There are important stories in the news this week, to be sure. And I am following them. The Iraqi elections. Sadaam's trial. Bush's NSA eavesdropping revelations. All important.
But the story that interests me most is the story of the Federal Judge in Pennsylvania issuing a ruling that the Intelligent Design policy instituted by the Dover School Board was unconstitutional and must be ceased.
The story was interesting to me on two levels.
First, it taps into my longstanding interest in the creation vs. evolution debate.
Second, the decision is a milestone in that debate and deserves a great deal of study and scrutiny. I'd advise everyone that is proffering an opinion on the ruling to actually read the thing.
I read the entire ruling - an ambitious excercise for a non-lawyer - including all 139 pages plus the footnotes. I read it all in one sitting.
After reading the Dover decision, I made a decision. That is, to start a new blog focused on this one topic only - separate from Partisan Newsjunkie.
Politics here.
Creation vs. Evolution over at my new home: http://onorigins.blogspot.com
Stop in and check it out.
Wednesday, December 21, 2005
This is News?
In the "this is news?" category tonight, I submit the lead story on all the network and cable networks tonight. Let's review it as reported by CBS:
Bob Schieffer introduced Wednesday's CBS Evening News by using loaded language as he pointed out how, “to protest the President's decision to continue spying on American citizens, a federal judge took the unprecedented step of resigning from the court that issues warrants in such cases,”
Really now. This is the state of mainstream journalism today?
First of all, it is of course loaded language. According to the totality of news reports on the topic the judge did not officially announce a reason for his resignation. Would you get that from Scheiffer's phrasing "to protest the President's decision..."? Of course not. That phrasing was loaded and agenda driven.
So, if the judge did not announce an official reason, how did Schieffer know the reason. Again, from reading multiple sources I learned that this was deduced from remarks that the judge made in private conversations. Really now! Is that the standard of reporting a lead story on network news now? CBS News is reporting rumors about private remarks as factual news now?
Finally, why is this news? Is it news that one Clinton appointee has a philosophical difference of opinion with President Bush? One judge out of 11 resigns and that is news? No, it is not.
If it were news, the accurate headline would be "10 out of 11 judges are not offended by the President's actions."
Bob Schieffer introduced Wednesday's CBS Evening News by using loaded language as he pointed out how, “to protest the President's decision to continue spying on American citizens, a federal judge took the unprecedented step of resigning from the court that issues warrants in such cases,”
Really now. This is the state of mainstream journalism today?
First of all, it is of course loaded language. According to the totality of news reports on the topic the judge did not officially announce a reason for his resignation. Would you get that from Scheiffer's phrasing "to protest the President's decision..."? Of course not. That phrasing was loaded and agenda driven.
So, if the judge did not announce an official reason, how did Schieffer know the reason. Again, from reading multiple sources I learned that this was deduced from remarks that the judge made in private conversations. Really now! Is that the standard of reporting a lead story on network news now? CBS News is reporting rumors about private remarks as factual news now?
Finally, why is this news? Is it news that one Clinton appointee has a philosophical difference of opinion with President Bush? One judge out of 11 resigns and that is news? No, it is not.
If it were news, the accurate headline would be "10 out of 11 judges are not offended by the President's actions."
Monday, December 19, 2005
Run, Forrest, Run
So, I was flipping through the channels last night and landed on a movie that is in my Top Ten best movies of all time list - Forrest Gump.
Interesting scene in the middle. Forrest has served in Vietnam and is in Washington D.C. to receive a Medal of Honor from the President. As he's walking through Washington, he accidentally gets caught up in a line going to a war protest on the mall.
Before he knows it, he's mistaken for a member of a group of veterans protesting the war and is thrust up on stage to speak - in the midst of a gathering of radicals and hippies. SDS types. Black panthers. etc.
Forrest, looking completely honorable and completely out of place in his military dress uniform and medals, steps up to the microphone to speak.
Behind Forrest is a huge banner, which reads:
Support the troops. Bring them home.
Wow. Things never change. Was Cindy Sheehan out there somewhere? Howard Dean? George Soros?
Probably not. John Kerry probably was, though.
Get off the stage, Forrest. Run, Forrest, run.
Interesting scene in the middle. Forrest has served in Vietnam and is in Washington D.C. to receive a Medal of Honor from the President. As he's walking through Washington, he accidentally gets caught up in a line going to a war protest on the mall.
Before he knows it, he's mistaken for a member of a group of veterans protesting the war and is thrust up on stage to speak - in the midst of a gathering of radicals and hippies. SDS types. Black panthers. etc.
Forrest, looking completely honorable and completely out of place in his military dress uniform and medals, steps up to the microphone to speak.
