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

Category: Politics

  • Veteran victims; the Left’s latest absurdity

    This week, the week of Veterans’ Day, we’ve been pummelled with the media’s latest attack on the United States. CBS claims that the suicide rate among veterans is above the rate of Americans in general, disregarding that veterans are young and male and so their rate matches that of their peers. (Refuted here by Say Anything and Aviation Week) Is it a tragedy? Yes it most certainly is, but it’s not Bush’s fault – it’s not the VA’s fault. It’s more the fault of our culture (looking at you, CBS).

    Associated Press claims that soldiers are deserting at higher rates than ever before (well, since Vietnam). The New York Times reports that a quarter of homeless peple were veterans at some point in 2006;

    Recent surveys have painted an appalling picture. More than 300,000 of the nation’s 24 million veterans were homeless at some point during 2006, and while only a few hundred from Iraq or Afghanistan have turned up homeless so far, aid groups are bracing themselves for a tsunamilike upsurge in coming years.

    Sure aid groups are bracing – they have a financial interest in inflated numbers – in fact if you scroll down to the bottom of the NYT story, you’ll see where they had corrected their 300k from a 500k number because they were in such a rush to get the story out on Veterans Day they didn’t have time to check the methodology of their polls.

    While “only a few hundred from Iraq or Afghanistan have turned up homeless”, New York Times sees a great way to turn public opinion against Republicans – yet again.

    Now I’m not calling the NEw York Times liars, but I’ll tell you - quite a few “veterans” I’ve met couldn’t tell the difference between an M16 and SOS. DC is lousy with phony vets – I’ve busted several out in my travels around the city. And none of them pretend to be cooks or clerks – they’re all SEALs and Rangers. In fact, I’m in the process of busting out a guy who made the mistake of pretending to be in the 1st Battalion Rangers at the same time I was there back in the days of woolen longjohns.

    I watched some national news program back in 1992, during the presidential campaign where a correspondent was interviewing a supposed Gulf War veteran who was homeless. The correspondent asked the man when he had been in the Gulf and the man replied that he’d been there since “May”. Now either the guy was there three months before Hussein invaded Kuwait, or he was there two months after the war had ended. But the interviewer continued with the piece and didn’t bat an eye.

    I’ll never forget that I ran into a “homeless vet” in Syracuse near my office there. He was bumming money from me by telling me he was a veteran. I told him that I’m a veteran, too. His immediate response was “Why are you wearing that suit”? As if I didn’t fit the mold of a veteran because I had a job and wore a suit.

    I’ve been in touch with many of my troops since I left the Army and as far as I can tell, they’re all doing great. But the left and the media want to portray us as mental cases boiling under our peaceful facade. Honestly, I am boiling underneath my (reasonably) peaceful facade – at the Left.

    Dean Barnett at The Weekly Standard, in his piece (dated 11-26) The Last Talking Point of the Left; the vet-as-victim, told of an email exchange he had with National Guard colonel;

    I recently exchanged emails with a colonel in the California National Guard–an attorney when not on active duty–about Bruce Spring-steen’s new song “Gypsy Biker.” The song portrays Iraq war veterans as gullible dupes who shed their blood while “the speculators made their money,” and the colonel wrote;

    It’s this portrayal of vets as burnt-out losers with nowhere to go but out on the open road that gets me. I was in court today, a vet, arguing a million-dollar case, in front of a judge who was also a vet. Vets aren’t burned out losers–we’re leaders. For every vet with problems–and they certainly exist, though I would guess in percentages far below that of the comparable civilian population–there are dozens of vets out there building businesses, raising families, and leading communities. Many give up weekends and vacations to stay in the Guard and Reserve. But I guess those guys aren’t cool enough or useful enough. 

    The stereotypical vet is the burned-out homeless guy with a torn old green field jacket. I say it should be the dad dropping his little girl off at preschool before he goes to the business he built from nothing while fielding phone calls from his Guard unit’s full-time staff and driving a car with a trunk full of military gear so that, when the next earthquake or riot hits, he can go out and protect his community–again.

