Political correctness can kill

[Bill Glasheen]

In light of the crazy controversy involving Arizona's proposed immigration law (requiring the enforcement of federal law) and the political posturing over it... In light of Obama going overseas and making nice with our former enemies... In light of the reluctance of anyone in the current executive administration to use words like "terrorist"... I give you the following piece from the Wall Street Journal.

U.S. NEWS
MAY 9, 2010, 1:06 P.M. ET.
White House: Pakistan Taliban Behind Times Square Bomb Attempt

By EVAN PEREZ
WASHINGTON — Pakistan's Taliban militants were behind the botched May 1 Times Square bombing in New York, top administration officials said, reversing earlier U.S. claims casting doubt on such a connection.

Attorney General Eric Holder told ABC News's "This Week" talk show, one of two Sunday shows on which he was scheduled to appear, that ''We've now developed evidence that shows that the Pakistani Taliban was behind the attack," according to an excerpt of the show's transcript.


Faisal Shahzad

The excerpt didn't detail what possible evidence might have led U.S. authorities to change their view from last week that the suspect, Faisal Shahzad, had likely acted alone. Mr. Shahzad, a 30-year-old, Pakistani-born U.S. citizen, has admitted to investigators that he built the bomb and rigged it to explode in a 1993 Nissan Pathfinder in New York City's bustling Theater District packed with tourists, U.S. officials say. He at least initially claimed to have acted alone, according to authorities, and the unsophisticated nature of the bomb led them to give that claim credence.

If proven to be true, the link to the Pakistani Taliban would demonstrate a new reach by the militant group, which is known to be behind bombings inside Pakistan. U.S. and Pakistan authorities had believed that the group didn't have the capability to carry out operations much beyond the country.

"We know that they helped facilitate it," Mr. Holder said. "We know that they probably helped finance it. And that he was working at their direction."

U.S. investigators' view of Mr. Shahzad's alleged links to established terror groups began to change late in the week after investigators gathered other proof, including electronic evidence from his computer and information gleaned by investigators in Pakistan, where at least one alleged contact was detained by authorities in the aftermath of the bombing attempt, U.S. law-enforcement officials said.

Investigators are now focusing on the financing of the attack, which cost approximately $2,000, plus how Mr. Shahzad covered his living expenses as he allegedly plotted the attack in recent months.

***

Sen. Joseph Lieberman (I., Conn.) said on "Fox News Sunday" that the fact officials weren't able to prevent the attempted attack, even though it was unsuccessful, proved the "system failed."

"The fact is that we were lucky," he said. "We did not prevent the attempted attack."

Mr. Brennan rejected the assertion that the administration had been "lucky."

"When I hear these references to being lucky, tell that to the hundreds of thousands of American men and women who are serving in Afghanistan and in other parts of the world, who are at our ports of entry, who are working around the clock here in the United States and abroad," he said. "That's not luck. That's patriotism."

I keep listening to this rhetoric, and shaking my head. WTF are these bozos thinking??? Just because we speak nicely and send diplomats, these whakos are suddenly going to forget their mission to destroy a way of living that goes against their radical religious principles?

On ABC This Week, George Will this morning got it best when describing the new paradigm of a lesser Taliban. Rather than the "spectacular" 9/11 style attacks against, say, Universal Studios, he feared that they'd figure out the power of sending half a dozen lunatics into regional movie theatres with suicide backpacks. Another commentator on the roundtable discussion (??) talked about the need to inform the American people that Israel has a democracy, lives free, and has a terrorism problem. They deal with it, and they get on with their lives. Meanwhile... we're all happily living with our naive heads in the sand.

I blame the fools who think you can appease a clear and vocal enemy. Apparently we never learned anything after the fall of The Third Reich.

But.. But... Our president won the Nobel Peace Prize!!!!

Sigh... At some point, the lunacy of it all is too much to bear.



- Bill

[Bill Glasheen]

It's spooky how my childhood friend and I work. We haven't seen each other for years. He's now a pediatric surgeon in Florida, and I'm a health services researcher based in Virginia. And when we were teenagers, we actually had different views.

But these days... When I think something, half an hour later I get an e-mail from him expressing the same view. Go figure..

From his e-mail, an article about the botched Time Square bombing.

- Bill

Faisal Shahzad, Subprime Terrorist?
Well, one way of falling behind with your house payments is to take half a year off to go to Pakistan and train in a terrorist camp.


