RADIO SILENCE

        I have a few frivolous posts on tap. Bashing the prestige press, week one in the NFL, salacious comments on actress Tiffany Limos, a tortured analogy comparing various writers to great offensive linemen and I do need to do a Captain Euro story. But following the examples of Vegard Valberg and Letter from Gotham I will maintain a respectful radio silence on 9-11. Those who should be heard do not need my frivolity distracting from their message. Those who should be ignored won't stop, but they will never learn.


        Before I depart, I will leave you with a few thoughts. Bloodthirsty barbarians committed a terrorist atrocity, killing thousands of my fellow countrymen. I will never forgive, nor forget. I will not moderate either my anger, nor desire to see their vile ideology wiped out and their supporters and cheerleaders reap their folly with interest. And I have no patience for those who follow either the spirit of Neville Chamberlain or the Vichy. Accommodation, appeasement and equviocation with evil is objectively siding with it. Ultimately, you can not be neutral between the arsonist and the fireman.

COMPARE AND CONTRAST

        Society A was built on the idea that a homeland would emancipate a dispossessed people. Regrettably, they did not consider the current inhabitants.


        Society B put their homes at risk in order to exterminate the uppity dhimni. They lost the gamble and blame everyone but themselves.


Medicine in society A:

Downstairs, before we left, the head of the hospital, an Israeli named Audrey, was showing me the children's waiting room. I couldn't help but notice, all around, an Arab woman with her son, an Arab family over there checking in, Arab children playing with the toys while waiting. The doctor saw the look on my face and laughed. "Oh, yes, we treat everyone." I guess I was astonished. She just shrugged. "We're Jews. This is how we live. It's also for the future. They're not going anywhere, and we're not going anywhere. There will eventually be peace. There has to be." When? A month? A year? A hundred years? More? She didn't know. I had to say it. You're incredible. You take everyone, you treat everyone, no one goes first, no one goes last, you just go in order of who needs help. That's, like, Mother Teresa stuff. "We're not saints, we're just doing our jobs. It's not easy, I admit. And it gets hard when they cheer when the bodies are brought in."

Medicine in society B:
        (Thanks to Charles Johnson)

A Hamas cell in Jenin was planning a double suicide bombing in Sheba Hospital in Tel Hashomer with the help of a doctor from Jenin, and a massive truck bomb that would blow up a Tel Aviv skyscraper, according to several indictments filed recently in the Samaria military court.

        Emphasis Mine.





        Society A is regularly condemned. Society B is the darling of the tout le monde.


        Those in Society B had better hope that Society A never follows their example.

THE NEW PHRENOLOGY

        From Little Green Footballs. The ever dangerous Robert Crawford comments on a bit of Paliswine onanistic fantasy.

The booklet, which sells for only NIS 2, is entitled The Koran Anticipates the Destruction of the US and the Sinking of the American Army. I'm planning a pamphlet entitled: "My Ass Predicts the Death of Thousands of Islamic Fascists". In ten years we'll come back and compare results. I bet my ass predicts the future better than the Koran.

        I've heard of talking out of your butt...

        It does put an interesting light on the saying 'never write a check with your mouth your ass can't cash.

KNOW WHAT I MEME?

        Folks, here's an early alert for the next idiotarian conspiracy bullshit meme down the pike. I spotted this posting on Free Republic of this Ha'aretz article.

The Bank of Israel has obtained information that several accounts held in Israeli banks may have been used to fund terrorist activities. However, because of banking secrecy laws, the central bank has not handed details over to the Justice Ministry.

        OK, looks pretty straight forward. There are a few ways to look at it. Israel is, contrary to the idiotarians' propaganda, not quite the police state they portray it if the bank secrecy laws protect the terrorist. Also terrorism needs cash. During the post 9-11 investigation, ATM surveillance footage of Atta was uncovered. On at least one occasion he was glaring into the camera as an expected transference of funds failed.


        Also Arab Israelis have been caught aiding the Palestinian terrorists. So it is likely this is one of the accounts used. Even more interesting, when you think about it, is that the terrorists do not trust Arab financial institutions, preferring to use Western conduits.


        Why bring this up? Well, here are the money paragraphs.