    But the Left makes it’s points with the public by making the norm less normal – and veterans always get the shitty end of the stick. 

  • Washington Post; nonpartisan my pink butt

    So the House passed the same stupid defense spending bill that was vetoed by the President and sent it to the Senate AGAIN. The Washington Post didn’t bother to post the story on it’s website until nearly noon today and they entitled the piece “Senate GOP Blocks $50B War Funding Package” (Ed. Note: They changed it last night to; “Funding Bill for Iraq War Falls Short in Senate Vote”) pushing the culpability for the failure of funding off on Republicans;

    By Shailagh Murray
    Washington Post Staff Writer
    Friday, November 16, 2007; 11:44 AM

    Senate Republicans blocked the latest Democratic effort to end the Iraq war, rejecting a $50 billion funding package that would require President Bush to begin withdrawing U.S. troops.

    The 53-45 vote fell seven short of the 60 votes needed for the measure to clear Republican procedural hurdles.

    But wait – what’s this:

    A GOP alternative, which would have provided $70 billion with no strings attached, failed 45-53, or 15 votes short of the 60-vote threshold.

    Oh, so the story’s title could have been “Democrat Caucus Blocks $70B War Funding Package” just as easily – or even “Senate Fails to Fund War”, but neither of those would fit the WaPo’s editorial policy.

    In another Washington Post story, Pelosi blames Congress’ low approval ratings on the Senate;

    In an interview at the U.S. Capitol, Pelosi said the Democratic takeover of Congress had raised expectations on action to end the conflict in Iraq, and that the Senate’s initial willingness to tackle immigration reform followed by its failure to do so left the American public disappointed in Congress.

    The House on Wednesday night passed spending legislation that sought to tie funding for the Iraq war to hard deadlines for beginning troop withdrawals, a proposal that has little hope of passage in the Senate.

    “People thought it was a problem that could be solved and when it didn’t happen I think it was a big disappointment,” she said. “Usually those low numbers relate to expectations and there were high expectations” on both Iraq and immigration.

    Maybe Congress’ low approval ratings are because Democrats made promises they never intended to keep. They need the war to win next year – all they have to do is keep sending legislation they know will be vetoed to play to the whacky wing of the Left. Don’t believe me? Let’s go back to the first WaPo story;

    Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (Nev.) said he may bring the Democratic bill back to the floor in December, but he and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) have asserted that Bush would not receive more war funding this year unless the president accepts Democratic withdrawal terms.

    Why would they continue to send legislation that was dead on arrival if they intended to end the war? And Washington Post carries their water for them.

  • The Kossacks on The Las Vegas Debate

    CNN seems to think Hillary won. Those reasonable people at the dailykos think otherwise. They have a poll.
    And the winner is: Kuchinich, in a tie with Obama.
    As much the idea of Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama scares me, putting that little weasel in office would be worse.

  • Mona Charen Talks To Ron Paul Supporters

    Real Clear Politics has this outstanding column by Mona Charen. Here’s an excerpt:
    1.. Ron Paul is inconsistent. Though he calls himself a man of principle and is apparently admired as such by his ardent fans, his principles seem somewhat elastic. He rails against the Bush administration for its supposed assault on civil liberties, yet when he was asked at one of the debates whether Scooter Libby deserved a pardon, he said no. “He doesn’t deserve one because he was instrumental in leading the Congress and the people to support a war that we didn’t need to be in.” Notice that he didn’t say it was because Libby was guilty of committing a crime. No, because Libby argued for a policy with which Paul disagreed, he deserved to serve time in prison. Ron Paul, the libertarian, who presumably values liberty above all, is willing to deprive someone else of his because of a policy disagreement?
    It is a short and sweet little write up.

