Oh, This Must Be Embarrassing

Why would only one investigation of the terrorist attack in Benghazi, Libya be sufficient when there are clearly several unanswered questions like where was Obama, why didn't Hillary Clinton provide the much-needed security and then lie about it, why did Susan Rice repeatedly insist that a Youtube video was to blame for the attack, why weren't armed forces employed to rescue and/or secure the embassy and its personnel and who is threatening the Benghazi whistle-blowers?

A special operations member who witnessed the attack on the U.S. Mission unfold in Benghazi, Libya on September 11 last year, as well as debriefed those who took part in the response, spoke with Fox News' Adam Housley on Monday night and revealed information that directly contradicts the administration's insistence that there was not enough time nor resources to send to Benghazi to help State Department employees, contractors, and intel operatives who were under a terrorist attack. FNC kept their source's identity hidden, as witnesses to the Benghazi attack have reportedly been intimidated  by the administration into silence. The assault left four Americans dead, including U.S. ambassador Chris Stevens.

"I know for a fact that C110 was doing a training exercise not in the region of northern Africa but in Europe and they have the ability to react and respond," the special ops member told FNC. 

The C110 is a 40-man special operations commanders and extremists force. They are capable of rapid response and deployment and are specifically trained for Benghazi attack-like incidents. The night of the attack, according to the special op, they were training 3 & 1/2 hours away in Croatia.

 **
  

Victoria Toensing,  who represents a State Department employee, told Fox News that "her client and some of the others, who consider themselves whistle-blowers, have been threatened by unnamed Obama administration officials." Toensing is a former DOJ official and counsel to the Senate Intel Committee.

And then there's this:

A jury in South Bend, Indiana has found that fraud put President Obama and Hillary Clinton on the presidential primary ballot in Indiana in the 2008 election. Two Democratic political operatives were convicted Thursday night in the illegal scheme after only three hours of deliberations. They were found guilty on all counts.

 

And two frauds the American electorates reaped.

 

(Merci)

The World Is Taking Crazy Pills (Pt. 14)

Are you out of your Vulcan mind?!

Remember when I said things would turn into a circus?

Muslims protest outside the American embassy in"solidarity" with the Boston bombers whose motives and actions are clearly unmistakable now:

Via Facebook called Wiener Chechens to their compatriots to protest outside the U.S. Embassy. They demand solidarity for the Boston bombers solidarity for Muslims and Chechens. Because there were allegations that the FBI had falsified evidence against the brothers. The “Pro Tsarnaev” had called via Facebook to demo.

This solidarity involved educated non-Muslims who DIDN'T kill children.

And there's always time for bad poetry.

That shuffling sound you hear is this man rolling in his grave.

Related: where is the backlash the perpetually-paranoid Muslim community keeps alluding to? Is the desire for self-preservation all too transparent now?

And: Secretary of State John Kerry declares that jihadists have no belief system or jobs policy (save, perhaps the Koran and the suicide-bombing).

Vaguely related: Mohammad (the prophet, apparently) is threatening a "Boston-style" attack on a Catholic school. Very Indonesian of them. Whatever could be the root cause?


Speaking of root causes, Prime Minister Stephen Harper says something smart:

Prime Minister Stephen Harper said this is not the time to "commit sociology" when asked about the arrests of two men this week who are accused of conspiring to carry out a terrorist attack on a Via train.

Harper was asked during a news conference with Trinidad and Tobago's prime minister about concerns with the timing of the arrests. He was also asked about when it's appropriate to talk about the root causes of involvement with terrorism.

The Conservatives had taken Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau to task when he suggested last week it was important to look at the root causes of the Boston Marathon bombings after offering condolences and support to the victims. They said he was trying to rationalize the bombings or make excuses when the Liberal leader said the bombings happened because someone felt excluded from society.

"I think, though, this is not a time to commit sociology, if I can use an expression," Harper said. "These things are serious threats, global terrorist attacks, people who have agendas of violence that are deep and abiding threats to all the values our society stands for.

"I don't think we want to convey any view to the Canadian public other than our utter condemnation of this kind of violence, contemplation of this violence and our utter determination through our laws and our activities to do everything we can to prevent it and counter it," Harper said.

And how right he is. Why is it material to have sympathy for people who wantonly murder others? What understanding does one need for someone who would blow children's legs off? When certain persons declare Jews to be "apes and pigs", is it because they feel excluded to the extent that they would have Jews excluded from the human race forever? Can one imagine enormous amounts of sympathy for the Nazis or the militant Japanese during the Second World War? And yet, after the September 11th attacks, that is just what happened. Why the embrace of death and defeat of cultures that emulate those things? The willing loss of self and the failure to ground one's self in things of great importance- national or cultural identity, strong faith and roots in a civilisation that works- might explain why now moral and political values are seen as relative. How fluid is the belief that willful murder based on the words of a seventh century war-monger is wrong? Too fluid.

