Bloodthirsty Liberal

Arab terrorists claim to love death more than we love life. I’m sure that’s true, especially when love and death are joined as one:

A man drowned in a well as he tried to rescue one of his sheep that had fallen in.

Twenty-three-year-old Yousef Hassan Mushaqy, from Yaseed in northern Nablus was herding sheep near the Al-Rahanein well in the north of the village, when one of the sheep went to drink from the well and fell in.

Mushaqy tied a rope around his waist so he could lower himself into the well and pull out the sheep. The rope snapped and Mushaqy plunged into the water and drowned.

To be fair, it was a fine looking sheep. Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his fri-e-e-e-e-nds.

I can hear Don Adams as Maxwell Smart in my head already. “The entire scientific community endorses global warming…. No? Would you believe less than half?”

In 2004, history professor Naomi Oreskes performed a survey of research papers on climate change. Examining peer-reviewed papers published on the ISI Web of Science database from 1993 to 2003, she found a majority supported the “consensus view,” defined as humans were having at least some effect on global climate change. Oreskes’ work has been repeatedly cited, but as some of its data is now nearly 15 years old, its conclusions are becoming somewhat dated.

Medical researcher Dr. Klaus-Martin Schulte recently updated this research. Using the same database and search terms as Oreskes, he examined all papers published from 2004 to February 2007. The results have been submitted to the journal Energy and Environment, of which DailyTech has obtained a pre-publication copy. The figures are surprising.

Of 528 total papers on climate change, only 38 (7%) gave an explicit endorsement of the consensus. If one considers “implicit” endorsement (accepting the consensus without explicit statement), the figure rises to 45%. However, while only 32 papers (6%) reject the consensus outright, the largest category (48%) are neutral papers, refusing to either accept or reject the hypothesis. This is no “consensus.”

No. No, no there isn’t. But don’t let that stop ya!

Pee Seeger has been a disciple of Woody, a Weaver, and that apotheosis of oxymoron: a folk superstar. But he was first, last, and always a Communist.

Until now (via Kathy Shaidle):

Pete Seeger, America’s best-known and most influential folksinger, wrote me a letter a few days ago. I did not expect to hear from him. Last June, I wrote in these pages about the new documentary on his life. The article ran under the headline “Time for Pete Seeger To Repent.”

…

So I felt some trepidation when I got Mr. Seeger’s letter. Surely he was angry, or at the least peeved, by my article. I had been a banjo student of his in the 1950s and regarded Mr. Seeger as my childhood hero and mentor. But for decades since then, I have been publicly identified as an opponent of much of what he has believed—that the Rosenbergs were innocent, for example, or that Fidel Castro was a friend of the poor.

I almost fell off the chair when I read Mr. Seeger’s words: “I think you’re right – I should have asked to see the gulags when I was in [the] USSR.” For years, Mr. Seeger continued, he had been trying to get people to realize that any social change had to be nonviolent, in the fashion sought by Martin Luther King Jr. Mr. Seeger had hoped, he explained, that both Khrushchev and later Gorbachev would “open things up.” He acknowledged that he underestimated, and perhaps still does, “how the majority of the human race has faith in violence.”

That sounds a little self-pitying, Pete. It’s not like you’re in a tiny minority who meekly mewl peace in the face of riotous mobs bellowing war. It only takes a Saddam and various apologists, enablers, and anti-American Americans to hobble opposition to his murderous regime.

I used to think Pete Seeger was one of the greates American of this century—but I see things differently now. It is America that is great, one of the greatest nations in history to have birthed and protected for decades such a blind and feeble-minded banjo player. What was he, the model for Deliverance?

Earlier today, we learned how Palestinian children are allowed to play with and around rocket launchers. Now we learn that their parents aren’t much smarter:

A protest by Fatah supporters against Hamas rule in the Gaza Strip turned violent Friday when Hamas men began forcefully dispersing the crowd, firing in the air and beating demonstrators and reporters.

Some 20 people were wounded in the clashes, including two French journalists and two children, according to doctors and witnesses.

Reporters covering the protest said they witnessed the beating of one journalist by Hamas men.

Okay, so maybe the French journalists aren’t so smart either, big surprise.

But with the Palestinian population getting whittled down from both ends of the demographic spectrum, how long before UN zoologists declare them a threatened species? Shouldn’t Gaza be converted into a preserve?

Honestly, these people will make you think Darwin was all wet.

PS: It’s not like they weren’t warned:

Hamas released a communiqué warning those who respond to Fatah’s call, and threatening them, “Your participation in worship with Fatah will cost you dearly… You don’t deserve to be beaten, arrested, or killed because of [this] corrupt group.”

They don’t deserve it—but what the hell, why not beat, arrest, and kill them anyway?

Remember that? It was a few weeks ago, someplace like South Carolina or something. The story came; the story disappeared. It’s baaack.

Egyptian students indicted on explosives charges in Florida

WASHINGTON (AP) — Two Egyptian students at the University of South Florida were indicted Friday for carrying explosive materials across states lines and one of them was charged with teaching the other how to use them for violent reasons.

