual holds to be his holiest book. This is indeed multiculti triumphalism and America should not permit it. Jews and Securalists have taken their oaths on the Bible, showing their respect to the American tradition. Of course Islam holds NO such respect and Ellison is merely a trojan horse from which the ROP can demonstrate that its will can prevail - even at the home of the Great Satan. By bowing the knee to the Muslim supremacy Ellison represents, the US builds up even greater troubles for itself. There is no reason to make an exception for Keith Ellison - unless we are so scared of what the Religion of Peace might do were its first Congressman confronted rather than accommodated!

Posted on Friday, December 1, 2006 at 09:26AM by David Vance
Democrats