Behind Forrest is a huge banner, which reads:
Support the troops. Bring them home.
Wow. Things never change. Was Cindy Sheehan out there somewhere? Howard Dean? George Soros?
Probably not. John Kerry probably was, though.
Get off the stage, Forrest. Run, Forrest, run.
Bush Fighting Back
Finally, after a long summer of press and opposition drubbings, President Bush is going on offense to defend his record on Iraq and terror. Finally, an effective and sustained response to the outrageous yammerings of the Defeatocrats.
So, a recap of recent boos and kudos is in order:
Kudos - to the President in his address and press conference, for a needed and compelling recap of the terrorist threat we still face and of his job requirement to protect the country as his first priority.
Boos - to the New York Times for attempting to dupe the country with a scandal story the day after the most significant news story of the year - the Iraqi elections. The non-story about the President authorizing domestic wire taps to track terrorist with foreign connections was held for a year and then dumped with a timing designed both to minimize the success story of the elections and to take down the Patriot act. As the President said today:
Boo - to the leaker within the NSA or the Congress who leaked this to the New York Times. Note to Democrats: this is a real secret, worthy of keeping. Not like this made up Valerie Plame outing that you've had your knickers in a twist over for the last two years.
Boos - to the Democrat leadership (Pelosi and Reid) who were briefed on the wiretaps, but ran for cover yesterday when the news story broke. Chickens.
Kudos - to the President for the courage to say that he ordered the wiretaps many times and would do so again as often as needed. This story says that we have a Commander in Chief who is serious about fighting the War on Terror with everything in his arsenal.
Boos - to the rest of the media for dropping the incredible story of the succesful Iraqi elections to chase like lemmings the wiretap story. One day. That's all the coverage that the MSM gave to perhaps the most significant news story of the year.
Kudos - to the U.S. Government and the Iraqi people for pulling off the election.
Boos - to the mainstream media who have kept alive on the front pages the story about the CIA running secret prisons for terrorists overseas. If we are, good. Shame on this leaker as well. Again, it shows that we're serious about fighting a war.
Boos - to the leftist party leaders who continue to make outrageous defamations day after day and continue to call for retreat in Iraq.
Boos - to the Senate Democrats who successfully killed, for now anyway, the reauthorization of the Patriot Act. Is there any position that the Senate Democrats have taken in the last two years that Osama bin Laden wouldn't have voted the same way on?
Boos - finally, to the Islamic Army of Iraq who, not content to wait entirely for the Democrats and the media to win this war for them, put a bullet in the head of an American captive this week. Barbarians.
So, a recap of recent boos and kudos is in order:
Kudos - to the President in his address and press conference, for a needed and compelling recap of the terrorist threat we still face and of his job requirement to protect the country as his first priority.
Boos - to the New York Times for attempting to dupe the country with a scandal story the day after the most significant news story of the year - the Iraqi elections. The non-story about the President authorizing domestic wire taps to track terrorist with foreign connections was held for a year and then dumped with a timing designed both to minimize the success story of the elections and to take down the Patriot act. As the President said today:
My personal opinion is it was a shameful act for someone to disclose this very important program in a time of war. The fact that we're discussing this program is helping the enemy.
Boo - to the leaker within the NSA or the Congress who leaked this to the New York Times. Note to Democrats: this is a real secret, worthy of keeping. Not like this made up Valerie Plame outing that you've had your knickers in a twist over for the last two years.
Boos - to the Democrat leadership (Pelosi and Reid) who were briefed on the wiretaps, but ran for cover yesterday when the news story broke. Chickens.
Kudos - to the President for the courage to say that he ordered the wiretaps many times and would do so again as often as needed. This story says that we have a Commander in Chief who is serious about fighting the War on Terror with everything in his arsenal.
Boos - to the rest of the media for dropping the incredible story of the succesful Iraqi elections to chase like lemmings the wiretap story. One day. That's all the coverage that the MSM gave to perhaps the most significant news story of the year.
Kudos - to the U.S. Government and the Iraqi people for pulling off the election.
Boos - to the mainstream media who have kept alive on the front pages the story about the CIA running secret prisons for terrorists overseas. If we are, good. Shame on this leaker as well. Again, it shows that we're serious about fighting a war.
Boos - to the leftist party leaders who continue to make outrageous defamations day after day and continue to call for retreat in Iraq.
Boos - to the Senate Democrats who successfully killed, for now anyway, the reauthorization of the Patriot Act. Is there any position that the Senate Democrats have taken in the last two years that Osama bin Laden wouldn't have voted the same way on?
