Germany's Merkel Coasts To Re-Election With Huge Majority

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has won an historic third term as her Christian Democratic party (CDU) is on track to win 301 seats in the 598-seat Bundestag, enough to form a government without needing a coalition partner to govern.

The Social democrats (SDU) are behind by over 17 points, 25.45% of the vote to the CDU's 42.50%, although this could change slightly. Merkel's current center Right coalition partners, the Free Democrats (FDP), are likely headed for a major loss with just 4.7 per cent of yesterday’s vote, according to the exit poll. If their numbers stay there, they won't even cross the threshold to enter the Bundestag.

A lot of the FDP's votes went to the anti-EU Alternative für Deutschland (AfD, a brand new party that might get into the Bundestag on its first try, with 4.9% and rising. They'd only need 5% to hit the threshold.

The far Left Greens, who caused Merkel all kinds of trouble in her last coalition look to end up with about 8.40%, a loss of over 2% from the last election. They'll be in the Bundestag, but Merkel might not need them to govern in a coalition and if she does, like the SDU their influence would be curtailed after these election results. If the CDU does bring them into government (and it's certainly possible if the SDU declines to enter a coalition with Merkel) there might have to be changes after leading Green Party member Jürgen Trittin was implicated in the Greens' ongoing pedophilia scandal during the campaign that has its roots in the Greens' support for sex with minors that dates back to its early days in the 1980s. The Greens simply aren't very popular right now.

That said, the most likely coalition would be a center Left Right Coalition between the CDU and the Social Democratic Party, who will likely swallow their pride in order to be in government - especially if they got some decent ministries out of it.

Why did Angela Merkel win so big? Two words, competence and trust. Germany is an Island of prosperity in a Europe of financial instability, and Merkel - known as Mutti, 'Mom' to many Germans - gets the credit for steering th3e country through rocky waters in difficult circumstances. Germany's unemployment rate is only 6.8 percent compared with an average of 12.1 percent in the 17-nation euro zone.Over 70% of Germans approve of the job she's doing, and the pastor's Daughter from East Germany is a trusted leader they feel they can rely on.

She's noted for projecting calm and for her ability to seek consensus even with widely divergent groups, something that resonates deeply with Germans. They feel the country's in good hands with her.

This election was simply a huge vote of confidence for Merkel.It's that simple.

This Time It's Nairobi's Turn

It's a Saturday, and so you decide to head down to the local shopping mall, maybe check out the latest computer gadgets, perhaps grab some lunch at the food court, maybe even a movie. You've been there before. It's air conditioned, and it gets you out of the house, so it's a pleasant outing with the wife and kids if you're a family man.

Except this day isn't going to be like the others. Today, you picked the wrong place at the wrong time. Today, you're going to have a collision with the Religion of Peace, and it just might be your last day on earth.

 

Islamist terrorists from Somalia's al-Shabaab targeted the crowded Westgate Premier Shopping Mall in Nairobi,Kenya at noon in a brutal assault with bombs, automatic weapons and grenades that left 68 dead and over 205 wounded at last count.This is still an ongoing hostage situation. and some of the injured were critically wounded, so it's uncertain just what the final death toll will be yet. Some of the dead reportedly were from Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta's own family.

As is usual in these attacks, the killers showed no mercy for children, the elderly, or women.They were waging jihad, and the maximum body count of infidels was all that was important. In fact, the attack took place during the filming of a children’s cooking show under a parking lot canopy, something that ensured a number of casualties among the children and their parents watching the filming.



The al-Qaeda franchise took credit for the attack on its official Twitter feed: “Only Kuffar were singled out for this attack. All Muslims inside #Westgate were escorted out by the Mujahideen before beginning the attack,” Al-Shabaab tweeted.

This confirms what a number of survivors told Kenyan security forces, that the killers asked the Muslims they encountered to identify themselves and escorted them to safety as they opened fire on the 'kuffars' - non-Muslims.

In one reported case, an Indian man who attempted to escape by claiming to be a Muslim was executed in cold blood when he was unable to name Mohammed's mother.

“They asked people ‘Are you a Muslim?’ and anyone who answered ‘no’ got a bullet,” Moshe Noiman, an Israeli living in Nairobi who witnessed the attack, told Israel’s Channel 10 news.

The Israeli coverage is no accident.The Mossad and Israeli commandos are reportedly aiding the Kenyans, and while Israel and Kenya have close relations, it goes beyond that. The mall is partly owned by Israelis and some of the hostages are said to be Israelis.

An unnamed Kenyan security source told the AFP that Israeli forces had joined Kenyan efforts to end the deadly siege. "The Israelis have just entered and they are rescuing the hostages and the injured."

Israeli foreign ministry spokesman Paul Hirschson refused to confirm or deny that its forces were involved, which is typical in these situations.



But in  the end, none of it matters.

Beslan, Mumbai, Netanya, London, Boston, Bali, Ft. Hood, Itamar, Darfur, Madrid, and now Nairobi again. And so many others. They all blur into one, because over the last decade or so, we have, as a society, normalized terrorism in the name of Islam.

Same old same old.

Muslims murder non-Muslims horrifically because of whatever grievance they feel like claiming this time. One time it's an innocent remark about a beauty contest, another time it's some cartoons, or anger over girls going to school. Sometimes it's simply because non-Muslims have the temerity to live and prosper on 'Muslim' land. Many times, it's simply old fashioned theft, rapine and pillage against non-believers.

The perpetrators might call themselves Boko Haram, or Hamas, or Islamic Jihad, or Abu Sayeff or Al Nusrah, Lashkar e Taiba, or any of the other groups actively waging jihad.

The details don't matter. The scenario is always the same. Non-Muslims are butchered in the name of Allah.Western politicians, or more often these days spokespeople issue the usual, carefully phrased condemnations. Sometimes, the perpetrators are caught and killed, many times they're not. Nothing changes. On to the next atrocity. Cycle, rinse, repeat.

Have you ever wondered why this macabre dance continues?

Here's one clue.

IIf you take a look at the official statement on Nairobi by a State Department spokes person, you'll notice something. It condemns a 'despicable terrorist attack', offers condolences to Americans and others whom were 'tragically affected', commends Kenyan security forces and promises undefined 'support'. At the every bottom, almost as an afterthought, it mentions al-Shabaab, not as a mortal enemy, but as a 'threat'.

What's missing here?

Here's clue number two, a tweet posted by British PM David Cameron:“It’s been done in the name of terror, not religion.”

Ah, and also from the UK, courtesy of Zombie, who writes on how the BBC, once the gold standard in journalism is now willing to break the rules of Journalism 101 with a misleading headline ("Nairobi Westgate Shooting Kills 11 In Kenya") the opening lede, which refers to '11 people who died in a gun battle (which directly implies there was a 'shoot-out' between equal combatants) and a subsequent paragraph which refers to "armed criminals" rather than terrorists attacking helpless civilians.

Al-Shabaab is finally mentioned in passing in the lower paragraphs ( the part of the story a great deal of research tells us the vast majority of readers skip over) but like the statement coming from our State Department, no real mention of whom they might be or what might have been the motivation for the attack.

So, what do we have in common here? A frantic, almost manic attempt to avoid even hinting, let alone mentioning one word in any form: I S L A M.

The victims in Nairobi ('people affected by the attacks?' what unfeeling arrogance!) were murdered in the name of Islam by Muslims. And yes, is has everything to do with religion.Why else do you think only non-Muslims were targeted?

That's the missing piece here, and the refusal of our elites to face up to it is not only why it keeps happening, but why we've been encouraged as a society to normalize it.