  • Where’s the war? (UPDATED)

    Reading the usual newspapers and wire services this morning, I was surprised to find that there’s no mention of the war in either Iraq or Afghanistan. D’ya think we’re weary of the war and that’s why the Washington Post doesn’t even have it’s usual link to the US casualties on the front webpage? Nope, I don’t think that’s the reason at all. The war is beginning to go the way it should have gone four years ago. But that doesn’t stop Democrats from yapping. From the Washington Times’ S.A. Miller and Sean Lengell;

    Top Democrats yesterday rejected reports of U.S. military progress in Iraq, saying victory remains “out of reach” as long as political divisions roil Baghdad.

    “It’s not getting better; it’s getting worse,” said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, Nevada Democrat. “The goal remains out of reach.”

    House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, California Democrat, said the reduced violence in Iraq wasn’t enough to win her support for the mission.

    “Certainly any time our military is engaged in military action, we want the best possible outcome for them, and they have produced that,” she said. “But their sacrifice and their courage has not been met by any action on the part of the Iraqi government.”

    Pelosi is talking through her ass, by the way. If they’d wanted “the best possible outcome” for the troops, they would have shut their stupid mouths four years ago until the job was done – then they can yap to their hearts’ content.

    So what’s it take to convince the Democrats that the war is being won? Yesterday the Iraqis took up one of their most controversial issues, the inclusion of former Ba’athists in the political process – the equivalent of Germans letting the former Nazis back into their process.

    From the Times article;

    Sen. Joe Lieberman, a hawkish Connecticut independent, said the war critics “remain emotionally invested in a narrative of retreat and defeat, even as facts on the ground show that we are advancing and winning.”

    They’re not “emotionally invested”, Joe, they’re politically invested in defeat. They have no emotions beyond their fear of being shown to be fools by Republicans.

    “Democrats can’t acknowledge the fact that our troops are winning the war against al Qaeda in Iraq without admitting that they’ve been dead wrong on the biggest national challenge of our generation at the same time,” said House Minority Leader John A. Boehner, Ohio Republican.

    “Had Republicans not stood their ground and prevented Democrats from forcing a retreat — on numerous occasions, especially in the early months of the year — who knows how firmly entrenched al Qaeda in Iraq would be today and what kind of strikes they’d be planning,” he said. “It’s a scary thought that could have been a reality.”

    Make that “most Republicans” – some greasy little cowards scrambling for that “maverick” label, cough-Hagel-cough, capitulated to the Left for purely political reasons.

    The Democrats want to encourage massive US casualties in the middle east, they want to encourage Iranian and al Qaeda strikes against the US – then they can use them in the 2008 campaign. Why else would Pelosi, et al. visit Iran’s poodle, Syria? To make the Arabs think we’re a bunch of cowards and fools – to insure them that no matter what they do to us or our allies, we’ll just turn the other cheek for them.

    Why else would Harry Reid continue to say that the war is lost, that surge wasn’t working even before it started? Because they’re a bunch of traitorous cowards who’ve bet their careers against the United States ever being successful at anything. They keep their jobs as long as they can convince voters that our revolution was a fool’s errand, as long as they can convince voters that we’re all failures.

    America used to be about winning. Fausta lists the 19 terrorist attacks against the US that have been thwarted since 9-11-2001. Gaius at Blue Crab Boulevard says, “The Democrats may spend their days paddling up and down denial, but the reality is that trying to lose in Iraq is not a good strategy for rebuilding America’s foreign relations.” Chickenhawk Express quotes Harry Reid’s latest trip down denial;

    Take for instance, Harry Reid’s comments today about the war in Iraq…

    “Every place you go you hear about no progress being made in Iraq,” said Senate Democratic majority leader Harry Reid. “The government is stalemated today, as it was six months ago, as it was two years ago,” Reid told reporters, warning US soldiers were caught in the middle of a civil war “It is not getting better, it is getting worse,” he said.

