Tenet Statement of 11 July 2003
Courtesy of Global Security, this is a link to the text of a statement issued by Director of Central Intelligence George Tenet last July. Below are some excerpts.

There was fragmentary intelligence gathered in late 2001 and early 2002 on the allegations of Saddam's efforts to obtain additional raw uranium from Africa, beyond the 550 metric tons already in Iraq.

[...]

[...]in the fall of 2002, our British colleagues told us they were planning to publish an unclassified dossier that mentioned reports of Iraqi attempts to obtain uranium in Africa. Because we viewed the reporting on such acquisition attempts to be inconclusive, we expressed reservations about its inclusion but our colleagues said they were confident in their reports and left it in their document.

[...]

In October [2002], the Intelligence Community (IC) produced a classified, 90 page National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on Iraq's WMD programs. There is a lengthy section in which most agencies of the Intelligence Community judged that Iraq was reconstituting its nuclear weapons program. Let me emphasize, the NIE's Key Judgments cited six reasons for this assessment; the African uranium issue was not one of them.

This is the statement in which Tenet said that the inclusion of the infamous "sixteen words" in President Bush's 2003 State of the Union Address regarding Great Britain's intelligence that Iraq had, in fact, attempted to purchase uranium from Niger, was a mistake. But it was only a mistake because it did not meet the CIA's standard of certainty, not because it was factually untrue to say that the British had evidence of such Iraqi activity.

We now know that the British were right. We now know that what the President said could have been said even more strongly. And we also know that the people who are trying to defend Joe Wilson are defending a liar with an axe to grind.

Iraq was trying to keep its nuclear weapons program alive. Remember that when you think it was a mistake for us to have invaded Iraq and removed Saddam.

Kerry's War against Intelligence
If you're not regularly reading the Kerry Spot at National Review Online, you really should. This is a post from yesterday (emphases mine):

More Kerry intelligence hijinks from AP:

Kerry said the intelligence needs to be improved so that the word of a U.S. president "is good enough for people across the world again."

The four-term Massachusetts senator said that nearly three years after the Sept. 11 attacks, "this president has not taken action sufficient to fix the intelligence problems that have plagued us."

This from a candidate who proposed and voted to cut $1 billion from intelligence in 1994, one year after the first World Trade Center attack. Specifically, he proposed cutting that $1 billion from the budgets of the National Foreign Intelligence Program and from Tactical Intelligence, while freezing their budgets. (The amendment was soundly defeated.) Kerry sponsored a 1995 bill to trim intelligence spending by $1.5 billion over five years. A candidate who, back in his first unsuccessful run for Congress in 1970, promised to "almost eliminate CIA activity" if elected. Who asked, in 1997, "Now that [Cold War] struggle is over, why is it that our vast intelligence apparatus continues to grow?"

Republicans also recall that in 1995, Kerry voted to slash FBI funding by $80 million. "Kohl, D-Wis., amendment to add $80 million for social crime prevention programs and offset the cost by cutting FBI funding by an equal amount." (H.R. 2076, CQ Vote #480: Adopted 49-41: R 9-40; D 40-1, 9/29/95, Kerry Voted Yea)

Kerry's record is in dire need of being better explored by the electorate. People simply don't realize that this guy is a disaster waiting to happen to America's intelligence community. And why would that be? Because the only thing that most people know about him ---and stop me if you've heard of this rumor--- is that he served in Viet Nam. The Democrats figure, as they figured wrongly with the inexplicable candidacy of Wesley Clark, that a military record will trump all suspicions of softness on defense and intelligence spending.

Man. If people just knew what Kerry's racket was, they'd dump him like a cold potato.

Name-Calling
The Belmont Club has a worthwhile post on the issue of what to call the al-Qaedist or Jihadist threat.

It would be a mistake to ignore the malignant works of Muslim extremists in our midst just because they do not properly or nominally belong to something called al-Qaeda. This is why the occasional argument one sees in the Leftist propaganda organs claiming that a terrorist such as Abu Zarqawi is not a part of al-Qaeda and, therefore, I guess, somehow beyond our interests, is a load of horseshit.

Forget the names: what is the thing in itself? What does it do?