The story of the Times Square bomber reads like some Urdu dinner-theater production of Mel Brooks’s The Producers that got lost in translation between here and Peshawar: A man sets out to produce the biggest bomb on Broadway since Dance a Little Closer closed on its opening night in 1983. Everything goes right: He gets a parking space right next to Viacom, owners of the hated Comedy Central! But then he gets careless: He buys the wrong fertilizer. He fails to open the valve on the propane tank. And next thing you know, his ingenious plot is the non-stop laugh riot of the Great White Way. Ha-ha! What a loser! Why, the whole thing’s totally — what’s the word? — “amateurish,” according to multiple officials. It “looked amateurish,” scoffed New York’s Mayor Bloomberg. “Amateurish,” agreed Janet Napolitano, the White House amateurishness czar.

Ha-ha-ha! How many jihadists does it take to change a light bulb? Answer: Twenty-seven. Twenty-six terrorist masterminds to supervise six months of rigorous training at a camp in Waziristan, after which the 27th flies back to Newark, goes to Home Depot, and buys a quart of lamp oil and a wick.

Is it so unreasonable to foresee that one day one of these guys will buy the wrong lamp oil and a defective wick and drop the Camp Osama book of matches in a puddle as he’s trying to light the bomb, and yet, this time, amazingly, it actually goes off? Not really. Last year, not one but two “terrorism task forces” discovered that U.S. Army psychiatrisat Nidal Hasan was in regular e-mail contact with the American-born, Yemeni-based cleric Ayman al-Awlaki but concluded that this was consistent with the major’s “research interests,” so there was nothing to worry about. A few months later, Major Hasan gunned down dozens of his comrades while standing on a table shouting “Allahu Akbar!” That was also consistent with his “research interests,” by the way. A policy of relying on stupid jihadists to screw it up every time will inevitably allow one or two to wiggle through. Hopefully not on a nuclear scale.

Faisal Shahzad’s curriculum vitae rang a vague bell with me. A couple of years back, I read a bestselling novel by Mohsin Hamid called The Reluctant Fundamentalist. His protagonist, Changez, is not so very different from young Faisal: They’re both young, educated, Westernized Muslims from prominent Pakistani families. Changez went to Princeton; Faisal went to the non-Ivy University of Bridgeport, but he nevertheless emerged with an MBA. Both men graduate to the high-flying sector of Wall Street analysts. On returning to New York from overseas, both men get singled out and questioned by Immigration officials. Both men sour on America, and grow beards. Previously “moderate,” they are now “radicalized.”

The difference is that Faisal tries to blow up midtown Manhattan while Changez becomes the amused, detached narrator of a critically acclaimed novel genially mocking America’s parochialism and paranoia. Mohsin Hamed’s book was hailed as “elegant” (the Observer), “charming” (the Village Voice), “playful” (the Financial Times), “rich in irony” (the Sydney Morning Herald), and “finely tuned to the ironies of mutual — but especially American – prejudice” (the Guardian). If only life were like an elegantly playful novel rich in irony. Instead, the real-life counterpart to the elegant charmer holes up in a jihadist training camp for months, flies back “home,” and parks a fully loaded SUV in Times Square.

He’s not an exception, he’s the rule. The Pantybomber is a wealthy Nigerian who lived in a London flat worth £2 million. Kafeel Ahmed, who died driving a flaming SUV into the concourse of Glasgow Airport, was president of the Islamic Society of Queen’s University, Belfast. Omar Sheikh, the man who beheaded Daniel Pearl, was a graduate of the London School of Economics. Mohammed Atta was a Hamburg University engineering student. Osama bin Laden went to summer school at Oxford. Educated men. Westernized men. Men who could be pulling down big six-figure salaries anywhere on the planet — were it not that their Islamic identity trumps everything else: elite education, high-paying job, Western passport.

As for the idea that America has become fanatically “Islamophobic” since 9/11, au contraire: Were America even mildly “Islamophobic,” it would have curtailed Muslim immigration, or at least subjected immigrants from Pakistan, Yemen, and a handful of other hotbeds to an additional level of screening. Instead, Muslim immigration to the West has accelerated in the last nine years, and, as the case of Faisal Shahzad demonstrates, being investigated by terrorism task forces is no obstacle to breezing through your U.S. citizenship application. An “Islamophobic” America might have pondered whether the more extreme elements of self-segregation were compatible with participation in a pluralist society: Instead, President Obama makes fawning speeches boasting that he supports the rights of women to be “covered” — rather than the rights of the ever lengthening numbers of European and North American Muslim women beaten, brutalized, and murdered for not wanting to be covered. America is so un-Islamophobic that at Ground Zero they’re building a 13-story mosque — on the site of an old Burlington Coat Factory damaged by airplane debris that Tuesday morning.