    Makes ya wonder, doesn’t it? Now contrast Reid’s words with these words from Michael Yon, someone actually on the ground in Iraq (h/t Wake Up, America);

    I can’t remember my last shootout: it’s been months. The nightmare is ending. Al Qaeda is being crushed. The Sunni tribes are awakening all across Iraq and foreswearing violence for negotiation. Many of the Shia are ready to stop the fighting that undermines their ability to forge and manage a new government. This is a complex and still delicate denouement, and the war may not be over yet. But the Muslims are saying it’s time to come home. And the Christians are saying it’s time to come home. They are weary, and there is much work to be done.

    Doesn’t sound like they’re talking about the same war, or even the same country, does it?

    Perhaps the media quit reporting on the war because they can’t get it right. Confederate Yankee reprints a letter that an Army LTC wrote to the Guardian to straighten out one of their reporters.

    UPDATED: The Senate failed to pass the bloated, same old stupid Democrat trick of trying to set a withdrawal date for Iraq while holding the troops hostage with defense spending – the same stupid political ploy that’s failed four times this year (link to AP/Yahoo story);

    Four Republicans joined Democrats in voting for the measure: Sens. Gordon Smith of Oregon, Olympia Snowe of Maine, Susan Collins of Maine and Chuck Hagel of Nebraska.

    Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., was the lone Democrat opposing it because he said it did not go far enough to end the war.

    The Republican proposal to pay for the Iraq war with no strings attached failed by a vote of 45-53, which was 15 short of the number needed to go forward.

    Reid and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said this week that if Congress cannot pass legislation that ties war money to troop withdrawals, they would not send President Bush a bill this year.

    Instead, they would revisit the issue upon returning in January, pushing the Pentagon to the brink of an accounting nightmare and deepening Democrats’ conflict with the White House on the war.

    In the meantime, Democrats say, the Pentagon can use some of its $471 billion annual budget without being forced to take drastic steps.

    “The days of a free lunch are over,” said Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y.

    So, the party that claimed to be the party of fiscal responsibility won’t pass a defense bill in the time of war. And blithering buffoon Lil’ Chuckie Schumer – the king of free lunches – doesn’t give a tiny rat’s ass about funding the troops as long as he can run over Congressional aides to get to the cameras and say “the days of a free lunch are over” to get his stupid goofy mug on TV.

    If you stupid ass Democrats send this incompetent bunch of boobs back next year, you deserve everything they won’t give you. More on the Senate at Crotchety Old Bastard,  Michele Malkin, Blackfive and Gateway Pundit.

  • Another Day, Another Victory For Political Correctness and Loss for Security

    As I told you HERE the LAPD had planned to map where Muslims lived to provide them with an idea of where trouble could start. Well, they wussed out. The big bad LAPD buckled under the protest of CAIR, the ACLU and others.
    We hear the hackneyed line Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety. That’s nice, if misguided. I submit that those who value inoffensive behavior over safety are doomed to suffer the will of those not concerned with niceties. Breitbart and AFP have the story. If people claiming to be Presbyterians were strapping on explosive laden vests and blowing themselves up in public places, they’d need to be watched. But, that isn’t the reality we find ourselves in. Yes, we are told that Islam is the “Religion of Peaceâ„¢” and indeed, the majority of Muslims are peaceful, law abiding people. The cold hard fact is, that the majority of terrorists in the world today claim to be Muslim. It is irresponsible NOT to look closely at Muslim communities and groups.

  • Lining up the sides for a new Cold War

    Last week we were treated to what Frenchmen look like when they’re being nice when M. Sarkozy addressed a joint session of Congress. This week, formerly chilly new prime Minister of Britain, Gordon Brown was caught “doing the Sarkozy” by the Wall Street Journal Editorial staff;

    So Monday night, in his first major speech on foreign policy since moving into 10 Downing Street, Mr. Brown sought to out-Sarkozy the Frenchman. “It is no secret that I am a lifelong admirer of America,” he said in London. “I have no truck with anti-Americanism in Britain or elsewhere in Europe. I believe that our ties with America — founded on values we share — constitute our most important bilateral relationship.” In noting the recent pro-U.S. tilt across the Channel, Mr. Brown said, “It is good for Britain, for Europe and for the wider world that today France and Germany and the European Union are building strong relationships with America.”