Hey, sometimes trainwrecks happen, car crashes occur, or a building collapses. Sometimes terrorists hit for some reason. Just part of the risks involved with daily life. Workplace violence, like Fort Hood. The Lottery of Life. Stuff happens. Isn't that a shame. Just suck it up and be glad it wasn't you this time.

Heaven forbid anyone should ever delve into the motivation for every one of these attacks.

But walk with me awhile and let's take a look at this from a jihadi's view point.

Islam is the only major religion that promises Paradise as a heavenly reward for murdering kufars, infidels, non-believers. It says so directly in the Qur'an and the Hadiths, in numerous places.

Many Muslims don't follow these parts of their religion, but a substantial number do. So from the standpoint of a Muslim who believes what's stated in his or her religious scriptures and who has been indoctrinated that this is the way, the truth and the light, where's the downside in murdering non-believers, who the Qur'an says are Hell bound anyway? If you do it successfully and survive, you're a hero and nothing really bad is going to happen to you. Even if you're incarcerated, the humane West will see to it that you have top quality halal food, comfortable accommodations and in most cases an early release date, and you will be thought of as a hero. In fact, if you're lucky enough to be part of Hamas or the PLO, you'll even get paid a salary far beyond what you could earn outside jail courtesy of gullible Western donors and receive a hero's welcome when you're eventually kicked loose as a 'good faith gesture for peace'.

And if you die? You become an instant shaheed, a martyr, with a promised reward of 72 nubile young women to use and abuse as your sex slaves throughout eternity as a reward.

Major Nidal Hasan, the Fort Hood killer who murdered 13 defenseless Army personnel understood this perfectly. He started by admitting to the murders in his opening statement, after he successfully demanded the right to represent himself at his trial. His defense consisted of calling three witnesses to get them to state on record that he was indeed the murderer of 13 people, including a pregnant private who lay wounded on the floor and pleaded with Hasan for her baby's life before he finished her off.

The judge, Colonel Tara Osborn obviously followed orders from higher up when she disallowed any evidence that pointed towards jihad or Islamism as Major Hasan's motive for the murders, the same thing that's been done with all of the other jihad attacks Islamic fascists have inflicted on the West. She actually tried to help Hasan by suggesting that the murders were the result of a sudden spontaneous flash of rage. But Major Hasan wanted his jihad as a Soldier of Allah and would have none of that:

"It wasn't done under the heat of sudden passion," Hasan said before jurors began deliberating. "There was adequate provocation — that these were deploying soldiers that were going to engage in an illegal war."

Not only that, but the evidence clearly showed that Hasan made thorough preparations for the killings, even going to the extent of putting paper towels in the pockets of his cargo pants to muffle the rattling of the extra ammo he was carrying to avoid arousing suspicion.

From Nidal Hasan's viewpoint, it's all good. He murdered a bunch of infidels, performed a successful jihad and is headed for a painless death via drug cocktail, followed by a traditional Muslim funeral like Osama bin-Laden's (which involves cursing non-believers) and a gala reception by Allah as an honored shaheed. Even his assets, over $300,000 in accumulated pay and benefits was donated to a charity, we're told, rather than being subject to civil recovery by the surviving victims or their families.And of course, we're not allowed to know which charity.

The jihadis who have murdered infidels from Boston, to London, to Mumbai, and now Nairobi see it exactly the same way, as a winning proposition. And that's been reinforced every time one of these attacks occur, because the non-Muslim world has refused to even condemn the ideology that drives this religiously sanctified murder, let alone punish the perpetrators or the societies that aid and abet it in any meaningful way, even in Muslim communities in the West.Is it any wonder it continues? Or that young Muslims want to emulate the Nidal Hasans? Do you think that might perhaps change if he were hung publicly with a piece of bacon shoved into his mouth and then simply dumped into the sea without Muslim rites? After all, we're being constantly told these attacks have nothing to do with Islam. so why not? And might things change if there were a price tag for aiding and abetting Islamic fascism, if the ideology itself was actually identified, targeted and attacked, especially in western countries? Might we see changes in Muslim countries that aid, finance and abet this ideology if there was a direct cost involved?

Instead, our elites have decided out of fear, political expediency or sheer personal financial gain to present Islamic terrorism as just one of those hazards of everyday life, something unpleasant that just happens and has to be expected sometimes, like a flood or a bad thunderstorm. Talk about blood for oil...



So the jihad against the West is going to continue. This time, it was Nairobi's turn. Tomorrow, it could be New York, or Zurich, or London or Nigeria. Or your town, your loved ones. It will continue because we allow it to continue, because we continue to live a lie.

Until we decide that enough is enough.

The Council Has Spoken!! This Weeks' Watcher's Council Results

 

Alea iacta est...the Council has spoken, the votes have been cast, and we have the results  for this week's Watcher's Council match up.

"Ten soldiers wisely led will beat a hundred without a head" -Euripides





This week's winner, The Right Planet's Sun Tzu on Syria   is a fascinating look at Obama's Syria strategy as channeled through Sun Tzu's classic "The Art Of War'. Here's a slice:

The ancient Chinese military philosopher Sun Tzu wrote in his famous treatise, The Art of War, that one must prepare to be assured of victory. Of course, one must be able to define victory. Sun Tzu defined victory as “crushing the enemy.” Of course, this means one must clearly define the enemy as well.

The rush to go to war with Syria reveals some classic examples of foolishly ignoring the maxims of war–whether you like them or not. Ignoring maxims that have withstood the test of time for centuries is another example of doing the same thing over and over again and hoping for a different result each time–the quintessential definition of insanity–or defeat, in this case.

In the first chapter of The Art of War entitled “Laying Plans,” Sun Tzu said:
1. The art of war is of vital importance to the State. 2. It is a matter of life and death, a road either to safety or to ruin. Hence it is a subject of inquiry which can on no account be neglected.

War–a matter of life and death … of vital importance to the State … a subject of inquiry which can on no account be neglected. War is not a trivial matter or a game. War can either provide a “road to safety”–protecting the American people and the nation’s vital interests–or it can lead a nation down “the road to ruin.”

Following the previous two maxims in “Laying Plans,” Sun Tzu sets the entire foundation for every maxim which follows, for it is the description of the arena in which any strategy is confined, and the art of operating within that arena in order to achieve victory against the enemy-The Moral Law (Spiritual) and Heaven & Earth (Physical):

3. The art of war, then, is governed by five constant factors, to be taken into account in one’s deliberations, when seeking to determine the conditions obtaining in the field. 4. These are: (1) The Moral Law; (2) Heaven; (3) Earth; (4) The Commander; (5) Method and discipline

The fourth head of the fourth maxim, applied to the United States, defines the Commander (Sovereign) as the president himself during a time of war. He assumes the mantle, per the U.S. Constitution, of Commander-in-Chief of the U.S. military. The importance of the Commander-in-Chief to deliberate the “five constant factors” at all times is considered mandatory by Sun Tzu.

The eleventh maxim in “Laying Plans” states:
11. These five heads should be familiar to every general: he who knows them will be victorious; he who knows them not will fail.

Sun Tzu warns the Commander (General) in his fifteenth maxim in “Laying Plans” of the dangers of ignoring the “five constant factors,” or heads:

15. The general that hearkens to my counsel and acts upon it, will conquer: let such a one be retained in command! The general that hearkens not to my counsel nor acts upon it, will suffer defeat:–let such a one be dismissed!

Sun Tzu’s requirements for a good Commander are spelled out in the ninth maxim in  “Laying Plans”:
9. The Commander stands for the virtues of wisdom, sincerity, benevolence, courage and strictness.

Can these virtues be said to accurately describe our current Commander-in-Chief?