This is how civilisations die.


Also: who the hell let this guy out?

Jaser was determined not to be a refugee on Oct. 30, 1998. 

In 2004, a warrant was issued for Jaser's arrest so he could be deported.

At the deportation hearing held that August, he claimed that he was a stateless Palestinian and there was nowhere to send him. His lawyer also pointed out that a pre-removal risk assessment had not been done as required.

Jaser was born in the United Arab Emirates, but at the 2004 detention review hearing, Jaser said he was not a citizen of that country.

"I am a Palestinian by blood, that does not give me any rights whatsoever in my place of birth," he said.

The issue of his criminal convictions also surfaced at the 2004 hearing, with the government counsel saying Jaser had "five fraud-related convictions" and "two prior convictions for failure to comply with a recognizance."

At the conclusion of the hearing, Jaser was allowed to stay on bail until the government figured out what to do.

Jaser later applied for, and was granted a pardon. It's not clear if the pardon was for one or all of his charges.

The Armenian Genocide (WARNING: rather shocking pictures).


Kicking Africans off their land is the green thing to do!

When you think about the effects of global warming hysteria, you might think of higher electricity prices, not people being thrown off their land and having their homes burned down. But that is exactly what’s been happening in the East African country of Uganda, where a British company called New Forests has been seizing land to grow trees and then sell the so-called “carbon credits” for a profit that could reach nearly $2 million per year. According to reports published in the New York Times and Telegraph of London, New Forests is backed by the World Bank and has been using armed troops, with the government’s permission, to forcibly evict over 20,000 poor people from their homes. This certainly gives terrible new meaning to the concept of Green neo-colonialism.

Is there an African Idle No More movement against self-righteous white liberal types?


(With thanks to all)

Mid-Week Post

Every third letter in this sentence spells a secret message.

Terror suspect refuses to recognise Canadian law: 

One of two men accused in an alleged al Qaeda-backed plan to derail a passenger train in Canada appeared in court on Wednesday and disputed the authority of Canadian law to judge him, saying the criminal code was not a holy book.

Chiheb Esseghaier, a Tunisian-born doctoral student, faces charges that include conspiracy to murder and working with a terrorist group.

He and another suspect, Raed Jaser, are charged with plotting to derail a passenger train, and U.S. security sources say they sought to attack at a bridge near the U.S.-Canada border.

In a brief hearing where he was ordered back into custody, Esseghaier, 30, said the allegations against him are based on laws that are unreliable because they are not the work of God.

"All of these conclusions was taken out based on (the) criminal code," he told a Toronto court. "The criminal code is not (a) holy book."

He added: "Only the Creator is perfect."

Hear, hear!

This is from the Creator's holy book which I hope Mssrs. Esseghaier and Jaser have read :

Thou shalt not kill.

There are nine other rules like it they should also follow.

Evidence that North Korea carried out a nuclear test has been “unexpectedly” detected:

Radioactive gases that could have come from North Korea's nuclear test in February have unexpectedly been detected, a global monitoring body said on Tuesday, possibly providing the first "smoking gun" evidence of the explosion.

But the April 9 measurement - almost two months after Pyongyang said it had carried out the underground detonation - gave no indication of whether plutonium or highly enriched uranium was used, it said. …

Pyongyang's third nuclear test was registered virtually instantaneously via seismic signals around the world. But no radioactive traces that would have constituted conclusive proof were found in the immediate weeks afterwards.

The Vienna-based CTBTO, which has a worldwide network of monitoring stations, said in mid-March that it was highly unlikely any such radioactivity would be detected.

But Tuesday's statement said it made a significant detection of radioactive noble gases two weeks ago in Takasaki, Japan, about 1,000 km (620 miles) from the test site. Lower levels were picked up at another station in Ussuriysk, Russia.

"Two radioactive isotopes of the noble gas xenon were identified, xenon-131m and xenon-133, which provide reliable information on the nuclear nature of the source," it said.

"Detection of radioactive noble gas more than seven weeks after an event is indeed unusual. We did not expect this and it did not happen in 2009," the CTBTO added, referring to the reclusive country's previous nuclear test.

What do you mean “unexpectedly”? How did the Russians and the Japanese pick up isotopes when a body whose work it is to monitor and enforce a ban on nuclear weapons could not? Pakistan has been aiding North Korea since 2003. It is believed that North Korea has sufficient plutonium for six nuclear weapons and may even have as many as seven missiles. None of this was a secret. How is it a surprise?

Related: a "special relationship" with this country is really a conflict of interest:

For decades, the United States has reserved the term “special relationship” for two countries, Britain and Israel, but Secretary of State John Kerry called for a new “special relationship” with China during his recent trip to Asia. 