Boos - finally, to the Islamic Army of Iraq who, not content to wait entirely for the Democrats and the media to win this war for them, put a bullet in the head of an American captive this week. Barbarians.
Thursday, December 15, 2005
All Seeing?
We noticed last week that our local psychic is going out of business. Her building is up for sale and everything.
The obvious question: Why didn't she see that coming?
The obvious question: Why didn't she see that coming?
Tuesday, December 13, 2005
Saving Lives in Iraq
There are a lot of ways to tell a story with statistics. Pro or Con. Favorable or unfavorable. In a way the enlightens or that obscures the truth.
For months now, critics of the War in Iraq have thrown around statistics about how many civilian casualties are directly related to the American invasion to depose the murderous tyrant Sadaam Hussein and his thug regime.
How many? 100,000 thousand was the oft repeated, though unsubstantiated claim. 100,000 dead civilian Iraqi's caught in the crossfire.
Lately that number is being revised down by proponents who have challenged the wilder claims. How many? 30,000 appears to be the new number, used now by both more reasonable critics and by the Bush administration. That was the number used by President Bush even today.
30,000. Dead Iraqi civilians.
Is that possible? Certainly. It's a war, in case you didn't get the memo.
Is it unheard of? Not compared to most conflicts. Vietnam, according to a radio report I listened to today, produced 1 million or more civilian casualties. World Wars resulted in considerably more.
Is it to the shame of the U.S. that there have been 30,000 civilian dead?
No, it is not. In fact, I would go so far as to argue that our actions have saved lives in Iraq.
There are of course the thousands of Iraqis found in mass graves, killed at the hands of the Hussein regime. That's not a threat anymore.
There are, of course, the untold number of Iraqis killed directly by, or ordered killed by, Sadaam's thug sons - Uday and Qusay. Thugs who reportedly took after dinner strolls at night over to the prisons to select prisoners for execution purely for enjoyment. Those thugs are in the ground, and Iraqis are now safe from them.
More telling: take as my only case the U.N. sanctions imposed on Iraq after the first Gulf War.
Sanctions that prohibited Iraq from selling oil. Sanctions that resulted in the deaths of thousands of Iraqi children. (A case often shouted from the rooftops by Bush critics who claimed that the sanctions killed 500,000).
To alleviate the suffering, the U.S. and the U.N. modified the sanctions to allow Iraq to sell Oil - for - Food. Did it end the dying? Of course not. Sadaam promptly stole the money and used it to build many many palaces to his glory and to bribe French, German, and Russian diplomats to oppose any action against him in the U.N.
Children and adults died of starvation in Iraq under the U.N. sanctions, each and every year.
How many. Estimates that I heard were 5,000 per month. That's 60,000 / year dead. Every year for 12 years. That's 720,000 dead from the sanctions.
So, given 60,000 / year dying just from the sanctions - and Sadaam's refusal to comply with the requirements that would have lifted the sanctions, what were the options?
Bush opponents exclaim that the correct option for dealing with Iraq was to leave the sanctions in place. How many times did you hear Kerry, Dean, Clinton, and company argue that we shouldn't have invaded because "the sanctions were working".
60,000 dead per year is working? Were they willing to not invade and accept 60,000 dead in 2003, again in 2004, and again in 2005? They must have been, because none of them advocated withdrawing the sanctions and walking away.
On the other hand, President Bush rightly concluded that the sanctions were not working. And we couldn't just lift the sanctions and walk away. Not only would you still have mass graves filling up, the terror threat after 9/11 dictated that we take down a state sponsor of terror.
So. It costs 30,000 lives over 3 years to do the right thing. To invade Iraq and depose the regime.
That's deeply regrettable. But it doesn't tell the whole story.
The rest of the story is that by ending the sanctions and ending the regime, we likely saved lives. Yes, that's what I said - saved lives. What's the math?
Not invading - leaving the sanctions as the anti-war crowd advocated?
2003 - 60,000 dead
2004 - 60,000 dead
2005 - 60,000 dead
Total - 180,000 dead
War in Iraq
2003 - 28,000 dead
2004 - 1000 dead
2005 - 1000 dead
Total - 30,000 dead
That's the math of war. A regrettable war, but a just war.
Do the math. Tell the whole story.
That's my take on it.
For months now, critics of the War in Iraq have thrown around statistics about how many civilian casualties are directly related to the American invasion to depose the murderous tyrant Sadaam Hussein and his thug regime.
How many? 100,000 thousand was the oft repeated, though unsubstantiated claim. 100,000 dead civilian Iraqi's caught in the crossfire.
