This ain't Hell, but you can see it from here

Author: Jonn Lilyea

  • The rush to press

    I read and watched incredulously the CNN broadcast of the “Reliable Sources” bit on why the media isn’t reporting lower casualties and successes in Iraq. Noel Sheppard from Newsbusters transcribes;

    After introducing the subject, Kurtz asked, “Robin Wright, should that decline in Iraq casualties have gotten more media attention?”

    This was Wright’s amazing answer:

    Not necessarily. The fact is we’re at the beginning of a trend — and it’s not even sure that it is a trend yet. There is also an enormous dispute over how to count the numbers. There are different kinds of deaths in Iraq.

    That’s funny because two days into the invasion of Saddam’s Iraq, our troops ran headlong into a sandstorm – immediately the media called Iraq a quagmire and wondered if we’d ever remove the Hussein regime from power because of one little sand storm.

    The media had no problem trotting out the Hadditha story before the facts were known in order to smear the American soldiers, and now according to Little Green Footballs, Gateway Pundit and Michele Malkin, it might have been an al Qaeda plot – because they knew the media would pounce all over it without any real investigation.

    al Qaeda used the treacherous media against our struggle for national security with articles entitled “The Shame of Kilo Company” and “Did Marines Kill In Cold Blood?”. The New York Times even ferreted out a law professor who allowed them to quote that even though there isn’t enough evidence to prosecute the Marines, it doesn’t mean they’re innocent. Despite the fact that our Bill of Rights guarantees us the right of being innocent until the government proves otherwise; 

    “We can’t say those guys didn’t commit a crime,” said Michael F. Noone Jr., a retired Air Force lawyer and law professor at Catholic University of America. “We can only say that after an investigation, there was not sufficient evidence to prosecute.” 

    And still there’s no apparent shame from the media.

    Here’s another example; Abdul Sattar Abu Risha met with President Bush after he led the Sunni effort to run al Qaeda out of his little fiefdom – nary a word about the meeting in the press. Two weeks later the sheik was killed and it was in headlines across every newspaper as proof that al Qaeda was unbeatable in Iraq. Then we saw the pictures of the sheik and Bush. Apparently the media was wrong – it only reinforced efforts in Iraq against al Qaeda among the Sunnis – that’s not being reported either.

    Need more? The Washington Post has avoided reporting on increased security and the lessening lethality of terrorists in Iraq by running a four part series on the front page last week on IEDs – typical act of avoidance. Today the Washington Post runs the headline that “Top Iraqis Pull Back From Key US Goal“;

    For much of this year, the U.S. military strategy in Iraq has sought to reduce violence so that politicians could bring about national reconciliation, but several top Iraqi leaders say they have lost faith in that broad goal.

    Iraqi leaders argue that sectarian animosity is entrenched in the structure of their government. Instead of reconciliation, they now stress alternative and perhaps more attainable goals: streamlining the government bureaucracy, placing experienced technocrats in positions of authority and improving the dismal record of providing basic services.

    Nevermind that broad leaps have been made in the last few weeks towards Iraqi unity – nevermind that Iraqis rejected Joe Biden’s plan to divide their nation into pieces nearly unanimously.

    Sister Toldjah writes that Omar from Iraq the Model – an Iraqi on the ground in Baghdad – has written a piece for the Wall Street Journal detailing the signs that al Qaeda is losing in Iraq. Wonder why it’s not in the Washington Post. Oh, because today, they’re predicting political defeat for the Iraqis. That would be inconvenient to provide competing opinions, wouldn’t it?

    Who does the Washington Post, Robin Wright and the rest of the ignoramouses that claim to be the guardians of our freedoms think we are? They deride the blogs, just like they derided talk radio – but the mainstream press created the alternate news sources – by pompously deciding what we need to know and when we need to know it.

    Curt of Flopping Aces sums up;

    They struggle to explain why this news isn’t being reported but we all know why.  If it doesn’t fit their narrative, that being the “we’re losing in Iraq” storyline, then they want nothing to do with it.  If they were true reporters they would report this stuff because it IS news.

    Well, given that CNN never reported Hussein’s atrocities and continues to ignore atrocities in Cuba to save their precious access to propaganda, who can be surprised that they’ll continue to focus on the US shortcomings since Constitutionally we can’t restrict their access. CNN is just taking the route of least resistance. I don’t what is eating the Washington Post, besides a bad case of the dumbass – playing to these goofballs.