In the face of an enemy that has already done us harm on a scale greater than that which the Soviet Union itself did, we will not survive the liberal fetish with civil rights and legalities. That does not mean that we should forever abandon those basic principles that distinguish us from the great mass of humanity, but it will be necessary for us to safeguard them a while ---much like a man who wears glasses putting them aside while he gets into a fistfight with a worthless drunk.

Not Paying Attention
John Kerry is simply not paying attention.

As his aides confirmed this week to Reuters, the Most Liberal Member of the United States Senate did not read the intelligence report preceding the vote on the War for Iraq.

Senator John Kerry, whose campaign demanded to know on Wednesday whether President Bush had read a crucial intelligence assessment on Iraq, did not read the document himself before voting to give the president the authority to go to war[...]

Then, last week, Kerry told Larry King that he had not "had time" to be debriefed by the Homeland Security Department on the spate of new terror threats that has gotten plenty of bi-partisan attention from those members of the Senate Intelligence Committee who want to know.

So uninterested is Kerry in the subject of terrorism - and, by extension, in protecting Americans from potential disaster - that, he disclosed on the Larry King show, he hadn't "had time" to receive the private briefing offered to him by Homeland Security Secretary Ridge. But he obviously had time to appear on a fluff TV show and attend an orgy of Democratic Bush-bashing at Radio City Music Hall.

Couple this with the absolutely appalling number of votes the Senator has missed this year, and what you have is a guy who's not paying attention. If he had the character of a man like Bob Dole, Kerry would resign his seat and give the citizens of Massachusetts a full-time voice in the Senate.

Latest BS from the BCS
According to the Associated Press:

Bowl Championship Series officials plan to introduce a new formula tomorrow in an effort to decrease controversy surrounding the championship game. The new formula is expected to include only results from the Associated Press' media poll, the coaches' poll and computer rankings. It will NOT include other factors like bonus points for quality wins and strength of schedule. The B-C-S was criticized last year for the third time in four seasons. Critics say the old formula excluded teams from the championship that rightfully belonged. The new formula will take effect this season. The B-C-S has also decided to add a fifth game beginning in 2006.

These dolts just do not get it, do they?

What is the most exciting and well-loved sports event in our society? The NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament. You know: March Madness. The Final Four. A couple weeks of athletic meritocracy in action. If I haven't watched a whole game all year, I will shut down and ride the couch for hours and days on end to watch as much of that tournament as they will give me. I love it more than a Super Bowl or the second week of Wimbledon. I love it more than a Game Seven of the World Series or watching a race car flip into the stands at a 120 MPH. I will watch Eastern Bumfuck State take on Inner Mongolia Tech if that's what's on.

My point is that everyone loves to see these kids play for it all. Maybe you can argue with the seeding but, once they're on the floor, any school can beat any other. Or at least they might. And that's the thing. Championships are earned in the NCAAs. And every college sport has its playoffs and champions. Even every division of college football has a playoff system leading to an undisputed championship.

Except one. The most important one.

There is no argument that justifies the present system of determining a champion in Division I-A college football. And it pisses me off to hear the lame rationale of the foot-draggers and paid-off gristleheads who try to defend it.

If they had a 16-team field and four weekends to do it in, big time college football could have the greatest thing on its hands since sliced bread. Because nobody's watching the Poulan Weedeater Bowl on a Thursday night in the middle of December between a couple of schools with maybe two or three more wins between them than losses. Nobody's getting rich and nobody cares.

But in a true playoff system, everyone would care and everyone would watch. And the ad revenues would be sky-high because there would be something on the line to draw the viewers in and fill the stadiums up.

I don't care how you do it, Mr. Athletic Director and Mr. College President, but it has to be done. Quit thinking like you're in the 1950s and dump this anachronistic nonsense. The BCS is just your way of slowly "giving in." But you should give up giving in and get us what we deserve, which are football championships played out on the field instead of decreed by polls.

That is all.

A Handy Chart from The Economist
I'm stealing this graphic from The Economist because it shows the importance of a stable, extremist-free Middle East.

In the minds of those who cry, "No blood for oil!" this war we fight in Iraq against terrorists and tyrants and for democratic reforms is really a war for oil. Well, they're right. And I'm right. It's a war for both of those things. Why shouldn't it be?

