on the morning of Thursday, April 10, 2003, Donald Rumsfeld’s Pentagon prepared a top-secret briefing for George W. Bush. This document, known as the Worldwide Intelligence Update, was a daily digest of critical military intelligence so classified that it circulated among only a handful of Pentagon leaders and the president; Rumsfeld himself often delivered it, by hand, to the White House. The briefing’s cover sheet generally featured triumphant, color images from the previous days’ war efforts: On this particular morning, it showed the statue of Saddam Hussein being pulled down in Firdos Square, a grateful Iraqi child kissing an American soldier, and jubilant crowds thronging the streets of newly liberated Baghdad. And above these images, and just below the headline secretary of defense, was a quote that may have raised some eyebrows. It came from the Bible, from the book of Psalms: “Behold, the eye of the Lord is on those who fear Him…To deliver their soul from death.”
[…..]
Referring to Bush and Cheney, Rumsfeld said, “I wanted them to have fun.”
But at the end of the ceremony, the president could be seen climbing into his sedan, wearing an expression that one could interpret any number of ways: guilt, disappointment, self-loathing, a general sadness. Not “fun,” however.
From beginning to end, the Rumsfeld experience was never that.
Category: Quote of the Day
Quote of the Day
According to the National Intelligence Estimate of 2007, Iran
halted its weapons program in 2003. Nor are there any reports of
the diversion of Iran’s industrial-grade uranium from Natanz or
evidence of any secret centrifuge cascade to enrich it to weapons
grade.According to the Los Angeles Times, the EastWest Institute of
Russian and U.S. scientists says Tehran is “at least six years away
from building a deliverable nuclear weapon,” and a Rand Corp. study
says that Iran’s “ability to wreak havoc in the Middle East through
surrogates is exaggerated.”Iran represents no threat to the United States to justify a war.
And as Korea finished Harry Truman, Vietnam finished LBJ, and Iraq
finished the Bush Republicans, war with Iran would make Barack —
with the situations in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iraq all
deteriorating — a one-term president.Barack had best understand. The crowd manipulating him into war
with Iran has in mind, first, obliterating Iran; second, getting
rid of him.
Quotes of the Day
If we are to restore the principles of religious liberty, it will be necessary for State governments–and for Christian people in particular–to stand united against an ever-growing, ever-menacing federal leviathan that is intent on destroying the safeguards and foundations of a once-proud constitutional republic, which was, after all, rooted and founded upon Christian principles.
His evidence for this claim is two quotes by Rush Limbaugh. One saying Obama’s instincts on terrorists are wrong; the other saying that Obama is, with his policies, hurting America. There is no statement that seems strong enough to justify Frum’s assertion. Limbaugh seems to be using the same tone parents often take with their children when they’re engaged in self-destructive activities – ‘Do you want that shelf to fall on your head? Keep pulling it.’ His statement seems more hypothetical than anything else. If anything, Frum’s willingness to attribute Rush’s statement to ODS is evidence of his own crusade to caricature Limbaugh as a political Snidely Whiplash tying up the GOP’s future and placing it on the train tracks.
However, what’s most ridiculous about Frum’s statement is his belief that “no prominent liberal figure” ever accused the Bush administration of wanting to harm America.
Quote of the Day
A party defines itself by what it stands for, and what it stands against. After the Bush era, the Republican Party has been given the opportunity to redeem and redefine itself—in opposition to a party and a president who are further left than any in American history.
A true conservative party would relish such an opportunity.
After all, the Goldwater young did not lie down and die after a defeat far more crushing than the one the party suffered last fall.
Is this Republican Party made of similar stuff?
Quote of the Day
It is for good reason that many Christians (and non-Christians, for that matter) are looking twice at modern military service. In fact, a retired high-ranking military officer (whose name I will not divulge) recently told me, “Chuck, there is no way I could recommend that anyone volunteer in the U.S. military today.”
Obviously, we have a host of honorable men and women of sound character and conviction still serving in both the U.S. military and in various law enforcement agencies. Thank God!
It is also obvious, however, that the powers that be are quickly “remaking” (to use Barack Obama’s word) our military and law enforcement agencies into an image never desired or designed by America’s Founding Fathers. Thus, the conflict between good men and bad policies will only worsen. And many will continue to question the wisdom of giving their sons and daughters to modern military service.
On the other hand, an argument could be made that it is at such a time as this that good men are all the more needed in the U.S. military and in law enforcement. That is a very valid argument, by the way: as long as those good men realize what they will be required to risk when their superiors order them to surrender allegiance to the Constitution or to sacred principle. But then again, we are all required to share in that risk, are we not?
….
In 21st century America, race discrimination endures.
All we have done is switch the color of the victims with the color of the beneficiaries. Today it is white males applying for jobs and promotions as cops, firemen, government workers, who are held back because their color does not comport with the desired “diversity.”
What New Haven has done to Frank Ricci is like the U.S. Olympic Committee throwing out all the trial heat results in the 100- and 200-meter races because not a single white runner qualified.
New Haven contends the “disparate impact” of the test hurts the black community, proving discrimination. But does the relative absence of blacks in the National Hockey League prove discrimination?
If the Republican Party wants a future, it will become again the party that stands on the principle that “No discrimination means no discrimination,” that stands with the victims of state bigotry, and that stands up to hypocrites like the Jim Crow liberals of New Haven.
Affirmative action began as a mandate to cast a wider net and ensure all had an equal shot. It has become a mighty engine of state injustice that seeks to remedy the consequences of past racial sins and crimes, by committing new ones.