  • Junta cracks down on monks – again

     

    Photo from Kate

    According to CNN, the Myanmar junta is manufacturing evidence against the revered Buddist monks;

    Myanmar’s military leaders said weapons had been seized from Buddhist monasteries and announced dozens of new arrests Sunday, defying global outrage over its violent repression of protesters who sought an end to 45 years of dictatorship.

    Recent raids on monasteries turned up guns, knives and ammunition, though it was not yet clear to whom they belonged, according to The New Light of Myanmar, a mouthpiece of the junta. The government threatened to punish any monks that violate the law, stepping up pressure on clerics who led the protests.

    “Monks must adhere to the laws of God and the government,” the paper wrote. “If they violate those laws, action could be taken against them.”

    Security eased in the largest city of Yangon more than a week after soldiers and police opened fire on demonstrators. Some roadblocks were removed and visitors began trickling back to the heavily guarded Shwedagon and Sule pagodas, the starting and finishing points of protests that began in mid-August over a sharp fuel price increase.

    I can’t imagine where monks would get weapons – or what good they figured knives would do to help them against armed soldiers. Since the monks have traditionally only used civil disobediance and have shunned violence in their protests, it seems unlikely they were hording weapons.

    The UN in the meantime is still shuffling it’s feet towards any real action;

    Faced with mounting world outrage over violence in Myanmar, the UN Security Council was to meet Monday under pressure to quickly condemn the military regime for crushing pro-democracy protests.
     
    The 15-member body was to weigh a draft statement that would condemn “the violent repression of peaceful demonstrations” by Myanmar’s rulers, urge them to “cease repressive measures” and release detainees as well as all political prisoners, including opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

    The non-binding text, drafted by the United States, Britain and France, was submitted Friday to the full council after members heard a report from UN emissary Ibrahim Gambari on his recent mission to defuse the crisis.

    Of course, China and Russia are still blocking any UN action against the junta declaring that it’s strictly an internal matter. Probably because both have a poor record of human rights and don’t want to start a precedent of the UN supporting democracy movements.

    The Sunday Times (h/t Aftermath News) is circulating rumors of mass cremations. I guess the junta needed even more Nazi imagery, I suppose;

    THE Burmese army has burnt an undetermined number of bodies at a crematorium sealed off by armed guards northeast of Rangoon over the past seven days, ensuring that the exact death toll in the recent pro-democracy protests will never be known.

    The secret cremations have been reported by local people who have seen olive green trucks covered with tarpaulins rumbling through the area at night and watched smoke rising continuously from the furnace chimneys.

    They say they have watched soldiers in steel helmets blocking off roads to the municipal crematorium and threatening people who poke their heads out of windows overlooking the roads after the 10pm curfew.

    Blue Crab Boulevard quotes from the Times Online that the junta has stormed UN offices and demanded their hard drives to hunt down dissidents. I wonder how the UN will react to this;

    Burma’s ruling junta is attempting to seize United Nations computers containing information on opposition activists in the latest stage of its brutal crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrations, The Times has learnt.

    UN staff were thrown into panic over the weekend after Burmese police and diplomats entered its offices in Rangoon and demanded hard drives from its computers.

    The discs contain information that could help the dictatorship to identify key members of the opposition movement, many of whom have gone underground. UN staff spent much of the weekend deleting information.

    What the junta really needs is Jimmy Carter to come over and certify that there are no mass deaths in Burma, like he’s just done for Darfur (h/t Gateway Pundit and Sweetness and Light);

    The United States is exaggerating when it described the Darfur conflict as “genocide,” former US president Jimmy Carter has said, warning that the use of the term was legally inaccurate and “unhelpful,” The Christian Science Monitor reported Friday.

    Talk about “unhelpful”, I think that’s the term we can use to describe Jimmy Carter for the last 41 years when we need a one-word adjective to understate his foreign policy dalliances.

    Spanish Pundit has a report on the protests against the junta in Asia and Europe. Kate at A Columbo-Americana’s Perspective has pictures of the protest yesterday in DC and  New York City. She also has a list of upcoming protests worldwide.

    There was also a protest in Hong Kong today for their own democracy – that’s fairly significant since, Hong Kong is in, ya know, China – one of the Security Council members blocking UN action in Burma. Oddly, the story has disappeared, so I stole the picture while I still could (found it again at WebIndia);

     

     The Bristol Blogger recommends a Nobel prize for the Monks – I’ll go along especially if it squeezes Al Gore out of the running.

