Judge to Rule Monday on Wash. Governor

WENATCHEE, Wash. - The political fate of Washington Gov. Christine Gregoire hangs in the balance this weekend while a small-town judge decides whether her paper-thin victory was valid.

In a possible attempt to challenge the filibuster "truce", Bush Poised to Nominate Dozens for Judgeships.

Not just Tom Delay, but Democrats Also Got Tribal Donations.

MS-13 Suspected in Attack

By Tom Jackman, Washington Post Staff Writer

A group believed to be members of a violent street gang, at least two of them wielding machetes, chased and then slashed an 18-year-old Springfield man Sunday night, an attack that Fairfax County police did not disclose until it was revealed in court documents yesterday.

Darfur's Real Problem

The Washington Post has a fairly even-handed editorial piece on the Darfur situation.

Iranian smuggling ring busted near Mex border

You haven't seen this reported on by the MSM:
Feds believe man brought 60 from terrorist state into U.S.

A smuggling ring specializing in bringing Iranians into the U.S. over the Mexico border has been broken up in an FBI sting operation.

A 39-year-old Iranian with permanent legal residency status who is suspected of having smuggled 60 other Iranians into the U.S. was arrested Thursday in Mesa, Ariz., according to the U.S. Attorney's Office."

Full story at WorldNetDaily

TALES OF HORROR FROM THE AMERICAN GULAG

Bill at INDC JOURNAL writes about the "TALES OF HORROR FROM THE AMERICAN GULAG."

"Now that Amnesty International has declared Gitmo the 'gulag of our time,' the terrible stories are leaking out," he writes.

Go read about the terrible stories.

Judge Luttig

Hugh Hewitt thinks Judge Luttig is a very likely nominee to replace Chief Justice Rehnquist whose retirement might be imminent.

Judge Luttig: Indispensable Freedom
"Even in a society of laws, one of the most indispensable freedoms is that to express in the most impassioned terms the most passionate disagreement with the laws themselves, the institutions of and created by, law, and the individual officials with whom the laws and the institutions are entrusted. Without the freedom to criticize that which constrains, there is no freedom at all."
--- Judge Michael Luttig
Rice v. Palladin (4th Circuit, 1997)

Hugh also thinks Judge John Roberts would likely be the choice for the second spot should there be a second spot on the Supreme Court.

Confirmthem thinks Judge Michael W. McConnell could be President Bush's choice.

EU constitution nears meltdown / David R. Sands
European leaders yesterday scrambled to prevent a political implosion as the Netherlands became the second country in four days to reject an ambitious new constitution for the 25-nation bloc.

'No' votes harmful to euro, good news for U.S. dollar / Patrice Hill
The U.S. dollar is getting a boost from the slide in the euro caused by voters' resounding rejection of a European constitution in France and the Netherlands.


Black caucus retreats on 527s / Brian DeBose
Some members of the Congressional Black Caucus are teaming up with conservative Republicans to push for the first major changes in the 2002 campaign-finance reform bill, most admitting that they made a mistake in voting for the bill three years ago.

McCain Helps Democrats Drive America Left

Terence P. Jeffrey, Human Events

Liberal Democrats still have a grip on the steering wheel

Nuclear Option Still on the Table

Sen. Orrin G. Hatch, Human Events

Deal may be a truce, but it is not a treaty

Call Them the Sellout Seven

Mark R. Levin, Human Events

McCain & Co. abandon the GOP on judicial nominees

Take John on, Bill, or Get off the Playground

Patrick J. Buchanan, Human Events

Does Frist have the guts to challenge McCain?

Don't Let Dems Veto Bush's Judicial Picks

Linda Chavez, Human Events

Compromise asks President to consult with Senate on judges

Poll Shows Majority Support Personal Accounts

New Cato Poll Shows Majority Support Personal Accounts

"Most likely voters continue to support President Bush's proposal to let younger workers invest some of their Social Security payroll taxes through personal accounts, a new survey finds," the Washington Times reports.

"The poll by independent pollster John Zogby for the Cato Institute, which is being released today, found that when voters understood the benefits of personal investment accounts, including a better financial rate of return than the current system, the Bush plan was supported by 52 percent of Americans and opposed by 40 percent."