Whatever we are as a civilization and an economy, it is dependent upon our access to oil. And lots of it. All the time. Without the energy derived from the oil we pump here and import from abroad, our economy would not be the great phenomenon it is. Nor would any other country's economy survive. America would not be wealthy or mobile or capable of doing the great things we do every day as a free nation. Why should we apologize for that? Why should we not utterly reject the Leftist conceit that we do not have to fight for unfettered access to the energy sources that make us a great superpower?

The anti-war Left comforts itself with its false moral superiority, claiming that the War for Iraq was an elective ---and not a necessary--- war. Thus, these tools can heap abuse upon this Administration for pursuing its pre-emptive actions in Iraq and say that it's all for oil profits. But it's the wise man (like Keith Richards) who knows that you'd better walk before they make you run. That is, we are doing the right thing to demonstrate our power in the Middle East now when we have some (considerable) hope to obtain the kind of governments we want there, rather than having to later be at the mercy of governments that mean us ill.

It is a huge task that President Bush is undertaking, and the "payoff" is years away. He is being pilloried as an undiplomatic bully who has prosecuted this war for the benefit of some constantly-growing cabal of oil and armaments companies. But the diplomatic efforts he made were with countries that had other interests at heart and who lied to us and obstructed us at every turn. There was never going to be some magical, legitimizing alliance with assholes like Chiraq and Villepin. Only someone as craven as Kerry could pretend otherwise.

We have a moral and self-interested obligation to see whether we can begin a fundamental cultural transformation in Iraq and all across that region. We are the greatest power on Earth. We cannot allow the regressive and oppressive influence of Islam to continue to grow unchecked. Islam must be brought to heel. That is a fact and it supersedes any liberal, namby-pamby bullshit about racism or bigotry. Western Civilization won't have any liberal ideas and rights if we delude ourselves about what Islam does to the people it dominates.

Therefore, we must pre-empt. We must destroy. We must sacrifice what is necessary to guarantee that Lincoln's "last, best hope of Earth" survives. Because, if America is brought down in the face of Muslim tyranny, the whole world will go back into a dark age from which it may not return.

Pissing Me Off
In today's demonstration of why the Democratic Party is full of seditious losers, we have Corrine Brown, a Democratic Congressthing from Florida, accusing the Republican Party of stealing the 2000 Presidential Election.

During a vote on a foreign aid bill amendment which would bar any federal official from requesting that the United Nations come and act as observers of our federal elections this November, Brown said to the amendment's author, Republican Congressman Steve Buyer of Indiana

"I come from Florida, where you and others participated in what I call the United States coup d'etat. We need to make sure it doesn't happen again [...] Over and over again after the election when you stole the election, you came back here and said, 'Get over it.' No, we're not going to get over it. And we want verification from the world."

Where does one begin? Brown's ignorance is inexcusable and her faith in the UN is laughable. But we needn't believe that she believes the UN has some sort of moral or political authority over us Americans; we only need to know that Corrine Brown's judgement is shit. She and the other wankers (like Eddie Bernice Johnson and Jerrold Nadler) who called for UN observers of our elections did so to provoke real Americans into denouncing them. And I hope to hell they're getting an earful from their constituents because these people are the enemy. They are Michael Moore's leprous spawn. They are propagators of a lie so damaging that it deadens the sense of decency and excites only fury in those who know better.

All of this is to be hung around the necks of John Kerry and John Edwards. Let them exercise some party leadership and set the record (and these idiots) straight, if they will. But, if they won't, pile it on. Make sure that people know that these Democrats have placed the authority of the debased and corrupt United Nations above our own independence. If that isn't the definition of un-American, what would be?

What Else Would He Do on a Fence?
As the New York Post's Eric Fettmann points out, Kerry has also been straddling the issue of Israel's fenceworks, which have been erected to keep out the Palestinian suiciders. Although Kerry has now officially condemned the World Court's overreaching judgement against the fence,

Kerry last year sang an entirely different tune for the Arab-American Institute, to whom he bemoaned "how disheartened Palestinians are by the Israeli government's decision to build a barrier off the Green Line, cutting deeply into Palestinian areas."