So, in the ruins of a building reduced to rubble in the name of Islam, a temple to Islam will arise.

And, whenever the marshmallow illusions are momentarily discombobulated, the entire political-media class rushes forward to tell us that the thwarted killer was a “lone wolf,” an “isolated extremist.” According to Mayor Bloomberg a day or two before Shahzad’s arrest, the most likely culprit was “someone who doesn’t like the health-care bill” (that would be me, if your SWAT team’s at a loose end this weekend). Even after Shahzad’s arrest, the Associated Press, CNN, and the Washington Post attached huge significance to the problems the young jihadist had had keeping up his mortgage payments. Just as, after Major Hasan, the “experts” effortlessly redefined “post-traumatic stress disorder” to apply to a psychiatrist who’d never been anywhere near a war zone, so now the housing market is the root cause of terrorism: Subprime terrorism is a far greater threat to America than anything to do with certain words beginning with I- and ending in -slam.

Incidentally, one way of falling behind with your house payments is to take half a year off to go to Pakistan and train in a terrorist camp. Perhaps Congress could pass some sort of jihadist housing credit?

Given the demographic advance of Islam in Europe and the de jure advance of sharia in Europe (the Geert Wilders blasphemy trial) and de facto in America (Comedy Central’s and Yale University Press’s submission to Islamic proscriptions on representations of Mohammed), you wonder why excitable types like Faisal Shahzad are so eager to jump the gun. The Islamization of the West proceeds apace; why draw attention to it and risk a backlash?

Because the reactions of Bloomberg & Co. are a useful glimpse into the decayed and corroded heart of a civilization. One day the bomb will explode. Dozens dead? Hundreds? Thousands? Would we then restrict immigration from certain parts of the world? Or at least subject them to extra roadblocks on the fast-track to citizenship?

What do you think?

I see, as part of the new, culturally sensitive warmongering, that the NATO commander in Afghanistan is considering giving out awards to soldiers for “courageous restraint.” Maybe we could hand them out at home, too. Hopefully not posthumously.

— Mark Steyn, a National Review columnist, is author of America Alone. © 2010 Mark Steyn.

[AAAhmed46]

Uh...mark styn. I can't stand him.

According to what he wrote in his articles in Macleans, muslims come to the west to 'secretly take it over' and raise their kids to do the same. Really? Doesn't look like they are doing a good job. What about employment, a better life? So on and so on?
Christopher Hitchens said much the same about mr mark.
A man who despises all religion and a self professed one issue voter(which is islamic fundamentalism) stated in his article taht he felt Mark Steyn does some gross generalizations.
In nearly all his articles, he fails to mention the heaps of immigrants in bars and night clubs living the materialist lifestyle. Not exactly healthy or productive, but it shows a high level of cultural integration. Or even the many muslims who work in the pentagon(long before Obama was elected)
When Steyn complains of political correctness...no when the extreme right wing(not regular right wingers) complains of political correctness in the war on terror, they often complain about not enough talk talking about how your typical friendly joe mohammed is secretly plotting to take over the world, or how his entire religious view is utterly violent therefore making him untrustworthy(ignoring the layared nature of religion) or completly focussing on the extremist zealous nature of the conflicts and ignoring the political connection(IE When a terrorist says "IN THE NAME OF ISLAM, I WILL KILL THESE INNOCENT PEOPLE" the extreme right(not regular right wingers) will stop there and say thats all the motive there is. But then, they fail to ask "WHY is this so and so the target of the fanatics?" or even how did so and so get attracting to this fanatical ilk? We see the reliigous langauge, but how much political language is there?

Bill, based upon your overall posting history on this particular issue, your not the type to make gross generalizations of muslim immigrants or converts, you also have an awareness of the very caucasian appearance of many arabs(particularly lebanese, syrian) and the very white boy look of many kashmiri and lahori pakistani people. So the 'political correctness' that is so evil in regarding racial profiling, maybe not so political correct but takes in the reality that not every muslim or terrorist is a brown dude, therefore maybe racial profiling maybe a big waste of time. But hey, arn't we now going into a different issue?
My point is this: Don't let the current political trends totally colour your views on the issues. Remember, during the cold war, these were the good guys according to the right, and the left, the socialists and liberals has a generally negative view of the muslmi presense in the world. How things change depending on the stupid political disagreements of the time.
You may agree with his current article, but the man himself who wrote it, has a very different perception of politically correct then his article lets on.
Blah.