In October 2001, in the wake of the September 11 attacks on the United States, the Supervisor of Banks, Yitzhak Tal, ordered all banks in Israel to screen their customers' bank accounts and reports to him any account or financial activity of persons suspected of terrorist activity or connections with terrorists. The accounts were screened for persons and organizations appearing on a list published by U.S. authorities in accordance with a presidential decree issued shortly after the attacks.         After completing screening of the accounts at the end of 2001, the banks handed over their findings to Tal. Several suspicious accounts and financial transactions were found. The Bank of Israel has confirmed the existence of accounts believed to have been connected to the financing of terrorist operations but refused to state how many suspect accounts had been uncovered and to which terrorist organizations they were connected.

        Now, look again at the FR posting. The person who posted the article is a well known Israel basher on FR who delights in finding anything either negative or misrepresentable about the Jewish state. And who has comment number 3? Yep. Justin Raimondo of 'antiwar.com.' In other words an underboss in the neo-isolationist wing of the 'hate America and death to Israel' mafia.


        If you re-read carefully the two paragraphs above, you will notice the dog that did not bark which in Justin's ears sounds like the hound of the Baskervilles. (2 point ref, but only for the first part of the analogy). There is no mention of which groups were involved or who they were targeting. It is as likely, if not more so, that these accounts, if they were for terrorism, were against Israelis, not Americans. As my contracts professor loved to say, 'There's less here than meets the eye."


        Of course, such inconvenient reality means little to Justin, who, when last heard from, was making an ass out of... well, not you and me, because we know he's a clymer who is full of chomsky, but himself and his fellow lemmings over the 'Israeli art student spy ring.' (Oh, by the way, the real story is not spying. It's about young Israelis, who have a free year after serving in the Tzahal, travel abroad. And they need money while travelling, so they sell artwork. Years before I heard of antiwar.com, I read an article about Israeli tourists in Japan who sold paintings to the locals. Sorry I can't quite recall where I saw the article, but it was either in the Jerusalem Post Magazine, or Jerusalem Report. But I digress.)


        You know he's going to spin a sinister involvement of Sharon sending money for nefarious, cabalistic schemes in the US. Why, in Justin's fevered mind, he's already writing this up as the smoking gun! They'll want to create some excitement since their beloved 'martyrs' have been conspicuously unsuccessful in murdering Israelis lately. So get ready for the next round of taurine scatology from these freakaziods.

OH GODS, BOOK 1!

        Congratulations to Neil Gaiman for winning the Hugo for best novel for American Gods.  If Bujold's Curse of Chalion had to lose, at least it lost to the best.  Anyhow, as Tyler Stewart, proprieter of Pandemonium, pointed out, Lois has enough Hugos as is!

        I was at the Millenium Philcon, when the Hugo went to the Harry Potter book. People left the presentation snarling with anger. I’m glad to see a winner everybody can get behind.

        Analogy time. American Gods is to Neverwhere as Casino is to Goodfellas.

        And speaking of movies, Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Rings won Hugo the Best Dramatic Presentation.

        Gee. What an upset.

FIGHT FEEBLEY HARVARD!

        Schadenfruede unbound!  Harvard Law has just discovered the joys of discovering Uncle Sam's purse strings tend to turn the recipient into a marionette.  The school has been forced to allow military on campus.  Previously, the services were barred from Harvard, ostensibly to protest the 'don't ask don't tell' policy.  This replaces the earlier bans, ostensibly because of the Vietnam War, the Cold War, etc.

        So, what changed their minds?  Two words: 'Filthy lucre.'  See, there's a 6 year old federal statute, known as the Solomon Amendment (Look for Pub. L. 104-208), which cuts off all of f all of Uncle Sam's do-re-mi if a college or university discriminates against military recruiters or ROTC. As the amendment says...

"None of the funds made available in this or any other Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act for any fiscal year may be provided by contract or by grant (including a grant of funds to be available for student aid) to a covered educational entity if the Secretary of Defense determines that the covered educational entity has a policy or practice (regardless of when implemented) that either prohibits, or in effect, prevents . . . access by military recruiters for purposes of Federal military recruiting. . . ."

        From the article...

        In an emotional letter to students and faculty, Clark wrote that under the threat of enormous financial loss, the greater good of the university would have to override the law school's stance against discrimination and the military's ''don't ask, don't tell'' policy. The decision is expected to influence policy at other law schools.


        "I have personally struggled with this issue," Clark wrote. "At the same time, most of us reluctantly accept the reality that this University cannot afford the loss of federal funds.... To say that this decision is just about money trivializes the significance these funds have on students' educations, faculty careers, and scientific research that can lead to cures to life-threatening illnesses and debilitating diseases."