Ahmed Abdellatif Sherif Mohamed, 24, an engineering graduate student and teaching assistant at the Tampa-based university, faces terrorism charges for teaching and demonstrating how to use the explosives.

He and Youssef Samir Megahed, 21, an engineering student, were stopped for speeding in Goose Creek, South Carolina, on August 4, where they have been held on state charges.

The two men were stopped with pipe bombs in their car near a Navy base in South Carolina where enemy combatants have been held. They were held on state charges while the FBI continued to investigate whether there was a terrorism link.

Mohamed was charged with distributing information relating to explosives, destructive devices, and weapons of mass destruction, which is a terrorism statute, a Justice Department official said. The crime faces a maximum of 20 years in prison.

huh.

- Aggie

So maybe that school was onto something when they banned playing tag:

The three Palestinian children killed in Gaza on Tuesday were only playing near rocket launchers targeted by Israeli troops, and were not connected with the terrorists, an army probe determined Thursday.

…

The Israel Defense Forces said the children were killed after an army ground unit fired on Qassam launchers in the area. The launchers, which were pointed at Israel, were deployed in fields just outside Beit Hanun, near the Ghazal family’s home. According to the IDF, troops detected “unidentified movement and opened fire.”

…

But the probe, which was launched immediately after the incident, determined that the children were playing tag near the launchers, as revealed by army footage recording the incident. The video reportedly shows the children – who appear as figures whose age cannot be determined – approaching the launchers and then moving back, in a way that could be seen as suggesting that they were loading the launchers with rockets.

From the IDF press release:

They were children who were playing and the way that they were playing they were touching the launchers and it was impossible to determine whether it was someone who was actually at the time attempting to use them or dismantle them. As it turns out it was kids who were playing with them.

The Ha’aretz story shows a picture of the grieving relatives, but I wished they’d stamped the word “GUILTY” over it. Who lets their children play with military equipment? Do they feed them lead paint and encourage them to swim after a big meal?

The Israelis should feel bad (and they do), but they did nothing wrong. Those children could have been terrorists (they usually are), and those launchers could have been aimed at Israeli schools (they usually are). Don’t want your kids to die? Don’t let them play around Qassam launchers—or, better yet, here’s an idea: get rid of the launchers and renounce indiscriminate slaughter as a foreign policy. Or maybe your kids lives aren’t worth the sacrifice.

I like a powerful woman as much as the next submissive, weak, and unworthy lickspittle of a man.

But Angela Merkel? That way my fantasies do not lie:

Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel tops Forbes magazine’s list of the world’s 100 most powerful women for the second year in a row, while Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice slipped to fourth from second last year.

Merkel “continued to impress the world with her cool leadership at two back-to-back summits,” Forbes said.

Back-to-back, huh? No, I’m still not feeling it.

But Condi’s always appealed. Who knocked her out of bed? Sorry, that should read Wu knocked her out of bed. And a Ho.

The Power Women

Angela Merkel
Wu Yi
Ho Ching
Condoleezza Rice
Indra K. Nooyi
Sonia Gandhi
Cynthia Carroll
Patricia A. Woertz
Irene Rosenfeld
Patricia Russo

I’m sorry, but with the exception of Candi Condi, there just isn’t a single one to get excited about.

Are you telling me there was no room on this list for the Ukrainian Knockout,

Yulia Tymoshenko? She was Number Three in the world only two years ago. Not all men are so fickle, Yulia. We’ll always have Kiev.

Both parties have scandals. But give me a red-blooded Republican stall romp over bloodless, sexless Democratic money sleaze any day.

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton will give to charity the $23,000 in donations she has received from a fundraiser who is wanted in California for failing to appear for sentencing on a 1991 grand theft charge.

The decision came Wednesday as other Democrats began distancing themselves from Norman Hsu, whose legal encounters and links to other Democratic donors have drawn public scrutiny in the past two days.

…

Reports in The Wall Street Journal and The Los Angeles Times this week caused numerous Democratic candidates and organizations that have benefited from Hsu’s contributions to reconsider the donations.

So the WSJ had to dig this out, huh? Too bad the WaPo has no history of investigative journalism. Most of the Journal’s coverage is for subscribers only, but you can start with the LA Times here.

But the Dems aren’t done whoring for money:

The Federal Election Commission yesterday issued the latest in a string of six-figure fines against partisan political groups — this time, against America Coming Together, a group financed by George Soros and labor organizations that sunk more than $100 million into campaign activities intended to help Democrats in the 2004 elections.

George Soros has that kind of money under his sofa cushions. That’s where he keeps his senators, too.

The Clinton’s are no strangers to Asian fundraising shenanigans, by the way.

And if Hillary really wants to raise money, she could learn from her hubby’s Lincoln-bedroom-by-the-hour trick, and run tours of his bedroom. Generate more traffic than Graceland, that would.