The administration has used rhetoric like “pin pricks” and “unbelievably small” to describe possible military action by the U.S. against Bashar al-Assad’s regime in Syria. So right off the bat the administration has ignored one of the most important maxims of military strategy–the element of surprise. Informing the enemy of your methods and strategy is a recipe for defeat, as Sun Tzu states in the twenty-fifth maxim in the first chapter:

25. These military devices, leading to victory, must not be divulged beforehand.

The environment in which war is fought, i.e. Heaven and Earth, is one based in deception. The need to peel away the many layers of deception employed by the enemy is a “constant factor” during war. The last chapter in the The Art of War is entirely devoted to the use of spies and double-agents, and their importance in gathering reliable and actionable intelligence on the enemy, or as Sun Tzu describes it–foreknowledge.

18. All warfare is based on deception. 19. Hence, when able to attack, we must seem unable; when using our forces, we must seem inactive; when we are near, we must make the enemy believe we are far away; when far away, we must make him believe we are near. 20. Hold out baits to entice the enemy. Feign disorder, and crush him.


More at the link.


In our non-Council category, the winner was Walid Shoebat with John Brennan has a New Benghazi Problem   submitted by The Right Planet. This has to do with punishment meted out to a CIA employee who refused to sign a non-disclosure agreement barring him from discussing the Sept. 11, 2012 terrorist attack in Benghazi...after CIA director John Brennan publicly stated that no such thing would be tolerated.

OK, here are this week’s full results. Only The Mellow Jihadi was unable to vote this week, but was not subject to the 2/3 vote mandatory penalty:

Council Winners

• *First place with 4 2/3 votes! The Right Planet –Sun Tzu on Syria


• Second place with 2 2/3 votes –Bookworm Room - Andrew Sullivan’s marvelously misguided theory about how Obama played Putin when it came to Syria


• Third place with 1 2/3 votes –Nice Deb -Grief Stricken Christian Woman in Syria Lashes Out: ‘We Blame Obama!…He Is Helping The Rebels’…


• Fourth place  with 1 1/3 vote – Liberty's Spirit-Foreign Policy Clowns: Allowing Tyrants to Dictate Exceptionalism


• Fifth place  with 1 vote – Joshuapundit-Whoopsie...Gay Icon Matthew Shepard Was Actually Killed By Lover Over Meth


• Sixth place *t* with 2/3 vote – The Glittering Eye-The Lack Of Moral Outrage


• Sixth place *t* with 2/3 vote – The Noisy Room-  Obama’s Middle Eastern Sleight of Hand


• Sixth place *t* with 2/3 vote – Simply Jews –  Amnon Lord: Obama as a grand failure - or missing the great red herring.


• Seventh place *t* with 1/3 vote – The Colossus of Rhodey –Moonbat gun control round-up


• Seventh place *t* with 1/3 vote – The Mellow Jihadi –Speaking in Japan to. . .

Non-Council Winners

• First place with 2 1/3 votes! – Walid Shoebat-John Brennan has a New Benghazi Problem   submitted by The Right Planet


• Second place *t* with 1 2/3 votes – Mark Steyn – American Ineffectualism    submitted by The Noisy Room


• Second place *t* with 1 2/3 votes –Lee Smith/Weekly Standard  –The Damage Done    submitted by Liberty's Spirit


• Second place *t* with 1 2/3 votes -Habitable Worlds -Emotive but Meaningless    submitted by The Razor


• Third place with 1 1/3 votes Richard Fernandez/PJ Media -A Gift Horse In The Mouth    submitted by Simply Jews


• Fourth place *t* with 2/3 vote - Seraphic Secret –12 Years After 9-11  submitted by The Watcher


• Fourth place *t* with 2/3 vote - Middle East Forum –Beware Syrians bearing gifts   submitted by The Political Commentator


• Fourth place *t* with 2/3 vote -AEI Ideas –Saving al-Assad submitted by GrEaT sAtAn”S gIrLfRiEnD


• Fourth place *t* with 2/3 vote -Roger Kimball/PJ Media –Fundamentally Transforming the United States of America   submitted by Nice Deb


• Fourth place *t* with 2/3 vote -James Joyner/Outside the Beltway –  Obama Syria Speech Instant Reaction    submitted by The Glittering Eye


• Fourth place *t* with 2/3 vote -Allergic To Bull – “I Know They Went to Heaven”   submitted by Rhymes With Right


• Fifth place *t* with 1/3 vote -Castor Praetoria – Things Your SgtMaj Hates..."That's not my job!"    submitted by The Mellow Jihadi


• Fifth place *t* with 1/3 vote -Douglas Ernst – Dianne Feinstein, NSA apologist, is more dangerous to America than men with rifles will ever be   submitted by The Colossus of Rhodey


• Fifth place *t* with 1/3 vote -New Scientist – Why A Cyberwar won't happen  submitted by Bookworm Room


• Fifth place *t* with 1/3 vote -Barry Rubin – The Solution: How to Deal with Obama Middle East Policy    submitted by The Watcher

See you next week! Don't forget to tune in on Monday AM for this week's Watcher's Forum, as the Council and their invited special guests take apart one of the provocative issues of the day with short takes and weigh in...don't you dare miss it. And don't forget to like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter.....'cause we're cool like that!

Sukkot - A Stop Along The Way

I'll be taking a hiatus for a day or so to celebrate the holiday of Sukkot, which commemorates the forty-year period during which the children of Israel were wandering in the desert. Sukkot is also a harvest festival and the direct ancestor of the American Thanksgiving...William Bradford and the Pilgrims were very familiar with the Bible (Bradford, like many other educated people of his time spoke and wrote Hebrew) and likewise wanted to give thanks for their deliverance from the wilderness.

In honor of the sojourn of children of Israel in the wilderness, people live in or spend time in temporary shelters. These contraptions are called sukkahs. The sukkah has at least three sides and a partially open roof covered with palm fronds, reeds, or whatever. Ideally the roof must be partially open so that the sky and the stars can be observed.

It's a tradition to eat in the sukkah and to have people over Essentially, it's a party, coming as a counterpoint to Yom Kippur and the Days of Awe.

The sukkahs can get extraordinarily inventive, and kids absolutely love to help put them up and decorate them:








Plain or fancy, elaborate or made from scratch and thrown together, the sukkahs reflect the long journey of the Children of Israel from there to here and remind them of their roots.

Another observance during Sukkot involves what are known as The Four Species or the lulav and etrog. The lulav consists of a palm branch, a myrtle branch, and a willow branch bound together. They all have symbolic meanings relating to the land of Israel.The etrog is a citrus fruit native to Israel (and now, California) and is held separately. With these four species in hand, one recites a blessing and waives the species in all six directions (east, south, west, north, up and down).

I'll let my pal Ya'akov have the last word....Chag Sukkot Sameach!

Freed Gitmo Detainee Killed Fighting For Syrian Islamists

 

Now, this is embarrassing. At least it ought to be.

Just when President Obama and his minions are working so hard to convince us how 'moderate' and worthy of U.S. arms and support his Islamist friends are, this shows up like an ant at a picnic.

The Syrian Islamic Movement posted a video on YouTube showing the body of Mohammed al Alami, who the video identified as a veteran of the jihad in Afghanistan “who went through hardship for the sake of God in the prison of the Americans in Guantánamo for five years.”

('Hardship'? No appreciation for all those halal meals and taxpayer provided prayer rugs and Qur'ans, I guess)

Alami was a Gitmo detainee who admitted attending an al-Qaeda training camp but was one of the 500 or so who was released during the Bush Administration instead of being hung - and of course, like most of the others he went right back to the jihad.The records show that the U.S. Army general in charge of Gitmo at the time advised against releasing Alami. But what was an expert, on the scene opinion worth next to winning the hearts and minds of the Muslim world? Besides, Alami and th e500 or so others who were kicked loose gave up their word they were through with jihad. They pinky promised!