No, the Catholic Church did no such thing. The Archdiocese of New York did and it shouldn’t have:

Scaling down a legal fight with the White House, the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York has agreed to drop a request for documents about the government's requirement of insurance coverage for birth control, a court filing on Monday said.

The archdiocese sent a subpoena to President Barack Obama's administration in February asking for documents from White House staff, including Obama himself, for use in a church lawsuit against the contraception mandate.

Citing the burden involved and calling a subpoena of the president's office inappropriate, the White House asked a federal judge to toss out the subpoena on April 4.

A notice filed in U.S. District Court in Washington late on Monday said the archdiocese agreed to withdraw its subpoena. It did not say why.

A lawyer for the archdiocese declined to comment on Tuesday. A spokeswoman for the U.S. Justice Department, which represented the White House in court, had no immediate comment.

The archdiocese is continuing its lawsuit in Brooklyn federal court challenging the Obama administration's health policy requirement that employers generally include coverage of birth control in health insurance plans they offer workers.

If it makes the archdiocese feel better, Obama won’t answer any questions about Benghazi, either. I guess the alleged Catholics should have thought about this before voting Obama in.

The judge in the Kermit Gosnell case has re-considered one count previously dropped and has re-instated it. Gosnell had been seen smiling after the charges were dropped. What a b@$#@&%.  His defense lawyer has rested and had not called one witness:

The sensational and sometimes grisly trial of Philadelphia abortionist Kermit Gosnell reached an important point Wednesday when Dr. Gosnell’s defense team declined to call any witnesses – including the defendant himself.

Closing arguments in the trial, now in its sixth week, are scheduled to be heard next Monday, after which the controversial case goes to the jury.

Gosnell faces the death penalty if he is convicted in the deaths of four newborns. Prosecutors allege that the infants were born alive and viable during late-term abortions. Gosnell is also charged in the 2009 overdose death of a Nepalese refugee who overdosed on sedatives while awaiting an abortion.

Gosnell is also charged with racketeering, performing illegal abortions, and failing to counsel women 24 hours before a procedure.

Before going any further, Gosnell committed INFANTICIDE as the babies were born ALIVE before having their spinal cords severed. There is no such thing as a post-birth abortion.

Gosnell's lawyer must how completely risky it would be to call Gosnell as a witness in his defense. How can one defend the squalor and butchery of which Gosnell is accused?

 

When knee-jerk reactions and public education failures collide:

As a youth I collected stamps, coins and currency and one thing that those hobbies instilled in me was the desire to learn where countries were located on maps. Also, I was born in Uzbekistan, my parents came from Poland, my brother was born in Germany, I studied in Israel, traveled to more than two dozen countries before the age of 30, and consequently have no problem knowing exactly where any country in the world can be found on a map.

However, I have often found that many of my fellow Americans are lousy in geography. I mean really lousy. So I was not surprised when I read that the Czech Republic became alarmed when Twitter and Facebook users erroneously left messages confusing the birthplace of the Boston Marathon bombers with the Czech Republic…

There is no secret message.


(With thanks)

 

Unbelievable

There are no words:
  

The judge in Kermit Gosnell’s trial dropped three murder charges against him on Tuesday. These charges were for three of the seven babies Gosnell is accused of killing after they were born alive.

Tuesday morning, Gosnell’s attorneys asked for these charges to be dropped due to lack of evidence. The court did not release details why the judge dropped these three charges or which babies they were for; LifeNews has since reported one of the charges dropped was for "Baby Boy B," the 28-week baby found in a freezer. Last week, the medical examiner could not confirm if the baby died before or after he was born.
His defense insists there were no live births at Gosnell's abortion clinic, the Women’s Medical Society, but the grand jury report and prosecution witnesses provided contradictory evidence. 

Kareema Cross described a baby born in a toilet that struggled to get out. She also described how one baby pulled his hand away from employee Linda Williams’ hand before she flipped him over and snipped his spinal cord.

Gosnell still faces four counts of first-degree murder for the babies born alive that were killed and one count of third-degree murder of Karnamaya Mongar.

Witnesses saw Gosnell poison and sever the spinal cords of live-born babies and cause the death of Karnamaya Mongar in the filthy rat trap he called a clinic.


Oh, so THAT'S the reason he blew up children:

Boston Marathon bombing suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev informed investigators that he and his brother were not directed by a foreign terrorist organization. Instead, they were “self-radicalized” and motivated to kill, in part, by U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Washington Post reported.

That must be a big comfort for people who have had their limbs blown off. And they were worried that their permanent physical disabling was for nothing.

Oh wait....


Hilary Clinton lied to Congress:

House Republicans released their report on the investigation into the Benghazi terrorist attack, having concluded that then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was not telling the truth when she told Congress that she wasn’t aware that officials at the U.S. mission in Benghazi had requested extra security.