Lately that number is being revised down by proponents who have challenged the wilder claims. How many? 30,000 appears to be the new number, used now by both more reasonable critics and by the Bush administration. That was the number used by President Bush even today.
30,000. Dead Iraqi civilians.
Is that possible? Certainly. It's a war, in case you didn't get the memo.
Is it unheard of? Not compared to most conflicts. Vietnam, according to a radio report I listened to today, produced 1 million or more civilian casualties. World Wars resulted in considerably more.
Is it to the shame of the U.S. that there have been 30,000 civilian dead?
No, it is not. In fact, I would go so far as to argue that our actions have saved lives in Iraq.
There are of course the thousands of Iraqis found in mass graves, killed at the hands of the Hussein regime. That's not a threat anymore.
There are, of course, the untold number of Iraqis killed directly by, or ordered killed by, Sadaam's thug sons - Uday and Qusay. Thugs who reportedly took after dinner strolls at night over to the prisons to select prisoners for execution purely for enjoyment. Those thugs are in the ground, and Iraqis are now safe from them.
More telling: take as my only case the U.N. sanctions imposed on Iraq after the first Gulf War.
Sanctions that prohibited Iraq from selling oil. Sanctions that resulted in the deaths of thousands of Iraqi children. (A case often shouted from the rooftops by Bush critics who claimed that the sanctions killed 500,000).
To alleviate the suffering, the U.S. and the U.N. modified the sanctions to allow Iraq to sell Oil - for - Food. Did it end the dying? Of course not. Sadaam promptly stole the money and used it to build many many palaces to his glory and to bribe French, German, and Russian diplomats to oppose any action against him in the U.N.
Children and adults died of starvation in Iraq under the U.N. sanctions, each and every year.
How many. Estimates that I heard were 5,000 per month. That's 60,000 / year dead. Every year for 12 years. That's 720,000 dead from the sanctions.
So, given 60,000 / year dying just from the sanctions - and Sadaam's refusal to comply with the requirements that would have lifted the sanctions, what were the options?
Bush opponents exclaim that the correct option for dealing with Iraq was to leave the sanctions in place. How many times did you hear Kerry, Dean, Clinton, and company argue that we shouldn't have invaded because "the sanctions were working".
60,000 dead per year is working? Were they willing to not invade and accept 60,000 dead in 2003, again in 2004, and again in 2005? They must have been, because none of them advocated withdrawing the sanctions and walking away.
On the other hand, President Bush rightly concluded that the sanctions were not working. And we couldn't just lift the sanctions and walk away. Not only would you still have mass graves filling up, the terror threat after 9/11 dictated that we take down a state sponsor of terror.
So. It costs 30,000 lives over 3 years to do the right thing. To invade Iraq and depose the regime.
That's deeply regrettable. But it doesn't tell the whole story.
The rest of the story is that by ending the sanctions and ending the regime, we likely saved lives. Yes, that's what I said - saved lives. What's the math?
Not invading - leaving the sanctions as the anti-war crowd advocated?
2003 - 60,000 dead
2004 - 60,000 dead
2005 - 60,000 dead
Total - 180,000 dead
War in Iraq
2003 - 28,000 dead
2004 - 1000 dead
2005 - 1000 dead
Total - 30,000 dead
That's the math of war. A regrettable war, but a just war.
Do the math. Tell the whole story.
That's my take on it.
Wednesday, December 07, 2005
Disgrace(s) of the Week
It's a good thing that I don't write a regular column identifying the "Disgrace of the Week". There are just too many lately to choose from. The increasingly outrageous, left-wing, anti-war Democrat party is serving up example after example at a pace too fast to document well. Here are some recent candidates:
1. Let's start at the top:
Howard Dean, Chairman of the Democratic National Committee - who made this outrageous comment this week in a radio interview, while our troops are in harm's way on a war mission authorized by the President and the Congress:
Unbelievable, that a chair of a major party would declare defeat and hoplessness less than 10 days from the major milestone that the troops have been fighting toward - the December 15th election in Iraq.
It goes without saying that he should resign. But I'll say it. He should resign. He has disgraced his party, and the rank and file of his party should call for his resignation.
2. Or maybe we should go with the man the Democrats thought should be President - Sen. John Kerry. A man who stumbles to a new position, all of them defeatist, on the war every day and who this week arrived at this disgraceful comment:
Excuse me? "...young American soldiers..." "...terrorizing kids and children...". Are you kidding me? Does he not understand how loaded the word "terrorizing" is in the current climate of the War on Terror? Of course he does, and he meant to use it. The man who made outrageous claims against our military in Vietnam is at it again. He can't help it. It's deep in his psyche to allege the most heinous behavior by our troops in the field. And a lot of you wanted him to lead our country?