        To coin a phrase... BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

        Sorry, Dean, but the PC movement has done a tremendous job in trivializing education. And frankly I don't respect your trivializing the services merely because you and your narrow minded ilk disapprove of their policies.



        Of course the trivials are not taking this lying down. The Harvard hooligans want to keep discriminating to protest discrimination. According to the Crimson...

"Lambda board member Lindsay Harrison said last night that the group will protest the Defense Department policy by, for example, filling all interview slots with its members when military recruiters come to the campus."

        Heaven forbid students should be exposed to actual diversity.

        But it's not only in Cambridge that the Soloman Amendment is desipsed. South of the Charles in Boston College - the Jesuit institution historically best known for point shaving, a misandronist professor and drunken louts staggering out of off limit bars, has an orbaization dedicatied to the repeal of the amendment.


        And then there is this article by Sean Roaney a Washington School of Law 2L.

Further clouding the amendment's future is the fact that certain states, including virtually every state in the northeastern United States, have enacted state civil rights legislation banning discrimination against gays and lesbians. Compliance with the amendment, therefore, requires that law schools in these states directly contravene their own state law.

        Sean clearly needs to re-check his Con Law notes. There's no conflict. When a state statute and a federal law are at loggerheads, Uncle Sam wins.

As Representative Solomon opines, however, these laws are of little importance. These states, he reasons, can merely amend their legislation to allow for military recruitment. Amendment opponents do not find this a palatable option, however, and continue to hope that the Supreme Court will eventually overturn the military policy.

        Highly unlikely. The 'don't ask, don't tell' policy is itself a compromise and the current court makeup will not interfere so deeply with military policy during wartime.


        Anyhow, as a wise man said, every doctor needs to be a patient at some point, every law professors need to know what it feels like to be smacked with the club of laws used for social engineering ends. If it's good enough for the high school students of Southie and Roxbury, it's good enough for the law students in the Ivies.

        Still, with apologies to Tom Lehrer...

        Fight feebly Harvard! Faint, faint faint!

        Impress them with our cowardice... do!

        Faint in Harvard's disgrace and shame!

        We're just unworthy of your name!

        (Oh poopie!)

        Okay. Weird Al, I ain't.

UPDATE

        Maggie Gallagher chimes in, unfavorably comparing craven Crimson to the Augusta National Golf Club’s defiance in turning down advertising revenue rather than acceding to the National Council of Women's Organizations’ demands that they grant immediate membership, to women in their club. William ‘Hootie’ Johnson declared, "We are sorry, but not surprised, to see [the sponsors] drawn into this matter but continue to insist that our private club should not be 'managed' by an outside group. "

DRAFT BEERS AND DRAFT PLAYERS DO NOT MIX!

        One note on my fantasy draft. While I firmly believe my team is solid, I darn near made a fatal error thanks to the quintet of Yuengling beers I consumed that afternoon. I drafted two quarterbacks (Donovan McNabb and Jim Miller) with the same bye week. Fortunately I traded Miller for a pick I used on Mark Brunell.

I'M SO SORRY!

        You kinda noticed the lack of updates... Sorry. I have an excuse, or rather a whole slew of them. Most of them are not very good.

        First was the bar. I stopped blogging while cramming my skull full of relevant information. Then came the period of recovery.

        As soon as my brain recovered, my body took a blow as a persistent flu bug knocked me out for a week. Then weekends at the Cape with my family, job hunting and drafting my fantasy football team came into play. Oh and three dates in as many weeks with three different women.

• I rendezvoused with Margaret in NYC while traveling down to State College PA for the draft.
  
• Ashi, a graduate student in Rhode Island; we spent an afternoon in Providence.
  
• Linda whom I took out to 'Blue Man.' (Of course, the next day she sent me a 'You're nice, but not that interesting' email. I guess flying toilet paper and Captain Crunch do not a romantic evening make.)
  
  

        Sadly, a good many of my comments have fallen by the wayside. Some were overtaken by events. Others have been dealt with far better by others, like Howard Bashman's excellent attack on the egregious use of polling data by the majority in ATKINS v. VIRGINIA. The Court is supposed to be isolated from the passions of the populace! That's the way the founders designed it!

        I also was thinking of writing about how many Congressional liberals are exceptionally wealthy and relating it to an article in USA Today regarding a disturbing trend of the children of the wealthy eschewing traditional summer jobs for glamorous internships. These kids will become the next ruling class without having actually known what drudgery for an for a dollar is like. Call it cliched, but they do build character.