[...]

"We do not need another barrier to peace," Kerry told the Arab-American audience. "Provocative and counterproductive measures only harm Israel's security over the long term, they increase hardships to the Palestinian people and they make the process of negotiating en eventual settlement that much harder."

Must be some sort of newfangled nuance us non-billionaires can't fathom.

James Woods' Suspicions
I had heard James Woods talk about this before on TV, I think, but I had kind of filed it away until I came across a reference to it at InstaPundit. Kinda gives you the chills:

On a flight to Los Angeles several weeks before the attacks on September 11th, 2001, James Woods grew suspicious of four of his fellow-passengers: well-dressed men who appeared to be of Middle Eastern extraction.

"I watch people like a moviemaker," Woods later explained. "As in that scene in 'Annie Hall' [in which Woody Allen and Diane Keaton sit on a bench in Central Park and comment on passers-by]. I thought these guys were either terrorists or FBI guys. The guys were in synch - dressed alike. They didn't have a drink and were not talking to the stewardess. None of them had a carry-on or a newspaper. Nothing.

"Imagine you're at a live-music event at a small night club and you're standing behind the singer. Everybody is clapping, going along, enjoying the show - and there's four guys paying no attention. What are they doing here?"

Woods became so convinced that the men were "casing" the plane that he kept his cutlery after lunch and shared his suspicions with a flight attendant. "I said, 'I think this plane is going to be hijacked.' I told her, 'I know how serious it is to say this,' and asked to speak to the captain. The first officer promptly assured Woods that the cockpit door would be kept locked and the plane landed safely.

Some time later Woods's agent asked him how the flight had gone. "Aside from the terrorists and the turbulence," he drily replied, "it was fine."

I've left out the best part of the anecdote. Go check out the site itself. It's very interesting.

(Thanks to the InstaPundit for hipping me to Anecdotage.com.)

Better Hair
Stanley Crouch says to forget the fluff and recognize that the jihadis don't care who's in the Oval Office. That may be, but don't kid yourselves that a Kerry victory this November won't be interpreted by Islamofascists as a repudiation of the Bush Doctrine. They succeeded in Spain and now have the Filipinos over a barrel. What bigger win could they score than to see the Great Satan turn on its own President?

But will America do that? Do we really have any reason to elect a man who refuses to say anything worthwhile on the subject of the War for Iraq? As Crouch asks:

What we need to know from Mr. Kerry and Mr. Edwards is what kind of a war strategy they have and what it would do to give us a better chance to defeat these enemies who do not go on vacations, follow elections or respond to polls. What, exactly, do these two men propose to keep our shores safe and to handle the troubles we are faced with in Iraq as well as with the growing body of jihadists?

That is the most important question on which to base our choice, but one that the Kerrion will not answer. Instead, they have rationalized Kerry's lack of ideas by calling him a "stealth candidate." The strategy of such is to neither say nor do anything that might resemble an actual conviction. Just plod along and wait to capitalize on Bush's mistakes.

The only problem with that strategy from Kerry's perspective is that we have achieved great goals in Iraq. Thus, he and his [supporters] must work feverishly to emphasize and obsess over the mistakes we have made and omit as often as possible any mention of our successes there. With that, the Democrats and their whores in Big Media hope to create the impression that we are somehow on the brink of military and diplomatic disaster ---and that Kerry represents some sort of "alternative." But he doesn't; he's just not Bush ---which is good enough for people who think a traitor like Michael Moore is someone worth listening to.

Give us some details, Senator. And don't pretend that the French and Germans are suddenly going to change their whole foreign policy just because you might get elected. Only an egomaniac like Bill Clinton could say that and get away with it.

Keep Hoax Alive
This afternoon, I watched John Kerry speak before the NAACP's convention in Philadelphia. It was one of his usual barnburners, filled with all the well-worn lines he's been delivering for months now. But, just as I began to doze off, he said some things that made me realize just how much of a hack and opportunist he really is:

This is the most important election of our lifetime. Our health care is on the line. Our jobs are on the line. Our children's future is on the line. America's role in the world is on the line.