“The specific security requests pertaining to Benghazi, you know were handled by the security professionals in the department,” Clinton told Congress in January. “I didn’t see those requests, they didn’t come to me, I didn’t approve them, I didn’t deny them.”

The House report suggests that Clinton received a request for more security from Gene Cretz, who preceded Christopher Stevens as ambassador to Libya.

“On April 19, 2012, the response cable from the Department of State to Embassy Tripoli, bearing Secretary Clinton’s signature, acknowledges Ambassador Cretz’s request for additional security but instead articulates a plan to scale back security assets for the U.S. Mission in Libya, including the Benghazi Mission,” the House report says.

Monday Post

In medias res and so on.

The RCMP foil a terrorist plot:

The RCMP arrested two men Monday in connection with an “al-Qaeda-inspired” plan to attack a Via Rail train in the Toronto area, which they said could have led to innocent people being killed or injured.

An international investigation disrupted the scheme before there was an “imminent threat” to the public, said James Malidza, an RCMP assistant commissioner, told a news conference.

The two accused, Chiheb Esseghaier, from Montreal, and Raed Jaser, from Toronto, were charged with conspiring to carry out an attack and commit murder at the direction of or in association with a terrorist group.

The men are not Canadian citizens but police refused to say how they came to be in this country or where they are from originally.

The plot was to derail the train somewhere in the Toronto area, and the two accused had allegedly been watching trains and railways in preparation.

No one knows how the two would-be terrorists got into Canada? Oh boy...

Al Qaeda? Lutheran, is it?


Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, in the hospital with a self-inflicted gunshot wound, has been charged with the bombings that killed three people and maimed over a hundred more:

Prosecutors formally charged Dzhokhar Tsarnaev with the bombings at the Boston Marathon in a hearing held on Monday in his hospital room, accusing him of crimes that carry the possibility of the death penalty.

It's all very well and good to blame the social workers whose job it is to perpetuate and protect their jobs but there are also parents (used in the loosest sense of the word) who tortured a child to death:

A woman who alerted authorities to the death of a Manitoba girl cried Monday as she testified about the abuse the child endured during her final days.

“They shot at her with a pellet gun and … played a game with her called choking the chicken,” the woman told an inquiry into Phoenix Sinclair’s death. ...

The abuse Phoenix suffered was detailed at Kematch and McKay’s murder trial, which was told the girl was frequently confined to a bare basement room, forced to eat her own vomit and choked until she lost consciousness.

The inquiry is examining how Manitoba child welfare failed to protect Phoenix, who had spent much of her life in foster care or with family friends before being returned to Kematch. Months before Phoenix’s death, social workers paid a short visit to Kematch, didn’t actually see the child, but decided all was well.

In June of 2005, Phoenix died after a brutal assault on the basement floor of the family’s home. McKay and Kematch buried her in a shallow grave near a landfill and continued to pretend she was alive. ...

McKay also had a long record of domestic violence outlined in the province’s family services central database. But social workers never caught on that he had become part of Phoenix’s life.

The inquiry has already heard of a list of failures by social workers.

Social workers were sometimes unaware of who was taking care of Phoenix — usually it was friends of the family or relatives, for days or weeks at a time. In 2003, she was seized from her biological father’s home after a day-long drinking party where suspected gang members were present.

The father was told to undergo alcohol counselling before he could get his daughter back. He didn’t, but regained custody anyway.

North Koreans beg for food from Mongolia:

The North, suffering under dictator Kim Jong-un's cruel regime, cited a "severe" shortage of food and requested aid during a recent meeting with Mongolia's President Ts. Elbegdorj.

"We ask Mongolia to seek possibilities of delivering food aid to North Korea," an article by InfoMongolia said.

Millions of people live near starvation at the secretive state, and children orphaned by misfortune or their parent's imprisonment, often die from malnutrition.

Chilling video footage recently documented a 10-year-old-boy starving to death on the streets of North Korea.

Survivors of the regime have revealed how food is often used as leverage to control starving people.

Malnutrition is so severe that the North Korean populace is even shrinking in height, experts say.

North Koreans used to be taller than their South Korean counterparts, but now, most men are lucky to exceed 150cm in height, according to analysis.

At the Fur: the city of Toronto funds an event that is disgusting AND anti-semitic; passing an anti-terrorism bill is a bad lead-in to a foiled terrorist attack; I would like to remind CAIR-Canada that the only thing the police or Canadians owe them is a ham at Christmas, not appropriate notice to get their backlash speeches in order; troofers for Dzhokhar; and child abuse in a New York school.



The second I hear how religion is a superstition or superstitious, I know that the argument is juvenile and arrogant one. It is not said with certainty otherwise proof would be offered. It never is forthcoming. It's rather like an empty threat which, after so many utterances, becomes tiresome. China's failure to quash religious belief has been a failure despite the use of totalitarian force and now what it believes is an appeal to reason, the surest and most insincere red flag of a party incapable of stamping out what it first sought to:

China is struggling to get its estimated 100 million religious believers to banish superstitious beliefs about things like sickness and death, the country's top religious affairs official told a state-run newspaper.