        Speaking of character, there was this little bit of horror that appeared in the Boston Globe. (It's at the very bottom and I read the article when it originally appeared, wiseguys!) Folks, I've read too much about my representative and the function of male member, thank you very much.

        One incident I do need to relate. Here in Boston we are extremely fortunate to be a regular port of call for the Navy. When the ships are in port the Navy lets visitors board and see what Uncle Sam uses their tax dollars for. I have toured a frigate, a cruiser and destroyers. (The line for the aircraft carrier John. F. Kennedy was too darn long.)

        This time I went to see the USS Kearsarge, a Wasp class amphibious assault ship. Now I always carry my Swiss Army knife, but I am prepared to ditch it as needed. So I come to the ship and see they have a metal detector and a warning that anything they find that violates security will be confiscated. I asked if I could check my knife. The guard was angrily adamant. Even if I voluntarily gave them the knife with no prompting, they would confiscate it. Now I remember being able to carry the knife around the Capitol dome, with the full knowledge and blessing of the security people therein. But that was long before 9/11 empowered the 'tweezer people.' Now I couldn't leave the knife in my vehicle because I did not take any vehicle down. My bike was in the shop and I didn't want to drive downtown. So I took my knife and hid it in some weeds. The guard did not want to know and I was passed through without comment.

        I could forgive the guard for being curt. Unlike the mental midgets of the airways, they were doing their jobs in a reasonable manner. I had a problem with a specific rule. So I was not going to give him any unpleasantness, even if he were not well armed and backed up by grim faced sailors toting M-16s.

        The tour was well worth the trouble. I climbed aboard an LCAC, looked at guns and other equipment and talked to sailors and marines. I especially want to thank Private Goldman (USMC) for answering my idiotic questions, especially about the grenade launchers. And I did find the discussion about whether a sniper rifle could take out windows of the planes at Logan to be fascinating.

        Oh yeah. It was a guy thing.

        Two more notes before I vanish. Despite my absence, my page has been getting regular hits. But most of them have been about 'Frontier House' or Ben Grimm's recent revelation. Go figure. But I do need to update Jewish Marvels soon.

        Also here's my fantasy team lineup- current as of this writing.

COOL FACTOR NOTED; LET'S PROCEED. (3 point ref)

        Japanese engineers testing a new supersonic jet design encounter a minor setback.

NASTY COMMENTS

• Not with a bang, but a whimper.
  
• Senator McCain is never afraid to be the only Republican standing among Democrats. Witness the Keating five.
  
• Daltrey and Townshend are releasing a new album. Its title is Who’s Left?
  
• When anyone says we can not define terror or that one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter, I will suggest they're against the law. Literally. 22 U.S.C. 38 §2656F(d)(2)
  
  

TORO! TORO! TORO!

        “For there is surely nothing more beautiful in this world than the sight
of a lone man facing single-handedly a half a ton of angry pot roast!”

Tom Leher.

        The photographer was never in danger, apparently. But nobody seems to care about the poor schmuck whose shirt the bull has on its horns!

QUALITY, NOT QUANTITY.

       One reason my blogging is minimal (aside from time constraints) is that I want to try to be at least minimally original, instead of citing the same articles the rest of the warblogers do. And I care that I say things well. So that means I do bupkus.

        Here was one overdue issue posting. Prior to the speech where Bush called for Yassir to take the golden handshake, my main worry was not necessarily what he would say, but how the world would interpret his words. Specifically, I was afraid the Palestinians would see it as a vindication of their terror tactics.

        Judging from the snarls, yowls and whines from the Arabs and their chattering class enablers, I need not have worried. The Guardian, New York Times, Washington Post and Saudis all hate the president's declaration. Obviously it's a winner.

        As the cliché goes, "When you're up to your ass in alligators, it's hard to remember the first objective was to drain the swamp." Well, the Palligators (unique among crocodilians for their venomous nature) are distracting Bush's corps of engineers from draining the Axis of Evil Swamp. Were I a more conspiratorially minded man, I would say the House of Sod financed this upswing to distract from their 79% responsibility for 9/11. They point to their beloved homicide bombers and say to the US 'Solve this first.' (And it helps to distract their souk suckers from the debacle in Afghanistan as well.)

        So, Bush offered a solution. That the solution is unacceptable to anyone in position to negotiate is immaterial. No longer will they sell the same camel for new concessions. No more will their constant bad faith negotiations continue. Even if they do reject Bush's conditions for statehood, it is clear he is washing his hands of the Pals and moving on.