That is why we cannot accept a repeat of 2000. This November, thanks to the efforts of the NAACP and heightened vigilance across the nation, we are not only going to make sure that every vote counts; we're going to make sure that every single vote is counted.

One way to do that is to fulfill the promise of election reform by reauthorizing the expiring provisions of the Voting Rights Act, and vigorously enforcing all our voting rights laws. It is a great injustice to us all when African-Americans are denied their fundamental right to vote. On Election Day in your cities, my campaign will provide teams of election observers and lawyers to monitor elections and enforce the law.

As you see, Kerry deliberately summoned up the spectre of expiration for the Voting Rights Act of 1965 ---a well-known urban legend that has been a source of great concern to many black Americans for years now. But no matter how many times the myth that black Americans will lose their right to vote in 2007 has been sunk, it still manages to float back to the surface ---thanks to the enterprising efforts of dredge-artists like Kerry. Of course, he could take refuge in the letter of his comment by saying he was referring only to the one provision in the Voting Rights Act that must be renewed (and always has been), but he very obviously meant to suggest that the evil Republicans are going to deny blacks the right to vote by refusing to renew the Act. Just like they disenfranchised thousands of black Floridians in 2000. Get it? Here comes the poll tax again, folks. Here come old flat-top.

This one suggestion alone leads me to believe that Kerry is too irresponsible to be taken seriously. But will anyone in the star-struck Big Media ask him why he thinks it's necessary to bring up the superflous notion that the whole Voting Rights Act is just days a way from expiring? Don't hold your breath.

Why Wilson Denied His Wife Recommended Him for Yellowcake Investigation
We now know from the new Senate Intelligence Committee report that Joe Wilson lied about several things, but the one I find most interesting at this particular moment is why he would deny that his wife was the one who recommended him for the job of going to Niger and "investigating" whether there was any truth to the report that Saddam had attempted to buy yellowcake uranium from that country.

It seems like a minor point now because of what has happened since the infamous Robert Novak article that took Valerie Plame's identity and employment information worldwide. After all, the critics cry, a crime was committed when Novak referenced those "senior Administration officials" and publicly confirmed what Plame did for a living. It was treason, they say, to deliberately expose a CIA covert operative. But, more importantly to anti-war Bush-haters and Leftist media whores like the Wilsons themselves, the whole thing has been a great tool in undermining this Administration politically.

But was Valerie Plame's secret identity as a spook as important to her husband ---or to anyone--- as we are led to believe? This is why Ambassador Wilson lied to everyone: when he ---a person never before employed by the CIA and without investigative experience--- accepted the assignment, he invited the kind of scrutiny of his connections that would eventually lead to the question of whether his wife might, indeed, have some involvement with the Company. He was outspoken in his contempt for the Bush Administration's policies, and his wife was also politically involved in opposing them.

Wilson had never hidden the fact that he was married to Valerie Plame. He said so in his own biography at the Middle East Institute's website.

And Valerie Plame was the name his wife used in her assignments overseas in her cover role as an energy industry consultant.

Reporters knew that Plame was a CIA employee, not just because it was unofficial common knowledge in Washington, but because the CIA itself confirmed it. If Plame had still been an active covert agent, the CIA apparently made no attempt to hide her employment from those who inquired. Clifford May and Joshua Micah Marshall were able to find this out from the CIA, as was Novak. Thus, was she really protected from disclosure if even the Agency itself made no explicit prohibition against it to the press?

Plame is in the almost-stereotypical role of a spy, being the wife of an ambassador. Spouses of high foreign service officers are often used as clandestine go-betweens. And it would not have taken a rocket scientist to figure that out.

Wilson was recommended by his wife for the Niger mission because of his old contacts there. He did not take his assignment seriously, except insofar as it provided him some minor role in promoting his own (and his wife's) agenda amidst the larger case being built against the Saddamites.

I think Joe Wilson's judgement is one of the most dubious of anyone's in the issue of this war. He accepted an assignment from the CIA on a crucial question of fact, based on his wife's recommendation, with a frivolous and partisan motivation for doing so. He then decided to out himself in the press by writing about his mission.

I have no sympathy for the Wilsons or whatever trouble it is that they have had or asked for.