President Obama has made the same mistake President Bush did, but on steroids, not only angering jihadis but our long time allies in the region as well.

 A lot of  the freed Gitmo jihadis have rejoined their  terrorist pals after getting a get out of jail free card from the Bush and Obama Administrations.. . and gone right back to wage to “the jihad” after leaving custody.

We still have around 164 'guests' at Club Gitmo, including such luminaries as  9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM) and USS Cole bomber Bad al-Rahim al-Nassir. But rest assured that the Obama Administration is working hard to free them. Every  since Gitmo became the tropical resort of choice for vacationing jihadis,  there have been military commissions who look at the jihadis in the guest quarters and make decisions on whether to keep them locked up or not. Attending those hearings used to be open to all interested groups, but according to Judicial Watch, the rules have changed this year per President Obama's direct orders.

From now on, only Leftist advocacy groups  Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, Human Rights First, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the American Bar Association will be allowed access.

All of them, at one time or another, all of these groups have openly advocated for the Gitmo detainees' freedom  as pro bono  legal counsel or as political advocates.

Expect most of them to be able to return to their careers of waging jihad against Americans very soon.

The Navy Yard Shooting And What It Shows.

By now, we have most of the facts surrounding yesterday's Washington Navy Yard tragedy.

 

The Left was sorely disappointed not to get some right wing Tea Party type as the perpetrator, and even more distressed to find out that it was a black man who didn't possess one of those scary "assault weapons', like the AR-15 idiots like Piers Morgan reported he had.

Instead, the killer, Aaron Alexis, used an ordinary hand gun and a shotgun.

It's been reported that Aaron Alexis was a mental case who had a history of multiple arrests with police in various states and was accused of committing numerous gun crimes, including firing a gun into his neighbor’s occupied apartment and blasting the tires off of a car in a fit of rage. According to all existing laws, he should never have gotten the Navy security clearance he held, let alone been able to obtain a firearm of any kind. Yet those laws were not enforced.

I'll ask the question no one else seems to be able to. Was his race a factor in why those laws weren't enforced and why he retained his security clearance, or was it just a simple screw up? Certainly the Fort Hood jihadi, Major Nidal Hassan would never have been in a position to murder 13 people while screaming 'Allahu Akbar' if it wasn't for political correctness.

Alexis had been seeing a psychiatrist and reported hearing voices , yet no one saw fit to remove him from work in a highly protected classified area. Of course, now we know that one of those voices was likely that of Joe Biden, saying "Buy a shotgun! Buy a shotgun!".

There's another, horrendous similarity to Fort Hood. Both the Army dispensary there and the DC Naval shipyard were gun free zones, by Federal law. So a killer following his own rules had free rein to murder, because his defenseless victims could not shoot back.

And that doesn't just apply to the Navy Yard. Washington DC has some of the most anti-Second Amendment laws in the nation. While the Supreme Court may have struck down the old laws, which were even worse, in practice, it is gun control nirvana. It's almost impossible in DC to obtain the kind of weapons Aaron Alexis used to murder unless you have the time, money, connections and patience to get the city bureaucracy to allow you to purchase arms to defend you and your family.

That was highlighted by yesterday's events. The elites, of course, were protected by their private security, courtesy of the taxpayers. But the rest of DC's residents in the area, as well as the personnel in the Navy yard had to just sit there and pray.

Originally, it was thought that there were multiple gunmen on the loose.

So the D.C. police sent out an advisory to residents with “Do not take action” in big letters. Instead, they got given an “event” number and instructions to call 911.

Soon after that they were ordered to “Shelter in place!”. This translates as, 'We know you're defenseless anyway, but don;t try to defend yourselves or you're loved ones if anything hairy happens. And don't run, either. Just hide and hope you get lucky this time.'

As it turned out, there was only one killer, and he got his just reckoning with a lethal dose of lead. But what if there had been more than one killer? How many would have died?

For that matter, even if Aaron Alexis slipped through the cracks, how much would the toll of dead and wounded have been reduced if his victims had the means to shoot back?

And the Left, including our president is using this tragedy as a call for gun control, to make us even more helpless. Have they no shame?

We indeed have psychos and monsters among us. We always have and always will. And they don't pay much attention to laws. Murderers will always be able to obtain firearms when they want them. They'll steal them, buy them illegally or even make them if they get a little easily acquired know how.

Taking away the means of Americans to defend themselves and their loved ones is not just heartless and inhumane. It is an affront to basic human dignity.

And it shows clearly how the elites feel about the rest of us. As Machiavelli said long ago, "When you are disarmed, you are not only defenseless but despised. "

School Field Trip To Mosque Features Islamic Readings, Qu'rans For Students

Tennessee is one of the main areas targeted by Islamists for penetration. A number of foreign funded mega Mosques have been built that are far larger than needed to serve the existing Muslim population, and the Obama Department of Justice has been especially aggressive in threatening citizen's groups and local municipalities when they attempt to exercise their existing zoning laws to try and prevent it.

As reported by FOX News Radio’s Todd Starnes, Hendersonville High School recently sent its students of a field trip to a mosque as part of a three-week course on world religions. The students got a fairly slated representation of the Religion of Peace. They were given punch and cookies at the mosque and listened to readings from the Qur'an. They were also offered copies of the Qur'an to take home – which some took and others declined.

Islam defines this as dawa...a part of jihad that involves propagandizing for Islam among the infidels to make political inroads in non-Muslim countries.

While a trip was also taken to a Hindu Temple, no trips were offered to Christian churches, Buddhist temples or Jewish synagogues.

Parents were particularly outraged at this, asking why the school would tour only a mosque but not any of the other religions.

“If you can’t go to all five, why are you going to any?” parent Mike Conner inquired. “We sent the principal an email and voiced our concerns. She sent back a reply and told us they could not afford to go to all five.”

The reason the mosque got the nod becomes obvious as you find out that students who chose not to participate in the field trip were instructed to write a paper comparing and contrasting the Christian, Hindu and Islamic faiths.

The assignment included a worksheet that was visibly biased towards Islam, stating that Muslims treated their conquered people better than the United States treated minorities.

“If we were to compare the attitude of the Muslim rulers towards the minorities living under their rule during the nineteenth century – with the attitude of the Europeans and the Americans towards their minorities, I dare to say that the record of the Muslims would be better,” the author wrote.

I guess the author never talked to any Armenians, Jews, Greeks or Balkan peoples.

The worksheet further stated that the “Prophet of Islam was prepared to live in peace with the followers of other monotheistic religions,” and also said “Muslims in the Middle East and Asian conquered lands of other peoples but they did not impose their religion over them.”

Conner told Fox News his daughter declined to complete what she considered to be an unfair and unbalanced assignment.

“Because of a surplus in information on Muhammed, and a lack of complete and thorough information on Mahatma Gandhi and Jesus Christ, there is not enough true facts to properly complete a comparison and contrasting paper,” Jessica wrote on her paper.

Her parents warned her that she might be punished by her teachers for standing up for her beliefs – and she was. Jessica received a ‘zero’ for the assignment.

Conner and his wife met with school officials who refused to change their daughter’s grade or give her an assignment that was more balanced.

“They told us we were being hostile towards Islam,” Conner said. “It was a very confrontational meeting. Their attitude was, ‘I can’t believe you would question our motives with your children.’”

Conner said he hopes the school board will take action against the teachers.

“Someone needs to be held accountable,” he said. “They are our children – not theirs.”

The Sumner County School District, once this little exercise in dawa was outed has said that the district schools will no longer include visits to religious venues. But the teachers involved in this and the school principal will remain in place.