Oopsie...........

TV reporter squashes baby squirrel
Steps on cuddly creature while doing story on rodent's adoption by cat
--Glasgow Daily Record, Scotland

Call Me a Skeptic, if You Wish

From WND

Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas said in an interview aired in the U.S. yesterday the era of Palestinian suicide bombings may be over and the culture of violence is changing in the Middle East.

I need proof.

The French's E.U. Non

To be honest, I'm not devastated that the French voters threw the EU into turmoil. The birth and confirmation of the EU into reality if and when it happens will only put us one step closer to the "perfect world order" of the much awaited "world government" that both the UN and the left subscribe to.

But, before we get carried away with this newly found moralistic insight that the French have recently discovered enabling them to see the folly in the idea of the EU, let's note the two primary reasons that they voted it down:
(1) The present constitution of the EU upon which they are voting, isn't leftist enough for them, and,
(2) they are not happy with Frances "limited" role in the EU, which has diminished to some degree over the course of time as they shaped it into what it is today.

Gulag ?

Excerpts from:

General slams Amnesty report

By Audrey Hudson
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
May 30, 2005

Gen. Richard B. Myers yesterday condemned as "absolutely irresponsible" an Amnesty International report that compared prisoner treatment at Guantanamo Bay to the Soviet gulag, adding that 100 out of 68,000 detainees held in the war against terrorism were abused.

"It's very small compared to the population of detainees we've handled," said Gen. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. He also noted that many of the abuses have produced courts-martial and other punishments.

The London-based human rights organization called the U.S. facility in Guantanamo Bay "the gulag of our time," comparing it to the Soviet Union's slave-labor camps where millions of people died.

Amnesty International also suggested that foreign governments investigate senior U.S. officials involved in "torture scandals" and arrest and question Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, former CIA Director William Tenet, and Vice President Dick Cheney.

"I think it's irresponsible. I think it's absolutely irresponsible," Gen. Myers told "Fox News Sunday."

"I think I'd ask them to go look up the definition of gulag as commonly understood. We've had 68,000 detainees since this conflict against violent extremism started. We've had 325 investigations into alleged abuse. We've had 100 cases of substantiated abuse and there are 100 individuals that have had some sort of action taken, either court-martial or administrative action," Gen. Myers said.

Natan Sharansky, a former Soviet dissident sentenced to the gulag, also criticized the Guantanamo comparison, telling Time magazine this week that the Amnesty report lacks credibility.

"I have very serious criticisms of Amnesty. There is no moral clarity. It doesn't differentiate between what I call fear societies and free societies," Mr. Sharansky said.

"In the democratic world, there are violations of human rights, but they are revealed and dealt with. In a fear society, there are no violations of human rights because human rights just don't exist," said Mr. Sharansky, who now lives in Israel and has served in its parliament and Cabinet. "Amnesty International says it doesn't support or oppose any political system, so it ends up with reports that show a moral equivalence" among regimes.

"But here's the question that needs to be debated by everybody, and that is: How do you handle people who aren't part of a nation-state effort, that are picked up on the battlefield, that if you release them or let them go back to their home countries, they would turn right around and try to slit our throats, our children's throats?" Gen. Myers said.

"We struggle with how to handle them. But we've always handled them humanely and with the dignity that they should be accorded," Gen. Myers said.

(All emphasis is added - H.H.)

"It will take a long time to prepare peoples and governments of most nations for acceptance of and participation in a world government ... we will have to be willing to work patiently until peoples or governments are ready for it."

--- Ambassador Warren Austin, Chief of the US Mission to the UN, United Nations World (1949)

"The kindergarten ... has a significant part to play in the child's education. Not only can it correct many of the errors of home training... it can prepare the child ... for membership in the world society ... As long as the child breathes the poisoned air of nationalism, education in world-mindedness can produce only precarious results ... it is most frequently in the family that the children are Infected with nationalism."

--- UNESCO propaganda, Towards World Understanding Vol. 5 (1949)

"The American people will never knowingly adopt Socialism, but under the name of 'liberalism,' they will adopt every fragment of the Socialist program until one day America will be a Socialist nation without knowing it happened."