And the dude was put on a no fly list, and yet still got on a plane. Not exactly an obama problem, but a systemic problem.

You know what? Im not even an obama supporter. Sure i liked him over McCain, but that isn't saying much, since McCain was not a bad guy, he just...fell into a bad crowd(see my old post on how he allied himself with the same men that horribly insulted his family and friends during the race)

[AAAhmed46]

The guy who alerted authorities was a muslim as well. Media and mark steyn forgot to mention that. I wonder why?


http://thinkprogress.org/2010/05/05/sen ... im-vendor/

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/w ... 114495.ece

The times square bomber is a real issue of concern. But so much of the rhetoric in the war on terrorism is also manufactured. Like the south park scare. 4 wackos who ran that damn website, were banned from many mosques because they harrased the muslms that worshipped there.
Yet CNN interviewed them(a website run by 4 guys) and Ayaan Hirsi Ali, but not one mainstream muslim representative? THe impression given was a general outcry over it. The south park super-friends episode has been on for years and years, played and replayed in the middle east. No riots, no one cared. Thats right, they have south park in the middle east, and it's popular enough.
But can't blame fox this time, it's CNN doing faulty reporting, desperate to fish for a story, so they made a non-issue an issue.






And islamophobia is very real, you just don't hear about it, as it isn't picked up. Steyn would like to deny it because to deny it's existence suits his political slant on things. Why didn't CNN report this?

http://www.firstcoastnews.com/news/tops ... 48&catid=3

http://minnesotaindependent.com/58396/r ... g-a-muslim

http://www.islamophobia-watch.com/islam ... rance.html

[Bill Glasheen]

Very well put, Adam.

So where's the rational middle ground?

I agree 100 percent that Islamophobia is a bad thing. You're talking to the man who admire's Jefferson's Virginia Statute on Religious Freedom. The short of that - it supports both freedom of religion and freedom from religion. It's the libertarian ideal of the freedom to do your own thing.

On the other hand you're also talking to a person who builds predictive models for a living. What do the data tell us? Well to start with, we're trying to predict rare events. That's extremely difficult, but not an altogether useless exercise. Considering the cost of a false negative prediction, the effort is worthwhile.

So walking into the exercise, we know it's not going to be easy. The first clear point to be made is that being Muslim alone is next to useless information. Half a billion to a billion Muslims, and we get 3 terrorist events in the last couple years. That's a lot of zeros on the relative risk score to manage (e.g. 0.00000 ... 02). Given limited intervention resources, well forgetaboutit - even if we can make ourselves love to hate all towel heads. (Self-depricating joke...)

However... narrow it down to an association with Wahhabi or Taliban Muslims. Now it at least gets intellectually interesting. Then... how about disenfranchised muslims traveling to and from the northwest region of Pakistan and/or having ties with the Pakistani ISI. Now we're talking about an association with a clear and vocal enemy. Failure to call a spade a spade here is IMNSHO criminally negligent.

- Bill

[AAAhmed46]

Very well put, Adam.

So where's the rational middle ground?

I agree 100 percent that Islamophobia is a bad thing. You're talking to the man who admire's Jefferson's Virginia Statute on Religious Freedom. The short of that - it supports both freedom of religion and freedom from religion. It's the libertarian ideal of the freedom to do your own thing.

On the other hand you're also talking to a person who builds predictive models for a living. What do the data tell us? Well to start with, we're trying to predict rare events. That's extremely difficult, but not an altogether useless exercise. Considering the cost of a false negative prediction, the effort is worthwhile.

So walking into the exercise, we know it's not going to be easy. The first clear point to be made is that being Muslim alone is next to useless information. Half a billion to a billion Muslims, and we get 3 terrorist events in the last couple years. That's a lot of zeros on the relative risk score to manage (e.g. 0.00000 ... 02). Given limited intervention resources, well forgetaboutit - even if we can make ourselves love to hate all towel heads. (Self-depricating joke...)

However... narrow it down to an association with Wahhabi or Taliban Muslims. Now it at least gets intellectually interesting. Then... how about disenfranchised muslims traveling to and from the northwest region of Pakistan and/or having ties with the Pakistani ISI. Now we're talking about an association with a clear and vocal enemy. Failure to call a spade a spade here is IMNSHO criminally negligent.