    GI Jane wrote yesterday on this blog, that Denmark elected a center-right govenment with Anders Fogh Rasmussen, a staunch Bush supporter at it’s head, and of course Germany has center-right Andrea merkel calling shots for them. So all of our allies are lining up with us again – that’s good, I suppose. Mike’s America says it’s better than the alternative;

    Meanwhile, both Bill and Hillary Clinton continue to insist that America’s standing in the world has been damaged by President Bush and only THEY can restore it!

    Yeah, that’s what we need to restore America’s image: more Europeans making jokes about a stain on a blue dress!

    Fausta says;

    That’s what happens when George W. Bush squanders the good faith of the EUros…

    But I see all of this good news a bit differently - always the cynic, I see an impending disaster. I wrote back in September about the Axis of Ultimate Evil;

    Well, you’ve got Hugo Chavez buying weapons from Russia, drilling oil with China (who is, by the way, drilling oil off the coast of Florida in cahoots with Cuba) and forming alliances with Iran and Nicaragua (not to mention Chavez coming out against boob jobs), Syria getting weapons technology from North Korea.

    […] 

    I’m starting to see a pattern here. This growing alliance is cartoonishly evil – like some kind of alliance of fiends set against the Justice League or Superfriends. Except there isn’t any Justice League or Superfriends – there’s just us. Well…some of us. 

    Well, now we have friends. China and Russia, who are both running a screen for resource-rich and repressive Myanmar government in the United Nations, are now training their militaries together which completes the circle of the alliance of our political and economic competitors.  In fact the AP writes that a US Panel reports Chinese espionage as one of our biggest threats;

    Chinese spying in America represents the greatest threat to U.S. technology, according to a congressional advisory panel report Thursday that recommended lawmakers consider financing counterintelligence efforts meant to stop China from stealing U.S. manufacturing expertise.

    The U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission also said in its annual report to Congress that small- and medium-sized U.S. manufacturers, which represent more than half the manufacturing jobs in America, “face the full brunt of China’s unfair trade practices, including currency manipulation and illegal subsidies for Chinese exports.”

    China’s economic policies create a trade relationship that is “severely out of balance” in China’s favor, said the commission, which Congress set up in 2000 to investigate and report on U.S.-China issues.

    With the war in Iraq winding down, the cartoonishly evil axis probably needs to strike at us while we’re trying to catch our breath, and before our own alliance has any real strength. We know that the French are always the friendliest when they’re in trouble – that probably should have been my first hint.

  • Democrats living in a time warp

    With resounding military successes occurring everyday in Iraq, with more and more areas of Iraq falling under the control of the Iraqi military and Iraqi police, the Democrats are bound and determined that they want credit for pulling the troops out. So they’ve tied funding to the war to a complete withdrawal of US troops by the end of next year. from the Wall Street Journal’s David Rogers;

    The Iraq war debate erupted anew in Congress as the House approved additional military funding but only after Democrats attached conditions that set the goal of ending U.S. combat operations by the end of next year.

    Adopted 218-203, the measure gives the Pentagon $50 billion in emergency funds to sustain military operations until next spring, when a more extensive debate is expected after lawmakers receive a new report from Iraq commander Gen. David Petraeus.

    But the White House immediately said it would veto the “bridge” funding unless the House restrictions are removed, and the resulting stalemate will almost certainly run into next month — and possibly next year.
     
    Republicans accused Democrats of pursuing a “fool’s game” that ignores progress made on the ground in Iraq. Democrats countered that the war’s cost and strain on the U.S. military has become a threat to American security, and strong action by Congress is needed to force a change in policy by the president.