Wang Zuoan, head of the State Administration of Religious Affairs, said there had been an explosion of religious belief in China along with the nation's economic boom, which he attributed to a desire for reassurance in an increasingly complex world.

While religion could be a force for good in officially atheist China, it was important to ensure people were not mislead, he told the Study Times, a newspaper published by the Central Party School which trains rising officials.

"For a ruling party which follows Marxism, we need to help people establish a correct world view and to scientifically deal with birth, ageing, sickness and death, as well as fortune and misfortune, via popularizing scientific knowledge," he said, in rare public comments on the government's religious policy.

"But we must realize that this is a long process and we need to be patient and work hard to achieve it," Wang added in the latest issue of the Study Times, which reached subscribers on Sunday.

"Religion has been around for a very long time, and if we rush to try to push for results and want to immediately 'liberate' people from the influence of religion, then it will have the opposite effect and push people in the opposite direction."

(Sidebar: oh? You think?)

Is this the same country that believes that the number four is unlucky and finds ghost spouses for the deceased? If this sounds like a swipe at another's culture, look who brought it up- the very country that has a state administrator of religious affairs whose concern that people are being "misled" is as genuine as a phantom bridge for sale. It is hardly anyone's business what higher power a man prays or doesn't pray to unless you're a communist country where faith in the government cannot rival a faith in God. That's the root of it.


What the fff..... :

Talk about making an introduction.

Rookie news anchor A.J. Clemente left a lasting impression on NBC’s viewers in North Dakota Sunday night, when his first words on air at his new job were “f—ing sh-t.”

Earth Day

If the poll to the right is any indication, truly fantastic people would rather celebrate my mum's birthday than Earth Day, an invented day of observance co-founded by a killer and an over-population fanatic.

Artist's conception of the blogger pleased with the poll results.

And why not? My mum likes trees. Isn't that what Earth Day is all about- trees?


This year's Earth Day has been more sedate than most, I think. Even the Governor-General's Earth Day message was not short of rhetoric heard before:

In a statement released by his office, Gov.-Gen. David Johnston said Canadians “are bound together by a shared love of the land — the ocean coasts, tall mountains, open fields, quiet forests and frozen tundra that compose Canada’s rugged and majestic landscape.

“It would be a grave error to take all this for granted.”

He went on to say natural wonders are “not as immutable and eternal as we should like to think; much like a famous work of art, they require great care, maintenance and attention. We live in a symbiotic relationship with our planet, dependant on its resources for sustenance, shelter and wealth.

“The well-being both of our planet and of humankind rests on the delicate balance of the earth’s ecosystems. Only by promoting sustainability will we be able to face the challenges ahead as both our global civilization and our planet grow older. In other words, let us aspire to be curators rather than plunderers of this earth. 

Our children will thank us for it.”

Right. We shouldn't take our natural beauty for granted. This is why we have national parks and serious environmental protocols and laws. Perhaps Governor-General Johnston would like to direct his indignation toward China, Russia and India, the world's biggest polluters?

And take a step back whenever someone says we should do something for the children. The road to hell is paved and such.

Saturday Post

There is yet more to say even on the week-end.

I know, Kittysaurus. I could scream, too.

That this needs to be explained in this day and age displays the failure of the public school system:

The ambassador of the Czech Republic to the United States stressed Friday that his country is different from Chechnya, the region with which one of the Boston Marathon bombing suspects has close ties.

“As many, I was deeply shocked by the tragedy that occurred in Boston earlier this month. It was a stark reminder of the fact that any of us could be a victim of senseless violence anywhere at any moment,” Czech ambassador Petr Gandalovič said in a statement Friday.

Gandalovič cautioned people, largely on social media, that the Czech Republic and Chechnya are not the same thing.

 “As more information on the origin of the alleged perpetrators is coming to light, I am concerned to note in the social media a most unfortunate misunderstanding in this respect. The Czech Republic and Chechnya are two very different entities – the Czech Republic is a Central European country; Chechnya is a part of the Russian Federation,” he said.

The next time someone emphasises pink shirts, Earth Day or veggie sex over basic geography, punch them in the face.


Watch the train wreck:

The combination of policy success and coddling by the media was sure to affect the president’s judgment. His ego never has been what one could call petite. “Phil, what’s my name,” the president is said to have asked his legislative director one day in the first term. “President Obama,” the aide replied. And Obama said, “Of course I’m feeling lucky.”

(Sidebar: what a douchebag.)