You just don’t care:

Animal lovers: Hold your brickbats. Our family has a delightful dog rescued from a shelter, and I hate cruelty to our canine friends. The issue here is not dogs but people, specifically people in the media.

Why is it that the poor — and, for that matter, the struggling middle class, too — disappear in the media, barricaded behind our fixation on celebrity, our titillation with personal sin and public shame, our fascination with every detail of every divorce and affair of every movie star, rock idol and sports phenom?

I don’t know, E. J. You’re the dog-owning, bleeding heart media maven. Why don’t you tell us? I would hazard a guess, however, that, as the poor will always be with us, they are hardly news. And they don’t have agents.

Lest you think your heartlessness and insensitivity stop there, however—you’re just getting warmed up:

Americans think global warming is real and serious. Poll after poll shows that there are not many climate skeptics left. The issue has received an enormous amount of media attention over the past several years, but it still doesn’t rank at or near the top of issues people want the president and Congress to address.

…

According to the Pew Project on Excellence in Journalism, the media ratings for the July “Live Earth” concerts orchestrated to draw attention to the issue were “disappointing,” with smaller than normal Saturday summer viewership. Why doesn’t the issue have a bigger public opinion footprint?

Why don’t the public trust rock stars and politicians to solve the world’s problems, in other words? Because the public are shallow, vapid drones, that’s why. The media keep telling them that they starve people, they mistreat dogs, and they’re ruining the planet—but like a surly teenager being told to clean up his room, they just stop listening.

The public disgusts me. If you’re a member of it, get the hell off my blog.

Remember the Israel-bashing conference to be held in the EU Parliament, but was not of the EU Parliament?

Well, I was wrong about it. Turns out it’s not an “attack on Israel” but rather an attack on what Israel is, does, and believes:

A UN-sponsored conference on the rights of the Palestinians, which opened Thursday at the European Parliament in Brussels despite protests and critics by Israel and MEPs, denounced the continuing Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories and accused Israel of “apartheid.”

The two-day conference, entitled “International Conference of Civil Society in Support of Israeli-Palestinian Peace” is organized under the auspices of the United Nations “Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable rights of the Palestinian People.”

…

While Pierre Galand, chairman of the European coordination committee of associations for Palestine, told EJP that the conference was not “an attack on Israel,” several speakers used harsh words against the Jewish state.

Clare Short, a British Labour MP, criticized the EU for allowing Israel to build what she named “an apartheid state” against the Palestinians.

She called for sanctions and a boycott against Israel “like we did with South Africa.”

No, I don’t see an attack on Israel, uh-uh.

Israel’s ambassador to the EU, Ran Curiel, but also several MEPs, had asked the European Parliament to cancel the conference in its premises because of its anti-Israel agenda.

…

But the president of the European Parliament explained that the conference was not organized by the EU assembly which only provided space and facilities.

I knew the EU was useless, but I didn’t think they had been reduced to letting rooms. Can just anyone use its space and facilities? Maybe we can have a Bloodthirsty Liberal Jamboree there sometime. I understand public urination is encouraged over there. I look forward to passing five pints of Duvel on the walls of the Parliament itself.

The United Nations found some of the WMDs for us! Our military couldn’t accomplish this, but the brave diplomats at the U.N. did it easily. And, like Alice discovered in Wonderland, there truly is No Place Like Home.

UNITED NATIONS (CNN) — Workers found vials believed to contain the poison gas phosgene at a U.N. office building in New York Thursday.

U.N. spokeswoman Marie Okabe said U.N. chemical weapons experts quickly secured the toxic material.

U.N. archivists for UNMOVIC, the U.N. chemical weapons agency, unexpectedly turned up samples of material from an Iraqi chemical weapons plant in old files.

The samples were in weapons inspectors’ files dating back to the 1990s, but the substance is not believed to pose any immediate danger, U.N. officials said Thursday.

What exactly is this crud?

Phosgene was used extensively during World War I as a choking agent and caused a majority of the war’s gas deaths, according to the CDC.

Phosgene gas and liquid are irritants that can damage the skin, eyes, nose, throat and lungs, the CDC said.

The material was taken from al-Muthanna chemical weapons plant north of Baghdad. The samples are sealed and have been there since 1996.

The samples were in containers that ranged in size “from small vials to tubes the length of a pen,” Okabe said.

Ewan Buchanan, a spokesman for UNMOVIC, said the substances are in a sealed metal box and wrapped in a plastic bag, “so there is no immediate danger.”

Well, I wonder if they should fertilize the flower beds in Central Park.

- Aggie

So Oliver Stone wants to make a film about Morey Amsterdinejad.

Is he going to call it Poltroon?

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has expressed his approval of plans by director Oliver Stone to make a film about him.

Ahmadinejad told an August 28 press conference in Tehran, “I have no objection, generally speaking, but they have to let me know what the frameworks are.”

But who to play the Shrimpy Shah? Morey Amsterdam? Dead. Bob Denver? Dead. Moe Howard? Dead. Totie Fields? Dead.

How about one of these fellas?

The one on the right is a dead ringer. The one on the left is just dead.