--- Norman Thomas (1884-1968), Socialist Party's Presidential candidate 1928-48 (1948)

"[Teachers should] teach about the various proposals that have been made for the strengthening of the United Nations and the establishment of a world citizenship and world government."

--- William Carr, NEA Associate Secretary writing in the NEA Journal (1947)

"To achieve world government, it is necessary to remove from the minds of men their individualism, loyalty to family tradition, national patriotism, and religious dogmas... The re-interpretation and eventual eradication of the concept of right and wrong which has been the basis of child training, the substitution of intelligent and rational thinking for faith in the certainties of the old people, these are the belated objectives... for charting the changes in human behavior."

--- George Brock Chisholm (1896-1971), head of the World Health Organization, Psychiatry (1946)

"In the struggle to establish an adequate world government, the teacher... can do much to prepare the hearts and minds of children for global understanding and cooperation ... At the very top of all the agencies which will assure the coming of world government must stand the school, the teacher, and the organized profession."

--- Joy Elmer Morgan, Editor of the NEA Journal, The Teacher and World Government (1946)

"Why not locate the headquarters of the future international organization within the United States' own borders, so that the concept of international cooperation could match forces on the spot with those of it's arch-enemy, isolationism - utilizing at all times the American people's own democratic media?"

--- Trygve Lie (1896–1968) pro-communist Norwegian Socialist, internationalist and Globalist who became the first UN secretary-general and was instrumental in the ceasefire that deprived the UN Forces a victory and put in place the future flashpoint for nuclear war on the Korean peninsular. (1945)

"The United Nations is the greatest fraud in all History. Its purpose is to destroy the United States."

--- Representative John E. Rankin, (1882-1960) served sixteen terms (March 4, 1921 - January 3, 1953) as Mississippi's First District Representative in the United States House of Representatives (1945)

"… the efforts of the United Nations to bring about a world community favorable to peace. We will work primarily to strengthen the United Nations into a world government of limited powers adequate to prevent a war and having direct jurisdiction over the individual."

--- World Fedralist Association

"Great popular support and enthusiasm for the United Nations policies should be built up, well organized and fully articulate. But it is necessary to do more than that. The opposition must be rendered so impotent that it will be unable to gather any significant support in the Senate against the United Nations Charter and the treaties which will follow."

--- Political Affairs: the official publication of the American Communist Party (CPUSA) April (1945)

"Teachers and school administrators (should) come to see themselves as social engineers. They must equip themselves as 'change agents'."

--- Kenneth Benne, President of American Education Fellowship, Progressive Education (1949)

Not to Worry, I'll Protect You

I find this laughable.
Annan promises to protect Darfur refugees.
You tell 'em Mighty Mouse.

WHAT NEXT FOR EU?

Fallout heavy from France's decisive 'No'
By Martin Walker UPI Editor

WASHINGTON -- France's decisive rejection of the draft new constitution for the European Union Sunday by a 55-45 margin on a turnout of Over 70 percent of voters plunged France and Europe into a deep political crisis.

Other European officials were uncertain whether there was any point now in continuing with the planned referendums in other countries, and particularly in Britain.

"I do not think there will be much appetite to hold referendums in east Europe, in
Scandinavia or Britain after the French Non," said Britain's last Minister for Europe, Denis MacShane, MP. "Why should other governments go over the precipice to political defeat?"

There is no time now to stop the Dutch referendum, scheduled for Wednesday, but the turnout might now fall below the 30 percent required for it to be binding. But the British referendum, promised for next year, is now "not very likely," British diplomatic sources have signaled.

"Britain will hold a referendum if there is a treaty to hold a referendum on," MacShane said. "But a French Non means the new Treaty of Rome cannot be ratified. It was always a mistake to call a Treaty a constitution. But a constitution needs the confidence of the people and powerful, united leadership. Europe lacks confidence and effective leadership today so it was not a propitious time to hold plebiscites on the new Treaty. There may be some who hope this Treaty can be made to fly but it would be an insult to France and her citizens to say the Treaty they reject will continue on as a dead man walking. We will have to begin again."