- Bill

I'm torn on the whole Wahhabi thing as the basis of comparison, because i know at least three or four wahabbi's. They aren't violent, though i don' agree with all their views.

Salafism in it self isn't violent, but it can LEAD to takfiri salafism, a method beliefs, which are VERY insane beliefs.

Kume-de linked me a great book called the Wahhabi myth(take it with a grain of salt) it makes excellent arguments to prove why wahabbism is not inherently violent, but it also fails to identify ideological causes to terrorism linked to theology.
Here it is:

http://www.masjidtawheedchicago.org/boo ... bimyth.pdf

Another book that is probably(despite it's age) very good on this topic is this one, which is the OPPOSITE arguement, that there is a clear link between the two:

http://www.amazon.com/Terrors-Source-Id ... 180&sr=8-1

It's a tiny book, but the info is very very unique and well researched, the only one of it's kind i have ever seen.




Separate from the books, my own personal experience is that i have noticed that among Arab's, wahabism is very common, almost a mainstream authority. Among african, south asian, malaysian, muslims tend to have less of a wahabbi influence(it is there, and growing at an alarming rate, particularly in Pakistan)

Bosnains used to be the most liberal minded religious folk around, and they still are. But now there is a growing and powerful trend of a growing craziness there.

[AAAhmed46]

Pakistan(and probably every other country) have pretty short sighted views on foreign policy, thinking of short term gain, ignoring possible long term pain.

Pakistan(under the late mrs.Bhutto) helped establish the Taliban in Afghanistan. And now it's biting them in the ass.

[IJ]

I'm lost, Bill. We tried to play nice, we still suffered an attack, what does that prove? There will be events like this in the future; playing hardball or softball won't change it. So what does an attempt to reach out to the swayable Islamic world prove w.r.t naivete or bozo-ness? What was Obama supposed to do that would have stopped this?

[Bill Glasheen]

We tried to play nice, we still suffered an attack, what does that prove?

We??? Who is we??? Don't speak for all the citizens in this country.

Obama did a world tour - complete with olive branches extended to some of our enemies. But it wasn't just an olive branch. On more than one occasion, he suggests that *WE* had done wrong.

He gets his Nobel Peace prize.

He then

• Increases troop levels in Afghanistan.
• Sends a series of predator drones over to Pakistan to kill some Taliban.
• Changes his mind about closing down Guantanamo Bay.
• Still has troops in Iraq.

All along, he engages in a major language parsing campaign. We can't call a terrorist a terrorist. We can't identify enemies of the American people and/or our way of life.

And then there are a series of attempted terrorist attacks. Mind you, they were bungling attacks. There was the underwear bomber, the hapless Times Square bomber.

However....

Remember that Timothy McVey did a lot of damage with very little, and with almost no help. Meanwhile the last two terrorists sent over were trained by the Taliban.

What does it prove?

• Obama is an idiot. All the wordsmithing in the world isn't going to change the fact that certain elements don't like us.
• By now if Obama hasn't figured out that aid to Pakistan is making its way to our enemies via the ISI, then he's a fool. Dozens of people comment at least weekly on the WSJ blogs about it - most being of Indian descent. If they know it, then Obama should. Obviously the people from India know a thing or two about terrorism exported from Pakistan. (Can you say Mumbai?)

There will be events like this in the future.

And the sky is blue.

playing hardball or softball won't change it.

No matter what we do, there will be no change? That statement doesn't pass the sniff test.

So what does an attempt to reach out to the swayable Islamic world prove w.r.t naivete or bozo-ness?

Obama spoke like Ghandi, and acted more Bush than GW himself. That is a pretty good definition of bozo-ness.

What was Obama supposed to do that would have stopped this?

Umm... He can start by stopping with the BS language, unless that was meant all along just for the hope-and-change crowd at home. Because all the Smooth Operator language in the world isn't changing the actions of our enemies. Their ears are tone deaf to it.

The best approach to an effective foreign policy starts with a clear representation of the challenges we face.

- Bill

[IJ]

So you just don't like his rhetoric. That's fine. But you make it sound as if he's missed some key opportunities and somehow this stupid bombing attempt reflects his ineptitude.