        The Palestinians should take a cue from the ideals of Zionism. Hetzel wanted to make the Jews 'A nation like any other. That dream must become their reality. No more disproportionate attention to the Pals and no more special leeway given to aid their genocidal quests. Let them deal with the consequences of their folly or reap the rewards of their courageous change. Either way it's long past time to move on

THE BEST THING ABOUT THE WORLD CUP....

HECKLER'S VETO OVERRIDE

        Cant Watch needs to learn to enjoy schadenfreude. Noting, and approving of, the suspension of the organization of the kaffeya wearing brownshirts at San Francisco State University, Erin O`Connor decries the removal of their hate filled web site from the server.

My point? We have to defend the expression of groups like GUPS if we want to be sure our own expression is protected. These are tough truths to swallow when one is on the wrong end of bigoted and nasty expression, but they are the truths we have to swallow if we are to preserve the liberty that makes our lives so preciously free.

        Well, the way I see it is…

1. Speech codes are wrong.
   
2. The campus left supports speech codes.
   
3. The speech codes are not applied to the campus left, or anyone who is not white and straight
   
4. We (meaning the non-PC crowd) need to apply the speech codes to the PC gang with the vigor of Vern Schillinger initiating his newest prag. (2 point ref)
   

        This way, you assail their hypocrisy, while forcing them to chose between their causes and censorship. These Hamans built the gallows. Let their sorry hides swing from it.


        The free speech of the General Union of Palestine Students is a modest sacrifice for a world with no speech codes.

INSIDE BASEBALL AND NOT THE BOSOX

        Here in Massachusetts, the Dems control the state, even with a GOPer in the corner office (meaning Governor. There is no governor’s mansion here in Massachusetts). Though we’ve had a run of Republican governors, they’ve been either had one eye on a better job, or a head firmly up their butts. Most of the GOP establishment in the Commonwealth consists of what I call ‘Vichy Republicans’ who try to out Dem the Dems.

        Now with Mitt Romney seeming to revive the Mass GOP, plus dissatisfaction with the two Toms (Birmingham and Finneran) who essentially run this state, the Dems are getting desperate and nasty, trying to beat him in the court house and not the ballot booth (usual Democrat tactics). All I can say is the people who scream about Mitt’s working in Utah have driven many people to New Hampshire.

        At least is has been hurting them in the polls.

UPDATE: The panel has ruled the Romney meets the residency requirements! Now if we can only get democracy into the State House of Representatives and Senate.

ARRRRGGGGHHH!

        Bush tries to appease the jackals again. How many times will we fall for their bait-and switch before saying 'screw `em.' and leaving them to rot in their cesspool.

        One in his speech I found particularly risible.

The Palestinian people are gifted and capable...

        Yeah, but only when it comes to murdering children.

        Update: The Pals and their Arab bretheren are not happy with the speech, which, on second reading and more careful consideration was much better.then I had believed. More later. (Hopefully)

OVERDUE UPDATE

        Sorry, but between work and the bar review class, I've not been able to do squat. Sunday is my one free day and last Sunday I was comatose and this one I had a wedding (and the less said about that, the better...). Gomen, Gomen!

AN APOLOGY IN ADAVNCE

        Folks, blogging is going to be erratic at best, non-existent at worst for the next month or so. See, I'm studying for the bar. That means four hours of classes Monday through Friday 6-10 PM. Plus I work Tuesday through Saturday on the night shift 11 PM -7 AM. Sunday I sleep.

        One incident I should mention. The lecturer on Contracts is a blond guy from the University of Alabama who speaks with a broad southern accent. His name is David Epstein. I am not joking. Professor Epstein used some quintessentially Dixie illustrations as examples. Any time Uniform Commercial Code Section 2, which as we all know deals with the sale of goods, was discussed, the sale of grits would be involved.

        The problem was when he had to use an example for consideration with a preexisting statutory or contractual duty rule. He used a Kinky Friedman concert for his example. Now I'm not a huge fan of 'The Kinkster,' but I have heard of him. However, during a break, apparently (I saw the taped lecture), several people went up to complain about the example, convinced that he was using an anti-Semitic slur. The professor assured the listeners that the Kinkster was a real person. He also added that he was glad he did not mention the singer's backup band 'The Texas Jewboys.'

        Some people.

SKAKEL THOUGHTS

Even a Kennedy is not immune to justice, unless his last name is Kennedy. Then he’s scot free!

SINCE I CAN'T DO A REAL UPDATE...

Someone needs a leave desperately!