  • Sorry state of the Left; the politics of bad taste

    I’m tired of the “phony soldiers” story and that seems all that’s on the blogs this weekend. Even EJ Dionne at the Washington Post blogs that (surprise!) he’d take the word of Media Matters over that of the cacophonous opposition of those of us who’ve listened to Rush for decades.

    Wes Clark (h/t Hot Air) has decided that Rush shouldn’t be on Armed Forces Radio – but it was because of the popular demand of the troops that Rush was added to AFRTS broadcasts back in 1994 (when they were abandoned by the then-current administration). Shouldn’t it be by popular demand that Rush is removed by the line-up or is Wes Clarke the sole arbiter of what the troops should have for entertainment?

    But regardless, Kos diarist dlawbailey has taken Rush’s “phony soldier” controversy as a signal that the Left can bash troops at will now (h/t to LGF, Uncle Jimbo and Sparta. dlawbailey even takes potshots at Pete Hegseth’s wife’s appearance in an attempt to undermine the good works of Vets for Freedom. And spouting off about stuff he doesn’t understand (like ROTC training and military service) including the one glaring point that Uncle Jimbo caught the weasel on – the 101st hasn’t been a parachute unit since the early 70s. When I was stationed in Panama, they used to show up for the unit training at Jungle Operations Training Center in their blue berets instead of the maroon berets of every parachute unit in the Army. I was stationed there 1976-1978, so it’s been that long that the 101st has been “dopes on a rope” (a derisive phrase used only by paratroopers when referring to the 101st and their special training requiring them to slide down a rope to arrive at the cutting of battle by air. I’ll add that it’s not acceptable for non-airborne personnel to use the term and my use of the phrase is not a signal for Leftist diarists to begin referring to the noble troopers of the 101st Airborne Division as “dopes”).

    Since I also spent a few years teaching ROTC (at the University of Vermont), I can also add that not every cadet gets to go to Airborne School – the detachment is assigned a number of slots and there aren’t ever enough slots for everyone. Participation in political organizations while in an ROTC detachment isn’t limited by Army regulations – so cadets can join any organization to which they are drawn just like any other college student. Cadets aren’t confined by the UCMJ – dlawbailey should do a little research before wrapping himself/herself in minutae he/she doesn’t understand.

    Peckerwood dlawbailey complains about Hogseth’s lack of training – anyone who has spent a month in a TO&E unit knows that a bright and shiney new El-Tee has already had a few years of training at whatever college they attended, six weeks at Advanced Camp (if they’re ROTC), six months of their Basic Officers’ Course and ancillary training (Ranger School, Airborne, etc.).

    It’s not unusual for someone in a National Guard unit (like Hegseth) to not be Airborne or Ranger because of the rare times those particular officers get a slot at school. Unlike the idiots at Kos, the Army puts more stock in experience than schooling. The Basic Airborne Course – although it’s a great honor to be among the finest soldiers in the history of the world – isn’t a leadership school. Aside from being physically and mentally rigorous, the main prerequisite for the course is the student’s ability to obey the Law of Gravity at varying heights – nothing about leading troops in combat. I’ve even had leg Ranger LTs; they’d graduated from Ranger School, but not the Basic Airborne Course. Just the luck of getting school slots – that’s all.

    It seems that the “phony soldier” phony signal has turned loose the moonbats everywhere. Newsbusters reports that one-in-five Democrats thinks it’s a good thing if the US loses the war in Iraq. Wha??? Unless one-in-five Democrats are al Qaeda sleeper operatives, that should make the DNC think whether they want the votes of that constituency or not.

    Newsbusters also reports that members of the mis-named “Think Progress” have taken to praying – that the President and Vice-President die. In the words of a member named ‘Uncle Ho’ (clearly a misinformed person just for chosing that nom de plum); “I pray for Bush, and Cheney too. I pray that both die suddenly to free us from their neo-Nazi rule”. Yep, neo-nazi rule. Even after viewing the repression of the monks in Burma, the Left still thinks we’re ruled by nazis here.

    Speaking of which, Kate took pics of the latest Buddist protests in DC at the Myanmar, Chinese and Indian embassies yesterday. Why aren’t more of the Left getting involved against REAL injustice instead of this manufactured phony soldiers crap?