I know you believe he can't change the Taliban's or AQ's feelings about us, but nothing can; he's not trying to reach them. He's trying to reach the undecided Islamic world, reduce some friction, reduce the cultural norm that hating America is standard, shift the bell curve a bit so maybe a few people who were headed to AQ decide to skip it. We heard from our own army that our all-hard strategy was alienating the population at large and making our work impossible; part of the Iraq turn around was reaching out and trying to make more allies. So he's putting troops in Afghanistan (where this all started in a big way, where he promised to focus) and getting tough on terrorists in Pakistan with the drones, and you're annoyed by the language? Is it interfering? Or just making him look stupid in a "bring it on" "crusade" and silly joke about middle east warfare Bush sort of way? It sounds to me he's trying not to offend the Islamic world while going about some nasty business that needs doing--and it's not his fault he got the Nobel.

As for Pakistan... tough spot. Hard to know how to support the state so it doesn't collapse, without any of the aid being used against us... I wouldn't like to see the state collapse and have to wonder where the nukes ended up. If he lets that happen and Manhattan disappears, it'll be his fault for not aiding them, right? What about just having some good will or state permission to continue drone attacks against identified terrorist targets? No advantages there? Meanwhile Pakistan's traditional enemies from India don't fancy aiding the state at all; go figure.

[Bill Glasheen]

part of the Iraq turn around was reaching out and trying to make more allies.

One hundred percent the result of efforts under George W Bush.

If anything, Obama's opposition to "the surge" was a hindrance to the success in Iraq. The stability brought about by that troop surge helped cement the alliances being made on a region by region basis.

By the time Obama stepped in office, the country was more stable than it was before Operation Iraqi Freedom began. At this point, he's just letting the process come to Bush's logical conclusion.

So he's putting troops in Afghanistan (where this all started in a big way, where he promised to focus) and getting tough on terrorists in Pakistan with the drones, and you're annoyed by the language? Is it interfering? Or just making him look stupid in a "bring it on" "crusade" and silly joke about middle east warfare Bush sort of way? It sounds to me he's trying not to offend the Islamic world while going about some nasty business that needs doing--and it's not his fault he got the Nobel.

First - Nothing has changed. If anything, Obama has stepped up overall military activity (Iraq plus Afghanistan plus Pakistan plus other non-volatile fronts).

Second - Obama didn't have to accept an award that was being discussed and decided upon in his first month in office. He didn't do squat, and he knows it. This is less about peace and more about Norwegian socialist politics.

Third - If anything, the situation in Iran is getting worse. Opposition to the government there is being crushed, and a nuclear program is on full steam ahead.

Fourth - This "don't call them terrorists" campaign and naivete about our enemies is leading to some pretty stupid and frankly dangerous propaganda. For instance, the Times Square bombing was initially attributed to some middle aged white guy who was probably a tea-party wacko or someone again health care reform. (Look it up yourself.) Only last Sunday did an Obama administration representative come on all the major talk shows and admit they had egg on their face. Indeed this Pakistani that they finally caught - who allegedly acted alone when they first caught him - was someone trained in Northwest Pakistan by the Taliban.

As for Pakistan... tough spot. Hard to know how to support the state so it doesn't collapse, without any of the aid being used against us... I wouldn't like to see the state collapse and have to wonder where the nukes ended up. If he let's that happen and manhattan disappears, it'll be his fault for not aiding them, right? What about just having some good will or state permission to continue drone attacks against identified terrorist targets? No advantages there? Meanwhile Pakistan's traditional enemies from India don't fancy aiding the state at all; go figure.

The Obama administration has been all over the map on Afghanistan and Pakistan. The ideal is rarely a reality, and Obama dithered while the reality of Afghanistan festered. So it isn't the least corrupt government in the world. Duh!!! Now, get on with securing and stabilizing the area, or give it back to the people who want to run their terrorist training camps.

I can buy that Obama is better at world propaganda than was Bush. But I don't buy that he's DOING anything different militarily in a way that is "better."

And I do fault him for being naive about the actions of the Taliban in Pakistan when they announced their intentions months before. Pretending it won't happen won't make it so. Leading the American people to believe that we're safer and better off is disingenuous. And allowing the party faithful to blame the Time Square bomber on domestic political foes has got to make you believe that he really hasn't a clue. THAT is scary.

If ignorant both of your enemy and yourself, you are certain to be in peril.
- Sun Tzu


- Bill

[IJ]

Bill says: the Iraq turnaround was due to efforts UNDER GWB. I agree, but not sure that means the credit is for GWB, and much of the mess was due to poor planning in the first place. Also, I wasn't making a point about who should get credit, rather, trying to demonstrate the strategy can work.