Such words are usually delivered at the moment in the play when Nemesis appears onstage, ready to correct the hubris of a tragic hero. And though Obama is neither a tragic figure nor a heroic one, he definitely suffers from a case of misplaced confidence. He clearly assumed that the power of his oratory, his charisma, and national shock at the horror in Newtown, Conn., would allow him to sign the first significant gun legislation in a quarter of a century. He was wrong.

Obama has been cushioned from criticism and the ill effects of his incompetence. I doubt that lucky feeling will remain.


Obama and the the word "terrorism":

And here the president faces a challenge. Will Obama level with the American people and use the word? His administration obsessively adopts language that extirpates any possible connection between Islam and terrorism. It insists on calling jihadists “violent extremists” without ever telling us what they’re extreme about. 

It even classified the Fort Hood shooting, in which the killer screamed “Allahu Akbar” as he murdered 13 people, as “workplace violence.”

In a speech just last month in Jerusalem, the president referred to the rising tide of Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamists as the rise of “non-secular parties.”

Non-secular? Isn’t that a euphemism for “religious,” i.e., Islamist?

Yet Obama couldn’t say the word. This is no linguistic triviality. He wouldn’t be tripping over himself to avoid any reference to Islam if it was insignificant.

Therein lies the dilemma for Obama and other leftists. If they cannot bring themselves to say what is already apparent, how can any problem be resolved? Do they want the problem resolved? Islamist terrorism isn't non-speculative or general. It is rooted in Islam. It occurs mostly in Islamic countries. Its victims are largely Muslim. Those who take credit for these acts base their motives in the Koran or in the name of Islam. Such things take the guesswork out of motivation and responsibility. One must conclude that failure to recognsie the obvious is due to fear or support.


Because he's Mark Steyn:

It’s very weird to live in a society where mass death is important insofar as it serves the political needs of the dominant ideology. A white male loner killing white kindergartners in Connecticut is news; a black doctor butchering black babies in Pennsylvania is not. When the manhunt in Boston began, I received a bunch of e-mails sneering I was gagging for it to be the Muzzies just as hungrily as lefties were for it to be an NRA guy, a Tea Partier, a Sarah Palin donor. But, actually, I wasn’t. On Monday, it didn’t feel Islamic: a small death toll at a popular event but not one with the resonance and iconic quality the big-time jihadists like — like 9/11, the embassy bombings, the U.S.S. Cole. After all, if the jihad crowd wanted to blow up a few people here and there IRA-style they could have been doing it all this last decade.

The culture of death has wrapped itself around a morbid purpose, it seems, and that is to stroke the egos of the politically radical.


China is an octopus:

China has deployed near Taiwan a powerful missile designed to take out US aircraft carriers as Beijing strengthens its ability to prevent US forces from aiding Taiwan during potential conflict.

Uh-oh:

The section of my book America Alone on demographic decline begins with Japan – because Japan presents “the demographic death spiral in its purest form”. The Economist and a bunch of other smart guys all said at the time that it was “alarmist”.

Seven years later, everyone’s ringing alarm bells. From today’s Asahi Shimbun:

Japan’s population has dropped by a record 284,000.
As of Oct. 1, 2012, the country’s population was estimated at 127,515,000, down 0.22 percent from the previous year, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications said April 16.
The decline is the largest in both number and rate since 1950, when comparable figures were first available.
The population dropped for the second year in a row for the first time.
Japanese society continues to age, with the population of elderly, aged 65 or over, estimated at 30,793,000, up 1,041,000 from the previous year. It was also the first time that the elderly outnumbered children, aged 14 or under, in all 47 prefectures.

The central fact of our age is the unprecedented, voluntary self-extinction of the developed world.

(Gracias)

And Now....

After a week of unimaginable suffering and difficulty, let us all wind down.

Look at this Newfoundland puppy. Isn't he sweet and fluffy?

Save the Stratford cat. You'll be happy that you did.

I didn't know Americans had their own flavour- but they do.

Animals that share love.

It's time to put aside our differences and make some peanut cup cookies.

Or you make something from one of Shakespeare's plays (his birthday is coming up, you know).

But Wait! There's More!

After hours of locking down Watertown, a part of the greater Boston area, the police finally captured nineteen year old Dzhokhar Tsarnaev after a nearly twenty-four hour manhunt. His older brother, Tamerlane, was killed last night and the younger Tsarnaev fled. He was found hiding in a boat on Franklin Street.

And now begins the circus.

Finding this person wasn't the circus itself, though it certainly may have seemed that way. The law enforcement authorities' handling of this manner in a timely fashion is quite stellar and they rightly deserve praise. What is coming, however, will be politically and emotionally frustrating. Where once people speculated wrongly or in a politically distracting way, there now rises efforts to quell the obvious through back-pedalling or silence. Where is the haste to judgment now? And let's not forget CAIR's rush to avoid the backlash that never, ever comes. In the immortal words of Ibn Warraq:

Most important, Ibn Warraq  describes the “mind-set” of most Muslims as intolerant, self-pitying, stagnant, and trained to blame others for their own failures.