The Final Judgement on the World Court
The indispensable blog Power Line brings us the thoughts of Professor Jeremy Rabkin, who writes in today's Wall Street Journal that the World Court (and these are my words) is an overreaching sack of Jew-hating crap.

You absolutely have to read this post if you have any doubts why the United States must never allow "internationalization" (Kerry's favorite notion) to ever impose its own will on ours through nonsense like the International Criminal Court or this other rotten front for the decadent and corrupt UN.

If Kerry Is Opposed to the War...
I wish I had seen more than just a few minutes of excerpts from Kerry and Edwards' joint appearance with Leslie Stahl on 60 Minutes last Sunday, but what I did see made me quite uncomfortable. After literally hanging on each other for the past week in a weird show of, uh, unity, they then proceeded to make a show of independent-mindedness in their interview. It was, indeed, logrolling in our times.

John Podhoretz saw something else in their interview ---something that Kerry is going to eventually have to explain without resort to these truly ridiculous claims that what we need is more "internationalization" of the War for Iraq:

John Kerry has finally spoken the words that make the November election an unambiguous choice. On "60 Minutes" on Sunday night, according to the official transcript released by CBS News, Kerry said: "I am against the -- the war."

He tried to qualify them, to fudge them a bit, but no matter. The words are now out there and can't be taken back.

The possible future president of the United States opposes the war in Iraq now being fought by 130,000 American troops.

But will you hear Kerry call for withdrawal? No. Will you hear why, exactly, our efforts there have been a mistake? No. Is there any chance that he will elaborate upon his call for more internationalization with greater specificity? No. It's all a joke. He doesn't feel the need to offer any alternatives because he knows that the war, however bloody and costly it has been, has been waged to win us the influence in the Middle East that we have long needed. We are there because it is the first step that has to be taken to transform the Arab world.

The essence of Kerry's strength as a candidate to those whom he expects to support him is that he is not George W. Bush.

Pathetic.

Joe Wilson's Credibility Is Shot
Looks like the oh-so-famous Plame Affair has run into some trouble.

Former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, dispatched by the CIA in February 2002 to investigate reports that Iraq sought to reconstitute its nuclear weapons program with uranium from Africa, was specifically recommended for the mission by his wife, a CIA employee, contrary to what he has said publicly.

Wilson last year launched a public firestorm with his accusations that the administration had manipulated intelligence to build a case for war. He has said that his trip to Niger should have laid to rest any notion that Iraq sought uranium there and has said his findings were ignored by the White House.

Wilson's assertions -- both about what he found in Niger and what the Bush administration did with the information -- were undermined yesterday in a bipartisan Senate intelligence committee report.

Keep reading, comrades. It gets better.

Cuomo, Equivocator
Tim Russert interviewed former New York Governor Mario Cuomo last night. Cuomo, who's hawking a book on Lincoln, said a lot of stupid shit, but the following remarks, which I have fisked for your enjoyment, struck me as particularly insipid (italics mine):

So, yes, Lincoln took liberties he shouldn't have, the way President Bush is trying to take liberties now that he shouldn't have.

Liberals lie because the truth is too burdensome. They would like us to believe that there has been rampant censorship, mass arrests, and a huge surge in spying upon the American people. But all that's garbage. There's obviously no censorship in a time where a filthy liar like Michael Moore (whom Cuomo is shilling for) can release a two-hour propaganda film insinuating that the President is working in collusion with our enemies to enrich themselves and overthrow democracy.

Nor have there been mass arrests of innocent Americans ---just the arrests of people who are suspected of actual collusion with Muslim terrorist organizations, such as al-Qaeda. Is the civil rights crowd so far gone that they can't even see the wisdom in detaining terrorist sympathizers? Ask real Americans, who realize that we are in a war, whether they care that some Muslim troublemaker is being held without access to counsel.

And as for the G spying on us, I think it's safe to say that, if we are suspected of some sort of wrongdoing, that's something they've been able to do for quite a while. The saving grace? The vast majority of us aren't suspected of anything wrong. You think the FBI gives a rat's ass about Aunt Gladys' phone conversations with her neighbors? Get real. And slippery slope this.

And that's what the Supreme Court just about told him ---uh, I'm shocked that a Supreme Court that handed him the election, heh, you know, retreated sufficiently back toward objectivity that they were able to give, to give him a slap on the wrist.