John Kerry should, as well, resign. He has disgraced his party, and the rank and file of the Democrat party should call for his resignation.
3. How about the most under-reported outrage of the week. I'm talking about Ramsey Clark going to Baghdad to lead Sadaam Hussein's defense team in his war crimes trial.
Ramsey Clark, Democrat. Ramsey Clark, former Attorney General of the United States under the Democrat administration of President Lyndon Johnson. Ramsey Clark, anti-war protestor for 30 years and hero of the unhinged anti-war left. In Baghdad to defend the butcher and terror threat that we launched a war to depose.
Ramsey Clark cannot, of course, resign. Nobody elected him to anything. He should instead, be denied re-entry into the U.S. and/or tried for treason.
The shocking fact is that, in two of these three disgraceful acts, we're not talking about fringe players. Granted that Ramsey Clark falls into the Cindy Sheehan fringe left category. But Howard Dean and John Kerry are leaders of their party. The logical question is - how much more extreme and disgraceful are these leaders going to allow their hatred of George W. Bush to take them?
1. Let's start at the top:
Howard Dean, Chairman of the Democratic National Committee - who made this outrageous comment this week in a radio interview, while our troops are in harm's way on a war mission authorized by the President and the Congress:
"The idea that the United States is going to win the war in Iraq is just plain wrong,"
Unbelievable, that a chair of a major party would declare defeat and hoplessness less than 10 days from the major milestone that the troops have been fighting toward - the December 15th election in Iraq.
It goes without saying that he should resign. But I'll say it. He should resign. He has disgraced his party, and the rank and file of his party should call for his resignation.
2. Or maybe we should go with the man the Democrats thought should be President - Sen. John Kerry. A man who stumbles to a new position, all of them defeatist, on the war every day and who this week arrived at this disgraceful comment:
"And there is no reason, Bob, that young American soldiers need to be going into the homes of Iraqis in the dead of night, terrorizing kids and children, you know, women, breaking sort of the customs of the – of – the historical customs, religious customs," Kerry said Sunday. "Whether you like it or not ... Iraqis should be doing that."
Excuse me? "...young American soldiers..." "...terrorizing kids and children...". Are you kidding me? Does he not understand how loaded the word "terrorizing" is in the current climate of the War on Terror? Of course he does, and he meant to use it. The man who made outrageous claims against our military in Vietnam is at it again. He can't help it. It's deep in his psyche to allege the most heinous behavior by our troops in the field. And a lot of you wanted him to lead our country?
John Kerry should, as well, resign. He has disgraced his party, and the rank and file of the Democrat party should call for his resignation.
3. How about the most under-reported outrage of the week. I'm talking about Ramsey Clark going to Baghdad to lead Sadaam Hussein's defense team in his war crimes trial.
Ramsey Clark, Democrat. Ramsey Clark, former Attorney General of the United States under the Democrat administration of President Lyndon Johnson. Ramsey Clark, anti-war protestor for 30 years and hero of the unhinged anti-war left. In Baghdad to defend the butcher and terror threat that we launched a war to depose.
Ramsey Clark cannot, of course, resign. Nobody elected him to anything. He should instead, be denied re-entry into the U.S. and/or tried for treason.
The shocking fact is that, in two of these three disgraceful acts, we're not talking about fringe players. Granted that Ramsey Clark falls into the Cindy Sheehan fringe left category. But Howard Dean and John Kerry are leaders of their party. The logical question is - how much more extreme and disgraceful are these leaders going to allow their hatred of George W. Bush to take them?
Thursday, December 01, 2005
Democrat's Dishonorable Hindsight
If one more Democrat leader steps up to a microphone and advocates the position that we should immediately withdraw from Iraq (as House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi did this week), or that they were wrong to vote for the War there and would not have voted that way if they knew what they know now (as Sen. Hillary Clinton did), I'm gonna puke.
Both are dishonorable positions from elected leaders while we have troops in harm's way working to achieve victory in the task layed out by their Commander in Chief, and authorized by these revisionist cowards.
For the record, I do not support their assertion that the war was a mistake, is a disaster, or was entered into through lies and manipulation of intelligence. I support both the troops and their mission, Democrat claptrap notwithstanding.
Both are dishonorable positions from elected leaders while we have troops in harm's way working to achieve victory in the task layed out by their Commander in Chief, and authorized by these revisionist cowards.
For the record, I do not support their assertion that the war was a mistake, is a disaster, or was entered into through lies and manipulation of intelligence. I support both the troops and their mission, Democrat claptrap notwithstanding.
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