Bill says Obama may have stepped up overall military activity. I haven't disputed this, in fact, I highlighted his Afghanistan surge and pakistan drone attacks.

Bill is still in a tizzy about Obama getting the peace prize. He points out BHO could have refused it. Yes, well... to what end? Just to appear rude? He was very humble in his acceptance and clearly stated he didn't think it was deserved. This was a correct and reasonable position to take.

Bill points out the situation in Iran may be getting worse. Ok, but what kind of control do we exert there? Was this due to change in head of state here? What is it BHO should have done? This is like saying the Jones bought a Hummer and we had a warm summer--where's the link?

Bill implies that a change in language ("don't call them terrorists") and naivete about our enemies led to the suspicion a white guy was behind the amateur attack in Times Square. Seriously? Not calling them terrorists is going to change the fact that the first thought we all have when there's a mention of a possible bombing like this is that it's radical Islam? Highly doubt that. And the reports I heard was that a white dude was seen running from the site and the authorities mentioning his description were very clear that this could be completely innocent behavior and unrelated. So what's the problem? What are they supposed to do, see someone possibly fleeing the scene and assume this lead is unimportant, that it has to be a brown person? Just how traumatized are middle aged white guys that they can't even stand being mentioned in the context of an attack with carefully worded disclaimers?

Bill says Obama dithered in Afghanistan while it festered. I believe he may have misspelled O-b-a-m-a. He meant "B-u-s-h." He was the one who brought us to Iraq instead of "securing and stabilizing the area;" Obama has refocused attention there.

Bill says he doesn't think Obama is doing anything different militarily. Super! Since he was pleased with Bush, he can lay off Obama.

And lasted, Bill implies that Obama naivete about Taliban intentions ... something? What is meant here, specifically? He thought they were setting up schools and having bake sales? Of course they're terrible. And Obama has told us we're safer and better off? "Mission Accomplished" or something? I missed this speech, and a reference would be helpful. I have only heard in the news that there have been some foiled plots and we remain at risk. I feel more attacks are inevitable, but again, I may have not heard all the press releases. False comfort would be disingenuous, yes, but we have a habit of yanking the public around like this--see the terror warning indicator. Specifics about how Obama coulda and shoulda prevented people from mentioning the white guy in the NYC case would be welcome--and see above. I mean, domestic terrorists did pull off the #2 job in our history right?

I just don't see what's so dumb or so annoying about BHO thusfar--at least in this arena.

[Bill Glasheen]

Bill says: the Iraq turnaround was due to efforts UNDER GWB. I agree, but not sure that means the credit is for GWB, and much of the mess was due to poor planning in the first place. Also, I wasn't making a point about who should get credit, rather, trying to demonstrate the strategy can work.

We're waiting...

Bill is still in a tizzy about Obama getting the peace prize.

And your point is???

Bill points out the situation in Iran may be getting worse. Ok, but what kind of control do we exert there?

How about at least some vocal support for freedom-loving resistance in Iran, Ian? Could it hurt him?

JFK and Ronald Reagan implored the Soviets to tear down the Berlin Wall. And you know what? It happened. Meanwhile... Many of my Iranian friends are pretty ticked that our leaders were silent when the opposition in Iran had a chance to get a voice.

Barry gets no pass on me here, Ian. Yes he could have used his position as a bullypulpet for freedom in Iran. Instead, he was worried about offending those nice people over there. You know... the ones that just might cooperate with us if we act humble.

Weasel!!!!

Bill says Obama dithered in Afghanistan while it festered. I believe he may have misspelled O-b-a-m-a.

Nope... I meant what I said, Ian.

Do your research. There's a very precise formula calculated for what it takes (in numbers) to overcome an insurgency such as what had developed in Afghanistan. Barry had a chance to act decisively. He had a chance actually to do what he promised in his campaign. Instead, he got involved in analysis paralysis, and ended up with less than what was needed to get the job done safely.

Instead of doing all that community activist work, he'd have been a much better Commander in Chief had he read Sun Tzu.

Bush...

... isn't president any more. It's all on Barry's shoulders now. No more passes.

I just don't see what's so dumb or so annoying about BHO thusfar

Really? Well apparently you're in the minority. Because the latest WSJ/NBC poll of likely voters has Democrats losing very badly in the upcoming elections.

What do the voters see that you don't, Ian?