If this is what's going on in a relatively conservative area like Tennessee, can you imagine what's going on in places like California, Massachusetts and Connecticut?



Hartford, CT middle school kids visiting local  mosque in 2012, learning tenets of Islam

France Seeks To Ban 'Sexualized' Child Beauty Pageants

 

The French Senate passed an interesting bill today, one that would ban beauty pageants for children under 16 and impose stiff penalties on adults who try to enter children into such a contest.

This provision is an amendment that's part of a broader bill on women’s rights, It now heads to the National Assembly, the French Parliament’s lower house, for debate and another vote.

Proponents of the measure say that it will protect children from being prematurely “sexualised” through the use of heavy make-up and sexually provocative attire.

Or as we call it here on this side of the pond, the 'Jon Benet Ramsey look'.

The amendment came after a parliamentary report was released entitled “Against Hyper-Sexualisation: A New Fight For Equality”, which, in addition to calling for an end to the pageants, encouraged a ban on adult-style clothing for children, including padded bras and high-heeled shoes.

The clothing ban apparently didn't fly, but the ban on the Lolita oriented pageants which feature this type of attire did.

Adults who try to enter a child into such a contest can be hit with up to two years in prison and a heavy 30,000-euro fine.

This is a lot more important than it seems at first glance. It's a push back, however limited, against the rising decadence in western culture. And I think the French are on to something here.

When you put twelve-year-old girls in adult style makeup and sexually enticing clothing, it not only sends a message to the girls, but to those watching them. In the case of certain males, that message is 'up for grabs' and 'permitted'. To a lot of young girls, that message is 'this is how you have to dress and behave to be cool, desired and worthy of attention'. The end result in too many instances is sexual exploitation, teen pregnancies, and heartache.

I'm not surprised this became an issue in France. Contrary to popular belief, French sexual and dating culture is fairly conservative, due to its strong Catholic heritage. The usual 'date' in France consists of a group of like minded friends of both sexes who go out together and may or may not gradually pair off.An individual American style one on one date is usually a sign of serious involvement.

And France's unpopular Socialist government only recently imposed legalized gay marriage over a storm of widespread protest.

If this passes in the Assembly, it will be a small step, but an important one. We should definitely emulate it on this side of the pond.

The Watcher's Council Nominations: Indian Summer Edition

Indian Summer, the dream time, neither totally here nor there...

Welcome to the Watcher's Council, a blogging group consisting of some of the most incisive blogs in the 'sphere, and the longest running group of its kind in existence. Every week, the members nominate two posts each, one written by themselves and one written by someone from outside the group for consideration by the whole Council.Then we vote on the best two posts, with the results appearing on Friday.

Council News:

This week, Ask Marion and Maggie's Notebook took advantage of my generous offer of link whorage and earned honorable mention status with some great articles.

You can, too! Want to see your work appear on the Watcher’s Council homepage in our weekly contest listing? Didn’t get nominated by a Council member? No worries.

Simply head over to Joshuapundit and post the title a link to the piece you want considered along with an e-mail address ( which won't be published) in the comments section no later than Monday 6PM PST in order to be considered for our honorable mention category. Then return the favor  by creating a post on your site linking to the Watcher’s Council contest for the week when it comes out Wednesday morning

Simple, no?

It's a great way of exposing your best work to Watcher’s Council readers and Council members. while grabbing the increased traffic and notoriety. And how good is that, eh?

So, let's see what we have this week....

Council Submissions

• Liberty's Spirit – Foreign Policy Clowns: Allowing Tyrants to Dictate Exceptionalism


• The Noisy Room – Obama’s Middle Eastern Sleight of Hand


• Joshuapundit-Whoopsie...Gay Icon Matthew Shepard Was Actually Killed By Lover Over Meth


• The Political Commentator – Sports analogies for Obama Strategies!


• Simply Jews – Amnon Lord: Obama as a grand failure - or missing the great red herring.


• The Mellow Jihadi – Speaking in Japan to. . .


• GrEaT sAtAn”S gIrLfRiEnD – Sinai Insurgency?


• The Razor – Memento Mori - The Art of Abandonment


• VA Right! - Putin is Right! America IS NOT Exceptional


• The Right Planet – Sun Tzu on Syria


• The Colossus of Rhodey – Moonbat gun control round-up


• Nice Deb – Grief Stricken Christian Woman in Syria Lashes Out: ‘We Blame Obama!…He Is Helping The Rebels’…


• The Glittering Eye -The Lack Of Moral Outrage


• Rhymes With Right – Black Actors Step, Fetch, For Racist Liberal Sarah Silverman


• Bookworm Room – Andrew Sullivan’s marvelously misguided theory about how Obama played Putin when it came to Syria

Honorable Mentions

• Ask Marion - After a Year, Congressional Benghazi Report Finally Points Negatively To Senior State Department Officials


• Maggie's Notebook - Palestinian Nidal Hasan’s Military Pay Went to Charity: Won’t Disclose What Charity or In What Countries

Non-Council Submissions

• Lee Smith/Weekly Standard – The Damage Done submitted by Liberty's Spirit


• Mark Steyn –American Ineffectualism submitted by The Noisy Room


• Roger L.Simon/PJ Media – Going to War with the Blind General of Benghazi (An Apology) submitted by Joshuapundit


• Middle East Forum -Beware Syrians bearing gifts submitted by The Political Commentator


• Richard Fernandez/PJ Media – A Gift Horse In The Mouth submitted by Simply Jews


• Castor Praetoria – Things Your SgtMaj Hates..."That's not my job!" submitted by The Mellow Jihadi


• AEI Ideas – Saving al-Assad submitted by GrEaT sAtAn”S gIrLfRiEnD


• Habitable Worlds –Emotive but Meaningless submitted by The Razor


• Heritage/The Foundry – Morning Bell: 5 Ways Obama Has Trampled the Constitution submitted by VA Right!


• Walid Shoebat – John Brennan has a New Benghazi Problem submitted by The Right Planet


• Douglas Ernst – Dianne Feinstein, NSA apologist, is more dangerous to America than men with rifles will ever be submitted by The Colossus of Rhodey


• Roger Kimball/PJ Media -Fundamentally Transforming the United States of America submitted by Nice Deb


• James Joyner/Outside the Beltway – Obama Syria Speech Instant Reaction submitted by The Glittering Eye


• Allergic To Bull – “I Know They Went to Heaven” submitted by Rhymes with Right


• New Scientist-Why A Cyberwar won't happen submitted by Bookworm Room


• Seraphic Secret – 12 Years After 9-11 submitted by The Watcher


• Barry Rubin – The Solution: How to Deal with Obama Middle East Policy submitted by The Watcher

Enjoy! And don't forget to like us on Facebook and follow us Twitter..'cause we're cool like that!

Blaming Putin For Being Putin Is Unjustified

Vladimir Putin has been coming in for a great deal of criticism lately from Americans, especially in light of his op-ed in the New York Times.

The op-ed was obviously hand crafted to present Russia and Putin's case in the best light, but isn't that what op-eds are supposed to do?

Here are the main point Putin makes here. Let's look at them one by one:

• A strike on Syria poses a huge risk to escalate the conflict in the Middle East and could destabilize the region.

Absolutely true. Aside from any hostilities between Iran, Hezbollah and Israel (I think the odds are perhaps at least 50-50 here). There's also the risk of establishing another Hamasistan on Israel's borders armed with Assad's weaponry, a very likely scenario given whom the insurgents actually are. And there's also a major risk of destabilizing U.S. client state Jordan,where the Muslim Brotherhood is extremely powerful. King Abdullah has obviously considered this, since he's adamant that no attacks on Assad be launched from Jordan's soil.