This idea of retaliation is a seventh century one and certainly not one that should be entertained in Western countries where the rule of law (such as it is) still stands. The kind of person selfish enough to think only how they will be affected by the actions of their comrades is beneath contempt. The real victims are those whose bodies are wrecked because of violence no one dare speculate on. They are the people who live under constant threat of violence. The twenty-four hour lockdown of Boston is a reality for many in Islamic countries where venturing outside may result in kidnapping or death. That the post-modern West would choose- choose!- to crumble in the face of inexcusable barbarity is more demoralising than any land-of-opportunity tale splashed across the mainstream with all the accommodating swiftness imaginable.


Moving on....


North Korea now trains children for armed service:

North Korea's newest batch of future soldiers — scrawny 11-year-olds with freshly shaved heads — punch the air as they practice taekwondo on the grounds of the Mangyongdae Revolutionary School. Students and teachers here say they're studying harder these days to prepare for a fight. ...

Inside the sprawling compound of the Mangyongdae Revolutionary School, students are made aware of their government's latest invectives against its foes, in addition to usual subjects of study: biology, history, foreign languages.

"At the moment, the situation on the Korean Peninsula is tense, and America is being bad to us," said Lt. Col. Kim Hak Bin, an administrator at the military academy. "But you can see that the students here look just as bright as usual, and life and classes are carrying on the same as before.

"Our students are ready to go to the front lines whenever a war breaks out, and they are now studying harder than usual," he said Thursday.

This country that sets out conditions for its returning to the six-party talks trains children for its army. At least they will eat a meagre meal before potentially being cannon fodder.


I'll bet it is:

Presumably as a result of the Boston marathon explosions, the Harper government is putting its proposed anti-terrorism bill on top of their priority list.

(With thanks to all)

Second Boston Bomber Captured

Reports now in that the second Boston bomber is now in police custody.

Progressing....

In Other News...

... because the world doesn't stop for terrorists, their zero-sum game or the people who would humanise them to such an extent as to garner sympathy for them and their limb-removing penchants.


Twelve bodies have been recovered from a Texas fertiliser plant that exploded on Wednesday.


Related: the Czech ambassador to the United States travelled to West, Texas to offer aid if possible. What is the root cause of this? Unknown. It might be because the ambassador is a decent human being.


An earthquake measuring 7.0 on the Richter scale shook off of the northern islands of Japan. There was also an earthquake between Pakistan and Iran measuring 7.8.


Vaguely related: Japan and Mongolia co-operate to counter China's influence. When was the last time that happened?


Kermit Gosnell news: Rush Limbaugh weighs in and an abortuary employee observed a baby delivered in a toilet trying to get out.


The Supreme Court of Canada will decide if a Muslim woman can testify in court unveiled or in another room altogether. I, too, would like to testify while sitting at the lake. Why should I have to obey the law or local customs? That's for suckers.

A Root Causes Primer

Remember when someone said this:

"But there is no question that this happened because there is someone who feels completely excluded, completely at war with innocents, at war with a society. And our approach has to be, okay, where do those tensions come from?"

And this:

If recent history is any guide, if the bomber ends up being a white anti-government extremist, white privilege will likely mean the attack is portrayed as just an isolated incident — one that has no bearing on any larger policy debates. Put another way, white privilege will work to not only insulate whites from collective blame, but also to insulate the political debate from any fallout from the attack.

And this:

The Chicago Sun-Times has compiled a list of domestic bombings since 1886. Included in the list are two by Bill Ayers' former group, the Weather Underground. Ayers and his fellow former terrorist wife, Bernardine Dohrn, are close friends of President Obama, who did not call yesterday's Boston Marathon bombings as acts of terror.

And why not this:

"ALL OF IT,” said Robert Redford, when asked if he supported the bombings by The Weather Underground.

Well, it turns out that the bombers were Tamerlane Tsarnaev and his brother, Dzhokhar, Chechen immigrants to the US. Tamerlane was shot and killed by police after a car-jacking and the killing of an MIT police officer while his younger brother is still at large as of this writing. Dzhokhar, described as personable, posted links to pro-Chechnyan and Islamic sites on his social media page. His family are both baffled and angry at their actions.

One must also recall the hostage-taking and massacre at Beslan in September 2004.

Now, at what point does one understand the tensions that would cause two people to devise, plant and detonate bombs that killed three people, including a child, and lacerate hundreds more? Do children who have had their legs blown off really need to understand the motivations or emotions of a terrorist whose cause could not be any further away from them? Does one really need to examine alleged racial privilege when the motive may be sectarian or political? If a holy book instructs millions of its followers to dominate the globe, is that a no-brainer or is further examination warranted?