In Michigan, Washington and California, none of them red states, majorities have voted to abolish affirmative action. Only Colorado failed in a dead heat last fall. A Republican drive to write into federal law an end to all race and gender preferences, as well as to all race and gender discrimination, is a cause whose time has
come.This is a winning issue for the GOP, for it is rooted in principle and comports with what is written on the human heart. Down deep, even liberals know that what is being done to Frank Ricci is not right.
Quote of the Day
His beef with President Obama: Liberals and progressives aren’t getting much face time. “He turns his back on people who have nowhere to go politically but to support him,” — “And that’s a very bad sign.” — “You don’t spend trillions of dollars with a massive detour of that money at Wall Street. You’ve got to go to the communities”
Quote of the Day
The Internet is the last best source of free and independent information left. Think where the liberty movement would be without the Internet. But even as we speak, President Obama and his allies in Congress are attempting to obtain the authority to censor information on–and curtail access to–the Internet. Plus, in the name of “cybersecurity,” they are plotting to obtain the authority to monitor and seize anyone’s personal computer at will.
Quotes of the Day
Americans are divided.
“Rendition,” a film based on a true story, where an innocent man suspected of belonging to a terrorist cell is sent to an Arab country and tortured, won rave reviews.
But more popular was “Taken,” a film in which Liam Neeson, an ex-spy, has a daughter kidnapped by white slavers in Paris, whom he tortures for information to rescue her and bring her home.
Certainly, Cheney and Bush, who make no apologies for what they authorized to keep America safe for seven and a half years, should be held to account. But so, too, should Barack Obama, if U.S. citizens die in a terror attack the CIA might have prevented, had its interrogators not been tied to an Army Field Manual written for dealing with soldiers, not al-Qaida killers who favor “soft targets” such as subways, airliners and office buildings.
Quote of the Day
The New York Times Company also has a major problem with the Boston Globe, which Sulzberger bought back in 1993. That paper is on the verge of bankruptcy and recently told its employees that it will cut their pay and health benefits. Since the Times and the Globe are big on “universal” health care, that caused some giggling in anti-Times precincts.
Over the past few months, newspapers in Chicago, Seattle, Minneapolis and Denver have either folded or filed for bankruptcy. With the exception of The Rocky Mountain News, all the papers were committed left-wing enterprises. The truth is that most Americans are traditional-minded folks; they believe their country is noble, they want respectful discourse. Fanaticism of any kind is not the American way.
The New York Times is most definitely a committed left-wing concern that is openly contemptuous of the conservative, traditional point-of-view. That is the primary reason the paper may soon dissolve. And all the cash in Carlos Slim’s fat wallet is not going to change that.
*****
Rooted people love the things of the heart: God, country, family and faith. The weapons of the mind have been given to us, they believe, to defend the things of the heart.
Knowledge follows love; it does not precede it.
Most Americans have grown to love America long before they read the Constitution, or the Federalist Papers. There are heroes in Arlington who never learned to read. A true nation is an extended family. If fathers or sons do not defend it, it is their conduct that is indefensible.
Obama may be popular today, but he will lose the country and his presidency if he lets the perception take hold that he, the personification of American sovereignty, does not react as a normal patriot.
The Obamaites may not like Sarah Palin’s phraseology. But they need someone in their councils who is rooted in the Real America.
Quote of the Day
Over $4 million a DAY is spent to incarcerate illegal aliens; 29% of all prison inmates are illegal aliens; 13 Americans are killed EVERY DAY by drunk-driving illegal aliens; Latino gangs, such as MS-13 and the 18th Street Gang, are now found in at least 37 states; and in New Mexico, nearly half of jail and prison inmates are illegal aliens.
Additionally, FreeRepublic.com recently released FBI statistics showing that 95% of warrants for murder in Los Angeles during the First Quarter of 2006 were for illegal aliens. 83% of warrants for murder in Phoenix were for illegal aliens. In Albuquerque the percentage was 86%. The Most Wanted lists in those three cities found that 75% were illegal aliens. In the southern Border States, illegal aliens perpetrated 53% of all investigated burglaries. Plus, 71% of all apprehended stolen cars in Border States were stolen by illegal aliens.
Furthermore, according to Congressman Steve King (R-Iowa), illegal aliens murder 12 American citizens EVERY DAY. Put that murder statistic in perspective: illegal aliens murder more Americans EVERY YEAR than the total number of U.S. soldiers that have been killed in Iraq in over 5 years of fighting.
In addition, according to Dr. Deborah Schurman-Kauflin of the Violent Crimes Institute (VCI), “there are approximately 240,000 illegal immigrant sex offenders in the United States. This translates to 93 sex offenders and 12 serial sexual offenders coming across U.S. borders illegally per day.” According to Dr. Schurman-Kauflin, illegals “averaged 4 victims per offender. Nearly 63% had been deported on another offense prior to the sex crime.”Dr. Schurman-Kauflin concludes her report saying, “Illegal immigrants who commit sex crimes first cross the U.S. border illegally. Then they gradually commit worse crimes and are continually released back into society or deported. Those who were deported simply returned illegally again. Only 2% of the offenders in this study has no history of criminal behavior, beyond crossing the border illegally. There is a clear pattern of criminal escalation. From misdemeanors such as assault or DUI, to drug offenses, illegal immigrants who commit sex crimes break U.S. laws repeatedly. They are highly mobile, work in low skilled jobs with their hands, use drugs and alcohol, are generally promiscuous, have little family stability, and choose victims who are easy to attack. Their attacks are particularly brutal, and they use a hands-on method of controlling and/or killing their victims.”
Mind you, this is only a small sampling of the carnage, both fiscally and criminally, that illegal aliens inflict upon America. And yet, G.W. Bush, John McCain, and Barack Obama still desire to provide amnesty and permanent U.S. citizenship to illegal aliens. And unless the American people again rise up to defeat these forthcoming amnesty proposals, that is exactly what will happen.