    But that’s not it. Crotchety Old Bastard (who tells us his son is still kickin’ ass in Iraq as a member of the Red Falcons – best wishes to him from this old trooper, too) writes that Medea Benjamin, the head shriveled up, barren old bag of Code Pink has made the brave decision to forego the protections she recieves from the Constitution. Who does she think she’s kidding? Does she think we’re going to put her on a raft in the Pacific Ocean and tie it off with a 12-mile rope on the Santa Monica pier? Dumbass.

    And Code Pink has taken to bravely assaulting recruiters who, generally can’t defend themselves the way they’ve been trained according to Marooned in Marin. And those goofballs in front of Walter Reed every Friday night protesting the war? Well, it turns out that because we’re winning the war in Iraq, their voluntary participation has waned and according to Chickenhawk Express, Michele Malkin and the Free Republic, protesters are being drafted by the unions and forced to participate – even though they’re not exactly sure why they’re there.

    As I predicted three months ago, the Left and their anti-war politics are failing and they’ve succumbed to the same tactics of al Qaeda – attacking innocent people who can’t defend themselves (apparently, according to Crotchety Old Bastard, al Qaeda is even adopting the tactics of Democrats and attacking the dead, too). Just like the tactic isn’t working for al Qaeda, it’ll bring a ugly end to the anti-war screwballs, too, but not before there are a bunch more casualties – on both sides.

    UPDATED: It seems Uncle Jimbo, a retired special warfare operator of some reknown, started a diary on Kos and has been banned for – get this – being a pedophile. All he did was bust on the Koskommies for the aforementioned diarist’s post busting on an honest-to-goodness bronze star awardee’s career (and wife, by the way). The comments on Jimbo’s diary post are really beyond the pale. The closest comment to anything supporting the troops is when one commenter called Markos a “a f*king veteran”. Like I said – the politics of bad taste.

  • Children Health Insurance Lies

    Perhaps Washington Post’s most partisan hack writer, Eugene Robinson, who is either the most stupid person on the face of the Earth, the most free of common sense, or the biggest liar on the planet, has written a bit of projection this Friday entitled Bush’s Veto Lies;

    Bush’s veto Wednesday of a bipartisan bill reauthorizing the State Children’s Health Insurance Program was infuriatingly bad policy. An estimated 9 million children in this country are not covered by health insurance — a circumstance that should shock the consciences of every American. Democrats and Republicans worked together to craft an expansion of an existing state-run program that would have provided coverage for about 4 million children who currently don’t have it.

    It was one of those art-of-the-possible compromises designed to advance the ball toward what has become a national goal.

    First of all, Eugene, there might be nine million children without health insurance, per se, but all nine million of those children have government-provided health care through medicaid. And if Democrats wanted to “advance the ball” as you put it, why does the Washington Examiner today report that Democrats aren’t in the mood for compromise with the White House?

    Bush, who vetoed the bill on Wednesday, told a Pennsylvania crowd he is willing to increase his funding proposal for the program if it will lead to a deal with Congress.

    But both House and Senate Democrats insisted there is no room for compromise.

    House Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., called Bush’s overture “an insult” and said he is a president out of touch with reality who used his “macho pen” to hurt children.

    “If he thinks he can waltz in here, with his secretary of Health and Human Services, and sweet-talk us, he can’t. We’re not going to compromise. If he’s hoping for that, he’d better hope for something else,” Reid said.

    House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said, “We have compromised all we can compromise,” but then added, “We’re always willing to talk.”

    Seems to me that the President has been willing to compromise since the beginning of this discussion, but the Democrats froze House Republicans and the White House out of the negotiations. The only reason the Senates Republicans were asked to participate was because of the 60% needed to pass legislation in the Senate these days.

    In fact, the President said he’d have signed the bill if Democrats had made CHIP available to children who live in households with an annual income of 200% of the poverty line – but the Democrats intentionally made the goal for families with an annual income of 300% (about $60,000) of the poverty line. I’m pretty sure a family with $40-60,000 of annual income can afford their own health insurance without the government. So Democrats let it fail because they’re trying to hand out entitlements to the wealthiest Americans – how’s that feel Eugene?

    Well, Eugene Robinson – disingenuous person that he is, says the people between $40-60,000 “fall into a perilous gap”;

    The program Congress voted to expand provides health insurance for children who fall into a perilous gap: Their families make too much money to qualify for Medicaid but don’t make enough to afford health insurance. 