The statements regarding understanding motives or racial privilege are distractions at best and insulting at worst. A terrorist act is a terrorist act. Do we forgive the wife beater because he has had a troubled life/long day/bad temper or do we right ourselves with the moral compass we are supposed to possess and stamp out transgression wherever we see it? One doesn't need to further comment on Ayers' or Redford's disgusting support of violent acts. What needs to be done is to have one's head screwed on straight. Morality is not a relative thing. It was once carved in stone. We should start acting like that again.


(Merci)

A Familiar Pattern

Is anyone getting tired of this dance?


April 19th, 2013:

North Korea offered the United States and South Korea a list of conditions on Thursday for talks, including the lifting of U.N. sanctions, signaling a possible end to weeks of warlike hostility on the Korean peninsula.

The North Korea's top military body also said in a statement the denuclearization of the Korean peninsula would begin when the United States removed nuclear weapons that the isolated state says Washington has deployed in the region.

The move was likely a sop to the North's only major backer, China, which has signaled its growing unease over the escalation of threats, and which said later on Thursday that talks were the only correct way to end the tension.

"Dialogue and war cannot co-exist," the North's National Defence Commission said in the statement carried by the official KCNA news agency.

"If the United States and the puppet South have the slightest desire to avoid the sledge-hammer blow of our army and the people ... and truly wish dialogue and negotiations, they must make the resolute decision," it said.

The United States has offered talks, but on the pre-condition that they lead to North Korea abandoning its nuclear weapons ambitions. North Korea deems its nuclear arms a "treasured sword" and has vowed never to give them up.

January 2013:

North Korea threatened to attack rival South Korea if Seoul joined a new round of tightened UN sanctions, as Washington unveiled more of its own economic restrictions following Pyongyang’s rocket launch last month.

In a third straight day of fiery rhetoric, the North directed its verbal onslaught at its neighbour on Friday, saying: “’Sanctions’ mean a war and a declaration of war against us.”

The reclusive North this week declared a boycott of all dialogue aimed at ending its nuclear programme and vowed to conduct more rocket and nuclear tests after the UN Security Council censured it for a December long-range missile launch.

January 2010:

 North Korea proposed Monday signing a peace treaty this year to formally end the Korean War, a suggestion that Washington quickly dismissed.

In a move seen as an attempt to bolster its negotiating position, the isolated communist regime said a return to negotiations on its nuclear weapons program depends on better relations with Washington and the lifting of sanctions.

May 11th, 1993 - October 14th, 2006:

Following the 9/11 attacks in the US, Washington put North Korea on the "axis of evil" list and has since contended that North Korea's possession of nuclear weapons poses a serious threat to the world. Several times, the US administration proposed bringing North Korea before the UN Security Council to impose economic sanctions. However China, North Korea's main ally and trading partner, indicated that it would likely veto any sanctions on Pyongyang.

1987 - 2006:

As for marking holidays with a bang, Pyongyang’s first nuclear test came on October 9, 2006, the eve of Party Founding Day—one of the most important national holidays in North Korea. That led to the resumption of diplomatic negotiations by the George W Bush administration and, sequentially, new rounds of diplomacy, the lifting of financial sanctions, the resumption of food aid, and the removal of North Korea from the US State Dept. list of state sponsors of terrorism. This landmark event, Pyongyang’s first nuclear test, was preceded in July by a seven-rocket salute on America’s birthday, when it fired off six short-range missiles and one long-range missile on the morning of July 5, 2006 (the afternoon of July 4, Independence Day, in Washington DC). North Korea’s second nuclear test was on May 25, Memorial Day in the US. The 1983 Rangoon bombing also took place on the eve of Party Founding Day, which also happened to be a Sunday. 

As for Pyongyang’s penchant for provoking on a Sunday, its first long-range missile test took place on Sunday, Aug 31, 1998. That led to a flurry of diplomatic activity on Washington’s part and the transfer from the US to North Korea of $177 million worth of food aid through the WFP (400,000 tons) in 1999, in return for the privilege of inspecting an empty cave in Kumchangri. The North’s third long-range missile test took place on Sunday, April 5, 2009. The North also blew up a Korean Airliner on Sunday, Nov 29, 1987. 

One would think that after decades of threats, cooling down, extortion and capitulation, someone would catch on. If any involved in the six party talks were serious about resolving the ongoing crisis on the Korean peninsula, they would re-think their strategy and develop a new one. First of all, North Korea should not be engaged; China should. It is clear even to the corpulent dictator now managing North Korea that China owns it and China will keep its buffer state as long as it can. Therefore, China should face the brunt of sanctions and inquiries (like its North Korean bank accounts). No food or medical aid should be given unless inspectors have free reign in North Korea. South Korea must step up its efforts to either re-integrate North Korea or develop strategies for re-building it as a new democratic state.

(With thanks)



Do not engage North Korea. Engage China.