It always comes back to the 2000 Election, doesn't it? The casually observed, fully ingested belief that the President is illegitimately the President. Cuomo is just as irresponsible as any other McAuliffite tapeworm in the Democratic Party with respect to this. As I say, liberals lie because they can't deal with the truth, which is that George W. Bush won every recount in the State of Florida and, therefore, all of that state's electoral votes. It was only because of the machinations of the DNC and the Florida Supreme Court that the nonsense of counting undervotes by constantly changing standards was ever entertained. But the trauma has been too great. They cannot believe they lost to the Cowboy from Crawford.

As for the Supreme Court's recent decisions granting more rights to these terrorists and terrorist sympathizers, it is not a "slap on the wrist," Mario. It will become a huge liability and hindrance to our efforts to successfully prosecute this war. And it would prove to be so even if your man gets in.

But I think Lincoln was wrong. I think Roosevelt was wrong, and I think it's a mistake to give them a pass because of the wartime excuse.

The old "wartime excuse" ploy, eh? Why would a President undergo the political risks and costs of making any abrogations of even a few people's rights if it weren't for the exigencies of war? What a lame-ass.

But I think Lincoln had a better excuse than Bush does because, while terrorism is a big problem, it is not a threat to this nation's survival. It's a threat, but it is not a threat to our survival. Lincoln was, was dealing with the threat to survival.

This is irresponsible as hell. It sounds a whole lot like the traitor Michael Moore's opinion that the deaths of the 3,000 victims in the atrocities of 11 September 2001 were not all that statistically significant in a nation of 280 million. After all, we only saw the World Trade Center disintegrate into rubble and the Pentagon erupt in flames. We only saw our entire nation's airspace close down for a couple of days. No effect at all on travel or tourism or America's economic and national confidence in general.

Cuomo, you are a joke. An overrated, liberal joke. I hope you remember your statement when we are next attacked on our own soil, you equivoacting turd. Can you imagine how much worse it would be if the Islamofascists have a nuke or some anthrax or sarin gas to kill hundreds of thousands of Americans?

So, I think they're both wrong, uh, I think Lincoln is less wrong.

I think it's a real blessing that your brand of pie-eyed, Leftist crapola never got past New York and my TV, you wretched sop.

Wall to Wall Horseshit
The World Court has ruled that the wall erected by the Israeli Government to protect its citizens on the West Bank is illegal, discriminatory, and must come down. Naturally, Arafish and the Car Swarm People are ecstatic:

The Palestinian people in the occupied Palestinian territories and in Diaspora rejoiced and took to the streets to celebrate justice, following the advisory opinion issued by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) that deemed the Israeli Apartheid Wall illegal.

Throughout the Palestinian provinces, massive demonstrations were organized to condemn the Wall and to assert on adopting the ICJ's advisory opinion by a resolution from the UN General Assembly and Security Council.

I don't know how effective this wall has been in meeting its purpose, which is to keep out car bombers and other kinds of terrorists, but it must be effective to some degree because it is helping to concentrate Arab movement into Jewish Israel into fewer and fewer points of access, terrorist or not. And since Arab terrorism against Jews in Israel has declined dramatically over the past 18 months or so, it is not unreasonable to make a connection between the two. (And, of course, the fact that the leaders of these savages are being smeared on the pavement every so often has also helped to quell their violence.)

Regardless, the World Court ---a front of judgement for the United Nations--- has once again stuck its nose in the business of Israeli sovereignty and security, proving that they are unconcerned with the rights of Jews to be safe from Arab savagery. After all, does the World Court have anything to say about the United Nations souping up the fence around their headquarters in Manhattan?

The United Nations plans a $21 million security upgrade at its New York headquarters in light of attacks on U.N. installations over the past year, including a bombing in Baghdad that killed 22 people, a spokesman said.

The improvements are to include a higher fence and new gates, improved outdoor lighting, additional closed-circuit television cameras, vehicle barriers and an electronic system for controlling access, according to U.N. documents.

Security for corrupt "diplomats" and immunity-abusers, not for Jews trying to live their lives in peace.