    Yea-uh-uh, the Democrats are worried about our security – that’s why they’re coming out against an attack on Iran. The Washington Times’ S.A. Miller and Sara A. Carter reports that Democrats are still living in 2006 when they thought they could control troop deployments (and before President Bush demonstrated to them that they couldn’t);

    The bill mimics Democrats’ previous challenges to Iraq policy and likely will stall emergency funds, which would pay for about three months of warfare while lawmakers debate the rest of the $196.4 billion war-funds request for 2008.

    The top Democrats — House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada — say they will withhold troop funds for at least the rest of the year if Mr. Bush does not accept the pullout timetable.

    “There is a growing sense within our caucus that it is time to play hardball,” said Rep. Jim McGovern, Massachusetts Democrat and outspoken war critic. “This is George Bush’s war. He started it. He’s got to finish it.”

    Well, then let him finish it, numbnuts. Steny Hoyer still thinks it’s January 2007, according to the Washington Post;

    Democrats know that but say that their efforts to limit the war since taking control of Congress in January are a political — and, some say, moral — necessity. “The American people voted for change,” House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer (D-Md.) said yesterday. “We ought to extricate American men and women . . . from refereeing a civil war.”

    Seein’s how Sunnis and Shi’ites are both engaged in killing al Qaeda, how’s it a civil war, dumbass? Michael Goldfarb (The Weekly Standard blog) writes the Army credits that cooperation with the decline in IED attacks (which occured at about the same time the Washington Post spent a whole week on IED attacks);

    So what is the explanation? Meigs reels off the numbers for Noah Shachtman:

    What Meigs was able to share, however, were statistics on the number of tips locals gave to coalition forces in Iraq – and number of IED caches found by those troops. As you might expect, there’s a heavy correlation between the two. About 8,500 tips came in September of 2006; by May, the number had peaked at more than 24,000. In August, the figure was approximately 19,200. Similarly, the number caches found – about five per day in September, 2006 – jumped to more than 20 per day in May. After a dip over the early summer, that figure has been steady in recent months, at about 15.

    The Times reports that Hoyer is moving the goal post;

    “What has not happened is what the administration predicted would happen, [that] an environment would be created where political reconciliation would occur,” Mr. Hoyer told reporters on Capitol Hill. 

    As if to answer Hoyer, the Iraqis take up discussing allowing Ba’athists back into the process – one the Left’s prerequisites for success. (h/t Ace of Spades)

    Of course, the recurring theme is that the war is Bush’s fault. The Post quotes Murtha;

    “We want a plan in Iraq. . . . We want stability in the Middle East,” Rep. John P. Murtha (D-Pa.), chairman of the Appropriations defense subcommittee, said minutes before the vote. “We want to put a plan in place that holds the president accountable.”

    The problem is that when it turns out all rosy, the Democrats will be held accountable for their total disregard for the safety of our troops and the nation.

    Michele Malkin sums up the whole Democrat effort last night in one simple phrase;

    “Stop pestering me, Code Pink! I beg you to stop!”

    Michele also listed the linguine-spined cowards of the Republican party who voted with the Democrats;

    The 4 Republicans who supported the withdrawal bill: English (PA), Jones (NC), Shays (CT), Walsh (NY)

    One voted “present:” Lewis (GA)

    And 11 didn’t vote: Bono, Carson, Cubin, Doyle, Hastert, Jindal, Mack, Oberstar, Pearce, Sessions, Weller

    Gateway Pundit reports that Democrats are bailing on Pelosi in larger numbers;

    Sadly, Speaker Pelosi has failed to pick up any Republican backers to cut and run with the democrats from Iraq since she took over the House in January. And, 5 more democrats bailed on the party since July.

    No matter how hard Democrats try to make it George Bush’s war, it’s still going to cost them in the end for their treasonous waivering which has prolonged the conflict – their treasonous waivering which goes back to 1969.