- Bill

[Bill Glasheen]

You want a major bozo factor, Ian? Here it is. The people of Arizona are tired of the federal government not enforcing immigration laws they made, and they're getting tired of bearing the lion's share of the consequences. So they've decided to take matters in their own hands.

And of course instead of helping with the economy and not f-ing up health care, Barry once again has to stick his nose in something that has less to do with helping people get jobs and more to do with appeasing a voter constituency. And on what grounds? Well...

Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr., who has been critical of Arizona's new immigration law, said Thursday he hasn't yet read the law and is going by what he's read in newspapers or seen on television.

Mr. Holder is conducting a review of the law, at President Obama's request, to see if the federal government should challenge it in court. He said he expects he will read the law by the time his staff briefs him on their conclusions.

"I've just expressed concerns on the basis of what I've heard about the law. But I'm not in a position to say at this point, not having read the law, not having had the chance to interact with people are doing the review, exactly what my position is," Mr. Holder told the House Judiciary Committee.

This weekend Mr. Holder told NBC's "Meet the Press" program that the Arizona law "has the possibility of leading to racial profiling." He had earlier called the law's passage "unfortunate," and questioned whether the law was unconstitutional because it tried to assume powers that may be reserved for the federal government.

What? A White House staffer speaks before doing his homework? That neeever happens.

- Bill

[JaySal]

Hello All:

I have been following and reading all the “Hub-Bub”, concerning Arizona’s new immigration laws. I know I am not the sharpest pencil in the box or the brightest bulb on the circuit. There are so many others in these forums, so much smarter then I. I am just a blue collar working guy. However, Please let me see if I really understand and got the below proven historical facts correct. For the below specified countries, regarding Illegal immigration?

LET ME SEE IF I GOT THIS RIGHT…

1. IF YOU CROSS THE NORTH KOREAN BORDER ILLEGALLY YOU GET AT LEAST 12 YEARS IN PRISON AT HARD LABOR, OR SHOT.

2. IF YOU CROSS THE AFGHAN BORDER ILLEGALLY, YOU GET SHOT.

3. IF YOU CROSS THE IRANIAN BORDER ILLEGALLY YOU ARE DETAINED INDEFINITELY.

4. IF YOU CROSS THE SAUDI ARABIAN BORDER ILLEGALLY YOU WILL BE JAILED.

5. IF YOU CROSS THE CHINESE BORDER ILLEGALLY YOU MAY NEVER BE HEARD FROM AGAIN.

6. IF YOU CROSS THE VENEZUELAN BORDER ILLEGALLY YOU WILL BE BRANDED A SPY AND YOUR FATE WILL BE SEALED.

7. IF YOU CROSS THE CUBAN BORDER ILLEGALLY YOU WILL BE THROWN INTO POLITICAL PRISON TO ROT.

8. IF YOU CROSS THE MEXICAN BORDER ILLEGALLY YOU WILL BE THROWN INTO PRISON OR SHOT.

HOWEVER……..
IF YOU CROSS THE U.S. BORDER ILLEGALLY YOU GET
1 - A JOB,
2 - A DRIVERS LICENSE,
3 – A SOCIAL SECURITY CARD,
4 – A WELFARE CHECK,
5 - FOOD STAMPS,
6 - CREDIT CARDS,
7 – SECTION 8, SUBSIDIZED RENT
8 – GUARENTIED GOVERNMENT LOAN TO BUY A HOUSE,
9 – TOTAL & FREE EDUCATION,
10 – TOTAL & FREE HEALTH CARE,
11 – YOUR OWN PERSONAL LOBBYIST IN WASHINGTON,

12 - BILLIONS OF TAX DOLLARS SPENT ON PUBLIC DOCUMENTS PRINTED IN YOUR LANGUAGE,

13 - THE RIGHT TO CARRY YOUR COUNTRY’S FLAG WHILE YOU BURN THE AMERICAN FLAG IN PROTEST THAT YOU DON’T GET ENOUGH RESPECT,

14, LAST BUT NOT LEAST, AND MY PERSONAL FAVEROTE. YOU NEVER HAVE TO PAY TAXES, BUT YOU GET ALL THE SAME BENEFITS AS THOSES OF US THAT HAVE PAID TAXES AND INTO THE SYSTEM OUR ENTIRES LIVES. WHAT-A-DEAL!

I JUST WANTED TO MAKE SURE I HAD A FIRM GRASP AND UNDERSTANDING ON THE SITUATION… If I am wrong, please correct me?