• The fight in Syria is not between a democratic opposition and a dictator but a sectarian civil war, with the opposition dominated by Islamist jihadis domestic and foreign with allegiances to al-Qaeda and the Muslim Brotherhood.

He's right again on that one, as I reported here. And just as in Libya, where President Obama's clueless intervention on behalf of the Islamists put weaponry and armaments in the hands of jihadis who then went on to attack neighboring countries, an intervention in Syria risks a similar outcome.

When Putin told British PM David Cameron that the jihadis that beheaded a British soldier in broad daylight in London were no different than the majority of the Syrian insurgents, he was simply stating a fact. Bad as Assad is, these people are infinitely worse.

• From the outset, Russia has attempted to work with President Obama and the UN on a diplomatic solution to the war in Syria. Putin writes "We need to use the United Nations Security Council and believe that preserving law and order in today’s complex and turbulent world is one of the few ways to keep international relations from sliding into chaos. The law is still the law, and we must follow it whether we like it or not."

From his perspective, Putin is again correct. He's consistent touted a diplomatic solution, but simply refused to sign off on an attack on an ally and client in order to put the Islamists in power.

• Poison gas was definitely used in Syria, but it could just as easily been used by the opposition forces to provoke intervention as by the Syrian Army.

He's right again, as far as I'm concerned. As I reported here, there's no conclusive evidence who used the poison gas first, and in reality, the insurgents were in a position to benefit much more than the Assad regime from a gas attack.

• America has used what Putin terms 'brute force' intervening in a number of countries since 9/11. He cites Iraq, Libya and Afghanistan, none of which could be called successes in any sense of the word. Moreover, these sort of interventions send a message to some of the world's bad actors that actually promotes the proliferation of WMDS. As Putin outs it, "The world reacts by asking: if you cannot count on international law, then you must find other ways to ensure your security. Thus a growing number of countries seek to acquire weapons of mass destruction. This is logical: if you have the bomb, no one will touch you. We are left with talk of the need to strengthen nonproliferation, when in reality this is being eroded."

Putin's has a point here. While not all U.S. interventions have been so poorly thought out or strategically bungled, lately our record has been pretty poor. Putin undoubtedly also has Kosovo on his mind, where we violated international law to bomb our historic ally Serbia's military installations and civilians to intervene in a sectarian civil war during the Clinton years. Then there was Libya's Khaddaffi, who voluntarily gave up his own WMD arsenal and then was attacked by the West and ended up as an extrajudicial execution victim whose corpse was sodomized. This was a major wake up call to a lot of countries, especially in the Middle East. Certainly the Iranians see it that way.

Putin finishes up by throwing President Obama a bone, saying their working relation is improving, but then comments on President Obama's throw away line on on American exceptionalism, where he stated that the United States’ policy is “what makes America different. It’s what makes us exceptional.”

Obviously, President Obama tossed that out as a feel good tidbit, because based on almost every action he's taken since he took office President Obama obviously doesn't believe it himself. Putin finishes by saying: "It is extremely dangerous to encourage people to see themselves as exceptional, whatever the motivation. There are big countries and small countries, rich and poor, those with long democratic traditions and those still finding their way to democracy. Their policies differ, too. We are all different, but when we ask for the Lord’s blessings, we must not forget that God created us equal."

Fine, the line on G-d is a bit stilted coming from a former KGB leader. But while America is exceptional, what President Putin is reminding Americans here is that other countries feel the same way about themselves. It's called nationalism. We've simply gotten a little unused to thinking that way, because it's been a long time since America had a president who considers America's interests first...the way Putin does Russia's.

That's why he's so popular with the majority of Russians.

Is this the start of a new Cold War? Hardly. Vladimir Putin is not our enemy per se. He's merely seeking to derive maximum advantage for Russia. And if we elect a clueless, narcissistic amateur as our commander-in-chief, can we really blame Putin for using that to his country's advantage?

It's like judo, where you manipulate an opponent's strength against him. Putin's good at judo. Barack Obama never even played the game.

Obama Breaks U.S. Law To Arm Al-Qaeda And The Brotherhood in Syria

The Hill reports today that President Obama has issued yet another executive order trashing federal law on U.S. arms sales to begin supplying anti-chemical weapons equipment to insurgent forces in Syria.

Under the Arms Export Control Act, the U.S. is prohibited from authorizing shipment of any item included in what's known as the U.S. Munitions List.

Paragraphs (a)-(c) of Category XIV specifically outlaws exporting “chemical agents” or “equipment for dissemination, detection, and identification of, and defense against” those agents.

Section 121.7(e) explicitly names “nerve agents, gases, and aerosols” under the definition of the chemical agents that the government is explicitly banned from exporting.

National Security Council spokeswoman Caitlin Hayden informs us that by dint of President Obama's awesomeness, the laws forbidding these exports now no longer apply to “"international organizations ... [and] select vetted members of the Syrian opposition, including the Supreme Military Council.”

"This action is part of longstanding and ongoing efforts to provide life-saving chemical weapons-related assistance to people in need in Syria," Hayden added.

Need I mention that the Supreme Military Council, the armed wing of the Obama -backed Syrian Opposition Coalition is Muslim Brotherhood dominated?

Or that the rebels themselves have poison gas?



 And have committed numerous atrocities? Although of course, to channel Hillary Clinton, since a lot of them have been carried out against Syria's Christians (it is the Sunni insurgents who are exclusively responsible for the murder and ethnic cleansing of Christians in Syria) what difference does it make?

 But wait, there's more. The the shipment will violate another law, the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which, in case you've forgotten, mandates anyone suspected of providing material support to al-Qaeda, the Taliban, or associated forces is subject to indefinite detention in military custody. The Washington Post reported  on September 11 that the The Obama Administration has been sending the insurgents shipments that are “limited to light weapons and other munitions that can be tracked.” However, according to  CBS News, the list of materiel being trafficked to Syrian jihadis is a lot more heavy duty:

The agency has also arranged for the Syrian opposition to receive anti-tank weaponry like rocket-propelled grenades through a third party, presumably one of the Gulf countries that has been arming the rebels, a senior U.S. intelligence official and two former intelligence officials said Thursday. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the classified program publicly.

 President Obama has approved shipments of weapons and money to the Syrian insurgents, one of whose main components is the al-Qaeda franchise al-Nusra. Does anyone seriously believe that arms and money we've given to the president's Muslim Brotherhood friends hasn't found it's way to al-Qaeda? Oddly enough, this same president, who wants to arm our bitter, sworn enemies the jihadis and is spending taxpayer dollars to do it is doing absolutely everything he can to disarm Americans and destroy their Second Amendment rights. Why? Any 'journalists' out there with the stones to ask him?

My friend and Council mate Terresa over at The Noisy Room has a great piece  out  that puts this further into perspective.

Obama Gets Ready To Engineer A Government Shutdown - And Blame The GOP

 

Having proven himself (again) a miserable failure at foreign policy, President Obama's next gambit is going to be to return to class warfare territory.

Aside from having his media worshipers revive the old 'blame Bush' song to try and cover Obama's foreign policy debacles, the next step will be to force a shutdown of the government and blame the Republicans for it.

Look for our Dear Leader to make the coming debt ceiling debate to be about food stamps, 'inequality', entitlement programs, the Evil Rich (translation: non-Obama donors grossing over $250K per year before taxes) and the even more Evil Republicans that represent them.The president and the usual suspects will almost certainly throw out a few dog whistle phrases that translate as racism.

Now, the House Republicans don't have to put up with this.Especially since even a blind man can see what's coming.