    How can they not afford health insurance when the family is making more money than I have most of my life – and I always had insurance for my kids. I considered it part of my responsibility as a parent. In fact, I made sure they had health insurance until they were 21. Maybe the problem isn’t President Bush – maybe it’s the Democrats (and Eugene Robinson’s) fault for making it seem as if it’s Government’s responsibility to provide healthcare instead of parents.

    Robinson repeats this idea throughout the piece;

    Health care is arguably the biggest domestic issue in the presidential contest and, while the candidates and the country may be all over the map in terms of comprehensive solutions, there’s a pretty broad consensus that some way has to be found to ensure that children, at least, are covered.

    The only candidates talking about it, at any length are the Democrats – but I understand Robinson’s failure to admit that, as I’m sure this supposed journalist is only listening to the Democrats and those are the only candidates this journalist will accept as “his president”.

    And more ignorance from partisan hack Robinson;

    The president said Congress was trying to “federalize health care,” even though the program in question is run by the states.

    The why is the federal government paying for it? The Federal government doesn’t just hand over money to the States without strings attached, or haven’t you read even a page of Title 21 (Public Health) of the Code of Federal Regulations which contains 9 volumes of text in regard to state-run programs.

    And so what if 72% of Americans were “for” the program according to the Washington Post survey – how many understood what was in the bill and what was in dispute? Do you think I trust the Washington Post to honestly survey Americans? Has that ever happened?

    More Robinson drivel;

    Bush seems to be upset that Congress didn’t adopt his pet idea to tackle the health insurance issue through — guess what? — tax breaks. None of the major players on Capitol Hill thought this would work.

    Um, Eugene, no one “on Capitol Hill” thought any of his other tax cuts would increase revenues and stabilize a failing (Clinton) economy – but they did. To ask anyone in Congress to approve of a tax cut or a tax break is like asking a crack addict to go cold turkey. Or haven’t you lived in Washington DC long enough to know that? You have, but you’re not honest enough to tell the truth, are you?

    The actual truth is; the Democrats need an emotional issue to take the focus off of their dreary record of national defense – and this is the one they’ve chosen.

  • Obama; the President of what, then?

    This is the most ignorant drivel I’ve ever read. Barack Obama, a Democrat candidate for the President of the United States claims that wearing an American flag pin took the place of “real patriotism”;

    “The truth is that right after 9-11 I had a pin,” Obama said. “Shortly after 9-11, particularly because as we’re talking about the Iraq war, that became a substitute for I think true patriotism, which is speaking out on issues that are of importance to our national security.

    “I decided I won’t wear that pin on my chest,” he said in the interview. “Instead, I’m going to try to tell the American people what I believe will make this country great, and hopefully that will be a testament to my patriotism.”

    Well, then when is he going to tell us what will make this country great, then, since all he’s done since he became a national figure is to talk down our economy, our way of life, promised to take more money from us, and tell us our national security isn’t worth defending.

    I’m sick of these half-witted Leftists and their sorry-assed yammering about this country and their brand of patriotism. If they like this country, even a little bit, why can’t they tell us what they like about it? Why is it they want to rewrite every paragraph of the Constitution? Why are they down on capitalism – our economy? Why are they constantly harping about the shoddy way we treat our “poor”? Why do they constantly claim that they’re embarrassed to admit they’re Americans?

    Everytime a Leftist tells me they love this country, I ask them what they love about it – they’re stymied. Why do they stay if they can’t find any reason that makes it worth living in? And why are so many other people from around the world flocking here if it’s so terrible?

    Obama is proving to be the most amateurish candidate ever to run for the Presidency – he makes wild foreign policy statements about negotiating with thugs while threatening our allies. He wants to do away with nuclear weapons by using grade playground tactics – “you first, then me – now you again”.

    I’ve got a flag on my desk – it’s been there since before 9-11. Our building manager gave out flag pins to everyone in our office. I wouldn’t wear it – the little bag it came in said “Made in China”. Now that’s a reason to not wear a pin, not some putred half excuse about uber-patriotism that sounds like it was written by an Art History major at the University of Vermont.

    Little Green Footballs says this bit of theater proves that Obama is Hillary’s stalking horse. Michele Malkin redesigns the Presidential seal for him. Ace writes that he’s patriotic to the Nation of Earth. Atlas Shrugs compares his statement to Katie Couric’s last week – a nuanced answer vetted by opinion polls? 