And other smaller countries, like the Danes and Swedes who voted to stay out of the euro currency, or the Czechs, have their own reasons to question the referendum.

"Many governments of smaller countries did not like this constitution which eliminated the right of each country to have an EU Commissioner and brought in a powerful figurehead president of the European Council," MacShane said. "We must take a pause see if new ideas and leadership can emerge for the European ideal. The language of the 1980s and 1990s is now history. We need a new, younger generation of pro-European leaders to emerge from the shadows of yesterday's men."

The fluent French-speaking MacShane, who had backed the campaign in France for a Yes vote, noted that even if some Labour officials felt relief at the prospect of avoiding an uphill battle to win such a referendum in Britain, it was still a setback for Prime Minister Tony Blair.

"Mr. Blair like the majority of MPs who were elected as Labour or Lib Dem MPs on a pro-EU manifesto supports the new Treaty," MacShane said "Britain needs a strong effective European Union that can give back confidence to all European citizens that the EU works for them. We believe the new constitution helps that process. So the French Non is extremely negative. It sends an international signal that the EU is incapable of drawing up its own rule-book which can be accepted by citizens."

"Tony Blair signed the new Treaty of Rome in good faith and Britain believes it is good for Europe," MacShane said. "The new treaty gives more power to national parliament, to citizens and makes clear the limits of what the European Commission can do. It is a coherent response to the need for more clarity, more democracy and more transparency in Europe. Labour wanted a referendum to fight and win the cause of Europe."

Part of the problem, MacShane noted, was the high level of unemployment and low level of economic growth in France, factors which had helped to weaken the voters' faith in their political leaders and in Europe's economic policy-making. Each of the big three economies of the euro currency zone, Germany, France and Italy, had been sluggish, locked into a low growth and high unemployment pattern.

"Europe has been in economic stagnation for a decade in part because of wrong decisions by the European Commission with its obsession on over-regulation and by the failure of the European Central Bank to respond to the economic standstill," MacShane said. "Political-constitutional advances have to be based on economic and social confidence. Until Europe accepts the need for reform it will be hard to move forward to our common wish to see Europe as a powerful actor for peace and democracy in the world."

"The French Non is a symptom of a deeper European crisis - the failure of adapt to the new economic and social and environmental order in the world since the end of communism and the arrival of open trade called globalization," MacShane went on.

"The answer will not be found by the gentlemen of Brussels but by the willingness of political actors in Italy, France, Germany, Spain, Britain and the rest of Europe to rethink out-of-date 20th century economic and social ideology. We need a new 3-way historic compromise between economy, society and environment. Unfortunately we only hear the shrill protectionism and rejectionism of those who know how to say No to the future rather than work collaboratively to build a new Europe."

"I hope this shock will force pro-Europeans to unite and defeat the reactionary forces of the left and right who have unleashed a politics of fear in place of the hope all Europeans need," McShane added.

Saudi Women Rated Least Free

Saudi women rated least free in Arab world.
May 23, 2005

Shuneh, JORDAN -- Saudi Arabia received the lowest rating on women's freedom in a new survey released at the World Economic Forum in Shuneh, Jordan, on Saturday.

France Rejects EU?

"PARIS (AP) -- French voters rejected the European Union's first constitution Sunday, President Jacques Chirac said - a stinging repudiation of his leadership and the ambitious, decades-long effort to further unite the continent.

Chirac, who urged voters to approve the charter, announced the result in a short televised address. He said the process of ratifying the treaty would continue in other EU countries.

Earlier, the Interior Ministry said that with about 83 percent of the votes counted, the referendum was rejected by 57.26 percent of voters. It was supported by 42.74 percent.

All 25 EU members must ratify the text for it to take effect - and nine already have done so. The Dutch vote Wednesday, with polls showing opposition to the constitution running at about 60 percent."

China-Japan Rift Worries Observers

"Friction between Japan and China over the events of World War II has escalated to a level that threatens to destabilize the region, according to scholars who warn that hostilities could result unless calmer heads prevail."

"Leaders are playing to nationalism, because that's all they have as glue," said Andrew Horvat, visiting fellow at Tokyo Keizai University.

--Washington Times