They can make the debate about cutting off spending on ObamaCare, legislation that is unpopular with 75% of Americans according to the latest polls.Even the unions want off that particular bus.

The GOP can literally marry these constituents politically. And yes, no matter what nonsense you hear from the timid, both the mandatory and the discretionary funding can be cut off. Congress does exactly that with the Hyde Amendment, which prevents funds going to MedicAid from paying for abortions with exceptions for incest and rape. It is a rider that is attached to the annual appropriations bill for the Department of Health and Human Services and has passed every year since 1976.Congress did the same thing when it came to aid to Nicaragua's contras, attaching a rider to defense allocations.

The GOP could even call for a national referendum on ObamaCare. After all, since the president has illegally delayed implementation of parts of it for partisan political purposes and Americans now have a much better idea of what's in it, to channel Nancy Pelosi, shouldn't they be able to vote on it?

They can make the debate about taxation, calling for cuts for America's besieged taxpayers.

And they can make the debate about ending the very selectively implied sequester, especially when it come to our military. Americans need to know about the defunding of Tricare and the arbitrary firings of military personnel to deny them pension rights and contrast that with the money spent on the president and his wife's multi-million dollar vacations and White House galas.

In short, instead of going into defense mode, they can go on the attack, let Americans know that they oppose a government shutdown but that in exchange, they want to hold this president to some common sense measures, particularly on ObamaCare.

Will they do it? Will they begin challenging the narrative that's being advanced? They will if they want to win elections.

So far, though, crickets. But we'll see.

Forum: Black On White Crime - Sensationalism Or A Growing Trend?

Every week on Monday morning , the Council and our invited guests weigh in at the Watcher's Forum, short takes on a major issue of the day. This week's question: Black On White Crime - Sensationalism Or A Growing Trend?

 The Razor: Sensationalism – but justifiable. We’ve been hearing a lot about it in the conservative media due to the reaction to the MSM racist reporting of the Zimmerman trial. The truth is that most interracial crime is black on white, not white on black so the reaction to the media slander of George Zimmerman is justified. I use the “slander” rarely, but clearly it applies in the treatment Zimmerman received by large media outlets. NBC’s editing of the 911 call was purposely and clearly done to damage Zimmerman’s character and undermine his defense. But I digress.

The Glittering Eye: I think it's sensationalism.  The FBI's report for 2012 isn't available yet but its reports on hate crimes for 2011,  for 2010, and for 2009 suggest a long term decline in hate crimes, generally, although hate crimes against Catholics, Muslims, and homosexuals have increased very slightly (probably within the margin of error).

Historically, most crimes against whites have been perpetrated by whites and most crimes against blacks have been perpetrated by blacks.Despite some highly publicized incidents I believe that will continue to be the case.

Bookworm Room:Can it be both? That is, blacks commit crimes disproportionate to their numbers in the general population. Although they mostly prey on other blacks (which is why it's unconscionable that the most vulnerable blacks are not allowed to carry legal self-defense weapons), they've always preyed on other races as well. That hasn't changed. That they use terms of racial opprobrium when attacking whites hasn't changed either. What's changed is that, in the wake of the Trayvon Martin trial, we're starting to pay attention, not just to the crimes, but to the verbal attacks that accompany those crimes.

If you remember way, way back when Doonesbury was still funny, Trudeau looked at forced integration in America's schools (so this must have been in the very early 1970s). Those strips revolved around two utterly innocent little boys,one white and one black, who meet up and become friends when they find themselves in the same school. The strip that stands out in my mind is the one in which the white boy inadvertently starts a race riot at the school because of his response to a big black boy who is bullying him. He calls the black kid "honkey," and all Hell breaks loose.

I don't know why, but it seems to me that we've reached that level of insanity and satire today when it comes to the always dangerous black underclass and the rest of American society.

 JoshuaPundit: I see this as both. While blacks overwhelmingly victimize blacks, the real story has to do with the percentage of black on white crime versus white on black crime. That ratio has remained fairly constant for the last 5 years or so, with blacks victimizing whites at a ratio of between 8 times and 6 times higher than whites victimize blacks each year. In 2007, for example, according to the FBI's  ‘single offender victimization figures’  there were 433,934 crimes against whites, eight times the 55,685 whites committed against blacks.

It's important to realize that this has nothing inherently to do with race, but everything to do with culture. That's the core of it, in my view. Especially telling is that the vast majority of black kids in America grow up without fathers.

Comparatively few crimes committed against whites, Jews or East Asians are prosecuted as hate crimes, no matter what racial animus was involved, for the simple reason that the majority of hate crimes are federal matters that involve violations of civil rights. And our Department of Justice since Eric Holder became Attorney General  has been very reluctant to prosecute any civil rights violations if they involve whites  as victims.If we are to believe J.Christian Adams and others who used to work there, this is a deliberate policy, especially in the DOJ's civil rights division.

This perception of bias in both the DOJ and in the media, combined with the current president and the DOJ's high profile insertion into cases that involve black, Muslim, homosexual and Hispanic victims has led to an unfortunate  backlash where a number of violent crimes with black perpetrators and  white victims are being reported lately that emphasize the difference in how favored groups are treated vs. whites.

Many whites whom ignored President Obama's close association with a number of racist groups and figures were given the impression by this president and his campaign that this would be a healing, post-racial presidency. It has been anything but, and the increased buyer's remorse at the perceived unfairness is what's driving the attention now paid to black on white crime.

The Right Planet :  John McWhorter, a black associate professor of English and comparative literature at Columbia University, wrote in a recent article for Time:

The numbers don’t lie: young black men do commit about 50% of the murders in the U.S. We don’t yet know whether the attack on Lane was racially motivated, nor can we know whether the three black boys who attacked a white boy on a Florida school bus recently would not have done the same to a black kid. (Critics took Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson to task for not condemning the violence.) But hardly uncommon are cases such as the two black guys who doused a white 13-year-old with gasoline and lit him on fire, saying “You get what you deserve, white boy” (Kansas City, Mo.) or 20 black kids who beat up white Matthew Owens on his porch “for Trayvon” (Mobile, Ala.).

So, it’s just fake to pretend that the association of young black men with violence comes out of thin air. Young black men murder 14 times more than young white men. If the kinds of things I just mentioned were regularly done by whites, it’d be trumpeted as justification for being scared to death of them.

If one just goes by the FBI Uniform Crime Report (UCR) statistics, violent crime in America is proportionately highest among blacks. Numbers aren't racist; they just "are."

If there is sensationalism, it's the sort of manufactured racism witnessed in the Trayvon Martin case. Both the Justice Department and the state-run press exhibited a marked zealousness in attempting to influence public opinion and the court in favor of a guilty verdict against George Zimmerman. NBC even went so far as to edit tapes in an attempt to portray George Zimmerman as racist. The FBI even investigated Zimmerman but was unable to uncover solid evidence of a "hate crime" perpetrated by a "white Hispanic" against an innocent black teen. It's pretty disturbing when one sees our own Justice Department, in league with the press, trying to influence a verdict for political gain, even if it means agitating racial divisions.

Recently there was the senseless murder of Christopher Lane by three teens, two of them black, who decided to kill somebody "for the fun of it." Two of the teens had tweeted their hatred for whites on numerous occasions. When Al Sharpton was asked to comment on the Chris Lane murder, Sharpton replied, "Not my problem." Apparently Sharpton did not see any injustice done. Nothing to see here, folks. Move along now!

What I think Sharpton reveals in his response to Chris Lane's senseless murder is how to answer Sharpton's own charges of racism. The next time Al Sharpton or Jesse Jackson start crying "RACISM!" just respond, "Not my problem."

GrEaT sAtAn"S gIrLfRiEnD  :Trick question or perhaps an even more better answer is Yes and No.