  • Night raids in Myanmar

    Hoping the world is still looking at the two Koreas and the South African mine disaster, the Myanmar government stepped up repression of the revolt last night (CNN/AP); 

    After crushing the democracy uprising with guns, Myanmar’s junta stepped up its campaign to intimidate citizens Wednesday, sending troops to drag people from their homes in the middle of the night and letting others know they were marked for retribution.

    “We have photographs! We are going to make arrests!” soldiers yelled from loudspeakers on military vehicles that patrolled the streets in Yangon, Myanmar’s biggest city

    People living near the Shwedagon Pagoda, Myanmar’s most revered shrine and a flash point of unrest during the protests, reported that security forces swept through several dozen homes about 3 a.m., taking away many men and even some women for questioning.

    A U.N. Development Program employee, Myint Nwe Moe, and her husband, brother-in-law and driver were among those detained, the U.N. agency said.

    Dozens of Buddhist monks jammed Yangon’s main train station after being ordered to vacate their monasteries — centers of the anti-government demonstrations — and told to go back to their hometowns and villages.

    Another AP story on CNN tells of the brutality perpetrated on ethnic minorities in Myanmar;

    The Karen, the Shan and other minority groups who live along the Myanmar-Thai border have been attacked, raped and killed by government soldiers. Their thatched-roofed, bamboo homes have been torched. Men have been seized into forced labor for the army, while women, children and the elderly either hide out in nearby jungles until the soldiers leave or flee over the mountains to crowded, makeshift refugee camps.

    “Many, many thousands of Karen have died in those 60 years,” Karen National Union secretary general Mahn Sha said this week of his people’s struggle for autonomy since 1947.

    The military junta has denied reports of atrocities and says the ethnic rebels are “terrorists” trying to overthrow the government.

    And the UN fiddles. Meanwhile, Enzo  (with a hat tip to Kate) reports that, after the night time raids;

    The only thing of which one can be sure is that somewhere in the country large numbers of people are being held in an invisible prison camp, without charge, without legal recourse and without the ability to communicate.

    Incognito warns that there’s a Burma-related email virus. Kate emails me that Sylvester “John Rambo” Stallone witnessed the atrocities in Burma while making Rambo 4 – but one must wonder why he waited for Myanmar to become world news before he bothered to mention it – couldn’t be the publicity, could it?

    Gateway Pundit reports 50 students get 5 years at hard labor for last week’s protests.

  • FARC, Chavez, Soros and Rice

    I just got this emailed from Kate;

    The US State Department is gifting the FARC a massive propaganda win-win by granting propaganda caravans for the FARC operatives to tour and visit their poor boys inside a US prison. Speaker of the US Congress Nancy Pelosi thinks this is a good idea. Her staffers, led by counsel to Pelosi and to the pro drugs funding George Soros insist that this is a good idea, never mind what U.S. and UN counternarcotics agreements and laws detail. So too, apparently, does Assistant Sec of State Tom Shannon. We do not know what, if anything.

    I’d read earlier that the talks with FARC had been delayed – because FARC demands the release of their members held in US jails. So, in effect they’re asking for a prisoner exchange in the middle of their war. According to El Universal, FARC puts the blame for failure of the talks on Uribe while the success will fall to Chavez;

    FARC, senior member “Iván Márquez” put the blame on Uribe for the failure to swap the people kidnapped for imprisoned guerrillas.

    “If no swap has been made and continues causing suffering, it has been because of the president’s wild intransigency and stubbornness,” said Iván Márquez, whose actual name is Luciano Marín Arango.

    “All of us really want the success of President Chávez’ important mediation for this to be possible,” he added.

    Commie bros keepin’ it real, I suppose. But eCrisis ties Pelosi and Soros to FARC;

    While we are aware that Pelosi’s legal counsel is a Soros man whose commitments to bringing down Plan Colombia and aiding and abetting the pro drugs agenda is well known, we are not aware that State Department must roll over and treat the FARC as if this is a legal state group of actors. For it is not. The FARC is a non state subset of narco terrorists whose legitimacy does not exist.

    BBC calls Columbian Senator Cordoba an “opposition senator” but she’s actually FARC’s representation in the legislature. She wants 500 FARC terrorists released in exchange for hostages;

    Colombian opposition Senator Piedad Cordoba, who has been acting as a mediator in the process, confirmed that elements were lacking to “complete the circle” and reach a deal.