Laughable Rationales
Don't you love Teresa Heinz' explanation of why she converted from the Republican to the Democratic Party? It was just 18 months ago, she says, when her great disappointment at how Georgia Senator Max Cleland was defeated led her to change her affiliations. (Apparently, Cleland's patriotism was questioned beyond Ms. Heinz' ability to deal with it.)

The first comparison that came to my mind upon hearing this laughable rationale was Jack Ruby's explanation for why he shot Lee Oswald. You know: to spare Mrs. Kennedy the grief of having to return to Texas to testify at the trial of her husband's murderer.

Don't forget: Teresa Heinz is an incredibly wealthy woman. There is absolutely no question that she remains a Republican because it is inconceivable that she would willingly part with the millions more in taxes she would have to pay every year through higher rates and lost loopholes were her own husband to become President.

Populism my ass.

The Two Multimillionaire Leftists on the Democratic ticket preaching Two Americas is a farce. At least Bush and Cheney aren't going to pretend that they're not rich.

Limousine Liberals
Have a look at Thomas Sowell's take on the contrivance of the Kerry-Edwards ticket. He is not impressed.

Selecting Senator John Edwards as a vice-presidential running mate was more image-making. Senator Edwards has had few, if any, achievements during his one term in the United States Senate, and savvy political observers question whether he would have been re-elected if he had decided to run again for the Senate. But he brings more image -- a more lively and engaging image -- to spice up John Kerry's dullness with his own more gushing sparkle.

Just as Senator Kerry's long-ago military tour of duty in Vietnam is exploited politically today, so Senator Edwards' working class origins are being similarly exploited. But John Edwards has long since grown rich as a lawyer suing for millions of dollars in medical malpractice lawsuits.

This ticket is not much for ideological balance, is it? Presumably, that is what Kerry was looking for before when it was clear that he wanted John McCain to be his running mate. Yet this should tell us something about Kerry: here's a guy whose Senatorial voting record is extremely liberal, but who is so intent upon getting to the White House that he was willing to team up with a guy who is a moderate Republican ---and largely considered a thorn in the side of the consevrative wing of the GOP.

Why would Kerry have wanted that? Because he knows his own undeniable liberalism is not going to appeal to Middle America once they find out about him. (And they will. The DNC Convention is only a couple weeks away, and I very much doubt that his bland, platitudinous nonsense is going to sell.) So what does Kerry do instead? Pick a guy whose record in government is so brief and inconsequential that one can make of it whatever one wishes to. But Edwards is also very much a limousine liberal. And when you have a couple of multimillionaires with the balls to stand before the country and talk populism, it's gotta be a joke.

Right?

Meditate on the image of seditious and treasonous garbage like Michael Moore and Ted Rall and Maxine Waters and Ted Kennedy and know that a vote for John Kerry is a vote for those who hate America.

Attrit 'Em All!
Have a look at Ralph Peters' essay in this summer's issue of Parameters. Turns out, the only way we're going to be able to defeat the terrorists is to kill them:

And we shall hear that killing terrorists only creates more terrorists. This is sophomoric nonsense. The surest way to swell the ranks of terror is to follow the approach we did in the decade before 9/11 and do nothing of substance. Success breeds success. Everybody loves a winner. The clich?s exist because they're true. Al Qaeda and related terrorist groups metastasized because they were viewed in the Muslim world as standing up to the West successfully and handing the Great Satan America embarrassing defeats with impunity. Some fanatics will flock to the standard of terror, no matter what we do. But it's far easier for Islamic societies to purge themselves of terrorists if the terrorists are on the losing end of the global struggle than if they're allowed to become triumphant heroes to every jobless, unstable teenager in the Middle East and beyond.

Far worse than fighting such a war of attrition aggressively is to pretend you're not in one while your enemy keeps on killing you.

And Peters continues:

Curiously, while our military avoids a "body count" in Iraq--body counts have at least as bad a name as wars of attrition--the media insist on one. Sad to say, the body count cherished by the media is the number of our own troops dead and wounded. With our over-caution, we have allowed the media to create a perception that the losses are consistently on our side. By avoiding an enemy body count, we create an impression of our own defeat.

In a war of attrition, numbers matter.