Check it - the media and auxillary talking heads, pundits and lamestream media's never ending auxillary cadre of talking heads offering nonstop and often uncool uncalm and uncollected analysts, are actually feeding the flame. The Zimmerman thing for example is often portrayed in a racecarist way, inciting the easily excited among us to act out even more in revenge.

As best understood, crime stats are actually decreasing, yet intense media focus  (or lack of it depending on the racialality of the victims and or perps) tends to make it sensational.

  Well, there you have it.

Make sure to tune in every Monday for the Watcher’s Forum. And remember, every Wednesday, the Council has its weekly contest with the members nominating two posts each, one written by themselves and one written by someone from outside the group for consideration by the whole Council. The votes are cast by the Council, and the results are posted on Friday morning.

It’s a weekly magazine of some of the best stuff written in the blogosphere, and you won’t want to miss it.

And don’t forget to like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter..’cause we’re cool like that, y'know?

Caption These Photos

They were taken in Iowa, where serial prevaricator and stolen valor Vietnam 'combat hero' Senator Tom Harkin is holding an annual Democrat steak fry, a traditional meet and greet for Democrats with presidential fever.

My caption?


Chelsea: "Don't worry Mom . Wait'll he takes a bite out of his steak"

Feel free to weigh in.

An Alternative Headline

The Soros funded Raw Story has a piece out   (h/t Memeorandum) on a story about an appearance by GOP  Rep. Justin Amash on George Stephanopoulos' Sunday show on ABC. It's headlined, "ABC News panel laughs out loud after GOP rep. says Obamacare delay is a ‘favor’ to Obama":



As usual, it's not a 'news panel', but one conservative versus 4 Democrat Lefties, counting the host, a devout Democrat who used to be one of President Clinton's spin doctors.

What Amash said that caused such merriment among the panel and the host is that since President Obama has delayed the employer mandates on ObamaCare (illegally, I might add), the Republicans, who hold a strong majority in the House would be doing him a favor by delaying the massively unpopular bill for everyone.

Here's my alternative headline for this story: "Biased News Host And Panel Show Lack Of Professionalism In Reaction To GOP Guest."

It's gotten so bad that they're not even bothering to pretend to be objective any more.

Whoopsie.Gay Icon Matthew Shepard Was Actually Killed By Lover Over Meth

Another day, another Leftist narrative crumbles.

Breitbart has the story, a report on a review in the gay publication The Advocate of a new book written by well known gay author Stephen Jimenez entitled, The Book of Matt.

Ask the average American who Matthew Shepard is, and they'll tell you he was that poor homosexual who was murdered by two thugs and tied to a fence because he was gay.

The part of the story that's true is that on October 6th, 1998, Shepard met “two strangers” at the Fireside Lounge in Laramie, Wyoming and went off with them. The two men drove him to a remote area, robbed him, pistol whipped him to death and left him hanging on a fence.

Shepard later became a secular saint, an icon for gay rights and same sex marriage. His murder was used to lobby congress,was the subject of hundreds of speeches and fund raising appeals, and became a flag to rally around. Songs were written about him by well known pop stars, a foundation was formed in his name, a TV movie or three was made about him if memory serves me and even national hate crimes legislation named for him.

Turns out that the truth was very different.

As gay journalist Aaron Hicklin, writing in The Advocate asks, “How do people sold on one version of history react to being told that the facts are slippery --- that thinking of Shepard’s murder as a hate crime does not mean it was a hate crime? And how does it color our understanding of such a crime if the perpetrator and victim not only knew each other but also had sex together, bought drugs from one another, and partied together?”

This startling revelation comes in The Book of Matt to be published next week by investigative journalist Stephen Jiminez, who over the course of years interviewed over 100 people, including Shepard’s friends, friends of the killers, and the killers themselves.

According to The Advocate, one of the premier gay publications in the country, Jiminez “amassed enough anecdotal evidence to build a persuasive case that Shepard’s sexuality was, if not incidental, certain less central than popular consensus had lead us to believe.”

Even before Shepard died, two of his friends were peddling the narrative that he died at the hands of vicious homophobes. Within days the gay establishment latched onto what would drive the hate crimes story for years to come; even now, the Laramie Project, a stage play about the killing is performed all over the country. Indeed, it will be performed next week at Ford’s Theater in Washington DC.

But what really happened to Matthew Shepard? 

He was beaten, tortured, and killed by one or both of the men now serving life sentences. But it turns out, according to Jiminez, that Shepard was a meth dealer himself and he was friends and sex partners with the man who led in his killing. Indeed, his killer may have killed him because Shepard allegedly came into possession of a large amount of methamphetamine and refused to give it up.
The book also shows that Shepard’s killer was on a five-day meth binge at the time of the killing.

My, my. As if we've never had people fall out over drugs, or attempt to torture someone to get them to give up their stash and go a bit too far. Especially if they were under the influence.

Shapard's death was a tragedy, but the use that was made of it was obscene.

This is interesting because it's a textbook example of how the Left operates. Find a symbol, provide it with unearned moral authority, publicize it widely and push the new narrative for all it's worth. It's a variation of Saul Alinsky's Rule 13; "Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it." In this case, it's pick the symbol, freeze it, personalize it and use it to polarize anyone whom opposes your agenda.

Rachel Corrie was used in exactly the same way, as an icon and money maker by 'anti-Zionists', portrayed as a tender little buttercup murdered by vicious Jews instead of the hate-filled, anti-semitic terrorist groupie harridan she really was.

Aaron Hicklin, the writer of the review in The Advocate provides a cynical coda to all this that explains a lot: “There are valuable reasons for telling certain stories in a certain way at pivotal times, but that doesn’t mean we have to hold on to them once they’ve outlived their usefulness.” 
 

The defense against this, of course, is to never believe any of the Left's horse manure when the next attempt to manipulate you comes along. Or anyone, fo that matter.It's not as if we don't understand who the legacy media is by now, or why people will peddle certain narratives because thar's gold and political capital in them thar hills.

After all, if someone you knew repeatedly lied to you, would you believe anything they had to say, ever? Start from that premise, always take a good look at who's telling you what, who's paying them and what they're ultimately trying to sell you is a good place to start.

Yom Kippur, 5774

At sunset, Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement starts.

It is a day of fasting, prayer, spiritual reflection and contemplating G-d's judgement.

It's a day that always strikes me with awe and despair...because I know, and G-d knows exactly how imperfect a human being I am. All I can do, as the prayer says, is to ask G-d for understanding, mercy, and the strength to make things right because my good deeds are always too few.

Of course, Yom Kippur is not just about abasement. It is a time of hope, a time to see how to make things right between you and G-d and to persevere as you attempt to purify yourself spiritually. Because G-d's judgment occurs on this day, Yom Kippur. It is the holiest day of the Jewish calender, which concludes the period in the Jewish Calender known as The Days Of Awe.

In one famous instance Dodger pitcher and Hall of Famer Sandy Koufax stood up to considerable pressure and refused to violate Yom Kippur to pitch the opener to the 1965 World Series. (The Dodgers, BTW, won the series).

The above video is the traditional prayer, 'Kol Nidre', traditionally sung on Erev Yom Kippur, which is tonight. Here, it's performed acapella by Cantor Boaz Davidoff. It is a direct plea to G-d to forgive sins, unfulfilled vows and inequities: "May all the people of Israel be forgiven, including all the strangers who live in their midst, for all the people are in fault. O pardon the iniquities of this people, according to Thy abundant mercy, just as Thou forgave this people ever since they left Egypt."


May you all be blessed and inscribed. I'll see you Saturday night, G-d willing.

G'mar Chatima Tova.