    The proposed deal would see the 500 rebel prisoners exchanged for politicians, members of the armed forces, and three US citizens.

    The Miami Herald writes;

    Colombian Senator Piedad Córdoba told reporters she expects to meet Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice Friday and travel to a federal penitentiary in Texas to meet with Nayibe Rojas, a commander of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC.

    Rojas is serving a 16-year jail term on drug trafficking charges.

    A meeting with Rice would signal that the Bush administration approves of the mediation effort launched by Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez and Córdoba to secure the release of 45 high-profile hostages held by the FARC in exchange for about 500 FARC rebels in Colombian jails. The Colombian government has blessed the effort.

    Three Pentagon civilian contractors — Keith Stansell, Marc Gonsalves and Tom Howes — have been held by the FARC since 2003.

    Córdoba said the State Department told her it is awaiting an offer by the FARC before deciding on a U.S. position.

    Córdoba met Wednesday with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. ”This gives us a sense of the importance that the United States has given to this process,” Córdoba said.

    ”The first thing we want to achieve is trust — trust among the FARC, but also the Colombian government and the U.S. government,” she said, adding that a meeting between Chávez and FARC leaders set for Monday in Caracas has been postponed until more details can be worked out. 

    If there’s any truth to this deal, the US Air Force should send in a J-DAM to the meeting and end the whole process. FARC is no less a terrorist enemy of the US than al Qaeda.

  • Hugo Chavez officially off his rocker

    I’ve written before that Chavez plans to move his clock ahead 1/2 hour but he let that idea fall off the radar until now (Pravda/AP);

    Hugo Chavez’s plan to turn back clocks by a half-hour has some Venezuelans pleased at the prospect of sleeping in. Others seem vexed that Chavez is making the entire nation change its daily rhythm. Some bloggers suggest Chavez wants to get out of Washington’s “imperialist” time zone, but Venezuela will be a half-hour apart from his Cuban allies as well.
     
    “It seems crazy to me,” says 38-year-old Maritza Mendoza, who sells orange juice from a sidewalk stand in downtown Caracas. “It’s a whim, just like the change of the currency.”

    Venezuela’s upcoming launch of the “strong bolivar” – eliminating three zeros and reducing bills to 2-, 5-, 10-, 20-, 50-, and 100-bolivar denominations – joins a growing list of changes promoted by Chavez. He’s transformed the national seal, the national flag and even the country’s name – now the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, after independence hero Simon Bolivar.

    So by adding a 1/2 hour to the time will make Venezuelans more productive and knocking off a few zeros, will save the bolivar, and Venezuela will be a paradise – well, except for the evil CIA (AP);

    President Hugo Chavez accused the U.S. on Wednesday of trying to spur a military rebellion, saying the CIA is behind the distribution of leaflets inside army barracks calling for his ouster.
     
    Speaking to dozens of army officers at Venezuela’s largest military base, Chavez urged soldiers to resist calls for a coup from “oligarchs and their imperialist masters,” a reference to the United States.

    “They will always try to divide us and confuse us to weaken us, and thereby dominate us,” said Chavez, who weathered a short-lived coup in 2002.

    Noting that leaflets calling for a rebellion have been circulating in army barracks recently, he said: “That’s why they have the CIA.”

    I’m pretty sure that if the CIA got inside the Venezuelan Army barracks, they’d do a little more than leave pieces of paper laying around.

    Jungle Mom at The Jungle Hut writes that Venezuelan Jews are more than a little worried about Chavez’ threat to close down schools which don’t teach the chavista party line. Julia at The End of Venezuela as I Know It gives a glimpse of what’s inside her 11-year-old niece’s textbooks – complete with anti-Bush cartoons.

    Daniel at Venezuela’s News and Views asks “Where is the success of Chavez’ economic  policies?” The Devil’s Excrement questions the Venezuelan government’s report that inflation was at 1.3% for September charging that food and beverages are increasing at 25%. The chavistas claim it’s because food and bevergaes aren’t controlled by the government;

    According to the Central Bank of Venezuela, inflation for September was largely driven by the increase of prices on products outside of government price controls, which rose by 2 per cent, whereas products under government price controls rose only 0.5%

    But, hey, that one day the clocks change, you’ll get an extra half-hour sleep. Yay!